

School superintendent requests school be turned into prison - kefeizhou
http://holykaw.alltop.com/school-superintendent-requests-school-be-turn

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latch
Kudos to the superintendent for doing his job. Whatever validity you think his
point has, there's no doubt he'll get a lot of attention thanks to the clever
way he's approached the problem.

I'm one of those people that, whenever they hear about economic problems,
always thinks individuals are responsible. I want to know, am I wrong? Nowhere
does it say you need a house with a spare bedroom and a bathroom for each
person. You aren't entitled to a car, let alone two. It isn't some birthright
that you go on vacation or buy a flat screen through credit.

Education is important. It's also expensive and difficult. Why aren't parents
more on the hook? Yes, some parents really, really can't. But most could. It
might take substantial life style changes, but the amount of money an average
westerner can free up is staggering.

I know michigan is particularly hard hit, so this might not be the most
sympathetic example to ask, but I just can't help feeling this way. (and that
doesn't change the fact that I think the superintended did a great job,
whether I think it's the states problem or not).

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nkassis
Most parent that can already do send their kids to private school. But we have
to admit that public schools often get the short end of the stick in most
state budget discussions. Even if parents contribute more (taxes) it ends up
not being used properly. Also, the bigger the house usually means the more
taxes you pay to the school board ;p

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Duff
Huh?

Public school STUDENTS get the short end of the stick. Public schools as
institutions get rich funding streams, second only to Medicaid at the state
level.

I'd suggest looking into the $7,500 per student figure as well. Usually when
school people look for more money, they lowball that figure by excluding
things like capital expenses, administrative expenses and busing.

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jbooth
Public schools as institutions? What's that even mean, that when you add up
1,000 salaries it's a lot of money? Ok, so what?

Teachers and school administrators aren't taking home megabucks -- if they
were, that per student figure would be a lot higher. Typically, administrative
expenses and busing will be included in that figure but capital expenses are
probably not (but the building may be already paid off anyways).

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TomOfTTB
First I agree the cost Michigan pays per prisoner is too high. Texas manages
to get by at $13,000 per prisoner Michigan shouldn't need $40,000. But that's
for all the expenses to keep them alive (room, board, medical, etc...). So the
comparison isn't an accurate one.

But let me ask this:

Michigan is a state where the average teacher makes $57,958 per year BEFORE
benefits (<http://www.teacher-world.com/teacher-salary/michigan.html>).
Benefits that include a lifetime pension after retirement. This is in a state
with a median income of $44,627 (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan>)

Yet they rank 30th in education: <http://tinyurl.com/5wwq8ep>.

I'm not saying teacher's shouldn't be well paid. If they were making 10% over
the median income I would have no complaints. But they're well above that and
that, as much as the prisons, is why the schools in Michigan have no money.

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skimbrel
Really? Please don't blame the teachers for this.

This line of reasoning has never made any sense to me -- why does everyone
blame the public employees and want to take away their (hardly that great when
compared to the rest of the country) salary and benefits? The solution isn't
to cut them off at the knees; the solution is to raise everyone else up to the
same standards.

If you want someone to blame for this, start with the No Child Left Behind act
that forces schools to waste their budgets on meaningless standardized
testing, and then penalizes them for it when they do poorly, creating a
vicious cycle where a failing school can never become successful because it
loses more funding each year. Or you could just go back to the root of the
problem and blame the robber barons who, through well-paid lobbyists, have
convinced the federal government to dismantle itself and its services year
after year since 1980 in the name of the free market. We forgot what happens
when corporate influence runs unchecked; we're learning again, and we're
learning the hard way. The American experiment is dangerously close to
failure.

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anamax
> This line of reasoning has never made any sense to me -- why does everyone
> blame the public employees and want to take away their (hardly that great
> when compared to the rest of the country) salary and benefits?

Oh really? Public employees are far more likely to have pensions than the rest
of us. Public employees earn significantly more too and have greater job
security.

We blame them because they have a huge effect on who gets elected, which
directly affects how much we have to pay for them.

> If you want someone to blame for this, start with the No Child Left Behind
> act that forces schools to waste their budgets on meaningless standardized
> testing,

What's your method for determining whether children are learning? We tried
trusting teachers and schools - that didn't work.

> Or you could just go back to the root of the problem and blame the robber
> barons who, through well-paid lobbyists, have convinced the federal
> government to dismantle itself and its services year after year since 1980

Education spending steadily increased (after inflation) during that time, so
if services went down, it wasn't because of spending.

Note that the US Department of Education was a shadow of its current self in
1980, so if you're going to argue that the federal govt has dismantled itself
wrt education, you get to explain why it's much bigger wrt education.

The US govt collects about as much in taxes per person as the "high tax/high
services" countries. (The US actually collects significantly more per person
than Canada.) Yet, we don't get the services. More money can't solve that
problem.

Before you start about rates, they're not the only term in the equation. The
US collects a smaller fraction of its economy, but it has a larger economy
(per person). And, even with much higher rates, the US has never collected
more than 22% of the economy in taxes. The sustainable max appears to be
around 20%. (People "adjusted" to the 21.9% and got the number back to 20.
That's going to happen when the tax code is used to encourage/discourage.)

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krakensden
> Oh really? Public employees are far more likely to have pensions than the
> rest of us. Public employees earn significantly more too and have greater
> job security.

Good benefits yes, good salary, not so much:
<http://www.onlinedegrees.org/calculator/degrees/education>

for instance. I really have no idea how people complain that teachers are
overpaid. It beats picking lettuce, but consider the opportunity cost of a
bachelors and a teaching certificate. They could be making a lot more money if
they were doing anything else.

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jbooth
Yeah, that's one of those "believe it because I want to believe it" things.

I mean, do these people actually know any teachers? Why aren't they teachers
themselves if it's so great?

I know for a fact that I'm not a teacher because the pay is shit and I'm not a
good enough person to sacrifice my lifestyle for it. At least I can admit
that.

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protomyth
"Education funding is being slashed left and right" - uhm no - most states
aren't getting the increases they want. The University of Minnesota loves to
use this tactic in press releases that their funding was cut, when actually,
their increase in funding was cut. I hate politics for the acceptance of lies
as standard practice.

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run4yourlives
To be fair, if enrollment is increasing and funding is flat, the effect is a
decrease in funding. From what I can gather, most areas have a per-student
funding model so this doesn't mean your statement is incorrect, but it's a
little more complicated than being the black to the university's white.

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protomyth
I did say most. The number of students is not increasing at a rate that would
mess put the per student in most parts of the US.

<http://nces.ed.gov> has a lot of the actual numbers as opposed to partisan
websites on either side.

PS: I am still trying to find a good source for # of non-teaching staff to
teaching staff ratios. I get the feeling it has changed heavily in the last 30
years.

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kylemaxwell
Not at all what I expected when I saw the title. And I tend to think that
spending that amount per student now would result in a future with (a) less
prisoners, (b) citizens with the tools to really improve themselves and the
world around them, and (c) taxpayers able to pay more.

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jonprins
Indeed. Spending more per prisoner than per student (even when you divide by
three, considering students spend ~8 hours a day at school) strikes me as
pretty backward. When you spend money, you're investing it. So Michigan is
investing nearly twice as much money per prisoner ((40k / 3) / 7k).

Which is a better investment: keeping bad people out of society /now/, or
educating the future generations to keep them from being a bad person? I won't
argue that the first one shouldn't happen. But should we really be investing
more in the short term than in the long term? Especially when the only
benefits in the short term are a society that feels (and might be) safer along
with enriched privately run prisons and their employees, and along the long
term is a sustainable and expanding economy based on, you know, not
imprisoning people.

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derobert
They also spend roughly half the year at school (remember weekends, holidays,
summer), so you should divide by six.

So, you're now at less per prisoner than per child.

Not that this strikes me as a valid comparison; makes more sense to me that
the cost of each should be compared to its own benefits, and to the costs of
additional taxation.

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Dove
If children were fully the state's responsibility the way prisoners are, I'm
sure they _would_ have those things and more.

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johngalt
Ok now lets see what private schools are paid per student and compare
outcomes.

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johngalt
Hmm... interesting, it appears that average private school tuition is over
$3000 less than the average public school expenditure per pupil and there are
better student teacher ratios. Wonder why he's not asking to be turned into a
private school?

Also it appears that public school spending has only gone up over the long
term. How about a "thank you for the most funding in 100 years" letter from
this administrator? Or perhaps a "I'm sorry we continue to fail at educating
despite record funding levels" letter. No?

Oh well I guess he decided to go with "We babysit for 7 hours a day and get
three months off, but we should be funded the same as institutions that
provide 24x7x365 care of violent adults."

edit: As some of the article commenters have pointed out: 40,000/365/24 =
$4.57 per hour 7,000/180/7 = $5.55 per hour

Schools already get paid more per person/hour even using his own numbers.

<http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d09/tables/dt09_182.asp>
<http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d09/tables/dt09_059.asp>

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zandorg
I wrote a novel (titled Alcatraz: The College Years) in 2004 where in an
imaginary version of 1985, a group of kids in a troubled school get sent to
Alcatraz (which in the story has been refurbished like a comfortable prison).
I was told the story was unlikely to happen...

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william42
Worst title ever? Possibly.

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creativeembassy
Great article. Not really hacker news-worthy though, is it?

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tokenadult
Paul Graham, the site founder, has a great interest in education policy, if
his essays

<http://paulgraham.com/articles.html>

are any guide to his interests.

