US schools lay off hundreds of thousands • Hacker News Board

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#191

Post by toomuchtodo » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 12:08 PM UTC

MattGaiser wrote: post #118

toomuchtodo wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funding education through employer taxes based on the education requirements they desire was an idea that I heard that might have some merit. You want someone with a bachelors? You pay X amount per year for that employee. A masters? Even more. You expose the employer to the cost of their desire, and thereby suss out if it is a want or a genuine need. Very similar to carbon taxes. If the tax is more expensive than on…

Would that alter employer behavior or just job descriptions? They could just set their employer talent management system to filter out applicants without those degrees.

If you employ them, and they have the credential, you still pay the tax regardless of job req contents.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#192

Post by blaser-waffle » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 1:05 PM UTC

MattGaiser wrote: post #33

avsteele wrote: post #22

Title: about teachers. Anecdotes: about teachers. Buried in the article: Susanna Loeb, a professor of education at Brown University, said she believes most of the 469,000 laid off in April were non-teacher personnel, as districts tend to fire teachers last If schools aren't open, a lot of janitorial, cafeteria worker, etc... are probably being laid off.

At least in my province (in Canada), "non-teacher personnel" included all the academic support staff for learning disabled kids and academic assistants.

While their numbers are non-trivial, students with disabilities (of whatever stripe) are a very small portion of the student body.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#193

Post by JeremyNT » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 2:02 PM UTC

RhysU wrote: post #54

malwarebytess wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Could someone not make the same argument about the national defense? The US's definition of National Defense is actually playing world police for corporate profit. With that in mind it shows that they are superficially similar only.

National Defense is a luxury good until it isn't. Moreover, it is not something that can be purchased on short notice.

> National Defense is a luxury good until it isn't. Moreover, it is not something that can be purchased on short notice.

This is a semantic game. Sure "national defense" is important, but the US military is not primarily a tool of national defense, it's a tool of global empire building and management.

Most of what the US could ever plausibly need for actual defense is sitting in nuclear missile silos and submarines.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#194

Post by Balgair » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 2:38 PM UTC

blaser-waffle wrote: post #192

MattGaiser wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in my province (in Canada), "non-teacher personnel" included all the academic support staff for learning disabled kids and academic assistants.

While their numbers are non-trivial, students with disabilities (of whatever stripe) are a very small portion of the student body.

Like all things, it depends. My SO has had classrooms with >50% of the kids on IEPs. My SO has also had classrooms with <10% of the kids on IEP. The school generally has about 25% of the kids on IEPs.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#195

Post by viburnum » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 3:33 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #132

viburnum wrote: post #2

You know who’s not laying off anyone? The military. Local funding of schools is ridiculous. Education benefits the whole nation. Educational investments shouldn’t be dictated by transient economic conditions.

The military is funded nationally for obvious reasons. But education is necessarily local; there are few things more personal to a community than the education of its children. We don’t need bureaucrats in DC deciding how kids in South Dakota are educated.

Financing and control are separate things. Social Security is national but recipients spend it however they want. And there’s already federal mandates in education without funding, some good, some bad.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#196

Post by DuskStar » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 3:35 PM UTC

viburnum wrote: post #2

You know who’s not laying off anyone? The military. Local funding of schools is ridiculous. Education benefits the whole nation. Educational investments shouldn’t be dictated by transient economic conditions.

And how would you propose to set budgets, or teacher salaries? Should the teacher in rural Montana be paid the same as the one in downtown NYC?

For that matter, "funding" is also "control" - do you think many states or cities are going to be eager to hand over their curriculae to the federal government?

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#197

Post by DuskStar » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 3:39 PM UTC

viburnum wrote: post #195

rayiner wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The military is funded nationally for obvious reasons. But education is necessarily local; there are few things more personal to a community than the education of its children. We don’t need bureaucrats in DC deciding how kids in South Dakota are educated.

Financing and control are separate things. Social Security is national but recipients spend it however they want. And there’s already federal mandates in education without funding, some good, some bad.

> Financing and control are separate things.

I'm not so sure this is true - or at least it's not true in practice. Look at "Obamacare" - the lever it used to control state medical regulations was federal medical funding, and that's not an uncommon situation. Federal highway funds are also a pretty well-known case of funding providing control.

IMO even if there was a "fund all the schools with no control" bill passed and signed this year, in ten years (when everyone is dependant on federal school funding) that "no control" provision would be looking pretty doomed.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#198

Post by DuskStar » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 3:41 PM UTC

Balgair wrote: post #194

blaser-waffle wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While their numbers are non-trivial, students with disabilities (of whatever stripe) are a very small portion of the student body.

Like all things, it depends. My SO has had classrooms with >50% of the kids on IEPs. My SO has also had classrooms with <10% of the kids on IEP. The school generally has about 25% of the kids on IEPs.

> The school generally has about 25% of the kids on IEPs.

That really just sounds like the definition of IEP has been stretched beyond all reason.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#199

Post by viburnum » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 4:15 PM UTC

DuskStar wrote: post #196

viburnum wrote: post #2

You know who’s not laying off anyone? The military. Local funding of schools is ridiculous. Education benefits the whole nation. Educational investments shouldn’t be dictated by transient economic conditions.

And how would you propose to set budgets, or teacher salaries? Should the teacher in rural Montana be paid the same as the one in downtown NYC? For that matter, "funding" is also "control" - do you think many states or cities are going to be eager to hand over their curriculae to the federal government?

Federal government does cost of living adjustments all the time, it’s not rocket science. Local control and national funding is a completely possible policy choice. There are tons of examples.

Re: US schools lay off hundreds of thousands

#200

Post by yalogin » Fri, Jun 05, 2020, 4:24 PM UTC

blisterpeanuts wrote: post #86

yalogin wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but the US pays for national defense only to fund corporations continuously with unneeded weapon manufacturing so that the respective politicians in those districts can keep winning. There is really no national defense reasons there.

What's an example of an unneeded weapons system?

I thought this was common knowledge to everyone and not at all controversial :) There are multiple reports over the years that the military is not asking for weapons but they are being assigned 100s of billions worth. If you are interested please dig it out.