{"id":1718,"date":"2011-07-23T10:26:03","date_gmt":"2011-07-23T14:26:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/07\/the-end-game-is-karen-noll.html"},"modified":"2011-07-23T10:26:03","modified_gmt":"2011-07-23T14:26:03","slug":"the-end-game-is-karen-noll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/07\/the-end-game-is-karen-noll.html","title":{"rendered":"The end game is …. —Karen Noll"},"content":{"rendered":"Received yesterday on\n\n“the qualified voters voting thereon in each separate school system proposed to be consolidated”<\/a>. -jsq\n
\n\n<\/a>\nQuestions abound: Why is it that Lowndes County residents will not be\nvoting on the most important issue to face their school system since\nits inception in 1950?\n

\nIf I lived in the county I’d be mad that CUEE and the Chamber of Commerce\nchose to leave my vote out of such a very important decision.\n

\nQuick fact: Consolidation alone will not save money & Consolidation alone\nwill not improve academic success, according to\n\nthe Vinson Institute report commissioned by CUEE and the Chamber.<\/a>\n

\n<\/a>\nFurther Query: Why would CUEE and the Chamber of Commerce spend $50\ngrand to collect the signatures for the petition causing the City of\nValdosta to spend thousands of tax dollars (2 staff dedicated to task &\n4 temps hired) to verify the signatures on the petition?\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

\nFYI:To get the referendum on the ballot for both city and county\nresidents to vote on, a state representative need only ask for the\nballot initiative on the house floor. Wow, that sounds quick, easy\nand very cost-effective. No need for the petition drive, no tax payers\nmonies wasted on the signature count, AND a true vote with all parties\nparticipating.\n

\nSo, why, oh, why didn’t CUEE go the GA constitution route for a REAL\nvote!!?\n

\nI’ll give you a hint this is NOT about education!! CUEE board members have\nvery little connection to the public school system. CUEE’s effort to\nconsolidate the schools is also NOT a noble act to integrate the school\nsystems. Let’s just say many county residence have already exercised\nschool choice.\n

\n\n<\/a>\nCUEE says they need a better prepared work force to attract business to\nthe area. First off,\n\nthere is absolutely no evidence that a consolidated\nschool district will produce marketable workers,<\/a>\nnor is that the schools\nonly goal. And frankly, the chamber and the Industrial Authority have\nthis all wrong. Both school systems produce very prepared college bound\nstudents. It is the job of business to provide the opportunities for our\ngraduates so we can retain them HERE and do not continue to experience\nbrain drain.\n

\nWhy has CUEE and the chamber put extensive time, energy and money into\nthis project to consolidate the schools? What is the end game? (wait\nfor it)\n

\nThe end game is consolidating the governments of the county and the city.\n

\nIf a community seeks to consolidate the governments, they must FIRST\nconsolidate the schools!!\n

\nThis is why the chamber commissioned a number of studies on the school\nconsolidation issue and when these studies didn’t get the result they\nwanted they simply used anecdotal evidence to say a single school system\nwould attract business to the area.\n

\nThis is also the reason why CUEE has no educational plan to speak\nof. I might also point out that CUEE would make NONE of the multiple\ndecisions about the schools if consolidated. Only the Lowndes County\nBoard of Education would be responsible for finding the solutions to\na vast array of issues that consolidation would hoist upon the board;\nnamely 7500 new students with a dramatically different demographic!!\n

\n\n<\/a>\nThe REAL route to school consolidation: If both districts expressed\ninterest in consolidating, the state would send down a team to devise\na plan for a true consolidation of the schools for FREE! We would have\na clear plan for educating our students to be valuable contributors to\nour community. Before I would consider voting to change the two system\nsituation we currently have, I need to have a PLAN that clearly identifies\nquality education as the first priority of the schools.\n\n<\/a>\n

\nKaren Noll\n
\n\nFriends of Valdosta City Schools<\/a>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Received yesterday on “the qualified voters voting thereon in each separate school system proposed to be consolidated”. -jsq Questions abound: Why is it that Lowndes County residents will not be voting on the most important issue to face their school system since its inception in 1950? If I lived in the county I’d be mad […]","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":[97,40,1376,14,15,49,70,3305,2,20,1105,88,21,22,3,54,1106,332],"tags":[1636,8705,3407,8869,8701,793,8815,7,805,1604,8712,1635,6,4069],"class_list":["post-1718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-community","category-cuee","category-economy","category-education","category-elections","category-ethics","category-fvcs","category-government","category-law","category-lcboe","category-lowndes-county-commission","category-planning","category-politics","category-transparency","category-valdosta-city-council","category-vboe","category-vlcoc","tag-consolidation","tag-education","tag-friends-of-valdosta-city-schools","tag-fvcs","tag-georgia","tag-industry","tag-lcboe","tag-lowndes-county","tag-money","tag-plan","tag-politics","tag-unification","tag-valdosta","tag-vcboe"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-rI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1718","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=1718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1718\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}