Oklahoma isn't working. Can anyone fix this failing American state?
Source: The Guardian
Oklahoma isn't working. Can anyone fix this failing American state?
Poverty, police abuse, record prison rates and education cuts that mean a four-day school week. Why are public services failing Oklahomans?
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Added up, the facts evoke a social breakdown across the board. Not only does Oklahoma lead the country in cuts to education, it’s also number one in rates of female incarceration, places second in male incarceration, and also leads in school expulsion rates. One in twelve Oklahomans have a felony conviction.
Rosa Brooks of Georgetown University Law Center wrote in an essay that states begin to fail when the contract between citizens and public institutions breaks down. States “lose control over the means of violence, and cannot create peace or stability for their populations or control their territories. They cannot ensure economic growth or any reasonable distribution of social goods.”
It may be hard to believe, but entry-level employees with a high school diploma at the popular convenience store QuikTrip make more than teachers in Oklahoma.
For four years running, the state has led the nation in tax cuts to education, outpacing second-place Alabama by double digits. Years of tax cuts and budget shortfalls mean that Oklahoma has fallen to 49th in teacher pay. Spending per pupil has dropped by 26.9% since 2008.
Things have become so bad that the Cherokee nation, a tribe systematically cheated out of its land allotments in the creation of the modern state of Oklahoma, recently donated $5m to the state’s education fund.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/29/oklahoma-education-system-four-day-school-weeks-poor
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