Building Better Schools for All

Almost a century ago, civil rights activist and educator Neval Thomas criticized Washington, D.C. as a “paradise of paradoxes.” In a searing article, Thomas decried the profoundly unequal conditions in the nation’s capital, contrasting the lack of funding for teacher salaries and facilities improvements in black schools with the American values of equality and advancement through education.

Yesterday, I was honored to join Vice President Kamala Harris in Washington, D.C. at Neval Thomas Elementary in service of the truth recognized by the school’s namesake so long ago: to create opportunity for all of America’s children, we must invest in all of America’s schools. And that investment starts with the literal foundation of an education—the brick-and-mortar buildings in which students learn.

“For decades, our country has chronically underinvested in our public schools. And far too many of our school districts have gone without important repairs and upgrades to buildings and to classrooms,” said Vice President Harris at the event to announce the Administration’s Action Plan for Building Better School Infrastructure. “And it threatens the health and wellbeing of students, of teachers, of staff, and administrators.”

By now, we know that school facilities are at the heart of teaching and learning. There’s never been a bigger wake-up call to the impact of unsafe learning environments than the Covid-19 pandemic, when an airborne virus, robbed a generation of children of quality, in-person education for over a year. Now, as classrooms reopen and masks come off, it’s more important than ever that schools prioritize student and teacher health to prevent even more educational disruption.

Well-ventilated classrooms with lots of natural light keep students alert and engaged and allow educators to show up as their best selves each day. In contrast, crumbling, outdated school buildings contain hazards like mold and asbestos, sending sick children home from class and driving teachers away from blighted classrooms or out of the profession altogether.

All too often, the difference between these two realities compounds broader social and racial inequality. Because individual school districts pay for facilities improvements through property taxes and public bond initiatives, the schools most in need of upgrades are frequently in the low-income areas least equipped to provide funding. And thanks to generations of systemic racism, they are also more likely to serve Black, Brown and Indigenous communities, whose students then suffer disproportionate educational impacts.

Only the federal government has the resources to close this widening gap, and I applaud the Biden-Harris administration for tackling the problem of aging educational infrastructure head-on. As the daughter of an educator and a career-long advocate for healthy schools, I feel deeply gratified to see the solutions that IWBI and our many partners have worked so long to champion.

One of our topline goals has been to reestablish a national school facilities clearinghouse, and we are thrilled to see this provision in President Biden’s budget —along with the establishment of a new Office of School Infrastructure and Sustainability. For decades, we have been sounding the alarm about the growing gap in educational infrastructure funding, most recently in our 2021 State of Our Schools Report that found the U.S. is underinvesting in school buildings by $85 billion each year. Now, we are encouraged that school districts have access to funding for school facility improvements from both the American Rescue Plan Act, which allocated $122 billion for schools, and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), which created a $500 million grant program for upgrades and repairs to improve indoor air quality and energy efficiency. To maximize this once-in-a-generation school infrastructure funding, the White House also released a new toolkit to help schools and school districts access available funding, as well as technical assistance opportunities and planning tools to help schools improve air quality, energy efficiency, and more.

These are all essential, long-overdue steps towards addressing Neval Thomas’ critique of unequal schools that has persisted for nearly one hundred years. But for all of our progress, there is still so much more we must do to move beyond his “paradise of paradoxes.” From ensuring that schools take full advantage of the available funding, to making the President’s proposed budget investments a reality, it’s now time to double down on our investment in school infrastructure to ensure that the next century of American education better reflects our national ideals and offers a level playing field for all our nation’s children to thrive.

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