School!

This week we went back to school to meet our new students. Tuesday was the first day of a new semester and so far I like my classes, I have more girls (Last semester I had maybe 15 in three classes), I have fewer students on their way to juvenile detention, and even though some of my students are talkative, they seem willing to work hard. So really I don't have any issues with my classes, but there's certainly of other people with drama to keep things interesting - several teachers have nearly 30 students in their classes, one English teacher may not have a job next year because there's no money, and our school district is facing a nearly $5 million shortfall. The irritating thing is that we have ways to cut our budget that the school board isn't even thinking about such as moving the school board office to a vacant elementary school instead of renting space and our illustrious governor thinks it's a good idea to cut funding for schools. Don't get me wrong, I voted for the man, but I didn't think it would go down like this. If he wants to create a better Virginia, cutting education isn't a good thing. And also, why are we opening rest areas when we're facing a $4 billion shortfall? Why can't people just be normal and stop at a McDonalds to pee like the rest of us?

On a lighter note, I'm glad Evan Lysecek (sp?) won the gold in mens figure skating (Evan is an American). That Russian guy kind of reminded me of an evil Russian mobster in a Die Hard movie. And the Russian hasn't been very gracious since he won a silver. Oh no, not a silver! The horror!