Welcome

The Wickerdale Walkers were organized as a nonpartisan community group with the mission to make a difference for our children and educators. We came together as a group of parents who were upset over the loss of our children’s bus service. During that process, we learned about the challenges that face our school district. We got off the couch and decided to help. We made the plight of our children’s schools and the educators who serve them, our own. Our group has met with key state legislatures to pursue changes and amendments to the current laws that would benefit all of Colorado’s school districts. We are continuing this fight, but we need support from the community in order to carry this out. Please consider joining our cause, whether you realize it or not this fight is your fight. Everyone has a vested interest in providing the best education possible for our next generation.

Will you attend the Wickerdale Walkers march on the Capitol in April?

How do I make a difference?

We have many ways to get involved. One of the easiest is to mail a red crayon, (Crayons 4 Education) to Governor Bill Ritter, sample letter below:



Crayons 4 Education

Mail to:

Governor Bill Ritter and Budget Committee Members

136 State Capitol

Denver, CO. 80203-1792





Dear Governor Bill Ritter and Budget Committee members,

You are in receipt of 1 red crayon; courtesy of Crayons 4 Education.

Please take note it is red; this is to symbolize the debt the state is passing onto our children. The cuts to next year’s budget as well as the rescissions this year are stripping Colorado’s children of their ability to compete. Colorado already funds education at $1400 less than the national average, an embarrassment which is now being compounded. The Crayon itself symbolizes Education. We must ensure that this generation is better equipped to meet the challenges of the wider world that they live in. We cannot accomplish this by crippling education year after year. We are demanding a full review of the purposed cuts and alternate methods of funding be devised. Our wish is that you look at the Colorado State Lotto, which currently provides money for Colorado States Parks and also pays farmers on the Western slope to retain their land instead of selling to developers. We appreciate the nice parks but in time of recession and extreme cut backs we are asking you what is necessary the luxury of parks or better education in the lives of our children NOW? If you would like to be better educated about our plan for redirection of the Colorado State Lotto funds please visit the following web site:

wickerdalewalkers.blogspot.com



The education of children is serious business and we can ill afford to jeopardize their (and our own future) with a culture of cuts and fiscal irresponsibility!



Sincerely,



"Wickerdale Walkers"

A group of concerned parents....

See us on Facebook as Wickerdale Walkers

wickerdalewalkers@yahoo.com

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Response to the Your Hub Article

Here is the link to the article:

http://denver.yourhub.com/HighlandsRanch/Stories/Opinion/Local-Happenings/Story~739487.aspx

My response was too long to post there so i am posting it here. Please read the article and understand this is the type of misconception we must overcome in this battle.


Dave's response:

All I can say is wow. As a parent and voter in Douglas County I found your article to be current, on task, thoughtful, informative and yet completely wrong. You are doing a great injustice by making a comparison that is in fact impossible. You are juxtaposing the “for profit businesses” with “not for profit school system”. This is an unbalanced equation with no common denominator. Children have no choice but to go to school, however, as an employee or person of business I always have the choice in what I am doing. If I do not make enough, I look for a new job. If my business is not successful enough I get more innovative. In business, my actions dictate my revenue stream. In education the revenue steam is outside of the employee’s sphere of control, innovation is locked up in the desk drawer of the state or federal government as mandates and “one size fits all programs” rain down like volcanic ash.
We are, duty bound to the endeavor of providing the best education possible for children. Before we berate the Douglas County School District we need to look at some facts. We are the eighth largest county by population and have the highest median incomes in the state. Yet we are in the bottom of 180 school districts in a state that funds education at $1400 less per pupil than the national average. Even with this yoke this county has consistently produced the highest test scores in the state. The funding formula is a living exercise in Robin Hood economics. Make more; take more, with no consideration for the fact that if we earn more it stands to reason that we have a higher cost of living. A teacher working here must be able to afford to live here. We have good teachers, because we pay well. Sounds like capitalism at its finest. I always shake my head when we as a people send a mixed message about education. As a society we engage in a five decade long struggle against socialism? We toppled that belief and disproved its false gods, yet we hold education in limbo between the failures of socialism and the faults of capitalism. The fault lives in the community, if you engage with the public and ask questions you will see it. Education lacks the “what’s in it for me” perspective. We have lost sight of the balance between wants and needs and to steal (slightly) from Benjamin Franklin, a society that sacrifices needs for wants deserves neither and shall lose both. Do we in sincerity believe that teachers have no economic aspirations that they are of a socialistic nature and are looking to be dependent upon governmental programs for their needs? No, they want opportunity and room to advance and grow. It was said at a school board meeting that teachers don’t go into to teaching to become rich. This may be a fair statement, but they don’t do it to be poor either. As a state we have created conditions where this is now the choice. This is a state problem and but it is our responsibility to take the fight there.
Douglas County is treated as if property value is always on the upswing and no one ever loses a job. The media reinforces this stereo type and pours glasses filled with the Kool-Aid for the public to drink down. Suddenly, almost magically, like an Oliver Stone movie, facts seem less important. Citizens line up across the pit and scream about how we got here, recriminations fester and suddenly the enemy lives on your block or next door, based on whose campaign signs they display in their yard. My group, The Wickerdale Walkers, has actual ideas and plans on how to do fix the mess; we are trying hard to be part of the solution.
I must ask every citizen reading this, have you attended a meeting of the school board, SAC, DAC or PTO? Do you have firsthand knowledge of what these cuts will do to our county (our property values)? Do you realize that the preliminary numbers for next year’s state education cuts gives Douglas County 13% of the total? To author such an article with no sort of remedy is in fact the worst kind of action we can engage in. This article speaks to administrative waste in one sentence then blames the union in the next. Is the problem management or is it labor? If this is just the start of an anti-Mill movement I applaud the effort, but it is, alas, about 15 years too late. The time to fix today was yesterday, we missed it. The time to fix tomorrow is now; if we do not act in long term meaningful ways we will be in the same leaky boat drinking from the same sieve 15 years from now. This means we need a levy to stop the bleeding while we actively pursue different avenues of education funding, such as Lotto, existing bond re-direction, co-op buying as a state and a host of other ideas. The enemy is not your teachers, administrators, parents, community or school board; right now it is the state and the poor way that the capitol has handled finances. That is where our energy must go. We must move above the fray and keep the fight where it belongs

The time for stale election year rhetoric has passed and I invite everyone to get off the couch and move in closer to the issues. Leave the safety of your laptops and show the courage you all have. If we are only to be about “tilting at windmills” we will soon learn that this is a real dragon and idiom alone cannot slay it. If we are not working on solving the problem, we are the problem. Visit us on facebook as the “Wickerdale Walkers” and get plugged in to solutions in the making.

4 comments:

  1. Wow, all I can say is Dave Schallert should have his facts straight before posting something like this! Does he work for a company that has a 401K? If not, that isn’t DCSD’s fault…it’s his! The DCSD pension plan is not free. It has the same principals as the business world;s 401K, except it is for a non-profit. There are several companies in the business world that provide health care benefits to their employees, JUST like DCSD. If he doesn't work for one of those companies, again, not DCSD’s fault…it’s his. If he thinks that teachers get paid so well and have summers off, then why not give up his good paying job and become a teacher? Then he might have some true insight into the school system.

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  2. Dave, great response. You need to get this on the Your Hub comments as well.

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  3. Dave,
    Your response is the one I wanted to write, but much better. Is there a way to edit it down so it can make it into the Hub? I'm glad I found it here, but the folks who need the information might be more likely to read The Hub. Well done!

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  4. Kelli
    re-read his post it is not about pension plans, health insurance or 401K's it is about how the state has mismanaged funding and now as a result our children are now suffering with larger class sizes, fewer teacher and support staff. Maybe you need to work in the school district and worry if you will be in the next wave of cuts.

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