I read about this controversy and am amazed at how low on the priority list Education is with regard to School Budgets. The discussion seems to be a coded conversation for "you can't close these schools because you will eliminate jobs that local people depend on". Jobs are important, don't get me wrong, but isn't the mission of the school to devote its resources to improving education? It seems like contemporary school budgets dilute their mission by taking on other roles at the expense of education: Daycare, Transportation, Nutrition, Sex Predator Monitoring, Healthcare, Alcohol and Drug Abuse and Local Jobs. All of these are important missions, but they are also all addressed by other government agencies. If we could spend more of the school district's money on Education and less on these other issues Education would not be in such dire straits.
Re: “The neighborhood school dilemma”
I read about this controversy and am amazed at how low on the priority list Education is with regard to School Budgets. The discussion seems to be a coded conversation for "you can't close these schools because you will eliminate jobs that local people depend on". Jobs are important, don't get me wrong, but isn't the mission of the school to devote its resources to improving education? It seems like contemporary school budgets dilute their mission by taking on other roles at the expense of education: Daycare, Transportation, Nutrition, Sex Predator Monitoring, Healthcare, Alcohol and Drug Abuse and Local Jobs. All of these are important missions, but they are also all addressed by other government agencies. If we could spend more of the school district's money on Education and less on these other issues Education would not be in such dire straits.