burlingtonfreepress.com

Sponsored by:

vt.Buzz ~ a political blog

Political notes from Free Press staff writers Terri Hallenbeck, Sam Hemingway and Nancy Remsen


11.07.2007

 

The school dance

It's about as awkward as a seventh-grade school dance, the issue of school mergers is. Nobody wants to be the one to take this one out on the dance floor.

Yesterday, Essex, Essex Junction and Westford rejected a merger. So did Whiting and Sudbury.

This, of course, comes at a time when there is hue and cry over school spending and subsequent property taxes. One of the solutions considered last legislative session: consolidate some of Vermont 88 gazillion school districts. Legislators pondered the issue right up until the public told them not us, not here. Education Commissioner Richard Cate went out on the road to take the pulse of Vermont on the issue and heard from school board members everywhere - not us, not here.

Yesterday, more towns added to the cry of not us, not here.

Today at the governor's press conference, which Cate happened to be attending on another matter, he and Gov. Jim Douglas danced the awkward shuffle.

Cate says: If the state wants fewer schools it's going to take some sort of state-driven solution, as in a mandate from Montpelier, but whether that's what the "state" wants he leaves up to others.

Douglas says: He'll wait to hear what Cate's report on his tour of the state says. Can he picture forcing communities to consolidate their schools? "I think we ought to withhold judgment," he said. "It's a touchy subject to say the least."

A touchy subject no one is likely to want to be the first to touch.

- Terri Hallenbeck

Comments:
Don't read too much into the Essex vote; it came on the heels of huge tax increases caused by the IBM reappraisal and January rejection of municipal merger. Village voters were in no mood to try out the unknown of school cooperation while still serving as the Town's cash cow on the municipal side.
 
We have too many school districts - top heavy with administration!
 
It's possible for districts to share administrators without consolidating. Whiting and Sudbury already share the same elementary school principal.
 
The trouble is no one wants to share. In southern Vermont we have failing schools and no one will do anything different!
 
That's because the NEA and their lackeys on the school boards don't want it different; they are happy the way it is now, no accountability, lots of dues to spend, and a bunch of paid-off dimocrat/progs doing their bidding in Montpelier and Washington.
 
Douglas might as well as fall on a sword if he mandates consolidation.
 
A question for all of you advocates of consolotation:

What proportion of our state eductation budget would be saved by consolodation???
 
Bubba - there you go again! Apparently you must think the NEA has such a stranglehold on society that they now control local elections.

Maybe we should just declare Bubba as King Bubba and let him dictate over Vermont.

Essex Town, Essex Jct, and Westford voted overwhelmingly to NOT consolidate - after 7 years of open public discourse - the vote wasn't even close!

Whiting also overwhelmingly voted NOT to consolidate with its neighboring district - again, it wasn't even close!

As for Jim Douglas, he is very careful on this topic of reducing school costs - he honestly believes and has said that consolidation should happen --- BUT and that's a big but, he says it is a local decision. He knows he would be crucified if he came out publicly and demanded a state law to force consolidation.

This is where he lacks leadership - he says the legislature should deal with consolidation so he can wash his hands clean.
 
A question for all of you advocates of consolotation:

What proportion of our state eductation budget would be saved by consolodation???
 
2%
 
A former school board member here:

The best way I saw to reduce costs and to maintain music and other programs is to optimize the number of students in each class room. One year we had about 45 children in each of grades 1 through 3. We wanted about 18-20 children per class at most so we ended up with three classes per grade with 15 students per class.

The neighboring school, about two miles way, had about 25 children per grade. Too big for one class so they had two classes per grade and 12.5 children per class.

With one school we could have divided the 70 total students into four classes and 17.5 students per class and saved one of five teaching positions.

We could have done the same with one district and students assigned to schools to optimize classroom numbers.

Given some better leadership we could have established a few multi-age classrooms and gone from five classrooms to an average of 3.5 classrooms per grade with 20 students per class.

A sneaky cost coming with too small classes are the costs for music, phys ed, art, maintenance, etc... which are the same per class regardless of the number of students.


I saw little savings to be had on the administration side with each administrator responsible for very large numbers of people (too large in my opinion). Non-supervisory staff in the central office spend a lot of time answering surveys and other paperwork for the state. Maybe would be reduced with consolidation.
 
If my kids are at a failing high school I should be able to send them somewhere else.
 
Go right ahead.
 
"A question for all of you advocates of consolotation:
What proportion of our state eductation budget would be saved by consolodation???"

You misspelled consolidation twice, in two different ways, in the short span of two sentences.

I don't know about consolidation, but you'd better go back to school.
 
If there is a "failing school" the state should close it. We should not be funding that.
 
Close Bellows Falls Union High School and the middle school ASAP!
 
What defines a "failing school"?
 
Post a Comment



<< Home

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Archives

June 2006   July 2006   August 2006   September 2006   October 2006   November 2006   December 2006   January 2007   February 2007   March 2007   April 2007   May 2007   June 2007   July 2007   August 2007   September 2007   October 2007   November 2007   December 2007   January 2008   February 2008   March 2008   April 2008   May 2008   June 2008   July 2008   August 2008   September 2008   October 2008   November 2008   December 2008   January 2009   February 2009   March 2009   April 2009   May 2009   June 2009   July 2009   August 2009   September 2009   October 2009   November 2009   December 2009   January 2010   February 2010   March 2010   April 2010