No Money? Then No Textbooks! Blog 12

Cutting teachers.....cutting salaries.....cutting aids/paras......cutting certain departments....what could possibly be next? In this case, it's textbooks! Our Federal government has reduced many schools down to the bare bones in order to cut costs and save money and still schools are struggling to make ends meet.

10 weeks into the school year, many public schools throughout Detroit have gone without textbooks AND supplies needed for everyday classroom necessities. Why? You guessed it!....no money.

As educators, we are taught to be flexible and to be able to work with what we have. If our curriculum is based on using certain textbooks, how do we adapt to meet the needs of our students and to be able to teach to the best of our ability without books for 10 weeks or possibly longer?

Keith Johnson, Detroit's Federation of Teachers President, said, "I have done visitations of 69 schools and with just about every one of them there's been a problem with textbooks." The book suppliers refuse to put the textbooks on credit due to so many schools having financial problems. One tech high school alone in Detroit is short 2,000 textbooks. Not much can be done to solve this dilemma when the sole answer is money.

What would you do in a situation like this? Computers help. But time is an issue when hundreds of students need computers in 45 minute intervals. Supplementary projects/activities can help, but is the material sufficient? 10 weeks and counting is a long time for these students to go without textbooks and proper supplies needed for a good education.

What next?