September 1, 2013
By Mickey Friedman
For the past two Sunday mornings, I’ve gotten to Fuel several minutes before seven. When I’ve seen men from the Department of Public Works emptying the trash cans on Main Street.
They’re working hard while most of The Best Small Town in America sleeps, carting away what we have discarded the day and night before.
I remember this when I get cranky thinking about the money we’ve spent on engineering fees for Downtown Redevelopment and the money we’re being asked to spend to fix Monument Mountain High School.
Because this is the best of government, and it happens when most people aren’t watching.
We’ve spent millions these last few years. Selling our older, supposedly failing buildings while building newer, supposedly better buildings.
I’m sorry we got rid of the Searles and Bryant Schools. I’m sad we’re getting rid of the old Firehouse.
And now I’m having trouble with the idea that we need to spend $56 million to rebuild a building built in 1968.
Déjà vu all over again: we only have to pay half. The State, 48.52%. But if we don’t spend $31 million today, it will only be more expensive tomorrow.
We owe it to the children. Like we owed it to the library-goers, the firemen, and the policemen. Of course, everyone deserves the best. Especially those who put out fires. Keep us safe. Teach our children. And, of course, our kids deserve the best. What the boosters of Monument Now call a 21st century education.
But something is desperately out of balance. Because everywhere around us, bigger and newer isn’t necessarily better. Kids today with their snazzy new schools and smartphones aren’t any smarter than the kids I went to school with at PS 86. Or nicer. Even though our buildings were old and we didn’t have iPads.
A writer and filmmaker, I embrace the arts. But if you ask me, we don’t need to spend a small fortune on a media center. Several years ago I mentored Matt G when he was at Monument. He might have been shortchanged with just a 20th Century education but he nevertheless made an extraordinarily lovely film.
Today, anyone and their grandmother can make a film on a laptop. A good film is about seeing and storytelling. It’s not and never has been about a snazzy media center.
Who needs an outdoor classroom and dining center? Forgive me for simplifying but when I was a kid an outdoor classroom was when the teacher took us outside. As for an expanded library, there are libraries in Lenox, Stockbridge, GB.
According to Monument Now, the current building “is not equipped for modern methods of learning and teaching.” There are structural, heating, and air conditioning problems, problems with the roof, plumbing, windows, etc. The building’s not energy efficient.
I don’t understand what they mean by a “modern method of learning and teaching.” Were the kids who went to Monument thirty years ago cheated? Was the money we spent ten years ago wasted? Exactly when did they discover this modern method? And why does it cost so much?
I know kids who came through Monument over the years and they seem fine.
The folks who want $56 million argue that if we just fix what’s wrong with the physical plant, we’ll be disrupting the kids and teachers without adding “sufficient educational benefit.” The stuff we need to “impact and adapt education to 21st century needs.”
As for disruption, let’s do the repairs in the summer.
As for preparing our kids for careers and college, that’s really quite complicated. As of 2011, college students and college graduates were ONE TRILLION DOLLARS in debt because of a corrupt university system. Read Matt Taibbi’s “Ripping Off Young America” in Rolling Stone. According to Taibbi, the government is making huge profits off of college debt, an estimated $184 billion over 10 years.
While universities, guaranteed students and money from the federal student loan program, unconscionably raise tuition then invest in frills and administrative salaries. Between 1990 and 2011, tuition and fees have risen 300 percent versus the Consumer Price Index. Our college students leave with crippling debt, then can’t find work that pays good wages.
What we really need are jobs. Let’s fix Monument’s roof so no one is hurt. Then invest in a multifaceted jobs-creation project. Maybe we can get back the old firehouse. Or Searles. Let’s fund an expansion of Railroad Street’s very successful apprentice programs in culinary arts, cosmetology, barbering, and their one-on-one mentoring projects. We can teach people to farm, to fix things, to build things. Let’s invest in transportation.
Friday, while waiting for my prescription at Rite-Aid, I heard three hard-working women talk about how now, in their retirement, they were unexpectedly housing their children, and raising their grandchildren.
It’s asking a lot to make them pay $400 more a year in taxes.
Let’s choose jobs, not debt.
______________________________________________________________________________
Matt Taibbi
Ripping Off Young America: The College-Loan Scandal