Posted on 04/07/2002 12:51:42 PM PDT by southernnorthcarolina
MONROE - The Union County school board on Tuesday night will discuss a preliminary budget that asks for about 18 percent more in county money.
The budget proposal, released Friday, calls for about $21.8 million in local funds, or about $3.3 million more than the school district received this fiscal year.
School board Chairwoman Carolyn Lowder said most of the increase would go toward keeping up with increases in student enrollment and closing the achievement gap between white and minority students. Lowder, who is on the committee that helped create the proposal, said she believes the budget request is lean.
"I feel like it's really what we need just to maintain the current level of services," Lowder said. "With the state budget crunch being handed on down to the counties, we're trying to be as conservative as possible and still let the commissioners and public know what our needs are."
School board members will discuss the proposal Tuesday night and the budget and finance committee will meet Thursday. Committee members can then make recommendations for changes based on comments from the board, Lowder said.
The board will is scheduled to vote on the budget at its May 7 meeting, she said, and forward it to the county commissioners, who have the final say over the local portion of the district's budget.
Last year, the commissioners funded the district's entire request of an 18.5 percent increase in its operating budget.
The request for an 18% increase, on top of last year's 18.5%, is disturbing enough. But what really is getting tiresome is the constant mantra of "we must close the achievement gap." I can't help but come away with the impression that Ms. Lowder would rather have the "gap" narrowed than have overall scores and achievement improve.
There are, it seems to me, two ways to attempt to "narrow the gap." We can strive to increase the scores and achievement levels of the bottom tier (often accomplished simply by dumbing down the standardized tests, as is happening with the SATs), or we can reduce the advanced course offerings which are aimed at the achievers.
Resources are, as ever, finite. I would submit that you get more bang for the buck by increasing course offerings and programs for the best and brightest. Spend massively on more remedial courses, and what do you get? At best, a Burger King cashier who can actually make change. Direct those dollars toward advanced courses, and you might play a role in launching an entreprenuerial career.
To be grossly politically incorrect, "achievement gaps" are good things. You'll always have your low achievers (due to lack of motivation, or pure old fashioned stupidity), no matter how many tax dollars you throw at them. Don't we want our top students to have as large a scoring/achievement gap over these unfortunates as possible?
The public schools are good at wasting tons of dollars and "socializing" children to believe in Marxism and Marxist doctrines. Other than that they are nothing more than a very expensive babysitting service. They have long outlived their usefulness and need to have the plug pulled on them posthaste.
You might be interested in this link to an interesting FR article posted the other day. It's about the Superior Court ruling on NC public education which states in part:
RALEIGH - A Superior Court judge ripped state leaders Thursday and ordered them to take definitive steps to ensure every child gets an adequate public school education.
N.C. leaders must put a certified teacher in every classroom, respond more quickly and emphatically to failing schools, and ensure that every child has the resources to perform at least at grade level, Wake County Judge Howard Manning wrote. Such steps are necessary for the state to meet its constitutional mandate to give every child a "sound basic education," he said in his final ruling in the landmark Leandro school-funding lawsuit
The Federal Government has been collecting statistics on black student achievement since the early 70's. Despite massive amounts of money, even more hand-wringing and curricula tweaking, and a whole new generation that never knew Jim Crow laws, this "achievement gap" HAS NOT CHANGED in 30 years! Black highschool seniors still score - on average - at the same level as white 13-year olds.
The stubborn refusal to admit that there is an approximately 15-point gap between average black IQ and average white IQ is wasting billions of dollars and millions of hours of teaching time, and breeding resentment and low self-esteem among blacks.
Excellent point.
And when they get tired of trying to raise black achievement scores, they'll settle for lowering white achievement scores by funneling all the money to "diversity training" and remedial classes. Either way, the socialists will be happy, since egalitarianism is an essential ingredient for a peaceful, socialist utopia.
Something is afoot.
I wonder what their spending is per student and how that relates to neighboring districts.
Seeing that most states have a state contribution to the total local funding that are based on local wealth it is quite possible that this area had a large influx of local wealth and as such doesn't qualify for as much state aid.
To dumb down curriculum to narrow a gap is mindless!
Can someone explain jst what the Hell this alledged "gap" really is...and why? I cannot fathom it at all.
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