GAY GEISER-SANDOVAL -- Educationally Speaking
I talked to someone who is against the school bond on June 6, which
would provide funds to upgrade our neighborhood school facilities. He
said when he was young, the area suffered major earthquakes and he went
to class wherever they could find a place. When my mom was in high
school, the Long Beach earthquake leveled her school that was made of
bricks. She had class in tents or out in the open where the school had
once stood.
Obviously, in the case of a disaster, we will all make do. If the
school bond doesn’t pass, the school district won’t close up shop on June
7. But let’s think about the long-term impact.
How would you like to work in a broken building? That is what you are
asking teachers to do. We know that many of our current teachers are
going to retire in the next five years.
Just imagine the disclosures that you would have to make as you try to
hire a new teacher:
1. “Don’t turn on the heater in your classroom because toxic fumes
might come out. We are working on getting a classroom set of blankets
issued before winter comes.”
2. “Keep one of your trash cans free to catch drips if the roof
leaks.”
3. “Keep an eye out for falling ceiling tiles and try to give a
warning shout to the student it is about to land on.”
4. “The walls in this school are growing a lot of mildew, so students
with asthma and allergies may have severe attacks. Get them outdoors as
soon as possible.”
5. “Don’t bring in a fan to cool down your room, even if the windows
don’t open. If you do, it blows a fuse for the whole school.”
6. “We know that some schools in the district are nicer than others,
but we want you to work in the one with the problems.”
I work in an office building with a permanent staff in charge of
building maintenance. The tenants expect a problem to be remedied in
hours, not years. When the air conditioning was turned off so that a
better model could be installed, the complaints went on all day.
Most of our schools have no air conditioning and some have broken
heaters. For some reason, we have been willing to subject our children
and our teachers to building conditions that we would never tolerate in
our own home or workplace. Why are we willing to let them be in a worse
place than we would want to be? If the bond passes, the schools will get
fixed so that they will be safe in an earthquake. All of the classrooms,
wherever they are located, will be the same.
There are about 90,000 registered voters in the district, but over
half of them won’t vote in the election, because there are no national or
state issues involved. Of those that vote, two out of every three have to
vote yes in order for school buildings to improve. Some people will vote
no, even though their property value will increase if we have schools in
good repair with quality teachers who want to work in them.
It is predicted that 25,000 of us have to vote yes on June 6 in order
for the bond to pass. Will you be one of them or are you willing to have
our local students go to school in tents?
* GAY GEISER-SANDOVAL is a Costa Mesa resident. Her column runs
Tuesdays. She can be reached by e-mail at GGSesq@aol.com.
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