School Boards
“In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.” – Mark Twain
Just got our school tax bill – over $500 🙁 We wouldn’t mind it so much if it weren’t for the fact that my daughter and the other students in her school hardly get any textbooks at all. And then we found the following, from Wikipedia, concerning our school board the EMSB:
“In 2005, both the Montreal Gazette and the French-language tabloid Le Journal de Montreal printed a special series of articles denouncing alleged nepotism and graft in the province’s public school boards. The Gazette’s investigation focussed almost exclusively on the hiring practices of the English Montreal School Board.”
Here’s what some people had to say – found on ACDSA – Making Quebec School Boards More Accountable To Parents, Students And Teachers 13/07/2006:
YOUR SCHOOL TAXES- WHERE IS IT GOING? LETTER TO THE GAZETTE EDITOR GIVES EASY ANSWER. Re: “Where does the money go? School taxes are too high and unfair” (Editorial, July 7).
Is there an easier question to answer? School board officials who are supposed to be working in the best interests of the public and the children get catered meals, trips, business expense accounts and more. Most of us have to brown bag it. Not them. While they eat salmon, salads, and desserts, teachers are rationed on the number of pieces of chalk that they get for a given year. Mismanagement is where the money goes.
Daniel Pineault, Pointe Claire
WHERE IS YOUR SCHOOL TAX DOLLAR GOING? Certainly, the extra money is not going into the schools themselves, which remain blighted by revolting washrooms, paint peeling from the walls of classrooms, out-of-date libraries and a lack of textbooks. Nor is it going to teachers’ salaries, which the government has limited”. Source: The Gazette
But merely asking the question is not good enough, the Gazette must find answers to this question with some solid investigative reporting by not just one educational reporter but on a scale similar to that of the health sector. Don’t ask the handlers of these vast amount of dollars, the school boards, for their answers for they will only camouflage the real picture to protect their own. Go into the schools, ask the teachers, ask the parents, ask the students, ask non compromised governing board members – the real frontier of education. Ask the question. How come that in some schools the total annual user fees paid by parents is equal or greater than the school boards operating budget for that school? Need a source? Ask ACDSA and we will gladly supply you with some leads and documentation. Posted: 09/07/2006
