New Jersey's Governor has actually had to defend himself, not just about trips to support other GOP'ers, or dealing with da fun left behind by John Tax-zine and his over-taxing of state residents, or da "Tunnel to Nowhere." Instead, he has to roll up his big sleeves and defend his plan to not pay school superintendents over $200,000 each year for whatever it is they do!
Now, we in da Manalapan and Freehold are know a little something about school superintendents. Because, we had da poster-child of what a school superintendent should not be.
We had King-Lord-Mr-Doctor-Grand High Exaulted Mystic Ruler Wasser.
He gets his Doctorate degree from a school that has traveled more than most Manalapan residents - and BTW, it's new address is now in Los Angeles. His exploits were so outrageous that even area TV stations did news reports on him. He and his backers brought shame and ridicule to our beloved school system and our district. And we had no choice but to foot da bill and pay his 6-figure pension when he "retired."
Now, da Governor wants to place a cap on what we pay these so-called qualified applicants. And, hard to imagine, there are those who feel that's wrong! They believe some of these guys should make over $200,000 each year, claiming better talented people will not take da job if its below $175,000.
To those people we say one thing -- King / Doctor / Mr. / Lord James Wasser could always come out of retirement for you.
DaTruth is, if we can't find people who can run a school district for $175,000 or less, than we're seriously doing something wrong. Nearly 10% of this entire nation is unemployed, and how many people don't even get unemployment benefits anymore? How many employed people who are underpaid are going to food pantries to get extra help? How many foreclosed houses are there in da state? How many people have their heat set at 60 degrees to save money? If a school district can't find a qualified person to run their district for under $175,000, then you can only surmise that either they're lazy in their jobs, or dare we say cronyism could be a possibility?
It might surprise you that da average salary for a school superintendent of a district of 25,000 students or more was $211,000. That detail comes from American Association of School Adminostrators, who claim in their data that school districts of 10,000 - 24,999 students, da median salary is $164,300. Add to this, da Los Angeles Unified School District has over 694,000 students and over 45,000 teachers --- yet only has one (1) superintendent!
New Jersey has over 550 towns and 600 school districts - and we have 600 school superintendents!
Now, according to da NJ Department of Education 2009 data -
Number of schools in NJ - 2,485
Number of districts - 604
Number of kids in all da schools - 1,380,000
So - a little 2nd grade math here ----
In New Jersey, we have twice da amount of students in da entire state that da Los Angeles Unified School District has, but we also have over 600 times da amount of school superintendents!!!!!!!!!
Is it any wonder that we pay so much in taxes in New Jersey!
DaTruth is, Christie is onto something here. We need to cut da fat in da schools -- NOT DA TEACHERS -- but da fat. Too many principals, too many superintendents, too many assistants. Does a school administrator need two assistants at $125,000 annually? Do we need 600 superintendents? If da big Guv wants to really fix this mess, how about cutting da number of districts in half by 2015? How much will taxpayers save if we cut 300 superintendents at $175,000, and at least one assistant at $125,000 each year?
How's about $90 million annually (simple math) - just for these 600 jobs - not including benefits or pensions or administration buildings or property or administration maintainance or secretaries and other incidentals too numerous to name -- that's just salary - with no teachers cut!!!!
DaTruth is, it's time to cut da fat. It's best for da taxpayers. It's best for da teachers. It's best for da kids.
And that's daTruth.
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8 comments:
D-Squad, apparently you're not a teacher. If you were, you'd know just how much this Governor is screwing around with us. Granted, you are right about the bloated administration, but the Governor has a habit of picking on us and not those who rake in all the cash. Pleasemake sure people know that. We're not the problem. What is is the bloated establishment and a Governor who has it out for teachers.
Any surprise here. Christie has had it in for teachers since he took office.
I don't think he's going far enough. Why do we need even 300 districts. You said it yourself. Los Angeles has all these kids and schools and only one district. Why not make each county a district. 21 counties. 21 districts. 580 high priced administrators out of a job. Better for the taxpayers.
No! Christie has had it in for the bloated leadership of the NJEA, not the membership, the president of which is making an enormous sum of money and who is the major obstacle to any kind of serious reform. There has to be a way to remove under performing teachers much more quickly than the system now allows. The longer this goes on, the further behind American education will fall in comparison to the rest of the world. No other country who is serious about education would tolerate what goes on in this country and how we protect incompetent teachers.
With every district that goes through the process of consolidation the cost is more, not less.
Look at Freehold regional.
Manalapan HS has department chairs. They have VP to report to. Then there is the principal. Yet, they are part of a district that has regional administrators for the different departments. Those people have staff. Then, there is the assistant super and the superintendant.
If Manalapan HS had no region to report to... No big regional salaries of 175K and up.
Do the math. It costs more to be regional!
Are you kidding? Why is it that my friend in South Carolina who owns a house twice the size of mine pays $1,200 in property taxes a year, and I pay that a month?
Something in this state has to give.
No kidding. SC has lower salaries. Move there and see how much your company will pay you to be in the Non-NY/NJ area.
Yea. Lose the large salaries for Supers, ass. supers and regional department administrators. Let the teachers teach without multiple, job justifying, high pay justifying administrators creating more non-teaching activities for each teacher to follow. For God's sake, give a course outline and let the teachers....teach!
Christie is a bully. Pure and simple.
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