On 4/6/2015 10:05 AM, Paul Braun wrote:
On Sun, Apr 5, 2015 at 12:54 PM, Chris Crawford <
chris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I graduated from elmhurst in 1994. My parents both went to Elmhurst in
the
late 1960s. The school was closed in 2010 as a cost-cutting measure by
the
local school district.
There are too many schools being shuttered for cost-cutting. It's a sad
commentary on modern-day politics. My HS is still open, but it's the
only
one in a small town.
How many school age children going to public schools were there when you
were a student? How many are there now? Without at least a rough
knowledge of the number of students being served, your statement is
meaningless.
When I was a kid, Berkeley's population was over 120,000. Now, with more
housing units, it's under 100,000. The difference is essentially all
attributable to fewer school age children. Household sizes, i.e. number
of children, plummeted in the last half of last century.
Keeping schools open just to keep them open, or for the nostalgia of
alumni, not because they are actually needed to serve the current number
of students, would indeed be a waste of taxpayer $. Consolidation of
underutilized facilities is almost always less expensive than keeping
all open, both in operating costs and in capital freed up.
Yes, it's complicated in detail, class sizes, arts programs, quality,
and so on. But without a measure of the student population to be served,
then and now, it's not commentary, sad or not, it's just noise.
Moose D'Opinion