[Wrecked944]

Okay, then I'll give more details if y'all are willling to listen (or read?). Take a city like...um...Worcester, where I happen to live. Start a non-profit business. Something really boring like storage unit rental or automated carwashes or just residential rental properties...something that turns a slow and steady profit with no fuss and no muss. There is an oil company in MA run by Joe Kenendy that does something very similar. They sell oil at a profit to regular customers in order to provide it below cost to low income people. So I didn't invent this idea. It works today.

Take the profits and use them to run a private school in the city. Pay the teachers serious dinero. Somebody really needs to pay teachers according to their importance in our society. Then you will get highly talented professionals entering the field and STAYING (I know too many super smart people who left teaching because they could not feed their families). Teaching should be a path to wealth, not poverty.

Keep the school private. Keep class sizes around five or ten. Tell the NEA to eff off. For that matter, tell the local school board and the state board of ed to eff off. Have open enrollment for any kid in the school district. No entrance exams. No fees. Every kid gets a private school education for free and the goal is that every kid goes to a top college - EVERY kid. Teachers get hired and fired based on the results of their students.

Then, like Boston Latin, make the parents and kids sign a contract outlining their responsibilities - which will be large. If a parent or kid doesn't live up to the contract, bounce'em. If Billy's parents don't like the program or the grades or whatever, then they can take him back to public school.

If you make that school function in a city like Worcester, then you will see property values increase as people WANT to live within the school's district. Teachers in nearby communities will gain increased bargaining power since they can say, "Pay me $12k per year? Screw you, I'm going to Worcester." Companies will want to locate in Worcester to access the well educated workforce. If enough kids go to the private school, then the public schools will have fewer students and so real estate taxes will decline while education improves.

Then, after the first school is operational and the bugs are worked out...replicate replicate replicate...

I've picked the brain of every teacher I can find for the past four or five years to develop that plan. When I retire, I seriously hope to make it happen.