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Larry T. Spider

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Larry T. Spider last won the day on December 26 2019

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  1. Closing 10 schools should help for now but if enrollment declines continue they are going to have to look at more. Any school that has under 400 students is going to have a higher than average per student cost and should be up for consideration. Obviously a million other factors such as location, building condition, school ratings, parent support, special programs housed at the school, etc.
  2. Was down to 400 last time I checked. My extended family all lived there and it’s where my grandmother was raised. Don’t think I have any living relatives left there. And to make this on topic. There’s plenty of cheap housing in the US. It’s just in the south and Midwest. Desirable places like southern Cali are always going to be expensive. People like me would move there as soon as it got cheaper and drive the prices right back up.
  3. No surprise, but it passed.
  4. Not that anybody cares now that certain schools have been saved but they are voting on the plan to close 10 schools tonight.
  5. It seems to be the sound track of near death experiences in an uber for me. No racist.
  6. In a reggaeton uber right now. Guy is an unstable maniac. Would’ve paid double for a Waymo.
  7. That’s a pretty typical sentiment because they don’t know what the offer truly is yet. Once an administration has been hired and the school starts to develop and image, that begins to change. Note that this is NOT applicable to charters taking over well run magnet programs. That’s just TEA not wanting to deal with one offs.
  8. I’ll add that doing this gives the school a two year break from accountability ratings and additional funding to support the turnaround. Other than pride, it should be a no-brainer for Austin ISD to “fix” the campuses that get an F rating every year.
  9. Not really interested in the magnet type schools but would consider having the company I work for take over the F rated schools. Not a huge believer in setting up charters to compete with public schools, but the district would be better served turning over certain campuses. They don’t know how to turn them around.
  10. The average Austinite has no idea if they are even paying for Project Connect, let alone what they will get out of it. They know for sure they are being robbed on the school taxes due to the state. Tough environment to ask for more tax money.
  11. I live in Round Rock so I haven’t been following this as closely as most of you. Project Connect would be my biggest hurdle in voting for this though. I was a vocal supporter and ride the train down from the Lakeline station pretty often. But since the vote passed, all we have seen is ballooning costs, cutting the additional lines down to 1 new one, and it not being online until 2033. Maybe somebody knows the answer, but I keep asking where the tax money being collected is going. Is it in an al gore lock box, being blown on consultants, being mixed with the general budget? Nobody seems to know. I would have serious hesitation voting for more taxes based on the above. Huge mass transit supporter but I feel burned.
  12. Back of the napkin math says 8 mil gets you 26,000 a month at a 4% draw rate. Thats also assuming no other income. Obviously have to factor in taxes, but what am I missing? You would probably die with 15+ million.
  13. Almost hit my goals for the year: Max IRAs for me and the wife. Done. Max my 401k. Will get there with continued contributions. Start a brokerage account and get it to at least 25k. I’m a few thousand short but will get there easily. Save for next rental property. Haven’t done as much on this one but have been prioritizing the accounts above since I feel behind on those. Working in public education for 15 years didn’t allow for much saving outside of TRS and IRAs.
  14. This is more of a broad conversation about measurables in education, but TEA is good at coming in and fixing those. So, they are good at fixing compliance issues, failing schools, the budget, and addressing some student discipline issues. They are bad at just about everything else and are willing to take a sledgehammer approach to achieve the metrics they are looking for. I think this approach is such a culture clash with Austin ISD campus level staff and parents, that it will go poorly. It is in no way collaborative. Don’t like libraries being turned into detention centers? Fuck right off. So, at the end of the day, you may get a district that runs efficiently and has no failing schools but still be unhappy with it because they cut your fine arts programs, pushed out your favorite campus principal, and re-zoned you to another school without a second thought.
  15. People that didn’t work for the district at the time will never be able to understand the damage that Stephanie Elizalde did to AISD in her short time here. She knew it was a stepping stone job and she was only really being judged by a couple of metrics. She fixed those, ignored the rest of the problems, created a laundry list of others, then bolted to Dallas. It was her toxic culture that led to TEA taking over the special education department. She is also the reason we have Segura, who is not prepared for the challenges he’s facing. Nice guy but this was a job very an experienced, savvy superintendent. But to keep staff on board after the Elizalde shit show, they had to make an internal hire of somebody well liked.
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