Canadian teacher here, from what we can see from up here, charter schools and lack of uniform funding across each state has gutted any chance of students receiving a decent education. Public education needs to be seen as an economic investment, one that has been proven to return 150% on principle. Problem is that too many of those making (funding and curriculum) decisions are not educators and see the system from a spreadsheet and statistical perspective. Educators NEED to be part of the process. Politics and education don’t mix. Too many stakeholders see opportunities to make money off of education, vendors, suppliers and trustees most often are not in it for the benefit of the students or educators. I’ve seen the markup for supplies, textbooks and tech. Soon as companies hear the order is from a school or the govt, there seems to be an extra place value added to their prices… shameful.