I am the mother of two young children. My oldest will be starting Pre-K this coming fall.So I probably don't have to say that public school is on my mind, has been on my mind since before he was born.Austin is a tricky place for schooling.There are plenty of well run schools with dedicated teachers and attentive students with oodles of parent interest to keep everything running smoothly...and then there are the rest. You might say, "Just transfer! No big deal!" but you would be wrong! AISD has been on a transfer freeze for several years leaving concerned parents without the income to support a move to re-zone their child for a decent school with very few workable options. Those options are about to shrink quite a bit more.
AISD is preparing for a cut of 1,000 positions for the 2011-2012 school year. The superintendent is splitting that between 771 campus positions, which seemingly will include teachers as well as "secondary" staff and 246 to the central office staff, that includes a lot of different administrative type positions.They are also planning to close several schools and move the students to near by schools. The superintendent says,"Make no mistake: reductions of this magnitude will have a fundamental effect on public education as we know it today in Austin. But as we restructure, the District will make the most effective use of our more limited resources, and we will continue our efforts to improve student achievement.”
I personally am both horrified and curious about how they plan to make this work. There is just no way I will let my children be a part of that experiment.
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