Happy Freakin' Birthday Mr. Goodman

Now, I was a dj in college and I was playing Butthole Surfers records on the air back when they were still on Touch and Go, but... Who am I kidding? I have said plenty of negative things about David Goodman in the past, and I'm sure I will have occasion to again in the future, but anything I say tonight could justifiably be attributed to jealousy, plain and simple.

Tech, Bexley, Schools, Elections

It's been a while since I've done this, but my world is clumping itself along a chaotic attractor again...

I got a letter inviting me to a meeting for folks who volunteered for the Bexley Technology Commission. I'm very excited. Bexley has some pretty forward looking folks.
...

For an example, take Bexley School District's decision to dump Microsoft and switch over all of their IT to Linux. It makes sense for them technically, practically, and financially. How much?

Upgrading ME to Windows XP, a newer version of the popular operating system, would cost the district about $412,000, she said. That price would include purchasing new machines and upgrading software.

The technology budget for the district last year was $159,000, so the Linux licensing fee of 50 cents per user was a far cry from the six-figure cost for sticking with Microsoft.

412000 / 2100 students = $196/pupil to upgrade to XP. Any guesses on Vista? Excellent move, BSD.

...

I've learned a thing or two about per-pupil spending, so I can tell you that State Rep. Larry Wolpert (R-Hilliard) is misrepresenting the data he cites:

Comparing the highest-spending 26 districts in the state, which range from $11,000 to $17,000 per pupil, with the lowest-spending 25 districts in the state, ranging from $6,000 to $7,000 per pupil, Wolpert said it's the lower-spending districts that perform better.

"You ask the question, 'Which has the highest number of successful school districts?' It's the lower standard deviation (the lowest cost-districts compared to the highest-cost districts)," he said.

First of all, someone doesn't know what Standard Deviation means. And those ranges? He must be using old data. in FY'06, 42 school districts spent more than $11k/pupil, and only 16 spent less than $7k. But even putting those details aside, what about his larger point? Well, here are the 26 highest and 25 lowest spending districts in Ohio, grouped by performance designation:

(click to enlarge)

As you can see, the left hand column, which contains the highest spending districts, does include three 'academic watch' districts, compared to zero in the low-spending districts. That's not Wolpert's claim, however. He says that lower spending districts do better overall and have more high-performing districts. That's simply not true. Half of the high-spending districts achieved 'Excellent' ratings. Fewer than one-fourth of the low-spending districts attained that rating. More money is associated both with high-performance and low-performance. Low-Spending is associated with fair-to-middlin' performance. If Mr. Wolpert would like to have a sit-down to discuss data, I'd be happy to do so.

...

In the meantime, I'll re-iterate my competing claim that the best predictor of performance in my data was the amount of locally-generated funding, which probably does correlate with Mr. Wolpert's predictors. Here in Bexley, folks are extremely committed to funding the schools, supplementing the voluntary mills with an educational foundation that is the envy of other local districts. If you like to help inspire envy, the humongous annual fundraiser is coming up. See here for details on BRAVO!

...

If you glossed over the school stuff, you missed reading that Mr. Wolpert's colleague in the G.A., Jim McGregor (R-Gahanna) got a much trendier committee chairmanship, Alternative Energy. I almost missed his somewhat bizarre assertion that switch-grass will improve highway safety because I was thinking about what woulda-coulda-and-perhaps shoulda happened to Mr. McGregor. He won an extremely close race against Bev Campbell, with a margin that shrank quite a bit after the recount. Ms. Campbell had considered challenging the election results, but ultimately decided against doing so. Carole Squire, who was officially defeated by a much larger margin, did decide to go forward and seek to have that result set aside. At least one expert testifying on her behalf during the hearings examining the election has stated:

"There were so many egregious disparities in the (conduct of the election), it is beyond any experience I ever had."

It'll be interesting to see how this develops.

You know what's cool?

Having John Glenn and Ted Strickland hanging out outside of your office. You know what's not-so-cool? When your best attempt at taking an unobtrusive cell phone photo of the occasion is a pic of somewhere between 7-9 legs, of which 3-4 belong to the aforementioned gentlemen.

sigh.

school funding 420

From the Bay of Pigs to Columbine, the date conjures up disaster.
The number itself conjures up pipe dreams.

On April 20, the Ohio Education Association will hold an election with 1300 delegates in Columbus voting to approve a one-time $25 dollar increase in dues that would raise $2.5m for the GIRFOF ballot drive, representing 25-35% of the projected budget for the campaign.

Beyond any superstitions or symbolism of the vote's timing, the article leaves me a bit confused:

If there are 130,000 OEA members,
and they each contribute $25,
and 25 X 130000 = 3,250,000

isn't there $750,000 I'm missing?

Meta Posturing

Folks who were in opposition to this weeks "anti-surge" resolutions almost invariably stated that they were opposed to debating a resolution that would not and could not actually do anything. For instance, the Dispatch published an editorial titled "Empty Gesture," which was referenced by Pat Tiberi in his remarks regarding the resolution. There's a point to be made on these grounds, but not until we establish that the Republicans are no more serious about this than the Democrats they disparage. Ask Mr. Boehner if he would oppose a resolution 'supporting the troops' on the grounds that it would be "a political charade, lacking both the seriousness and gravity of the issue it is meant to address." Picture in your mind Pat Tiberi standing up and saying "For all the chest-pounding from my Republican colleagues about supporting the troops, this resolution does nothing."

These guys are too gutless to vocalize support for the escalation, and patently insincere in their justifications for opposing the resolution.

Now that that's out of the way, perhaps we can discuss the point. The New York Times, in their editorial supporting the resolution, stated:

...we welcome the House of Representatives’ long-overdue attempt to shake some sense into Mr. Bush with a resolution opposing his decision to send another 20,000 combat troops to fight this disastrous war without any plan to end it. Yet yesterday’s vote, in which 17 Republicans joined the Democrats to produce a margin of 246 to 182, was the easy part. It takes no great courage or creativity for a politician to express continuing support for the troops and opposition to a vastly unpopular and unpromising military escalation.

So what we see are opinion makers stating that they support the resolution, even though it is an ineffectual and ultimately meaningless gesture, or conversely stating that they strongly oppose the measure, even though it is an ineffectual and ultimately meaningless gesture. We see Dennis Kucinich lining up with conservatives who are itching for a fight over funding the war.

Now, a number of folks, like Mike Turner (R-Centerville), are calling out the Democrats for not offering up their own alternatives. Let's be absolutely clear here - war planning is the responsibility of the executive branch. Congress gets a role in making declarations, in oversight and advice, and of course, in funding. The new Congress is not a rubber stamp (we're looking at you, Pat), but they still have the function of dealing with what comes across their desks.

So, rather than asking Mr. Turner why he is willing to state that "serious mistakes have been made in the execution of the Iraqi conflict," but he thinks that it is the responsibility of other congressfolk to come up with solutions for him to debate while he complains, I'm going to point out two alternatives that are floating out there:

1) The Murtha proposal, as outlined in the NYT editorial:

Mr. Murtha would link this year’s war financing to the Pentagon’s adoption of new deployment rules, including longer stretches from the battlefield for returning troops, more specialized training and better defensive equipment. That would let representatives cast a politically safe vote for financing the war, while forcing the Pentagon to gradually reduce the number of active duty troops available to serve in Iraq.

2) Believe it or not, Pat Tiberi dropped a hint in his floor speech that he wants to debate the findings of the Iraq Study Group. Mr. Tiberi could lead a movement to have Congress make support contingent on the President adopting the recommendations of the ISG as a complete package.

I don't see it happening. I expect to see more of the griping that I've described in previous posts and that Johnathan Riskind is now noting as well. The Republicans were never an attractive bunch, but they're particularly distasteful to listen to now that they're in the minority. Many of them can't bring themselves to oppose the actual acts of the majority, they oppose the fact that they no longer are the acting majority. Right now, they're complaining about political posturing by the Dems. As I said, I disagree, but there's a debate to be had over that point. The complaints of people like my Representative, however, are simply political posturing over the politically expedient issue of political posturing, which makes it seem as if they really just want to wrap themselves up in a blanket of irrelevance.