Our recommendation: Springboro voters should say 'yes' the first time to school levies

[Lurker]

Post Secondary Education wrote:

<quoted text>
As students leave the High School to take college courses they do not have to be taught at Springboro so I would venture a guess that it costs what it saves. How much does it cost Springboro to teach this same student 3-6 credit hours at our building? A full time high school student costs about $7,800 per year. If they leave half of the school year than it saves $3,900. What does it cost depends on how many credits they earn at the college. Why does our high school not push students to PSEO? I know of one student that graduated two years ago and had his first year of college completed completely free saving his family $20-50,000. Why doesn't Springboro tell all parents and students of this option and how great it is? I have heard it was cost. That does not pencil out to me. A 3 credit hour college course costs Springboro about $1,000 that is equal to what it costs to keep them in the High School for the course but saves parents that $1,000 later. Financially it is a wash to the district. Again I ask why aren't they pushing students to this unbelievable opportunity but instead discourage it?
This sounds exactly like the Conversion argument. Those opposed are opposed because they are protecting district jobs and has nothing to do with what is good for the kids. This seems very selfish to me.

I don't think it saves the school any money because it is going to still have teach the kids who don't chose this option. It is a good deal for kids and their parents but not sure how it is better than AP classes, which are already taught.

[Scoffer]

Lurker wrote:

<quoted text>
I don't think it saves the school any money because it is going to still have teach the kids who don't chose this option. It is a good deal for kids and their parents but not sure how it is better than AP classes, which are already taught.

Lurker should stop wasting words; Those first three little words say all there is to say about lurker posts: "I don't think...."

[Lurker]

Wow, true intellectual giants post on this board. Sorry if I don't live up to those high standards! My cut and paste skills are rusty!

[Just Watching]

Lurker wrote:

<quoted text>
I don't think it saves the school any money because it is going to still have teach the kids who don't chose this option. It is a good deal for kids and their parents but not sure how it is better than AP classes, which are already taught.

Undergraduate students, 2012-2013

The table below shows the total cost of tuition per semester, including General Fee and Network & Technology Fee for in-state and out-of-state undergraduate students, for the academic year 2012-2013.

Credit Hours
Lower Division,
IN-STATE
2012-2013

1.....$223.10

2.....$428.20

3.....$633.30

4....$838.40

5...$1,043.50

6....$1,248.60

7....$1,453.70

8....$1,658.80

9.....$1,863.90

10....$2,069.00

11....$2,274.10

12...$2,479.20

If you have more kids in college garning college credits then you would need fewer teachers at the high school teaching current event classes, film classes, etc. Reducing our unneeded staff, redeploying our unused resources in the high school to other areas of high need throughout the school district would certainly save us money and benefit all of the children who are now struggling within our system.

2000 plus children are still not getting it according to the data provide by the state assessment tests. Redeploying our forces to best serve and advance these children's education is of paramount concern for every taxpayer in this district. If the taxpayer is going to pay for it, we should demand something for our contribution.

If we can spend less on college than we do in the high school, how can we say no to 2000 children who are not getting the education they deserve by redeploying resources to better serve that population?

How can we say no to parents and children struggling with ever increasing costs of higher education?

How can we say no to providing the basic assistance to give our children the boost forward in life?

[Just Watching]

That fee structure was for Miami University Middletown.

If you do not wish for your children to participate that is fine, but please do not hinder the opportunities for others who do wish to pursue this option.

[Scoffer]

Lurker wrote:

Wow, true intellectual giants post on this board. Sorry if I don't live up to those high standards! My cut and paste skills are rusty!

Apology accepted! Now skip the pity party and forget about rusty cut and paste skills; stop denying the truth and educate yourself to the facts by "just watching."

[Lurker]

I go to the same meetings as just watching and don't see or hear what he hears.

[ATE is publically funded]

A Terrirists speaks wrote:

<quoted text>
Any district that pays for attendance to this Bill Ayres teacher conference should be shut down. This man/speakers hates this country enough to try to kill and blow up a govt. building why would anyone listen to ta terrorist and absolutely should never use tax payer money to listen to him and come home and be anywhere near children. Will Lisa go to hear Billy, she is a teacher?

Responsible parents of Springboro schools are going to have to deal with an unforeseen problem. Left-wing ’60s radical and onetime domestic terrorist Bill Ayers will be a keynote speaker at the Association of Teacher Educators annual conference in Atlanta next month. Should we allow public dollars to be used to send Springboro administrators and teachers to Atlanta in order to hear the words of a self-described anti-government terrorist?

Ayers gained notoriety alongside his wife Bernardine Dohrn as a member of the Weather Underground during the Vietnam War. He was involved in Chicago’s “Days of Rage” riot in 1969 and went underground as a fugitive from justice after an accidental Greenwich Village townhouse explosion in 1970 killed three Weather Underground members who were preparing a bomb that prematurely detonated.

Ayers admitted in a 2001 book that he participated in bombings of the New York City Police Department headquarters, the U.S. Capitol Building and the Pentagon in the early 1970s.

He subsequently became a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a “family friend” to Barack Obama before the president became a national political figure.

A sample of the wit and wisdom of Bill Ayers:
“Kill all the rich people.… Bring the revolution home. Kill your parents.”

The avowed communist revolutionary Ayers is best known for grooming Barack Hussein Obama for high office, as part of the same strategy of destroying America from within its own institutions that led him to abandon bombs for a career in education. Obama’s political career was literally launched from the apartment Ayers shared with fellow terrorist Bernardine Dohrn, inventor of the Fork Salute honoring the Manson Family’s senseless murders.

http://moonbattery.com/...

[Just Watching]

Lurker wrote:

I go to the same meetings as just watching and don't see or hear what he hears.

You won't see it or hear it at a meeting that is designed to promote a certain image. Doing your homework, utilizing your critical thinking skills, and thinking about what you have learned are the only way to enlighten oneself.

I try to annotate my sources for your perusal. Inspect them for yourself and then get back to us with your thoughts.

[Just Watching]

ATE is publically funded wrote:

<quoted text>
Responsible parents of Springboro schools are going to have to deal with an unforeseen problem. Left-wing ’60s radical and onetime domestic terrorist Bill Ayers will be a keynote speaker at the Association of Teacher Educators annual conference in Atlanta next month. Should we allow public dollars to be used to send Springboro administrators and teachers to Atlanta in order to hear the words of a self-described anti-government terrorist?
Ayers gained notoriety alongside his wife Bernardine Dohrn as a member of the Weather Underground during the Vietnam War. He was involved in Chicago’s “Days of Rage” riot in 1969 and went underground as a fugitive from justice after an accidental Greenwich Village townhouse explosion in 1970 killed three Weather Underground members who were preparing a bomb that prematurely detonated.
Ayers admitted in a 2001 book that he participated in bombings of the New York City Police Department headquarters, the U.S. Capitol Building and the Pentagon in the early 1970s.
He subsequently became a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a “family friend” to Barack Obama before the president became a national political figure.
A sample of the wit and wisdom of Bill Ayers:
“Kill all the rich people.… Bring the revolution home. Kill your parents.”
The avowed communist revolutionary Ayers is best known for grooming Barack Hussein Obama for high office, as part of the same strategy of destroying America from within its own institutions that led him to abandon bombs for a career in education. Obama’s political career was literally launched from the apartment Ayers shared with fellow terrorist Bernardine Dohrn, inventor of the Fork Salute honoring the Manson Family’s senseless murders.
http://moonbattery.com/...

Lovely people, I can see why the teacher's union is so enthralled by them. What is not to love?

I also note that it would appear the Mr. Ayres never did renounce his father's money, radical chic was more his style. No sense being a bum when you can pontificate from tony neighborhoods far from the results of your pontificating.

[Well Duh]

Lurker wrote:

I go to the same meetings as just watching and don't see or hear what he hears.

Many of those who go to the same meetings as our arrogantly proud boro parents (such as the few ones ones publicly spewing threats, false accusations, and hostility, on January 10 and January 22, at their neighbors who are elected by the public to serve as Board of Education representatives) "don't see NOR hear" what these parents hear. And neither do many of those who go to the same meetings agree with, nor appreciate, this flock of parental "angry birds" that descend upon our public business meetings trying to ram their personal self interest agenda of "grandstanding above all" down the throats of all Springboro parents and school district voters.

[SOS save our students]

ATE is publically funded wrote:

<quoted text>
The avowed communist revolutionary Ayers is best known for grooming Barack Hussein Obama for high office, as part of the same strategy of destroying America from within its own institutions that led him to abandon bombs for a career in education.

Our left-leaning media tends to refer to Bill Ayers as a former domestic terrorist. Don't let them fool you. There is nothing "former" about it. Ayers is every bit the domestic terrorist he ever was.

There is a clear delineation between the bomb-making Ayers of the '60's and '70s, versus the professor Bill Ayers of today. Part of his not-so-well-hidden agenda is all about a gradual undermining of America's longstanding core value system in our education system. The goal of Ayers as well as similar social terrorists is to use America's school room cirriculum as an agent to infiltrate the minds of our children. These people start this process by brainwashing today's teachers into believing the destructive leftwing values they teach are thoughts that mirror mainsteam thought. They'll happily do this at meeting places and seminars, just like this upcoming A.T.E. convention in Atlanta.

[buildingblock]

SOS save our students wrote:

<quoted text>
Our left-leaning media tends to refer to Bill Ayers as a former domestic terrorist. Don't let them fool you. There is nothing "former" about it. Ayers is every bit the domestic terrorist he ever was.
There is a clear delineation between the bomb-making Ayers of the '60's and '70s, versus the professor Bill Ayers of today. Part of his not-so-well-hidden agenda is all about a gradual undermining of America's longstanding core value system in our education system. The goal of Ayers as well as similar social terrorists is to use America's school room cirriculum as an agent to infiltrate the minds of our children. These people start this process by brainwashing today's teachers into believing the destructive leftwing values they teach are thoughts that mirror mainsteam thought. They'll happily do this at meeting places and seminars, just like this upcoming A.T.E. convention in Atlanta.

Dear Mr. Petrey,

Will you communicate to Springboro families and community members if our school teachers plan to support the key note speaker with their attendance at the national conference, and how will this trip for our teachers be funded?
We need to know your thoughts, as our Superintendent of Springboro Schools, as to what value you think our teachers would gain, and exactly what educational value supporting our schools Mission statement, would our teachers bring back into our Springboro students classrooms?

[a very rude awakening]

Each and every Springboro parent and concerned citizen should take a half hour out of their busy lives to read through this...

http://www.oagc.com/files/OAGC_Grading_On_A_C...

Could it be Springboro schools is just another Ohio school districts that has been victimized by low sets of standards being set for our school children? Is it possible that Boro's "Excellent with Distinction" designation amounts to not a lot more than some really nice banners to hang, and a nice perennial back rubbing from Columbus?

[PSEO]

Lurker wrote:

<quoted text>
I don't think it saves the school any money because it is going to still have teach the kids who don't chose this option. It is a good deal for kids and their parents but not sure how it is better than AP classes, which are already taught.

A student can go through a whole semester taking an AP course to at the end have a score on the AP National exam that does not get them out of a college course. If students get a score of 3 and the college they are going to require a 4 or 5 on the test they don't actually get out of anything. Why waste the whole semester taking a course at the HS when you could take one at a college and know for certain you are not going to be wasting your time?
Our scores on these AP exams is another reason Springboro did not score well on the US News report. It sounds like lots of kids don't pass out of college courses when they take AP courses due to some low scorers.

These kids take AP courses to test out of college courses. I would like to see a study or do a tracking to see how many actually got out of a college course by testing out of it on the AP exam.

My guess is that AP course work is not getting them out of college as much as taking the course at college would.

[Lurker]

PSEO cost the district $60K this year.

We could have helped a lot of our "failing" kids with that money!

[Why no answers]

Lurker wrote:

PSEO cost the district $60K this year.
We could have helped a lot of our "failing" kids with that money!

How many kids did that serve and how many credits did the kids earn?

[Boro class of 2019]

a very rude awakening wrote:

Each and every Springboro parent and concerned citizen should take a half hour out of their busy lives to read through this...
http://www.oagc.com/files/OAGC_Grading_On_A_C...
Could it be Springboro schools is just another Ohio school districts that has been victimized by low sets of standards being set for our school children? Is it possible that Boro's "Excellent with Distinction" designation amounts to not a lot more than some really nice banners to hang, and a nice perennial back rubbing from Columbus?

Let's take a look at last year's graduating class of Dennis and Five Points Elementary, Boro's class of 2019.

May 2012 Ohio Achievement Assessment
Springboro Community City Schools
Grade 5

http://www.oagc.com/files/OAGC_Grading_On_A_C...
(please see page 12)

Reading
A 5th grader needs to answer 25 out of 49 questions correctly (a minimum cut score of 51%) in order to be "Proficient".

Last year, OVER HALF!... 52.3% of Dennis and Five Points 5th graders (249 students) tested "proficient", or lower than the "proficient" cut score of 51%.
__________

Math
A 5th grader needs to answer 25 out of 52 math problems correctly (a minimum cut score of 48%) in order to be "Proficient".

Last year, almost one-third 31.4% of Dennis and Five Point 5th graders (147 students) tested "proficient", or lower than than the "proficient" cut score of 48%.

If almost 1/3 of today's sixth graders struggle to keep up with math and over 50% of them have difficulty with reading, how will a lot of these kids cope beginning next year when they'll be confronted with a much more difficult cirriculum that has been mandated by the state of Ohio?

[Now What]

Now that we all have read the Grading on a Curve document that everyone is pasting on here - what are you suggesting we do? What recommendations are you making to improve Springboro school district? Are the common core standards going to get us where you think we should be?
There has been posting after posting about the cut scores and how bad Springboro is doing but I've seen no specifics from anyone as to how to improve.

[Just Watching]

The first thing we need to do is disabuse ourselves of the notion that we are the best thing since sliced bread. We have some deep systemic issues that need to be dealt with in this community in regards to educating our children.

1) We need to realistically evaluate where our deficiencies exist, both inside and outside the classroom. Education is not a drop your child off for 7 hours and they return educated. It involves the parents backing up and supporting the teachers at home, Requiring and helping with homework to make sure it is done. Not all parents are created equal, so we need to make sure that the parents have the resources to learn the material being taught so they can help the children learn. There seems to be a need for a study island for parents who wish to help their children but have been away from school for many years.

2) Just like there are no two children who are alike in their abilities, we need to recognize that teachers are much the same. Not all teachers are created equal, some are excellent, some are good, some are mediocre, and some are bad. Nodding our head at the union mantra that all teachers are excellent is a bit too Animal Farm for me. Let us begin to call a spade a spade and utilize our resources in house to bring those less talented up to speed or show them the door. The ones paying the price for mediocre or less ability are the very ones we are here for, the children.

3) Raising the standards by which we choose to operate and then enforcing those standards will pay huge dividends for all involved, from administrators, to teachers, to parents, to children, to taxpayers. We are not condemned to troll the base standards that the state employs, we are perfectly free to aim so much higher.

4) Real achievement that can be measured and quantified. While some may call that teaching to the test, I call that basic knowledge required to function productively in this society. Feasting on semantics to cover up failure is no substitute for actual learning and academic achievement. Rote learning of your math tables may seem boring, but the results are undeniable. Build self esteem with actual accomplishment, not with a false Honor Society where the top 70% of your class is recognized as deserving that accolade.

5) Recognize that not all children learn in the same environment and realize that other choices may be necessary. Some may thrive under a more rigorous discipline setting, while different children wilt under the same authority. Build programs that allow parents the choice of where their child should attempt to succeed.

6) We are not fated to repeat the past in hopes of gaining an alternate ending. We are free to reinvent the system, let us grasp this opportunity and move both our school district and our children forward now.

7) Speak up against the status quo and demand true excellence throughout the school district. Only the vox populi can stem this tide of mediocrity.