The fact is that there is little or no evidence that any specific decisions on the above will guarantee or prevent students achieving their educational goals. Some students achieve honors in cramped schools and others fail in lavish ones. Technology can be more helpful to some students than to others depending upon, among other things, how the teacher uses it. Nevertheless, some people in the legislature appear to be taking the court s words literally and are trying to identify specific capital standards, price these out, and then figure out how to pay for them. And that s before we build a single new school to accommodate new student growth.
Different districts make different choices about how to use whatever capital funds they have.
Some might prefer slightly more cramped classrooms in order to build a more elaborate gym or auditorium or fancier science labs. Some might prefer a smaller book library in exchange for a larger media center. Some might even prefer doubling up administrators in order to afford more education technology. And in every case, these decisions could be appropriate. No set of specific building, facility and equipment standards will allow the types of variation we now see among the best schools in the state.