A Waste of Money!
KIDSPHERE Mailing List
Date: Tue, 20 Aug 1996 17:37:47 -0400
From: AFC...@aol.com
Subject: Re: A Waste of Money!
Mr. Anderson,
What is considered "fluff"? Is technology fluff? Is art? Music? The
performing arts? Speech? Where do you draw the line?
Raising one's salary does not necessarily equate with raising one's potential
or productivity...Simply paying a higher salary does not make one a better
teacher. How about accountablitiy? WHY can't Johnny read? WHY is our state
(I live in California, too) at the BOTTOM of the educational list?
For many of our students, the school lunch program is the onlly balanced meal
they have during the day...It is hard to concentrate when your tummy hurts
from lack of food...It is hard to feed the soul, when the mind is sluggish
from lack of food...
There are no quick solutions to any of the problems which you address...If
there were, they would no longer be problems...
My problem with this discussion is the same as any discussion on
censorship...WHO decides what is "best"? Who decides what is "fluff"?
Should we pump money into the Internet in the classroom, when the average
student in California may not be able to READ the webpages?
Jane Coffey
Computer Technician
Dutcher Elementary
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Date: Tue, 20 Aug 1996 17:49:48 -0500
From: Wood...@POBoxes.com (Woodstock)
Subject: Re: A Waste of Money!
Dear Sender -
Hi. This Is Nathan. I am 12 years old. I can understand your outrage of how
much it cost's to feed kids. Would you like to here why I am mad? I am mad
because I pay for my lunch, i make sure every morning that I have my lunch
money, etc. And alot of other kids get free lunches for:
1. Forgeting Lunch Tickets
2. Spending Lunch Money On Candy, Pop, Etc.
3. Their Parents Don't Want To Pay For Their Lunch
4. They Gave Thier Lunch Tickets Away
5. They Sold Their Lunch Ticket(s)
Those are just a few things i see everyday at my school. It also makes me
mad that their are so many democratic campaigns claiming republictions will
"starve" are poor poor country and take are cheap and free lunches away.
Well I hope i've helped or showed you aren't the only who is outraged.
Thank You, Nathan Tillett AKA Woodstock
Woodstock
Wood...@POBoxes.com
http://free.websight.com/Woodstock/
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Date: Tue, 20 Aug 1996 19:55:48 -0400
From: JFo...@aol.com
Subject: Re: A Waste of Money!
The hardest thing to believe in your entire message (and there was a lot of
incredible stuff there) is that you are a member of the educational
community. I would think that if you had any contact with kids on a regular
basis that you would see some of these issues differently. If you can't even
see the value of a program like head start then I really don't think I have
the time, energy or resources to bring you up to speed on this message board.
Ugh.
Jim :-)
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Date: Tue, 20 Aug 1996 20:05:21 -0700 (PDT)
From: Alexander Tomlin <vor...@halcyon.com>
Subject: Re: A Waste of Money!
On Tue, 20 Aug 1996, KIDSPHERE Mailing List wrote:
> Delivery-receipt-to: "Andersen, Charles" <cand...@c17m.mdc.com>
> Date: Mon, 19 Aug 1996 11:03:43 +0800 (U)
> From: "Andersen, Charles" <cand...@c17m.mdc.com>
> Subject: A Waste of Money!
>
> Kidspherians,
>
> I live in the state of California, and our local newspaper had an article which
> explained where federal dollars for education go in our state. I was shocked!
>
> Nearly a billion dollars ($970,000,000) go into the school lunch program! Only
> $107,000,000 went into vocational education programs. Traditionally,
> vocational education programs are the most expensive programs to operate
> because of the machines, tools, etc. to teach these classes. I'm sure that the
> solids (math, English, science, etc.) are receiving far less money.
>
> My question is this: Why are we spending nearly ten times as much on school
> lunch programs, as we are on educating our students to be productive members of
> society? Shouldn't we be focusing on education?! Shouldn't we be developing
> skills that help our children qualify for jobs upon graduation?!
>
> Something is very wrong with this picture!!! We shouldn't be in the restaurant
> business! We are teachers!
>
> The high school I taught at last year had 72% of the students on the school
> lunch program. Our school lunch program provided both breakfast and lunch. I
> would be interested in hearing the number of students on the school lunch
> program from your school?!
>
> To improve the educational system, we need to focus on the following:
>
> 1) Get rid of the Teachers Union. The teachers union is the biggest problem
> with the school system today! Those who run the union are more interested in
> politics than in doing what is best for the teachers, parents, schools and
> children.
>
> 2) Get rid of the school lunch program. What a waste! We are not in the
> restaurant business. We need new schools, equipment and materials - and
> teachers need to have their salaries increased to meet the same scale as other
> professionals. "Give someone a fish and you feed them for a day, teach someone
> to fish and you feed them for life".
I am sorry, but I have to disagree with this. Kids who are hungry can not
learn. Study after study has shown that kids who eat breakfast do far
better in school than kids who do not.
I personally do not live in an area that has a high degree of
reduced/free lunch and breakfast; I think the schools with the largest
percentages have only 25% on the program. However, when I student taught
in the city of Seattle, I was in a school where over 80% of the kids in
the school qualified and participated in the free lunch and breakfast
program. For many, many of those kids, that was the ONLY food they got
all day. They did NOT get dinner much of the time in their homes at
night.
If these programs were eliminated, what would those kids do? Have you
tried to do without lunch and breakfast and possibly dinner, too, and
tried to learn?
It's true, we are not in the restaurant business. I don't think we should
be in the values/morals business, either, but more and more those things
are being brought into the educational arena. It would be a wonderful
world if parents were better equipped and able to parent so that teachers
could just teach the basics and not have to concern themselves with
things that were traditionally dealt with in the home. It would be a
wonderful world if all kids could eat 3 meals a day provided by their
families so that teachers wouldn't have to worry whether or not a kid in
their class was hundry. It's not a very wonderful world, I am afraid.
I still remember kids I've seen from my student teaching days and my sub
days that were hungry kids. I don't think you could look those kids in
the eyes and deny them a meal just because you don't believe the dollars
are being spent wisely on the lunch program, could you? It sounds as if
you deal with high school students. High school students are very good at
hiding their pain (including hunger) or taking it out in other ways than
saying, "I'm hungry". I deal with elementary kids. They are less able to
disguise their need for a decent meal. It's hard enough for many of these
kids to concentrate in school with some of the stuff they have to deal
with at home, without dealing with hunger, too.
> 3) Get rid of all the "fluff" education such as head start, sex-ed, drug abuse,
> etc. We are in the business of "supplementing" the parents teaching to develop
> skills and knowledge needed to get jobs in the workforce! The schools should
> not be responsible for raising the children. Other services can be utilized to
> take care of children of neglect.
I agree with this to a certain point, but it's a large grey area about
where you draw the line. Schools get the brunt of the responsibility for
preparing future citizens because we have the most consistent contact
with those future citizens. Notice I said preparing future citizens. Our
job has for years gone beyond just providing an education.
> > 3) Double the teachers pay to bring them up to the level of other
> professionals. The teaching profession is one of the lowest paid professional
> occupations in the country - look at the numbers!
This is also true. I will never be able to touch my husband's salary, and
we have nearly the same amount of education. And I certainly don't think
his job is more "valuable" than mine. The difference is he is paid by
private corporate business and I am paid by the tax dollar. When you can
figure out a way to pay teachers other than by taxes, or a way to convince
the public that more tax dollars are merited by teachers, you'll get a
larger salary. Good luck.
> 4) Reduce the amount of administrators by 50%. Everyone is screaming that the
> school systems are broke, or nearly out of money. The fact is that we have
> never had as much money before as we do now! The problem is what we do with
> our money, too many administrators and too many unnecessary programs!
>
> 5) Allow teachers and schools to discipline children according. It's to the
> point now where nobody wants to do anything because of a fear of a law suit.
> The schools have to be granted permission to discipline without the fear of
> being sued.
I do agree with you on this one. I saw a child in my kids' school this
past year (in only first grade, no less!) who attacked both staff and
other kids and was not able to be controled because of the discipline
issue. Kids know from a very early age whether or not they are going to
get away with something. Time outs and losing recess does not work for
every kid. The alternatives are few since teachers' hands are tied on the
discipline, especially if you do not have the cooperation of the parent;
it's a tough issue. Thankfully, at the elementary level, this kind of
problem in our area is rare. --Karli, also a concerned parent and teacher
> > Charles Andersen > A Concerned Teacher! >
> > >
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Date: Wed, 21 Aug 1996 13:41:45 -0600
From: okcp...@iAmerica.net (Professional Development)
Subject: Re: A Waste of Money!
Charles wrote:
>Kidspherians,
>
>I live in the state of California, and our local newspaper had an article which
>explained where federal dollars for education go in our state. I was shocked!
>
>Nearly a billion dollars ($970,000,000) go into the school lunch program! Only
>$107,000,000 went into vocational education programs. Traditionally,
>vocational education programs are the most expensive programs to operate
>because of the machines, tools, etc. to teach these classes. I'm sure that the
>solids (math, English, science, etc.) are receiving far less money.
Because we don't have access to the figures you quoted, nor to the figures
about which you assume, we can't make a reasoned judgement.
>My question is this: Why are we spending nearly ten times as much on school
>lunch programs, as we are on educating our students to be productive members of
>society? Shouldn't we be focusing on education?! Shouldn't we be developing
>skills that help our children qualify for jobs upon graduation?!
I assume that you are some sort of teacher. Have you ever tried to teach
anyone something when they were hurgry, tired, hurting? THe missioners, at
least the more successful ones, recognized this when they fed the poor
before teaching the Word.
>Something is very wrong with this picture!!! We shouldn't be in the restaurant
>business! We are teachers!
Don't think anyone accused you of being in the restaurant business. But you
should be in the caring business. In our school District, many kids rely
on schools for the only meals they get during the day, as well as for some
form of structure in their lives. All this before education.
>
>The high school I taught at last year had 72% of the students on the school
>lunch program. Our school lunch program provided both breakfast and lunch. I
>would be interested in hearing the number of students on the school lunch
>program from your school?!
District wide we have about 60 percent on free or reduced lunch. We also
provide breakfasts. It's not the kids' faults that their parents won't
(can't/don't) provide nurishment.
>
>To improve the educational system, we need to focus on the following:
>
>1) Get rid of the Teachers Union. The teachers union is the biggest problem
>with the school system today! Those who run the union are more interested in
>politics than in doing what is best for the teachers, parents, schools and
>children.
Interesting opinion, but that's about all. I'd like to see your data.
>2) Get rid of the school lunch program. What a waste! We are not in the
>restaurant business. We need new schools, equipment and materials - and
>teachers need to have their salaries increased to meet the same scale as other
>professionals. "Give someone a fish and you feed them for a day, teach someone
>to fish and you feed them for life".
Again, try to teach a starving man to fish!! You've got to meet basic
biologic needs before any learning can occur. Feed him first, then teach
him where the fish came from.
>
>3) Get rid of all the "fluff" education such as head start, sex-ed, drug abuse,
>etc. We are in the business of "supplementing" the parents teaching to develop
>skills and knowledge needed to get jobs in the workforce! The schools should
>not be responsible for raising the children. Other services can be utilized to
>take care of children of neglect.
I really have to see your data on this. All the research studies I have
reviewed, and that is quiet a number, have indicated that Head Start is far
from fluff. Children who have experienced Head Start have a decided
educational advantage over those who have not had the experience. Look it
up. I won't comment on the other "junk", or parental responsibility. One
of my pet peeves.
>3) Double the teachers pay to bring them up to the level of other
>professionals. The teaching profession is one of the lowest paid professional
>occupations in the country - look at the numbers!
Show me the numbers. As I recall, police officers, fire fighters, and other
"public servants" are at least equally low in pay. I doubt that doubling
the pay is justified. I'd just like to see the opportunity to get rid of
those who don't earn what the current pay scale is. Those who spend their
time complaining rather than preparing and teaching challenging, interesting
lessons.
>
>4) Reduce the amount of administrators by 50%. Everyone is screaming that the
>school systems are broke, or nearly out of money. The fact is that we have
>never had as much money before as we do now! The problem is what we do with
>our money, too many administrators and too many unnecessary programs!
You sound like you have had a run in with an administrator. We have had
parent revolts because of a lack of assistant principals to administer
discipline. Your thesis, tho interesting, seems not to be supported by others.
>
>5) Allow teachers and schools to discipline children according.(?) It's to the
>point now where nobody wants to do anything because of a fear of a law suit.
>The schools have to be granted permission to discipline without the fear of
>being sued.
>
Allow teachers freedom to beat kids? Has happened. Discipline does not
equal punishment. You ought to look at the research regarding the
unintended effects of punishment. It's not intuitive and you probably
won't believe it because it flies in the face of what you are trying to
achieve (IMHO).
>Charles Andersen
>A Concerned Teacher!
Allison
Professional Training for all professionals