As you all know The Wife and I are educators. I am a site administrator and she is an elementary classroom teacher. We do not work in the same school district but we do work within the same county. Due to whatever moronic mismanagement of funds, the governor has declared a state of fiscal emergency. With a fiscal state of emergency the governor makes a budget proposal that presents cuts to programs that will touch every person in the state.
I have been an educator for 14 years, ten in this state. I have served as a special education teacher and as a site administrator. In those ten years the state has cut funds to schools in six of those years. During the years from 1998 to 2002 the state gutted the funding model for schools in the K-12 band. Example: my previous district made 2 million dollars worth of cuts over a four year period. Two million dollars means cuts to custodial support, grounds keeping, psychologists, nurses, food services, bus services, supply cuts, larger class sizes, pay freezes, reduction in health benefits, and cuts to funding for librarians, libraries, media aides, and funds for children of poverty.
Now the governor has proposed to cut 10% of the categorical funds for schools. Categorical funds are monies set aside for specific items/ programs. Example: Title One funds is money that can only be spent for students of poverty, students performing two years below their chronological reading level, or who score below the "proficient" line in their state testing. Schools get categorical money based on the number of students in that particular category. The governor wants 10% of that money back. Or the governor may take back whatever you have not spent. Or he make not give you anything more than what was already given. No one is certain.
Next year the governor proposes to halt the voter mandated Prop 98 funding for public schools. That would equate to a 4.2 billion dollars. That is one weeks worth of funding for the supposed "War on Terror" by the way.
A 4.2 billion dollar short fall in funding would cripple our efforts to educate our children. We will still be held to the impossible standards set forth by the federal government under NCLB and the state's own standards for academic achievement on the standardized tests. All this must be accomplished with no support services, impacted class sizes, sub standard materials, sub standard school facilities, and no supplies.
Our school system is in such a state of emergency yet no one in a position of power really cares. Why? Because all of their children attend private school. Public school is just fine if you are poor. The lack of commitment to public education by the state and federal government is a clear indication of the overall governments apathy for the common man and a clear indication of the continued propagation of a two class society where the "have nots" mean nothing. We are simply throwing away a huge percentage of our population.
I am thoroughly disgusted with the system and becoming exhausted with the fight. Every single day I hear about the terrible things our children and families endure in their day to day existence. However, I am supposed to minimize their stories and get their children to focus on performing well on the tests when they are really worried about their next meal, where they will live, if they will survive. We need to get them to perform with little to nothing. I am hopeless.
If you have children, fear for their future. They are entering a world that cares little for them unless they come from money.
We were once the most progressive educational system in the country. We are now 48th in the nation and continue to decline. Our schools are outdated and in desperate need of repair and rebuilding. They are over fifty years old and have not aged well. The system is funded on a model that is over 30 years old. Students get a little over $5000 annually. However, they were getting $5000 thirty years ago and the number has not increased since then. No adjustments for inflation or increased operational costs have been factored into the numbers. With a $4.2 billion dollar grab next year, schools will be unable to guarantee any sort of quality in their programs.
I am becoming tired and worn down. Do I try my shot at the private sector before it is too late for me or do I endure yet another dagger to the heart of our educational system? I am in a quandary. I am off to find my Magic 8-Ball.
Later...
I have been an educator for 14 years, ten in this state. I have served as a special education teacher and as a site administrator. In those ten years the state has cut funds to schools in six of those years. During the years from 1998 to 2002 the state gutted the funding model for schools in the K-12 band. Example: my previous district made 2 million dollars worth of cuts over a four year period. Two million dollars means cuts to custodial support, grounds keeping, psychologists, nurses, food services, bus services, supply cuts, larger class sizes, pay freezes, reduction in health benefits, and cuts to funding for librarians, libraries, media aides, and funds for children of poverty.
Now the governor has proposed to cut 10% of the categorical funds for schools. Categorical funds are monies set aside for specific items/ programs. Example: Title One funds is money that can only be spent for students of poverty, students performing two years below their chronological reading level, or who score below the "proficient" line in their state testing. Schools get categorical money based on the number of students in that particular category. The governor wants 10% of that money back. Or the governor may take back whatever you have not spent. Or he make not give you anything more than what was already given. No one is certain.
Next year the governor proposes to halt the voter mandated Prop 98 funding for public schools. That would equate to a 4.2 billion dollars. That is one weeks worth of funding for the supposed "War on Terror" by the way.
A 4.2 billion dollar short fall in funding would cripple our efforts to educate our children. We will still be held to the impossible standards set forth by the federal government under NCLB and the state's own standards for academic achievement on the standardized tests. All this must be accomplished with no support services, impacted class sizes, sub standard materials, sub standard school facilities, and no supplies.
Our school system is in such a state of emergency yet no one in a position of power really cares. Why? Because all of their children attend private school. Public school is just fine if you are poor. The lack of commitment to public education by the state and federal government is a clear indication of the overall governments apathy for the common man and a clear indication of the continued propagation of a two class society where the "have nots" mean nothing. We are simply throwing away a huge percentage of our population.
I am thoroughly disgusted with the system and becoming exhausted with the fight. Every single day I hear about the terrible things our children and families endure in their day to day existence. However, I am supposed to minimize their stories and get their children to focus on performing well on the tests when they are really worried about their next meal, where they will live, if they will survive. We need to get them to perform with little to nothing. I am hopeless.
If you have children, fear for their future. They are entering a world that cares little for them unless they come from money.
We were once the most progressive educational system in the country. We are now 48th in the nation and continue to decline. Our schools are outdated and in desperate need of repair and rebuilding. They are over fifty years old and have not aged well. The system is funded on a model that is over 30 years old. Students get a little over $5000 annually. However, they were getting $5000 thirty years ago and the number has not increased since then. No adjustments for inflation or increased operational costs have been factored into the numbers. With a $4.2 billion dollar grab next year, schools will be unable to guarantee any sort of quality in their programs.
I am becoming tired and worn down. Do I try my shot at the private sector before it is too late for me or do I endure yet another dagger to the heart of our educational system? I am in a quandary. I am off to find my Magic 8-Ball.
Later...
3 comments:
Run for office.
I'd vote for you and/or the wife before I'd vote for just about anyone else currently running or in office. I really don't care which office.
Unfortunately my Friend, there are not enough like you in the "industry" who are willing to fight as hard as you are. Do you go Private Sector? I wouldn't blame you if you did, but something tells me that you would regret it in the long run. You still sound like you have some fight in you.....The Governator is just like the rest of them....let's cut school funds first....that's soooo smart.....yeah let's handicap our future because the future we are coddling (rich, White Kids) are going to be a minority when they grow up......
Our governor expects a 10% cut across the board...for every department. Talked with the Warden...his situation is similar but corrections have "set asides" for this contingency. Public Health Depts across the state are also asked to cut. To tell you the truth, the Warden and I feel that both our respective institutions, by their nature, can affect stratagies that would enable us to survive financially in these belt-tigtening times (for a year or two, max)...and I personally, would gladly accept difficulties on our end to off-set education funding shortfalls. We could cap expansion, lay-off employees in their probationary period, accept more clients on our case-load, turn-away and sending back clients to thier counties/states/countries of origin...in otherwords, we can get creative, for the time being.
Unfortunately, we cannot and should not contract funding to schools. Conversely, Schools/education, by it's nature, have very little in the way of "FAT" to trim...by god, their already trimmed to the bone!
In fact, the notion of reduced funding is, at this point, comical if not soo outrageously ludicrous, it borders on draconian. And this is the FIRST year of budget shortfall. Economist's are expecting a recession...what might happen next year? and the next?
The questions we must ask our politicians, legislatures, and our tax-payers are:
1. Our teachers are paid shit...are you expecting them to except less than shit?!
2. Gone are paid music, art, sports programs/staff justifying it as an elective expense...this is based on the notion that schools should focus on the three "R's". By this logic, why not teach just three subjects?
3. Clearly class size is not deemed an important aspect of effective education...if so, lets just round up all the children in the gymnasium and have ONE teacher on staff.
4. There now is the expectation that teachers pay for materials out of pocket. Brilliant, lets take it to it's logical next step and ask teachers to come in after dinner to clean the schools, pay out-of-pocket to retrofit old buidings, come in on the weekends to remove asbestos ceilings and affect general repairs, come in in the mornings to work on the lawns and trees, etc. I mean, why not?
And here's the disturbing reality: OUR LEGISLATOR KNOW...what I mean is that they KNOW teachers are underpaid, that our state is at the bottom of the barrel in terms of perfomance, that education has become less rounded with cirriculum contracted to the most basic subjects, that our class sizes are too large, and that the disturbing trend of drop-outs, teenage pregnancy, crime, drug-use, gangs, is only getting worse..and yet, THEY DON'T GIVE A SHIT. THAT is what is most disturbing.
It's TITANIC mentality. The priveledged are in the life-boats, sailing from the hoards of the clamoring doomed. Yes, they might be caring and compassionate folk, but the sense of urgency is lost when you ain't drowning.
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