We just got back from a very energizing School Board<\/a> meeting where a number of people did an excellent job of making it clear that the kind of cuts being consider would really<\/em> hurt, and making a strong case for alternatives (like increasing our levy<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Of the many people who spoke eloquently for this vital cause, stand-outs for me were Greg Thorson, Arne Kildegaard, and Dave Erickson for the MARQS group<\/a>, and Dave Johnson and Dot Vick on behalf of the teachers. Greg, Arne, and Dave E. made it clear that the community realized how serious and difficult the problem was, but that there were options other than deep cuts (e.g., increasing the levy), and that there was significant support for exploring such alternatives.<\/p>\n

Dave J. and Dot did a great job (in very different ways) of pointing out what would be lost on the arts side if the proposed cuts went through. Dot used the names of the various kids of the School Board members that had been, were, or might be involved in the music program as a great way of really bringing the message home to the Board and got a great round of applause.<\/p>\n

There were also two very well spoken students (don’t remember their names, I’m afraid) and Athena Kildegaard on the importance of the arts for students, and a group of bus drivers who expressed significant concerns regarding the possible privatization of the school bus system.<\/p>\n

A number of other people who spoke on behalf of not gutting important programs, and dozens of people (like us) who were there to clap and cheer at appropriate moments but didn’t actually speak. I was really impressed by the turn out, and I think the applause at various moments really helped emphasize the broad support for the message.<\/p>\n

Pumped by all that, WeatherGirl<\/a> and I worked up a MARQS<\/a> logo that I dreamt up (literally – maybe more on that later). We’re thinking t-shirts, bumper stickers, etc., maybe from CafePress<\/a>. I also should get it plugged in to the MARQS<\/a> web site, but CSS continues to drive me crazy. I really need to just get a book and learn the rules instead of guessing and flailing :-(.<\/p>\n

Heading to my wish list, Perfect tracks<\/cite><\/a> on Blue Note<\/a>. It’s featured on the cover of the latest Electric Fetus<\/a> catalogue, and it sounds very cool.<\/p>\n

Currently listening to<\/strong>: The brilliant “Mercury blues” from David Lindley’s El-rayo X<\/cite>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We just got back from a very energizing School Board meeting where a number of people did an excellent job of making it clear that the kind of cuts being consider would really hurt, and making a strong case for alternatives (like increasing our levy). Of the many people who spoke eloquently for this vital … Continue reading “School levy in Morris: Rock, rock on!”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,1,2,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-general","category-music","category-politics"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p90sy-1C","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":102,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2005\/04\/02\/school-levy-letter-to-the-editor\/","url_meta":{"origin":100,"position":0},"title":"Morris needs to re-pass the school levy: A letter to the editor","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"2 Apr 05","format":false,"excerpt":"The following is a letter to the editor that I intend to send to our local paper regarding the current school funding issues (also here). Comments and questions always welcome. (I should mention that as an anti-spamming measure, all comments have to be approved before they appear on the page,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":254,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2005\/10\/30\/why-umm-students-need-to-vote-on-the-levy\/","url_meta":{"origin":100,"position":1},"title":"Why UMM students need to vote on the levy","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"30 Oct 05","format":false,"excerpt":"Below is a letter to the editor for the University Register, UMM's student newspaper... Tuesday, the 8th of November, the residents of the Morris Area School District will turn out to vote on a proposed school levy. While most UMM students realize that they can vote in this election, I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":241,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2005\/10\/01\/school-levy-campaign-had-a-nice-kick-off-meeting\/","url_meta":{"origin":100,"position":2},"title":"School levy campaign up and running","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"1 Oct 05","format":false,"excerpt":"Thursday night saw the \"formal\" kick-off meeting for the campaign to pass November's school levy. There had obviously been many meetings before that, initially to just get this thing on the ballot in the first place, and more recently just to track what the School Board was up to and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":208,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2005\/08\/01\/schools-are-more-important-than-pools\/","url_meta":{"origin":100,"position":3},"title":"Schools are more important than pools","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"1 Aug 05","format":false,"excerpt":"Below is a letter to the editor of the Morris Sun-Tribune that appeared in the 27 July 2005 edition (requires registration :-( ) under the title (of their choosing) of \"Pool or no pool, support levy\". This was written by Sub-Evil Boy and I while we were in Wisconsin, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":206,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2005\/07\/22\/the-people-shall-speak\/","url_meta":{"origin":100,"position":4},"title":"Huzzah! The people shall speak!","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"22 Jul 05","format":false,"excerpt":"Regular readers will remember from earlier posts such as this and that that a group of concerned citizens (MARQS) has been working to encourage the Morris School Board to address their budget issues head on by proposing a long overdue school levy. Tonight saw a major step in the right\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education"","block_context":{"text":"Education","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/education\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Sub-Evil Boy","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/photos18.flickr.com\/23167264_0e5d0f3e7f_m.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":232,"url":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/2005\/09\/11\/we-had-lunch-with-loudon-wainwright\/","url_meta":{"origin":100,"position":5},"title":"We had lunch with Loudon Wainwright","author":"Nic McPhee","date":"11 Sep 05","format":false,"excerpt":"Well, sort of... :-) The day started with WeatherGirl and I having a very productive strategy meeting with Arne and Athena to work on the design of a MARQS pamphlet in support of November's school levy vote. While we were deep in planning, who should come into Common Cup but\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Art"","block_context":{"text":"Art","link":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/archives\/category\/art\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Across the rim","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/static.flickr.com\/23\/42191762_744db2118b_m.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/UnhinderedByTalent.com\/Phi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}