Friday Funnies
Because I’m feeling like sharing the things I find chuckle worthy this morning. First up, many many thanks to Jan Sutter who mailed in one of the funniest letters to the editor I’ve read in a long time to the Alameda Sun:
I’m disappointed the tax-funded charter school thing didn’t fly. Holding teachers accountable and awarding merit pay to quality schools is good.
Fact is, we haven’t taken the model far enough. I think we should have charter police forces. Like charter schools, we should provide tax money for diversified law enforcement. We could start with the proven school model and have Catholic police precincts, Jewish, Evangelical, Muslim, Chinese Christian, agnostic and so on. We’d then establish tax-funded magnet police precincts with low crime to attract deserving citizens.
Of course, like charter schools, the police would be the ones to pick who lives in a district. Success would be measured using a police performance index (PPI). In law-abiding precincts, officers would get merit pay. Where law breaking was high, cops would be held accountable. If rampant crime didn’t drop, officers would be put on probation, reprimanded or even fired.
Still no improvement? Then under-performing police stations would be closed down entirely. Citizens would be given tax vouchers to relocate to better areas. Don’t want to move?
Then tax money would go to purchase firearms to form peer-driven, well regulated militias like in the Constitution. Which, to think about it, might make whole communities in Alameda lively learning-centers indeed.
And then for those of you that are actively following the national primary race, some guy named Mighty Rex has created a Guide to the Candidates, Star Wars Style. This should speak to your inner geek, or have you heading over to wikipedia to try to figure out who Boba Fett is. Someone should get this guy to do political commentary somewhere, it would be so much more fascinating than the current crop of folks that say the same thing: nothing. With apt characterizations like Darth McCain, Mitt Skywalker, and SeeJoe Threepio I’m waiting for the next installment. Or maybe an Alameda version when our local election rolls around, I think the folks over at Alameda Daily Noose could do a bang up job with “An Alameda Guide to the Candidates, the Harry Potter edition.”
I chuckled too when I started reading the letter. Then I ended up thinking it’s a good idea, especially the last paragraph.
Comment by Jack Richard — January 19, 2008 @ 10:17 am
Hmmm, reminded me of two quotes:
“Smirking chimps, though unprovoked, are oft to throw their own escrament.”
“Conscience is but a word that cowards use, devised at first to keep the strong in awe”.
Comment by poguemahone — January 20, 2008 @ 12:05 am
Sorry that facts aren’t as humorus as fiction but here are some anyway.
Do Charter Schools Take Money from Public Schools?
Charter schools are public schools. When a child leaves for a charter school the money follows that child. This benefits the public school system by instilling a sense of accountability into the system regarding its services to the student and parents and its fiscal obligations. Fiscally, charter schools have demonstrated efficiency. For example, ABC’s “Prime Time Live” ran a story on Yvonne Chan, the energetic principal of a San Fernando Valley’s Vaughn Next Century Charter School. The local school district, one of the largest and most bureaucratic in the nation, typically took a year to buy computers for its classrooms. Ms. Chan thought that was ridiculous. It took her charter school six days to purchase computers, and for less money. As a result, the Los Angeles Unified School District revised its purchasing system. Overall, in its first year of operation, Vaughn Next Century generated, through operational changes and efficiencies, a $1 million plus surplus, which it used to expand facilities to benefit both students and staff.
Comment by poguemahone — January 20, 2008 @ 3:59 pm
More chuckle free facts.
How Are Charter Schools Funded?
Charter schools are public schools. Most charters are created by groups of educators, parents and community leaders. Some have been converted from existing public schools. A small number of charter schools were once private schools. Like district public schools, they are funded according to enrollment (also called average daily attendance, or ADA), and receive funding from the district and the state according to the number of students attending. However, in a number of states, they do not receive the full equivalent of their district counterparts: Minnesota charters only receive the state portion (about 75 percent of a district school’s total per-pupil allocation); charters in New Jersey and Colorado also receive less than 100 percent of the per-pupil funding. In other states, charters must negotiate their funding in their charter contract, often below the level of funding of their district counterparts. In Arizona, charter students are funded at about 80 percent of their district peers
Comment by poguemahone — January 20, 2008 @ 4:01 pm