See ‘Interested’s’ comment after the article “The Defeat of Reason…” and other like comments that he (almost certainly not a she) has left.
“Have you read any books on educational theory?”
‘Interested’ I’d like to answer your question and ask you a few in return. You ask why parents of school children did not support the Amendment. I’m sure parents did support the amendment- the question really is, why does it appear as if some parents voted “no” at the polls? Part of the answer to that question is that parents have limited information. The only newspaper in town is littered with inaccuracies. Both sides of an issue are never explored in any depth. Parents can’t get accurate Minutes to town meetings because they are not posted on web sites or easily obtainable. All the parents I know work for a living and can’t attend meetings that run to midnight. They hear (or hear about) uninformed ranting citizens at Town Meetings who have a questionable level of understanding of what Prop 46 actually says. This is about communication; this is not about parents sharing your opinions and questioning accountability.
You appear to be uninformed about public education in general, but specifically the Woodstock education system. You are not to be blamed for this. The lack of accurate communication is an issue. Your comments suggest to me that you are a business person- with perhaps a finance backround. In my experience, an average citizen with a business backround often assumes that education is a “business”. Likening an educational system to a factory and a child as a product, as you have done, is an inappropirate analogy. Lets stop that. There is no ‘product’ as a result of education and no monetary value in a child. There is no balance sheet at the end of the term that shows profit or loss or cost of goods sold. There is merely a human being who hopefully learned to think, reason, and communicate well enough to perpetuate a responsible society that can best govern its needs. If that was easy to evaluate, there wouldn’t be as many ways to measure how well or how poorly schools live up to their primary task. Quite simply, success is measured differently for each child and schools succeed in some way every day. Some children and some schools may be ‘average’ on one scale and extraordinary on another scale. Success, however measured costs money. Please stop trying to simplify the inherent uniqueness of education.
You believe the Board of Education is not accountable. I think the Board is highly accountable by design. As one entity, the Board puts its best effort forward to deliver a quality education for each child within the scope of its limitations and constraints. Prop 46 is a huge constraint. I think the Board could do a more effective job of spending money on education, dollar for dollar, if they did not have an arbitrary spending percentage dictated to them by a Board of Finance every year and for only that year, or an antiquated and artificial spending cap. To suggest that the Board is purposely trying to hurt students and parents with program cuts is blasphemy! There is very little left in the budget to cut. Because a school is not a factory, the Board can not just simply cut 50% of the “workers”, force them to take a pay cut, or do away with busses. There are mandates and regulations in place to insure we educate our children. The suggested cuts are the few items in the budget that are not regulated or mandated.
Now let me ask you a few questions: Do you have an advanced degree is school managagement or adminsitration? Have you ever earned a teachers certification and know what the requirements are to be a member of the profession? Do you know anything about CT State or federal law as it pertains to educational mandates that must be funded? Do you understand that CT law requires schools to be heated and lights to be turned on and thus, utility bills to be paid? Have you read any books on educational theory? Do you know what a curriculum coordinator does? Do you know what PBL is? Do you know the difference between an authentic assessment and a formidable assessment? If the answers are “no” to these questions, then you would better serve the community by trying to broaden your knowledge base before you make uneducated blanket statements about funding education in Woodstock. You might also take the position, along with many others, that you may never fully understand the entire educational system in our country, and in our town particularly. That is fine because no one can be an expert on everything. This is why we hire qualified, certified, and highly educated administrators full time to guide the educational system so it can be appropriately managed and accountable to its supporters.
What I do know is that you are obviously a product of public education. And that is why public education is failing around the country. The system will ultimately implode because of escalating fixed costs and unfunded mandates. The teachers unions have destroyed public education. One big problem with public education is that it is run by people with no business experience and have bought into the nonsense that money is the answer to all of our problems. That’s because public education has been able to extort money out of Americans by threatening them with their child’s education and being lulled into thinking rising property values means rising taxes are a form of property value protection. The children in our school system can’t spell, write a composition and their math facts are horrendous. Just try to get change from a teenager if they don’t have a calculator or cash register to do it for them. Your school system is full of wasted spending and poor results. Your only answer is to keep taking money from property owners. Reval will seriously affect lower income and middle income homeowners this time. Small houses and water front (Bungay) values have grown the most. Plus under Prop 46 taxes can still go up 1 mil which translates to about 6.5% in peoples taxes. You seem to have forgotten to tell the public this in your story. And by the way I have vast experience and knowledge of the Woodstock school system and national education. I’m just not a brain-washed individual being paid by the educational system in America.
There you go again, ‘Interested’. You make these sweeping statements, accusations, and intimations that are SO SO inaccurate and all-encompassing as though the world is coming to an end, or is it “the sky is falling”. Your handle ought to be “Chicken Little”. You say, “The children in our school system can’t spell, write a composition and their math facts are horrendous.” I ask, “Which children?” Here’s some of the verbage you spew from one sentence to the next, “failing, implode, destroyed, extort, threatening, lulled, brainwashed,…” and phrases like “One big problem, bought into nonsense, horrendous, full of wasted spending,…” Sounds like you’re having some sort of bad dream. Maybe you ought to take some deep breaths, and go lay down.
Interested, whenever anyone describes his own experience as “vast” my BS detector starts clanging.
You are correct that the teachers union is part of the problem, nationally as well as in Woodstock, but our local problems with funding and growth are larger than that.
Kudos Cyssan!!! If you are the ‘product of public education’ (as ‘Interested’ accuses), I want every kid in Town to read your statement and know your educational path. I applaud your statement … and I am sure that the multitude of visitors to this site today feel the same way as I do. I know of one school kid who reads this site and hope that more are following this commentary to understand the strains being imposed upon the school system… and to understand both sides of the argument. For students, this would be a good education in local civics.
‘Interested’ – You are neither interested, nor interesting. Can you get off your soap box long enough to listen to yourself? You sound ridiculous. It’s obvious that you learned how to argue and bully at some point in your life – you certainly never learned how to have a rational discussion. Remember, “Ignorance is bliss.”
Hey “interested”..or should I say “Ernie”? Gee- you sure sound like him! Anyway, our Woodstock kids do just fine INSPITE of the lack of funding. Your statements and generalities are about as true as me saying “all” the cheap people in town are “stupid”. They arent all stupid, they are just cheap! Now about what I think of you……..
This is a very unusual situation. For a bunch of educated people you don’t even understand the outcome of the Prop 46 vote. The citizens of Woodstock are sending you a message which your high quality education obviously prevents you from understanding. Even the parents of the school children voted against the Amendment or did not bother to vote at all, which is a form of a vote. Your BOE has been acting very irresponsibly for the past 2 years and have not done due diligence with their budgets. The people are fed up and won’t give you any more money until you clean up your act. You are such fervent special interest people you can’t even question your own budgets or the behavior of your BOE. Why don’t you become objective and start looking into the house of cards that is your education budget. The statement that the budget is lean is like saying the fat lady at the circus is skinny. At the last BOE meeting they are finally proposing to look at all the issues we have been bringing up for years. Why don’t you make them follow through and get some real answers. When you finally answer questions from the citizenry maybe they will give you money for better programs not just more money for a mediocre product of education.
Interested, You are clearly over-interpreting the vote. It would be interesting to put other budgetary items up for a referendum like the Selectmen salaries as suggested by the article on the right. What do you think would be the outcome of that vote? It would be interesting to have your answer as I believe you were in that position at one time (see comment by “Whitey”). The sentiments of Mr. Cinquanta suggest that any budgetary item may be voted down by a landslide. Does this make it right? I don’t think so.
At least you people are consistent. Always look in other places for money, ie government side of the budget, Woodstock Academy, increased taxes, etc, etc, etc. Never ever can the Education Mafia look in the mirror and conduct a self examination. The reason you won’t look at your own budget is you are scared to death the public might find out just how incompetent your BOE, BOF and Superintendent really are. You’re budget is a house of cards that can not stand scrutiny. Every time a comment is made about looking into your spending, the subject is changed and attacks are made against the person asking the questions. No wonder the citizens of Woodstock won’t give you any more money. I thought the purpose of this website was to exchange ideas and did’t care who was saying them. I guess your level of education prevents you from exploring the world of ideas and the truth. Is your pastime to just discredit everything Ernie Wetzel says. Unfortunately for you he has been and is very effective.
It’s interesting (no pun intended) that you equate the suggestion that you are “over-interpreting the vote” as an attack on you. It’s a criticism of your statement. The only comments here dripping with sarcasm and using the words and phrases like “education mafia” are yours.
A person who is very passionate about a particular cause can take two paths. One is anger, the other is optimism. One path leads to destruction, the other to production. At every fork in the road, a choice between the two paths must be made. Prop 46 is the fork in the road. Keep the passion, make the right choice. Take the challenge. Let’s make our school system lean, but mean. Lets show that we can provide an excellent education without having to raise taxes. Let’s become the Jet Blue of Windham county. It can be done. We can have it all. Just get back to basics. Strong dicipline and parental accountability cost nothing. Strong English, Maths, Science, and History. Increase the amount of homework. Class sizes up to 30 with parental contracts on disciplinary actions. The rest is fluff. Connecticut Mastery tests which establish school ranking pays no attention to art, gym, and music. They are nice, but not necessary. Self Pay for sports, Self Pay for school bus transportation, Self Pay for music or art lessons if those services are desired. Special Ed. is funded by the State. Enrichment programs provided by PTO and Woodstock First greatly appreciated. Establish other volunteer programs in the schools where the elderly might partake and offer free meals in cafeteria for exchange of services. Volunteers play a huge part in the hospital setting and save dramatically on services that would otherwise be salaried out. Keep the passion, make the right choices.
Dear Optimistic, We already are the Jet Blue of Windham County!
ASHFORD – 81/169
BROOKLYN – 144/169
CANTERBURY – 42/169
CHAPLIN- 18/169
EASTFORD – 35/169
HAMPTON – 17/169
KILLINGLY – 98/169
PLAINFIELD – 126/169
POMFRET- 126/169
PUTNAM – 39/169
SCOTLAND – 31/169
STERLING – 118/169
THOMPSON – 160/169
WINDHAM – 36/169
WOODSTOCK – 164/169
Special Ed is NOT funded by the state until the individual costs exceed 4.5 times the normal per pupil spending. That means until a special ed student costs us more than $38,641 the state doesn’t kick in anything and then the state only pays the excess over that threshold.
Volunteers in the schools would have to be finger printed & have background checks. Finger prints cost $25, background checks cost around $200 (I think). Then they would have to be managed/organized/ and covered by liability insurance. It would be illegal for them to do anything that the teachers do.
The cafeterias are self supporting. Other than salaries, the district has no costs. Free meals would be out of the question. Most of the volunteer positions in hospitals would not be salaried out, a portion yes, but not body for body.
“Interested”….(are there two of you?) Is this theater, or are you serious about saving money?. Here are some of my suggestions to add to your list:- have everyone take turns to clean up the town beach and have a pay as you go system or permit system. (the town beach is worth $20,000.00 a year.). Let the recreation director and her “budget” go- thats $14.000.00 a year(she just organizes the Roseland Cottage Concerts anyway- and they should be the product of grants-not the tax payers). Close Town Hall on fridays- or one day a week- dont know that effect in dollars (Eastford does). There is a male custodian at the Elementary school NOTORIOUS for calling in sick and standing around socializing- lets let him go and have volunteers pick up his slack- his salary is about 25,000.00 a year. Does this help any?>
I’d point out to Optimistic that Woodstock First is some sort of political group. I think the Woodstock Education Foundation is what is looking to support school enrichment.
Is everything beyond English, Math, Science and History really “fluff”? What do you think being educated means? I think it includes at least some exposure to art and music and for many kids sports is an important motivator as well as improving fitness. Rote learning has its place but we need to include the things that promote creativity as well. Of course the waste needs to be wrung out of the system – and I won’t argue with the cps folks about teacher abuse of sick days – but we shouldn’t try to just meet the minimum, we are a wealthy enough town with bright enough kids to be able to do better than this. Others manage and we can too. The idea behind public education is that it is just that-the community supports it. Extra fees for what should be part of the school experience are inappropriate.
Clapper, Under the current restraints of Prop 46, Yes, everything beyond English, Maths, Science, and History IS fluff. I agree that exposure to Art, Music, Gym is wonderful. Were it not for Prop 46, I would support those programs 100%, but that is not the case. Therefore, if we are to make cuts, it should be in those areas. Rote learning? Since when is English, Maths, Science, and History rote learning? If done properly and done well, it is not rote. I am not suggesting that we meet the minimum, but we have to be realistic. We are not a wealthy town, the parents of most of the children do not really value education (check out the voting numbers), and the community does not support education. Those of us who value it are in the minority have to make the best of it and make difficult choices. Extra fees are totally appropriate. We The Bomb’s suggestions are good ideas and need to be part of the whole brainstorming process. People like fact finder are invaluable in taking ideas that some of us suggest and figuring out if they can work. I would argue that Woodstock is not the Jet Blue of Windham county. Jet Blue is a highly efficient company that provides as good service as the other airlines at much cheaper prices. We are not there yet, but we need to be thinking in those terms rather than whining and sinking the angry arguments with Interested, but angry.
If its really true that the community does not value education, and I still hope that’s not the case, I would much rather see programs offered on a pay-as-you-go basis than abandoned, but its still wrong to do that.
Do we want our kids flipping burgers for those whose parents thought sacrificng their beer budget in added taxes was worthwhile? That’s where we’re headed with this.
This response is to “interested” above and in reference to the “message” that he believes this past referendum conveys. I believe that the “message” is no more than an expression of ignorance and fear (ie: “my taxes will go up in the THOUSANDS”), and the simplest form of selfishness (ie: “I don’t care about the school system or property values- I’m going to die in my house anyway”). If people were thinking that the BOE and superintendent were crooked- as you suggest- then Livernois and Schultz- the biggestdrum beaters would have been elected last November. They were NOT!. Bright and hard working people who now serve, were elected. Again, your soap box about “education” is getting old- along with your outdated tapes and information. Our entire budget needs to be looked at- in detail- not just your pet peeve.
A message for “interested, but optimistic” , please change your name! Many people think that you and “interested” are one and the same, and I would hate for you to give “interested” ANY of your credibility.
FYI…in Massachusetts Towns…many familes pay individually for busing, music, etc. It would nice if everything were covered…but it certainly seems to be a logical alternative given the circumstances
[...] A most eliquent quote of Cyssan from his article at this site: “There is no ‘product’ as a result of education and no monetary value in a child (from the school’s point of view). There is no balance sheet at the end of the term that shows profit or loss or cost of goods sold. There is merely a human being who hopefully learned to think, reason, and communicate well enough to perpetuate a responsible society that can best govern its needs. If that was easy to evaluate, there wouldn’t be as many ways to measure how well or how poorly schools live up to their primary task. Quite simply, success is measured differently for each child and schools succeed in some way every day. Some children and some schools may be ‘average’ on one scale and extraordinary on another scale. Success, however measured costs money.� [...]
[...] We have heard much supportive commentary and vitriol about our public school system here at the Café, in the Villager, in numerous town meetings, and causal conversation among friends. Some people don’t like standard tests because these tests contain cultural, demographic, social, and cognitive biases. And I wish to refer all readers to the elegant statement by ‘Cyssan’ the value of our school system that cannot be measured by standard testing. Nevertheless, the results of such standard tests may provide certain insights into the efficacy of education systems. Furthermore, the federal government has mandated goals in education with achievement measured by standard testing. So the results of these statewide standardized tests are recognized both as a measure of performance of students and school systems. [...]
[...] I’ve commented in a previous article here at the Café on the importance of teachers and the indelible impact they have on children’s lives (see “It’s On You�). ‘Cysan’ has also written a memorable article on our school system and its immeasurable impact on our children. [...]
[...] And there have been, are, and will be times when the interests of our children are contrary to interests of the voting members of the community who elected us. It is those times when board members must look to their conscience and choose between taking the easy and expedient path to please those who vote versus executing on an agenda that best serves the students in the Woodstock school system, a system that includes Woodstock Elementary School, Woodstock Middle School and Woodstock Academy. ”…investment in the futures of our children is ultimately an investment in the economic health and well-being of the Community of Woodstock.” See this article published in February 2006. Also, see Cyssan’s view on the value of our education system. [...]
[...] This is why I often refer to Cyssan’s article that was published here at the Café well over a year ago. This article describes realistically and articulately what is accomplished in a good day’s work in our school system – it’s one of the best that the Café has published. However, I don’t want to stray too far into areas that I don’t fully understand, so back to what I have observed and learned. [...]
[...] see Cyssan’s view what’s important in our education [...]