State of the State - case closed, money is bad for schools

[michigancat]

Yeah, I don't believe her stat about math/football, and I don't think anyone considers sports as a "main mission" of schools as she asserts. she shouldn't even mention it and should focus on elevating the teaching profession IMO.

link to these claims/stats?

It's in the podcast I linked to. I'll look for the stats

[Kat Kid]

Like I don't even know where to start with the 5x as much on football as math.  It is absurd on its face.

Total construction budget of football stadia in a district + equipment/facilities/maintenance + coaching/administrative salaries + transportation + substitutes

is nowhere near the cost of
all math faculty + curriculum/materials + facilities even leaving out the administrators/support staff

Like it is at a minimum an incredibly dishonest distortion of an actual school district's budget.  My guess?  It is some sort of incredibly lazy aggregate spending dollar figure that she has found because it fits her narrative.

[michigancat]

I found this (from the same author that was on the podcast):

Football at Premont cost about $1,300 a player. Math, by contrast, cost just $618 a student

n many schools, sports are so entrenched that no one—not even the people in charge—realizes their actual cost. When Marguerite Roza, the author of Educational Economics, analyzed the finances of one public high school in the Pacific Northwest, she and her colleagues found that the school was spending $328 a student for math instruction and more than four times that much for cheerleading—$1,348 a cheerleader.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/10/the-case-against-high-school-sports/309447/

Can't her point be made without distorting facts? It just makes me dislike her and question everything she says.

[Kat Kid]

The key word there is per student.  What does that mean? 

It would be incredibly dishonest to use "per student" to mean "per student participating" and then take the amount of money that it costs to field the football teams each year vs. the amount of students enrolled in math and the costs for that.

If that isn't the trick, then they are leaving out tons of costs on the math side.

[Kat Kid]

"Football at Premont cost about $1,300 a player. Math, by contrast, cost just $618 a student."

Yep that is exactly what they did.

[Kat Kid]

They saved $150,000/yr.  By suspending all sports for an entire high school.  That isn't nothing, but for comparison, one large Kansas district is attempting to save over $1 million/yr by cutting back on the electric bill.

[michigancat]

Like I said before I listened to the podcast - it's a red herring. This thread is evidence.

[CNS]

Well, there you go.  Cut my suggestion of sports and stick to my first suggestion of facilities. 

There are plenty of contractors out there that sell new MEP equipt to schools that have a quick ROI.  Before I left my last job, the company was establishing a partnership with a local MEP designer and then offer to design replacement MEP systems, install new equipt, finance the cost over a 10yr period, and the utility savings over first ten yrs would pay for the cost of the work.  I have no idea how it worked out since I left, but basically, other than maint, it is like free new stuff for 10 yrs, and afterward huge savings. 

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

"hey, our children are fat and lazy, any ideas?''

"well, in the fall we could spend 5x our math budget to ship the largest males off to other schools to ram into the largest males at those schools.  then in the winter, the tallest males and females could jump up and down beneath metal hoops until a suitable fraction have ankle and knee problems.  in the spring, the ones with the best hand eye coordination can use a club to try to hit a small ball thrown at them by whatever child in a nearby town has the best throwing ability.  the children can take turns with the hitting, they can sit on a bench and chew stuff while they wait.''

"males and females?"

"the females should use a larger ball."

[john "teach me how to" dougie]

They saved $150,000/yr.  By suspending all sports for an entire high school.  That isn't nothing, but for comparison, one large Kansas district is attempting to save over $1 million/yr by cutting back on the electric bill.

that's total compensation for one tenured California teacher.

[ednksu]

I mean the fact that every major professional group in Kansas didn't support Brownback should have been to tell you neocons he was a sinking ship, these next few years will.  Good news, this will only set Kansas behind states like Oklahoma. 

Its also nice to base your policies on counterfactuals and when those are proven dead wrong go back to change the original narrative or obfuscate the truth with quips. 

Yeah guys lets keep plowing along this road because even though the last few YEARS haven't worked, eventually, maybe, someday, one of Sam's policies might work. How rough ridin' long do these test on taxation and economic policy have to go on before they are proven wrong?  How many more years of failure before with give this up?

Here is the reality, the tax bullshit isn't working.  The state is now going to strip the funding for its most valuable resources to cover that bullshit.  Why would a company move here when the roads are crumbling and we produce citizens with the intellectual capacity of door stops?

Blather blather blather. The best "consequence" of lower taxes you can come up with is "stripping the funding for its msot valuable resources" (not specific enough to even refute), "crumbling roads" (our roads are just fine and we're still doing plenty of maintenance and new construction) and "dumb kids" (whether we spend $12k or $14k per kid doesn't have jackshit to do with how much they learn - it's how you spend it).

But seriously, let's raise taxes. If there's one thing that will draw more people and jobs to Kansas, it's higher...

eff you can't have a conversation can you. 

How many decades of economic data do we need before you admit that slashing taxes like you neo-cons want to do, does nothing to help the economy?  How many sacks do you Laffer Curve nut jobs need dragged across your face before you say you are wrong?

The keynsian European welfare state is clearly the better model!!!!  Real life data proves it!!!!!

It's cute when Edna quips about economics.

Thanks for the strawman instead of defending your decried economics.  I'll take that as a tap out. 


I mean if you really want to get your system against "mine" I'll gladly talk gilded age versus Keynesian.

"Strawman"!!!!

It's cute how the libtards immediate retort to every fact raised that completely undermines their unfounded point of view is "strawman". Never once has that term been correctly used by the libtarded.

We come to Fantasy Land, population partisan drone libtards

I seriously think you're mentally disabled.  Like I hope you live in a group home.

You can't inoculate against a position and then give a textbook definition of that position.  You created an argument to argue against when nothing like it was mentioned.  Its like saying anyone who mentions Godwin doesn't know what the eff he is talking about and then going on a rant about how Germany got so much right in the late 30s and 40s with their "reforms". 

Seriously rough ridin' stupid.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

I think I've come up with a good way to improve student test scores without spending more money. Might even save money.

My young kids go to public school. Supposedly a "good one." Lots of fancy computers and iPads in all the rooms. They let them play video games on them during recess. Not educational "games" but stupid crap like temple run. On school iPads. They're even allowed to bring their own iPads from home , and many kids just play those during outside recess and the bus. Maybe we should actually make kids engage in physical or intellectual activities while at school. Start there.

My son told me the best game on the school iPads is Subway Surfer, a game similar to temple run in which you are a graffiti artist trying to tag trains while being chased by the cops. Nice.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

My point back a few pages was this absurd notion that keeps getting propagated that increasing education spending automatically improves the education process.   In some cases it only gives administrators license to create more and more worthless administrators who have zero impact on actually improving the education of students.

Right. Plus buying all these toys that are just making kids dumber.

[michigancat]

My point back a few pages was this absurd notion that keeps getting propagated that increasing education spending automatically improves the education process.

no one says that

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

My point back a few pages was this absurd notion that keeps getting propagated that increasing education spending automatically improves the education process.

no one says that

No, but many say that we need to spend more to give our kids a quality education, which is almost as stupid.

[Kat Kid]

They saved $150,000/yr.  By suspending all sports for an entire high school.  That isn't nothing, but for comparison, one large Kansas district is attempting to save over $1 million/yr by cutting back on the electric bill.

that's total compensation for one tenured California teacher.

Salary + benefits + pension for a 20+ year employee?  Probably so.

[ednksu]

My point back a few pages was this absurd notion that keeps getting propagated that increasing education spending automatically improves the education process.   In some cases it only gives administrators license to create more and more worthless administrators who have zero impact on actually improving the education of students. 

Dax the problem is that you have districts like 501 with no tax base, no special local option taxes, etc to fund the schools which have Ipads for every kid to use at recess.  For christ sake Topeka West High School ran out of money for copy paper 5/8th through the school year a few years ago.  You are better, but I know KSUWs, Fakes, and Johns of this board can't see past their white, middle class, suburban privileged noses to see that poor districts are the ones who are hurting. Rural districts are hurting, inner city districts are hurting.  You know how taxes play a role into those equations.  The average per pupil keeps these districts on life support, not spending money like a drunken sailor on ipads. 

[Kat Kid]

I think I've come up with a good way to improve student test scores without spending more money. Might even save money.

My young kids go to public school. Supposedly a "good one." Lots of fancy computers and iPads in all the rooms. They let them play video games on them during recess. Not educational "games" but stupid crap like temple run. On school iPads. They're even allowed to bring their own iPads from home , and many kids just play those during outside recess and the bus. Maybe we should actually make kids engage in physical or intellectual activities while at school. Start there.

My son told me the best game on the school iPads is Subway Surfer, a game similar to temple run in which you are a graffiti artist trying to tag trains while being chased by the cops. Nice.

Your school retains ownership of the iPads or do students?  I'd go ahead and double check the acceptable use contract your son and you signed to be sure you aren't in violation before you fire off that letter to the school board.

[Kat Kid]

My point back a few pages was this absurd notion that keeps getting propagated that increasing education spending automatically improves the education process.   In some cases it only gives administrators license to create more and more worthless administrators who have zero impact on actually improving the education of students.

Right. Plus buying all these toys that are just making kids dumber.

LOL

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

I think I've come up with a good way to improve student test scores without spending more money. Might even save money.

My young kids go to public school. Supposedly a "good one." Lots of fancy computers and iPads in all the rooms. They let them play video games on them during recess. Not educational "games" but stupid crap like temple run. On school iPads. They're even allowed to bring their own iPads from home , and many kids just play those during outside recess and the bus. Maybe we should actually make kids engage in physical or intellectual activities while at school. Start there.

My son told me the best game on the school iPads is Subway Surfer, a game similar to temple run in which you are a graffiti artist trying to tag trains while being chased by the cops. Nice.

Your school retains ownership of the iPads or do students?  I'd go ahead and double check the acceptable use contract your son and you signed to be sure you aren't in violation before you fire off that letter to the school board.

No, I didn't explain it properly. Some bring their own electronics from home, but the classroom has iPads that stay there. They don't go home with students. They've got stupid games on them like subway surfer. And teachers are letting them play those games during recess.

[michigancat]

case closed, money is bad for schools

[sys]

It would be incredibly dishonest to use "per student" to mean "per student participating" and then take the amount of money that it costs to field the football teams each year vs. the amount of students enrolled in math and the costs for that.

it's also disingenuous (not dishonest) to talk about the health benefits of organized scholastic sports, when only a small % of self-selected students participate.

[sys]

They saved $150,000/yr.  By suspending all sports for an entire high school.  That isn't nothing, but for comparison, one large Kansas district is attempting to save over $1 million/yr by cutting back on the electric bill.

that's total compensation for one tenured California teacher.

did they fire the fball coach who also pretends to teach classes in his spare time?

[michigancat]

It would be incredibly dishonest to use "per student" to mean "per student participating" and then take the amount of money that it costs to field the football teams each year vs. the amount of students enrolled in math and the costs for that.

it's also disingenuous (not dishonest) to talk about the health benefits of organized scholastic sports, when only a small % of self-selected students participate.

I'm not on NPR making my case, nor have I written a book on the subject or claim to be an expert.

I would easily be swayed in favor of eliminating all scholastic sports with a little better data on costs, how they are funded, and the impact they make on students. You've made very good points against scholastic sports (and all sports in general). However, in this particular discussion I think it takes attention away from more important reforms.

[sys]

it's a sideshow.  i agree with you on that.