Another way to battle low tax revenue is to encourage more underemployed women to step up their careers and thus pay more state taxes. Ditto on underemployed citizens in general, which I find to be the case in Longmont. Many state residents are not working in jobs that challenge them in the state of Colorado and therefore our tax base is smaller than states where two income families are the norm. Women in particular need to start more businesses, and challenge ourselves to continue to work and pay taxes into the system if we want to have strong funded public schools for our children.

As far as budget cuts, we all know what to do: Cut teachers and administration. The biggest lever arm in our school budget is salary. Just do it, and stop pussy footing around, acting like cutting bus services will balance the budget. Another area to consider: the pension plan for teachers is very generous. Who else in society earns such a pension, not many government employees, not high tech employees and not self employed individuals. For instance, in the federal government, Department of Commerce cut the big pension years ago. When will teachers catch up and need to use 401Ks like the rest of us do for their retirement?

*And, last Thurs. we read Bartholomew and the Oobleck (we made oobleck in class….studying states of matter….solid or liquid?!)

Gene