Caesar, beware of Brutus. Take heed of Cassius. Come not near Casca. Have an eye to Cinna. Trust not Trebonius. Mark well Metellus Cimber. Decius Brutus loves thee not. Thou hast wronged Caius Ligarius. There is but one mind in all these men, and it is bent against Caesar. If thou beest not immortal, look about you. Security gives way to conspiracy. The mighty gods defend thee!
As for the rest of y’all, here’s some other stuff:
- Kasich MUST win Ohio tonight — Otherwise, I don’t hold out much hope for the Republic, Julius.
- Nikki Haley calls Kirkman Finlay “childish” and “rude” — For bullying and intimidating DJJ employees in a hearing. It’s fascinating to see Nikki Haley, Tea Party darling, defending bureaucrats from a fellow Republican. Of course, they’re her bureaucrats now. But I take it as further evidence that she’s grown in office — a lot.
- Offshore drilling plan scrapped for South Carolina, other Atlantic states — That’s been out there all day, but here’s your chance to comment.
- Former USC teacher, sister arrested after meth bust — He apparently was not a chemistry teacher, yo, so I don’t know how this happened.
- US millennials feel more working class than any other generation — But if you say to them, “A Working Class Hero is something to be,” they look at you and go, “Huh?”
- Obama condemns ‘vicious atmosphere’ in 2016 campaign — Bless him, but that’s just not going to have any effect at all…
Related Posts
In Sports, 5 USC basketball players have been suspended and it’s rumored they had to dress one of the student managers for tonight’s game.
Thanks, Howard. I meant to include that, and got distracted…
So was Kirkman bullying the DJJ administrators, or did Nikki want to deflect attention to yet another poorly lead and managed department? This could go either way for sure, but It isn’t clear what really happened from The State’s reporting.
Either way, SC is doing a heck of a job failing its most vulnerable kids, from the schools, to DSS, to family court and on to DJJ. It’s a broken platform from end to end.
You are so right Mark. I met with Senator Lourie yesterday, and we talked about DSS, DJJ and Family Court, all of which are failing our children, mostly non-white and from low-income families. I met with Kirkman a couple of weeks ago, and he wanted to talk about DJJ because of his concerns. Senator Lourie told me Kirkman was doing a good job.
Kirkman is often a bit abrasive, but he is trustworthy, a man of his word. Governor Haley still wants to cut taxes, under-funding agencies with critical missions that protect the most vulnerable. I don’t see much growth.
“I met with Senator Lourie yesterday, and we talked about DSS, DJJ and Family Court, all of which are failing our children, mostly non-white and from low-income families.”
How in particular is family court failing? Not that I’m necessarily arguing with that point, I’m just curious what you and Sen. Lourie see as the family court’s main failing.
P.S. On a related note, I’m heading out to Richland County family court now for a hearing.
Volunteering as a Guardian ad Litem was an eye-opening experience.
We do have a system that is designed to meld the underclass into a criminal class; and we callously punish children for the failings of their parents. This starts with the way the school attendance law is written, and goes on from there.
Oh, I think it’s a deeply held value among a huge swath of the SC electorate that children must be held accountable for choosing the wrong parents…
The real problem is women having children that they cannot support. Invest more money on that one problem and the downstream problems are minimized. DJ, DSS issues are a symptom, not the problem.
Well, the judicial system certainly isn’t a panacea. Family court does the best it can, but you can’t live people’s lives for them. I only see the private cases, and my interaction with DSS is limited to a couple rare exceptions when my private family court cases intersect with an abuse and neglect case.
As for schools, everyone has some modicum of school choice except for the very poor.
The wealthy have the choice of any private school they want. The middle class have the choice to move to just about any public school district they want and can shop for the best public schools. Only the truly impoverished, who have no choice in where to live (and can’t move) have no choice in where their children go to school.
Only the truly impoverished, who have no choice in where to live (and can’t move) have no choice in where their children go to school.
Which is why the state has a moral obligation to provide those students with something more than a “minimally adequate” education.
There is no guarantee that if you increase the funding, the performance will be that much better. The factors that determine outcomes are unrelated to funding. If you can’t fix the parents, it doesn’t matter what you do in the schools. Which is why we SHOULD support some type of voucher system for the poorest students in the worst schools. At least those with parents who care will have a better opportunity. Otherwise, we may as well make the rest wards of the state.
And Doug, where are those kids in the poor, sparsely populated rural districts — which is where the worst schools are — going to take those vouchers?
You have an idea for driving to Columbia or something?
Because I refuse to believe that excellent private schools will crop up in poor country areas that don’t have enough population density to support a supermarket. It just won’t happen.
Oh, wait, I know: The seg academies in those communities will just throw their doors open to those students they were created to provide an escape from. Right?
All these suburban libertarians who drive their kids to private academies in the city — and I’m not talking about you, Doug; I’m talking about the typical voucher supporter — just cannot imagine why this wouldn’t work. But I can.
And you know what else, Doug? The state should not be in the business of subsidizing the private educations of the few students who have parents who have enough on the ball to claim the vouchers and can transport their kids every day. The state’s responsibility is to see that EVERYONE has equal access to a good education. THAT is the purpose of what libertarians like Will Folks are pleased to call “government schools” (government being, by definition, a bad thing).
Only public schools will ever be able to perform that function, especially in the poor, rural areas.
If the public schools aren’t doing the job, identify the problems and FIX them. The public schools are the only kind that have to be run the way we, the people of South Carolina, tell them to. They are the only ones we CAN fix…
Brad
That is the issue I have with school choice too.
I work in a lot of small towns across South Carolina.
Many of our poorest children can only go to the local public school. Many ride the bus each day. They simply can’t get to a private school 30-40- 60 miles away.
and in most cases, if they could get to a private school, the private school doesn’t want them (or may not want more than just a small number- usually the best athlete).
Last thing- many private schools cater to families that are involved families – meaning they are involved in the school’s life or public service activities.
They require a certain amount of parental participation in activities (raising money, volunteering at school, volunteering in the community)- things a poor family or a single mom can’t do.
“The state’s responsibility is to see that EVERYONE has equal access to a good education. ”
So let’s follow that thought. Right now the schools in these districts are not “good”, correct? The facilities may be below standard but there are also teachers and administration there as well. When you increase the funding to these schools, what happens to the PEOPLE who are there now? Are you increasing their salaries across the board? Or are you tossing out the teachers and principals and superintendents who have overseen this poor performance? You believe more money will fix the schools, the staff, the parents, and the children, right?
How much money do you want and how soon will you guarantee measurable success? You don’t know and you can’t guarantee success.
The fact is that you have never supported any voucher of any type for any student. You think there is some aggregate solution based on pouring money into broken schools with broken families. It’s not possible. If it were possible, you could point to places where it HAS worked.
Meanwhile, your favorite Republican candidate for President touts his record on implementing and expanding voucher programs. Is he lying about the success?
I’ve made the same suggestion over and over – if you don’t support vouchers, you should support paying young, poor women to delay having children until they are age 25, That would have the greatest impact on fixing poor schools.
I don’t support vouchers.
As the parent of 3 children that attended private school- and are now in public school (and the husband of a former private school teacher now a public school teacher), I know that a lot of private schools do not want to open their doors to everyone that can pay.
They are private for a reason. They are usually small for a reason.
It’s true, increased funding does not guarentee results, but nevertheless, it is hard to get results without adequate funding. How exactly do you make sure funds are used efficiently and appropriately and accountably? I’m not sure. But I think we should find a way to solve that problem instead of just blanketly refusing to increase funding, which seems to be your position.
In general I don’t think vouchers are a good idea for most of the reasons already stated here later on in this thread. But I wouldn’t rule them completely out under the right conditions – conditions that aren’t tailored to be taken advantage of by the already sending their kids to private school but want the public to pay for it crowd – and conditions that might actually help students living in poverty. I’ve read all the proposed voucher bills thus far and there’s not been one acceptable to me yet that meets these conditions.
Until there is a bill that evaluates a student’s need on an individual vs. whole school basis, that has a parent accountability component, and holds the private school to the same standards – I don’t think much change will be effected.
i.e. if a student, after attending public school for a specified (??) amount of time, fails to meet standard on the state tests, and parent involvement in the student’s education can be documented by attendance at conferences, signing agendas, etc., then that student would be eligible for a voucher (for a certain amount??) to go to a private school for a year, provided they could find one they could get to that would take them, and provided that they return to the public school for testing the following year and if they do not meet standard or show significant progress, they lose their voucher.
I suspect that the handful of students with engaged parents who would qualify for a voucher under such a plan in places where the need is greatest would likely have no place to go
What burned me is that the Family Court would say “we can’t hold parents responsible for bad parenting” (such as not sending – as in allowing/enabling – a child to attend school); and then toss the child into DJJ or a foster home a third of the way across the state. It was clear it was easier – for everyone involved in the entire process – to punish the child. This, to me, is absolutely unacceptable.
Parent’s should not be given an automatic pass in truancy cases. Yes, some kids are bad apples and some good parents cannot control their child despite their best efforts. However, the vast majority of these cases revolve around situations where the parent is, if not entirely, then certainly predominantly, the cause of the truancy.
Truancy is the gateway to running off the tracks. This is the time we need to focus on keeping kids on the right path. Penalizing them for truancy which is not their fault only guarantees bad societal outcomes in the near and long term. Traumatically ripping kids out of their community only hardens them, scars them and violates their youthfulness. The system is a factory manufacturing criminality.
In this way the Family Court system is misguided, corrupt, and broken – ethically most of all. There are unfortunately other ways as well. But punishing children for the faults of their parents is the worst possible impulse. And it happens every day of the school year. And the children are defenseless to challenge it, let alone stop it.
If we do not have legal consequences for bad parenting, then we have no mechanism to alter the trajectory of any of the ills Doug rails on about – such as teen pregnancy, absentee fathers, welfare milking, educational drop-outs, etc. The Law should be a bulwark for liberty and justice; not a hammer to pound our most vulnerable children.
DSS not having a functioning child support IT system is a problem.
The problem is a lot deeper than just DSS. There have been a half-dozen highly qualified companies attempt to fix this problem but due to the lack of cooperation between state agencies they can’t even get started before they give up.
Agreed. Bryan Casky and I talked bout the Balkanization of government agencies, including DSS, just yesterday.
DJJ agency directors aren’t hurting for money.
Corrections officers and line employees who are dealing with the kids every day are underpaid, and the hiring ranges are awful.
You can’t attract decent candidates or people with very low starting salaries for adults that have to deal with violent children.
When I worked for LLR, the only employees that got raises every year were the agency heads. The line employees- the people facing the public every day, making the hard decisions were never getting raises.
Nothing has changed.
“I don’t see much growth?”
There you go again, Moriarty, with the negative waves about my girl Nikki…
🙂
Some, not much.
There’s a good possibility that it could be both: DJJ is failing and Finley is a bully.
Not sure where to report this, but why haven’t the local media picked up on these related stories?
http://www.thenerve.org/usc-spent-millions-for-software-it-already-had/
http://www.thenerve.org/usc-peoplesoft/
I sent an email to Ron Aiken regarding the second story – the Peoplesoft implementation saga. I felt his reporting focused too much on the software when, in my experience, failed IT projects are a result of people problems (internal processes, political infighting, resistance to change, too many project managers and not enough workers). Software like Peoplesoft doesn’t just delete or duplicate data randomly. 95% of the time it’s human error or not following instructions correctly. Particularly in higher education, there are people who have been in their positions for many, many years and have extreme resistance to changing the way they do things. They’ll blame the software when they have to learn something new or when it doesn’t do things the way they’ve always done it.
Oh this isn’t a software problem, it’s a people problem. USC did not employ any consultants to help them with the migration, they had “experts in house who could handle this task”. This all lands on Bill Hogue, Jeff Farnham, and Harris Pastides. Bill Hogue is still listed as USC’s CIO, but he checked out over a year ago. He may come in maybe one day a week, which may explain why calls to him go unanswered. Jeff Farnham was hand picked and promoted to deputy CIO when the former deputy CIO suddenly passed away and Farnham is far from qualified for the position and has a history of only hiring from a pool of applicants who go to his church. Pastides is trying his best to keep this quiet and the local media is too scared of embarrassing USC that they aren’t reporting on it.
Dozens of large universities are using Peoplesoft successfully. The University of Georgia is in the process of transitioning to Peoplesoft next year and have been preparing for this for 3 years. USC may eventually make Peoplesoft work, but it’ll be quicker to start over than to try and fix the multi-million dollar mess they’re in right now.
You are right on the money, “Howard”. Good people can overcome bad software but bad people can’t be fixed with good software.
You are also right that The State tends to play nice with USC. If they lose USC, they may as well close up shop.
Jeff Farnham e-mailed all of his managers this morning that they were given notice that a third article will be coming out today. They were told it was full of false information and not to believe anything they read.
Here is the latest article to come out, now I can understand why Jeff Farnham reported them as being all lies. If any of this is true he’ll be lucky to get away with just getting fired.
http://www.thenerve.org/onecarolina/
And as ususal, not one of the local news outlets has said the first word about this. I think they have an agreement not to write anything negative about USC. It’s sad when the only investigative reporters in this city are with two blog sites.
Um, fellas — it doesn’t work like that.
I’m not sure what it is you expect of other media, but it would take a responsible news organization weeks if not months to develop a story like the one at that link.
I don’t think you have any idea the level of work that goes into finding out enough to have the confidence to write, “The top executive running OneCarolina and the current head of USC’s human resources department were running an outside multi-level marketing business that recruited subordinates to join and/or hand over business contacts” — a statement that, if you had it wrong, would be highly libelous. (And to a newspaper editor, the phrase “would be highly libelous” has a similar meaning to when Egon said, “Don’t cross the streams. It would be bad.”)
I’m sure it would take John Monk awhile, and he’s the best there is in South Carolina.
When did these stories start appearing? Let’s suppose The State did what you and Doug seem to think they should: Immediately drop everything and try to reproduce each story that appears on The Nerve. (Which is debatable.)
It would still be awhile before you’d see anything.
Just FYI…
So I guess if we want to read about this situation that we’ll need to stick with The Nerve and FitsNews. How what is now reported as nearly a $100 million issue just gets overlooked by the watchdogs at all the major news outlets.
That’s not what I said, but nevermind…
Have you ever watched Aaron Sorkin’s The Newsroom with Jeff Daniels? I don’t know how realistic it is, but there’s a recurring theme of sacrificing getting the scoop for getting it right. Good series, and you can watch the entire series in a couple of weeks.
Brad I understand what you’re saying, but it seems odd that nobody else is picking up on this. Now that the story has broken it’s not like anyone else who reports on it has to reinvent the wheel. It’s been 12 days since this story broke. The problem first was reported on The Nerve on March 9th, with follow up articles on March 14th and today with yet another story coming out on Wednesday. To this date I’ve never seen anyone else write on it except for FitsNews repeating the story on his blog. One would thing that say a television reporter would be able to follow up on the story, if for nothing else to get comments from USC regarding the story.