In class, I'd said that if mathematics was never specified, I don't think I'd be able to justify spending the million dollars only on improving mathematics education. Especially in the more urban areas of New Jersey, there's just far too much disrepair to ignore the option of spending money on improving the physical structure of school buildings. When doors and windows are broken, hallways have leaks and bathroom stalls are missing doors, there are problems much larger than the state of math textbooks or a lack of SmartBoards in each room.
Of course, in newer and more affluent districts, problems like these wouldn't arise nearly as often. That's why I posited the idea of, at the upper end of the spectrum, purchasing an electronic book reader such as the Amazon Kindle for each student. In class, I gave the excuse that it eases the burden on the students' backpacks; in reality, it also eases the burden on the schools' budgets. Purchasing an electronic textbook license will cost much less on the whole than to purchase a completely new set of textbooks each time a newer edition of a math or science book is released. The electronic readers themselves can then be returned to the school after a student has completed high school and loaned anew to the incoming freshmen.
That said, I have to agree with my classmates who came up with the idea of using the money to hire additional teachers. Classroom sizes continue to spiral out of control, not only increasing the student-to-teacher ratio but also forcing teachers to work more than ever before, both in terms of class coverage and grading. With more teachers, it opens up the possibility for more prep periods to be spent on teacher collaboration rather than teacher relaxation. (Not that relaxation is bad, mind you, but it's not the entire point of having the prep.)
