Preach! Preach!
Allow me an explanation.
I know there are a few of you with whom I've briefly gotten in small debates about the referendum. I let it drop because it's not the kind of thing that's worth creating tension over, but now that it's over and it failed 20 per cent to 80 per cent, let me explain.
There's a pretty bad overcrowding situation in district forty-one. I know it may not seem like it because a) it wasn't a problem when we were in school and b) a lot of us went to ben franklin, which is the least affected (ironic, because it's the only school with space for more portables). So for the past four years, my mom, Joey Vivoda's dad, and all of the other people on the d41 school board have been working pretty damn hard to come up with a solution. To say they've given a lot of themselves isn't just rhetoric, it's the truth - the normal board meetings start at 7:30 on Mondays, and there were many times when my mom wouldn't get home until well past midnight, even when she was swamped with work and personal obligations. But, I digress. My point is that they've worked their asses off over a four-year period to come up with the most reasonable, effective, and plausible solution to a pretty difficult problem. And it turns out that this town either a) loves its money too much, or b) is too lazy to actually read a newspaper or flyers or log onto a website and find out the real facts to make the right choice regarding its education system. It just really upsets me - not even as liberal, but on a very basic level - that, as a country, we complain about the quality of our public education when we're not even willing to put the required amount of money into it. And Glen Ellyn is a really a microcosm of that. We constantly bitch about how much Hadley sucks, but we refuse to pass a referendum to give its district the money it needs - not even money it wants for crazy shit, money it needs to prevent overcrowding and keep operating at a normal level. Yet last year we passed a parks referendum. Why? Because in Glen Ellyn, it's all about property values.
So that's it. I can't wait to move out of Glen Ellyn. Not because it's boring, there's nothing to do, I hate my parents, or the cops suck. I want to move out of Glen Ellyn because eighty per cent of the people care more about how much their house costs than properly educating their kids.
I know there are a few of you with whom I've briefly gotten in small debates about the referendum. I let it drop because it's not the kind of thing that's worth creating tension over, but now that it's over and it failed 20 per cent to 80 per cent, let me explain.
There's a pretty bad overcrowding situation in district forty-one. I know it may not seem like it because a) it wasn't a problem when we were in school and b) a lot of us went to ben franklin, which is the least affected (ironic, because it's the only school with space for more portables). So for the past four years, my mom, Joey Vivoda's dad, and all of the other people on the d41 school board have been working pretty damn hard to come up with a solution. To say they've given a lot of themselves isn't just rhetoric, it's the truth - the normal board meetings start at 7:30 on Mondays, and there were many times when my mom wouldn't get home until well past midnight, even when she was swamped with work and personal obligations. But, I digress. My point is that they've worked their asses off over a four-year period to come up with the most reasonable, effective, and plausible solution to a pretty difficult problem. And it turns out that this town either a) loves its money too much, or b) is too lazy to actually read a newspaper or flyers or log onto a website and find out the real facts to make the right choice regarding its education system. It just really upsets me - not even as liberal, but on a very basic level - that, as a country, we complain about the quality of our public education when we're not even willing to put the required amount of money into it. And Glen Ellyn is a really a microcosm of that. We constantly bitch about how much Hadley sucks, but we refuse to pass a referendum to give its district the money it needs - not even money it wants for crazy shit, money it needs to prevent overcrowding and keep operating at a normal level. Yet last year we passed a parks referendum. Why? Because in Glen Ellyn, it's all about property values.
So that's it. I can't wait to move out of Glen Ellyn. Not because it's boring, there's nothing to do, I hate my parents, or the cops suck. I want to move out of Glen Ellyn because eighty per cent of the people care more about how much their house costs than properly educating their kids.