Tuesday, August 18, 2009
City School Funding Moves Forward
Posted by Mary Cashiola on Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 1:14 PM
The City Council's education committee approved the Memphis City Schools' $879 million budget this afternoon.
The city's contribution to that figure is $78 million.
Members of the city school board also told the committee they were for the concept of single-source funding, but need more details before they can back a specific plan.
Committee chair Janis Fullilove also recounted her recent experience at Oakhaven Middle/High School, which she said reminded her of "the riots in the '60s."
"There were about 200 children fighting in the street," she said. "I saw one young man put his hand down his pants as if he had a weapon. I did not see a weapon, but he was threatening other folks in the crowd.
"It was horrid. It was reprehensible. It was frightening. Neighbors were standing on their porches. Parents couldn't get out of their cars to pick their children up from school. They couldn't find their children.
"I understand this is the third such incident that has happened since school started over there at Oakhaven."
Comments (5)
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Why can't an all black school be the best school in Memphis??? Looks like busing and integration did not work. Again, the government is WRONG, kinda like health care reform!! Do you know what is the longest and most expensive war we have ever fought???...........The war on poverty!!
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First of all why does it have to be black schools why couldn't it be schools in general? All kids need an education not just blacks! Also blacks tend to not care (in some neighborhoods) about education they care more about 'stuff' and not if thier child is learning anything in the school or how they are behaving. They could be great if we had the involvement and the funding that goes along with other schools.
Seriously, how do you start with a story about funding and commit a complete non-sequiter and transition to some random anecdote about an incident at Oak Haven? I'm willing to be wrong here but this was a fairly transparent and craven attempt to spice the story up with violence. Give me a break.
Pub, it was a quick round-up of what happened at the council meeting. They passed the funding, Fullilove talked about Oakhaven. Simple as that.
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