Very proud of OK teachers. 25 to 30 thousand rally in capitol.

[madfloridian]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024778282

That takes courage. Good for them.

[NYC_SKP]

1. Wow!

That's quite a turnout!

[avebury]

2. My problem with education fundiing in Oklahoma

is the fact that the existing budget is not effectively managed. Considering the population of Oklahoma, there are way way too many school districts resulting in way too much money going to pay administrative costs versus going into the classroom. There is no amount of money that will ever make the teachers happy. You could give them 100% of the state's budget, the lottery money, and whatever money you can dig up and they will never ever be happy. As it stands, they already get over 50% of the state's budget.


If there is one way to really upset state employees it is when the state legislature contemplates merging the State Employee Retirement System with the Teacher's Retirement System. State employees don't want the teachers allowed anywhere near their retirement system because the teachers are draining their system at a faster pace then the rate that the state employee's fund is being reduced.

[madfloridian]

3. Greedy teachers...they are never satisfied. Fire them all.

Turn schools over to private companies who will really teach the children well.

[avebury]

4. There is nothing wrong with expecting tax payer

dollars be spend wisely. Teachers should be fighting to get the number of school districts reduced to cut back on administrative salaries. Additional administrative costs, purchasing, computer, etc. can also be consolidated into a smaller amount of regional officers. The result of more efficient spending is that there is more money made available to put into the classroom.

As a state employee I have watched the state move to consolidate smaller agencies under the umbrellas of OMES to cut back on costs. A lot of functions have been consolidated under the Oklahoma Management Enterprise System, a now huge super-agency that has worked well in some areas, not so well in others. Budget cuts are routinely shoved down the throats of state agencies.

We have a Governor and State Legislature that wants to cut taxes and cut budgets. Where on earth do you expect them to then come up with more and more funding for Education? There area also vital state agencies that required funding was well. As long as the Republicans and Tea Party crowd control Oklahoma you can expect to continue to see deterioration in Education funding and state services. That is just a sad fact of life.

[madfloridian]

5. Follow the educaton money.

Then get back to me.

[avebury]

7. A co-worker was telling me about a young lady who

went to school with her daughter. This girl was on the school newspaper and decided to do a filler story on School Administrative Costs in the the school districts around Oklahoma City. What started out as a probably dull story picked up steam when she realized what she was going to have to do through to get the information administrative costs from the State Dept. Education. She ended up writing two stories, one on the original story line and the second on what it took to get the information. The school refused to print either story so she made copies and distributed it around herself. I used to have a copy by threw it away a while back. It was pretty interesting and you could understand why the school did not want the information getting around. I have to admit, the amount of administrative positions and costs actually shocked me. Most schools generally have one Principal and one Vice Principal. There were schools that actually had a Principal for every grade level (in the same building). Which School District was the biggest offenders regarding Administrative costs? You guessed it, the school district that the girl was in. The numbers don't lie. Why on earth are we paying to employ so many upper lever administrative personnel when we need money for the classrooms? Just looking at the information the girl got from the Dept. of Education really made you sit up and take notice that money is routinely diverted from the classrooms to administration.

[avebury]

6. I should have also mentioned that you have no clue

just how much money the Oklahoma State Legislature wastes every session. Their focus is not on how to make Oklahoma attractive to business, it is not about improving education, and so on. It is all about what unconstitutional law can they try to put on the books and then have our State Attorney General defend it in the inevitable court case. Not long after I moved here the most controversial issue was whether or not to ban cockfighting. Yes cockfighting. Then Sally Kern wanted to try to pass a bill that would have denied funding to PUBLIC libraries if they did not BAN certain types of books. Then there is the 10 Commandment Monument law (with a built in defense fund). If you have to build in a defense fund into a law that is a pretty good sign that you know that your law is unconstitutional. The law to ban sharia law (they prefer to have the Christian version of Sharia law). Kern tried to pass another law that included trying to dictate who might be able to speak at a public assembly in school (only Class Leaders, Merit Scholars, Team Captains, etc.). If a student is not a somebody, she didn't want them speaking at a school rally. Governor Fallin hates the little people. She does not want them to have health insurance. She doesn't want them to earn a decent wage or to earn annual and/or sick leave. But she probably will sign the bill giving the Highway Troopers their raise (it must be the fond memories that she had with one of her State Trooper guards when she was Lt. Gov.).