It continues to spread...
...like a disease. Truly, I have this image in my mind of this putty like substance coating the nation little by little. This disease called unemployment and layoffs..
Today for our "professional development," we had a meeting about how the budget cuts were going to affect us/our district. Basically, they are capping all salaries, all day kingergarten is gone, no school repairs, no more Career Ladder (an incentive program for teachers at difficult inner city schools, an extra amount of cash a lot of teachers depend on), and 205 employees will be laid off in our district alone. This is massive cuts all over the state.
Out of our already too small budgets, they are going to cut more. We were supposed to talk about ideas for other ways the district could save money, or try to convince congress not to pass the bill. Arizona is already 51st in the nation (That's right, 51st, not even 50th) in education-really? You want to give us Less to work with???? There are some rallies and email campaigns going on. People talked about striking (though not seriously). One woman suggested we all stop buying supplies and teaching materials out of our own pocket to prove a point. That the only way this system is still running on as little as we have is that teachers are buying their own shit for their kids! With even less.... I don't know. 51st in the nation and they are slashing the education budget. Fucking smart. (Haha, I suppose that makes sense).
So. 205 layoffs, unless they can find other ways to cut spending. They say we shouldn't worry, that the situation looks alright, but this reminds me of that episode of the office, only its our principal standing up there saying everything is fine, full well knowing the place is closing down. Bah..
I'll be fine.
Today for our "professional development," we had a meeting about how the budget cuts were going to affect us/our district. Basically, they are capping all salaries, all day kingergarten is gone, no school repairs, no more Career Ladder (an incentive program for teachers at difficult inner city schools, an extra amount of cash a lot of teachers depend on), and 205 employees will be laid off in our district alone. This is massive cuts all over the state.
Out of our already too small budgets, they are going to cut more. We were supposed to talk about ideas for other ways the district could save money, or try to convince congress not to pass the bill. Arizona is already 51st in the nation (That's right, 51st, not even 50th) in education-really? You want to give us Less to work with???? There are some rallies and email campaigns going on. People talked about striking (though not seriously). One woman suggested we all stop buying supplies and teaching materials out of our own pocket to prove a point. That the only way this system is still running on as little as we have is that teachers are buying their own shit for their kids! With even less.... I don't know. 51st in the nation and they are slashing the education budget. Fucking smart. (Haha, I suppose that makes sense).
So. 205 layoffs, unless they can find other ways to cut spending. They say we shouldn't worry, that the situation looks alright, but this reminds me of that episode of the office, only its our principal standing up there saying everything is fine, full well knowing the place is closing down. Bah..
I'll be fine.