Very interesting input on the second Workshop on updating the
Lowndes County Comprehensive Plan, including quite a bit about agriculture,
rivers, and roads.
Educational issues are in the Update, including the underlying issue: poverty.
See also the invitation with a link to the Workbook draft used at that meeting.
Here are links to the LAKE videos of the two main topics, followed by a video playlist. Continue reading
Again like every year, more precinct consolidation. Why?
Public notice via the VDT, The Lowndes County Board of Elections will hold a Special Called Meeting on 8 July 2014,
The Lowndes County Board of Elections will hold a Special Called Meeting on 8 July 2014, at 5:30 p.m., and a regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday, 22 July 2014 at 9 a.m., to discuss precinct consolidation. The public is invited to attend.
The meeting will be held at the Lowndes County Board of Elections office at 2808 N Oak St., Valdosta, GA 31602.
For more information call Continue reading
Pushers of the charter school amendment must be desperate! Blurring the line between public officials and private citizens, state Attorney General Sam Olens wrote:
Local school boards do not have the legal authority to expend funds or other resources to advocate or oppose the ratification of a constitutional amendment by the voters. They may not do this directly or indirectly through associations to which they may belong….
As Jim Galloway wrote yesterday for the AJC in Sam Olens orders local school boards to stay out of charter school fight,
That means organizations like the Georgia School Boards Association, and perhaps, the Georgia School Superintendents Association, would be barred from speaking out against the proposed constitutional amendment.
And would that include organizations like PAGE, which produced the slides that a local middle school teacher used last week? What about that teacher, or Dr. Troy Davis, speaking a few weeks earlier, both on their own time?
Olens’ letter would apply to what the VDT said was in the VBOE and LCBOE joint resolution, at least the part about “The resolution explicitly states that the boards are asking voters to not support the Constitutional Amendment relative to state charter schools.”
But what does Olens mean, duly elected local school boards don’t have authority to express opinions about educational matters that would directly affect the people who elected them?
Why has Sam Olens suddenly gotten religion about this now, after he was silent last year when both VBOE and LCBOE adopted resolutions against the school “unification” referendum? Where was he when both boards of education hosted numerous forums opposing consolidation?
Will he next be telling the Valdosta City Council it can’t pass a resolution opposing a referendum? What exactly is the difference between that elected body and an elected school board as far as expressing such an opinion? And all of those resolutions were non-binding opinions.
Will Sam Olens next be telling the VDT it can’t editorialize against the charter school amendment?
How desperate are the pushers of the charter school amendment?
Continue readingApparently the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gave more money to ALEC than Pepsi, Coke, Kraft, and Intuit combined, but no more. Who’s next?
Jessica Pieklo wrote yesterday for care2, Bill And Melinda Gates Dump ALEC,
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation became the latest high profile backer of the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council to withdraw financial support after pressure from groups opposed to ALEC’s support of “stand your ground” laws and Voter ID.
And private prisons, such as the one CCA wanted to build in Lowndes County, and “anti-immigrant” bills that creat many new crimes to fill those private prisons. And charter schools, such as the referendum for charter school tax credits on the ballot in Georgia in November. Some of our local “white fathers” pushed school consolidation a few months ago and charter schools are yet another attack on public education, backed by ALEC.
Roll Call reports that a foundation spokesperson said it does not plan to make any future grants to the organization. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation contributed more than $375,000 to ALEC in the past two years.
Meanwhile, according to ALEC Watch:
ALEC’s more than three hundred corporate sponsors pay annual membership dues ranging from $5,000 to $50,000 to advance their agendas, plus additional fees of $1,500 to $5,000 a year to participate in ALEC’s various task forces, where, according to an ALEC publication, “legislators welcome their private-sector counterparts to the table as equals.”
That’s the very model of a bad public-private partnership and crony capitalism. (More detail by ALEC Exposed.)
So what excuse does the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have? Jessica Pieklo’s article says:
Continue readingReceived today. -jsq
Dear Friends,Continue readingAfter learning abut the for-profit charter school issue from and the tax
credits for private school tuition, I interpret today’s VDT articles as part of a political agenda to further dismantle a Georgia Constitutional right to Free Public School Education. Here we are again, let’s paint the schools as failing and then try to legitimize further defunding of the schools. And instead of Free Public Education the students from poor families will continue to get what ever is left when the well-to-do take their large piece of the public school education pie.
CHARTER SCHOOLS SERVE STUDENTS ALREADY SERVED WELL IN PUBLIC EDUCATION:
It is important that we understand that Free Public Education is clearly being
Received yesterday on ALEC, Trayvon Martin, CCA’s private prisons, and charter schools?. -jsq
I could use quite a few verbs, adjectives, nouns to describe my year with K-12 and NONE of those would be complimentary. Public funds are used to the pay salaries plus all other expenses for this privilege to freely HOME SCHOOL a child. The lead educator is the LEARNING COACH (who is the stay-at-home relative). If I had wanted to be a TEACHER, I would have chosen an education career. Bottom line-slick way to divert public funds for private profit…. And now those kids can participate in public school sports. All those voices that rose up to defeat Lowndes-Valdosta Consolidation should RUN-not WALK to stop the PRIVATIZATION of PUBLIC EDUCATION in Georgia!Checking tosee where Amy Carter, Ron Borders, Jay Shaw and other POLITICIANS stand on this issue. Been out of loop for a minute..Trying to make up for lost time with K-12..I am sure someone will update me. Thank you for your advocacy.
-Fannie Jackson
I don’t think Ron Borders holds any elected office, and Jay Shaw is retired; his son Jason Shaw was elected to the same statehouse seat. Here’s a list of our state elected officials.
On HR 1162, “state-wide education policy; clarify authority – CA”, 
in the House, Amy Carter and Ellis Black voted for it, and Jason Shaw voted against it. In the Senate, Tim Golden voted for it. I believe that means it now goes to a statewide referendum in November.
On HB 797, “State chartered special schools; revise funding”, 
in the House, Amy Carter and Ellis Black voted for it, and Jason Shaw did not vote. In the Senate, Tim Golden voted for it Monday.
There is one new candidate running for one of these statehouse seats so far, JC Cunningham, and K-12 education is top of his issues list:
I will work to improve our schools so our children have every opportunity to succeed. Too many students have dropped out of high school, and we have lost far too many good teachers due to budget cuts to our K-12 schools because, “…we live in challenging times and tight budgets”. The budget could not have been that tight if they were $23.5 million dollars available to fund an Administration building for Valdosta State University. Our elected representative should have been advising the Governor to Ear Mark that $23.5 million for the Georgia Department of Education in order to retain and hire more teachers and Para Pros.
Saturday I heard him say he opposes the charter schools constitutional amendment.
-jsq
I found the controversy over the Lowndes Grading Policy convenienttiming for last week’s House vote on HR 1162 for a GA Constitutional Amendment to allow the state to establish Charter Schools with no oversight by local boards of education. HR 1162 failed the necessary 2/3 vote on 02/08/12. However,it was approved to be reconsidered on 02/09/12 so it has not gone away. Our 3 South GA republican representatives all voted in favor of HR 1162. (No surprises there, but we will remember in November.) Meanwhile part of the reason HR 1162 failed was the state Democratic Caucus undercut the House vote by requesting Democrats deny HR 1162 in favor of their version HR 1335, which they say goes further in allowing state officials to over ride local school board denials of special schools.
Obviously CUEE is not the only party interested in undermining and over riding local school board authority. However, I suspect CUEE had a hand in the phone campaign asking Lowndes school parents to call Rep. Shaw if they were in favor of HR 1162 because we all know that is one of their tactics. The message did not say to call if they were against it. CUEE is definitely still very much in the mix for discrediting local school board authority and our elected officials are evidently in their corner.
-Barbara Stratton
The reporter didn’t call it “new”, Troy Davis did when he sent it to all the teachers. Maybe you should talk with some teachers who are deeply against the policy before you start ranting. And to correlate this with consolidation is ridiculous, you’re just stretching for controversy.Dr. Smith enumerated several other things which he alleged that reporter misrepresented; see above link.-Amy
And Dr. Troy Davis
set the record straight yesterday in the VDT.
I’d be happy to talk to teachers, pro or con. Send ’em over!
“Stretching for controversy”? Around here you have to duck to avoid controversy. You know, like the VDT saying it won’t publish any more stories about school consolidation….
I see the VDT is not ducking this one, though, rather helping stir it up. In yesterday’s story, the VDT announced mission accomplished:
The new grading policy for grades third through eighth released by the Lowndes County school system in January has stirred controversy locally and even nationally.It wasn’t the grading policy that stirred controversy, it was Scott James, Fox News, the VDT, the AJC, the SMN, etc. And that “controversy” will make it easier the next time “unification” rears its ugly head.
-jsq
According to the Minutes of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber Board of Directors meeting held Tuesday, January 17, 2012, 8 – 9:30 a.m. at Country Inn & Suites:
I wonder what was said in that “thorough discussion”? Maybe which local vendors Chamber members’ dues are subsidizing by paying off CUEE’s debts? Maybe who owns those vendors, and what their relations might be to the CUEE or Chamber boards?Consider Finance Committee recommendation regarding acquisition of Education Framework: Clinton Beeland made a motion that the Chamber Board provide $30,000 towards the repayment of debt incurred by the Committee for a Referendum on School System Unification with local business vendors.
In return for this consideration, the Chamber is to receive the ownership rights to and the future use of the professional publication entitled “An Education Framework”. Carl Holley seconded. After a thorough discussion, motion carried unanimously.
Anything more substantial than Chamber or CUEE people said in
the meeting at VSU 20 October 2011
in which
that “framework” was never actually presented to a group invited in the middle
of the night?
“Future use”, eh? So outspending 10 to 1 yet losing the school consolidation election 4 to 1 didn’t give the Chamber pause, any more than the Chamber paid any attention to the copious evidence that consolidation is a bad idea that makes education worse.
Instead of pouring more money down the CUEE rathole,
I think
Jim Parker had a good idea for the Chamber:
How about as a first step the Chamber pledge an equivalent amount of money it and its members have spent on CUEE to the Boards of Education yearly, to be used as the teachers see fit?I’m sure the two school boards could use $150,000 each for their teachers.
How about it, Chamber? Want to show some leadership?
-jsq
Just a decade ago, private prisons were a dying industry awash in corruption and mired in lawsuits, particularly Corrections CorporationWe’d already heard from Bloomberg that Continue readingof America (CCA), the nation’s largest private prison operator. Today, these companies are booming once again, yet the lawsuits and scandals continue to pile up. Meanwhile, more and more evidence shows that compared to publicly run prisons, private jails are filthier, more violent, less accountable, and contrary to what privatization advocates peddle as truth, do not save money. In fact, more recent findings suggest that private prisons could be more costly.
So why are they still in business?
In a recently published report, “Banking on Bondage: Mass Incarceration and Private Prisons,” the American Civil Liberties Union examines the history of prison privatization and finds that private prison companies owe their continued and prosperous existence to skyrocketing immigration detention post September 11 as well as the firm hold they have gained over elected and appointed officials.