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It is well-known that it takes a lot more than $8500/child to get a top-quality education. The best schools in the Northeast now charge well upwards of $35,000/child. That's 4 times what typical public school funding provides per child.
If you cannot teach kids for $8500, I can, and so can a lot of folks with any decent college education behind them.
So can most good teachers, for that matter.
But do you understand that by the typical Classroom Money Math model -- that is not what the teacher has to work with?
That turns out more like $50,000 / 20 kids = $2500. So where, oh where does that other $6,000per kid go?
If you cannot teach kids for $8500, I can, and so can a lot of folks with any decent college education behind them.
So can most good teachers, for that matter.
But do you understand that by the typical Classroom Money Math model -- that is not what the teacher has to work with?
That turns out more like $50,000 / 20 kids = $2500. So where, oh where does that other $6,000per kid go?
(you follow? $8500 - $2500 = $6000)
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Originally Posted by Ivorytickler
School board salaries
Superintendent salary
Principal's salaries
Counselor's salaries
In building secretarial salaries
Administrative salaries
Janitorial salaries
Librarians salaries
Computers
Internet
Utilities
Classroom supplies
Books
Retirement funds
Try setting up a school system.
Add to that building maintenance (roof repairs, for example)
grounds maintenance (especially for those football fields)
There are a lot of expenses that go into running and maintaining a school and that doesn't account for growth in the school population where you might have to build new schools.
If you cannot teach kids for $8500, I can, and so can a lot of folks with any decent college education behind them.
So can most good teachers, for that matter.
But do you understand that by the typical Classroom Money Math model -- that is not what the teacher has to work with?
That turns out more like $50,000 / 20 kids = $2500. So where, oh where does that other $6,000per kid go?
(you follow? $8500 - $2500 = $6000)
If that is the case, then why are there waiting lists for schools that routinely charge well above $35,000 per child? If there is no difference in the education at Sidwell Friends and the average DC public school, then why did the Obamas and the Clintons choose it for their children? Why are there schools like Choate and Collegiate and Dalton where the tuition is four times what you say is necessary to teach a child?
I can only imagine that the parents want the best for their children, and having the money to provide the best, they do. You can't claim that the typical DC school is anywhere on a par with these schools. Or maybe you can. I just don't believe it.
I know the education at the school where I teach is seriously substandard. I believe that my students deserve the best, but there is no way that they can get it. I stay because I believe that I can help some of them just by being aware of what "real' schooling looks like. I serve the students best by staying and not going somewhere that my talents may be better used. Because if I leave, the quality of education will take a serious nose dive. As it is, our entire math department is leaving and will have to be replaced. I'm curious if I'll be called upon to teach math again, but that is highly doubtful.
The worst schools in this country are so bad that I wonder if many people really understand how much like the third world they are. How can we be a strong country if we allow poor children to languish in third-world schools?
Add to that building maintenance (roof repairs, for example)
Well, as for your example -- actual roof repairs are generally a construction budget item -- from Bond Funds. Not part of the Operations and Maintenance Budget we are talking about. Bond Funds are a Whole Other Animal. Often with as much fraud and/or theft as the O&M Budget. Probably a whole other discussion, if you would like.
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grounds maintenance (especially for those football fields)
Football Fields. Yes, there is an educational priority. Our $30 million budget school spent $2 million on ours. But just to be balanced they spent another $1 million on baseball.
Meanwhile they tell me they cannot afford new Science Books for my kids. The books are 12 years old, and kids are just 10 years old. I have no sympathy for this bullshiit. The people we have operating our schools are child-minds in adults' clothes.
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There are a lot of expenses that go into running and maintaining a school and that doesn't account for growth in the school population where you might have to build new schools.
Again, Construction, Remodels, New Buildings are all Bond Funds -- whole other topic than O&M. But overall, they generate additional money into the system as they are internally charged with various admin fees, which get used in other functions.
If that is the case, then why are there waiting lists for schools that routinely charge well above $35,000 per child? If there is no difference in the education at Sidwell Friends and the average DC public school, then why did the Obamas and the Clintons choose it for their children? Why are there schools like Choate and Collegiate and Dalton where the tuition is four times what you say is necessary to teach a child?
Do you really not understand, or this just rhetorical? SF is different. In some very different and significant ways.
Not only is the feature of Connection (you get that?) and Exclusion (you do get that part, right?) -- often just raising the price increases the perceived value. And of course security, for all these special little targets.
But let's go deeper. Do you know the Math Program they use at SF? Singapore Math. Very uncommon in the US. Why do you figure that is?
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I can only imagine that the parents want the best for their children, and having the money to provide the best, they do. You can't claim that the typical DC school is anywhere on a par with these schools. Or maybe you can. I just don't believe it.
Of course not. And directly by intent. The DC (and large cities, as near as I can tell -- intentionally educationally cripple their Negroes, various darkies, poor folks and the whole bottom SES -- Just To Keep the Plantation Hands on the bottom.
I know that is a harsh and strong thing to say, but having looked this over a good bit, that is what the pattern looks like to me. Meanwhile the Big House of the Plantation (SF, per your example -- every city has its parallel), get ONLY the Best. None of this is an Accident.
Quote:
I know the education at the school where I teach is seriously substandard. I believe that my students deserve the best, but there is no way that they can get it. I stay because I believe that I can help some of them just by being aware of what "real' schooling looks like. I serve the students best by staying and not going somewhere that my talents may be better used. Because if I leave, the quality of education will take a serious nose dive. As it is, our entire math department is leaving and will have to be replaced. I'm curious if I'll be called upon to teach math again, but that is highly doubtful.
Well God Bless you. Truly, Thank You for Your Service to Our Country.
I can tell you this -- We as individual men are required no more than to do right in our place and time.
A couple of years ago, I did a year with lower SES kids on their way into college. Loved them and loved the work. But many had been so screwed over by their Public Schools.
Quote:
The worst schools in this country are so bad that I wonder if many people really understand how much like the third world they are. How can we be a strong country if we allow poor children to languish in third-world schools?
Totally agree on the start of that, but I think you miss what is going on at your finish.
The US is not so much "strong" as it is Predatory. Sad to say that, as a former troop and officer of the Empire, here on Memorial Day weekend. Not a nice thing to say, but at some point in our lives we should probably speak the truth, no?
If you do not understand that, look up the closing speeches of George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower, and Smedley Butler's -- War is a Racket.
Here is the game -- Predation starts at home. It is practiced here, and applied elsewhere. That third world of which you speak. Why do you think the third world is the third world if we are supposed to be the "top?" You have to look no further than your own experience for that answer.
It has never really been about the children. Historically, the push for public education was by leadership who wanted competent workers in the Industrial Revolution. Read John Taylor Gatto, former NY state teacher of the year regarding education reform.
Problem is Education has become an 'industry' itself and both major factions in education: politicians and teachers unions / educational administrators have interests in opposition to creating a better environment for the student. Politicians are looking at (policy) capital budgets for schools and 'programs' they can claim for political capital and as avenues to enrich themselves and cronies via construction and services contracts etc...
Teachers Union administrators are working to grow a bureaucracy to continue expanding teacher rolls and also programs to claim for political capital and add bureaucracy to validate 'administrators' and the non teaching staff.
A system of reform in public education should first establish the environment for learning. This is analogous to securing a perimeter in the military. This would mean simply removing those who are not there to learn. Get them OUT of the public schools. This daycare function has to go. Establish a designated place for the willful slaves to be confined in a 'hang out' location- perhaps a vacated school or former post office property. The consequences of this action should be the individual signs away their voting privileges in society until they achieve a GED.
This would be a major corrective action toward bad government, which caters to creating dependency voting blocs without demanding consequences for poor decisions and actions. This may also provide an incentive then for those who would like to participate in society by then reorienting themselves to the education process. Get a GED to be able to vote. Put the onus on the student.
Second parents who are not involved in students life should be discouraged from procreating. They are creating a negatively leveraged social societal model. Growing the idiot class they are not helping they are whelping for welfare benefits. This has to stop.
See: 'Idiocracy'
That would be my suggestion for tieback to the whole individual education process.
Likewise technology will enable those with a learning spirit to do so on their own. Tools such as:
Khan Academy
MIT Online
Stanford Online
are there already for those with a healthy natural curiousity.
I foresee a continuing bifurcation along these lines of educational mindset - those who want to, will find a way and the rest will condemn themselves to serfdom groveling to the nanny state for more when they contribute little to nothing.
Some Education related sayings:
"Educatio est omnium efficacissima forma rebellionis" which is scripted in Latin. The English translation means "Education is the most effective form of rebellion". The moral of Thorin's quote is that much more can be accomplished with a book rather than a bat. To truly make a difference, you need not only angst, but also a firm foundation on what makes the system what it is. Past revolutionaries (Che, King Jr, Gandhi....) all knew how to use the system to their advantage and bring about change. Society loves stupid people because they are so easy to control. To truly make a difference organize with the tools that truly bring about change: Education and Unity. The sheep (people in general) are force fed crap everyday via the media. Unfortunately, they take it all in with their mouths open wide. The uneducated cannot tell the difference between truth and lie, instead they tend to believe everything that is broadcasted without even questioning it. Everyday the system is unjust and unfair. Without education, and unity, this massive corporate lobbied tax hijacked machine can never be re-tooled. It is up to YOU to make the changes needed to improve YOUR society. It is time to stand for what you believe in, and be heard. Ignorance is the single greatest tool of oppression.
“Government in its very essence is opposed to all increase in knowledge. Its tendency is towards permanence and against change…the progress of humanity, far from being the result of government, has been made entirely without its aid and in the face of its constant and bitter opposition.”-H.L. Mencken
The Miseducation of the Negro – Dr. Carter G. Woodson
“If you can determine what a man shall think you’ll never have to concern yourself with what he’ll do; If you can make a man feel inferior you’ll never have to compel him to seek an inferior status for he will seek it himself; If you can make a man feel justly an outcast you’ll never have to order him to go to the back door, he’ll go with out being told, and if there is no door his very nature will demand one”
I choose not to be a common man
It’s my right to be uncommon if I can
I seek opportunity not security
I do not wish to be a kept citizen
Humbled and dull by having the State look after me
I want to take the calculated risk
To dream and to build
I refuse to live from hand to mouth
I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence.
The thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia
I will never cower before any master nor bend to any threat
Its my heritage to stand erect proud and unafraid
To face the world boldly and to say. This I have Done!
I think George Carlin summed it up best in this pointed 'comedy' [ahem truth] sketch
Do you really not understand, or this just rhetorical? SF is different. In some very different and significant ways.
Not only is the feature of Connection (you get that?) and Exclusion (you do get that part, right?) -- often just raising the price increases the perceived value. And of course security, for all these special little targets.
But let's go deeper. Do you know the Math Program they use at SF? Singapore Math. Very uncommon in the US. Why do you figure that is?
Of course not. And directly by intent. The DC (and large cities, as near as I can tell -- intentionally educationally cripple their Negroes, various darkies, poor folks and the whole bottom SES -- Just To Keep the Plantation Hands on the bottom.
I know that is a harsh and strong thing to say, but having looked this over a good bit, that is what the pattern looks like to me. Meanwhile the Big House of the Plantation (SF, per your example -- every city has its parallel), get ONLY the Best. None of this is an Accident.
Well God Bless you. Truly, Thank You for Your Service to Our Country.
I can tell you this -- We as individual men are required no more than to do right in our place and time.
A couple of years ago, I did a year with lower SES kids on their way into college. Loved them and loved the work. But many had been so screwed over by their Public Schools.
Totally agree on the start of that, but I think you miss what is going on at your finish.
The US is not so much "strong" as it is Predatory. Sad to say that, as a former troop and officer of the Empire, here on Memorial Day weekend. Not a nice thing to say, but at some point in our lives we should probably speak the truth, no?
If you do not understand that, look up the closing speeches of George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower, and Smedley Butler's -- War is a Racket.
Here is the game -- Predation starts at home. It is practiced here, and applied elsewhere. That third world of which you speak. Why do you think the third world is the third world if we are supposed to be the "top?" You have to look no further than your own experience for that answer.
I appreciate your coming clean with this. It's very much like what Stephen Colbert said about the US being a Christian nation: “If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn’t help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we’ve got to acknowledge that He commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don’t want to do it.” — Stephen Colbert
It's very refreshing to find someone who is willing to say that relegating millions of poor American children to a third-world education is just fine. Most people try to deny the fact that those conditions exist and are actually widespread. Thank you for your year of service also. One is better than none.
Add to that building maintenance (roof repairs, for example)
grounds maintenance (especially for those football fields)
There are a lot of expenses that go into running and maintaining a school and that doesn't account for growth in the school population where you might have to build new schools.
I didn't include sinking funds because, here, they're a separate pot. Infrastructure and maintenance come out of a separate, local, pot while the operating budget comes from the state.
About half of the money that comes in with the kids goes to the classroom (including teacher pay and benefits). The other half goes for everything else it takes to run a school system from the principals, secretaries, counselors, janitors, cafeteria staff, school board, superintendent, his staff, etc, etc, etc...
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