More Lame Duck Legislation.........

Information from Steve Norton at MI Parents for Schools –

(The comments in the parentheses are me – Terese commenting).

Four Bad Bills being considered in the legislative lame duck session –

Bad Idea #1 - Let's pave the roads with our children's education (Among other things, the idea to eliminate sales tax from gas sales…….sales tax is used to fund schools……with no method set to replace those taxes except for the guess that sales in other areas will increase.   Really?)

Bad Idea #2 - Cut school funding and then take 'em over when they have budget problems (the “Early Warning System”)

Bad Idea #3 - Cut school funding and then force them to flunk 3rd graders who don't test well in reading (We want students to learn, but what is magic about 3^rd grade?   Has flunking a kid ever really increased academic performance?  Because, if it did, wouldn’t it be done more frequently?)

Bad Idea #4 - Cut school funding, and then slap a simplistic letter grade on them to show how badly they're doing (I’d like to know the criteria for a grade and schools are never simply ONE thing, so how can there be one grade that would reflect how a school is doing?)

Go to the “MI Parents for Schools” site for full information on these bills!

http://capwiz.com/miparentsforschools/issues/alert/?alertid=63971636&MC_plugin=4461

"Taking Away Our Schools" from Michigan Parents for Schools

The Lame Duck Sessions are revving up in Lansing and the following bills are predicted to skip committee hearings and come to the floor of the legislature as early as Thursday.


Go to the link below to read more information from "Michigan Parents for Schools" and CALL YOUR LEGISLATOR......leave a message!


http://capwiz.com/miparentsforschools/callalert/index.tt?alertid=63960631


Here is the basic information about these bills.  Walled Lake could become one of these schools if only because the STATE ITSELF has caused us to spend less per pupil over the years with their school aid cuts!  This is ludicrous!


From "Michigan Parents for Schools" -

Here is a good example of why we need to tell our story. A package of bills now before the Michigan Senate would give the state even more power to take over school districts that "might" be in financial distress. What's wrong with this picture?

• As we argued in our recent article, most districts are having financial troubles because the state has not given them decent funding, not because they have been throwing money to the wind.
• There are over 19 indicators the state could use to say your district could be in "financial distress." The MI Assn of School Boards says just 2 of these indicators could catch over 250 school districts in its net - close to half!
• The bills give broad new powers to the state Dept. of Treasury to take over districts and demand sweeping cuts. Are the folks who process our tax returns the right people to make sound decisions for our schools?
• The emergency manager rules are bad enough, but these bills would allow Treasury to skip over any review process or local objections and ask the Governor directly for an emergency manager for a school district. Why be so eager to strip us of control of our local community schools?

This is bad law no matter how you look at it.