Dozens of textbooks fill a dumpster outside Dutch Fork High School. Used copies of the chemistry book seen here sell online for $27.50.

Are the books worn out?  Most of them appear to have been used by just two students.  Are they outdated?  The same book is selling today for $27.50 online.

The district says its policies prohibit dumping surplus property.  Instead, the district must sell the items, or recycle them.

This next school year District 5 will spend $12,363 per student – even higher than the state average of $11,242 per child allocated in the FY09-2010 budget. That doesn’t include money from a $244 million local bond referendum approved by voters in November – money the district says it desperately needs.

Surely other schools could have used these books. If so, why are they in a school dumpster? But, then again, why should other schools have to settle for Dutch Fork’s hand-me-downs? … We may never get to the bottom of DumpsterGate. But we can address the larger problem of wasting taxpayer dollars by bringing more transparency to South Carolina’s public school system.