The reference to the consolidation process which produced a magnet school
in Troupe Co. without any improvements in general academic or financial
improvement takes me back to my first CUEE meeting experience. It was
held at the new Valdosta Boys & Girls Club. VDT news articles stated
the meeting would be to discuss consolidation.
However, at the meeting
questions concerning consolidation were strictly forbidden. We watched
the movie
Received today.
Updated 5PM 28 Sep 2011: Added preface and other changes to
the
document by Etta Mims.
-jsq
I am attaching an 8 page document I compiled this week to show
that
CUEE and the Vote Yes supporters are not answering the questions being
asked of them. They are dancing around the topics but these supporters
are spending alot of money to put our children and the employees of
both schools in danger of 4-5 years minimum of changes that will be
detrimental to all concerned.
Another interesting note, if you go to the Vote Yes page, and
CUEE still doesn’t have a plan for improving education.
When asked for any concrete examples of education improving
because of school consolidation, not one person could come up
with one: not CUEE, not the Chamber, not their invited experts.
Their invited experts established that consolidation in Troup County
not only didn’t save money, it required a bond issue.
And it took four or five years of the hardest work they’d ever done,
even though they couldn’t give any evidence that it improved education.
It was like that on almost every point: the Chamber and CUEE either
couldn’t answer the simplest questions, or even more frequently
demolished their own case.
The last question asked to give an example of any company that
had declined to come in because of multiple school systems.
Not only could nobody give an example, but someone, I believe it was
Walter Hobgood, stood up at the podium and said when he was working
for a large company he had never encountered a case where they looked
at the number of school systems.
Early on Chamber Chair Tom Gooding went on at great length about
Continue reading →
That’s 400 MW of solar power in twenty 20 MW PV plants,
just across the state line in Gadsden County, Florida.
Plus ongoing jobs, expanded education, private sources of investment, and customers for the electricity.
In considering the change at West Side, officials noted in last
year’s budget proposal talks that about 73 percent of its students
are bus riders, brought from all parts of the county. The school posts
a per-student transportation cost of $1,198, more than twice the zone
average of $529.
“Why is West Side so important to the county?” parent Brandi Kennedy
asked. “You have buses picking up kids all over the county to go to
West Side.”
Because children are chosen to attend the magnet school through a lottery,
Kennedy said she couldn’t understand funding the fine-arts focus of
the school when it is not more prestigious than other county schools.
As series of decisions, not unrelated to race, made by the “white fathers” of
the city of LaGrange, led the citizens of the city to vote their school system
out of existence and to become a part of the county system.
The quotes around “white fathers” are in the paper.
Hm, back when I first encountered CUEE, they were speaking to SCLC in Valdosta
late last year, Rusty Griffin among them, and the theme was desegregation.
They did not receive a warm welcome.
Funny how CUEE changed its tune to “unification” after that.
But the local “white fathers” are still insisting on making decisions
for all of us.
Make your plans now to attend the first Vote YES public forum on school
unification, which is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 27 at
the Rainwater Conference Center.
Our guest speaker will be Dr. Terry Jenkins, who served as the
Superintendent of
Troup County Schools during the unification process of LaGrange and
Troup County school systems in 1992.
Many of the same issues and rumors being discussed locally were also
debated when
LaGrange and Troup County were voting to unify their school systems. In
his presentation,
Dr. Jenkins will discuss how the school unification issue unfolded in
Troup County, its impact to improving test scores and graduation rates,
and how the decision to unify their school systems has transformed the
community for the better.
Tom Gooding, Chair of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce,
asked the school boards to do the Chamber’s homework.
He got no takers.
Reiterating the Chamber’s demand from its
letter of 9 September 2011,
Gooding asked VBOE superintendent Dr. Cason at the 20 September VBOE
forum to commit to meeting about what to do if the “unification”
referendum passes.
Dr. Cason said that should have happened two years ago, and
Now is not the appropriate time.
He said if the referendum passes, then the two school boards will sit down
together.
Dr. Cason didn’t say anything about inviting the Chamber or CUEE to such
meetings, since, after all, neither the Chamber or CUEE would have any legal
role.
Tom Gooding rebuffed @ VBOE 20 Sep 2011
education, referendum, consolidation, statement,
Forum at Valdosta Middle School, Valdosta Board of Education (VBOE),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 20 September 2011.
Videos by George Boston Rhynes for bostongbr on YouTube.
Georgia operates the fifth-largest prison system in the nation, at a
cost of $1 billion a year. The job of overseeing 60,000 inmates and
150,000 felons on probation consumes 1 of every 17 state dollars.
Last night was the second of the three forums
the Valdosta Board of Education (VBOE) approved
along with its
statement opposing school consolidation.
George Rhynes reports there were 300 people there,
and he videoed everybody who stood up and spoke.
Videos of last night’s Valdosta school forum by George Rhynes
education, referendum, consolidation, statement,
Forum at Valdosta Middle School, Valdosta Board of Education (VBOE),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 20 September 2011.
Videos by George Boston Rhynes for bostongbr on YouTube.
Videos of last night’s Valdosta school forum by George Rhynes
education, referendum, consolidation, statement,
Forum at Valdosta Middle School, Valdosta Board of Education (VBOE),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 20 September 2011.
Videos by George Boston Rhynes for bostongbr on YouTube.
The reference to the consolidation process which produced a magnet school in Troupe Co. without any improvements in general academic or financial improvement takes me back to my first CUEE meeting experience. It was held at the new Valdosta Boys & Girls Club. VDT news articles stated the meeting would be to discuss consolidation.
