When is your brother not your brother? Today!

Well, bus drivers, janitors and secretaries, etc., remember when they said...join the union, be part of the brotherhood and we will take care of you. Remember, it is the teacher's union and not the bus driver, janitor and secretary union. Maybe the teacher's could have taken a 10% pay or benefit cut to save your jobs! Where is that brotherhood now!!!! I am sure they are hoping you will be gone before the next union contract vote.

A Golden Ticket to the Country Club School

Please come to our school. We have small classes, your child will have academic independence, and our students even have an opportunity to govern the school. We only have 400 students and incredible arts programs for "alternative learners". Also, your child will dine out every day at a small, boutique shopping area . We also provide private limousine service (buses) to take your child any hour of the day to any class they would like to take at another campus. Even though you attend this "alternative school', you may still participate on any sports team at your public high school and we will drive you there too. You will have it all and be among the academic elite of Ann Arbor.

Every year, 300-400 families line up to see they will receive one of 100 golden tickets to attend the Country Club of Ann Arbor Schools, Community High School. It a private school for public school kids that is paid for with your tax dollars.

Unfortunately, Community High School is no longer a school for artsy, alternative learning kids. It is just a place where smart parents know enough to get a private school education on the tax payer's dime. In the past, most art leaning kids did not take AP Physics or AP Biology, but since the school's enrollment has changed and new students pool want AP History, we will accommodate all of their needs and desires, and will spare no expense. We even bus them to these classes they would like to take. This is very expensive to do and is disruptive to everyone and just think about what it is doing to the environment

Wouldn't this money be better spent on the truly at-risk children? Also, the cost of running a public high school for 400 children is outrageous? We are suppose to gain efficiencies at the High School level not increase our cost per student. Why are we offering a boutique education to a elite (academically, financially, etc.) group of children. Look at the demographics of this school and more importantly, look at the composite Merit Scholar Scores. These kids would do fine anywhere.

Ann Arbor Community 25.1

Ann Arbor Huron 23.2

Ann Arbor Pioneer 22.3

Ann Arbor Roberto Clemente 14.8

Ann Arbor Stone School 14.2

If you want to go to Community High School, you need to accept that it does not have sport teams and you will not get the same classes you will get at Huron or Pioneer. What do you think about merging this this school into the Pioneer campus? Savings (remove the administration and building expense) plus save the environment!

Estimated savings: 12 teachers

COME LITTLE CHILDREN TO THE ANN ARBOR SCHOOLS

How much money should we spend trying to convince children and their parents to attend AAPS? Estimated Waste: $500,000 or the equivalent of 6 new teachers.

MARKETING AAPS SCHOOLS

Ann Arbor Public School student growth has been about the same for the past few years. This year, there was a unplanned net gain of 60 kids to the Ann Arbor Public School district with means $600,000 more in funding from the state. Unfortunately, instead of trying to control cost, our BOE spends a lot of effort and money attempting to attract students back from private schools. Not a very good, long-term solution to a financial crisis would you say? Plus, the Charter Schools all had gains and most private schools are at capacity; for example Greenhills and Gabriel Richard both have waiting lists. So, the gain is not from stealing kids from these schools. In case our parents do not understand the message, we have a school spokesperson to say it plainly in English. A nice luxury and possibly $160,000 per year (including benefits).

New, Fancy E-Newsletter:

In addition, we just added a new E-newsletter for AAPS. Most of our schools communicate with our children and families via a free school newsletter run by volunteers. I am sure the schools would be happy to add school district information. Why do we need a district E-newsletter and more importantly, a someone manage and write it. This is a luxury and not a necessity!

Estimated Waste: 1 New Teacher


An Ad campaign, PR Spokesperson and her secretary, webmaster, e-newsletter, etc. could all be laid off and not one child or teacher would even notice. Instead, to save money, the BOE (Board of Education) will attempt to slash teacher jobs or people that directly influence our children's education--are their priorities screwed up??


Marketing 101 for schools: Have a good educational product and your market will stay with you or with come to you via word of mouth!!!


ELIMINATE: School Spokesperson, Secretary, Marketing Campaign, Webmaster, E-newsletter and other PR consulting projects=$500,000 WASTED!!!!!


NET GAIN: 6 New Teachers

Athletic Directors-Two too many!

Please let me know if I am in error that we have three high school athletic directors; one at each high school? University of Michigan has one. Estimated: $200,000 waste= ~3 teachers. Please correct me if I am wrong.

Welcome to AAPS Waste Watcher

Well, the recent 2009 Washtenaw Regional Enhancement Millage election had a lot of controversy. The voters in Washtenaw County finally said, "NO MORE TAXES & IT'S THE ECONOMY STUPID". Ann Arbor meekly voted to favor of another tax increase (we love taxes here) and what is a few more unemployed; we have shelters for those guys. The results of the election did bring forward several critical questions about the AAPS district:

• Where is all that money going and who is running our school district?
  
• Why is one of the richest school districts in the state always crying....poor?
  
• Are our children eating our school tax money for lunch?
  

I, with many other guest commentators, have decided to explore the aforementioned questions and will hopefully be uncovering and discussing the following:

1. Identify apparent waste in our public schools
2. Provide solutions for better spending

Our ultimate goal is to provide a world-class, child-centered education system for our community. If it does not directly impact the classroom, it is WASTE!!!!


The educational systems need to be designed to weather tough economic times. We welcome comments from the community and hope parents, staff, administrators, teachers and taxpayers will participate in this constructive forum.