This measure would direct the legislature to allocate funds to reduce class sizes and increase staffing support for students in all K-12 grades, with additional class-size reductions and staffing increases in high-poverty schools.
Sounds pretty straightforward, right? You like schools, I like schools. We all like schools. And as a now-registered old person, I think kids are dumb enough already, and I really don't want to slide the bar any further in the stupid direction.
But, this will cost. There's no two ways about it. If you reduce the size of the classes you have to have more teachers (third-path option - half-day school, but nobody seems to want to bite on that one, and you STILL have to pay the teachers). And you need more places to teach. Yeah, its a toughie - just how much do YOU like educated kids?
Of course, our state legislature doesn't look particularly good in all this. They are already in contempt of court (state supreme variety) for not delivering on promised K-12 education, so they have not shown a lot of gumption in the first place. Worse yet, while the state pleads poverty for educating its kids, last term they had no problem finding 9 Billion in cuts and tax breaks to keep Boeing from shipping the assembly of a new plane out of state (the plane-maker thanked the state legislature, took the money, then shipped out about 2000+ engineering jobs, making the legiscritters looks like prize bumpkins). So yeah, left to their own devices, Olympia probably ain't gonna deliver without a lot of people making serious growling noises behind them. This is a serious growling noise.
So I say YES on this one, but go in with your eyes wide open. This is a good thing, but one that will come with a price tag. One which we really should be paying.
More later,
