{"id":1323,"date":"2011-11-01T09:57:07","date_gmt":"2011-11-01T13:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/11\/all-about-school-consolidation.html"},"modified":"2011-11-01T09:57:07","modified_gmt":"2011-11-01T13:57:07","slug":"all-about-school-consolidation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/11\/all-about-school-consolidation.html","title":{"rendered":"All about school consolidation"},"content":{"rendered":"<a href=\"http:\/\/www.valdostacity.com\/Index.aspx?page=454\">\n<img decoding=\"async\" style=\"float:right;border:none;\"   width=\"50%\" height=\"50%\" src=\"http:\/\/www.valdostacity.com\/Modules\/ShowImage.aspx?imageid=433\"><\/a>\n<strong>Update 12:55 3 Nov 2011:<\/strong> <a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/11\/financial-issues-of-consolidation-lcboe-1-november-2011.html\">LCBOE&#8217;s own video<\/a> of their 1 November open forum on Financial Issues of Consolidation is now available on YouTube.\n<br>\nApparently there are still many people out there who don&#8217;t know much\nabout school consolidation.\nA quick yet comprehensive way to find out is to read the\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/10\/valdosta-graduation-rates.html\">\nGrassroots Handbook Against School Consolidation<\/a>\nby David Mullis.\n<p>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/10\/valdosta-graduation-rates.html\">\n<img decoding=\"async\" style=\"float:right;border:none;\"   width=\"50%\" height=\"50%\" src=\"https:\/\/chart.googleapis.com\/chart?&#038;chtt=Graduation%20Rates%20for%20VHS%20and%20Valdosta%20City%20Schools|Data:%20The%20Grassroots%20Handbook%20Against%20School%20Consolidation|%20by%20David%20Mullis|Graph:%20Lowndes%20Area%20Knowledge%20Exchange&#038;cht=ls&#038;chds=40,100,40,100,40,100,40,100&#038;chxr=1,40,100&#038;chs=500x400&#038;chdl=VHS|VCS|VHS%20AA|VCS%20AA&#038;chco=cc5500,ff99ff,87c6ae,ffcc66&#038;chxt=x,y&#038;chxl=0:|2007|2008|2009|2010|2011|2011%20fall&#038;chd=t:57.3,61.1,71.5,72.5,76.5,77.9|57.3,61.1,71.5,71.9,69.1,71.7|49.7,53.4,67.2,67.3,71.6,73.3|49.7,53.4,67.2,67.1,63.6,66.7\"><\/a>\nSee also the statements against consolidation by <a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/08\/the-school-systems-dont-want-to-consolidate-walb.html\">\nboth school boards<\/a>.\nMany citizens spoke at the\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/vboe-29-august-2011\">\n29 August 2011 VBOE meeting<\/a>\nwhere all but one Valdosta School Board member\nvoted for the statement against consolidation.\nVBOE then held three open forums:\n\n<!--more-->\n<ul>\n<li>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/vboe-8-september-2011\">\n8 September 2011 at Valdosta High School<\/a>\n<li>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/vboe-20-september-2011\">\n20 September 2011 at Valdosta Middle School<\/a>\n<li>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/vboe-25-october-2011\">\n25 October 2011 at JL Lomax Elementary School<\/a>\n<\/a>\n<\/ul>\nThe Lowndes County Board of Education spelled out its reasons in\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/08\/lcboe-resolution-against-school-consolidation-read-by-supt-smith.html\">\nits unanimous resolution against consolidation of 30 August 2011.<\/a>\nLCBOE has organized two open forums, both at Lowndes High School:\n<ul>\n<li>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/lcboe-4-october-2011\">\n4 October 2011<\/a>\n<li>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/lcboe-1-november-2011\">\n<strike>Tonight, <\/strike>1 November 2011<\/a>\n<br>\n<strong>Update 12:55 3 Nov 2011:<\/strong> <a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/11\/financial-issues-of-consolidation-lcboe-1-november-2011.html\">LCBOE&#8217;s own video<\/a> is now available on YouTube.\n<\/ul>\nAll of these forums organized by the school boards have had an open mic\nwhere anyone could come up and speak or ask questions,\nexcept the first, which took written questions.\n<p>\nThen there&#8217;s the <a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/10\/valdosta-city-council-voted-to-oppose-school-consolidation.html\">\nquite detailed Valdosta City Council resolution against consolidation<\/a>.\nBefore that there were the numerous statements pro and con by Valdosta\nCity Council members <a href=\"\/blog\/category\/vcc-25-august-2011\">when they voted 25 August 2011<\/a> about putting\nthe referendum on the ballot.\n<p>\nCompare to the videos of CUEE&#8217;s\n<ul>\n<li>\n<a hef=\"http:\/\/lake.typepad.com\/on-the-lake-front\/cuee-24-march-2011\/\">\n24 March 2011 Kick-Off meeting<\/a>,\nor\n<li>\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/09\/videos-by-lake-of-cuee-school-unification-meeting-27-sep-2011.html\">\nthe videos<\/a>\nof\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/cuee-27-september-2011\">\nCUEE&#8217;s 27 September 2011<\/a>\ndog-and-pony show where\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/09\/cuee-demolishes-its-own-case.html\">CUEE demolished its own case.<\/a>\n<\/ul>\nNo one but CUEE or Chamber or invited guests could stand up and speak.\nQuestions were only taken in writing, and selected by CUEE.\n<p>\nThen there was a meeting\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/10\/a-most-educational-meeting-vsu-wiregrass-tech-cuee-fvcs-et-al.html\">\n21 October 2011 at the VSU Continuing Education Center<\/a>\nwith invitations by telephone in the middle of the night.\nWho called it was unclear, who was invited even less,\nfor what purpose there was no consensus, yet there was a\ndecision by the pair of presiding college presidents.\nIt was not advertised to the public and\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/10\/at-the-door-of-the-most-educational-meeting-karen-noll.html\">\napparently not even to the newspaper of record.<\/a>\n<p>\nFriends of Valdosta City Schools\n<ul>\n<li>\ngave a\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/08\/your-childrens-education-at-stake-sam-allen-fvcs-7-july-2011.html\">\npress conference 7 July 2011<\/a>\nat which several people spoke against consolidation\n<li>\nand, in conjunction with Vote No for the Children, SCLC, NAACP, etc.,\n<a href=\"\/blog\/category\/fvcs-22-october-2011\">\nheld a 300-person march 22 October 2011<\/a>\nat which even more people spoke.\n<\/ul>\n<p>\nFinally, there was the one and only forum with pro and con consolidation\nadvocates standing side by side answering questions,\norganized 2 May 2011 at the\n<a href=\"\/blog\/2011\/07\/a-real-education-dialog-lcdp-2-may-2011.html\">\nLowndes County Democratic Party meeting<\/a>\nby Gretchen Quarterman.\n<p>\nSo, if you don&#8217;t know about consolidation, pick your source,\nand you can find out a lot pretty fast.\nRead, watch, or attend in person tonight.\n<p>\n-jsq\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Update 12:55 3 Nov 2011: LCBOE&#8217;s own video of their 1 November open forum on Financial Issues of Consolidation is now available on YouTube. Apparently there are still many people out there who don&#8217;t know much about school consolidation. A quick yet comprehensive way to find out is to read the Grassroots Handbook Against School [&hellip;]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97,40,1376,14,15,49,3305,2,1105,3,1106],"tags":[1636,8829,8704,8705,8869,8701,8815,7,3410,383,1635,6,8816],"class_list":["post-1323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-community","category-cuee","category-economy","category-education","category-elections","category-fvcs","category-government","category-lcboe","category-transparency","category-vboe","tag-consolidation","tag-cuee","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-fvcs","tag-georgia","tag-lcboe","tag-lowndes-county","tag-schools","tag-taxes","tag-unification","tag-valdosta","tag-vboe"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-ll","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1323\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}