Students escape antiquated classrooms a week earlier

Getting away from classrooms and other antiquated education systems:

The state's budget crisis is putting so much pressure on public school districts that some are being forced to trim the school year before school gets out this year.

Last month, based on a California Watch Survey, I wrote about proposals in the majority of California's 30 largest school districts to shorten the coming school year by granting teachers unpaid furlough days.

But on Tuesday, the board of the Los Angeles Unified School District, the state's largest school district by far, voted to shorten the current school year by a week before summer vacation begins in June. That means the number of days students will be in the classroom will drop from last year's level of 180 days to 175 days this year.

A great opportunity to replace the classroom with technology for individual studies. Rather than cut the school year for a week, lets simply cut the classroom education for four weeks out of the year, stagger some classes, and move many others to on line personal study. By letting students stagger their school year based on grade level or course demand, the schools can split more time between supervised classrooms and unsupervised on line study. Total costs go down and total learning goes up.

Not fast enough though, as California will likely print up some funny money this year:

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - California - with its state worker furloughs and IOUs - became the poster child of the budget crisis gripping statehouses across the country last year.

Unless Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and state lawmakers learn to get along, the state is likely to face more of the same this year.

California already is more than $6 billion short of the revenue it needs. The gap is projected to grow by nearly $14 billion in the new fiscal year that starts July 1.

Lawmakers are expected to begin tackling the deficit as early as this week, but acknowledge they won't deal with the most difficult decisions until later.

David Blair, a municipal bond analyst at PIMCO investment firm, says that will only make investors worry. He says IOUs could return this summer.

(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.