Thursday, January 14, 2010

Even Pre-School Gets a TV

For about five months I've been trying to get my school district to order $150 worth of English children's books for my elementary classes. The Board of Education told me they had no money, so I should ask each school to cover 1/3 of the cost. I started today at Geruma by asking the English teacher for a $50 commitment. She passed the request along to the school secretary, who said they probably don't have the money.

Just ten minutes later we had a meeting in the teachers' room where the vice-principal announced that next month all 11 teachers (I'm number 12) are getting new computers and all five classrooms are getting 52" flat screen televisions (recall this is Geruma where the class sizes range from 2-5 students). I smiled at all the excitement in the room, but could only think 'no fair!'

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

And the reason they feel 52" flat screen tv's are more important than books????

Dave said...

Despite the proximate timing, I am sure the two are unrelated. The electronics are probably being funded through a national grant whereas my request is so small it has to pass through the annual [local] budget. It's unfair on the surface, but not something easily solvable. I'm just going to keep asking and hoping...