I'll address what I can here - some of it I'm not sure about:
Is it true that Jackson has increased the mills of this Feb. levy from 3.9 to 4.9? If this is true, there's no way the voters will approve this.
They did so because they lost an entire year of funding, and thus are even deeper in debt. Just to catch back up to what they had been asking, they apparently had to increase the millage. As an accountant, I'd say that fiscally (for the JLSD's part) makes sense, although obviously it doesn't go over well.
I know that part of the reason they are putting this levy on in Feb. is because many senior citizens will be in Florida, etc. and won't be available to vote, but it will still be defeated if the mills are increased.
The admin/BOE has officially been saying they put it up to capitalize on the "momentum" from the 'better' results in November (it wasn't defeated as badly as the other three times). I won't begin to get into whether they also were trying to capitalize on seniors being gone, but that's another story....lol.
Also, Jackson is shooting themselves in the foot by cutting busing. For one thing, it's unsafe. For another, it's inconvenient. Still another, bus drivers have lost their jobs because of this yet Jackson won't cut retired/rehired employees who make much more than the bus drivers. Nor do they cut some administrative jobs that are not really necessary. It seems it's always the lower personnel who get their jobs cut.
The BOE/admin has repeatedly said they've scaled back administrative positions as much as possible, although they evidently haven't scaled back their salaries through caps/reduced wages. According to the ODE, Jackson does spend less per pupil on administrative costs than many other districts, if not most (I've got the data somewhere, but I'm too lazy to find it now...lol). Not that they couldn't cut more, though, perhaps, I guess. Personally, I'm a little flustered over the elementary busing cuts and I've already given Ken Douglas (BOE president in 2008) an earful about it. My kids won't be directly affected by it, as we're outside the 2mile zone, but it still sucks, esp. for those students at Strausser with the dangerous roads around that particular school.
It's kind of embarrassing to Jackson Township, which is considered one of the more affluent districts in NE Ohio, that they need to cut busing. I've always said that Jackson schools and teachers are some of the best around; however, they need to be managed more effectively.
Becasue I wish to remain as neutral as possible, I'll save my personal comments here.
Get rid of some of the overpaid Administrators - we could save more money this way. Also, I do agree that we didn't need such high ceilings in some of these school buildings. It's costly for heating and cooling.
See above on the admins. I would think that, as we replace retiring admins (there are very high profile ones coming up between now and 2010), we should do it with much cheaper labor.
I'm not sure I agree 100% on the ceilings, as there is a 2nd floor in a portion on the peripheral of the Commons, although I think the design might have been a bit better. I do think the streetlights are pretty silly. I was in there over break and all the tables were gone, leaving the streetlights all by themselves in the middle of the huge Commons area - looked very out of place - I would have recommended better lighting.
As far as natural light goes, when I was at JHS, it was almost depressing having most of your classes w/o windows. One of the little joys of the day was to be able to go to lunch and sit by the windows in the old cafeteria - regardless how gloomy it might be that day. So I agree w/letting in as much natural light as reasonable. Not sure it was done in the best way possible, but I do think having natural light is a good thing.
