USDA Announces $138 Million in University-Led Biofuel Research (ContributorNetwork)

Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced today the department is going to launch five major agricultural and biofuel research and production projects that will be led by several leading public universities in the country. The projects will specifically extend over five years and will help develop regional renewable energy markets in several areas of the U.S.

Vilsack was joined by representatives from the private sector, several research institutions, and the biofuel industry at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in Seattle.

The projects will consist of more than $136 million in research and development grants and recipients include the University of Washington ($40 million), Washington State University ($40 million), Iowa State University ($25 million), Louisiana State University ($17.2 million) and the University of Tennessee ($15 million). The grants will come directly from the USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture through the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative, both of which were created through the 2008 Farm Bill.

Vilsack spoke about the importance of the projects and what they will mean for boosting American jobs, the economy, and the country's energy future: "We have an incredible opportunity to create thousands of new jobs and drive economic development in rural communities across America by continuing to build the framework for a competitively-priced, American-made biofuels industry. The past two years, USDA has worked to help our nation develop a national biofuels economy that continues to help us out-innovate and out-compete the rest of the world while moving our nation toward a clean energy economy."

The Seattle Post Intelligencer reported the University of Washington will use its $40 million grant to research and develop the use of converting poplar trees into fuel. Washington State will use its grant funding to research using residual wood and wood waste created after logging for aviation fuels. The two university projects will also involve research institutions and corporations, including Weyerhaeuser, which is one of the largest wood processing company, including pulp and paper products, in the world and is based in the state of Washington.

The three other universities will use their portion of the funding to utilize local agriculture and native crops and plants as the center of their biofuel research projects, which includes native perennial grasses in Iowa, cane and sorghum in Louisiana, and switchgrass and woody biomass in Tennessee. Additionally, each project will look to establish new technologies and boost regional renewable energy markets.

Rachel Bogart provides an in-depth look at current environmental issues and local Chicago news stories. As a college student from the Chicago suburbs pursuing two science degrees, she applies her knowledge and passion to both topics to garner further public awareness.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/science/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ac/20110928/us_ac/9632951_usda_announces_138_million_in_universityled_biofuel_research

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Enterprise Content Management System (CMS) - Business Consulting

Content management system (CMS) can be defined as a system used to organize and create documents and other content. In terms of web applications a CMS is used for managing websites and web content which in many cases requires a backend system for editing and creating documents.

One such solution is PostNuke. PostNuke is a free, open source content management system released under the GNU General Public License. The PostNuke project was started because some PHP-Nuke users believed there should be a more open development environment. They felt the only way this could be done was to develop their own fork of the PHP-Nuke code. PostNuke is now a separate project sharing very little code (if any) with the original project.

Another solution is Mambo (formerly named Mambo Open Source or MOS) which is an open source content management system (CMS) for creating and managing websites through a simple web interface. It has attracted many users due to its ease of use. Mambo also includes more advanced features such as page caching to improve performance on busy sites, advanced templating techniques, and a fairly robust API. Mambo can provide RSS feeds, printable versions of pages, news flashes, blogs, forums, polls, calendars, website searching, language internationalization, and other possibilities.

Quick application.
Gentics Content.Node (Enterprise CMS) offers your employees a simple editor. Costs for training can be reduced while the acceptance of your intranet or website increases through the power of the "crowd".

Multilingual functions allow you to publish your contents in different languages if needed. Editing of multimedia content is easier for your employees. Individual enhancements on your intranet, website or extranet can be expanded in any direction and will be displayed on your webservers, JBoss portal, Microsoft Office SharePoint portal, SAP Netweaver portal, Facebook page or Twitter account.

Source: http://www.ameradeals.com/2011/09/enterprise-content-management-system.html

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Replacement Windows Are a ... - Home Garden Kitchen Improvements

If you are thinking about home windows replacement in New Jersey, then you have probably begun looking into the energy and cost-savings that are a benefit of replacement windows. You may be replacing your windows because there are leaks or gaps in the window frame that are not repairable, or perhaps your glass has shattered. You may be thinking about replacing your windows because your heating and cooling bills have increased exponentially over the last few years, and you are pretty sure it is because of the poor quality of insulation that your old windows provide. Whichever reason is driving you toward this decision, you will want to choose the best replacement window for your needs.
When contemplating home windows replacement in New Jersey, you will want to research the available types of modern energy-efficient windows. You will definitely want to make sure to consider certain factors that can make a big difference to you. The style of windows, the installation methods, and the cost will all come into play. You will want to speak with a windows design consultant at your local home improvement center to discuss your needs and get advice on the best options for you.
As you look at the many styles of windows available for home windows replacement in New Jersey, you will see that there are many options to choose from. You can choose from double windows or bay windows, two-piece windows or three-piece windows. There are windows that slide up and down to open or those that tilt in from the top for ease of cleaning. One of the more popular styles is the double hung windows which have top and bottom panels that are both capable of sliding up and down. You may want different styles of windows for different areas in your home.
The next factor in determining the cost of home windows replacement in New Jersey is the method of installation. Of course, you will want an authorized windows contractor to complete the installation, but if you know a few things about what is needed, you will understand the estimate better. If the wood frame is in good condition, you may be able to just have them pull out the old and replace it with the new, as long as the interior structure is sound. With more extensive damage, more will have to be done. For instance, if the existing window frames are badly damaged you will need to have the entire trim removed and will have to replace the entire window unit. In order to get the best energy-efficiency, as well as safety and security from your home windows replacement in New Jersey, you will need to replace all aspects of the window. If the frame is great, you may simply have to have a sash replacement. This allows for the new types of windows that tilt in or out to be installed.
Remember that when doing a home windows replacement in New Jersey, you will be able to save money over the years with modern energy-efficient windows. Although the cost may seem high initially, over time your windows may practically pay for themselves.
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William Folmer and Sears have been helping homeowners get great value for many years.You can get big energy savings from your custom exterior home windows without sacrificing the look you want.home windows replacement new jersey

Article from articlesbase.com

More Windows Articles

Source: http://www.sewarenlibrary.com/building-greenhouse/replacement-windows-are-a-good-investment.html

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Fanboyism Taken to New Heights With Glass and Aluminum iPhone 5 Mockup

And the "Biggest Apple Fanboy of the Week" award goes to (drum roll please) the guys who made this insane real-life, glass and aluminum mockup of an iPhone 5.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GearFactor/~3/bh1lXKkucXg/

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If a Territory Manager is a ?Hunting Farmer,? How Should Their ...

> Sales Comp Answers > Comp Design Principles > If a Territory Manager is a ?Hunting Farmer,? How Should Their Comp Work?

If a Territory Manager is a ?Hunting Farmer,? How Should Their Comp Work?

While many established sales organizations use the hunter-farmer model as their sales force organization model, there are inevitably geographic territories or customer segments that do not justify a dedicated team of new business sellers (?hunters?) and account managers (?farmers?).

New business sales jobs focus primarily on acquiring new accounts.? The incentive plan rewards for new revenue or profit margin brought to the company.? In contrast, account managers often are assigned a book of business that includes several new business sellers? territories. Their focus is on retaining and growing established accounts (so new business sellers can continue to bring in new customers).

The territory manager we will discuss is a hybrid of the two with the expectation to not only acquire new customers but also retain these customers (and grow revenue or profit margin). The compensation plan that results is often is a hybrid of the hunter and farmer plans? key components that may let the territory manager decide whether hunting or farming will maximize the incentive pay regardless of sales management?s preference for a more balanced approach.

An alternative approach that has been more successful in achieving sales management?s objective is to measure performance and pay incentive pay based on net new business revenue or profit margin.? This approach communicates to territory managers that any lost business must be offset by new customer acquisition or selling additional products or services to current customers.

The key is that the net new business goal is set based on historical territory performance plus the desired growth.? The goal will not usually be as great as for a direct seller since the lost business goal for account managers is an offset to the growth.? In addition, there is often real work involved in servicing and maintaining the established book at historical levels before any growth is achieved. However, the net new business goal should always be a positive number ? new business exceed anticipated losses to keep the territory manager focused on growing the business by at least the overall percent the company is expecting revenue or profit margin to grow.

When goal setting is a challenge for this job and results may be volatile, and effective compensation arrangement may be a mix of bonus and commission.? For example a prorated bonus is paid for performance above threshold to excellence (e.g., 80% to 120%) then a commission is paid for above excellence performance (over 120% in this example).? This approach retains the needed linkage between pay and performance while ensuring that the additional incentive dollars are self-funded.

Source: http://cygnalgroup.com/if-a-territory-manager-is-a-%E2%80%9Chunting-farmer%E2%80%9D-how-should-their-comp-work/

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Prisoners bull riding

It's a quiet night at the ranch have been. Stella Barker was sitting alone in a rocking chair by the fire watching a replica giant television. Her husband Max had gone to Oklahoma City for the night in hopes of buying a new pair of bulls in an auction this evening. They had grown up rodeo bulls for over ten years and had a reputation with some of the best bulls in rodeos in the country.

He was startled at the sound of the ringing telephone, she says, hoping that Max would let her knowThose who had arrived safely in the city. Instead, he heard the voice of a stranger at the other end of the phone is switched on to explain that the prison of someone close, a rodeo bull owned were able to go their prisoners to their entry into the prison of Rodeo McAlester Oklahoma prepare search.

He said: "Please slow down, I'm not understanding what you want." The caller repeated: "We have the inmates in the prison rodeo, McAlester, and we ask if you bullscan practice on your ranch? "

Giving some thought she replied: "Yes, I think so, but only if you bring it here I'm not able to ride on the transport of bulls to jail interested .."

The caller said: "This is not a problem, we want them on every Wednesday afternoon for the next five weeks, so that they would get some practice bulls."

He thought, why not? Bull-riding prisoners could not be worse than that of the bull riders I'm ruthless abouthere! Stella said: "Bring it on, it will help both, the training of young bulls and give you a prisoner of the practice they need .." He put the phone in the hope that he made a good choice.

Max tries to call on his cell phone in his room at the Biltmore, but there was no answer. He said he met his old high school Rex Morrison for dinner. She was disappointed that he was not prepared to hear the news. But his reaction the next morninghas confirmed that he did the right thing.

He said: "This is great news for the Bulls definitely need some outs It will help us, new bulls that I bought at an auction to form last night ?"

For the next few weeks, the prisoners arrived at their ranch to ride bulls. Stella loved to see in the box, to ride it.

The armed prison guards released the chains around the bound prisoners' ankles only briefly, so they have the freedom to get into the shafts to ride bulls.The hands of the prisoners chains like they were wrapped in long bull rope around her wrists and was thrown to the ground when the guard was there again shackle your ankles so that he could not run away.

The prisoners were not afraid to be on a bull at a time. It seemed difficult for the pilots bull caught hold your hand high into the air with the heavy chains wrapped around their wrists. The prison spurred cowboy bulls and wild dogs cry out with passion,hung around eight seconds.

Max was glad that the cops had their new releases, and he was satisfied with the way they like it. The weeks flew by and soon the prisoners were not on the ranch to ride their bulls. It is assumed that they went McAlester, has heard but not how well they rode.

Life returned to normal at the ranch. The bull rider drifter is more to show up to get on bulls, and bulls Max endurance training andStrength of character, commissioned by the fans and the Cowboys, to perform at NFR in Las Vegas out.

How has achieved with his life, sometimes the look on the face of the prisoner recalled how he rode a bull at a time. She was not aware of the crimes they had committed, or the conditions of the sentence, but had formed a positive opinion of the men who were seen riding bulls. He thanked them for their commitment and loved him and said. "I'm proud of you you have a couple of niceTake bulls. Good luck to McAlester! I will never forget. "

Source: http://entertainment-short-fiction.chailit.com/prisoners-bull-riding.html

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A List Of Things Paul Carr?s New Startup Isn?t

Apparently my former colleague and fellow Diet Coke fiend Paul Carr is founding a startup post-TechCrunch, instead of heading back to professional blog jockeying like the rest of us pixel-stained wretches. Yay Paul. So what on earth is it already? Well Carr himself told me that the startup is a media-play, traversing the intersection between old media and new media -- "the third way," as he puts it. Okay.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/pT1x9N-12f8/

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Payday loans in Michigan | personal finance budgeting

Hi friend! If this is your first time visiting the personal finance budgeting, you may want to subscribe to the latest articles by email from the personal finance budgeting for free, Thank you.

Short term, high interest credit loans available till the next payday or salary day are referred to as payday loans. Although very much beneficial in times of cash crunch to cover up for unexpected and unforeseen expenses, payday loans are accompanied with exorbitant interest rates which makes them difficult to repay. Payday loans are banned in a significant number of states across US, however, certain handful states considers them legalized, albeit under strict guidelines.

Michigan payday loans are available from more than 650 lenders distributed across the state. The state government of Michigan has introduced several new regulations which inhibit any operator from operating illegally in the state for payday loans.

Customers can take a payday loan up to $600, and can take two loans simultaneously. The payday loan lender can levy processing fees up to $15 per every $100, and can also charge extra for every transaction. All in all, Michigan state government has ensured that applicants are not lured by the false claims of Michigan payday loans companies.

A critical aspect that helps determine the type of payday loan available to the applicant is his or her credit history. People with bad credit histories are viewed as a risk by most banks and financial institutions, and hence it is difficult to obtain a suitable a payday loan with bad credit.

Bad credit payday loans are available in the market, but with an interest rate more than twice than that of normal payday loans. Thus, it becomes vital to pay off past debts on time to maintain a good credit rating and avail easy access to payday loans as and when required.

Nowadays, no credit check payday loans are becoming more and more popular. This is because folks get easy access to payday loans without the hassle of credit checks and past credit histories. This exposes the company that gives out the loan to slight risk as they may lose their money with some applicants. However, no credit check payday loans facilitate easy distribution of payday loans to needy folks out there in times of cash crunch.

The internet is the best place to search for payday loans. Several sites are available on the web that are dedicated to offering payday loans. The applicant can browse through several different sites to strike the best available deal. Online sites offering payday loans are very much in the business of offering no credit check payday loans as the applicant is actually not required to visit a payday loan office for verification.

In case you are searching through the web for more info about the sphere of personal finance budgeting, then please make sure to visit the URL which was mentioned in this passage.

Why Mitt Romney's Health Care Record Won't Stop Him (Atlantic Politics Channel)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS Feeds and Widgets via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/141353536?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Body Sculpture A Deep Tutorial About Body Building 202 Detail ...

Jewish spiritual care: Creating sound spirit - YNET News

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Pipilotti Rist: big time sensuality - The Guardian

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Highlights of Cassilly's life, career - St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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Joint study will evaluate city-county shared space - Napa Valley Register

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Bj?rk Premiers New Music Video For "Moon" (VIDEO) - Huffingtonpost.com

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Gilbert 9 million cancer center opens today - AZCentral.com

... owned and operated by Banner Health, ... a meandering pathway and a symbolic rock sculpture. ... Phoenix westbound I-10 reopens after body found;

Leaving Afghanistan: Some troops say they'll miss it - msnbc.com

A woman looks at an ancient sculpture on display ... Security personnel in plain clothes carry the body of a would-be suicide bomber ... health official ...

Mexico City Blind Photographer Share Their World - NPR News

... a sculpture next to Mexico City's ... They ask people they are photographing to talk to them so they can figure out how high or low on their body to ... Health; Sports; arts & life ...

Source: http://reviews.cglights.com/lists/298-health-fitness/31794-body-sculpture-a-deep-tutorial-about-body-building-202-detail-pages-health-fitness.html

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Italy vs USA Live Streaming Rugby World Cup Video Online Internet ...

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Education News ? Harris County Department of Education Needs to ...

This is an amazing piece of research on the part of Colleen Vera. She is a fiscally responsible Texan who believes everyone must do his/her part to root out wasteful spending of our tax dollars. Colleen has spent countless hours putting this report together to show that the Harris County Department of Education (Houston, Texas) is a boondoggle that must be cut. I suspect such entities as HCDE exist all over this country. Colleen presents her action plan toward the end of this article; and her own example should spur other Americans to rise up, dig out the truth, and expose these examples of wasteful spending. Donna Garner

Colleen Vera ? When you look for ?government waste? you don?t have to go all the way to Washington, D.C. Harris County has the mother lode of waste right here in Texas. It is called the ?Harris County Department of Education?(HCDE). 5 reasons it should be shut down:

• ? it is obsolete
• ? duplicates services
• ? is unconstitutional
• ? operates ?for-profit? businesses
• ? performs poorly

#1 It is Obsolete

It all started in 1866 with the Texas Constitution. Article 7. 1 reads,

??it shall be the duty of the Legislature of the State to establish and make provision for the support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools.? [i][i]

At first the Legislature gave county boards authority to operate local public schools, so in 1889 HCDE was formed and served about 900 students in Harris County. Over time, the Legislature allowed ?independent school districts? to form if they had 500 students and a tax base. Houston ISD formed in the 1920?s.

Across the state, as students moved to independent school districts, the county education boards shut themselves down and handed over their authority, assets and tax base to the new independent districts. [ii][ii]

But not HCDE. Even after all their students moved to public schools operated by independent school districts, HCDE?s board did not shut itself down. Their board members were not willing to give up their power and authority to tax. Instead, all these years Harris County taxpayers have had to pay county education taxes as well as their independent school district taxes.

They pay for the election of two school boards as well as the salaries and infrastructure of two separate school districts. Even though the HCDE Board knows they are obsolete, they continue to tax and invent reasons why they should still exist. Their employees lobby to keep their cushy jobs and the taxpayers even support an entire ?marketing department? to spread the word all over the country about the ?great job? HCDE does.[iii][iii]

I have always been told??follow the money??and that certainly rings true here. HCDE?s own website reads:

?The passage of the Elementary and Secondary Act of 1964 created many federal projects. Programs such as Adult Education, Manpower and Neighborhood Youth Corps became available to districts through HCDE. During this time, HCDE also added a department to serve special education students.?The role of HCDE as an agent of education equalization today is far beyond anything foreseen by the founders in 1889.? [iv][iv]

When HCDE no longer had schools to operate, they attached to federal programs to justify their existence because that is where the big education money flows deep- ?Head Start?, ?Safe Schools?, ?Elementary & Secondary Education Act (ESEA)?, etc. Ever wonder how the liberal programs the Feds want to push into conservative places like Texas get in the door? Through organizations like HCDE that use taxpayer money to support liberal programs and organizations. The two largest grants awarded to HCDE in 09-10 w ere both from the Feds:

• Head Start for $12,786,762 and
• 21^st Century CLC[v][v] (after school programs) for $7,331,250.[vi][vi]

As a matter of fact, HCDE is so attached to the Feds that President Obama?s Education Czar, Arne Duncan, even visited in person. [vii][vii]

You just have to read their board meeting minutes to see that HCDE is all about money ? contracts, grants, travel and purchases take up most of the agenda. You?ll also notice the lack of discussion about student achievement and curriculum. Awards and commendation are mentioned about employees, but nothing about students. LULAC shows it gratitude for use of HCDE meeting space and the League of Women Voters is commended for its work with HCDE, but there is no mention of student organizations. Discussions are even held on how to spread federal programs and ?outreach? to state officials (a nice way to say tax dollars spent to lobby for more liberal programs)[viii][viii]

Some board meeting notes:

12/14/2010[ix][ix]

#4 Edward Ybarra with LULAC Council 402 extended his gratitude to the Board

and Administration for allowing LULAC the use of HCDE meeting rooms for

their meetings throughout the year.

#5F. Angie Chesnut reported on Carl Schwartz?s recent hospitalization and welcomed

him back..Carl Schwartz reportedon his recent emergency visit to the hospital

and reported that he is feeling better.

11/16/2010[x][x]

#5D. Debra Kerner reported on her attendance to a governance session of the Head

Start Policy Council. Louis Evans reported on his attendance to the October

21,2010 Lights on Afterschool breakfast and congratulated Doug Kleiner and

Lisa Caruthersand other staff for a job well done.

Debra Kerner reported on the staff appreciation luncheon held before the

November 16, 2010 Board Meeting and thanked all the staff for their hard work

during the gubernatorial debate October 31, 2010.Jim Henley thanked staff for

bringing HCDE to the forefront of the community with the gubernatorial debate

and the visit from Arne Duncan earlier in the year

10/19/2010[xi][xi]

#4 Howard Sims, Head Start Policy Council Chairperson, addressed the Board

regarding the Head Start Program and spoke on the importance of the program.

Mr. Sims thanked the Board for the support it provides to the program.

#5H Debra Kerner thanked HCDE staff for working the gubernatorial debate.

Debra Kerner announced the Civic Leadership Breakfast taking place 10/21/10

10/19/2010[xii][xii]

#2 A detailed recap of the gubernatorial debate hosted by HCDE and the League

of Women Voters on October 3, 2010 at HCDE followed and the Board

discussed ways to thank the staff who participated in holding the event;

#3. ? It was requested that Jimmy Wynn attend the next committee meeting to

discuss outreach to state officials?Mr. Evans suggested that in 2011 we plan

town hall meetings in each of the Congressional districts to brief the public on

the reauthorization of ESEA. Ms.Chesnut suggested that we reach out to the

ISD Trustees to develop relationships with them and said she was currently

discussing this possibility with Dr. Griffin?

The Texas Legislature has not had the backbone to force HCDE to shut down. In the 1990?s when the Legislature reformed the education code, they left a loophole allowing the two remaining county school boards in Texas to continue collection of a second school district tax and continue operation of their obsolete county districts. So, for over 60 years, Harris and Dallas County residents have carried an extra tax burden that no other counties in the state have had to bear because of the greed and lack of leadership of elected officials.[xiii][xiii]

#2 ? Duplication of Services

If you live in Harris County you already know about your local independent school district but it is time to learn about HCDE, the second district you are forced to support with your hard earned tax dollars. The Board consists of seven members whose elections, training, travel, meals, etc. are all paid with tax dollars. [xiv][xiv]

Their Organizational Chart which consists of:

o Board of Trustees

o HCDE Attorney

o Superintendent of Schools

o Consultant for School Governance

o 4 x Assistant Superintendents

o 27 x Various Director/Management Positions

These 41 positions are needed to manage the 1,293 employees and extra contract labor. [xv][xv]

We don?t know the exact dollar amounts because HCDE salaries are not reported in the same fashion as every other public school district in the state if Texas.[xvi][xvi]

So how many faculty and staff is that per student? Great question!!!

According to reports from Texas Education Agency (TEA) ? the organization that the Texas Legislature puts in charge of collecting information and data on schools in Texas- HCDE operates 7 schools with a grand total of ?0? students. That is right. TEA reports ?ZERO? students educated by HCDE.[xvii][xvii]

District HARRIS COUNTY DEPT OF ED (101-000) District Type County Region INDEPENDENT HARRIS COUNTY (101) 04 Mailing Address Web Address 6300 IRVINGTON BLVD www.hcde-texas.org HOUSTON, TX 77022-5618 Phone Fax District Email (713) 694-6300 (713) 696-0730 jsawyer@hcde-texas.org Superintendent Enrollment as of Oct 2010 DR JOHN SAWYER 0

#Enrolled Campus# Campus name Type of instruction[xviii][xviii]

0	?101000001	HIGHPOINT NORTH CAMPUS	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL
0	?101000002	HIGHPOINT EAST CAMPUS	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL
0	?101000003	ACADEMIC BEHAVIOR CTR EAST	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL
0	?101000004	ACADEMIC BEHAVIOR CTR WEST	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL
0	?101000005	ACADEMIC BEHAVIOR CTR NE	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL
0	?101000006	ZENITH PROJECT	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL
0	?101000007	NEW H S	ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTIONAL

All 7 schools in HCDE are reported by TEA as having ?0? students enrolled

Not only does HCDE report ?0? students enrolled in their schools,

HCDE is not reported by TEA Pupil Projection Reports.[xix][xix]

But the TEA Payment Ledger show HCDE?s share of the Foundation Allotment from the state in 10-11 alone:[xx][xx]

2010-2011 Foundation

District: HARRIS COUNTY DEPT OF ED, 101000

Payment Class: 1

Date	Description	Current Allotment	Adjustment Amount	Payment Amount	Paid to Date	Remaining Balance
09/14/10	Foundation Allotment	$865,025			$0	$865,025
09/24/10	September Foundation Monthly Payment			$129,754	$129,754	$735,271
10/22/10	October Foundation Monthly Payment			$86,762	$216,516	$648,509
11/19/10	Foundation Allotment	$933,484			$216,516	$716,968
11/29/10	November Foundation Monthly Payment			$86,252	$302,768	$630,716
12/24/10	December Foundation Monthly Payment			$97,130	$399,898	$533,586
01/24/11	January Foundation Monthly Payment			$97,113	$497,011	$436,473
02/24/11	February Foundation Monthly Payment			$48,449	$545,460	$388,024
03/24/11	March Foundation Monthly Payment			$97,006	$642,466	$291,018
05/24/11	May Foundation Monthly Payment			$96,909	$739,375	$194,109
06/24/11	June Foundation Monthly Payment			$97,055	$836,430	$97,054
07/22/11	July Foundation Monthly Payment			$97,054	$933,484	$0

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Now how can that be ? No students listed but all that money? It could be because HCDE operates ?alternative schools?. Their own description is:

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?Students served on the ABC campuses have needs that are not met in their home districts for varied reasons. Two Highpoint Schools serve expelled and adjudicated youth in grades six through twelve. All students served in the Academic and Behavior Centers and Highpoint Schools are referred/placed directly from their home districts that have contract agreements with HCDE for these services. The ultimate goal for students served in all our programs is successful reintegration back into their home districts.? [xxi][xxi]

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Either TEA has overlooked HCDE and not made HCDE report their students? attendance, test scores, drop-out rates, etc. or TEA allows HCDE?s students to be included in their home school?s reports. But if that is the case, how can any district be expected to report a student it had to expel? Something does not add up.

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So, if HCDE is a school district whose focus is NOT educating the children inside its district boundaries, just what do they do with the nearly $16,000,000 of local tax dollars they collect each year?

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According to HCDE, they provide:

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??educational resources to school districts and the general public throughout Harris County and beyond. Services include adult education, programs to promote safe schools, after-school programs, therapy services, professional development for educators, special schools, alternative certification for principals and teachers, and Head Start programs. We offer purchasing procurement, grant development, program research and evaluation, school finance support and records management. Since 1889, our services continue to evolve to meet the needs of our education public. HCDE is dedicated to the equalization of educational opportunity and to the advancement of public schools. We impact the educational community through visionary leadership, shared resources and innovative programs. ? [xxii][xxii]

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That sounds good but just why does Harris County need a separate school district to do this? How do all the other counties in Texas (except Dallas) get by without needing to pay for a separate county department of education?

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Simple, they use the Texas Regional Educational Service Center system as well as other organizations that specialize in educational support. TEA has Harris County assigned to the Region 4 Service Center [xxiii][xxiii]which provides many duplicate services:[xxiv][xxiv]

Purchasing Cooperatives, Adult Education, Art Staff Development, Central Office

Administrators Academy, Bilingual Staff Development, Choice Facilities Partners,

Digital Learning, Educator Certification, ESL-ISOL, Virtual Instructor?s Academy

(VIATx), etc.

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Around the state other service centers also provide duplicate services to HCDE.

Region 10 provides not only Purchasing Cooperatives, but also Fiscal Management Services, School Finance Council Training and Financial Consulting.

Region 20 provides Grant Evaluation and SBDM Training.[xxv][xxv]

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In a comparison of HCDE to some of its peers, MGT of America found that 26 of the 43 services offered by HCDE were also offered by Region 4 which is also located inside Harris County ? a whopping 10.97 miles away from HCDE![xxvi][xxvi]

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According to MGT of America?s report, others providing duplicate or similar services as HCDE are:[xxvii][xxvii]

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HCDE SERVICE/PROGRAM OTHER ENTITIES PROVIDING SIMILAR SERVICES

Grant Writing Universities, Sterling and Associates, District grant writers, some RESCs (regional service centers)

Research and Evaluation Universities, University of Houston, Office of Community Projects(more community than district), Mainly Universities (i.e., UT?s School of Public Health)

Adult Education Houston Community College, Community-based or

Faith-based programs, Sylvan Learning Systems, Reg. IV has an Adult Ed program. Last division done in 1988

Houston Community College Adult Ed. serves Houston ISD

North Harris Community College

Region 4 serves 4 or 5 districts

Next division will be in when reauthorization occurs

CASE City of Houston has an after-school program

Head Start NCI, Gulf Coast, AVANCE, (Head Start is divided among 4

grantees, so no one else in their areas can provide Head Start)

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Special Schools No Peers (unless JJAEP downtown)

JJAEP, New Bay Treatment, Shiloh

Avendale Behavior Treatment and Training Center (BTTC)

Community Education Partners (CEP) ? Private

Therapy Services Special Education Directors in Districts, National companies (last4-5 years), Supplemental Services, Soliant, Invo

ECI No others in area, Mental Health, Texas Children?s Hospital and satellites, Pediatric Home Health Co., Kid Development Therapies(KDT)

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TEA posts a list of 74 Alternative Schools in Harris County.

If you remove the 7 that are run by HCDE, you still have 67 alternative schools in Harris County alone.[xxviii][xxviii]

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ECI posts 7 locations besides HCDE in Harris County where their services are provided.[xxix][xxix]

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The biggest argument always used to keep HCDE open is the fact that a section of Head Start operates out of the HCDE building. We all know that Head Start is a federal program that operates nationwide. Different groups contract with the Feds to operate the program all around the country. Every normal person can reason that when HCDE shuts its doors, Head Start will still operate the same centers as it does now. All that will change for Head Start in Harris County is the location of this particular office and some of its procedures. Shutting down HCDE will NOT shut down Head Start in Harris County. The director of this Head Start program would be given a time window to update the contract with the Feds and then time to find a new office space. If they can?t figure out how to run it without HCDE, then they can travel all around the state to learn from all those who operate Head Start programs without the benefit of a local taxpayer supported county department of education building.

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To quote the Fed?s:

?Head Start programs have an indefinite project period. Therefore, once the grant is awarded, the organization will continue as the grantee agency unless they decide they no longer want the grant (relinquishment) or are terminated for cause. In these cases, the funds are still available for the service area and will be awarded throughcompetition.?[xxx][xxx]

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#3- Is Unconstitutional

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Remember Texas Constitution 7.1?? support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools?? Our local school district taxes are collected to support our free public schools. But HCDE is providing services to organizations all over Texas and the US.

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Of the 400 ?Entities? HCDE reports serving, ONLY 26 are Harris County School Districts.[xxxi][xxxi]

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The Texas Constitution says nothing about local tax dollars to support public free schools in Minnesota, Ohio, Missouri, New Mexico, Rhode Island and Arkansas! A quick look at the purchasing cooperative offered by HCDE shows that Harris County tax payers are quite generous. Not only do they supply the beautiful building with state of the art technology supported by an abundance of personnel, they provide services so other organizations around the country can also benefit from HCDE[xxxii][xxxii]. Organizations like:

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APPLY VALLEY, MINNESOTA BROWNSVILLE HOUSING AUTHRTY BENBROOK WATER AUTHORITY

BRUNSWICK CITY SCHOOLS (OHIO) CENIKOR FOUNDATION DENTON COUNTY

DEVEREUX FOUNDATION DONA ANA COUNTY, NM EL PASO HOUSING FINANCE CORP.

HIDALGO CTY DRAINAGE DIST #1 MINNEAPOLIS, MN NORTH LITTLE ROCK SCHOOL DIST

O?FALLON, MISSOURI RAINDROP FOUNDATION PRAIRIE VIEW A&M UNIVERS

SAM HOUSTON STATE UNIVERSITYITY ST. CECILIA CATHOLIC SCHOOL ST. FRANCIS DE SALES SCHOOL

STEPHEN F. AUSTIN UNIVERSITY TARRANT COUNTY COLLEGE DIST. TEXAS SOUTHERN UNIVERSITY

TEXAS STATE TECH. COLLEGE TEXAS STATE UNIVERSITY TEXAS TECH UNIVERSITY

TEXAS WOMAN?S UNIVERSITY TEXAS A&M CORPUS CHRISTI TEXAS A&M COMMERCE

TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY HSC REGION I ESC REGION II ESC

UNITED WAY GREATER HOUSTON UNIV. OF NORTH TEXAS UNIV. TEXAS SYSTEM

UNIVERSITY PARK, TEXAS WESTERLY PUBLIC SCHOOLS (RI) WEYMOUTH, MA.

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A look at the way HCDE spends money shows it is NOT an ?efficient system of public free schools?. They use tax dollars to operate a fully staffed ?Marketing? department. Now what school district offering a wonderful educational service to their local community needs a marketing department that travels all over the country promoting itself? What school district allows the purchase of $250 gift cards to be given as awards (door prizes) at conventions? What school district allows its administrators to stay at the Ritz Carlton? The list goes on and on. You can see for yourself by selecting any month at the bottom of the page:[xxxiii][xxxiii] http://www.hcde-texas.org/preview.aspx?name=BusinessServicesFinancialReports2011

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Some Examples:[xxxiv][xxxiv]

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11/03/2010	Target	Awards recognition	Gift card for recruitment booth at TOTA conf	$250.00
10/19/2010	Apogee Publications	Ads,Bids & Notices	Advertising ? NAOEP	$1000.00
09/10/10	GlobalGoals	Ads,Bids & Notices	TCUF ? ConferenceSponsorship	$2500.00
09/13/2010	NAEP INC	RentalSpace Events	TOAL conf booth	$650.00
09/23/2010	TASBO	RentalSpace Events	1 booth for CFP	$1050.00
12/21/2010	FrenchCorner	Food/refresh	Staff Luncheon Meeting	$611.50
11/03/2010	FilterfreshHouston	Food/refresh	Tea & Coffee Service at	$3314.83
10/04/2010	Dave & Busters	Food/refresh	Dinner 4 the End of Yr. Policy Council Banquet	$1449.98
08/18/2010	Panera Bread #4111	Food/refresh	Lunch for mtgw/League of Women Voters	$97.21
09/24/2010	SAMSCLUB #4712	General Supplies	Fall Festival door prizes	$77.78
09/27/2010	THE RITZ CARLTON PNTGN	Employee Travel-Lodging	Hotel Expence for CHarris	$724.35
09/17/2010	4IMPRINT	General Supplies	Promotional Items	$1,513.14
09/20/2010	APL*ITUNES	Software Purchases	Software for IPAD ? L. Pitr	$36.77
09/10/2010	FINGERPRINT SERVICE	Professional Services	Fingerprint Services for Yolanda	$45.45

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From August to December of 2010, HCDE employees spent $72,593 in ?Food/Refreshment? purchases. In August alone a sampling of employee expenses totaled $34,257.58. One employee raked up $690.34 in taxi rides between HCDE owned buildings from August 2010 through February 2011.

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When the Texas Constitution says??support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools? it does NOT give a school board the power to tax local citizens and throw the money away on food, travel and pet projects, especially to benefit others outside their district and their state.

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#4 Operates For-Profit Businesses

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On Oct. 1, 2010, MGT of America, Inc. released its performance review of HCDE.[xxxv][xxxv]

Page 1-12 reads: ??HCDE is currently engaged in instructional programs and services as well as entrepreneurial initiatives.? What???

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Why on earth is a school district risking local tax dollars on ?entrepreneurial initiatives?? Well, when you don?t have any REAL purpose, you have to invent something to do.

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One is called Choice Facilities Partners (CFP). According to the report,

?? (CFP) is a unique purchasing cooperative created in 2006 ? to support a variety of facility needs in any governmental agency ?both in and outside of Texas. Unlike other cooperatives in the Department, CFP buys nothing and sells no physical product. Most of the other HCDE cooperatives exist at least in part to support HCDE activities, including purchasing, records storage, etc. CFP started as a Job Order Contracting (JOC) program in 2006, but has since grown to provide a wide range of facility-related services, including construction, energy conservation and management, furnishings, fixtures, and equipment (FFE), disaster recovery, and building exteriors and grounds. In each area, CFP has researched the need, issued the RFP, reviewed and approved qualified service providers, and created contracts for others to use. The services are free to the governmental agency and paid for based on a percentage of the contract between the agency and vendor. CFP acts as the conduit to connect the agency with qualified vendors and will monitor, audit, and intervene on behalf of both vendors and contracting governmental agencies, as requested. Through this process, agencies should be able to save time and move forward with projects both more quickly and more efficiently than by bidding for qualified vendors themselves.?[xxxvi][xxxvi]

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The first 2 years in operation, this taxpayer funded ?entrepreneurial initiative? reported a total loss of revenue of $284,106. But, unlike real business entrepreneurs who have to make a profit to earn a paycheck, CFP stuck it out and in 09-10 made $931,328 in profits.[xxxvii][xxxvii]

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I know I am only a retired teacher who knows nothing about business, but I can see two major problems with this government run business model. First, CFP is taking jobs away from the private sector; and second, their profits are tax exempt. That makes HCDE an agent of wealth redistribution. Their government run business is taking money that should have been made by private contractors, keeping it all, and sending it to the causes they deem fit. CFP sure has that government run socialism ring to it!

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But more disheartening to me is another quote in the report about CFP:

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? The data included in Exhibit 5-14 indicates that some staff members have received consultant contracts. In FY 10, staff person #1 received $2,428 and staff person #2 received $72,800. The information provided is not sufficient to determine the work done?One consultant shares office space in the CFP area. He has worked with the Division since 2008-2009. He reports directly to the Superintendent, although he is shown on the organizational chart as reporting to the CFP Director. During the onsite review, MGT was told that he makes regular monthly reports to the Board regarding his activities. A review of minutes since 2007 found only two references to this consultant. Those were reports of presentations with the CFP Director at conferences on 7/17/07 and 4/15/08?

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MGT recommends a complete review and appropriate reduction in the use of consultants providing services for the CFP unit. MGT does not assert that any of the contracts shown in Exhibit 5-14 are inappropriate. However, MGT believes that CFP has an excessive number of consultant contracts, including contracts for staff that are not based on best practices. Staff should be compensated through the salary schedule and any additional contracts should only be for work that is clearly outside the already paid role of the staff person.[xxxviii][xxxviii]

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Some might think it sounds great that a school district is running a few profit-making businesses on the side to bring in extra funds. Great that school district employees can make some extra money on the side as private contractors in one of the districts government run businesses.

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But then there is that pesky line in the Texas Constitution, Article 7.1 that reads, ??it shall be the duty of the Legislature of the State to establish and make provision for the support and maintenance of an efficient system of public free schools.? The business of a school district should be to use the funds established by the Legislature to educate their local students. Not to risk taxpayer funds on business ventures that take jobs away from local contractors.

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#5 Poor Performance

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HCDE?s performance review does list items like financial transparency that HCDE is doing well. It also boasts a high job satisfaction rating among HCDE employees. [xxxix][xxxix]

Texas State Comptroller, Susan Combs, has given HCDE ?gold status?[xl][xl] for financial transparency in the ?Independent School District? category for a ?self-scoring checklist [xli][xli]that evaluates how local governments provide online access to their expenses and revenue. ?

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But the report also lists items where improvement is recommended. Some examples below show that while HCDE boasts about being a leader in education, it can?t run its administration building or schools properly.

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HCDE does NOT make long range plans for students or facilities.

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Their curriculum is NOT aligned with TEA standards.

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Even though they offer Special Education training to other school districts, in surveys their special schools received the LOWEST ratings.

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They provide ?Safe Schools? training to other districts but their own Emergency Response Plan is lacking.

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Other areas they are lacking include salary schedules, employee reference checks, job descriptions, etc.

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They also do not have controls in place for employee use of the Internet. An internal HCDE report shows that over a 2 month period ?34 percent of network activity was for social networking site visits. This was the highest percentage of any sites and there were over 3.6 million page views recorded. The report clearly indicates that there is substantial volume related to HCDE employees using social networking sites. ? [xlii][xlii]

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That is an average of 2400 page views per employee ? 40 per day!

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Some highlights of the report:[xliii][xliii]

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1. ?HCDE lacks a comprehensive, long-range plan ?? (pg 1-11)
2. ?Consider the elimination of the HCDE Alternative Certification Program?The Alternative Certification Program for Teachers has certified 15 teachers since its inception and program expenditures exceed revenues by over $19,000 annually. By contrast, Region 4 has had an effective alternative certification program for nearly 20 years. Region 4 certified 1,000 program completers for the 2009-10 school year and 1,100 the prior year.??(pg 2-38)
3. ?HCDE has not evaluated the fidelity of the Highpoint discipline program implementation at the Highpoint School to determine its effectiveness, consistency with national research findings, or improved student outcomes.MGT consultants did not find evidence of key indicators for measuring student outcomes or program effectiveness during onsite visits or interviews. While the Boys Town Education Model is recognized nationwide as an effective program, HCDE has no fidelity or student outcome measures in place to determine its effectiveness in the alternative environment of the Academic and Behavior Center model.? 2-55)
4. ?While the Academic and Behavior Centers provided services for 100 percent of the students that were referred by the client school districts, the 2008-09 Division of Research and Evaluation Report documented that only 64.7 percent of the client school districts were satisfied with the Academic and Behavior Center services. Survey results showed a decrease in the overall program quality from 2007-08 (92.9% quality satisfaction) to 2008-09 (64.7 percent quality satisfaction)?.(pg 2/57)
5. ?The Academic and Behavior Center Campus Improvement Plan are not comprehensive and do not adequately address the need for improvement.? (pg 2-57)
6. ?The curriculum and instruction at the Academic and Behavior Center are not adequately aligned with the Texas Department of Education general education curriculum content standards or alternative or modified assessments.?(pg 2-59)
7. ?Student transitions from Academic and Behavior Center to the home campus are in need of improvement?Client satisfaction surveys (2008-09) indicate that of all Academic and Behavior Center services, the participating school districts are least satisfied with the transition program from Academic and Behavior Center back to the home campus. Further, the surveys indicate that the transition program does not provide adequate assistance the home campus when students from Academic and Behavior Center return to their home school?(pg 2-63)
8. ?Based on client district surveys, Highpoint Schools received the lowest rating (3.04 on a 4.0 scale) of all services provided by the HCDE?the Highpoint School does not have suitable, written campus improvement plans. Further, the Highpoint School does not adequately address targeted, research-based strategies for students who are high-risk for dropping out of school.?(pg 2-66)
9. ??The Highpoint School does not follow curriculum pacing guides that are aligned with the Texas Education Agency core content standards and there is no? curriculum committee or organized unit established to review the current curriculum scope and sequence or write curriculum pacing guides . ? (pg 2-67)
10. ?The Highpoint School does not provide adequate staff development to regarding, differentiated instruction, accommodations, and research-based instructional strategies.?(pg2-70)
11. ?The Department should establish a transition process for students entering and exiting the Highpoint School. (2-72)
12. ?HCDE lacks a comprehensive system for annually reviewing job descriptions to ensure alignment of current job performance responsibilities with previous job performance responsibilities?(4-6)
13. HR does not have a process for the development, implementation, and evaluation of a long-range divisional plan. HR typically conducts a one-day planning retreat in the summer of each year. During that retreat, Division staff review their annual goals for the previous year and set goals for the coming fiscal year. Interviews with staff reveal that this activity did not occur during the summer of 2009; however, the HR Director did develop goals/projects for 2009-10 without stakeholder or staff input. A review of the ?Human Resources Long- Term Goals and Projects? provided by the Human Resource Director (Exhibit 4-4) did not have evidence of specific planning activities/tasks, time lines, budget information, or evaluation criteria, nor did these goals align with other departmental goals and objectives.? (4-10)
14. ?HCDE does not have a formal process for the classification/reclassification of positionsand the assignment of pay grades.?(4-14)
15. ?HR does not have a comprehensive process for conducting employee reference checks,which could result in important employment information being overlooked.?(4-16)
16. ?HCDE does not have a system for automating and storing regularly used HR forms, resulting in an inefficient use of staff. With the exception of benefit services, which is provided through a contract by Education Service Center Region 4, other processes require staff to provide employees paper forms or to e-mail the forms upon the request of an employee. When the forms are completed and returned, the HR staff is required to manually process the forms and file as appropriate.?(4-20)
17. ?HR does not have a single, comprehensive salary schedule that reflects all salaries for the organization.? (4-22)
18. ?It was not clear who provided supervision or evaluation of staff in CFP, although they described themselves as a ?well-working? team? (5-6)
19. ?HCDE does not have a comprehensive facilities master plan, although it owns and operates four special schools, owns 13 other facilities, and leases space in another 20 buildings? (5-15)
20. ?A report provided by the technology network staff shows that between February 19, 2010 and April 5, 2010, 34 percent of network activity was for social networking site visits. This was the highest percentage of any sites and there were over 3.6 million page views recorded. The report clearly indicates that there is substantial volume related to HCDE employees using social networking sites. While some of this activity may be used as marketing strategy, the Department does not have an updated Board policy relating to the specific use of these sites.Therefore,staff may be accessing the sites for reasons other than marketing HCDE services.?6-15
21. ?The review team was unable to identify a position assigned to coordinate all of HCDE?s internal safety and security activities. Because of this lack of coordination, personnel in human resources report that they do not know where to obtain updated copies of the Emergency Response Plan for new employees, and personnel interviewed in other divisions were unsure of how to obtain safety training.? (7-5)

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Comments by persons receiving services by HCDE posted by MGT of America:[xliv][xliv]

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1. ?It seems that some of the programs are duplications of the Region Service Center. Many times we have registered staff for workshops/sessions only to have the workshop cancelled. This happened with Spanish Six Plus One Writing Traits more than once. One other session was also cancelled due to lack of participants. We now look to Region 4 ESC first for out of district staff development. HCDE does not do the best job in promoting its workshops and services.? (8-9)
2. Remove any costs that are supported by tax-based subsidy and convert to a private, non-profit that exists through fees and grants to support the education community. (8-9)
3. Developing instructional materials, having mini-conferences, especially in mathematics to be aligned with ESTAR and MSTAR like Region 4 does. (8-10)

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Summary

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HCDE played a very important role in establishing Harris County schools in the early 1900?s but we now live in 2011. HCDE outlived its purpose decades ago but personal agendas and greed have kept it open, sitting quietly in the background sucking up taxpayer dollars and introducing federal programs into our local community.

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It is time for HCDE to close its doors, end its taxing authority, divide its assets among the 26 independent school districts of Harris County, and send its successful programs to Texas Regional Education Service Centers or private, non-profit organization like the Education Foundation of Harris County. [xlv][xlv]

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The elected HCDE Board won?t relinquish its power on its own, and we don?t have any Texas politicians with enough backbone to even bring up the subject.

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WE THE PEOPLE need to use our voice and vote to get the job done.

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As Harris County taxpayers you can:

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1. Contact your elected HCDE Board members:

http://www.hcde-texas.org/default.aspx?name=BoardMembers

2. Contact your Texas Legislators: http://www.fyi.legis.state.tx.us/

3. Sign the Petition to the Board and Legislature:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/shut_down_hcde/

4. Educate your neighbors

5. Vote in a new HCDE Board Members and Legislators in 2012 that will make the changes needed

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As Texas voters you can:

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1. Educate your neighbors

2. Voice your opinions to your Legislators: http://www.fyi.legis.state.tx.us/

3. Vote in new Legislators in 2012 that will make the changes needed

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Our nation is in a financial mess. We have to start by looking in our own backyard, find the waste ourselves, educate our neighbors and then force our legislators to make the changes needed. If we sit back and wait for the politicians to do it, there will be nothing left to leave our grandchildren but debt.

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Colleen Vera

Retired Texas Teacher

www.TexasTrashTalk.com

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Footnotes:

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Email this post

Source: http://educationviews.org/2011/09/25/harris-county-department-of-education-needs-to-be-closed/

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Saudi women get right to vote

Moscow, Sep 25

King Abdullah said Sunday that women in Saudi Arabia are now allowed to vote, run in municipal elections and be appointed to the consultative Shura Council, local media reported.

"Because we refuse to marginalize women in society in all roles that comply with sharia, we have decided, after deliberation with our senior ulama (clerics) and others... to involve women in the Shura Council as members, starting from the next term," he said.

King Abdullah said the decision had been taken after talks with senior Muslim clerics (ulama).

"Women will be able to run as candidates in the municipal election and will even have a right to vote," King Abdullah added.

Source: http://www.prokerala.com/news/articles/a249360.html

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The plot-crazy spectacle of "Boardwalk Empire"

HBO

Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi) rules "Boardwalk Empire."

Almost every time an episode of "Boardwalk Empire"?ends, I feel slightly disappointed -- not because the hour wasn't entertaining, but because it failed to deliver the richness, depth and ambition of the great series that obviously influenced it, chiefly "The Sopranos"?and "Deadwood." This is not the least bit fair, I?realize, but feelings are feelings. But then the next episode comes on and I'm giddy with anticipation again. Why??Boundless naivete? An unreasonable faith in the creative powers of series creator Terence Winter, one of the secondary architects of "The Sopranos"?

I don't know -- but I'm starting to think maybe it's that terrifically minimalist opening credits sequence, with Atlantic City treasurer Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi) staring out at the ocean and coolly smoking a cigarette, watching the tide roll in bearing thousands of illicit bottles, then turning and walking back toward the boardwalk, his shoes and trouser legs miraculously dry again. ?The music -- "Straight Up and Down,"?by Brian?Jonestown Massacre -- sounds like the middle section of the greatest single the Rolling Stones never recorded, which of course subconsciously links the "Boardwalk"?credits to the oeuvre of executive producer and pilot director Martin Scorsese, and then again to "The Sopranos," which specialized in touches that were Scorsesean yet somehow didn't flagrantly rip off Scorsese.

I've been watching and re-watching this opening credits sequence in the run-up to season two of "Boardwalk," and I think I might have finally figured out why it obsesses me so. It's because -- like some of the greatest sequences in Scorsese's films, and in the two most "Boardwalk"-like HBO series, "The Sopranos" and "Deadwood" -- the sequence is not realistic, but expressionistic and dreamy, a slightly mysterious but highly evocative glimpse into the personality of one character. It's subjective filmmaking, subjective storytelling. It considers a character from the inside out, rather than the other way around.

No actual episode of "Boardwalk Empire" has ever attempted anything quite like it. The closest the series got was some long, silent close-ups of key characters in season one: young Al Capone improbably enraptured by a bar mitzvah, and perhaps thinking that it's time he, too, finally became a man; treasury agent Nelson van Alden watching a group of black baptists praying down by a river, and savoring his own deep, if conflicted, Christian faith; the slow zoom into the face of Nucky's kept woman, Margaret Schroeder (Kelly MacDonald), at a meeting of Atlantic City's League of Women Voters, as she watches Nucky in the audience laughing it up with cronies, rudely oblivious to the speech of the mayoral candidate that Margaret just vouched for.

"Boardwalk" scrutinizes these and other characters from a great and detached distance, considering them mainly in terms of their plot function -- which is all right, I guess, if that's all you want from a TV series. And to be fair, that show's massive ambition and ever-expanding universe of story lines and characters is dazzling, in the way that an immense diorama or mural is dazzling.? "Boardwalk"?is miles ahead of most hour-long dramas, so a part of me thinks, "The worst minute of this is better than the best hour of any broadcast network crime series, so why be ungrateful?"?

Because of the unrealized potential, that's why. The gifted kids always get criticized more harshly. "Boardwalk"?is special, or has the potential to be special. Yet there have been too many times when it seemed to use a knack for period atmosphere and bloody gangster plotting to cover for the fact that it still didn't know what it's about.

One of the most powerful moments last season was the scene where Margaret finally walked out on Nucky, telling him, "There's goodness in you, I know it. How do you do what you do?" To which Nucky replied -- in a curiously flat reading by Buscemi -- "We all have to decide for ourselves how much sin we can live with."?It was such sub-"Godfather"?b.s., so utterly unremarkable, and seemed to bear very little relation to the character of Nucky. He's a lot of things -- clever, ruthless, mordantly funny, surprisingly charming -- but there isn't a spark of Scorsesean or David Chase-ean spiritual torment anywhere in him. He seemed to say that line because it's the sort of thing that post-"Godfather" gangsters are supposed to say when pressed by women they care about.

You can see this sort of disconnect in other major characters, too -- especially van Alden, who's really a grab-bag of cop-on-the-edge cliches and deranged Christian tight-ass cliches. His rigid determination to observe the letter of the law, his horrifying sadistic streak, his fascination with the angel Margaret and the attraction to the whore Lucy Danziger (Paz de la Huerta), are arresting but faintly ludicrous. He's like Popeye Doyle crossed with George C. Scott's character from "Hardcore," not so much multifaceted as messily fragmented, and apparently very gullible and dumb, otherwise he would have seen through the pathetic lies of that Judas underling that he ended up drowning in the river. (Michael Shannon's dour magnetism almost unifies the character -- but there are still moments where the panic in van Alden's eyes seems to have less to do with the character's demons than with the actor worrying that he's being asked to perform miracles that would not be necessary if the writers didn't treat van Alden as one-stop shopping for bug-house killjoy pathologies.)

But let's return to "The Sopranos" for a moment. As some of you know, I used to write about TV and pop culture for the Star-Ledger, the stomping grounds for David Chase's gangster epic. I covered the first three seasons of the series before handing it off to my brilliant colleague,?Alan Sepinwall; during that period -- 1999 to 2002 -- I got regular emails and and letters from readers. Some were eager to discuss the show's take on psychology, suburban life, consumerism, the waning of the Baby Boom generation, and other recurring topics. Others -- the majority, honestly -- wanted only to complain that the show kept wasting their valuable time delving into that when what they really wanted to see was more gangster stuff: set-ups and double-crosses, torture scenes, beat-downs, assassinations, drug orgies, visits to strip clubs. This was the "less yakkin', more whackin'" contingent.

"Mad Men" is aimed at the first group, "Boardwalk" at the second. Writer-producer Matthew Weiner, whose "Sopranos" scripts zeroed in on psychology and class anxiety, created "Mad Men," which often feels like "The Sopranos" minus the gangsterism and cruelty -- a slightly caricatured TV cousin of John Updike and John Cheever's fiction, fascinated by the illusions that fuel the American dream, and the lies that its middle class tells itself. Terence Winter, on the other hand, went on to make a series that never seems more alive than when its male characters are engaged in colorful and often violent pissing contests. Not content to explore Prohibition-era Atlantic City as a microcosm of early 20th century America, the show almost instantly widened its focus to cover New York City and Chicago, and added so many gangsters and power brokers to its recurring cast -- Nucky Thompson, Al Capone, Arnold Rothstein (Michael?Stuhlbarg), Lucky Luciano (Vincent Piazza);? the great, fictional gangster Chalky White (Michael?Kenneth Williams); Commodore Louis Kaestner (Dabney Coleman), a domineering tycoon based on German American hotelier and politician Louis Kuehnle -- that it started to feel like a "Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band" album cover of crime.

The show's women are adjuncts to the main action -- even the moral compass Margaret Schroeder, who briefly threatened to become as central as Nucky, then was quickly reduced to kept woman status, a character defined almost entirely through her relationship to the show's male lead.? Cable TV is awash in crime dramas, but none has the overwhelming machismo of "Boardwalk Empire", and none validates the macho code so unironically through its choice of whom to focus on. During its first, twelve-hour season, it never really developed any of its major female characters except Margaret. Lucy Danziger remains a grasping, dimwitted, petty tramp who gets naked a lot; she's just a bit more sympathetic now because she's so pathetic, a broken and discarded sex doll. Gillian (Gretchen Mol), the mother of the Commodore's son and Nucky's protege Jimmy?Darmody (Michael Pitt), started out an aging, manipulative showgirl and has hasn't developed many new shadings; in the second half of season one, she was defined mainly through her sexual relationship with Lucky Luciano (which enraged her son), and the tidbits she's been given thus far in season two aren't exactly harbingers of a well-rounded, non-freakshow character. ("I?used to kiss his little winky.") Compare this to "Breaking Bad", "Justified" and "Sons of Anarchy," crime series in which the women routinely affect and sometimes drive the action rather than merely being affected by it, and are complex and intriguing in their own right, and "Boardwalk" seems especially impoverished.

Jimmy's wife Angela (Aleska Palladino) briefly flirted with going off to Paris with a female lover, and had good reason to flee after Jimmy mistakenly thought Angela was having an affair with the woman's husband and thrashed him on the boardwalk in front of their son and dozens of onlookers; but she stayed with Jimmy, and it is impossible to discern what, if anything, the show makes of that beyond its immediate value in situating Jimmy, a World War I veteran who wants ... well, what, exactly??When Jimmy was in Chicago midway through season one, he didn't call his wife for months (although, as readers point out, his letters were intercepted by van Alden), and had an affair with a beautiful prostitute whose face was horribly slashed (the show eventually forgot all about her once Jimmy got revenge). Jimmy doesn't want to be just another gangster, yet he is one, and he's very good at it, if a bit hotheaded at times. But except for the occasional college-boy locutions -- which pleasantly surprised the intellectually vain Arnold Rothstein -- Jimmy still isn't a terribly distinctive character. He wants to escape Nucky's influence and define himself, but in relation to what, or against whom??In season two he's making an alliance with the Commodore and Nucky's resentful brother Eli (Shea Whigham); I can't decide if it makes sense for Jimmy to be betraying his surrogate father, who for all his faults is still three times the man that Eli or the Commodore will ever be, because Jimmy is still a question mark. The downside of not defining a character is that they're blobby and unsatisfying; the upside is, you can have them do whatever the plot requires, and nobody can complain that they're behaving inconsistently.

Michael Pitt's impossible challenge often reminds me of Michael Shannon's -- and Steve Buscemi's, and Kelly MacDonald's. He's being asked to make sense of a character who often doesn't make sense, and who often seems to be defined -- if indeed he's defined at all -- by the show's moment-to-moment storytelling needs. Even considering Margaret's financial problems after her husband's murder and her growing attraction to Nucky, I didn't entirely believe it when she became Nucky's kept woman, remained in that state for the rest of the season, and eventually returned to him even after she learned that it was Nucky who ordered her husband killed -- and when the new season began last night, she was still with him. This is not a feminist issue, it's a dramatic one. Was Margaret so moved by Nucky's story about losing his wife and baby that she put aside any misgivings she had and decided to try to save his soul and make a good man out of him? Could she be that naive? Is she more weak or hypocritical or damaged than she appears??I?can't judge because the show hasn't given me enough information. When writing teachers tell students that action defines character, this is not what they mean.

The interior life goes largely unexamined in Winter's Atlantic City, and it's not a case where a show has decided, a la "The Wire," to depict its characters with an almost journalistic detachment. The characters on "The Wire"?were defined in terse scenes and bold strokes, but you got a sense of what they were like on the inside, and you never found yourself two seasons in looking at a major character and thinking, "Who is this person?" The the direction, photography, editing and acting on "Boardwalk Empire" are so much more sophisticated than the writing that it's bewildering. When last night's season two premiere sent Nucky to jail, shored up a Jimmy-Eli-Commodore alliance, and introduced two new cities into the "Boardwalk"?plot axis, I groaned. More locations, more gangster characters and more criminal subplots is really not what this series needs. What it needs is more interest in the characters' inner lives, and sense of purpose that's bigger than, "Let's see how much trouble Nucky can get himself out of this week."?

I love individual characters on the show as much as I loved anybody on "The Wire," "Deadwood"?or "The Sopranos" -- Margaret Schroeder; the Commodore, who has shown us a terrifying new side of Dabney Coleman, and is turning into this show's version of George Hearst on "Deadwood"; Al Capone, who traded his little-boy porkpie for a proper fedora after his eureka moment at the bar mitzvah; the disfigured sharpshooter Richard Harrow (Jack Houston) with his slurred speech and "Phantom of the Opera"?half-mask; Arnold Rothstein with his self-satisfied aphorisms and condescending lectures; Chalky White, who appears to be using his ill-gotten gains to lift himself, his light-skinned, obviously much more educated wife, and their brilliant son into Atlantic City's upper-middle class. (The scene in the premiere where Chalky, Nucky and Eli listened to the boy playing Claude Debussy's "Clair de Lune" on piano would have been as beautiful as as any of the suspended lyrical interludes on "Deadwood"?if it had made any goddamn sense on a plot level. Terence Winter, are you really telling us that Eli and Nucky went over to Chalky's house to put him under house arrest and protect him from violent Klan retaliation, and they had small talk and listened to a recital first?)

But even when I'm getting wrapped up in Winter's world and its people, a misjudged touch will break the spell. The cut from Nucky declaring war on the Klan at a black church to Nucky promising to protect white Atlantic City against the negro menace was an amusing commentary on Nucky's "I'm whatever you want me to be"?political style, but it fell apart when you considered how intimate Atlantic City was. Even if we take extreme racial segregation into account, wouldn't you think that both the white and black communities would eventually learn that Nucky played them both for fools??Atlantic City had a newspaper, didn't it? Richard Harrow is simply and powerfully conceived, like a real-world progenitor of the misunderstood monsters that would populate Universal horror films in the 1930s. We already knew that he adores Margaret and her children and covets their domestic tranquility, because we saw how he looked at them and how he acted in their presence.?Was it necessary to drive that home with a scene of him going through magazines, cutting out pictures of mothers and children and pasting them into a scrapbook?

"Boardwalk?Empire" is a transporting and engrossing series with passages of greatness, but it lacks faith in itself, and it's simultaneously too much and not enough. And it has yet to show us anything with the eerie power of that opening credits sequence:?Nucky Thompson standing on the beach facing the vastness of the ocean, with its intimations of mortality, rebirth and subconscious demons, then turning away from it and loping back toward town. I'm starting to see the credits as an accidental analogy for the shortcomings of this promising, infuriating series, which would rather retreat toward the familiar than venture into the unknown.

Source: http://www.salon.com/ent/tv/feature/2011/09/25/boardwalk_empire_season_2/index.html

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