29 Comments
User's avatar
Thena's avatar

Cyrus, I appreciate your passion. One thing you missed is getting the “woke”, BLM, DEI agenda out of our schools and libraries!

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

Please explain to me how BLM, DEI hurt anything. Jim Heffernan E-mail me at jimhefferna84@gmail.com Cyrus was on target, I think you're drinking the kool-aid.

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Loretta Green's avatar

Those issues take the focus off of study and class instruction and are useless. I can't stand the crude sexual language that comes as a result of focus on genitalia. ENOUGH!

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

I knew it was a mistake to wander into the comment swamp, but now I'm just curious. Where are you seeing crude sexual language and focus on genitalia? Are you a student, teacher, or parent or are you just reading Epoch Times?

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c Anderson's avatar

How about this? I know it isn’t exactly what you expect, but it is more than sexual language. Now you can go into your tantrum that it is just one school in Oregon. https://www.opb.org/article/2024/11/25/st-helens-oregon-school-district-high-middle-school-sexual-abuse-arrest-investigation-police/

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Javier's avatar

Jim, You should check out DEI central…PPS. They hired the worst superintendent finalist..because she checked off 2 identity boxes. The school board rehired a fired teacher who was calling in sick to work a second job because he was Black. Despite their obsession with race, and incessant virtue signaling, their Black students have dismal academic outcomes and it’s not improving. DEI in Portland only seems to create racial division while also not improving the education for any of our children.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12303339/Woke-Portland-school-board-says-unreliable-dance-teacher-fired-hes-black.html

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

Ah yes, Daily Maily, National Enquirer of Britain

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

There's really no need to look over the hill. We have it right here in Tillamook. Witness the recent events with the HS girl's basketball team. Playing for an assistant coach, the girls won 4 games in a row and were ranked as one of the better 4A teams in the state. There were complaints against the coach so he was suspended. The school board decided to reinstate the coach and 9 or the 11 girls refused to play for him. The school board decided to keep him anyway, probably because he was black and went to the "right" church.

Those school board members are up for re-election, but when only 35% of voters actually vote a small minority of voters will probably decide who is going to run things.

Too bad the school board decided to let false ideas of diversity shoot down what could have been an outstanding season of girls' basketball.

Election is coming up in May, be there!

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c Anderson's avatar

DEI is racist.

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

DEI is racist only in the hands of a racist. I am mystified how people can be opposed to diversity, equality and inclusion. To me, it's only a different way of saying "E Pluribus Unum" What's more American than that?

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Javier's avatar

Although desperately needed good luck with getting more instructional time. The teacher’s unions (like the radical Anti-Semitic PAT in Portland) will fight this tooth and nail. PAT just got a big fat raise and teachers here have some of the fewest instructional days in the US. The unions say they’re here for the kids, they’re not. They’re here to get more pay and less work for teachers. And of course to push their political agenda.

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Concerned Citizen's avatar

As a parent I would like everyone defending the teachers and their unions to tell me how a 53% literacy rate at a A++ rated High School is acceptable when OR spends $18K+ per student.

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Trebla Greborts's avatar

Administration. This happened in the University of California about a dozen years ago-more administration than faculty. And to a large extent the admin types make more than the professors. How did the central mission of the university get so distorted?

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Mark Garvey's avatar

According to the Oregonian K-12 education in Oregon was in decline prior to the pandemic. Currently in Portland only 30% of graduating seniors are proficient in math and 40% in English, meaning that most of the students who graduate high school in Portland have no basic skills. Sadly this travesty (graduating students without basic skills) is scheduled to continue until 2028, which is unacceptable. Clearly K-12 education in Oregon is failing students and their families. The people running the system have had several years to right the ship, have failed and need to be replaced by a new proactive culture with a sense of urgency to create an academic environment that will inspire and motivate students to succeed.

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Ketzel Levine's avatar

Pick a subject and you beat the same drum, Cyrus. Everything's failing, falling behind, getting crushed beneath the undue burden of bureaucracy. If nothing else, your views are certainly fashionable. Ah, the company you keep.

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Javier's avatar

Ketzel,

Aren’t you concerned about providing a good education for our children? Seems like it’s a good thing to be concerned about and try to improve.

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c Anderson's avatar

How are pedophile teachers getting hired in Oregon? Our children are not safe at school. With more bureaucracy, you would think these scum bags would be identified before they are hired. https://katu.com/news/local/banks-school-district-responds-to-teachers-arrest-on-sexual-abuse-charges-luring-crime-investigation-sex-abuse-child-student-wymon-smith

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

Cyrus has valid points, why can't we leave it at that and stay out of the weeds.

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c Anderson's avatar

Pedophilia in schools is NOT going into the weeds. Safety in schools is essential. How is it possible that we can’t seem to keep predators out of our Oregon schools? Every school in my rural Oregon county has had problems with hiring teachers who are sexual predators. Where is the accountability?

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Tj's avatar

Is the growth in admin due to the increase in special ed support? Because that has grown dramatically

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Randy Gottier's avatar

I drive school bus and told the other day if stopped by police and ICE that we do not comply.

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

It's called the 4th. Amendment, we don't live in a police state, yet. Here's the text in case you forget, Fourth Amendment

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

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c Anderson's avatar

The taxpayers of Oregon own the school bus. As an Oregon taxpayer, I want illegals off of the school bus and back in their own countries. The 4th Amendment has nothing whatsoever to do with taxpayer owned school busses but convoluted thinkers love to twist law. They use checkpoints for drunk drivers. https://www.forbes.com/advisor/legal/dui/dui-checkpoints/

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

Your constitutional rights do not evaporate when you enter a bus.

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c Anderson's avatar

Illegals who cross into our country are not American citizens and do not have Constitutional Rights. Good try though JH.

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Jo Highet's avatar

Illegal aliens have no constitutional rights

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Jim Heffernan's avatar

No so, the Constitution speaks of persons, read what lefty Justice Scalia had to say, Justice Antonin Scalia wrote “it is well established that the Fifth Amendment entitles aliens to due process of law in deportation proceedings.”

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Randy Gottier's avatar

Ignoring the fact that there is a thing called law, entering the country without doing it properly is a violation of that law. I had to become a legal citizen so it's not like it's a impossible thing to do. There is a consequence to breaking the law, right?? Remember your party telling us regularly that NO ONE is ABOVE the LAW. Now you want to throw a smoke screen of "police state". It don't work like that, and I'm not sure why its that difficult to understand. When the FBI was raiding American citizens homes and carting them off to goo loges did that upset you? Probably not. Having our state spit on the law of the country will not end well for us here, think about that.

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