Our city school system is facing a deficit of $9.6 million if a levy doesn't pass in May. If it doesn't pass, every single extra-curricular activity will be cut, busing will be lost, jobs will be cut, several schools will be closed (including the one I,
tommu,
krissy, and
Dr. Shin Hakubi attended), the Gifted And Talented Enrichment (GATE) program will be eliminated (which the fore-mentioned four attended as well as
Greth and
yensiltheflyingmonkey), the school day will shortened, and lunch will be made optional and moved after the school day. This is absurd. Here is a letter I wrote to the editor on this issue. Hopefully all of this city will read it.
A Modest Proposal
The system of education in our locality has found itself to be in dire straits financially. We now face a possible deficit of $9.6 million dollars--this problem should be rectified immediately with a complete focus on the issue at hand. As Americans, all communist schemes to take our money for the supposed “good of the whole” are naturally to be opposed. All factors extraneous to our ends should be ignored. Chief among these factors are things not associated with the education of our children; is this not a “system of education” that we seek to maintain?
Now, of course, there are many things that do not lend to our children any semblance of an education. Of those which we may now consider, most unfruitful for students are basic transportation, sufficient time and instructors, food, physical exercise and refinement, social development, music, art, theatre, culture, and a sense of support from the community. Some of these things even admit to providing to students primarily such superficial qualities as health, discipline, initiative, significance, perseverance, curiosity, understanding, confidence, patience, self-esteem, inspiration, communication skills, vision, creativity, innovation, and abstract reasoning. Obviously, each of these is a quite costly and unnecessary luxury provided for the mere coddling of our children. We desire them to mature into wonderfully efficient machines, able to process information without bothering with any quarrelsome or complex topics related to paying their bills—such “extra-curricular activities” and “personal instruction” will simply lead to worthless dreaming and aspiration.
Now, there are some crucial facts that we can use to our advantage. We have 7,143 students in our district. With a deficit of $9.6 million dollars and a 180-day school year, that gives $7.47 per student per day, and--with the new 5.5 hour school day--$1.36 per hour. As the students are no longer expected to purchase or to provide a lunch during the school day, but have already grown accustomed to paying for a lunch every day, they can be charged every day that they attend, perhaps by the hour. This system yields manifold benefits. First, only those receiving the benefit of the education pay for the education--the community at large obviously enjoys no benefit from having an effective and productive educational system for those who will be supporting and improving the community in future years. The village has no obligation to raise the child. Second, students will be discouraged from attending a full school day in the first place, thereby diminishing the average operating costs. While some would project that such a fluctuating classroom would be disrupting, the diminished number of teachers will lead to such large impersonal classrooms that instructors and students alike will probably not even notice the absence of other children.
Finally, the elimination of such extraneous elements will preserve our community--by which I mean that our children will remain in our community. They will be less likely to apply successfully to college, and even if accepted, they will be less likely to sustain the challenge of higher education, compelling their return to our fine, productive, encouraging, and uplifting city. And what could be more ideal than a rigid, static, and un-adaptable society?
I trust that each of these points will be considered by voters as they determine their stance on the proposed school levy.
Jonathan Swift (AKA John Pate, Central Academy graduate)
Note to the confused: This work is of satiric intent.
