Mehlville School District Makes the Front Page of the Call Again!

I haven’t verified my count yet, but if I remember correctly, the Mehlville School District has been on the front page of Call Newspapers 7 out of the last 8 issues…all positive stories highlighting the successes of the students of the Mehlville School District.

A big thanks to Mike Anthony, Burke Wasson, Bill Milligan, and the rest of the Call Newspaper staff for recognizing the great things our students are doing.
Karl

Quote of the Day – Voltaire

Voltaire Quotes
Common sense is not so common.
Voltaire

Capital – WSJ.com – The 1.3 Trillion Dollar Swing to The Wealthy

To put the following in simple terms, over the last 30 years, the middle-class has slowly started to disappear. The reason why this is relevant is because it will become an experiment in “compounding interest,” so to say. You see, the more people we have falling in to poverty, and in to the lower classes, the more poor children we will be attempting to educate. Which, or course, leads to a larger drain on American society (it cost at least 70% more to educate children in poverty than those above the poverty line), which leads to a lower standard of living for everyone. If we are to maintain our current standard of living, and if we are to improve the standard of living for our children, we need to make sure the middle class is strong and vibrant, and we need to be very sure that we are doing everything in our power to help impoverished children escape from the cycle of poverty of which they are otherwise sentenced. This, of course, leads to more crime, more welfare, more unemployment, a weaker economy, etc.

I am not advocating for a “free ride” for the poor, but I am advocating for some creative and critical thinking as it relates to saving and strengthening our current standard of living as citizens of the United States of America. This is only possible by changing the way we educate our children to compete and survive in this globalized economy, as well as provide the resources necessary to get it done the most effective and cost-efficient manner possible.

I can tell you with almost 100% certainty that high stakes testing like No Child Left Behind (NCLB) is not going to accomplish that. It does nothing but tell us what we already know, and that is what the socio-economic status of our communities are. No Child Left Behind is a complete waste of taxpayer money and economic resources.  It is time to use our collective heads and do something intelligent about our educational systems…all of them.

Capital – WSJ.com
The gap between women’s wages and men’s is narrowing, but the gap between economic winners and losers of either gender is widening. And the patterns of inequality among women are more similar to than different from the patterns among men: Earnings at the very top are growing much faster those at than at the middle or the bottom. Everything else is detail.

Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers puts it sharply. If the distribution of income in the U.S. today were the same as it was in 1979, and the U.S. had enjoyed the same growth, the bottom 80% would have about $670 billion more, or about $8,000 per family a year. The top 1% would have about $670 billion less, or about $500,000 a family.

Click here to read the entire article, and get the data…

No Child Left Behind: Truths and Consequences

Here is a good video on the downfalls of No Child Left Behind (NCLB.) What you will see here are mostly the cons of No Child Left Behind

Weekly Mehlville Update – November 2nd, 2007

Friend,

Attached to this email are this week’s news releases I sent to the media.  I think you’ll find quite a few items that may interest you – Internet Safety, A Salute To Veterans that you can attend and a Focus Group you can participate in, just to name three.  I hope you enjoy the releases.
Please remember that you are invited to join us on Monday evening at 7pm at Bernard for the next COMPASS meeting.  Dr. Lisa Counts will talk about staffing.  I’ve seen the preview of her presentation and it is very good.  Dr. Counts will give your great information about our staffing situation.  Plus, she’s a very enjoyable speaker to listen to.  I know you’ll be glad you came to COMPASS after hearing her speak.

In other District news, congratulations are in order for the Mehlville football team.  They have won their District Championship and now qualify for the State Quarterfinals. I believe Mehlville will host a playoff game on November 9 (next Friday).  I’ll pass along final details when I get them.

According to my calendar of events, Oakville High has a fall play this evening at 7pm.  On Monday evening, the Oakville choir is performing at Canaan Baptist.  Then on Tuesday evening, the Mehlville Choir is performing at Canaan Baptist.  Both performances begin at 7pm.  Mehlville High is hosting a blood drive on November 7th beginning at 8am.  Oakville High has its Parochial Night on November 7th at 6:30pm.  And, Wohlwend is having a Papa John’s fund-raiser on November 8th.

Finally, don’t forget the children do not have school next Thursday and Friday due to State Teacher Conferences.

Have a great weekend,

Patrick W. Wallace, APR
Director - School/Community Relations
Mehlville School District
Phone: (314) 467-5152
Fax: (314) 467-5198

Synthetic grass fields come in under budget – St. Louis Post-Dispatch

STLtoday – News – St. Louis City / County
Synthetic turf will be under budget

11/02/2007

The final cost of installing two synthetic-turf fields at the Mehlville School District’s two high schools is expected to be $23,000 less than originally budgeted. District officials made this announcement at a recent school board meeting.

The project had been expected to cost $1.55 million. In addition to the unused budgeted funds, $62,000 in earned interest on funds for the project will be applied toward the payment.

Work on the turf fields started in the spring and wrapped up in August. The turf fields replaced natural grass athletic fields.