This year’s CMAS test scores show we’re closing the COVID gap, which is undoubtedly good news, but a return to mediocrity for our public schools is hardly cause for celebration.

COVID-19 isn’t why the majority of students cannot read, write, or do math at grade level. That’s unfortunately been the case for a long time in Colorado. It’s even worse when you look at students of color, such as black students in Denver Public Schools, where just 27% of them are given the education to read or write at grade level. That percentage is even lower for Latino students, at 24%. If you’re wondering, 73% of white students are at or above grade level.

The calls for further “investment” into this broken system should be met with skepticism. According to the Common Sense Institute, we’re spending more than $16,000 per student, per year. For a class of 25, that’s more than $400,000. Where is that money going?

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According to that same study, administrators have grown five times faster than the student population in recent years, and though per-pupil spending has increased by 50% since 2007, teacher salaries have only increased 30%.

Incremental reforms have been met with ferocious opposition from the government school employee union (i.e. teachers union) at every step of the way. Anything that jeopardizes their iron grip on our education system (and its dollars) is off-limits. They’ve made news recently for taking a bold stand against capitalism and seeing one of their own members appointed to the legislature, state Rep. Tim Hernández, who has already made quite a name for himself (see my last column on vacancy committees).

CMAS scores show positive, if modest, momentum post-COVID | POINT

I want teachers to be paid more. I see no reason why a good teacher can’t make six figures with the dollars we spend on education.

I want to see black and Latino students given the same chance to succeed as their white (and Asian) counterparts. It’s absolutely unacceptable that three-fourths of these students are being failed by our system.

I want to see students given multiple career paths to choose from, not a cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all approach that treats all students like devices to be programmed on an assembly line.

Our commitment shouldn’t be to antiquated institutions, but instead to the students of our state, and as of today, yesterday and the day before, we have failed to fulfill that commitment.

Sage Naumann is a conservative commentator and strategist. He operates Anthem Communications and was previously the spokesman for the Colorado Senate Republicans. Follow him on Twitter @SageNaumann.