Intercepts
A listening post monitoring public education and teachers’ unions.

If the so-called stimulus bill didn’t stimulate you, it must be because you’re a negative-minded cynic. You should follow the example of this company – which I shall not name –  whose officers couldn’t be happier. They sent me this message:

“Over 100 billion stimulus dollars are headed toward decision makers in schools. Make sure your marketing messages are top of mind (sic)!

“The 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act gives schools new financial resources to provide services, upgrade technology, outfit labs, and address other pressing needs. In many cases, these dollars must be spent soon or immediately.

“How can you make sure you’re part of their spending plan?

“[Redacted] has 5 ways to help you get your share of stimulus dollars… Reach over 27,000 new superintendents, 35,000 new principals, and 764,000 new teachers who may have dollars to spend and no established sources!”

I’m thinking about writing a book on current affairs, but I’m can’t decide between two titles:

1) We Are All Matthew Lesko

or

2) Waiting for the Visigoths

Labor Notes held an informal contest to “Name That Federation!” on the notion “that the AFL-CIO, Change to Win, and the NEA may unite.” A few were clever (“AFL-WTF?”), but most were lame.

It seems to me that most labor organizations lack a decent acronym, so I took the initials of the members of this proposed federation – NEA, AFL-CIO and CTW – and fed them into the Internet Anagram Server. It generated 3,265 possibilities, some of which fit the bill for the federation’s legislative agenda, while others were just funny. They include:

A Conceit Flaw
Facile Act Now
Win Fecal Taco
Alien Cow Fact
Can Loaf Twice
Win a Face Clot
A Coin Flew Act
Fact on Ice Law
We Can Foil Act
Flaw Once I Act
A Nice Flat Cow

I’m eager to get hold of my federal recovery tax credit so I can use it to help pay my new state taxes.

It must be time for another media wave. Yesterday’s EIA Communiqué contained a quote of the week featuring the case of a Georgia woman who received a felony conviction for sending her son to a public school outside of her home district. In the past I’ve referred to offenses of this type as the school choice black market.

Today Joe Williams at Democrats for Education Reform goes one better by relating the story of Yolanda Hill, who is in jail for sending her kids to a school in the Greece Central School District instead of the Rochester public schools, home of the renowned “living contract.”

Her story appears in the local newspaper under the reassuring headline, “Rochester-area schools unlikely to arrest parents.” Then you can read about her kids.

In a similar vein, Greg Forster over at Jay P. Greene’s Blog quotes AFT President Randi Weingarten:

“Should fate, as determined by a student’s Zip code, dictate how much algebra he or she is taught?”

The answer, evidently, is only if fate wears the uniform of a school district border patrol officer.

Click here to read:

1) EIA Exclusive: AFT Subsidies Kept Some Affiliates Alive
2) San Diego Affiliate Proposes Opting Out of CTA Initiative Funding
3) NEA Personnel Moves
4) Last Week’s Intercepts
5) Quotes of the Week

The Oregon Education Association finally found an argument for limited government it can support.

Teachers testified before the state House Education Committee “seeking changes to a 2007 law restricting the sale of soda, fruit juices and high-calorie snack foods in schools. It turns out that the law, intended to combat an obesity epidemic among Oregon’s children, had the unintended consequence of pulling the plug on vending machines inside teacher lounges.”

Laurie Wimmer Whelan, lobbyist for the Oregon Education Association, said “whether a teacher wants to buy a bag of peanuts or a cookie shouldn’t be a legislative issue.”

Welcome to the Nanny State you helped create, OEA.

The Albuquerque public schools provide a cheese sandwich, fruit and milk to students who have no money to pay for lunch, and for some reason are not enrolled in the federal free school lunch program.

But parents are complaining.

“We’ve heard stories from moms coming in saying their child was pulled out of the lunch line and given a cheese sandwich. … One woman said her daughter never wants to go back to school,” said Nancy Pope, director of the New Mexico Collaborative to End Hunger.

The Farmington Daily Times reports, “Experts agree that children will increasingly be forced to eat cheese sandwiches or apply for federally subsidized lunch programs as more parents nationally lose jobs and the economy struggles.”

This is stupid on both fronts. If the district decides to feed them regardless of whether they pay or not, then feed them like any other child. What’s next? Muffin stumps?

On the other hand, when did a cheese sandwich become the equivalent of child abuse? If only I had known this when I was a kid, I could have hired a trial lawyer and sued my parents.