I was noticing this morning that a facebook group “Make Education a Priority in South Dakota,” which has been closely watching the Education task force, had the organizer of the group making a few critical comments about the task force’s last meeting:
The complaining was about the group not being bold enough. And the very next post on the web site – coming after this lament – was very telling about the reality some of the critics are living in:
Yes, it’s a post asking people to support Bernie Sanders’ idea of “Free College to all Americans.” (Yay! Free stuff for all of us! Woo Hoo!)
The complaints about the task force not being bold enough and Bernie Sanders free stuff interestingly both have the same problem at their root. Someone is going to have to foot the bill for all these pipe dreams.
Socialist Bernie Sanders might want to give away college for everyone, but the rest of us will have to foot the bill. Amy Scott-Stoltz might want legislators to be bolder in their plan for schools, but the reality is that any proposal has to be created and passed in the realm of actuality, and not fantasyland.
Our legislators are going to have a difficult enough time swallowing a $75 million dollar plan for schools if it involves a major tax increase. There are those who will want more, but they’re also competing against those who want a lesser increase. And those who want none at all.
That was always the problem with SDEA in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. They wanted it all, and all at once, and damn anyone who said no. Look where it got them. Yes. It’s nice for your kid to want a pony, But when you live in the middle of town, there are issues of practicality, and mom and dad are going to say “Heck NO!”. And maybe that bicycle would have been a better choice before you pitched that fit, and got nothing.
Unlike the pipe dreams of people who are dreaming about utopia, the task force has to operate in the land of reality. And what they end up proposing may be bold – not in fantasyland terms, mind you – but in the terms of actual reality.
People have to vote on it. People have to pass the legislation. And taxpayers have to be able to swallow the cost when they’re asked to foot the bill.
Bold in reality may be difficult enough to accomplish in the atmosphere of limited funds and competing political needs. Those wanting more would be wise to keep that in mind before they set their hearts on that pony.
–had the organizer of the group
I bet that the organizer is the group!
Just like all people shouldn’t own a house, not all people should go to college. If you don’t have skin in the game, why should you try? The Democrats and others calling for free college don’t seem to understand that you are going to waste a lot of money on people who won’t contribute a doggone thing after they get their basket-weaving degree.
Another reason to go against it-Bernie Sanders is for it.
It is immoral to force hard-working blue collar stiffs to heavily (or fully) subsidize the educations of others who will use those degrees to make a lifetime of wealth far beyond the working stiffs who paid for it.
The Blue Ribbon Task Force was to come up with solutions and failed! Hopefully, the mainstream media will have the honesty to identify this undisputable fact.
All the Blue Ribbon Task Force wanted was more money, period. They didn’t want to look outside the box at different, more cost efficient ways to use the monies allocated to education, they didn’t want to address capital outlay levies, they didn’t want to address the disparity between administrator/athletic director salaries and actual teacher salaries. They simply wanted more money and more respect for teachers. Well, the respect issue is one result of the lack of values and respect learned at home and in the media; nothing to do with funding issues. I value education and educators. Maybe more of the monies directed at education should be at actual teachers, if that is the perceived problem, and not new buildings and new sports programs and associated costs. Put the athletics and extracurriculars outside of the school’s purview and there would be more money left for education. Consolidate administration districts under one administrative umbrella. And lastly, remember that most people in SD don’t get the salaries or the perks that teachers get; it’s simply a fact.
Agreed.
The lack of respect for the classroom teacher is a downward trend.
The incident in SC is indicative.:
The student refuse to stop texting.
Refused to leave the room.
Refused the administrators request,
Refused the officers request.
Officer attempts to arrest and handcuff her.
results:
Officer get fired.
Teaching delayed for another day.
Parent (not plural) emboldened to expect school to handle everything without any real power over child and without any disciplinary support.
Possible out of the box solutions:
1. Train teachers to subdue disruptive students, restrain them, and remove them from the classroom.
2. Immunize teachers and school from lawsuits for teachers acting in accord with their training.
3. Pay teachers for the training and the increased responsibilities.
Repeat this process for administrators-all of them.
Teachers will have more respect, if only to better manage classroom for all.
“Let us promote intelligence with our political decisions this year.” I agree! But that does not mean free college to everyone. I love listening to the man-on-the-street interviews with people who don’t know the names or political views of people running, but they will definitely vote for Obama/Hillary etc because of the free stuff attached to that vote. How would a free college education ever change that scenario?? But that is what the left is advocating.
Free College? Nothing is free! Does Bernie and his socialists have a time limit on when you must finish school by? Do they determine what you get a degree in? Otherwise we will have kids going to school and partying forever and never grow up! Either way I see a huge cost on taxpayers with no accountability.
Anon just keeping sending teachers out of state great valurs.
“Be bold!” The people who head the teachers’ union must have given that phrase as their marching orders because they knew that “Raise taxes!” would not have worked. “Be bold!” is all I heard from the teachers at the public meeting, who by the way crashed the business and community leaders meetings as well as having their own meeting here in Sioux Falls, and I keep hearing liberals, many of whom call themselves Republicans, repeat the mantra.
Scores of students are SC’s Spring Valley high school walked out of the building today in support of the fired officer.
I think most students understand that their teachers (SROs as well) have a tough job–this overreaction and obsession with funding misses the mark.
We need to give teachers their respect back. It won’t cost much except time & trust.
The Morrill Land Grant Act of 1862 provided states with a funding mechanism to provide a free college education to its citizens. Morrill was a farsighted Republican from Vermont who considered access to higher education paramount to the success of the Union. President Lincoln signed the law and for over 100 years tuition was very affordable (sometimes free) throughout many states who agreed to the federal program.
However, in the last 40 years states like South Dakota have neglected to properly support their universities. As a result tuition and fees have grown exponentially and now our young people that go to college face incredible student loan debts upon graduation. Sanders and Clinton are suggesting we return to the 19th century Republican ideal of a free and public education. Unfortunately the current Republican leadership shares little in common with the Lincoln Republicans. RINO, indeed.
— Sanders and Clinton are suggesting we return to the 19th century Republican ideal of a free and public education.
1. The Morrill Land Grant Act provided no funds for construction, tuition, initial expenses or ongoing expenses or for anything else.
2. The “free & public” education was founded on using public funds to educate Catholics in parochial schools. Is that what you want to return to?
3. “Free & public” education never included anything beyond a basic education for children.
To repeat:
It is immoral to force hard-working blue collar stiffs to heavily (or fully) subsidize the college educations of others who will use those degrees to make a lifetime of wealth far beyond the working stiffs who paid for it.
Wow!
I was hoping for a wee bit more.
How about using electronic text books from a central data base?
Or
Using online classes to teach specialized classes
Or
Consolidating school administrative services with other school districts
Or
Consolidating building and ground services with other government entities
Or
Using the Governor’s houses as incentive to attract new teachers.
Or
Renting facilities for non-educational uses during non-school days
The only thing we get is ‘We need more money.’
What a disappointment!
http://www.britannica.com/topic/Land-Grant-College-Act-of-1862
“Act of the U.S. Congress (1862) that provided grants of land to states to finance the establishment of colleges specializing in “agriculture and the mechanic arts.” …it granted each state 30,000 acres (12,140 hectares) for each of its congressional seats. Funds from the sale of the land were used by some states to establish new schools; other states turned the money over to existing state or private colleges to create schools of agriculture and mechanic arts (known as “A&M” colleges). The military training required in the curriculum of all land-grant schools led to the establishment of the Reserve Officers Training Corps, an educational program for future army, navy, and air force officers. The second Morrill Act (1890) initiated regular appropriations to support land-grant colleges, which came to include 17 predominantly African American colleges and 30 American Indian colleges.”
https://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/Morrill.html
“…officially entitled “An Act Donating Public Lands to the Several States and Territories which may provide Colleges for the Benefit of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts,” the Morrill Act provided each state with 30,000 acres of Federal land for each member in their Congressional delegation. The land was then sold by the states and the proceeds used to fund public colleges that focused on agriculture and the mechanical arts. Sixty-nine colleges were funded by these land grants, including Cornell University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Wisconsin at Madison.”
Nowhere in the above act does it state that the purpose of this act was to fund in perpetuity free tuition for students. This act allowed the establishment of land grant colleges to focus on ag and mechanical arts. And the only land grant college in SD is SDSU. This act did not say that students deserved a tuition free education. And it did not help in the establishment of other state and private colleges.
Besides, to refute a statement above by Jason, NOTHING is free in this life. If you don’t pay for it, someone else does. And that well is going dry, my friend.
(Springer – one link per post please. It put this into moderation. -PP)
Isn’t this how the county extension offices got started?
The reason college is hyper expensive is because every year people with no credit history are given low interest loans to blow at colleges, no questions asked. How expensive would Camaro’s be if upon graduation from HS, you could take out as much as $100,000 in loans for a new Camaro? I guess they’d be about $100,000. As soon as the marketplace is removed, by creating artificial demand, the price skyrockets.