Making a move

[PAUL161]

Were not too bad off Walter, last I read, were 48th out of 50 states in education, wonder who 49 and 50 are? Seems like were always behind in school supplies, school building upgrades, teachers pay and benefits. When's the top brass going to get on the ball and do something about this? I heard that some teachers were buying needed supplies out of their own pocket! This should not be. JMHO. PJ

 

[NutmegCT]

Paul - good comment. And there are thousands of school districts across the USA where teachers have to buy their own materials (paper, printer ink, white boards, writing supplies, etc. - for the kids!).

Compare what we spend per capita on entertainment - to what we spend per capita on education. Pretty embarrassing. Could our priorities need a bit of re-arranging?

“The family which takes its mauve and cerise, air-conditioned, power-steered and power-braked automobile out for a tour passes through cities that are badly paved, made hideous by litter, blighted buildings, billboards and posts for wires that should long since have been put underground. They pass on into countryside that has been rendered largely invisible by commercial art. ... They picnic on exquisitely packaged food from a portable icebox by a polluted stream and go on to spend the night at a park which is a menace to public health and morals. Just before dozing off on an air mattress, beneath a nylon tent, amid the stench of decaying refuse, they may reflect vaguely on the curious unevenness of their blessings. Is this, indeed, the American genius?” John Galbraith, The Affluent Society, 1958.

In that book, Galbraith was pushing for increased investment in infrastructure and education.

grumble grumble
TM

 

[Basil]

On second thought...

 

[waltesefalcon]

Paul, I have some experience at this point and can usually hit all the back to school sales and can usually only spend around $300 out of my own pocket on school supplies before school starts. During the year I'll probably spend another $500 on this and that for my classroom. I know some who are not as frugal as me and can spend a grand or more of their own money every year. One thing OK does well is pay our administrators, my principal makes nearly double what I make, our superintendent makes over six digits.

 

[PAUL161]

Walter, Admiration goes out to you and all the teachers that do that, but when the general public pays school taxes every year to overcome that, where is this money going? Mismanagement of school funds? We hear it all the time, were out of funds, not enough money coming in to cover the increased cost of supplies. My granddaughter is a teacher in Pennsylvania, fortunately in a prestigious area where monies shortages aren't as serious as in other parts of the country and she loves her job! I just wish more thought by our governmental agency's in getting our children's ratings up to the level of other countries. Our teachers are doing a wonderful job with the tools at hand, but to me, they need more tools and shouldn't have to pay for them out of their own pocket. I vote for increases in teachers pay every time it comes up on the ballot, I wish everyone would. Sorry for running off. I get carried away at times, especially when it comes to our kids. PJ

 

[waltesefalcon]

Paul, my feeling is that there is a lot of wastefully spent money in education. When I began teaching the district's English teachers got together every three years and we would write our own benchmark tests, last year we spent $300,000 for a test that had incorrect answers in some instances, vague directions, and was very poor overall quality. This year the district has decided to buy three different benchmarks give all of them to our students and then try to decide which they will use moving forward. These tests may be as good or possibly even better than the old benchmarks that we wrote ourselves but at least in the past we weren't throwing money away for tests.
My district is also very good at having too many administrative positions. My building has gone from three principals and two counselors in the nineties to having five principals and four counselors for a smaller student body. At the district level we have also seen the number of administrators nearly double in the past fifteen or so years.

 

[Popeye]

Paul, your post started me thinking, and per a quick Google search, about 50% of school personnel are non-teaching. I'm not sure the accuracy of "50%" - but anything in that range strikes me as high.

Our local school, which I like, I counted names of people at the school; of 53 employees, 17 are non-teaching. 31%. Obviously there are central employees that I am not counting.

Interesting.

 

[Basil]

Walter, Admiration goes out to you and all the teachers that do that, but when the general public pays school taxes every year to overcome that, where is this money going? Mismanagement of school funds?

I can't speak to OK education system, but here in Albuquerque there is a clue to the answer to that question.

When my wife and I first moved to Albuquerque when I was at UNM (early 80's) the Albuquerque Public Schools administrative offices were downtown in a few small, one-story adobe buildings. Today, the APS administration is housed in a multi-million dollar, 8-story complex that houses goodness knows how many "administrators," many of whom no doubt make more $ than the average teacher. (There are other satellite building/offices as well - this is just the "main" building.

By the way, when I was still working, our building was right next door to APS.

 

[waltesefalcon]

Bas, that is massive, from the photos it appears to be nearly as large as the the State administration building here in OK. I found a copy of the Oliver Hodge building that houses the Oklahoma State Department of Education.

 

[NutmegCT]

A couple thoughts on that massive APS building.

How much of the building houses equipment, books, desks, computers, etc., and how much actually houses working staff.

Also, school districts usually borrow money for capital investments like buildings. But tax money pays operating expenses (the staff), and is often supplemented by state and federal contributions.

Districts rarely ask for school tax increases for a new building, as the tax doesn't actually cover the building. The district borrows money ("bond issue"), then has many many years to pay it off - if the state doesn't cover it, which in many cases, it does. Every state and every district is different.

Another case of the administrators saying "Trust us - we know what we're doing".

gak

TM

 

[DavidApp]

How much money is waste and how much is fraud?
In Macon the school board is taking the old superintendent to court over a purchase he made. 15,000 computer systems that were incomplete and had no software for them. He somehow went around the system and signed off on the deal on his own. Something like $20 million went missing when it was all said and done. It is now coming out most of the money moved off shore shortly before the ink had dried on the deal.
The computers still sit in storage never having been used.
He was going to introduce Chinese immersion to the schools as well.

David