“…but liars figure.” That’s how Twain ends a famous epigram. Only sometimes the figures are lies. Its funny how by inflating St. Louis county’s school district’s enrollment by 5% JCI was able to squeeze another $1.5 million out of the children.
No wonder their Duluth work has turned into such a fiasco. If the figures Tom Day reports are accurate I’ve underestimated our enrollment loss in Duluth. Its over 50% worse than the 10% I’ve written about.
A document given to each School Board member showed that when Superintendent Keith Dixon arrived in 2004, 194 students living in Duluth were attending schools outside the Duluth district. By 2008-09 that number had ballooned to 1,563:
I’m glad the students are taking it well and goodness knows Frank Wanner is on top of the situation despite the Trib’s reports that the high school faculty at Central High are at each other’s throats:
It’s not just teachers from Denfeld who have complaints about Central administration, said Frank Wanner, president of the Duluth Federation of Teachers and a Central social studies teacher. Teachers from all schools expected that efficiencies gained by combining schools would help reduce class sizes and provide more administrative support.
Too bad the human needs of Duluth’s Children lost out to the Business community’s saucer-like eyes as it contemplated all the spending a half billion dollar Red Plan bond would unleash. Its nice of the Trib to highlight those needs in their editorial pages today:
Duluth and the Northland can look no further than our alarming suicide rate to grasp the seriousness of addressing our region’s mental well-being. Children are crying for help. There’s urgency, as much here as anywhere, to embrace the issue — before the next Columbine. Or Red Lake. Or Tucson.
