Michigan Public School Class Cut so Teachers Could Work on Lawmaker Recall Effort

Michigan Capitol Confidential ^ | 7/28/2011 | Jack Spencer

[MichCapCon]

According to the parent of a daughter attending summer school in the Grand Blanc Community Schools, students were let out of class early last Thursday so that teachers could participate in the campaign to recall Rep. Paul Scott, R-Grand Blanc.

Petition language was approved last Thursday (July 22) for the attempt to recall Scott, Chairman of the Michigan House Education Committee. The recall campaign is trying to collect more than 9,000 names by Aug. 5 in the hope of getting the recall election placed on the November ballot. Gathering that many valid signatures in such a short time frame is a tall order.

The petition language includes both the so-called pension tax and alleged K-12 cuts as reasons for the recall. A logical place for the recall campaign to start looking for signatures is within Grand Blanc's school community. However, the recall campaign and regular school business aren't supposed to mix.

“Last Thursday at 1:55 my daughter texted (text messaged) me from her summer school class and asked me if I heard about what Representative Scott was trying to do,” said Ken Jones, the parent of a 17-year-old Grand Blanc summer school student. “I asked her what she was talking about and she said that Scott was trying to make it so that all the teachers would get fired. I asked her if her teacher had told her that. She said 'yes,' and then she said that she was going to get out early, at 2:15 (instead of 3 P.M.) so they (the teachers and students) could go and sign petitions.”

[cripplecreek]

a few days later an assistant principal came into the class, basically saying that someone had called the school asking about it (letting students out early) and he seemed to be trying to find out which student had told the story.”

If you can't strongarm the legislators, strongarm the students.

[Puppage]

strongarm the students.

Well, they are a captive audience.

[cripplecreek]

I see from the local news that teachers claim that they’re being “forced” to cheat due to high standards.

[G Larry]

Can UNION teachers work 39 hours per week on political activities and 1 hour per week on teaching and still be considered in compliance with their contract?

At what point are they considered to be working on POLITICAL CAMPAIGNS, while being PAID under GOVERNMENT CONTRACT?

[Puppage]

I see from the local news that teachers claim that they’re being “forced” to cheat due to high standards.

That's unbelievable. And, these people are actually "teaching" kids.

How about, if the standards are too high, you force yourself to work harder?

What is it with people today? Things get a little tough and their solution is to cheat?

[tcrlaf]

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK (against you!)

[DonkeyBonker]

Another reason why unions should be banned.

[tcrlaf]

A LOT of us are missing the boat right now on these recall elections.

Democrats are organized, and have millions of dollars in cash flowing in for the Wisconsin and Michigan recalls.

[cripplecreek]

A LOT of us are missing the boat right now on these recall elections.

Actually I've been thinking about that myself. We need a full list of who all faces recall. I suspect it would be extensive. In fact we need a nationwide list and campaign to show that the democrats are trying to overturn elections they lost.

I also see from the local news that a "medical" marijuana clinic in Lansing is offering pot if people register to vote which I suspect is tied to this recall effort. I don't understand how they can do that. Its like the pharmacy offering darvon to people for registering to vote.

[J40000]

My kids and I drove past a bunch of these recall ‘volunteers’ yesterday.

I told the kids that this is what Democrats do whenever they lose elections. They act like spoiled brats to get their way.

How long did we put up with Granholm???

[cripplecreek]

How long did we put up with Granholm???

8 years too many but we did it like adults.

[FourPeas]

Having friends and relatives with kids in Michigan school districts, I’m very interested in this topic.

I wish you’d post the whole thing here rather than expect me to click to your blog.

[cripplecreek]

Its a fine news site for Michigan political news and they’ve managed to snatch some fine writers from newspapers around the state.

[FourPeas]

That may be so, but it appears the poster is excerpting their own blog. That’s beyond annoying. And, unnecessary.

[cripplecreek]

Whatever. Obviously your annoyance is far more important than any information you may gain.

[FourPeas]

You have it backwards. To the blogger, getting blog hits is more important than communicating information.

1. In Windows, opening another tab or occurrence of a browser uses memory. Closing that tab/occurrence does not free all of the memory used. Therefore, as more articles are clicked on, an increasing amount of memory is rendered unusable causing the system to run slower and eventually needing to be restarted.
2. Exposing my system to the tracking cookies, spyware, malware, etc. by going to various blogs is bad policy. I am running various pieces of software to eliminate as many of them as I can, but it's a constant battle that's unnecessary if the blogger actual intent was to communicate information.
3. Mr. Jim Robinson, himself, has said [emphasis mine]:
   
   So, long story short, we created a special forum for blog posts. This was in lieu of simply deleting all blog posts. The theory was that as long as they were posted in the bloggers forum, those who didn’t wish to read them could simply click on the “news” forum and they wouldn’t see them. But, of course, as some blogs are definitely better than most others and some are much better than your typical mainstream news sources, we soon allowed certain blogs to be posted regularly to the news section.
   
   This all worked more or less to a certain degree without too much friction until the non-commenting, short-excerpting, long-complaining blog pimp was born.
   
   I have no complaint if a good conservative blogger posts his own material to FR, not as an excerpt to drive hits and discussion back to his blog, but rather to impart useful information to OUR readers and to promote and join in on the discussion and conservative activism HERE on FR.

[fieldmarshaldj]

Fire their asses.

[cripplecreek]

You just seem kind of whiney to me.

[FourPeas]

Good day, Missy.