#1022 (School Taxes)

I don't have a problem paying some sort of base tax for public schools to educate the little terrors, but I've said for years now that parents should pay more based on how many school-aged children they've got at their homes.

And that's regardless of whether the kids are home schooled or sent to private schools or whatever. If they COULD go to public schools, then parent pays.

Just another way breeders get the rest of us to cover their runts...

They've been trying to pass a levy around here for a while, since the BOE doesn't know how to budget their money correctly. However, ever since someone inside the BOE spilled the beans a couple years back that teachers were getting benefits such as no deductables for doctors visits (when it wasn't listed as one of things the money was going to be used for) and huge raises, just about everyone has been against it. As a result, the schools are run-down and have hardly any money for repairs and such.

But then again, it's really their own fault. The first teachers who are begging for the levy were the ones who treated anyone who didn't have a certain last name as a snob. For example, my second grade teacher (who was the first to actually beg for the levy) told me that I would amount to nothing, would be a dead-beat dad, and end up dying at the age of 22, while telling another person that he would end up a success, have excellent and well behaved children, and be rich. Just before they spent more tax payers money (the cost to hold it was $70,000--enough to actually do some of the "repairs" they needed, but that money was stolen from the 4H group, who raised the money themselves by doing fundraisers) to hold a special election on the levy, I went up to that teacher and asked her if she remembered me. Of course, she said no. I reminded her that of what she told me, then proceded to tell her where I'm at now--still going to college (though part-time) and almost finished, while having an excellent fulltime job that pays more than her job while having all the benefits she wished she had. I also reminded her of that person she said would be successful has two brats who act like spawns of satan, no sort of insurance except for car insurance, a no-good wife who only sees him as a sperm donor and a walking wallet, a job that hardly pays anything, and living in a crappy, old trailer. Then I told her that as a result of that, that's the reason why I keep voting "NO!" for the levy. Of course, when the time came up, I voted no, just like the majority of other people.

My only question is this: what exactly are you teaching children? To be snobs to people who don't have a certain last name? No wonder brats act as such now-a-days. I'm not going to pay extra taxes just so you can continue to teach other kids to be snobs to each other because of their last name. Also, I'm definitely not going to pay extra taxes just so the snobs (because all those "successes" always were the ones who got on the school teams) can get a excellent bus to travel in during away games, while they keep having a pathetic season (it's always a 0-32 record) when the school's chess and programming team always comes in first in competitions but get no budget at all.

Oh, according to many younger cousins, the school system which I went through is still like that. Guess they don't learn their lessons, do they?

According to the last levy, they mentioned that if the levy didn't pass, they would have to cut some sports. The very same day the levy failed, they put more money into the sports teams and P.E. teachers funds while decreasing funds from other places like the other teachers budgets (e.g. the science teachers who need the money to pay for lab materials, English teachers who need the money to pay for literature the is required by the state to be read at that level, and even computer science teachers who need newer computers since they're still using the Win 3.1 computers I had to use when I was still going there.)

Again, I ask, what are they really teaching in these schools? The answer is pretty obvious. As a result of such another, it becomes another reason to vote "NO" for school levies. I suggest everyone vote no if any nearby school systems who request a levy.

School taxes have been a LONG TIME gripe of mine. Something has to be done about the way property owners are raped for school taxes. Pahrunts should have an increase in taxes per kid.

Oh yeah... They always play the sports card here too. Why our taxes pay for school sports is beyond my comprehension.

Cut everything that doesn't involve education (sports is not education) and then we'll talk about raising taxes. Maybe.

I wouldn't mind paying school taxes IF THE KIDS WERE ACTULLY LEARING SOMETHING AND THAT THEY WOULD BE GUARNTEED TO BECOME PRODUCTIVE CITIZENS.
Back when I was a teen sprog, my 8th grade "Home and Careers" class had a unit on how to WASH DISHES! If you don't know how to wash dishes when you are 13 or 14 years old, there is something seriously wrong with you (or more likely the "parents" who expect everyone else but themselves to rasie their kids). That's tax dollars at work for you.
I'm kind of torn on the school sports issue. I used to run cross-country in both high school and college and I absolutely loved it. It also gave me some discipline so I know how to apply said discipline in the real world. Plus I read studies that girls in sports are less likely to become knocked-up teen sprogs with dead-end futures.
However, I don't like seeing other programs (ESPECIALLY academics) cut to imporve sports programs. Junior's going to eventually need to know how to read, write, and do simple math in order to succeed in the real world.

this reminds me of a quote by robert a heinlein in to sail beyond sunset about how the world in the book declined into bread and circuses

A quote" Entertainers and professional atheletes were mistaken for people of importance, they were idolised and treated as leaders, their opinions were sought on everything and they took themselves just as seriously - after all if an athlete is paid a million or more a year, he/she knows they are important ... so his opinions on foreign affairs, and domestic policies, must be important too, even though he/she proves himself to be both ingorant and subliterate every time he opens his mouth (most of his/her fans are just as ignorant and unlettered" first said in 1987

This morning I was reading letters to the editor in our local (village) newsrag. About halfway through I shouted, "BINGO!"

The school budget vote is coming up on Tuesday. The letters had all kinds of bingoisms.

"Children are da fyooture"
"It's for the kids" (several of those)
"Think of the children"
etc.

Barf.

Once again, I'll be voting no. They want yet another tax increase. If the budget gets voted down, they'll bitch and moan about Da Fyootures and "we just don't know what else we can cut." (How about sports, genius?)

Then they'll come back for another vote, and keep the cycle going until voter apathy results in a yes vote. This has been an annual strategy. I think, if the first vote fails, they need to stick with the current budget until next year. Do you ask your boss for a raise every 2 weeks if he says no the first time?

Last year the teachers went on strike because their BASE PAY was the lowest in the county. Only one or two teachers actually made that base pay. The average salary was right in line with the rest of the county. It was such a load of B.S. that I still can't write about it without feeling an invective-filled rant coming on.

There was a story in the paper this morning about the recent news about the levy. Of course, they use the "it's for the children" ad nauseum. Of course, based off history, they won't use it on the majority of the children (the well-behaved children that will amount to something, that is), but use it on the brats of breeders, brand new sports equipment (like they get every year) for those brats, and benefits to the teachers.

Fattie, the same thing happened in both my 7th, 8th, and 9th grade Home. Ec. class. Majority of the people didn't know how to wash dishes (even by hand) at all. I know this is stereotypical and I apoligize for such, but back then, I at least expected half of the females to know how to wash dishes, and a small minority of males to know. They didn't, only me (a male) and another female actually knew how to wash dishes. It's actually quite sad that breeders are not even teaching their own brats how to do simple chores. I wouldn't be surprised if any of those brats even knew how to wash or even fold their own clothes.

That's another thing about the sports that I didn't mention last time: the girl's sports teams have not yet received any new funding. It's always been the boy's teams. The boy's teams, despite their constantly bombed records, still get all the sports funding, while the girls, with almost always a perfect season, get no funding what-so-ever. Even better, the girls teams here get bigger crowds then the hardly-any-crowd boys teams.