Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
Re: Education secrets, editorial, July 15.
The Corporate Tax Credit Scholarship Program is one of Florida's many education success stories. The St. Petersburg Times' attempts to characterize it otherwise won't change the program's positive impact on Florida families who want more choice for their children.
Some 16,000 low-income children received scholarships last year, and the program was expanded to serve 10,000 more this year. These students now have access to educational opportunities that were previously beyond their reach.
As part of this commitment to students, the Department of Education monitors the Corporate Tax Credit Scholarship Program, meeting all legal oversight requirements. Every scholarship funding organization provides an annual financial and compliance audit, approved by an independent accountant, to the state's auditor general. These audits ensure that SFOs correctly distribute corporate tax scholarships and that the nonpublic schools the children are attending are financially sound.
Contrary to your assertion, DOE maintains identification records for each private school and works closely with the SFOs to review and approve school eligibility for the program. To support this effort, the DOE is introducing a pilot program to improve data collection and information sharing related to schools and students, which will allow for potential automation of the current data collection system.
Without awaiting the results of a pending investigation, the Times' editorial built its case against the scholarship program based in part on allegations that an employee violated Florida's public records laws. In a report issued this week, the inspector general dismissed the claim as baseless. Fortunately for students in the program, we're more thorough when assessing schools for our voucher dollars.
Re: Education secrets.
Your July 15 editorial questions the accountability of the highly successful Corporate Income Tax Scholarship Program, which offers educational opportunities to low-income Florida families.
The scholarship funding organizations representing the west, central and north Florida areas and serving more than half the students in the scholarship program have formed an association, the FLA-SFO, which sets standards and regulations relating to accountability for the scholarship program.
While no official determination has been made regarding the audits, FLA-SFO members have elected to adhere to the State Single Audit Act, the most rigorous full compliance audit available. This audit will ensure that all rules, regulations and compliance measures associated with the program are being followed by the scholarship organizations. This includes the provision of the law that no funds can be used for administrative or fundraising purposes.
The Single Audit Act allows nine months for completion of audits, a time frame similar to the one the public school districts follow. FLA-SFO members will submit their audits well within this time frame.
The FLA-SFO members have immediately and fully complied with all school and student information requests from the DOE. This has included providing a list of participating schools, the number of students in each county by grade and developing a process to transmit our entire student list to DOE.
Finally, the members of FLA-SFO have taken additional steps to safeguard the integrity of the program and promote the best practices and highest ethical and operational standards, including requiring proof of income from all of their participants. By contrast, less than 5 percent of public schoolchildren participating in the Federal Free or Reduced Lunch Program are required to submit income documentation.
While our most vocal opponents may try to confuse the facts and employ scare tactics, the truth is that the scholarship program has been proven as an innovative and highly successful way to help Florida's neediest children and its taxpayers, while safeguarding the proper use of scholarship funds.
Re: They don't want to pay for education, letter, July 14.
After reading this letter by a middle school teacher, I felt compelled to respond. Yes, it is sad that many of Florida's children are struggling in school. It is a problem that we can't ignore. The biggest problem, however, is teachers like the one who wrote in. This teacher admits proudly that she has humiliated and shamed her students by pointing out that a student having the answer to her pop question is "obviously not a product of Florida's school system." She then blames our governor, accusing him of promoting ignorance.
Unfortunately there are too many teachers like this one who never seem to be able to look in the mirror to find the problem. Who knows how many of these students simply give up because their teachers are telling them what failures they are. If people decide that their children's lives are too precious to move here, it's not because of our governor. I believe it's time for teachers like this one to look in the mirror.
Re: Show us a better way, letter, July 14.
The letter writer wrote regarding the article, All FCAT A's are not created equally (July 6). He is of the opinion that teachers are not teaching, since students are not learning. He challenges teachers to come up with an answer to providing a better way to "objectively" measure "accountability."
The FCAT is meant to be used to assess the level at which a child is "achieving" at this moment in time. It is meant to give a teacher an idea of where to start teaching this child (at what approximate level). The FCAT is being used to "punish" children who do not learn at the same pace as the politicians have deemed as "normal" or "acceptable."
When someone comes up with "one answer" to solve poverty, learning disabilities, the moral decay of our society, teenage pregnancy, drug addiction, absentee fathers, mental illness, lack of funding from the government, etc., then it will be more probable that someone will come up with "one answer" to "objectively" measure teacher "accountability."
There are no easy answers to what ails our society. And our children are a reflection of all of it. Perhaps the politicians need to look closer, and with compassion, and start helping more - instead of less.
Re: Court strikes down abortion notification,
"Forcing a girl to tell her parents before she gets an abortion violates her privacy rights under Florida's Constitution, the state Supreme Court ruled."
This is crazy! A 12, 14 or 16-year-old child doesn't understand the ramifications that an abortion will have on her physically or emotionally. That is why parents make decisions for their children when they are exactly that, children. This has to be one of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard in my life. What are we telling our kids? You can't vote until you are 18, but sure, have an abortion without anyone knowing about it. Madness, I tell you!
Who in their right mind would let a child get any operation without parental consent? No one! Every procedure my children receive, including getting a tooth pulled, has to be approved by me or my husband.
Privacy rights? That's a joke. When you live in your parents' home, you are their business. About the only privacy I had growing up was a journal. And if my parents felt that I was in trouble, they had every right to read it.
Something is really wrong with this picture. Part of the problem is that we give our children condoms and basically permission to have sex. Obviously with almost 100,000 teenagers getting abortions in 1999 that idea isn't working.
Re: Court strikes down abortion notification.
The Florida Supreme Court has added another giant step to the already established universal trend to demoralize, dehumanize and, most important, desensitize the most basic, all-important cornerstone of a successful society: the family unit.
The "sadness" of abortion continues to surface and will continue to do so, thereby reaffirming the consuming need for it to be noticed and dealt with accordingly, while those who wish to forget must yet again be faced with this ongoing debate.
The pathway out of this dilemma lies in the singular responsibility of every individual to choose basic, God-given principles and use them diligently. Till then, court decisions will remain a moot point.
Re: Look close before he dies, mom says, July 11.
I offer my deepest sympathy to the family of Ken Michaud. I would also like to applaud his parents for trying to make his friends see what horrors can happen when you abuse drugs. Seeing beyond their worry and grief was brave and noble. More parents should be like them. It's too bad the system let them down when trying to get help for their son.
Re: Look close before he dies, mom says.
My heart goes out to the family of Ken Michaud, the young man who drowned after "huffing" freon from the family air-conditioning unit.
I, too, have a friendly outgoing teenager who was able to charm her way out of it every time we sought intervention. Her school counselor told me she was "beyond anything they could do to help." I picked her up from school one day and she was obviously high, so I took her to the police station where she admitted drug use. The officer who helped us told me there was nothing he could do. I made repeated calls and contacted every agency recommended. The counselors at PAR recommended anger management classes. Her counselor put her on antidepressants.
Finally, she was hospitalized for four days, saw a psychiatrist three times (who felt he'd "connected" with her) and our insurance was billed $15,000. And still nothing changed.
Our daughter recently celebrated one year in sobriety after agreeing to attend a 12-step program, for which our family is very grateful. However, we understand the frustration of begging for help everywhere you can think to go. We know what it means to feel absolutely terrified for your child and be offered a Band-Aid to try and fix it.
It's horrifying to realize that children have to die and no matter how often and how loudly you ask for help, there's really very little help out there to be offered.
We invite readers to write to us. Letters for publication should be addressed to Letters to the Editor, P.O. Box 1121, St. Petersburg, FL 33731.
They can be sent by fax to 727 893-8675 or by e-mail to letters@sptimes.com (no attachments, please).
They should be brief and must include the writer's name, address and phone number. Please include a handwritten signature when possible.
Letters may be edited for clarity, taste and length. We regret that not all letters can be published.