What you fail to realize is that you spent three years hurting kids – our future. If you didn’t have control in your classroom, you weren’t able to instruct, you hurt our kids. If you did have control and was able to teach, you left the kids high and dry because you wanted to move up the ladder faster.

What capacity would a teacher work in that would pay them more and give them more responsibility as they move up the ladder? Isn’t TEACHING enough? Let me tell you, three years of teaching experience would not qualify you to do anything more than teach for another three to get true experience to move forward in the career. Would you trust someone with only three years of classroom experience to make decisions for you?

What type of structure would you suggest that would allow teachers to move up? Who would define effectiveness and set the standards?

Wish them well when it time to move on? WHAT?

Being an educator requires you to be loyal. It is a calling for people who understand the importance of education, stability and cultural responsibility.

You jumping from job to job within 7 years shows you inability to remain stable. Your employment record would cause a red flag for any potential employer. BUT, what you did was USE the educational system for your own personal advantage when it’s core is based on giving back to society.

Generation X has both helped and hurt our society. A true discussion needs to be had about the importance of stability in the workforce – especially education.

I don’t think it’s hypocritical for you to play, though, really, because you don’t think your money is going to a good cause. The article cites surveys that show that folks in states with lottery funds earmarked for education actually think twice about voting for school-related bond issues and tax hikes because they sincerely believe the lottery is paying for the schools. I wouldn’t argue that lotteries shouldn’t exist, but they shouldn’t be government-backed! It’s like government-endorsed predatory lending or something. I don’t question the pay-day lenders’ right to run a business, but I would be really fucking angry if Sonny Perdue forwarded state-run pay-day lending in the next session.

Anyway, I don’t think that a $2 price tag would make a difference. It might become prohibitive for the poorest folks if you raised the price to, say $20. But there isn’t a price point that is going to make middle and upper class folks become stupid enough to plunk down their cash for 1-in-a-gajillion odds.

The thing that is really getting me about it too is the profit margin. I mean, a non-profit would get SHUT DOWN for spending that large a proportion of its revenue on overhead. The board would probably get sued. And many are even coming up with incredibly clever models for raising money through sales and such like Cafe 458 here in Atlanta or uh… Girl Scout cookies, anyone? I think that some of the charities that got *slammed* in recent years about the proportion of their donations that went to programming did way better than 30 percent. In a “good” charity, that number should near 90 percent!

An interesting thing about your playing, though, Chutney — my parents always did when I was a kid too. Wonder if it’s an Okie thing.

My favorite rationalitzation is that I’ll give x-percent to charity. Or set up a foundation.

What if the tickets were $2 instead of $1? Would raising the “price point” make a difference, making them less of an “oh well” throw-away?

Strip away the framework of anything meaty and relevant that could be the least bit offensive to anyone’s sensibilities, and what do you have left? You have the lowest common denominator. You have the foundation, but no building around it.