Doooood! This toootally crazy article in the Herald-Advocate was all, "Fresh off last year's successful referendum, the Park Ridge-Niles District 64 school board is considering adding more administrative staff at a cost of more than $200,000 per year."
Whoooaa! What a toootal freak out, man! Superintendant Sally Pryor and Assistant Superintendent for Student Learning Diane Betts rapped the rush for this bad scene. Now that District 64 has some major bread coming through from the referendum, Pryor and Betts are toootally buzzed! But like, it's sooooo toootally bug to bogart new revenue for an administrative love-in.
We thought it was righteous that Board President Sue Runyon tuned in and turned on to the funky stuff and said, "When we talk about adding administrators, we have to talk about the public relations component," she said. "At the referendum, we didn't talk about adding administrators."
Doooood! Far out! You found the steering wheel for the karma bus! So like, now you've got to toootally hit the breaks on this bummer of an idea. And you may be diggin' it alone, because it sounds like C'man Mollet is ready to get it on by suggesting that "Carpenter Elementary School be among the schools considered for added administrative staff." While J'man Heyde is maybe like spaced out?
Board member Heyde said, "he would support the measure, but only if it worked financially with a long-term budget. "I think we are asking a lot of our principals and we are asking a lot of our administrators," Heyde said. "At the same time, we also have fiscal responsibility piece. (sic) We promised the community we'd go another 10 years without another referendum."
Dooooooooood. It's not just about the bread, man. It's like toootally about what's good for education! Like, if you are going to be trippin' on new hires, then it would be toootally groovy to spread the love to new teachers; reduce class sizes even further. Past board members researched class size for when the school board told the community that increasing class size was cool, because you'd have to reduce clase size to like 17 kids per teacher for the kids to benefit from smaller class sizes. So like, why not do that? We think that would toootally stoke the kids and the cats running the classes too. Like, toootally!
February 20, 2008
That Crazy Karma School Bus!
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20 comments:
Is PRU arguing for less money wasted on more administrators, or is it saying that it's okay to spend the money on more administrators so long as it also spends more money on more teachers?
Sounds like D-64 is already on its way to spending all the extra money we're giving them, and more. When I think about incompetent local elected officials, D-64 seems to always win: At least the City Council has a couple of aldermen who have a clue, as does the Park Board. But D-64 doesn't have anybody with any sense of what they should be doing. Scary!
We are saying that if the district chooses to spend money on hiring personnel, then it may want to consider spending that money on personnel that most directly benefit students; the whole reason d64 was created in the first place.
I wouldn't say that District 64 is too top heavy with administrators but I do feel that the students and teachers should be the top priority.
We always wonder how they are always running out of money. Here is the answer. More stupid spending.
My numbers might be a little off, but instead of going to referendum to raise taxes 5 years ago D-64 made about $10 million in cuts while telling us it didn't hurt the quality of education. Since the referendum passed, all they've done is restore things previously cut and plan for more expenses. More stupid spending by stupid administrators and board members.
I never thought of it like that before. Parents were told the cuts wouldn't hurt the quality of education and I thought that meant that nothing too important was cut. But now those cuts are being put back and they are talking about adding more costs? If those things that were cut weren't needed then why are they putting them back?
To me, this means adding additional pensions to the already costly pension system.
As I asked during the push for the tax increase, how much of the current budget is spent on pensions? I never received a straight answer.
To spend another $200,000 on administrative costs that do not directly benefit the students is negligent and irresponsible-a pattern with this district.
This is a district that collects over $200 in book fees per students in grades 1-5, then tells the teachers there is no money in the budget for individual student work books to be purchased. The students instead receive photocopies of the pages from the book to complete. How can paper, toner, depreciation on a copy machine and the salary paid to the person making the copies be cheaper than the paperback workbooks? What was the $212 book fee spent on if not on books for my child?
This is a school district that pays the superintendent a reported $220,000 salary and benefits per year but does not have the money to pay for building maintenance. The PTO's of the schools are then left to raise the money needed to maintain a clean and healthy environment for our children.
This is a school board and administration that was able to convince the enough taxpayers of D64 that it needed the money from the referendum to keep the quality of education in D64 at the level the voting taxpayers/parents expect and now wants to spend $200,000 per year on adminstrators who are not on the front line of educating our children. With this kind of irresponsible decision making regarding the budget-D64 will be back for another referendum and more of our tax dollars in a couple of years.
Just as PRU encourages taxpayers to let City Hall know they are watching and not happy with how our City is being run-please contact D64 and let them know you are watching and paying attention. Maybe if enough voting taxpayers speak up the D64 board members will think and will not be so cavalier and irresponsible in how they spend our money.
We encourage all taxpayers and citizens to pay attention and let all their elected representatives know how they feel.
So there!
No need to be so snippy-just wanted PRU to continue to emphasize the need to pay attention and keep questioning. And thanks for all the information.
Snippy?! SNIPPY?!
Irreverent, dammit! Unrepentant too!
Blogger comment box needs some damn smiley icons, dammit!
OK-irreverent and unrepentant and a bit snippy.
Just a bit snippy? Not full snippy? DAMN!
Why does District 207 (Maine Township Highschools) continue to shine with plenty of money in the budget and excellent programs? The difference is the Administration and the school board. District 207 never comes back crying for more money or making excuses for poor testing scores. We need to look at the qualities of those serving on the District 207 school board. Those are the type of people we need to recruit to run for District 64 next time around!
I would encourage everyone who has an opinion about the 12 additional administrators the district wants to hire for next year to come to the next board meeting on Monday, Feb. 25th 7:30pm at Carpenter School.
Anonymous February 21, 2008 8:43 AM
Sorry for being late to this party, but the answer to your question about why District 207's finances are better than District 64s is that 207 - which includes some of Niles and a lot of Des Plaines - has a lot more money per pupil than 64.
The quality of school board candidate does not appear to be all that different, in no small measure because most (if not all) of them are picked by the same jamokes: The school caucus.
About the pension issue: All District 64 teachers pay into the state pension system out of their own pockets. 9.5 percent of their gross. The Board pays nothing.
Anon@10AM on 3-2-08,
We sure hope you aren't a math teacher.
I'm sorry, but I don't understand what the "math teacher" reference means. I assume it was meant to be clever (maybe "snippy?", but too clever for me. I don't get it.
Is that completely snippy, or just a bit snippy?
If you say we're completely snippy you may inspire PRU.Admin to make some time to come and play with you, assuming you're a masochist and you're into that sort of thing.
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