Real solutions to save money

An Alternative Plan
So here are some concrete ways to save loads of money, and still have an awesome educational system in Idaho.

1. No more ISAT the way it currently exists. When I was completing my Master’s degree back in 2007 I called a person at the State Department of Education in Boise. She told me Private test vendors sell these mandated standardized tests to schools across the nation. The state of Idaho, buys an internet based version for testing from Computerized Assessments and Learning, LLC, a company located in Lawrence, Kansas. According to Heather Nyby at the Idaho State Department of Education, the cost of the test alone is $10,000,000.00. The contract with this test vendor is ten million dollars over a four year period. Currently, the Idaho State Board of Education has chosen a new vendor for the Idaho Standards Achievement Tests. Data Recognition Corporation, a national testing company based in Maple Grove, Minn., I will have to do some digging, but if Idaho paid 10 million in 2007, you know the price is higher in 2011.
Teachers should create their own end of course assessments that are aligned with state content standards. These teacher created tests can even be made at the state level. All construction and delivery of any standardized test is taken care in "in house" in our own state.
2. If you are going to cut the education budget, the State Dept. of Ed. should not ask teachers and administrators to take extra classes. How many millions are spent on the Math Initiative - that every educator is mandated to pass? How about the Literacy course? And best of all, all the millions spent on having a class in technology, which Idaho just decided to say it’s not needed any longer. I say we have an absolute freeze in professional development, no one, not one single teacher or administrator is allowed to travel outside of Idaho to attend conferences and trainings.
The best growth I ever encountered was watching fellow colleagues teach, right in my own school.
3. Four day work week. We need longer days, Monday through Thursday, 8:00 – 3:30, to fit in the entire curriculum we need to teach. With the added time Monday through Thursday the contact time with students is nearly the same. Yet, we save all the costs of busing, lunch, utilities, custodians for one day every week.