Continue readingI will be brief!
Where was CUEE and the people working to bring the two school systems together when local citizens were fighting for change, and seeking answers to the Hiring of Black Educators and the Federal Court Order being complied with that was filed decades ago? Where were they then?
And why can’t we find certain people in our community until the blind god seems to direct them from their hiding place from beneath the clay!
I have not seen these professionals take on
Tag Archives: Education
I’m baffled —Jon Parris
Well-said, Alex. I’m baffled that this website and the local NAACP are against unification… the status-quo has created a haves/have-nots situation that is untenable if we are going to consider ourselves a progressive area. A unified system would bring uniformity to curriculum and scheduling, eliminate redundant administrative positions, and allow (force?) everyone in the county to have a stake in the educational development of all the children in the county. What basically exists now is institutional racism… predominately lower-income minority (& some white) kids attending resource-depleted city schools due to a shrinking tax base, and predominately white middle and upper income kids attending the resource-enriched county schools with an affluent tax base.Continue readingI can see the downside for an older,
I understand what CUEE says —Alex Jones
Someone pointed me to your blog on the Biomass issue, and I came across your recent post on the school unification issue.Continue readingJust curious… have your ever examined the testing data for both school systems? A quick look at the last report card, and you will see why most people in this community believe our public education system is broken and does not adequately prepare our children to either attend college or enter the workforce.
Right now, we have two schools systems
CCA profits from California private prisons
CCA contributed to cutting funding for other services while getting more contracts for itself. Is that what we want in Georgia? Cut education funding while paying private prison companies? Is that what we want in Lowndes County?In three years, a private-prison construction and management company, the Corrections Corporation of America, has seen the value of its contracts with the state soar from nearly $23 million in 2006 to about $700 million three months ago – all without competitive bidding. Even in a state accustomed to high-dollar contracts, the 31-fold increase over three years is dramatic.
During the same period, the company’s campaign donations rose exponentially, from $36,750 in 2006, of which $25,000 went to the state Republican Party, to $233,500 in 2007-08 and nearly $139,000 in 2009. The donations have gone to Democrats, Republicans and ballot measures. The company’s largest single contribution, $100,000, went to an unsuccessful budget-reform package pushed last year by Gov. Schwarzenegger.
Costs vary, but CCA receives about $63 per day per inmate, or about $23,000 annually.That would pay for a lot of rehabilitation and education. How about we do that instead?
-jsq
Sentence reform in Georgia?
That annual bill has to be more than $1 million; maybe $1 billion.Gov. Nathan Deal signed legislation Friday [House Bill 265] that would create a panel to study Georgia’s criminal justice system with an eye toward overhauling the state’s tough sentencing laws.
The laws have left the state with overcrowded prisons and taxpayers with an annual corrections bill that tops $1 million.
The legislation creates a 13-member commission that would study sentencing reforms in hopes of offering alternative sentences for some drug addicts and other nonviolent offenders. The panel would have to report its findings by early 2012, in time for lawmakers to act on them in the next legislative session.
Anyway, Georgia seems to be discovering what Texas already did some years ago: we can’t afford to lock up so many people.
The high incarceration rate comes with high costs. Georgia pays $3,800 each year to educate a child in public schools, and $18,000 every year to keep each inmate behind bars, Deal said.
What will we do with them instead?
Hall County is one of several counties that have adopted drug courts, which aim to provide alternative sentences for low-level drug offenders. At the ceremony, drug court graduation Mike Wilcoxson said the program changed his life.That’s one solution.“One thing drug court has done for me is give me a sense of purpose in my life, to set goals for myself, to be accountable for my actions, and to break the cycle of addiction I had,” Wilcoxson said.
And if we’re not going to lock up so many people, why do we need to build a private prison in Lowndes County?
-jsq
Why Georgia wants to build private prisons
Slightly cheaper. Which we already learned is by having fewer guards per prisoner. Risking public safety for small dollar savings: does that sound like a good idea to you?.Private companies can build prisons faster and operate them for slightly less than the state, said Michael Nail, deputy director of the department’s corrections division.
How much cheaper? Continue reading
Misplaced Priorities: Over Incarcerate, Under Educate —NAACP
And this is not just finger-pointing; it includes pointers on how to get out of this mess:Misplaced Priorities tracks the steady shift of state funds away from education and toward the criminal justice system. Researchers have found that over-incarceration most often impacts vulnerable and minority populations, and that it destabilizes communities.
The report is part of the NAACP’s “Smart and Safe Campaign,” and offers a set of recommendations that will help policymakers in all 50 states downsize prison populations and shift the savings to education budgets.Short version: Continue reading
When the biomass plant is cancelled —John S. Quarterman
I applaud the activism of
the many and varied biomass opponents!
Let me repeat my prediction: the biomass plant will never be built.
That’s no reason to stop doing what you’re doing.
You know opposition is having an effect when
VLCIA repeatedly denies it.
You might be surprised how many other people think this plant will never be built. Ashley Paulk told me Continue reading
Meanwhile in Dublin and Laurens County, Georgia
![](http://www.georgiatrend.com/images/our-state/05_09_dublin.jpg)
Hm, instead of taking out $15 million in bonds to be paid back by the taxpayers, the community around Dublin joined together and made available just as much money: Continue reading
Valdostans protest biomass –VSU Spectator
![](http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5055/5559687827_0b8a7a2020_m.jpg)
Protestors wearing respirator masks held signs reading “Biomass? No!” in front of the Valdosta City Hall building on Thursday. Members of the Wiregrass Activists for Clean Energy, the VSU student organization Students Against Violating the Environment, and other concerned Valdosta citizens showed up to protest the construction of the Wiregrass Power: Biomass Electric Generating Plant.The Spectator article quotes from two speakers for whom LAKE happens to have video, linked below. Continue reading“We already have solar power resources in place that we could be using and I feel like money should be directed towards that,” Ivey Roubique, vice-president of the Student Geological Society, said. “It wouldn’t be good for the community and even though I’m in college here it still matters.”