Here Come the Property Tax Hikes (Stuyvesant: fit in, crime, houses)
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Not a fair comparison. I just did a cost of living comparison and it is 28% cheaper in Fairfax than in Westchester. Salaries, supplies, maintenance, construction, food--everything is a lot cheaper there so schools can do a lot more with less. The cost of basic things like building upkeep will be dramatically more expensive in Westchester.
I'm sure there are schools out there (in NYC metro and elsewhere) that manage to do more with less. And I'm sure that your local school district would love to hear their secrets. What annoys me about this whole conversation is the implication that schools could easily cut spending if they just wanted to. Do you really think that your superintendent is sitting on ways to slash spending without impacting education but he has decided to keep them to himself? It seems clear to me that every superintendent and school board is wracking their brains for ways to cut spending and reduce taxes. So, if you have some great cost-cutting ideas, by all means go to your board meetings and share.
Why things are cheaper in Fairfax than in Westchester? Fairfax actually has higher median household income than Westchester. I would venture that higher tax is one major driver behind the higher cost of living in Westchester. If you reduce property tax, you will see less pressure to keep up the price.
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Originally Posted by dma1250
Do you really think that your superintendent is sitting on ways to slash spending without impacting education but he has decided to keep them to himself? It seems clear to me that every superintendent and school board is wracking their brains for ways to cut spending and reduce taxes.
Are the superintendents willing to volunteer to cut themselves and their underlings? Fairfax only has one superintendent and manages its schools well.
But the regular suburban public schools follow the same required curriculum as the Westchester schools do. Carey High School in Franklin Square offers band, orchestra (even this I think they can cut), science research and all the AP courses to one's desire. It is not true that Carey is somehow - academics-wise - disadvantaged compared with Yorktown or Greeley.
As for Brox Sci, Stuy and Townsend, whatever costs they report accurately reflect how much the school spends on academic instruction - be it teachers' salaries, librarians, classrooms maintenance, etc. At the end of the day, they spend less than Westchester schools and yet produce great academic results.
Who said cutting costs was an easy job? It is never easy in both the public and private sector to do this. But it can be done. Here's an anecdotal example of why it can be hard. Take Garden City, for one. When district officials realized they can presereve their excellent academic programs (including reasonable class sizes, science research, math olympiad, etc.) with cost reductions by making big cuts with their sports programs, a bunch of parents raised a noisy howl of protest. Apparently too many GC residents were attached to their sports teams that they couldn't let go of no matter what. So the district had no choice but to make "win-win" decisions that resulted in lower quality in academics such as increasing class sizes and reducing gifted and talented offerings, among others. But that goes down the line with what tammy42 was saying about "collective priorities". My only point is that it's not true that you would have to sacrifice academics by cutting costs.
I'm not buying it. I haven't looked at those school's budgets, nor have I looked at Chappaqua's, so I can't really compare. But I have looked at my own and all I can say is that I don't see any excess or redundancy or fat.
But your example is indeed a good example of the problem--I don't consider sports programs to be unneeded waste either and I wouldn't vote for a budget that gutted the sports programs. Without questions, sports is less important than class size and academic programs--but there are a zillion studies showing that physical fitness is connected to academic fitness and that kids who engage in sports programs are less likely to get involved in dangerous activities. The job of schools is to promote growth and learning across the board--not just boost test scores.
I'm not buying it. I haven't looked at those school's budgets, nor have I looked at Chappaqua's, so I can't really compare. But I have looked at my own and all I can say is that I don't see any excess or redundancy or fat.
As you will see, they more or less have almost the same academic programs as you would find in any other school in Westchester.
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Originally Posted by dma1250
But your example is indeed a good example of the problem--I don't consider sports programs to be unneeded waste either and I wouldn't vote for a budget that gutted the sports programs. Without questions, sports is less important than class size and academic programs--but there are a zillion studies showing that physical fitness is connected to academic fitness and that kids who engage in sports programs are less likely to get involved in dangerous activities. The job of schools is to promote growth and learning across the board--not just boost test scores.
You can actually gut the sports program and still be good in academics. If fitness is what you want, then there's PE. If you want kids to stay away from dangerous and deviant activities, then there's a thing called discipline. Majority of a school's kids won't make it to a varsity team anyway. Send them to detention and don't be afraid to give "Ds" and "Fs" to students who score low in their exams as an incentive to spend free time studying instead of doing stupid things. Lots of reading, writing, note-taking, practice-solving and scratch paper - those are the ingredients to learning.
The unfunded mandates may be the biggest obstacle to reining in costs, with the pension mandate the single biggest one. Our schools are now advocating for Albany to eliminate mandates, as should taxpayers if they wish to see our schools continue to provide a quality eduction to our children.
Health insurance costs are one significant area that school boards could address now, but it would mean asking the unions to renegotiate contracts. School employees typically pay 5-10% of their health insurance premiums for family coverage, compared to NY state employees who pay 25% and private sector workers who pay 36%.
It is simply unsustainable to expect taxpayers to continue paying such a high percentages of health insurance costs for public school employees.
You can actually gut the sports program and still be good in academics. If fitness is what you want, then there's PE. If you want kids to stay away from dangerous and deviant activities, then there's a thing called discipline. Majority of a school's kids won't make it to a varsity team anyway. Send them to detention and don't be afraid to give "Ds" and "Fs" to students who score low in their exams as an incentive to spend free time studying instead of doing stupid things. Lots of reading, writing, note-taking, practice-solving and scratch paper - those are the ingredients to learning.
This to me is an excellent example of limited thinking, which gets our communities in trouble. Indeed, well-adjusted kids of a typical family with both parents living at home and 2.5 children may not "need" extracurricular sports. But alas, the world is not an ideal place for everyone. One size doesn't fit all. How much exposure have you had in your life to families where there is only one parent, who lacks parenting skills, and the kids are at risk? 'Give them d's and f's; don't be afraid to give them detention'...that is your solution? How is threatening them with detention going to keep these kids occupied after school? I personally came from a poor background and let me tell you, I've seen stuff that no kid should see. Many children that come from less than optimal situations don't have parents encouraging them to study. As a kid of a waitress who worked three jobs, I not once in my teen years was asked about my grades, much less my homework. And I saw a lot of kids benefit from extracurricular programs. Bottom line: assume nothing and err on the side of ensuring the children - all children - come first.
Conclusive studies have shown that extracurricular activities help not only keep at-risk kids engaged, but they give them positive behavioral reinforcement and teach social skills they may otherwise be lacking in elsewhere. In addition to being a motivation to keep up their grades.
These comparisons are unfair in my opinion. Stuyvesant only chooses students who take a specialized high school exam. You can not compare public schools with schools that pick the best and the brightest. They do not need to pay for special services and remedial help. There are many amazing NYC schools that spend less. The NYC teachers make far less than their NYC counterparts. The parents also pay for extra staff out of pocket. I have friends who are paid by parents for special services that we get in Westchester with our tax dollars. These schools spend way more per student than you can see on paper.
I am sure everything is cheaper in VA than NY. That is not news. I am sure they can pay their teachers far less and the teachers can live on far less.
This to me is an excellent example of limited thinking, which gets our communities in trouble. Indeed, well-adjusted kids of a typical family with both parents living at home and 2.5 children may not "need" extracurricular sports. But alas, the world is not an ideal place for everyone. One size doesn't fit all. How much exposure have you had in your life to families where there is only one parent, who lacks parenting skills, and the kids are at risk? 'Give them d's and f's; don't be afraid to give them detention'...that is your solution? How is threatening them with detention going to keep these kids occupied after school? I personally came from a poor background and let me tell you, I've seen stuff that no kid should see. Many children that come from less than optimal situations don't have parents encouraging them to study. As a kid of a waitress who worked three jobs, I not once in my teen years was asked about my grades, much less my homework. And I saw a lot of kids benefit from extracurricular programs. Bottom line: assume nothing and err on the side of ensuring the children - all children - come first.
Conclusive studies have shown that extracurricular activities help not only keep at-risk kids engaged, but they give them positive behavioral reinforcement and teach social skills they may otherwise be lacking in elsewhere. In addition to being a motivation to keep up their grades.
tammy,
The problem with "positive reinforcement" is that it is expensive to implement and distracts teachers and schools from their #1 responsibility which is to teach the lesson plan. Think about it. You're saying that in order for a kid to learn arithmetic to algebra, sentence to research paper and fairy tale to novel, you would build a whole nexus of supporting programs from fancy sports teams, student orchestras and bands and "innovative" teaching methods that would turn teachers into counselors/psychologists/entertainers when all a kid in a Catholic parochial school needs to do is read through a textbook, take lots of notes from teachers who lecture with chalk and blackboards and practice word problems at the end of each chapter. But then in the parochial schools, kids at all grade levels who fail to study hard enough for whatever reason will get a "D" or "F" in the next exam, just as kids who disrupt class for whatever reason are disciplined. They come from all kinds of backgrounds, rich and poor, stable families and broken homes. But when they step into school, they are expected to leave their problems at the door.
And if you ask how they should be occupied after school, well they should be doing their homework and studying for the next quiz. Or read a good book - a fifth grader can read Robinson Crusoe and White Fang. There are a lot of good books to read out there.
Last edited by Forest_Hills_Daddy; 04-04-2011 at 07:47 PM..
These comparisons are unfair in my opinion. Stuyvesant only chooses students who take a specialized high school exam. You can not compare public schools with schools that pick the best and the brightest. They do not need to pay for special services and remedial help. There are many amazing NYC schools that spend less. The NYC teachers make far less than their NYC counterparts. The parents also pay for extra staff out of pocket. I have friends who are paid by parents for special services that we get in Westchester with our tax dollars. These schools spend way more per student than you can see on paper.
I brought up Stuy, Townsend and Bronx Sci to disprove the claim that you need to spend so much to maintain academic excellence. Someone posted that cutting spending would mean taking away programs science research and Intel science competition. My point is that it is simply not true since Stuy & company also have the same programs.
The problem with "positive reinforcement" is that it is expensive to implement and distracts teachers and schools from their #1 responsibility which is to teach the lesson plan. Think about it. You're saying that in order for a kid to learn arithmetic to algebra, sentence to research paper and fairy tale to novel, you would build a whole nexus of supporting programs from fancy sports teams, student orchestras and bands and "innovative" teaching methods that would turn teachers into counselors/psychologists/entertainers...
I said no such thing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Forest_Hills_Daddy
And if you ask how they should be occupied after school, well they should be doing their homework and studying for the next quiz. Or read a good book - a fifth grader can read Robinson Crusoe and White Fang. There are a lot of good books to read out there.
Read my post again. What a wonderful world it would be if every child had the benefit of nurturing parents guiding them, ensuring they are doing their homework; reading Robinson Crusoe. That world doesn't exist. It is fantasy to think that kids should simply be "studying for the next quiz" or reading White Fang after school because that's what they "should" be doing. Did you not even read what I wrote? If you cannot use your imagination to ponder what life is like for kids in socioeconomic struggle, that is too bad...but kids in need shouldn't lose programs because there are people in their community who have a limited worldview. The fact is that there are kids out there who aren't doing their homework, and after school would otherwise be getting into trouble if they didn't receive positive reinforcement via public school enrichment.
Read my post again. What a wonderful world it would be if every child had the benefit of nurturing parents guiding them, ensuring they are doing their homework; reading Robinson Crusoe. That world doesn't exist. It is fantasy to think that kids should simply be "studying for the next quiz" or reading White Fang after school because that's what they "should" be doing. Did you not even read what I wrote? If you cannot use your imagination to ponder what life is like for kids in socioeconomic struggle, that is too bad...but kids in need shouldn't lose programs because there are people in their community who have a limited worldview. The fact is that there are kids out there who aren't doing their homework, and after school would otherwise be getting into trouble if they didn't receive positive reinforcement via public school enrichment.
Don't be afraid to admit the truth. If you really said no such thing, then why would you want to keep a whole portfolio of expensive programs that are vaguely (and subjectively) related to academics?
Then you contradict yourself in the second part of your post by saying kids shouldn't lose programs. So you are saying we should keep these programs after all.It's right there in your post, OK?
But there's a basic flaw in your argument. I'm talking about students in so called highly regarded Westchester school districts. These are not kids who are in socioeconomic struggle so the second part of your post does not apply.
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