LA Unveils Costliest School In The Nation - that's $137k per student | Hacker News Reader

LA Unveils Costliest School In The Nation - that's $137k per student

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11 pointsstretchwithme12 comments

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that's $137k per student

Only if they keep it open for just one year.

How many years do they need to keep it open to break even? How many years is the expected lifetime of the facilty?

Or the biggest question ... how many teachers could have been kept on payroll if they hadn't built it?

"Or the biggest question ... how many teachers could have been kept on payroll if they hadn't built it?"

I'm not sure this is the question to be asking. Obviously the laid off teachers will be upset to see lavish spending as they are let go, but I would argue student achievement is the better metric. It's possible that a new building helps students learn at a faster pace than a low student to teacher ratio.

agreed. dollars spent per unit of educational progress. I doubt a valid "unit" exists, which is one reason the public sector consistently fails at this. otherwise, you'd think turning over your brain over to government would work like a charm.

i don't anyone's asserting its just for one year.

"New buildings are nice, but when they're run by the same people who've given us a 50 percent dropout rate, they're a big waste of taxpayer money," said Ben Austin, executive director of Parent Revolution who sits on the California Board of Education. "Parents aren't fooled."

I had trouble believing the 50% dropout rate statistic, so I did a little Googling and found [1] that it was 34.9% in Los Angeles. While not 50%, 35% is still incredible. No wonder why the LA poverty rate is so high.

[1] http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/05/high-school-dr...

"No wonder why the LA poverty rate is so high."

Cause and effect.

It is more likely that the high drop out rate is caused by poverty and an uneducated environment. We have the same thing here in the north of Norway. Poor region (relatively) with low education levels among citizens and parents and higher dropout rates. Probably around 30%.

Also: educational achievement is STRONGLY correlated with equality, and California is one of the most unequal American states.

http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/education

a lovely shrine to our re-education facilities.

honestly if you have ever been outraged at the perceived inefficiency of public education read Underground History of American Education by John Taylor Gatto. Most of the "inefficiencies" make plenty of sense when you see that the stated goals of our education system do not align with their actual effects.

So... Soviet Russia had it right? Big, ugly and cheap buildings are the way to go? American conservatives never cease to surprise me.

Don't bring that here. Invoking Communism, the Nazis, etc. is generally not a good debate tactic, and panning an entire party is especially unwelcome.

Given the fact that CA is nearly bankrupt, this seems to me to be a travesty. It may not be the absolute worst way to spend money (please don't invoke wars), but it shows a pretty flagrant disregard for the fiscal realities of things.

Do you see why people might reasonably be unhappy about this?

My point was that beautiful surroundings matter.

I assumed that comparing the US to the USSR was so ludicrous that my real point would be obvious. But the Internet is not a place for subtleties.

Beautiful surroundings are a fine thing. But I've seen some good schooling done in pretty ugly buildings. In general I suspect the American propensity for applying capital solutions to labor-intensive problems.

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