Tuesday, April 24, 2007

¿Habla Espanol?

Take a look at item #30 on tonight's board agenda: Amendment to Consultant Agreement

"District administration requests Board approval for Axiom, Inc. to provide translation services (into Spanish) for the School Accountability Report Cards, for a total of $16,285.00 per year (for a three year total of $48,855.00) to be paid with general funds and possible reimbursement through mandated costs."

We don't question the need to translate this information into Spanish for parents and community members.

What are your thoughts about this expense? Any thoughts on how the district could have better managed taxpayer dollars?

PS: Axiom, Inc. has offices in Rancho Cucamonga. Maybe they're the one from Rancho that checks this blog ever evening at about the same time.

621 days without a settlement!

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Once again, going to outside consultants to pay for things that employees within this district could do. We have so much untapped talent in this district, but the DO and Board seem bent on cutting them out of the picture and outsourcing this sort of work. I wonder if this firm is based in Bangledesh or India? (Then again, cost reduction does not seem to be the board's goal in this case and others). Remember when teachers used to run the Buyback days and many of the inservice days? Heck, remember when there WERE buyback days?

Anonymous said...

I don't think the board has any interest in saving taxpayer dollars, the board needs to go! If I had the sort of job performance the board did, I'd have lost my job years ago.

Anonymous said...

So who on the board or district administration staff knows someone at Axiom?

Anonymous said...

I wonder if Axiom, Inc. will have a job waiting for Mitch after he's done screwing up YCJUSD? Their offices are in his hometown...it will sure save him from putting the miles on his Ford Five Hundred.

Anonymous said...

Axiom has offices in Rancho Cucamonga! Now, who do we know who lives in Rancho? It's not what you know, it's .......

Anonymous said...

I teach in NJ, and we just went through over a year and a half without a contract. It was tough enough...I can't imagine over 600 days like. Stay strong, and best of luck to you all! We are pulling for you on the east coast!

Anonymous said...

Hi NJ, thanks for the words of encouragement. It's good to know that we are not alone in our troubles.

Anonymous said...

A bit more than we paid Bernie's ghost writer for the Distinguished School application.

Anonymous said...

CHeck out the district's new website. Each division has pictures and names of its administrators and staff. A lot of people for such a small district. Our district claims financial hardship because it is so small, then hires more admin and staff than some districts twice their size. It's also interesting to see the glut of new Teacher On Assignment positions created and filled in the last year. These positions are not considered administrative (even though these people no longer teach, and the work they do is administrative in nature), and thus circumvent state caps on the amount of the budget which is spent on administrators. If I ran my personal life like the board runs this district, I'd buy a Ferrari and tell my mortgage company I can't afford to pay them anymore. For a group of people who purport to be successful businesspeople, they can't manage this district well to save their lives!