Of all fifty states Illinois Ranks

45th in Job Creation
11th In Property Taxes
5th highest minimum wage
6th highest workmens compensation cost.

One of the highest inheritance taxes at 16%.
In real terms per capita spending has increased by 50% in ten years.

Despite increased state revenue of 7B in six years the state is now 11B in debt.

Chicago spends 13,100 per student but it has a graduation rate of 51%.

In 2008 we lost 175K jobs.

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Chicago spends 13,100 per student but it has a graduation rate of 51%.

Hey, look on the bright side -- D.C spends $14k per pupil and has one of the lowest graduation rates around. Detroit spends a tad less than Chicago and has a graduation rate of 24%. We kick @$$ by these standards.

But don't you worry, while Obama is acting outraged over AIG rewarding incompetence and failure, his stimuls throws over $500 million at Detroit's public schools -- $350 million of which is given with no strings attached.

And yes, this is the same Detroit who through an independent audit determined that its $150 million deficit was masked by years of shifting funding and resources, hidden deficits, poor management, and lack of long term planning. They also found 611 teachers on payroll but not in the budget.

Thanks I feel a lot better already.

Chicago Public Schools new Motto

"Thank God For Detroit"

I was on the CPS web site the other day. Couple interesting numbers.

404k students, 24K teachers, average salary 68K.
They claim a student teacher ratio of 19:1 in K-8 and 21:1 in HS, so figure roughly 20:1 but with 24K teachers couldn't they maintain that ratio with say 480K students so do they have 4K teachers who do nothing or aren't holding teacher jobs.

Add this one to this list:

1) Ill-Annoy is Numero Uno in the number of governmental [and some might say "quasi-governmental"] entities that are empowered to levy a property tax.

I don't have the exact number of pick-pockets but I recall that it is over 5,000, including over 900 school districts alone.

Who's number two? Pennsylvania, with roughly 800 - fewer than the number of Ill-Annoy school districts.

Is a mosquito abatement "district", with its attendant pension fund really a "government entity"?

We're #1! We're #1! We're #1!!!

Taxpayer, those numbers likely include case managers who typically have a maximum number of students (usually around 12-15) they manage while the co-teach in regular ed classrooms and teach in instructional classrooms. It may include counselors and social workers as well...depends on how they report.

Of course we don't know exactly how they break it down. Trib ran an article several years ago showing that CPS would assign politically connected teachers into do nothing jobs. Reading specialists etc where they tutored say a handful of students.

Here is the breakdown for FY2009 for CPS.

1800 Admin Positions.
3700 City Wide personel
13,700 School Support
600 Principals
700 Assistant Principals
22,800 Teachers.

So roughly for the Entire CPS you have over 43,000 people working there or roughly one employee for every nine students. This year it will have a budget of 6.2B or roughly 15k per student. And for all that money all those people you end up with a fifty one percent graduation rate.

There are two ways of looking at this one that we're spending our money incorrectly that we still are not getting enough into the classroom.

Two that no matter what or how much we spend it will make little or no difference. At least at a marginal level. By Marginal I mean adding more resources money at a certain level will have little or no impact. The five best predictors of a students academic success are these.

1. Days missed during a school year.
2. Amount of time watching television.
3. Number of books in the home.
4. Quality of books.
5. Having two parents in the home.

There is little there that indicates that higher teacher salaries or better student teacher ratio improve academic performance.

taxpayer - I like a good list as much as the next person, and I do like the indicators for school success list you posted. The list did, however, look very much like one from George Will's column this past week, and the quote in its entirety is, "One scholar estimated that about 90% of the differences among schools in average proficiency can be explained by five factors," followed by the list.

The column on Arne Duncan and public education can be found here.

Yes I got that from George Will's column in last weeks News Week. I do think it has a lot of valid points that even teachers seem to agree with though in a backhanded kind of way.

If quizzed as to why schools, students are not performing better despite more money resources etc. They will blame the parents the students etc. Fair enough, even the best teacher will have what fifteen minutes to half an hour per day to devote to say a single student. Can that over come a negative home environment probably not.

If you look at the immigrant groups in the United States that have done the best academically. The top groups would be Jewish and Asian . Both groups have in common strong families and a strong belief in the value of education.

My argument is that we spend more and more money on education but don't see improvements. We don't see higher test scores, higher graduation rates. So this is not a question of us not spending enough but in how we spend it.

We spend a great deal now on teachers salaries and benefits we spend a lot on administrators, counselors the whole school bureaucracy.

Lets assume the list is right and all indicators are that it has some merit. Then we would have to say work around weak families. How do we do it.

Why do we have a school calendar that was best suited for the 1800's. Why do we have a school day that is set the same way. So we should make the schools more in line with our present society. Longer calendar, hours that are more like what people work at. Why are kids getting up at 6:30 to be at school at 7:20. Its ludicrous.

Counselors are not "bureaucracy", taxpayer. Thank you very much!

I would make #5 on that list, "Parents who support the value of education" instead of having two parents. I know a lot of students who live in single-parent homes and who are great, conscientious kids.

Figure you're either in the classroom or you're not.
You mean #6 right, there are already five.

I'm sure there are single parents who do a better job than two parents. But the overwhelming evidence supports the view that two parent households do far better than single parents. And that there kids do far better in school.

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Why are kids getting up at 6:30 to be at school at 7:20. Its ludicrous.

msnbc.msn.com...

Saw this article last week, and 11am seems very late to me. 8:30 is much more reasonable to me.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Ted E.,

This calls for a response from swampdawg.

Taxpayer, show me the "overwhelming evidence". But make sure the research controls for parental support of the value of education.

Counselors who practice modern, developmental counseling are in the classroom.

quote:

As a former teacher told me, scan trons make's a teachers job easier, period.

Case CLOSED!

Admins... A former teacher told Gus, so please lock this thread.

quote:

Originally posted by Amy:
Taxpayer, show me the "overwhelming evidence". But make sure the research controls for parental support of the value of education.

Counselors who practice modern, developmental counseling are in the classroom.

Heres one frankly I could have posted a couple of thousand. The NEA must agree with me since they reglularly complain about the breakdown of the two parent family as the reason their jobs are so much more demanding.
Daily Princeton

Probably impossible to control for parental involvement. Since that would seem somewhat subjective. Though it is nice that you seem to agree that the Parents are far and away the most important factor in determining a childs academic success.

I'm glad you seem to have so many positive experiences with single Parents. Of course under Pat Quinns higher tax rates. A single parent making say 40K will pay 200.00 more a year in state taxes after Quinn and his Democratic/Union allies in the Legislature get
their way.

So has anyone else noticed that Quinn's lips never move unless there is a union person around.

More Fun Facts about Illinois unemployment hit 8.6 in February a whole half a percent higher than the national average.

I just know that, that fifty percent tax increase is going to help those numbers.

quote:

Originally posted by Gus:

Sure, teachers make themselves "available" from something like 6:30-7:30 AM or after school from 3:30-5:00 pm, time permitting unless the teacher has other duties like sport or academic clubs, then, good luck.

It's all really dependent on the individual teacher. The wife knows several who are in 5 minutes before first bell, and out the door 5 minutes after last bell. The wife however... she is always talking to parents and students via email, and her students and their parents also have her cell phone number with the understanding to call if there is something they need. Her sister also teaches, but in the city at Gage Park High School. I'm often amazed at how available she makes herself to her students and how much she goes out of her way for thm on her own time and own dime. I doubt I could or would.

My wife is one of those aforementioned reading specialists. She works at a high school with kids who have reading and writing skills typically around a second grade level. Most of these kids are LD or BD and just flat out have a barrier they need help to overcome. I guess society as a whole could just turn their backs and say no to the funding for those programs, but the truth is... you pay now or you pay later.

She has about 15 kids on her case load IIRC. So she has to teach 3 sections a day, (2 reading programs plus one regular english class) plus do all the mandated state paperwork for these kids (IEPs, case reporting et). It's pretty extensive... a lot more paperwork than the vast majority of us deal with in our regular jobs. Plus she just started her Masters program through Benedictine.

These discussions always get into what teachers "do" for the money we pay them. I think we would all be well to remember there is bad.. and good... inthe teaching profession, just like any other profession out there.

Just my 2 cents.

This is true. But a large problem is that good teachers are rewarded the same as poor ones. There is really no incentive, besides personal pride to be a better teacher.

This is not so much a rap against teachers this is human nature. How many of us would go the extra mile if we knew there was no additional reward for doing so.

quote:

Originally posted by Amy:
Counselors are not "bureaucracy", taxpayer. Thank you very much!

I was inclined to agree with you, but then I looked it up:

bu·reau·cra·cy
Pronunciation: \byu̇-ˈrä-krə-sē, byə-, byər-ˈä-\
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural bu·reau·cra·cies
Etymology: French bureaucratie, from bureau + -cratie -cracy
Date: 1818
1 a: a body of nonelective government officials b: an administrative policy-making group
2: government characterized by specialization of functions, adherence to fixed rules, and a hierarchy of authority
3: a system of administration marked by officialism, red tape, and proliferation

1. Counselors don't make policy though we certainly try to influence it on behalf of students. I suppose you could call us non-elective government officials but I really don't FEEL like a government official.

2. We do have specialized functions and are required to adhere to rules (last time I checked that would qualify as any law-abiding citizen) and follow the chain of command.

3. We certainly do not want to create any kind of red tape....but any that exists is likely a reaction to overzealous parents that threaten to sue regarding just about anything.

You work for the government, you're a government official. Most of the rules etc I see coming from the schools do not benefit the students but rather benefit the teachers, administrator.


Ah yes lets blame the over zealous parents.
I wonder how many lawsuits are actually ever filed by parents against schools.

D41 had what over 100 suspensions last year, didn't hear of any lawsuits there.

So Parents should be involved but not to involved.

And of course the school and its staff will determine what those limits are.