DJA wrote:
"Savings" is a meaningless word to a bean counter. There is no column in their ledger titled "Savings". They understand accounts payable and accounts receivable and that's it. The proper approach is to show them how to increase revenue (and failing that how to cut expenditures).
My attempts to convince bean counters and PHBs at QUAKE and other companies prior to that have always failed. I know others at some of these same companies that have tried as well with the same results. The bean counters and PHBs just can't seem to be able to wrap their heads around that fact that saving money in one or more areas results in more money for investment into other areas or in higher revenue.
Like my brother said, they don't have a "Savings" column in their ledger and apparently it's not taught.
As a voter outside the education system it is my observation that, at least in California, the education system is not very interested in educating. They are more interested in infrastructure and its value and management. They believe that it's not possible to teach a child without a classroom, but it is possible to educate a child without a teacher (which is why I will vote to fire every sitting member of the San Diego Unified School District's board up for re-election).
I have voted against every school board incumbent in every election since my children have been attending school. They are all clueless and seem to have no interest in educating students or keeping teachers, only in continually increasing their already inflated salaries.
Just like many other companies, the people in charge would rather decrease overhead by firing the people under them (in this case, teachers) instead of looking at where they are really wasting the money. Heaven forbid they ever take a pay cut, or not vote themselves an increase.
Apparently, actual educators (i.e. teachers and their aides) have no leverage. They have no power. They have no permission. And they have no time. For teachers, having scarce resources may be the least of their problems in the current state of educational affairs, since the accepted solution to that is that fewer teachers leads to more resources.
I think the only people that have any leverage (and I've said this before) are the parents and voters. Unfortunately that group of people suffer from several maladies such as apathy, the "My vote makes no difference." syndrome, the lack of a will to fight the system, and the "I don't give a fsck." syndrome.
My wife and I often get weary of fighting both Granite Hills and Los Coches Creek Middle School on a weekly basis, but we have not given up and more often than not (in fact I can't think of a battle we've lost) we get our way.
Actually, it has to do with bullshit and greed. Reaping profits in the commodity markets. The scarcity, and thus increasing value, of land, on which it is more profitable to grow crops to burn rather than crops to eat (made possible by convincing gullible voters and politicians alike that the laws of physics don't apply to "My New Energy Source").
Actually, there's not enough attention on alternative energy sources. The oil industry still gets subsidies from government in the billions, where the alternative energy industry gets very little. Why does the oil industry even get any subsidies? Could it be the bullshit and greed?
PGA -- Paul G. Allen, BSIT/SE Owner, Sr. Engineer Random Logic Consulting Services www.randomlogic.com -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
