Cityhood for DeKalb County under study (Atlanta, Valdosta: houses, neighborhoods, best school)

[RoslynHolcomb]

Originally Posted by cqholt

Then elect new board members. The residents of DeKalb county have the power to hold the school board responsible. Sounds like you'd be a perfect candidate.

Unfortunately the board members ARE smart enough to use that last resort of rogues and scoundrels; race. And it will effectively keep them in office siphoning the lifeblood out of the county until there's nothing left but an empty carcass.

[rcsteiner]

Originally Posted by JPD

Again, by law, no new school systems are allowed in Georgia. Forming new cities will do absolutely nothing to address the concerns people have with our schools.

Until the law is changed, I fear you are correct. I was simply making the point that larger is not always better.

[Newsboy]

Originally Posted by RoslynHolcomb

Unfortunately the board members ARE smart enough to use that last resort of rogues and scoundrels; race. And it will effectively keep them in office siphoning the lifeblood out of the county until there's nothing left but an empty carcass.

The difference in Clayton is, their troublesome board members are neither smart NOR corrupt, but simply puppets backed and controlled by a fringe teachers union that practices reverse racism. They intentionally destroyed the Clayton school system just so their own people could get into administrative positions, and now the damage is irreversible. I'm certain the same people are pulling strings in DeKalb.

Back to the school district size issue: In Alabama, the problem is too many cities / too many school districts / too many itty bitty tiny schools (the AVERAGE high school in Alabama has 400 students) and NOT ENOUGH COMPETENT PEOPLE not only to RUN all those cities / schools, but get elected to local councils and boards. The pool of people truly qualified to hold public office is slim anywhere, but most especially in Alabama and Georgia sad to say.

[GeorgiaLakeSearch]

Originally Posted by Newsboy

The difference in Clayton is, their troublesome board members are neither smart NOR corrupt, but simply puppets backed and controlled by a fringe teachers union that practices reverse racism. They intentionally destroyed the Clayton school system just so their own people could get into administrative positions, and now the damage is irreversible. I'm certain the same people are pulling strings in DeKalb.

Back to the school district size issue: In Alabama, the problem is too many cities / too many school districts / too many itty bitty tiny schools (the AVERAGE high school in Alabama has 400 students) and NOT ENOUGH COMPETENT PEOPLE not only to RUN all those cities / schools, but get elected to local councils and boards. The pool of people truly qualified to hold public office is slim anywhere, but most especially in Alabama and Georgia sad to say.

I believe Chicago wins in the corruption of elected officials department. NYC DOE is also pretty corrupt. The city has improved from when I was growing up in NYC, but it is still corrupt. People believe APS are bad, well they should go see a NYC DOE ran school.

Clayton Co. has really gone down hill remember what happened with the police department. I remember when I could get normal people in my rentals down there, now it is government subsidized people.

[RoslynHolcomb]

There is no such thing as reverse racism. Sorry, a pet peeve of mine. I don't believe the numerous cities are the problem in Alabama. As I said before, given the county size there anything else would be impossible. Take Madison county. It's 813 square miles. Four times the size of Dekalb, but there are only three school systems; Huntsville, Athens and Madison County. And frankly, I like smaller schools. As a social worker I saw countless occasions of kids literally getting lost in those huge schools.

[cqholt]

Four times the size of Dekalb, but there are only three school systems; Huntsville, Athens and Madison County. And frankly, I like smaller schools. As a social worker I saw countless occasions of kids literally getting lost in those huge schools.

Athens is the county seat of Limestone County. 2 school systems in Madison County, AL Madison County, Alabama - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[RoslynHolcomb]

Sorry, I misspoke. I meant Madison, of course. There are three school systems in Madison county: Huntsville, Madison CITY, and Madison COUNTY. Madison County and the city of Madison have insanely large high schools. Sparkman High in the county got so large they had to split the ninth graders off into their own separate building. Making school visits in the county could take up to a week because there is a minimum of fifty miles between schools and I'm only talking about high schools! Imagine the transportation costs. As I understand it, the principals had a tremendous amount of autonomy.

[Newsboy]

Originally Posted by RoslynHolcomb

Sorry, I misspoke. I meant Madison, of course. There are three school systems in Madison county: Huntsville, Madison CITY, and Madison COUNTY. Madison County and the city of Madison have insanely large high schools. Sparkman High in the county got so large they had to split the ninth graders off into their own separate building. Making school visits in the county could take up to a week because there is a minimum of fifty miles between schools and I'm only talking about high schools! Imagine the transportation costs. As I understand it, the principals had a tremendous amount of autonomy.

The high schools in Madison County are not "insanely large" by Georgia standards. The largest high school in Alabama, Bob Jones in Madison, has about 2,200 students. Georgia has at least 20 high schools bigger than that. The "AVERAGE" size of a Gwinnett County high school is 3,000-plus. Some have nearly 4,000.

But that's not really the problem in Alabama, where I said in an earlier post -- HALF the public high schools in the state have fewer than 400 students. Some have fewer than 100! And they ALL play football.

I realize that Alabama is a very rural state with population spread out across vast areas, but still -- having dozens and dozens of little schools cannot be cost effective, much less provide well-rounded comprehensive programs. This preference for small community schools serving very rural areas (rather than consolidated county schools) also reflects a big cultural difference between Georgia and Alabama that quite often is overlooked.

As related to the OP, Dekalb County once has a system of smaller "neighborhood" high schools that was actually a model for the nation, which they began doing away with in the 1980s. It's hard to say whether that was good or bad. Many of them ended up closing or consolidation as demographics shifted..

http://www.ahsaa.com/Portals/0/pdf/o...sification.pdf

[cqholt]

s related to the OP, Dekalb County once has a system of smaller "neighborhood" high schools that was actually a model for the nation, which they began doing away with in the 1980s.

So was DeKalb County Schools at one time some of the best in the nation? State?

[RoslynHolcomb]

They are insanely large by Alabama standards, and that is my point. Huge high schools might work in Georgia with their small counties. In Alabama, the transportation costs of schlepping kids 50+ miles each day would quickly offset any alleged gains.

DeKalb has lots of problems, and these huge schools don't help.