Senate Bill 5 will start the process of taking the shackles off the State of Ohio that confine it by collective bargaining. The rhetoric provided by the sector of the population that is “addicted” to collective bargaining which has grown in influence since 1983, so long that many of those people don’t know any other form of life, is sickening. So sickening it makes me question completely the validity of public education, because these people didn’t learn the basics of American life. Their basic premise seems to be that if you can get a job, have a union protect that job for your life-time, then they are willing to sacrifice a life-time of freedom for some mundane “average” life. I personally find their view of the world repulsive and un-American. What I see in those crowded halls of protest at the State House is a group of people protecting their right to be “average.”
Old college professor hippies such as Francis Pivan, who has spent her entire life perpetuating progressivism is upset at the countries sudden desire to turn back to the Constitution, now that we know we’ve been scammed by people like her for decades.
Pivan is an old lady but she was around in the early days of all this change and she’s always been active in politics. And she opened herself to these name calling tirades when she said. “The strange stories that Glenn Beck creates with his chalkboard gain traction with Americans, who are made anxious by the large changes that have overtaken the United States, including the election of a black president and the increasing racial diversity of the population, deindustrialization and the decline of American power abroad, as well as cultural changes in sexual and family norms.”
Who are these people that I’m talking about? Is it just people like me, Doc Thompson, Ray Warrick, Glenn Beck or anybody else? No. It’s people like the comment below. This comment came to me from a woman that only knows me from these epic pages. And her comment speaks volumes of who exactly those Americans are that have now been awakened and will not sleep so soundly again. She was commenting on an article I did about John Meyer.
There are people in my life that move me. I mean…REALLY move me. They are few. My father, who gave me the tools to navigate through life..now and then as he was right when he said what I believe would waiver with experience. So right. My husband for letting me move in the direction that drives my heart and soul no matter what. Glenn Beck. Say what you may…he’s my people. He’s been saying what I’ve felt for years. Yes..I cry. All the time. And Rich, who has given strength and voice to those of us out there that share his passion and need for serious change on so many venues. We need you and those that stand by you in the fight for the simple morale and values we were taught to respect. I never thought in a million years I would be here. Last but not least…to John. Kudos to you for just handing it to them. I’m honored that you live in my county and Country. God Bless. You ARE a Warrior! Today..I am blessed.
COLUMBUS, OHIO – An overflow crowd of over 800 concerned Ohioans packed the halls of the Ohio Statehouse today in opposition of Senate Bill 5, a job-killing, anti-worker bill that would silence the voice of Ohio’s public servants. If passed by the Ohio legislature, Senate Bill 5 would eliminate collective bargaining for Ohio’s public employees and make it more difficult to attract and retain quality staff.
“Today, Senator Shannon Jones and her anti-worker allies jump-started their job-killing vendetta against Ohio’s middle class,” said Becky Williams, President of SEIU District 1199 which represents over 9,000 public sector workers in Ohio. “Reducing government, cutting taxes for the rich, and taking rights away from workers might sound good to Jones, but when you talk about taking safety forces off of our streets, educators out of our communities and leaving criminals unsupervised in our towns – it’s just not practical.”
While working under the misrepresented premise of “transparency” and “reducing the size and scope of government,” Jones openly admits that there will be no direct financial benefit to the taxpayers after her exhaustive one-year research of collective bargaining. To the contrary, a report published by Policy Matters Ohio found that “allowing public sector workers to bargain collectively reduces labor strife, reduce the likelihood of strikes and can lead to better training and higher productivity for public sector workers.”
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This type of rhetoric is dangerous, and extremely misleading. Their use of terminology such as Anti-worker and the such are manipulations of the basic facts. I know many hard-working people who routinely work circles around public workers as far as quality and it angers me greatly to hear that union represented workers are “working families.” It’s that kind of discussion that has created our bankrupt conditions that began 27 years ago.
Notice how many people showed up for this event. Those are your working families. The reason their voices get heard and the “real” working families get ignored are because the real workers are working. These people are just paid lobbyists. Groups like the OEA, Progress Ohio and many others have their members take off work to participate in these lobby events, and that’s how things became so messed up to begin with.
What’s better than sex? I’m talking about the kind of sex that people fantasize about in their deepest darkest secrets. It’s Senate Bill 5 otherwise known as SB5
Oh yes, SB5 is one of the most exotic, sexy pieces of legislation ever to grace paper and to come from the lips of a State Senator Shannon Jones. The dialogue and beauty of the text is enough to turn the coldest heart into a lavish, promiscuous, insidious romantic.
So what is this salacious document that I’m speaking so highly of? It’s the first, most aggressive legislation since the infamous 1983 act in favor of collective bargaining implementation, to be enacted in an attempt to stop the bleeding that public employees represented by unions are imposing on tax payers. For more than 27 years this law has remained unchanged and has strangled the State of Ohio in being able to create a positive business atmosphere that will attract business and bring jobs to Ohio. The organizations that stand behind the collective bargaining law of 1983 have little understanding of business and have over those 27 years helped create a complex puzzle that is straining the states pension system and a host of other labor related issues.
This bill is proposed by Senator Shannon Jones of Clearcreek Twp of the 7th District has the direct support of Governor Kasich and will take a major step in the direction of solving that puzzle by taking off the shackles that are draining the tax revenue flowing to the state from the caretakers of Ohio, the tax payers.
Listen to this guy. He’s why we need SB5. It’s people like him that go to those collective bargining rallies.
Among the many items in the bill the primary reforms are:
• Eliminates collective bargaining for state employees and employees of higher education institutions • Existing collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) covering those employees expire according to their terms • Eliminates salary schedules and step increases and replaces them with a merit pay system • Eliminates continuing contracts for teachers after the bill’s effective date • Eliminates teacher leave policies in statute and requires local school boards to determine leave time • Eliminates seniority as a sole criterion for Reductions In Force (RIFs) • Removes healthcare from bargaining and instead permits school boards to govern healthcare benefit plans for employees • Requires employees to pay at least 20% of their healthcare costs • Allows public employers to hire permanent replacement workers during a strike • Limits bargaining for local government employees (including school districts) to issues of wages, hours and terms and conditions of employment • Eliminates binding arbitration for police and fire • Abolishes the School Employee Healthcare Board • Prohibits school districts from picking up any portion of the employee’s contribution to the pension system • Allows a public employer in “fiscal emergency” to serve notice to terminate, modify or negotiate a CBA While much of this bill will focus on the state, it will immediately bring transparency to localities. No longer will local school boards be able to blame the state for policies created and imposed on the districts. Step increases by teachers will now be considered raises, as they should be and school boards will be given much more independence on solving their own problems. Immediately SB5 will make changes to teacher’s contracts and benefits: • S.B.5 eliminates new continuing, contracts after the bill’s effective date. • The bill eliminates teacher leave polices from statute and instead requires local boards of education to establish general leave policies for employees who are not covered by a CBA. • The bill abolishes the School Employee Health Care board and instead permits boards of education to govern health care benefits for employees.
For all these reasons and more SB5 is a bold bill that has the kind of power to seduce business back to Ohio and once again make attractive enterprise not only in bringing jobs back to the state, but to reduce the impact of the syndicate style unions that feed directly off tax payer funds, particularly in education, and allows the money to go where it’s needed. Such a step has been needed for many years but lacked legislators and a governor with the kind of courage needed to implement it.
But like any great romance, there is always a jealous lover, the overly dependent jealous spouse that lives like a leech off the life it professes to love. Below is the press release from just such a jealous, over imposing leech of the state, the OEA. They quickly seek support from their members to attempt to strong arm the bold legislative movement occurring in Columbus. Read for yourself their words and bullet points below.
OHIO EDUCATION ASSOCIATION OPPOSES SENATE BILL FIVE
For Immediate Release Contact: Michele Prater 614-227-3071; cell 614-378-0469 Ohio Education Association opposes Senate Bill Five Legislation will weaken public service to Ohio’s children February 9, 2011 (Columbus) – The Ohio Education Association (OEA) is gravely concerned that the Ohio Senate is not making Ohio’s children a priority. In a tough economy and facing a major budget deficit, Ohio must focus on the essentials, and nothing is more essential than giving our children a quality education that prepares them for good jobs. Sen. Shannon Jones’ legislation, Senate Bill 5 (SB 5), proposes to drastically curtail collective bargaining rights, ban public employee strikes, end collectively bargained salary schedules for public employees. SB 5 targets all state workers and all Ohio higher education employees, including OEA members at Columbus State, Youngstown State and other public colleges and community colleges, as well as OEA’s State Council of Professional Educators (SCOPE) bargaining unit whose members educate incarcerated adults and youths. OEA believes collective bargaining helps educators pursue the classroom conditions, tools and support that contribute to the kind of high quality 21st century education essential to preparing students for jobs and successful careers. Collective bargaining is a problem solving tool that shapes working conditions and improves learning conditions. Since 1983, Ohio’s collective bargaining law has created a framework that has made strikes rare and short in duration. OEA affiliates negotiate effectively to avoid strikes and disruption for student learning. Senate Bill 5 serves to weaken Ohio’s entire middle class. Rather than creating jobs in Ohio, this legislation will hurt local communities stifling job growth.
OEA’s asks you to remember that: • Collective bargaining allows educators a voice in improving opportunities for Ohio’s students, better classroom resources and improved teaching and learning conditions • Teachers know best what’s needed to improve student learning , and collective bargaining gives them the opportunity to focus on teaching rather than time consuming employment issues • Educators, like all public employees, are an integral part of the fabric of Ohio’s communities. Senate Bill 5 weakens Ohio. Rather than creating jobs, this legislation will hurt local communities, reversing Ohio’s positive economic outlook • Ohio’s collective bargaining law has created a framework for problem-solving that has made strikes rare. OEA affiliates negotiate effectively to avoid disruption for student learning • In a tough economy, with Ohio facing a major budget deficit, we must focus on the essentials. Nothing is more essential than giving our children a quality education that prepares them for good jobs.
There isn’t a successful formula for collective bargaining in the entire world that has sustained itself over time. The attempts tried have everywhere proved dismal failures, and under SB5 our state government has taken the first bold step to get the state healthy again. The rhetoric of the shallow rooted, selfish protectionists of the status quo will continue to rant the statements similar to the OEA Press Release. But none of them have a real plan. They are scrambling instead to find a way to keep the ponzi schemes going just a little longer because the tragedy for them is that they built their whole lives around those ponzi schemes, and it’s evident now that they won’t get out of the scheme what they invested.
For the rest of us, that chose to work outside that insidious system, and work for ourselves, or companies not tied to collective bargaining, our investment in long term longevity over short term gain proved the wise path. And it is our strategy that must be passed on to the rest of the state for the state’s health and future fortune.
Like all good love-making, sex is best when not rooted in selfish aims, but the mutual benefit of both partners. And the good lover knows what their partner needs even if the partner is obscure to the fact. So the sex is best when not done for the benefit of the giver, but for the receiver.
And that’s why this bill is so sexy. It’s what’s needed even when all parties aren’t aware that they need it. When the bill SB5 is thrust forward into the canvas of Ohio History much to the dismay of the intended object, the real impact will be felt only when selfishness flees the proceedings and both parties work together for mutual bliss.
But as many of you reading this know, sex is not good when third parties are involved and act as agents and matchmakers. That has been the role of collective bargaining in the State of Ohio. And that’s why we need to bypass the matchmakers and head straight for the bed.
There were many residents that spoke well at the Mason School Board meeting on February 8, 2011. But none spoke quite so well as Mr. John Meyer. Listen to him speak in the video below.
For that speech, I am dedicating this post to Mr. Meyer as the first official “Warrior of the Week.” If more people stood up and spoke like Mr. Meyer, we’d have a lot less corruption, manipulation, and scandalous behavior. It’s when the community sleeps that improprieties are committed by public officials. Now the community is wide awake, and I politely tip my hat to Mr. John Meyer for his bold and articulate speech that solidifies the temperament of the community.
John was on a media tour the following day which is captured here. Click to listen.
On February 8, 2011 Stacy Schuler will resign from the Mason School District at the 7 pm school board meeting. Kevin Bright has made the announcement that he will recommend Stacy be fired, and the board will of course act on that request. And to make matters easier on herself, Stacy is resigning, much the way George Coates did. George so far has stayed under the radar even though his actions may be technically much worse.
Now, it would seem that the firing of Stacy Schuler should be a forgone conclusion. It shouldn’t even be a question. George Coates the assistant principal felt bold enough to take cell phones from students, apparently in search of nude pictures of the student body from text messages sent to boy friends and girl friends known as sexting. And we know that the assistant principal was sending Stacy nude pictures of himself, at a minimum. These employees felt so untouchable that they abused their positions audaciously. The union provides an unprecedented level of job security, and that leads all too often to various degrees of abuse.
So the announcement of firing Stacy Schuler sounds all too similar to me. The proceedings from superintendent to school board are extremely reminiscent of how levies are introduced to a ballot issue, or how busing and other services are reduced. The formal proceedings are only formalities designed to make the public feel like they are a part of the process, when in fact the real decisions have already been made.
And that’s what’s wrong with education broken down into its most simplified form, and why many people are looking to School Choice as an option to this kind of tyrannical monopoly. It’s the kind of issue I’ve spent thousands of words discussing here in a hope that this chronicle can provide others questioning public education, some sense of support, and a blueprint to defeat their own school levies in other districts.
The things I’ve brought up for years are not only coming out of my mind however. Traditionally the union strong-arm methods have successfully isolated dissent to a defensive position and used the press to radicalize those dissidents in the eyes of the public. Meanwhile those same political thugs capture the high ground of “defending the children,” and use that platform to negotiate lucrative contracts from the public. Doc Thompson had on a guest from the Kato Institute that validates with a professional opinion what many of us in the trenches are feeling. It’s a great interview so enjoy it.
When Stacy goes to court, it will be revealed that the activity within the Mason School System should be on a nationally syndicated soap opera of provocative tradition, not taken as a serious institution that has the aim of educating our students. When board members are engaged in affairs that are publicly known, and other teachers are caught doing despicable, and immoral acts that are known by many in positions of power, the public faces the moral dilemma as to what to do.
What often happens is parents kick the can down the road because their kids are only in the school system for a relatively short time and those same parents just want the system to stay in tact long enough for their children to get what they need from the system. The union knows this, and they calculate that each year some kids leave, and new ones enter and since nobody cares truly for the health of their neighbor, and their communities, unions use that sense of selfishness to conduct a stage play full of smoke and mirrors.
So when Kevin Bright makes his announcement, and publicly chastises Stacy Schuler for her terrible behavior, know that he and the school board are aware of much worse than what Stacy has been involved with. But they will throw Stacy to the wolves like a Roman Emperor throwing a thief to the lions in a gladiator arena to appease the crowd. Their intent is to get past this terrible episode so people forget and get back to their lives, and the school can put another levy on the ballot in November to cover the step increases that the union contract requires.
Ironically, and this gives you an idea how big this story is, this is a video from China showing the Mason School System attempting to distance itself from Stacy when just months ago all was well, cover ups and all.
I say cover ups because these stories were very well-known, and for the superintendent to not know about it is one of two things. He’s really out of touch and isn’t listening to anybody. Or he is just trying to keep the bad stuff hidden so there isn’t any interruption in revenue flowing into the school system. Both options are bad.
In the face of such scandals as what is being dealt with currently at the Mason School System, and one month ago at the Lakota School System, thousands of rank and file participants within the teachers union crave to put these episodes of unpleasantness behind them. The worst thing in their eyes is for public debate to occur beyond a two-day news cycle. If a story lingers for too long, the value for the service they want to offer diminishes in the eyes of the taxpayer.
The downfall of those status quo protectionists however is technology. No longer can a spokesman tell a group of friendly reporters a controlled diatribe of manipulation intended to diffuse a crisis till it falls from people’s minds as their busy lives consume commitment to a righteous cause. Now with text messaging, and blog sites like this one, information moves freely without the control mechanism of political machines, and is why the FCC is pushing Net Neutrality.
That’s why what happened on 700 WLW February 4th of 2011 was unique as a story broke on that station throughout the day preceding a major indictment from a prosecutor’s office. It started with Sharon Poe speaking about the crises with Doc Thompson and ended 9 hours later after the indictments were announced and attorneys started to chime in with legal discussion. The story is basically this, a teacher Stacy Schuler of the Mason School System was indicted for 16 counts of sexual battery with 5 students. She is also involved in a sexual way with a separate issue involving the assistant principal George Coates. George called in his resignation on February 2, 2011. The story arch was fascinating and is captured in the video below. It is recommended that you activate the video and finish this article while listening if you are fortunate enough to be able to do both. If not, then give yourself some time. It’s a video that is 2 hours and 7 minutes long but condenses 9 hours of radio news breaking evolution over the day and is a compelling story in itself. So turn off the TV and let the video play and enjoy the theater of the mind without commercial interruption for the drama is as good if not better than any movie available to rent.
Sharon (the woman in the interview) and I have known, as most in the Mason community and in neighboring Lakota have known for some time that serious sexual allocations were transpiring in Mason. In fact I have the list of many improprieties, most of them taking place with consenting adults within the system and not directly effecting students. But the number and rank of the participants is alarming for any workplace. This teacher is just the most obvious participant because she got caught. Her actions since they involved students that posted information on Facebook and other online forums could not be quieted by the spin doctors and the info got out into the community.
Check these links for information on all the soap opera issues going on in Mason. There are several articles on those pages. Scroll down to the “Sex and Drugs for All” School Districts section to read the information. This information was published by Charles Foster Kane.
Scott Sloan came on after Sharon and had been working with the same information we all had but Scott had the guts to act on it. After he went off the air with Doc, a caller from Mason came on and defended the district and proclaimed that WLW was behind on the story and it wasn’t a big deal. WLW was in fact the only news organization running with the story. All the other outlets were waiting for the indictment to come down and reacted predictably once the story broke. That particular caller reflected a huge part of the population that just doesn’t want to deal with bad news.
It is because of people like the caller that these problems in schools have continued. They empower the perpetuation of illicit behavior in public institutions with the same careless abandon that a large portion of the population accepted the seductress explanations from former President Clinton.
The target audience of complacency which Clinton, Obama and teachers unions, along with others, speak to know what they’re doing. They hope to solicit more recruits to their thinking by encouraging public drunkenness, sexual exploits and other forms of decadent behavior because in such personalities are future apologists that won’t have the courage or fortitude to confront difficult issues when they present themselves. And on the backs of such weak souls were built the corruption we are finding in public education. In fact, as I was writing this article I received this comment from a reader which fits in the category just discussed.
Author : thompson (IP: 72.173.182.116 , 72-173-182-116.cust.wildblue.net) URL : Whois : http://whois.arin.net/rest/ip/72.173.182.116 Comment: you’re nuts. Salaries have nothing do to with morality. And for the record, teaching salaries are NOT I sugges you collect your thoughts before you put them out there to be read. Hope I don’t stumble onto anything else you rant, I mean write.
That is a guy that doesn’t see how things connect. The misspellings are because that’s how he wrote it, I duplicated it the way I received it. And to respond to that guy, being nuts is to take things at face value, like he obviously does.
You see, it’s not just the sex that is going on with some of the teachers, and administrators. Or principles and assistants that think it’s acceptable to send naked pictures of themselves to co-workers on computers owned by the school. Or child pornography obsessed teachers taking pictures of kids with their shirts off in the classroom. This is about the wholesome advertising of public education services to the community to justify extraordinarily high salaries negotiated by public sector unions. It’s like most things in life, in the end it’s about money.
During the levy campaign back in September after I had made a couple of appearances on WLW the Pro Lakota Campaign had flooded the station with protest letters and accused the station of being disingenuous to teachers and rationalized my questing of the amount of wages being imposed on our community budget as hateful. Their assertion is that because of their educational background and the fact that many of them have master’s degrees that they are better positioned to teach our children and that spending more and more money on public education will yield increased results. Or in the case of Lakota and Mason, it was to keep those districts excellent by approving a tax levy on our properties. We were told, “Wouldn’t you spend just 20 bucks a month to keep your kids safe.”
However, what we are finding is that these people in public positions are just as human as anybody. And these teachers and administrators in these schools are no more qualified to raise our children than our average citizens. This whole issue comes back to the topic of wages and whether or not public education officials should be paid so much and communities should be required to supported collective bargaining agreements.
My day on this historic date started as one of my employees told me about his experience of dropping off his son at Lakota because of the busing cuts. Lakota had stopped using police to guide traffic at the entrance my employee was using as a drop off. Instead a school official named by his son as an assistant principal was directing traffic. That assistant audaciously knocked on my employee’s window and told him to use a different entrance. “You can’t pull in that lot. You have to go to the other side.”
My employee told him that they had a paid parking spot in that particular lot and he had a right to be where he was.
The assistant principal directing traffic told him again to use the other lot.
My employee asked what he was supposed to do about his paid lot, the assistant said; “you should have passed the levy.”
I have instance upon instance given to me about principles at Lakota taking active roles in creating an environment of hostility that if they occurred in my work place, I’d be obligated to address the issue before the behavior corrupted my workforce, but not in public education. They live by different rules than the rest of us. And that becomes evident when you get to know some of them.
That’s why the sex scandals in Mason are important. Even if the teacher is innocent of all 16 counts we know that there is inappropriate behavior that went on between the teacher and the assistant principal at a minimum. As a society do we put up with it, because the taxpayers are the boss in this situation? Or do we just look away? Do we just approve the next levy while the bloated, corrupt monster of public education lingers on under collective bargaining agreements negotiated under school board members trained by the OSBA to carry out to the letter policies created by the teachers unions which are bankrupting communities?
I remember specifically when Lakota threatened to go on strike in 2008. What was their sticking point? Wages. They tried the same general tactic floating the strike word around back in March of 2010. It wasn’t about kids. It was money. Watch that video here. They got what they wanted. It didn’t matter to them if the community could afford it or not.
For those that don’t want to discuss the issue of cost and whether we get the value for the money we spend, I put the blame squarely on your shoulders for the current state of things, public education being just one, but very costly issue. When I hear stories like this sex case, and again, I know there is a lot more to the story which will be revealed, I get angry. I can’t understand why stories like this wouldn’t make people angry. But I also tend to view the world from the perspective of an employer. People that just want to punch their time card and cruise through life tend to look the other way when trouble comes or when taxes are too high and harming the community.
The underlining issue is arrogance. These Mason school employees that are currently in trouble have so little appreciation and respect for their community and where the money comes from that supplies their income that they participate in these reckless sexual activities. That behavior speaks volumes of how public education views the public they serve and it comes out when they are pressed.
The ultimate audacity is revealed in the Mason spokesman Tracy Carson when she was on with Tracy Jones and Scott Sloan putting on a happy face for the Mason District on January 26th, the same day that Stacy Schuler was put on leave. No doubt Mrs. Carson will say that she didn’t know about the teachers coming legal trouble, but what kind of spokesman wouldn’t know about this story, because I was hearing about it, and it’s not even my job to know. I find it hard to believe Tracy didn’t know. The story was out well before implementing the leave and if the spokesman knew anything about what was happening in the school, she’d know about this teacher, because everyone else did.
Yet, listen to her words on WLW. Do you think she actually thought the Mason school system could contain this story? Depending on how you answer that question will determine your ability to think critically. Because the bet from these people is this, you can’t think critically even when the evidence is right in front of you.
A Mason assistant principal resigns while Ryan Widmer proceeds through his third murder trail and a Mason Teacher is under police investigation all within Warren County.
While Jennifer Crew testified against Ryan Widmer, Mason’s High School Assistant Principle resigned his position. Read the article below while you listen to the testimony of Jennifer Crew as reported by Bill Cunningham. Click here:
The rest of this story unified in its nature and occurrence in the same county proceeds in this article from the Cincinnati Enquirer, February 2, 2011
MASON – An assistant principal at Mason High School who was recently placed on paid administrative leave has submitted his resignation from the Warren County district.
George Coates, a nine-year veteran of Mason Schools who makes $88,000 a year, was placed on leave last week for undisclosed reasons, Mason officials said.
Though Coates’ leave began days after a Mason High School teacher – Stacey Shuler – was also placed on leave and is being investigated by Mason Police for inappropriate e-mails, Coates was not part of that investigation. Coates cited “personal reasons” with his last day of work being Feb. 28. He was unavailable for comment.
What do the stories of George Coates and the relationship that will be revealed with Stacy Schuler the Physical Education teacher also at the High School have in common with Ryan Widmer? Sex
SEX, SEX, and more Sex!
Listen to Doc Thompson discuss the endemic problem that is rampant all over the country involving teachers that seem enticed by young students. If there is any lesson to be learned, it’s that teachers that we’re paying extraordinary amounts of money cannot seem to overcome their all too human frailties. This issue in Mason is going to be very disappointing as the facts percolate to the surface. Lakota just recently had its own embarrassing scandal in the Ryan Fahrenkemp case involving the FBI and that teacher’s obsession with child pornography. These cases in Mason, and Lakota probably have more to do with why those two districts elected not to attempt another levy until these stories fade from people’s minds.
George Coates, high school assistant principal made $85,311 in 2010 with 20 days vacation, full retirement and Medicare paid. Stacy Schuler, Physical Ed teacher at High School made $58,520.00 in 2010 and worked 185 days. (These numbers from Buckeye Institute website.) Why would these individuals risk these well-paying jobs to indulge in “inappropriate” behavior?
Well, ask Ryan Widmer who wanted to have a three-way with his wife so badly that he ruined their young marriage. Widmer obviously wasn’t ready to be married and was very immature in his thinking, having an adulterous relationship even so early in his marriage. Sounds like they were having normal marriage issues, but his sexual perversions were too much for his wife to forgive, and he couldn’t handle the rejection of her leaving, so bad things happened when their tempers got away from them.
The reason this Widmer case is so compelling to so many people is that Ryan sitting on that stand reveals the fool in many people that actually let their primal energy, sexual, and predatory, get away from them. Many people fear in themselves the same uncontrolled passions, but most will never completely release to the extremes that Widmer did.
What all this has in common is this, people that take for granted the fortunes in their lives which come their way are all too tempted to abuse those fortunes. Sounds like Ryan Widmer took his wife for granted and thought he could “nudge” her into fulfilling some of his fantasies that were obviously sexual. And these teachers, they are well paid, protected by powerful unions, those nasty little voices that call out from the deep recesses of their minds have the luxury of time and finance to act on their fantasies unlike other people who work from pay check to pay check and don’t have the spare time or the means to embark on “sexual deviancy.” Ryan Fahrenkemp resigned from Lakota in August when it became obvious to him that he was going down in flames, and now George Coates is fleeing the scene of the crime hoping to avoid the fall-out from the case with Stacy Schuler when her investigation is revealed. These stories have in common varying degrees of human fault anchored in sexual exploration and abuse of their specific powers.
Then there is Jennifer Crew in this whole, seemingly unconnected soap opera of warped minds and freaks. Jennifer cringed in her chair during cross-examination and revealed much about her true motif in this trial. There is no doubt that Widmer called her, sent her texts as he did with several other women when he thought she was an attractive woman, and could use his celebrity status to fulfill the fantasies he couldn’t get from his deceased wife. But once he found out that Jennifer was not very attractive, he cut off the relationship. And Jennifer wanting revenge let out some of what Ryan had told her. But her mind took liberties with some of those truths because her own lustful fantasies of being held by a killer would go unfulfilled, and it’s likely that only somewhere deep inside her own mind does the truth reside. Even loved ones near her will want to see everything in her motives but the truth.
The mind is a strange arena. Be careful what you allow in it because the ramifications can lead to various degrees of misery and human decay. That’s what all these stories have in common, human decay of the mind and that they are happening in Warren County, Ohio.
Oh, and for those that think I am making a distant connection here, and that this texting issue at Mason is a new and isolated issue regarding administrative abuses at Mason? No. Check out this video from way back in 2007, which is a precursor to the story that is about to explode upon the Mason School District scene.
It doesn’t matter to me if it’s a teacher, or a murder, if the personalities are up to no good; they deserve to be called out for their bad behavior. The Widmer trial will cost taxpayers over $50K, and I already told you what those two Mason employees cost the residents of Mason. Their bad behavior ultimately cost our society, because they chose to engage in that bad behavior without any respect for the taxpayers that end up having to pick up the mess in their wakes. They deserve the anger that is unleashed upon them.
Just another reason for the application of School Choice was discussed by Doc Thompson as he addressed the issue of the woman from Akron, Ohio that got caught lying about her residence in order to send her children to an “excellent” school.
I have a nephew that is something of a genius; school comes very, very easy for him. When he was younger his parents moved a lot, but for a few years he went to Lakota, and at Lakota he thrived, naturally. He’s a man now, but some of his best memories were of Lakota.
One of his worst experiences were when his family moved to Detroit, and he had to go to a Detroit public school. And in that school, being “smart” wasn’t so cool, or tolerated. Needless to say, he had a very rough time, and violence came his way often.
If there had been a nationwide School Choice program, my nephew could have stayed with the teachers he liked while he moved all over the country with his parents, and he could have avoided the cultural difficulties involved in changing demographic regions. On the other hand, it would work the other way too.
For those of you reading this that aren’t so technically savvy to understand how modern teaching methods are possible to be able to replace the traditional teaching methods, let me bring some personal experience to the matter.
As I’ve talked about, my oldest Daughter is married now, but she has dated the same guy since she was 14 and she met him in England. About a year before she met this young man, she and I had a long discussion after coming off The Spaceship Earth exhibit at Epcot Center in Florida. That is a neat exhibit because they constantly change it to reflect the emerging technology, so it’s always leaning forward, technically.
One of the changes was a room that displayed with cleaver animatronics an English kid talking to a Japanese kid online. She said to me, “Dad, do you think that will be possible?” I wasn’t sure, but it seemed like science fiction even to me, who had been following the technology closely, this was in 2003. Internet carriers were still charging by the hour for many services, and international service seemed to be a technical and costly barrier that would never be overcome.
Yet, one year later a new PC game came out, which I knew was in the making, called Star Wars Galaxies. It is a MMO and allows anybody with a computer to play the game with thousands and even millions of other players in real time. I gave that game to both my daughters for their birthdays, which were only 5 days apart, along with computers to run them and both my kids jumped into the world of Star Wars for the next 4 years. Naturally they met friends and did activities online within the game. A lot of my family was concerned that so much online activity would lead to some sort of sexual promiscuity. But I watched my kids closely and the activity within the game kept their minds busy with things more exciting than sex.
My oldest daughter became good friends with a guy from their online group who lived in England, just outside of London. That friendship went on for a year, again online, and they eventually wanted to meet.
The kid came over to our house a few times a year for about 4 years and the relationship matured to my delight in a traditional way. Sex wasn’t an option, because they lived over 3500 miles apart. So they started the way couples should start, as friends. And that friendship endures to this day.
Now many people who criticized me about that relationship were concerned that my kids weren’t doing the “normal” things. That my daughter wasn’t “dating” in the traditional way, or running around at school events, and all the things that society believes are important. What I witnessed was that both my children had increased their processing abilities; they’d play that game while they did their homework, and maintained online friendships. Living with me, it was impossible for them to not get outside and do some physical exercise, so that wasn’t a problem, and they still maintained relationships at school, so they weren’t anti-social kids, quite the opposite.
But the computer allowed me to solve a growing problem that I had to unravel as a parent. It was becoming obvious when my kids turned 13 and 14 years old that they were going to look a lot like their mother, so there would be lots of boys wanting to clamor all over them. I did not want to deal with 17 and 18 year old boys desiring to come to my house and pick up my kids and take them someplace that I did not have control. So I hoped to put all that off for a while by keeping their minds interested in other things so their biological concerns could be put on the back-burner.
The result was, no trouble with boys trying to get my kids into their back-seats of cars, and my kids were able to develop healthy ideas of relationships by taking away the physical pressure of being in the company of a young boy. And because Star Wars is about big ideas and is good science fiction fun, my kids with other kids learned about the basic necessities of living, food, economics, science, and emerging technology.
As time went on, my kids had webcams and were able to speak real time to their friends and really didn’t care that they weren’t physically in the presence of other kids, because their reality had expanded beyond the conventions of society. And I am very proud of them and how they turned out. It was a good decision to buy my kids that game and set them in a direction that continues to this day, because such a thing takes away the barriers that hold kids back.
My daughters both had oversea relationships. One worked out, one didn’t, but what they learned was far more valuable than dozens of dates where the pressure for sex would have gotten in the way of really getting to know the boys they were dating. It also allowed my kids to tell their classmates in school that they had boyfriends from England, which seemed to put them on a different level with the other girls who suddenly didn’t have to worry that my girls would steal the boys they were interested in, and it dramatically improved the relationships they had with those little girls.
The reason I just told that whole story is because all it took was for me to think out of the box a bit and try something different in raising my girls. I used the technology to help me solve some tough cultural problems that would have been troublesome. And the same options are available for all aspects of education, and those options are available right now.
We should not live in a country where parents have to lie and spend time in jail because they want their kid to go to a nice school. And Schools should not be able to have monopolies that drive up costs. And kids should be learning in a way that will truly prepare them for the world they’re getting ready for. The traditional way of education is holding us back socially. It is obvious to me that the traditional institutions are not being kept intact because it’s what’s best for our children, they are being held together for the adults involved, jobs, political influence, property values and sports which can be a gateway for kids to get scholarships and save their parents money. If education was truly for the kids it would be adapting to the options that are in front of us, not clinging to an outdated infrastructure that is costly and inefficient.
If you want to see that world that kids want to be in, just visit your local Gamestop store. Technology is here to stay, and learning must occur much quicker than it has in the past. Kids today are just tuning out the adult world anyway because the world they’re really interested in is on Xbox, or Playstation and the friends that play online with them every day. The world we all grew up in is changing fast. Whether that change is good or bad will depend on how we adapt to that world.
For people who think I’m saying too much regarding parents that are addicted to their kid’s school programs, check this video from Charlotte North Carolina that was shot just Friday night, January 38, 2011
Now, before people tell me this is an isolated incident, I’ve seen this kind of thing in the stands of many sporting activities, maybe not an all out fight, but tempers flare and there is a fine line between this kind of behavior and people who keep their tempers in check, because the desire is still present. It doesn’t matter if it’s a Friday night football or a basketball game, or a Saturday afternoon soccer game, too many parents feeling their own lives have passed them by get caught living through their children, and emotions like what started that fight permeate in the hearts of many spectators, whether they act on those violent thoughts or if it comes out of them in some other, less direct fashion.
It’s kind of an ugly reality of the human mind that does not get discussed in PR campaigns for passing tax levies, where pay for play sports is often a contentious topic because it’s something that parents who have kids going to these schools want, so emotions sometimes get heated.
But latelyMasonand the Lakota School Districts are adapting their levy promotional strategies into a softer, less confrontational approach after the defeat of two consecutive levies at Lakota, and the first in a long time in Mason. Now that the advocates of further taxation on the district’s residents realize that there is a real danger that the strategies in the past won’t work in the future, they are attempting to “soften” their image.
Scott Sloan and Tracy Jones had on a Mason Representative to do just that a few days after a very contentious School Board Meeting where deep cuts were announced to the school budget. Have a listen:
That is a unique interview in its PR value. It displays a change in strategy and a recognition that the school system needs to actually work to please the community instead of behaving with a top down approach. However, until these administrators begin to discuss the trouble they’ve locked the communities into regarding aggressive wages and benefits that are bankrupting districts with pleasant talk and selling themselves as redeemers of our children’s future and therefore infinite amounts of money should be tossed carelessly in their direction, nothing of any substance will change.
Their voices may be softer, but the arrogance and cover-up is still there. These are people craving for things to always be as they have been. What they are not seeing is that spending over $10,000 per pupil in the State of Ohio is the breaking point, and citizens aren’t willing to pay that much for an “average” product.
Sure, I know that these districts are rated “excellent.” But what does that really mean? Who is giving the ratings? The State! And the State has an incentive to keep things rolling in the mind of the public. They need schools like Mason, and Lakota to be rated excellent for their own political reasons, so those designations don’t mean a whole lot.
When I say the education is mediocre, I’m basing that on other methods and output that I’ve been personally witness to. I don’t see the light on in the eyes of too many students that I meet, and that is sad to me. If that’s what the parents of those students want, that’s fine with me. But don’t ask the community to spend 10K on mediocrity.
I will make a bold prediction. Before 2011 runs out, the world that educators like this spokesman in Mason understand will be radically turned upside down and funding perceptions will be dismantled.
That will happen not to hurt any particular group. But it will happen because communities are going to put “children” ahead of selfishness, and communities are looking into the future of school funding, which we all have to sustain for long periods of time, not just quarter to quarter, or levy to levy.
As seen in the above video emotions can get out of control when sports are combined with education and all those elements are tacked onto the backs of already stressed out tax payers. Most of our society has enjoyed the entertainment value of that marriage, but often those two issues don’t advance the educational value of the learning process, and at some point the value of those combinations have to be analyzed. Sports aren’t the only program schools offer that stir the emotions of parents. Band, art, several other electives designed for college prep, and busing can all have the same effect when schools threaten to pull the funding from under those programs. And the design of cutting off funding is to bring out those raw, primitive emotions seen in that video which pit community member against community member with the goal of preserving the status quo. The intent is not violence, but rather emotion that finds its release in the voting booth.
Speaking softly with a public relations consciousness won’t hide the true intentions. It’s just the latest attempt to spin people around so those same people can’t see the truth. But the truth can see those mutterers of PR for what they truly are, salesman for a product that’s too expensive and out of touch.
There is no question that employees of the public sector have been promised great pay, benefits and security well into the future. But what has happened is they were lied to by their unions that recklessly negotiated contracts then prevented any sort of management of those contracts by the taxpayer. And this is why Senate Bill 5 is needed, to bring balance back into the equation of budget allocation. Because what these charts show is that left to their own devices public sector unions will take everything they can get, and have become what they accused big business of being, and that’s a greedy entity seduced by power, and not caring what the impact to the tax payer is, so long as they get what they want. 
