[Vision2020] Insulted

[keely emerinemix]

I understand your point and would affirm it in part, having grown up not far 
from 200-year-old adobe homes that still had a century or two left.  
However, occupants in those homes were not then held accountable for their 
occupants' technological proficiency by the Federal and the State 
governments with computer or tech classes, not to mention high-stakes 
testing, conducted in homes that lack sufficient wiring, for example.  Or, 
said homeowner doesn't face ADA-incompatibility issues (the worst of which 
is impossible access for real people, not the possible sanctions coming from 
it); neither does the adobe-home owner have to accommodate playfield, 
auditorium, cafeteria and classroom needs -- he or she is free to live in 
tiny spaces if that's what they want.  If a kitchen (the "science lab" of 
the home) shorts out, is too small, or is outdated, the homeowner can decide 
to cook less and eat out more -- or fix the problems, remodel, or move.  But 
students in an old school do not have that choice.  Their facilities 
literally exist at the mercy of taxpayers.  And there is no bureaucracy that 
dictates that there will be accelerated "kitchen" classes, more of them, and 
for longer periods of use -- but if the proposed high school redesign(s) 
come about that require a greater emphasis on math and science, the school 
building occupants are in a bind, forced to deal with a situation the 
homeowner is lucky to avoid.

I hear often that UI buildings are often quite old and quite useable.  True. 
  But the older buildings that require only desks and seating for 
discussion-oriented courses for college students needn't be technologically 
state-of-the-art.  An adult-level survey of Elizabethan poetry could be held 
in a Quonset hut, I suppose.  But I would seriously doubt that any science, 
engineering, research, technology or lab-based courses located in buildings 
at the UI could be housed, even if pared down for younger children, in the 
kinds of buildings with the kinds of facilities we have at Russell, WP and 
the high school.  And the University makes sure that they provide adequate 
spaces for classrooms, cafeterias/restaurants/kiosks, recreation, and 
student services.  A sick UI student has a student health building to go to. 
  A sick WP student more often than not gets a cot in the hallway, along 
with other students needing individual attention.  College students can 
elect to leave inadequate facilities for greener pastures elsewhere, and 
they can vote for the legislators who direct funding.  Kids can't.

One Russell parent, who mercifully does not represent the majority, told me 
once that he didn't want the facilities committee "to cram playfields down 
their (Russell parents') throats, because that's not important to us."  
Really?  Since he's not invited to play on the asphalt jungle, I suppose 
that's OK -- for him.  Maybe even for his kids, who have a nice yard and 
soccer camp in the summer.  But it's a lousy attitude for the other 
schoolchildren, many of them from disadvantaged families, for whom a nice, 
safe expanse of playing field might just be the one respite from poverty and 
strife they can experience during the day.  Ultimately, I think you should 
not be able to drive through Moscow and guess with virtual certainty where 
"the poor kids" go to school and where the "other kids" go.  They're all OUR 
kids -- there shouldn't be "other" kids, and the measure of this or any 
other district is not how well my relatively affluent, secure, provided-for 
children do, but how well the kid with all the strikes against her does.  
And if that's not our standard, we're in the sort of trouble that even the 
shabbiest classroom can't adequately represent.

keely



From: Chasuk <chasuk at gmail.com>
To: "Jack Porter" <jporter at moscow.com>
CC: vision2020 at moscow.com
Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Insulted
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2006 09:15:08 -0800

I went to 13 different schools before the 10th grade.  Some of the
facilities were modern and new, some were decrepit.  I can't say that
it made much difference to me as a student.  However, the quality of
the teachers made a great deal of difference.

What is it about our present facilities that are so awful that they
need fixing?  My own children went to school locally, and they never
once came home and complained about the buildings.  They did come home
and occasionally complain about poor teachers.

A new building isn't necessarily a better one.  I lived in a house in
the UK that had been built in about 1535, and it was perfectly
habitable.  They don't seem to have the compunction there to tear
everything down just because it has gotten elderly.

So are we being asked to fund new construction out of honest
necessity, or just because our present facilities have gotten "old?"

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