You can throw stones at me all you want but I'm not here for a popularity contest. My main concern is the students and the teachers unions are only concerned about how much money they can extort from the tax payers. Voucher schools are the only means of bringing back real education principles. And we have found it difficult to combat the high cost of working within the union rules.

Very little money in the school budget, and why is that? Brace yourself because it is going to get worse until such time as public employees are brought in line with the private sector. PERS costs are killing our schools. Who in the private sector gets to work 185 days a year and get paid for 365. Who in the private sector gets fully paid retirement with the possibility of retiring long before most in the private sector. Who gets the best medical care, public employees or the private sector? Why should a public employee expect a private sector worker to pay more so that the public employee has better everything than the private sector employee has. We have some real greed going on here, and not solid thinking either.

@angelbabe - the "basics" are taught every day in our schools. The "extras" are provided by specialists often paid for by funds raised by parents. There is very little money in the school district's budget for the things I enjoyed while in school - music, PE, art, etc. That is why so many schools only teach the basics. Also, I wouldn't be throwing stones at others' grammar if I were you... just sayin'.

How about getting back to some of the basics? Like the ability to read and write properly? Our children are growing up in an environment that still requires these basic skills, but they aren’t getting them in the technology era, and certainly not through the schools, either! I see it daily in this format, with bad punctuation and grammatical errors, (and I’m NOT an expert, either). And this is from, I assume, College graduates! We are fast becoming a Nation of illiterates, and it is embarrassing.