Did you ever think we'd end up with a 4 day week for our schools??

[proud2BlibKansan]

This blows my mind. I'm on vacation in one of the most beautiful areas I have ever seen. The weather is perfect and I'm grateful to be escaping the heat at home.

Just hooked up with a former neighbor who is a retired teacher and living here. I told him how lucky he is since this is such a paradise. And he said not exactly, the school bond failed and they are going to a 4 day week.

When I was a kid, a school bond failing was unheard of. How far we have fallen that this is now the only choice our schools have, to reduce the length of the school week. How sad that we don't value our children enough to make sure they not only have the best schools but schools that are in session 5 days a week.

But what's even sadder to me is that so few seem outraged by this. Damn.

[DrDan]

1. yet we have $60B more for the war

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. Amen

[Dappleganger]

23. +10000

[AngryOldDem]

2. Anymore, it's a rare event when school levies pass.

And you hear the same old excuses every time: "I've raised my kids, I'm done." "The school district here wastes its money." "They just asked for a levy increase."

What they don't get is, the strength and health of the community -- as well as the future -- depends on a good school system. Education is so far down on the priority list that it's no wonder the U.S. is virtually a third world nation in this regard.

[Phentex]

8. Yes, all of that but then add...

that people will still gripe about being on the bottom when it comes to education. Do they think it will magically happen?

I'd say most of the time someone complains they are using your second comment: "Why should we give money when they just waste it?"

I would love to find out what would happen if education was ever a priority in this country.

[proud2BlibKansan]

18. I've been teaching 31 years. Waiting for that priority.

I'll probably go to my grave still waiting.

[babylonsister]

3. That is outrageous. Dumbing down some more?

What happened to going to school over the summer? Now too little education is acceptable?

[AngryOldDem]

4. Check this out.

A school district close to where I live went back yesterday. Partly out of budget concerns, but because the superintendent and teachers think that a long summer layoff does not benefit kids in terms of retention of what is learned. This year their schedule will be nine weeks on, two off. Pretty reasonable, and I know such a schedule has been successful elsewhere.

Meanwhile, a state legislator is trying to ram a bill that will make it illegal for schools to start until after Labor Day. He says that teachers and their unions are the driving forces behind the push for earlier school starts, purely out of self-interest, and he's NOT going to let the teachers get the upper hand here -- like teachers don't know what they're talking about.

Craziness.

[babylonsister]

5. Some legislators are just nutz and are on power trips.

What's the difference if you get out earlier or start earlier? Didn't this come about because of farmers needing help to get their crops harvested?

[AngryOldDem]

13. Yes -- farms had a great deal to do with it.

And this is Indiana, too, but individual districts should be able to set their own schedules without government interference. What works in a rural district will most likely not work in an urban one.

I've long thought that the idea of a three-month layoff should be scrapped. It makes no sense anymore.

[proud2BlibKansan]

16. Don't forget about air conditioning!

I am a huge proponent of year round school. But until all of our schools are air conditioned, it's cruel to educate our kids in hot buildings in July and August. And of course in this economy school districts can't afford to add a/c to older buildings.

[mopinko]

29. now the tourist industries are protecting their right to teen

workers. wisconsin passed a similar law a few years ago. tourism is something like the third biggest industry in the state.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. Check his donors

He's probably in the pocket of the tourism lobby.

[AngryOldDem]

33. No. He's just an idiot.

We grow 'em big here in Indiana.

[proud2BlibKansan]

38. We got em where I live too

They're everywhere! They're everywhere! LOL

[proud2BlibKansan]

12. Tourism!

We fought that lobby for years in our state. They claim school between Memorial Day and Labor Day hurts the state's tourism business.

[madrchsod]

6. the rockfalls il school district could`t get a bond passed for 17yrs

they finally put a public notice in the paper and since no one objected the district finally had its money.

this year the teachers union and school adminstration turned down obama`s/duncan`s bribe money. they are working out their problems together.

[dkf]

7. How did the school bond fail? No investors or no authorization to issue the bond?

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. Voters failed to approve it

[justabob]

28. was the bond straight education or was other stuff mixed in?

I mean, was there something less savory lumped in with school funding in the same bond package? That happens a lot... Competing issues in the same deal. Sometimes you have to vote for something you don't want to get what you do want, or vice versa. It is a neat trick.

[proud2BlibKansan]

32. I have no idea

[Brickbat]

37. It was an operating levy.

[Starry Messenger]

9. That just boggles my mind.

What are parents going to do with their children on that fifth day? Most people work, so that's going to be a logistical nightmare. Not every family has a stay at home parent.

[Brickbat]

20. And some of us who are at home are actually working at home! I work from home doing writing and

editing, and I'm in the school district the OP is talking about...while my children are old enough to look after themselves, it's still a disruption to have them at home for 20 percent of my work week. I can't do interviews outside the home, I risk being interrupted during a phone interview, and it's just disruptive to have them around sometimes.

[Starry Messenger]

22. Excellent point!

[Brickbat]

24. I feel so bad for other families -- my family is in an excellent position to "absorb" a four-day

week into our schedule and even then, it's going to be a big change for us. Not only that, but our school district is spread over a large, rural area...kids are going to have to be on the bus much earlier and get off much later, and activities will run later...there are so many families that this will be such a blow for.

[Karmadillo]

15. Serfs don't need school. Serfs need to work. Four days/week is excessive.

nt

[Brickbat]

17. I know where you are, and we're not going to a four-day week this year.

:hi:

They'll have to push it to next year if the tax structure doesn't change. Part of the problem here is an absolutely shitty taxing structure put in by Jesse Ventura when he was governor. Second homes, cabins and other vacation properties are not taxed for local schools here. When you look around, you see that the majority of land here is held by people who live elsewhere, or is tax forfeit land.

And yes, there are other reasons the levy keeps failing -- your teacher friend probably told you about how the new high school bond referendum that was handled poorly, and now voters feel like they need to punish the school district.

In any case, though, I share your frustration. Minnesota used to be a model of educational excellence. We're struggling now.

[YOY]

19. Only if they make it a full year school year. Even then...unlikely.

If they don't it would be tantemount with competing with the intellectual giants put out by fundie homeschooling.

[Brickbat]

21. Also, there is little leadership on behalf of the levy...I'm afraid I'm going to have to jump in and

do it my own damn self. There are a lot of issues with a tone-deaf superintendent who went straight for advocating for a four-day week instead of looking at things like user fees for buses and sports, too. It's odd to go through this every two years.

[newportdadde]

25. I saw recently were the first school in Missouri was going to four days.

It is just the first, we will see more of it across the country. It's another sign that our country is an empire in decline.

[proud2BlibKansan]

27. There are several in Kansas that have gone to 4 day weeks

Some have given up sports.

[revolution breeze]

26. School bond failed a couple of years ago

I asked friends why and they said they voted against it because previous bonds were not being used wisely. School board decided to buy land to build a new school, but the land was agricultural and could not be built on, one school was falling apart and they spent money on a "study" to decide if they should rebuild or just add on, the bond was used to buy two buses for the football team while the kids ate in the classroom because the roof was falling in the cafeteria. BUT how many of these people attended school board meetings or bothered to get involved? ZERO!

[lostnfound]

30. Amounts to blackmail of voters, IMHO -- working parents' nightmare -- but I personally

wish my son's school was a 4 day week. I personally wish kids had more time to be kids and less time imprisoned in classrooms. I think our population might even become smarter if they spent more time as children outdoors. Of course, you'd have to kill-the-televisions to see any actual benefit, and that won't happen.

[proud2BlibKansan]

34. "Imprisoned" in classrooms??

Nice choice of descriptive language. :eyes:

I can see where spending that extra day off glued to video games would not feel "imprisoning."

[n2doc]

31. The real problem is relying on bonds to fund basic schooling

This should be a central task of the state's budget. But no, that role has been taken by prison construction/funding.

Less schooling=poorer education=poorer job prospects= more crime=more prisons=less schooling.

[proud2BlibKansan]

35. Requiring a 2/3 majority is also a problem

Imagine if we needed a 2/3 vote to go to war.

[n2doc]

36. Somehow, I think they would manage that one

War and punishment are always easier to sell. Fear sells.