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Indiana has 9 of the 10 largest high school gyms in the country. New Castle, IN's facility holds 9,325 people -- half of the city's population. Despite this "Excessive 'education spending'," reports the the IER, "Indiana has one of the worst school systems in the nation."
via USA Today. 4
Comments:
Pete said... Maybe they should spend some more money on books and little less on gyms? Just a thought... 8:41 AM Bushwick Bill said... Please support the statement that "Indiana has one of the worst school systems in the nation" with evidence. First of all, that blogger is factually wrong, in that Indiana--like all other American states--has no one "system", but instead has dozens or hundreds of systems governed by independent school boards. (Allen County, Indiana alone has four (4) different public school systems, a Roman Catholic school system, a Lutheran school system, and tens of independent schools.) Further, your cited source merely asserts and offers no evidence more than an anecdote about some Indiana communities that spend a lot of money on gyms. (And so what?. It's not necessarily either/or. Sometime there's money for both!) In any case, the blogger describes himself as an administrator, that is, someone for whom the answer is always to spend more money on things administrators like. Funny how a century a go--when we paid our educators (then called simply "teachers") peanuts--we had a much more rigorous educational system (8th grade graduates were typically better educated than today's high school graduates). And there were no computers or A/V resources, either! Imagine! 9:43 AM Zach said... Bill, The blogger I quoted used the word "system" to describe the aggregate of all school districts in the state. I think her meaning is clear. Additionally, despite that some districts are governed by independent school boards, they're still subject to state legislation and budgeting. I attempted a quick search to find statistics to support my source's claim. Specifically, I looked for state education rankings based on standardized factors like SAT scores, or teacher salaries, which are even more applicable in this conversation. Most rankings of the latter showed that Indiana teachers were paid only 2% less than the national average. As for SATs, Indiana ranks 40th, while its Midwestern neighbors Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan each rank within the top 10 -- granted I think this study is flawed because the #1 state, Iowa, only showed a 5% student participation rate in the SATs, while Indiana boasted 66% (Some states prefer the ACT over the SAT). Still, the US Census shows that Indiana ranks 46th with persons 25 years old and over with a bachelor's degree or more. I admit I don't know enough to continue this debate. The variables needed to determine the quality of education are complex, and idiosyncratic! But, still, the fact that Indiana has 9 of the 10 biggest gyms is more than just an anecdote. I realize high school sports are a significant aspect of the state culture, but Indiana isn't alone in this respect. Nor is its demographic unique! There are many other farm states like Iowa, and Texas, and Illinois where communities live and die by winning and losing records of their local high schools teams. And, you can't help but wonder why their gyms are smaller! They have even more space than we do! 1:43 PM Osvaldo said... On a totally different note: Will you guys be working on the space this weekend? as a regular reader of your blog and admirer of your project in general, I really want to pitch in, and since I will be in NYC this weekend, I tought I might as well drop by if you still need extra hands. 12:20 AM Post a Comment |
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 Hi, I'm Zach. I grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana and graduated from Wake Forest. After college, I moved to Manhattan to get serious about a company I ran with friends. We sold it to Barry Diller's InterActiveCorp in 2006. I just wrapped up with a project I co-founded called Vimeo and left CV to focus on being a twenty-five year old. I have another blog called Copy and Taste, where I post about learning to cook. I live in Brooklyn now.  Del.icio.us My Flickr Me on Flickr Last.fm Linked in MySpace Netflix History Vimeo  Amir Blumenfeld Chris Bodenner Mareen Fischinger Fort Wayne Observed Nick Gray Hype Machine Jake and Amir Jakob Lodwick Oh My Rockness Jonathan Marcus Youngna Park Megan Scheminske Eliot Shepard Shorpy Signal vs. Noise Alex Soth Stereogum Ricky Van Veen Khoi Vinh Eugene Wyatt   Postal Skype SMS (via AIM) |