Happy December and Happy Hannukah to our Jewish friends. Today ushers in the first really cold weather. The big blast is supposed to last through the weekend. How is that Christmas shopping going? Are you all doing it on line or braving the elements and the masses?
A look at the stats show that some areas of Virginia have been
heavily impacted by recent immigration – like PWC and the two cities
(Harrisonburg, surprising to some, impacted the most), but
most of Virginia had only modest increases. Doubt, for example, if
it would have become a hot button issue in Manassas if immigrant growth had
been the state average of 7% over the past six years and not the +35%
the city experienced. Corey may soon find this key platform plank
isn’t a major state wide issue.
t
@Cargo, yes, what Pat said much better than I was able to spit out.
@Big Dog,
Pultry business driving immigration over in the valley? What is the other city?
Here is another question: if all the immigrants had been legal, would the situation really have been better? I don’t have an answer for that.
“Congress has just go to stop, yet neither side is willing to do what is necessary (because they are worried about their own ‘careers’).”
And thus the Tea Party was born. Even the today’s “victory” in keeping the current tax rates, isn’t. The GOP caved. Obama gets to review the rates very soon, and gets the GOP to support extending the unemployment funds without paying for them from the existing stimulus money. New funding has to be found now.
Hey Congress! Stop spending money!
M-H,
– Harrisonburg – home of the fighting “Poultry Pluckers”!
– The “two cities” are Manassas and Manassas Park.
OOOOOOooooops…forgot about those 2 cities.
Home of the fighting poultry pluckers. Too funny.
Cargo, some of us don’t find paying taxes to live in a civilized society. What if all taxes disappeared. What would you have? Do you really think that is realistic?
M-H,
Had they been legal? Doubt if that many poor unskilled, uneducated
(often illiterate in their own language) people would have been allowed to enter
or if they did, concentrate in just certain areas.
Impact studies are required for almost everything (Manassas Airport had to
spend thousands on one simply to expand a runway one hundred yards). Even
the most basic study would have forseen the tremendous negative impacts
in our area – public safety, healthcare and schools have all suffered not
to mention the devastation of modest middle class neighborhoods by overcrowding
and a chronic indifference to even basic community standards.
The immigrants are generally better off than they were in their home countries,
but we are not. Our lives have changed for the worse. The fiscal cost pushed
on local governments by Federal failure to control immigration is a never ending
nightmare.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/07/opinion/o7Shuck.html?hp
FYI
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/07/opinion/07Schuck.html?hp
FYI.
I don’t mind paying taxes either, for purposes that are within the public venue and agreed upon by the locality. I just object to the way that the taxes are seized. How about a flat tax, if an income tax MUST be used? Why not return to the original way we financed government? Tariffs. Or a national sales tax instead of an intrusive income tax.
Roads? Military? Those functions mentioned in the Constitution? No problem.
Stimulus? Bailouts? TARP? Misusing the Commerce clause? Regulatory agencies that
continue to overreach? Confiscatory taxes? Over spending. Not so much.
Twisting the knife stuck in our back dept:
– A child that enters the 9th grade at OHS and stays a month “belongs” to the
school and if they then move somewhere else, often back to their
native country, and OHS doesn’t receive official notification from another
school that the child is enrolled there, the individual stays on OHS’s books
until they, in theory, should have graduated — then they are charged to
OHS as a “drop-out”. The school is then chastised for having a “high
drop-out rate”. Que pasa?
(And, of course, it is illegal to ask anyone in our public schools if they are illegal).
And even if you asked them and they said illegal, what could you do about it?
I believe you can ask all you want but regardless, illegal immigrants are entitled to a k-12 education.
Really? Ok. In their country. If they are illegal, get their parents, and send them home.
You can say HOW you think things should be. That doesn’t make it so.
Cargo, how are you going to send 10 million people home? Reality check.
Yes, but no one addressed Big Dog’s key question – why should a high school be charged with that student dropping out if the student goes out of country? There needs to be SOME way to track that and rectify the problem. It is just plain unfair to schools with high percentage of immigrants – some of which are illegal – and some of which will pick up and move on a moment’s notice and never enroll in another school here in the US. But we are supposed to be happy with all the good things illegal immigrants are accomplishing in our schools….
Elizabeth Edwards has died. She was a remarkable lady.
As usual, Big Dog comes up with interesting things that make me go a-lookin’ to see….and GR has the point too of why should be charged.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I present a piece of our Virginia Code where not writing in American Standard English has caused the whole mess:
8VAC20-110-120. Pupil transfers.
A. For any pupil transferring from a Virginia public school, a certificate (on a form prescribed by the Superintendent of Public Instruction) shall be prepared certifying that such pupil has been removed from the roll of the school from which such pupil is transferring. The effective date of removal from the roll shall be the date such pupil withdraws from the school and shall be included on the certificate.
B. Any pupil transferring to a Virginia public school from a Virginia public school shall present such certificate to the school to which the pupil is seeking entry. This requirement does not apply to pupils transferring from a private school or a public school located outside of the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Somebody who wrote it understood the very last line of paragraph B to be the common sense – if you transfer out of the Commonwealth, you don’t need the paper. Alas, common sense does not apply when writing in legalese.
Elizabeth Edwards was indeed a great and remarkable lady.
To lose a child, battle cancer and deal with a sleazeball spouse
would have crushed many of us long ago. She is a inspiration.
BD, doesn’t the school continue to claim the student with respect to county/state/federal aid?
how are you going to send 10 million people home?
One) Stop them or make it more difficult to come here
Two) Make it unpleasant to be here
Three) Confine upon discovery
Four) Deport
It doesn’t have to happen all at once. Eisenhower was quite successful.
marinm, the answer to your question is NO .
It would be fraud to accept state and federal money for a “phantom student”.
My issue is there should be some way to remove an individual from our books
if they have left the area. I agree we should be proactive in preventing
dropouts, but sometimes, especially in transient groups, kids just leave
for reasons that have nothing to do with the school. And we are left with
a misleading high dropout rate.
but without the ability to track the population, how can one tell the difference between a drop-out and a move away?
BD, thanks for that tidbit. I didn’t know.
http://www.doublex.com/blog/xxfactor/brave-elizabeth
I agree.
http://www.doublex.com/blog/xxfactor/brave-elizabeth
There’s several definitions for “dropout” and one of them is if a student is in school the previous year but doesn’t return the next year they are a “dropout” if their parent does not officially withdraw them from school.
Also, when looking at graduation rates I discovered that a student is considered a graduate ONLY if they complete HS within four years of beginning ninth grade. Any students that are retained during HS and take five years to graduate, are NOT counted in the school’s graduation rate. And any student who leaves HS to enter a GED program is also NOT counted in the school’s graduation rate, even upon completion of their GED. A GED is considered “non completion” as far as NCLB and graduation rates are concerned.
For anyone who’s super interested in seeing how graduation rates are calculated in VA check out the following link. Go to page four and look at the NCES formula.
http://www.urban.org/uploadedpdf/410848_nclb_implementation.pdf
@Gainesville Resident
It doesn’t matter who or what the student is. If they enroll in a school, leave the school and don’t enroll else where, then the last school is the one who takes the hit. I am sure that schools in areas where there simply is a low graduation rate feel the same pinch.
The only thing I know to do about it is not pay attention to graduation rates. OHS is not the only school in the area with this problem.
@marinm
I do not believe so. Not if that student is not present.
There is an automatic drop time. I can’t remember what it is but I want to say 30 days.