Schools should cut funding for extracurricular activities such as sports and the arts when school buildings are in need of repair Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with this recommendation and explain your rea

The author claims that, when school buildings are in need of repair, the schools should do two things: prioritize these repairs over extracurricular activities and use the funds from those extracurricular activities to pay for the repairs. It is entirely possible that school districts will have to make a difficult choice such as this one, but it would be hasty to put into place a blanket policy without first examining the goals and priorities of the schools. Do schools serve solely to deliver academic services? I would argue no—athletics and art programs are very important as well, though academics are clearly the first priority.

A school faced with such a choice might instead base such a decision upon whether the needed repair is one that would interfere with academics if it were not made. For example, if a school’s heating system breaks down in the winter or the roof weakens and is in danger of caving in, then clearly the school will need to make the necessary repairs immediately. If the necessary funding can be obtained only from curtailing extracurricular activities, then those activities must go by the wayside. If the school cannot deliver on its fundamentals (academics), then it cannot (or should not!) offer additional programs that are designed to enrich the core offering but are not a part of the core offering themselves.

Note that there are two levels of decision to be made here: whether the problem, if not repaired, will interfere with academics, and whether the funds must come specifically from the after-school activities budget. Alternatively, suppose that the school could use re-painting but there is nothing dangerous or otherwise problematic about the current paint job; the issue is, in other words, aesthetic. Suppose, again, that the funds for re-painting would have to come from the extracurricular activities fund. Is it more important for the school to be aesthetically pleasing or to offer after-school programs? Reasonable people may disagree as to the answer, and this is the whole point: all repairs are not equal, and it is not necessarily the case that any repair trumps all extracurricular activities. The examination of these two hypotheticals allows us to uncover a problematic assumption with the original assertion. Is it the case that the school must make an either/or choice: either school repair or extracurricular funding? If significant, necessary repairs are needed, there are perhaps other avenues for funding: government grants, bonds voted for by the local community, even a fundraising drive.

At the same time, for ongoing maintenance issues of a more aesthetic nature, schools might reasonably decide to make some minor compromises—re-paint every six years instead of every four, say—in order to stretch their money to cover extracurricular programs. After all, everyone has to stick to a budget, and we all make trade-offs every day in deciding how to spread our limited funds. In conclusion, the author’s assertion is too narrowly drawn. It is entirely possible that a school may have to cut funding to some extra programs when it finds itself faced with a costly maintenance problem that would interfere with academics if not addressed.

After all, the school must first deliver on its mission to educate its students. There are many shades of grey, however, in distinguishing between necessary and “nice to have” maintenance, and it is by no means a foregone conclusion that any kind of maintenance trumps any kind of after-school program. In fact, there are many circumstances in which a school might reasonably defer or minimize long-term maintenance in order to maintain adequate funding for additional activities that can immeasurably enrich a student’s life and learning.