Educational is not a priority...

to the George Dubya,or Campbell mentality.

of course it is a priority!

just not for you

Education

I am hearing of many families, who are home schooling their children. One person said, when their school was closed down. Their little one had to, bus one hour to get to school, and, an hour to get home. That is too long a day, for a very little child. However, Campbell and Hansen, have made such a financial mess, of this province and the Olympic deficits. They have sold BC's assets and natural resources, which belonged to citizens of BC. They are desperate, to hide the mess, so they are slashing every service. However, there was wealth enough, to give himself a 53% wage hike, and also his ministers, did very well too. I can't see this province surviving, Campbell and Hansen. Without the provinces resources, BC has nothing to recover with. The, gruesome twosome, should go to prison, and, perhaps one of them will.

Clearly...

...whatever formal education Gordon Campbell has received has got in the way of his learning. It stands to reason he does not value such matters.

location, location, location....

Schools are often situated on prime... and central pieces of real estate - that also has a part to play in this, I think.

BC for sale

the Gordon Campbell Liberals are selling everything:
Jordan River;
BC's rivers and ecosystems;
public education;
and, as per the throne speech, public health care.

And BC citizens are paying to become serfs in our own province. Now there's irony for you.

With phony "free trade" and

With phony "free trade" and "globalization" having destroyed Canada's productive economy, the various governments have to sell the country to pay for whatever services they still provide and the "growth of service jobs".

Which are the same as when a factory fires the production workers, but increases the janitors and office staff by paying them off from the sale of machinery, tools, and property.

But, according to our "economists" this is GDP and Growth, so it is OK and "efficient economics."

But for how long ?

Ed Deak.

Private school stats?

Anyone know where to find stats on numbers and enrolment in K-12 pivate schools? It would be revealing to see.

Buy the House another round

It appears the blurred vision of 2003 has resulted in a complete lack of vision for the rural families of British Columbia and our children.

The long term plan of the

The long term plan of the multinationals is to depopulate the rural areas and use imported "cheap" labour in camps for resource extraction.
This is what the SPP (Security and Prosperity Partnership) with the "free movement of labour" is about, hooking up to the planned NAFTA highway, with BC's Hwy 97 being part of the plan.

This has been going on for many years, beginning with the destruction of the family farm system and replacing it with corporate agribusiness for the purpose of total people control. In Poland the EU is working on the destruction of 3 million family farms, not even the communists could accomplish, but their idiot twins, the capitalists will.

All in the name of "competitive efficiency", of course.

Basically the collectivization dreams of Stalin and Mao in different clothing under different flag.

Ed Deak.

"to depopulate the rural areas "

with "accidental" releases of sour gas perhaps?

New Provincial constitution needed to remedy schools issue

Excellent article and I agree that: "Trustees in British Columbia could once bargain with their local teachers and support staff. They could set tax rates on residential and commercial-industrial property and allocate their revenues to meet local needs. The province now controls all these functions, except for allocation: If Victoria does not give them enough money, it is up to trustees to decide which programs to kill, which schools to close, and which teachers to lay off. In effect, trustees' only function now is to do the province's dirty work, and to take the blame for decisions they didn't (and couldn't) make."

Since 2002 I have been making the case that BC needs a new provincial constitution, that re-allocates powers to the Province and cities/municipalities, including taxation powers, that provides, in some cases for concurrent jurisidctions, that puts checks against abuses of both executive and local power, that injects the concept of subsidiarity as a tool to balance provide wide harmonization of law issuing forth from Victoria, particularly the Premier's office. The UBCM has been crying foul big-time for years, this is inequality of power is a massive dysfunctional political institutional problem --and is the root cause of many democracy deficits in this province.

A question- does anyone have an answer

So what has happened to the ownership of those 176 schools and the property that comprised the schools and grounds? Are they being sold for real estate development,are they being sold to private companies in the education or other sectors? Does anyone have an answer?

Reeks and Wrecks

"establish a culture where the moneyed elites have all the advanced degrees declared "necessary" for any high public post or corporate management position and the serfs are technicians at best."

Robots never stay home to look after a sick child or collect a pension.

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Player Piano, author Kurt Vonnegut's first novel, was published in 1952. It is a dystopia of automation[1] and capitalism, describing the dereliction they cause in the quality of life.[1] The story takes place in a near-future society that is almost totally mechanized, eliminating the need for human laborers. This widespread mechanization creates conflict between the wealthy upper class—the engineers and managers who keep society running—and the lower class, whose skills and purpose in society have been replaced by machines.

Fiat Lux

The nice thing about Poland and it's rural culture is that it is a massive part of the national and ethnic character. People regularly work overseas and return to buy not just a home in the city, but a home in the country as well, in their home village, their dzialka. The EU is having a lot of difficulty with this, as well as in countries like Italy where it's the same thing, especially in the south.

You don't have that wide-spread appreciation for rural life or the land by most people in Canada, which is why Canada is being turned into the Wal-Mart of natural resources for the greedy, stupid world. The way Canadians at large take this place for granted is scandalous.

1952? 1927:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrdTdp5UF-M&feature=related

Chris Keam

I for one welcome mechanis(z?)ation. After all, it was what was "promised" to us in the 50's, what with the looming leisure society and all.

I mean, what did people think "leisure" was going to be about anyway - and endless round of parties and recreation?

The alternative is to follow the essence of Ned Ludd and destroy the machines. But that would only put us back into the Dark Ages, repleat with 30 year life spans, and obeisance to the lords of the manner.

That machinery replaces the "drudge" jobs is not the problem. The problem is thinking that mechanis(z?)ation marks the The End of History (Francis Fukuyama), instead of realizing that it really signals the beginning of true civilis(z?)ation (aka Gene Roddenberry's Dream).
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BTW, the squeeze being exerted by the Liberals is to force the school districts into a corner, where the only option is to cut teachers' salaries and benefits. That is their real goal. And as soon as just one concession is made in this direction, it will open the proverbial floodgates........

Rick,,,, Having spent a

Rick,,,, Having spent a lifetime in manufacturing, I have no objection to mechanization and tools, still buying more at my age, provided they enhance, but do not destroy human creativity.

A tremendous difference to the point of crimes.

Automation may be necessary in certain processes, we can't have people sharpening needles by hand, but in many trades, lumber mills are a good example, it has been used to replace a few workers with huge increases of electric energy, in the name of "efficiency, of course, meaning increased profits for the corporations, while people are being urged to shut lights off and pull plugs.

When I see irreplaceable materials, like hardwoods, being wasted forever in automated furniture manufacturing, making junk that will end up in the dumps in a few years, I could cry.

A lot of products, like clothing, appliances etc. could be made to last many times their present expected lifespan, years ago we had no garbage to speak of, but now our dumps are filled with products that wear out, or break down after a short use. E.g. Most of the repair shops have gone out of business, because it is "cheaper" to buy new from Asian slave labour joints. Last week I threw out a relatively new electric reciprocating saw, because we have no repair shops left in smaller towns.

Ed Deak.

In the general march of education......

....we see the demise of many jobs that would have been occupations in another era. I suppose what I am trying to say, Ed, is that a society shoudn't RELY on jobs requiring little education (either academic or learned as you go). All this does is puff up the numbers (20,000 jobs created this month).

As far as burning more oil to generate more electricity to run more machinery, it's because of our skewed costing system that many automated functions seem cheaper.

This article from the Walrus Magazine might interest you. I taken a small excerpt from it:
http://www.walrusmagazine.com/articles/2009.06-energy-an-inconvenient-talk/

Rick, "jobs created this

Rick, "jobs created this month" means nothing, because they're also including minimum wage, part time and so called "service jobs" which are not assets, but liabilities in any system, except in our phony economics, and have to be paid for by the sale of resources and the country itself.

I've had enough of academic education when I first had the chance to learn a productive trade at the age of 28, never looked back and learned more later.

When I was repairing, sometimes hundreds of years old fine furniture. it was very touching to see the pencil marks of long gone craftsmen, whose work practically lives forever.

What can people leave behind now, justifying their existence ? Holes in the ground and huge garbage sites ?

Rest assured that I've left my name on certain things I've built.

One of the most damaging intents of the present system is to deprive people of their identities and make them worthless, nameless "consumers" to fill the pockets of their "betters".

Years ago their betters were sending them up on the scaling ladders, now into mega stores to buy the worthless junk that's supposed to make them happy.

Ed Deak.

Agreed, Ed!

When the flunkies such as the Fraser Institute regurgitate these numbers, they should be required to show the breakdown..........