As a former public school teacher and member of the Board of Education, it has been discouraging to witness how the school board chose to reduce the Department of Education's budget.

When the local economy was flourishing, the DOE was awash with billions of dollars in state funding. This did not result in higher national performance ratings or world class learning facilities.

Instead, families and taxpayers were given excuses for poor test scores, procurement violations and low numbers of highly qualified teachers. The board continues to blame the system's ill performance on strict federal requirements, excessively difficult education standards, and now — a lack of funding.

It would be even more damaging for the board to fail to recognize that these surface solutions will not cure decades of fiscal and administrative problems that have plagued Hawai'i's public school system and prevented the delivery of quality education to Hawai'i's students.

Now is the best time for Hawai'i's educational leaders to step up to the plate and make truly meaningful changes to public education.

One of the areas where the Board of Education should undertake fiscal reassessment is its carryover funds. Since 2003 the Legislature has allowed the DOE to retain 5 percent of legislative appropriations that are unspent at the close of each fiscal year.

The DOE has $43 million in unspent funds carried over from the 2007 to 2008 fiscal year and $41 million from 2008 carried into 2009. Over the past 10 years the department has carried over $300 million. Teachers who pay for supplies out of their own pocket would surely welcome the use of carryover funds to stock their classrooms.

Another area within the DOE that the board can re-examine for fiscal savings is its administrative staff. Board Chair Garrett Toguchi indicated that only 5 percent of the $1.8 billion schools budget is spent on administration. He failed to mention that teachers only make up about 58 percent of the DOE's total staff.

An educational system that relies too heavily on centralized bureaucracy rather than school-level staff, particularly teachers in the classroom, does not serve our students well regardless of the economic climate of the day.

Over the years we've tried to cure our problems with the idea that more money will yield better results.

Instead what we need are systematic changes and support of those on the board and in the department who have the will and courage to make these changes.

Darwin L.D. Ching is the director of the state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations and served from 2005-2006 on the Board of Education, where he worked on labor negotiations for the HGEA Units 6 and 10. The opinion expressed here is his own.