Politics, Business and maybe some Education

I may be losing the argument that public education is "Big business".

Maybe I could jump over to the wagon that carries the sign "Big government". The government "giveth", and the government "taketh" away.

Money talks, or maybe it is no money means shut up:


Crist vetoes cuts to teacher bonuses

No money, no bill

And the fact that a public school system is going to be required to keep the public informed is uh, uh, oh yeah, "suspension of reality" or something to that effect.

Florida bill would tackle teacher turnover:

"HB 355 would also require that Florida parents be informed of their school's turnover rate. And it would set up a new state program, the Florida Teacher Induction Initiative, to offer more support to new teachers."

The way numbers are obfuscated and massaged, we might as well play "For one million dollars, if you guess the number I have in my mind, you win."

Back in the day when I really cared and thought I could make a difference, one of the bits of information I provided to the HCPS Superintendent's Advisory Council on Special Education was all of the facts about the needs of support for new teachers and why a lot of them quit within three years. If you think it is bad for regular ed teachers, just think what it's like for SpEd teachers having to deal with those special kids and those special parents and that special paper work. No one seemed to care about the research already done, but "they" (the HCPS SACSE district people) did form a sub committee to do their own "research". They may even still have the "teacher recruitment/retention" subcommitte. Who knows.

I have been thinking. After my previous post about a Superintendent's contract, what I should have done, starting in 1990, was to have lobbied my school board to put an incentive clause in the contract about deaf/blind kids. Wished I had thought of that back then. I might not be such a malcontent now.