There is a Chinese proverb that reads, “when planning for a year, plant corn. When planning for a decade, plant trees. When planning for life, educate people.”

In Alabama, and more specifically Selma and Dallas County, the worry over properly funding education is about to take another turn over the next few months as local school officials look to consolidate schools and state officials look to further cut education funding.

At a time when the education systems in Alabama are already strained by previous budget cuts, the thought of another round of proration has got to leave education leaders sick. But, at this point, they are probably so used to being asked to do more with less, much less that they are more thank likely numb to the idea of more cuts.

The longstanding system of funding schools in Alabama — property tax and portions of sales taxes — is no longer working. If it were, we would be able to permanently delete the word “proration” from our vocabulary.

If it were working, would the Selma City School System be looking at consolidating well-run schools with proven academic records and success rates? If it were working, would school children still not be able to take their books home?

Albert Einstein defined the word insanity as “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

So as the Alabama Legislature gets ready to reconvene, we ask they stop asking our schools to do more, to improve test scores, to improve retention and to better prepare the next generation with less money, less resources and less support.

Doing so would simply be insane.