Two Arkansas Schools to Close

The Dewitt School Board voted Tuesday night to close Humphrey Elementary and Gillett 6th through 12th grade.

[Harvey Edwards]

This State Bugs me to no end. Our last Legislative session they increased educational programs and funding more than any other program. They are hiring 8500 new educators. Will all this go to higher education ONLY? You know the schools that gather tuition money for the State. Before the State Governments number 1 money making business (Education) does that with the taxpayers money they should think of the working class and especially the working class poor ( most of us) and help good schools in our small working communities. Gillett (I am a 73 Graduate) is not on the failing grades list of schools like the school they are being forced to bus 20 miles to. Dewitt. Heck since Gillett is a better school academically, why not bus the less educated Dewitt Kids to Gillett ? I know I am beating a dead horse here, since dollar signs not quality is all our Governor Beebe is wanting. Governor, when these kids begin getting dummied down because of your inattention to their educational needs, what prospect will they have of thinking, Higher Education. Most likely they will have to leave the State anyway to get a job to sustain even themselves. I did I joined the Navy in 73 and retired. I have worked contract at the shipyards more recently for three times what I can make anywhere in the Delta of Arkansas. Governor you had best quit taxing small business and let them grow and raise kids and then it may be evident to even you that We love our small schools, they are why we stay here. They are the reason I quit working out of State. I have become defiant. I will not leave because you or anyone else is forcing us to. Is that clear Governor?

I am the media officer for the Arkansas Constitution Party , support the tea party , secure Arkansas, and any COnservative group who is "As we speak" determined to remove all of you Liberals from office in 2010. That is unless you see fit to resign earlier.

[Kayte]

Dear Harvey, I want to take a moment to explain why the schools in Gillett are closing. For the same reason small schools have closed all over the state of Arkansas for many years, now.

In 1993, under the hand of Senator Bob Dole, Bill Clinton signed an international education law known as, GOALS 2000: EDUCATE AMERICA ACT. I personally studied--dissected--that legislation, wrote editorials and held forums to repeal it.
When Mike Huckabee became Governor of AR., one on the first things he did was to sign onto GOALS 2000. The state conjoining bill was the infamous, Senate Bill 57! To that point I had helped Huckabee. But when I, and others, tried showing him the communist bill, he became irate--even with certain legislators. Huckabee is a temperamental tyrant, so to speak, and he wants his way.

Many of us, including one or two teachers, tried talking with him and showing him that SB 57 was merely an obedience to GOALS 2000.

Huckabee wanted those "federal dollars" coming into the state trough, and I imagine he made a bit off the deal, too, or he would not have been so destructive to get his way.

Once SB 57 passed, he lobbied for a bill known as the "Academic and Financial Distress Act." Upon reading this bill, one could see that almost every school in Arkansas would eventually be shut down. And today, very few rural schools exist.

The bill demands that a certain grade average be maintained (and the grades are very controlled now.) The bill also demands that the school maintain a specific number of students. The last number I read was 500 minimum. 500 students in a rural school is a LOT of students!

GOALS 2000 took away ALL local control, leaving only decoy school boards; gave State Boards the control to see that all National Laws were obeyed. The National Board of Education authorizes all the standards, subjects, etc. The State simply follows through.

Thus, the good Republicrat, Mike Huckabee, ruined the government schools in Arkansas, and the system has steadily fallen.

The goal is, according to the law, to have "regional" schools--or better said, "compounds."

Huckabee boasted about being a key speaker at a United Nations Conference in the 90's, and it was published in, I believe, the Weekly Standard.

Now you know why your beloved alma matta is being traded in for something better than local community. It's all in the law--international!

[Harvey Edwards]

Thank you Kayte. You must be one of the good guys, I wish more people understood the International or Global affect of herding our kids into reeducation compounds. Most don't they just gripe and then merely conform. that is why I will keep on campaigning and urge all to BE involved. http://home.earthlink.net/~harveywards/

Tonight there was a meeting in Gillett to form a charter school in Gillett. I hope it succeeds then more and more until the state realizes that BIG Government has never produced a satisfactory outcome. It will also let dollar sign Beebe know that the Largest business in Arkansas, Education, is in trouble until Schools are made people friendly and small town safe.

I wish other folks in Gillett would read and comment and use this Gillett News as a town rallying place to tell our State Legislatures to just back up and be responsible.
There I did it in only a few minute .
Pardon my grammer and punctuation. I came from Gillett.

[consolidation is BS]

I was a student at Holly Grove before it closed and I've heard so many stories of inequality and favortism since consolidation with Clarendon. I still believe consolidation was the beginning of the downfall of smaller communities. HG was already struggling beforehand and afterwards it became pretty much a ghost town. Several years later, Monroe county as a whole is steadily declining. I'm blessing not to reside there anymore, but I feel bad for the ones that do.
I hope it was worth the price of saving a few dollars. I am still a firm beleiver that a small educational setting is better to learn.