Posted on 03/12/2005 11:36:09 AM PST by Born Conservative
Good idea, but lawsuit city.
That's shocking, especially for an area with such HS football tradition.
I was a volunteer coach part/time(during 2 a days, off season liftings, games) for the freshmen at a fairly bigtime HS program(we got 8000+ at a varsity game, and one, maybe two NFL'ers one our team) for 4 years while I was in college. I wasn't an employee. We had other part timers, usually ex-players as I was. At the freshman level, only our head coach (and one assistant during two of the years) was a teacher.
>>The problem is not lack of money. The problem is the schools are getting top heavy with unnecessary administrative personnel and salaries that are gobbling up all the funds for actual education.
The reason school districts keep hiring more administrators is because of the ever-increasing STATE & FEDERAL REGULATIONS that require so much bureaucratic TIME for district compliance. If we could cut the head of the snake i.e. Federal Dept of Education, that would be an effective start to reducing the number of needed administrative educrats.
Right-Wing Librarian
However, the point I was making was that Texas spends way too much money on sports programs - having full time coaches for the major sports (football/basketball/baseball) who "might" handle a class or two of History during the day, but otherwise do coach stuff all day -
Your program, as well as the one where my daughter graduated, used a full time teacher who wanted a bit of extra money on the side - did the coaching after school - it isn't like that in Texas - it is a full time, high paid position, where a couple of winning seasons means you are recruited to move to a bigger school district with a bigger salary and you take your "assistant" coaches with you - Football coaches in Texas, who are winners, are treated like Kings -
So far we don't have any politicians out there willing to dismantle the Federal Dept. of Ed so Ed keeps getting bigger.
And if a politician came along that wanted to give it a serious try, the childish MSM would start printing those stupid "They want to starve children" stories again.
I oughta get a teaching certificate, move to Texas, and become a Dbacks and strength/conditioning coach there.
I have a winning record.....:)
And kill all the lawyers.
Michigan, where I went to high school for three years, required no PE. I arrived to Texas, and the school told me I couldn't graduate on time because I didn't have enough PE and I couldn't take two PE classes at the same time.
I was taking calculus, advanced chemistry, Latin, etc my senior year, but I couldn't graduate due to PE. I took my case to KPRC's answer to Marvin Zindler. Ron Stone said that we had all heard of no pass-no play, well, Channel 2 had discovered a case of no play-no pass. The local school district was shamed into allowing me to graduate. I graduated on time in the top 10% with a full ride to A&M.
That would get you an extra $2,500 over the teacher salary schedule and one extra conference period in a nearby district with five 5A (biggest) high schools.
Only the head football coaches are overpaid. Usually by granting them the title of "Athletic Director". I think the Athletic Director is responsible for scheduling all teams, but what else that job entails is beyond me.
Get rid of gym, and get rid of the school buses. The kids will have to walk to school and thereby stay in shape. Problem solved!
I went to a class A (biggest) high school in Michigan and a class 5A (biggest) high school in Texas. I can vouch that 8,000+ at a Michigan high school game is big time. (I don't think my high school pulled 8,000+ when we played our rival at the last game of the season. And that was counting the rival team's fans, too!) I will also state that 8,000+ at a Texas high school game is below average.
I suppose gym could be a good option, but most of the gym teachers I had in school sucked. I hated gym with a passion. Course, I hated all of my high school with a passion.
You want it, you pay for it. Not popular in today's let's borrow the money politics.
This Texas school district has an above average salary schedule. I assume that its stipends are also above average. Additional info: This district is largely minority (2/3 Mexican). I have a feeling that's why it has to pay more to attract teachers and other staff.
More like: You want it, you sign up for it.
The only difference is that PE is now an elective, not a requirement.
Here's the problem. In my old district, some students are 4 miles from elementary school, 5-6 miles from middle school(6-8 Grade) and 8-10 miles from the high school.
Now high schools can tough it out, but there's no way a 5 year old can handle a 4 mile walk, and both parents oftentimes work these days.
I've heard a lot of stories about Texas HS ball. We were on a playoff run and expected to win it all my senior year. We lost to the eventual state champs in the regional finals. That accounted for a lot of the high attendance at our games.
At the games I coached though, we got the players' families, some JV players getting ready for their game, and a few friends and girlfriends of the players. I coached the freshmen. Big difference.
I never coached for the glory anyway. Some of the ex-players as coaches helped me out when I started playing, and the coaching is my chance to do the same. I'll probably get back into coaching at some point once I have time.
We were part of that crazy tradition too - our daughter had her little cheerleader outfit she wore every Friday - no, she wasn't in High School, she was two years old....;^)
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