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Teacher Sells Ads On Tests
Tom Farber, a calculus teacher at Rancho Bernardo high school in San Diego, has come up with a unique way of covering district cuts to his supplies budget. He sells ads on his tests. "Tough times call for tough actions," Tom says. The price of an ad on a Mr. Farber Calc test is as follows: $10 for a quiz, $20 for a chapter test, and $30 for a semester final. Most of the ads are messages from parents but about a third of them come from local businesses. Principal Paul Robinson says reaction has been "mixed," but adds, "It's not like, 'This test is brought to you by McDonald's or Nike.'" I see his point. Being a local business whore is much better than being a multinational conglomerate whore.
This is Rancho Bernardo? That's not exactly the inner city. Maybe charge $2 more per seat at the football games and have a properly funded Calc class.
He was making a reference to the Oliver Wendell Holmes quote. See, e.g., http://timpanogos.wordpress.com/2008/10/09/quote-of-the-moment-oliver-wendell-holmes-jr-on-taxes/
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
correct.
The sugar in them MAKES you more thirsty.
You can't taste the sugar because of the fizz.
Drink Water!
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
It is not a question of people not paying their taxes, it is a question of how the politicians are spending our money.
Amen. I can't believe how the politicians here in Florida are more than happy to cut funding to education just so that they can give themselves a nice big raise. And it's not just politicians -- ask our superintendent about that nice big raise he just got, while teachers and staff CAN'T get a single damn raise because of the "budget crisis".
While I agree that there is tremendous waste in Public School Administration, I strongly disagree with your statement, "Schools get a fuckton of money as it is."
If you take a look at:
http://www.epodunk.com/top10/per_pupil/index.html
You will see that most states spend less than $10000 per year per student, before the current economic downturn and budget cuts. One thing that is not accounted for in this information is that it assumes perfect attendance. For every day that a student is not on campus in class, the school loses money. A parent who pulls their kid from school to make a long weekend or to make Thanksgiving a week long vacation instead of the 4-5 day weekend that most schools take is taking money out of the hands of the school.
I also noticed that some of your are under the misconception that teachers are paid enough as it is. Yes, teachers are paid a living wage. However compared to their peers with similar education, job experience, and job responsibility, teachers of all levels are grossly underpaid. This remains true even when you factor in all of the "vacation" time that teachers get. Most teachers I know (and I am one too, former High School, now Adjunct Professor), work in one way or another during these so-called vacation times. During Thanksgiving and Xmas break, most catch up on grading, plan for the coming term, etc. Many during summer break, take classes to keep their certifications, or teach summer school to make ends meet.
Do not ever think that all teachers have it soft. Most teachers are very dedicated caring involved individuals, it's the few that make the news that give the rest a bad name.
How would those physics equations help on a calculus test? Maybe if it had the formula for finding a derivative or part of an integration table maybe.
"but he is also making a very loud statement to the government to pull its head out of its ass and appropriate more education funding."
His statement is as ridiculous as it is loud. America spends more money on public education than any other country on earth, and has some of the worst scores. In the last 15 years, education spending has doubled, and test scores have steadily declined.
Our schools don't need more money. They need to start teaching hard core reading, writing, math, science, and critical thinking and stop appropriating gigantic school bonds to build football stadiums and soccer fields. They need to spend 0 hours per day talking about cultural diversity and 100% of their time learning hard facts and skills that will improve their minds and equip them to be successful.
This is the unfortunate truth. Special ed students often cost $40,000 plus to educate as many have their own full time private tutors. In a state that funds each student $6,000 to $8,000 a year the money for special ed kids comes from everyone else. The more public funds diverted to private schools the bigger the slice of non-special ed student funding becomes.
Tim Smith - Ramblings from Nerd Land
Since when has soda pop in the US had sugar in it?
I don't know where you get the idea that schools are having their funding reduced. In fact public per capita spending in America on education, in real dollars, has risen dramatically. And it takes a much larger share of spending than it did 40 years ago, too.
Look at table two of this pdf for the figures.
The vast majority of public funding still goes to public schools despite the fact that the return per dollar spent is immensely better under a voucher program. If you're going by results, vouchers are the best education investment America is making right now. If you're going by ideology, you're sentencing low-income kids to public schools that are broken because of something completely different to a lack of funding. Public schools are failing for the same reason our automakers are failing. They can't make a competitive product because they are focused on keeping the current system in place. Free our schools to compete, and the improvement will naturally happen, almost as if guided by in invisible hand.
And this was only trolling very slightly, in the phrasing. I believe everything I wrote.
My fellow Americans, let's restore the death penalty for child rapists. Let's do it . . . for the children.