Stand Up For Schools

• In the last two years, $17 billion was cut from schools and colleges.

• Entire art, music and PE programs were eliminated.


• More than 16,000 educators were laid off.


• And large California corporations enjoyed tax breaks.

In Exeter, CA the day started off with teachers, Elementary School Board Members, classified staff, and district office personnel all coming together to show their support and stand up for our schools. The next step is to put the pressure of Sacramento that they can not keep making the largest cuts in the state budget to education. In the last several years the largest percentage of the state budget cuts have come to education.

California is now ranked 46th in education spending, $2,400 below the national average. K-12 schools have suffered 60% of the state budget cuts - hurting an entire generation of children. Summer school has been canceled in districts across the state.

Education accounts for the largest part of the state budget so it is the easiest and quickest thing for the legislature to cut when time get tough. Well they have cut and cut and cut the last few years and it is time to find some place else to make those cuts.

It is also time to put someone up there in Sacramento at the top advising what is needed most for education someone that knows education best. Instead of it being some suite it needs to be a seasoned teacher up there that understands education and kids. Maybe then you will have that education reform everyone is always talking but we never get.

Total Money Makeover

"Total Money Make Over" by Dave Ramsey

I started working on a plan several years ago to get myself out of debt. Things have been going pretty well over the last 3 years and I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Recently a friend told me about Dave Ramsey and his book "The Total Money Make Over". This past Christmas I was give a gift card to Borders and decided to purchase Dave's book with my gift card. I have read a little more than half of the book and I wish someone had told me about this book 3 years ago when I first started working on getting out of debt because there is no doubt in my mind if I had started on Dave plan 3 years ago I would be out of debt at this point. However I have made some changes in my debt management plan and I'm already seeing some progress in my get out of debt plan.

The following are a few notes I have take from the book as I have gone along so far;

• Walgreens, Cisco, Microsoft and Harley-Davidson are run debt-free
• Sears now makes more money on credit than on teh sale of merchandise
• Debt is the symptom of over spending and undersaving
• Studies show that the zip codes that spend 4x's what anyone else does on lottery tickets are those in lower - income parts of town.
• "A budget is people telling their money where to go instead of wondering where it went" John Maxwell
• Cash enables you to say no to yourself
• Ignorance is not lack of intelligence; it is lack of know how
• Continuing to do the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity
• "You can get anywhere if you simply go one step at a time"