You'll recall that in our last episode, the school board stood firm and voted to retain the appliance fees as previously established.
Weeeelllllllll...it seems that there've been some changes. You didn't hear about them either, did ya? Nope...no discussion from the board table...YET we find that some changes have indeed been made.
SP-EYE sidenote: dontcha just HATE it when the board and the district make a big public fuss of something --usually moving to quickly cover what for many are quite ample derrieres, we might add. They staunchly defend the position du jour and THEN the shenanigans begin. Quietly, behind the comfort of closed doors, they DO take action. You see, while they like to put on a good game face in public, in reality, they don't particularly like to have their drawers a-droopin. Why? cuz inevitably they get made out to look like big sillies. And we can't have that...what with decorum and all.
You remember them buying like $300 of KitKats per year from employees' birthdays? Publicly supported. Privately: that policy has been given the boot. Those silly, inconsistent class supply lists? Gonzo. Pizza? Not being ordered.
Our only question is this: why do they make such an effort to make the citizens complaining about the silliness look silly, when it is the admin that ends up with egg on their faces? That's neither decorum, nor logical, people!
Ok...commercial over...back to the appliance fee-ass-co. But...you guessed it, they did all this stuff outside the public eye. They must enjoy eating crow in private. Of course they wouldn;t have to eat crow if they'd simply learn to say, "You know what? You're right...it's dumb and we're not gonna do it". That Pavlov guy never got the dogs to do that.
Many thanks to the individual who provided this update on the silly appliance fee-assco:
[Administration] have now determined that microwaves and coffee pots are okay...and refrigerators are only going to be $15 [not $30]. Great news, but proves the point that nobody did any kind of research on the true cost of running these appliances...they just grabbed numbers from who knows where. And I would be surprised if they have yet calculated the cost of truly running these appliances. So to get your microwave money refunded, here are all of the hoops you must jump through...(taken from an e-mail sent to all employees):
The following is the text of an e-mail sent out to all staff:
I jusfound out yesterday that we are refunding teachers who paid a microwave appliance fee for this year. This is the procedure that needs to be followed:
1) Teacher will contact School Secretary and ask for a refund
2) School Secretary will make a copy of the personal appliance fee form and give it to the teacher
3) School Secretary will direct the teacher to fill out an expense reimbursement form and attach the copy of the personal appliance fee form to it
4) Completed forms will be sent to Rhonda Page for an account code and payment
**In order to get a refund by April 26th all forms must be turned into Rhonda by Friday April 16th.
So what I would love to see is the actual calculations for the amount of manhours spent on originally collecting the fees, issuing stickers, the cost of the stickers and printing, and now the cost of all of this paperwork...both printing and paper costs, but also manhours spent filing and cutting checks. Not to mention the hours accumulated by all of the teachers having to take time to complete yet MORE paperwork to justify the over abundance of admin and secretaries in the district.
According to ( this website ) ONE compact dorm fridge should cost about $36 to run in a year. Assuming it is used 9.5 months of the year..that would be a pro-rated cost of $28.50. So the fact that the district is charging $15 to break even on energy cost means they did no calculations and this is nothing more than punishment and politics. If energy costs were truly a concern, they would:
a. charge for ALL appliances and not just refrigerators
b. they would have done their homework and calculated the true cost
c. they would also charge employees who work in the office for their extra energy. The offices are ALWAYs warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Ever wonder why?
SP-EYE: What an awesome insider look at more of the silliness. Thanks again for sharing.
Suggested motto for administration:
Learning by Doing: We just make it up as we go along.
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