State budget crises killing off summer school

A recent New York Times report begins with:

A year ago, the Brevard County Schools ran a robust summer program here, with dozens of schools bustling with teachers and some 14,000 children practicing multiplication, reading Harry Potter and studying Spanish verbs, all at no cost to parents.

But this year Florida's budget crisis has gutted summer school. Brevard classrooms are shuttered, and students like 11-year-old Uvenka Jean-Baptiste, whose mother works in a nursing home, are spending their summer days at home, surfing television channels or loitering at a mall.

Unfortunately, these summer school closings are all but as common as state and local budget crises. According to the Center on Budget Policy and Priorities:

The ongoing decline in tax receipts has worsened state budget problems. At least 48 states addressed or are facing shortfalls in their budgets for the upcoming year totaling $166 billion or 24 percent of state budgets. New data show a majority of states expect shortfalls in 2011 as well. Aggregate gaps through 2011 likely will exceed $350 billion.

Revenue shortfall of this magnitude have a negative multiplier effect which would, if it appears, likely aggravate the recession, tax revenue shortfalls and thus the governmental provision of essential social services like education. Unsurprisingly, the poor and the on-the-fast track-to-the-poorhouse are affected the most by this situation since they not only intensively use summer schools and other government provided social services, they also lack the wherewithal to acquire these goods when the public cannot or will not provide them.

Thus does the society allegedly beyond class conflict reproduce and deepen class differences and class domination.