Who Asked Us: Gov.'s Plan to Cut California School Days is Dangerous

Along with the rest of the country, California is facing yet another economic dive facing a deficit of some $15 billion this year. We will face major problems in the near future unless we can stop hemorrhaging money and get out of the debt we have put ourselves in.

Because of all the other big news of the last week especially the inauguration a surprisingly ignored headline has been the plan by our governator to cut five days from the public school year in order to save up to $1.1 billion a year, according to figures from the Children Now 2009 school report card. The plan will save money by removing five days of salary for every faculty member, and in the general infrastructure of schools power, water, etc.

Im frankly kind of shocked that this is not a story that everyone knows about. Part of the problem, I think, is that people are divided as to whether this is or is not a good course of action. Some would say that it is a good thing because it is a resourceful way to get a lot of money back into the budget for seemingly little sacrifice. But I think that this is not an acceptable way to loosen the budget. There are a lot of other places from which the state administration could take a small amount of funding, adding up to equally great, if not greater savings. Things we could cut could be, say, the salary of the high officials, or the budgets of police in extremely low crime areas, or perhaps even getting rid of tax breaks for the rich.

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