In my opinion Oklahoma does pretty good for what they spend, 47th in spending, and 42nd in performance. It could be worse: Alaska number 2 in spending (more than twice per pupil as OK) and 46th in performance.

Yeah your absolutely right when I was a Coal miner my property taxes were $44.00 a year. Now they are $4000.00 a Year I apologize that I can't come up with more.

P.S. We obviously got the best teachers money will buy. You want to bid for one it will cost you $82,000 a 9 month for a high school teacher.

lol

Worthless fricken teachers!

lol, you all are something else.

Perfect. Maybe Paul can make that your avatar. Suits you perfectly! LOL

Testing week is in two weeks in this part of the state. Only the larger districts are still closed, smaller schools that receive OG&E, Wind, or oil/gas $$ are not sitting to bad. Raising the production tax up from 2% to 5% sent them back to school with a smile for the most part.

Empower your school district. Make the board members have the say. Eff the state and the popo.

That was the biggest bait and switch job...

"The lottery will provide $300 million for education!"

But they didn't tack on 300 mill to the education budget. They pulled 300 mill that was coming from other revenue generators and replaced it with the 300 mill from the lottery... Schools gained nothing. The legislature got 300 mill freed up to spend elsewhere.

Mike

Our little school was closed Monday... Reopened on Tuesday and back to business as usual.

Mike

i USED TO BE ANTI TEACHER. THEN I DROVE A SCHOOL BUS FOR NINE YEARS. MANY SCHOOLS REQUIRE TEACHERS TO GET THEIR MASTERS. WITH THE LACK OF RESPECT FROM STUDENTS AND PARENTS AS WELL AND NO BACKING FROM SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS TEACHERS EARN EVERY DIME THEY MAKE AND FOR THE MOST PART ARE VERY UNDER PAID!I KNOW TEACHERS THAT HAVE QUIT BECAUSE OF THE LACK OF RESPECT FROM STUDENTS AND THE ATTITUDE OF THE SCHOOL BOARDS THAT THE BUDGET MUST PASS AT ALL COSTS, SO DON"T MAKE WAVES OR OFFEND THE PARENTS>

I to drove bus but I seen the opposite. Teachers and administration thinking they were above everyone else.

More attention was on sports than academics. Sports has its place but not bussing 150 miles for a game. The kids not into sports didn't get the attention compared to ones that were.

Teachers always whining.

I spent 7 years as a mayor and worked with school board on several projects and between union and government their hands were tied on a lot of things that needed changing.

If teachers want the respect than dump the union and the tenured clause and actually teach and the respect will come followed by the money. Tax payers are just tired of building fancy ridiculous buildings just to hear within 5 years they need more.

But yet our education is failing our kids. Kids were better off 50 years ago on what they were taught than what is taught today.

Fletcher schools did the same .

Aaron you mentioned the special activity buses... Afton has one so I inquired about it.

It's a regular Blue Bird school bus. The fancy paint job, decals, bells and whistles were paid for by donations from the community... And likely some revenue generated by admission to athletic events.

So taxpayers aren't necessarily on the hook for some of the stuff.

Mike

Also, different school organizations take turns working the concession stands. The revenue generated by concessions is used to fund the activities of the respective organizations that work the concession stands.

Mike

I can't believe I'm still attempting to educate some of you. (I'm really feeling the teacher's pain, lol) BUT schools do not get to decide where to spend the monies they get. There is a certain part ear marked for "buildings and grounds" a certain % for "special ed" a certain % for "transportation" "athletics" etc... There are schools with a lot of money for things but they can't increase salaries, or buy a new short bus for antigov with the money ear marked for "buildings and grounds" as an example.

That's crummy... Each school's board should determine how monies are spent.

And I can't speak for other schools, but our board members receive no salary.

Mike

Nothing but love and you know this.

I think more of us po'ed at things other than the teachers , per se. I get it . However , it's the direction of their protest that's infuriating. Instead of calling for the consolidation of districts,doing away with high paying administrators, and other cost savings measures they want more funding . That's only gonna happen with more/higher taxes.

A couple of years ago , there was a move to consolidate a lot of smaller rural districts . The biggest opponent ? The teachers. Kinda leaves one scratching their head.

Like I said. 8 grand per kid is plenty of money to educate them. The problem is the way its spent. If you want to cut wages eliminate first the weeds soaking up most of the money. Counselors, teacher aides, school superintendent, social workers. Firing those useless folks would free up a lot of money. Some kids are born with low IQ's and some are born with sorry parents. Nothing anybody can do about those things. Making the other kids pay for that is wrong. Eliminate mandatory school attendance. The kids the government must force to attend are never going to amount to anything because of forced attendance. Those kids take up teachers time and schools money from the rest of them. If a kid cant pass then fail them. Nobody benefits when kids that wont study still pass. If a kids self esteem is hurt when that kid doesn't pass into the next grade maybe that's a good thing?

If a parent throws a fit when a kid comes home with red stripes on its rear end after swearing at a teacher or whatever, expel the kid. If the kids dad wants to be a hero and smack the principal or whatever that's what jails are for. Kind of funny when that was how kids were educated we led the world in education. Now with all the psycho babblers and social workers crying and whining that kind of education doesn't work we have school shootings and stupid graduates.