Oakland schools broke, face bailout $100 million takeover would be biggest yet

The San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 12/8/02 | Meredith May

[nightdriver]

"The district also shifted $8 million out of the general fund to shore up programs that overspent their budgets, such as the cafeteria fund and child development programs."

"Child development programs?"

What the heck are these? I thought the entire public school system was intended to be a "child development program."

I'd like to see how many school administrators and other non-teachers' jobs are going to be on the line.

Public "servants" should be held to the same accountability as they hold publicly-held corporations as to how they spend their money.

[Demidog]

Close them down and replace them with nothing.

[blam]

"Right now I am reading "Radical Son" by David Horowitz."

Everyone should read that book!

[Jimbaugh]

The Lesson Here is: If you are bad at math become a School District Administrator and the state will make it all better.

[nwrep]

I was born, raised and educated in India, and I have had the opportunity to converse with some school teachers here. I have also talked to some parents whose kids go to public schools. From what I have gathered about Public schools in 3 states (CA, CO and OR), I would consider the vast majority of them to be an abomination, the teachers laughably incompetent (compared to the ones that taught me math and science), and the textbooks to be, to quote Woody Allen, "a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham."

[kmiller1k]

You are correct. West Fresno is next to need a bail out. Only two schools in this tiny district but they needed a 1 million dollar loan in Novemeber from the county superintendent to cover October's payroll. With the loan came certain strings: removal of the idiot board of trustees and oversight of the fiscal affairs of the district by the county superindentent. This district is almost 100% minortiy and the board is too. They of course are playing the race card that the budget is in balance and it is because the board president is black that the county wants him removed. It is absolutely incredible the imcompetance of this man and his astonshing ability to mismanage the funds. There is more but I won't bore you with the predictable details.

[okie01]

"It is absolutely incredible the imcompetance of this man and his astonshing ability to mismanage the funds. There is more but I won't bore you with the predictable details."

It is an unfortunate fact that many minority school districts no longer have as their only, or even highest, priority the education of the children enrolled.

Instead, the schools are all too often operated as jobs programs for incompetents and sources of graft for an opportunistic few.

If the public school system is failing -- and there is little doubt that it is -- it is because the system rewards incompetence and corruption.

[speekinout]

4,300 enrollment drop as students switched to charter schools, a 24 percent teacher pay raise

Why do these two factoids look incompatible? What did they get for a 24% (!!!) teacher pay raise if that many families went to charter schools? I'd guess that more families would have also liked to move to charters.

And, man, a 24% pay raise is out of line for anyone anytime. They probably still get merit increases and seniority increases, so an increase like this in the pay scale is even more outrageous.

[kmiller1k]

It appears you do know of the West Fresno district by your comments. Or, as I stated previously, the sputtering and whining by the board of trustees is so predictable as to be laughable. Yes, they did use district funds to hire cronies and pay for cars, phones, and trips with district funds. They used categorical funds for non-categorical purposes and justified these to the staff and public as necessary to raise test scores, which sadly, they did not.

[okie01]

"It appears you do know of the West Fresno district by your comments."

Not specifically. But I've seen the same story play out here in Texas and with depressing frequency over in Alabama, when I lived there.

One rural school district, in Camden, AL, built an elaborate palace of a high school. Then, couldn't pay their light bill. And, within a few years, the structure itself started crumbling -- having been built of sub-standard materials by, you guessed it, a minority contractor.

[Gritty]

The state is required by its own laws to rescue sinking school districts because children are entitled to free public education

Suck it up, Kali. There's goin' to be a lot more of the same before this is all over with. After all, Kalifornia uses Million Man Math to do their state budgeting too!

To paraphrase PJ O'Rourke: "If you think public education is expensive now, just wait until it's "free"!"

[CyberAnt]

This is good - I only hope people with purpose and finances can step in and put the schools under private status. It may be one way to prove to the public of CA that their dollars were not being used to educate their children.

The more schools which go bankrupt the better!! Let the private section take over and give our children a badly needed upgraded education.