State orders Detroit to close half its schools

[Viva_La_Revolution]

Source: AP


DETROIT - State education officials have ordered the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools to immediately implement a plan that balances the district's books by closing half its schools.

The Detroit News says the financial restructuring plan will increase high school class sizes to 60 students and consolidate operations.

State superintendent of public instruction Mike Flanagan says in a Feb. 8 letter that the state plans to install another financial manager who must continue to implement Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb's plan after he leaves June 30. Flanagan's said approval of Bobb's plan means the district can't declare bankruptcy.

Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/02/21/national/main20034397.shtml

[bluestateguy]

1. How are class sizes of 50-60 supposed to make things better?

A class that big is ungovernable in a high school setting, unless it's a class like band, choir or drama.

[midnight]

14. I have been asking this for several years...

[obxhead]

26. It is not their intention to make things better.

It's simply to cut funding from anywhere except the pockets of the rich.

[No Elephants]

32. +1

[pnwmom]

2. So they're writing off all those students, apparently. n/t

[snappyturtle]

10. Aren't they also writing off teachers? nt

[pnwmom]

13. Well, the purpose of the teachers is to teach those students.

The students' education is supposed to be the goal.

[Lindsay]

3. A lot of people in this country

have lost their freaking minds.

The rich keep getting richer, and the rest get high school classes of 60 students.

My heart breaks.

[virgogal]

4. God,what a mess !

[Betty]

5. just what the tea party/repigs want

why not go for 1000 kids per class? towards the ultimate goal of no education unless you are rich enough to afford it privately. Thus reinstating the serf class for all time.

[jkappy]

18. Now that the Wrong People are getting educated, edu no longer

counts for much at all. Or, at least, that's obviously the direction it's going.

[JJW]

6. Building Schools?

Are we still building schools in Iraq & Afghanistan? Perhaps we can outsource our education too!

The gutting of America by both parties and its' corporate masters continues unabated.

[XemaSab]

22. I think the point might just be to "outsource" ignorant kids with no future

to Iraq and Afghanistan for an "education."

[defendandprotect]

7. That was a very DEPRESSION-like circumstance -- schools closed -- !!

[Solly Mack]

8. K&R

60? Damn

[fascisthunter]

9. the destruction of American Society.... right winger's dream

fucking miserable misanthropes....

[lib2DaBone]

11. We're building schools in Afghanistan... and sending pallets of money to war lords...

.. but it's still not enough for the Tea Baggers and the Koch Bros.

What the Tea Baggers don't realize.. is that the Koch Bros only want two classes. The weal ty ruling class and the lowly servant workers.

The Tea Baggers think they are going to be included in the wealthy ruling class.... Bwwaaaaa lol.... sure they will...

[Bandit]

12. Couldn't they just give the wealthy another tax cut instead?

That supposedly is the cure-all...be-all of Republican Governance...

[davidthegnome]

15. The report is very vague

How many schools are we talking about here? Clearly quite a lot. Quite a lot of teachers and aides will be losing their jobs. The idea of 50-60 student size classes.... it's bizarre.

Approval of Bobb's plan means the district can't declare bankruptcy - how does that work? I don't get it. There's a lot I don't get. What the hell is going on in this Country?

[madrchsod]

16. they should read about what happened in chicago.

closing neighbor hood school is a huge problem in chicago.

[MannyGoldstein]

17. The bankers are smiling today

As they nibble canapes and drink champagne.

All is well in the world.

[roxiejules]

21. "Make no mistake...

What is happening in large urban districts today has been carefully orchestrated by vulture philanthropists." - Susan Ohanian



http://www.susanohanian.org/show_commentary.php?id=786

In addition to declaring all public schools failures, opening the door to vouchers and privatization, the Business Roundtable plan also paved the way for school-to-work plans sitting on the back burner ever since President Clinton failed to get the national test he wanted.

By 2000, the Business Roundtable had managed to create an interlocking network of business associations, corporate foundations, governors' associations, non-profits, and educational institutions. This network includes the Education Trust, Annenberg Center, Harvard Graduate School, Public Agenda, Achieve, Inc., Education Commission of the States, the Broad Foundation, Institute for Educational Leadership, federally funded regional laboratories, and most newspaper editorial boards.

In December 2008, former IBM CEO Lou Gerstner called for the abolition of all local school districts, eliminating local decisions regarding standards, teacher selection, and curriculum choice.

[bvar22]

19. As long as Upper Middle Class white students...

...can use Tax Payer money to attend "Charter" schools in the White Flight Suburbs,
its ALL good!

Welcome to the "New American Century"(PNAC),
brought to you by the Republicans and their close friends, the "Centrist" Democrats.
:patriot:

[roxiejules]

20. Everything will be outsourced

http://www.freep.com/article/20110128/NEWS01/101280435/1001/news/Union-says-will-fight-Sodexo-s-deal-take-over-DPS-building-services

Robert Bobb, DPS emergency financial manager, announced Thursday that the outsourcing will mean 699 employees will have to seek jobs with companies taking over custodial, engineering, maintenance, repair and grounds services Feb. 21.

Also at issue is that the $43.9-million, five-year contract is with Sodexo Inc., a multinational company that Human Rights Watch and other groups accused of human rights violations and union busting.

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

23. I guess outsourcing Maintenance, Engineering wasn't enough in January 27, 2011

Detroit Schools To Outsource Maintenance, Engineering
http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2011/01/27/detroit-school-to-outsource-maintenance-engineering/

DETROIT (WWJ) District officials says it’s a huge money-saving move for the Detroit Public Schools. DPS expects to save $75 million by outsourcing school maintenance and engineering services Maryland-based Sodexo Inc. and seven local companies.

In making the announcement, Thursday, DPS Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb said the plan will
eliminate 823 budgeted positions, in a five-year contract that begins late next month.

the plan will eliminate 823 budgeted positions

Wow

[Haole Girl]

24. Class sizes to 60 students is disgraceful

:-(

[inwiththenew]

25. Everyday Detroit looks more and more like the Detroit from RoboCop

It is really quite sad.

[blackspade]

27. What the hell?

I'm beginning to think that only teachers should be eligible to hold positions that impact schools financially or curriculum wise.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

28. The school board is elected, and the financial manager appointed.

No teaching experience necessary.

The jobs are financially rewarding to Robert Bobb and to the members of the school board.

They don't want to lose power (perks, graft, etc) to the mayor.

Most of the school board have no background in education, and neither does Robert Bobb.

Students are a secondary concern, at best.

[blackspade]

29. Which is why cutting educators out of the management of

schools is so detrimental.

[stockholmer]

30. it's all gone pear-shaped, your great nation is committing national suicide, cut by 1000 cuts

"Bobb filed his deficit elimination plan with the state in January, saying it would wipe out the district's $327 million deficit by 2014"



This $327 million deficit total amount is ALMOST 500 TIMES LESS than the $154 BILLION that top Wall Street banks paid themselves in bonuses alone for the 12 months of 2010.

This after they and the other global money-changers were bailed out at the USA taxpayer's expense for at least $23.7 TRILLION since the end of 2008 in loans, fiduciary promises, and straight-up giveaways.

Now they say they will need $100 TRILLION MORE between now and 2020.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/davos/8267768/World-needs-100-trillion-more-credit-says-World-Economic-Forum.html

Unless you do start to dismantle this cartel in next 1 to 2 years that ends the bankster-run monetary debt system (max), your country will come to resemble a mid-1980's Warsaw Pact state by the turn of the next decade.

The only difference will be that the state security apparatus enforcing the private overlords will on the American plantation will be the greatest military force-projection machine in history. Tracked, traced, databased, and each one of you are pledged as debt security on your tens of trillions of debt. Debt paid to the money-changers in perpetuity at gunpoint.

Fix it, or soon, very soon, you will perish as the nation you think you are. For 235 years, a rights-based, democratic republic has placed this zeitgeist of justice and freedom in in not just your beings, but in the collective world's as well.

At most times, like all other endeavours of man, it failed to live up to the ideals proclaimed. This is the tragic fate of all nations, but it is also their gift, as in the true striving to reach these unattainable ideals, humanity is lifted higher than if the ideals were never grasped at nor conceived.

[boppers]

31. I call bullshit.

This is so wrong, so insane, so impossible, that it can't be true. You can't just make classrooms twice the size by decree, or double the amount of time a teacher has by decree, it's simply not possible.

(What was the first stage of grief, again?)

[No Elephants]

33. More war. more tax cuts and more offshoring and we'll all be rolling in dough again.