Financially and economically speaking, things suck all over. For a lot of government entities, cutting the fat out of budgets no longer is enough. Now, cuts are seemingly draconian. Such is the case at Rancho Bernardo High School, part of the Poway Unified School District in suburban San Diego. Things are apparently so bad for this school district that they can no longer afford to adequately fund the budget used to copy quizzes and exams. Math teacher Tom Farber decided that the situation was simply unacceptable.
Speaking during an interview I heard on the CBC show As It Happens (via Wisconsin Public radio), Farber pointed out that as a math teacher, the only instructional budget he needs is for printing up tests. And yet, the district cut the budget. Brilliant. Farber went on to say that kids in his more advanced classes need to be tested thoroughly and frequently to be prepared for advanced placement tests at the end of the semester. Receiving college credit for AP classes rides on the test performance.
Farber's creative solution to the funding issue? Sell ads on the bottom margin of the quizzes and exams. He didn't want to ask for donations, as he believes parents get hit up for enough extra fees for nearly all extra-curricular activities these days. Ads meant that at least people got something for their donations.
From USA Today...
"Tough times call for tough actions," he says. So he started selling ads on his test papers: $10 for a quiz, $20 for a chapter test, $30 for a semester final.
San Diego magazine and The San Diego Union-Tribune featured his plan just before Thanksgiving, and Farber came home from a few days out of town to 75 e-mail requests for ads. So far, he has collected $350. His semester final is sold out.
...
To Farber, 47, it's a logical solution: "We're expected to do more with less."
Of course, there is always somebody ready and willing to screw up a good idea...
That worries Robert Weissman, managing director of Commercial Alert, a Washington-based non-profit that fights commercialization in school and elsewhere. If test-papers-as-billboards catches on, he says, schools in the grip of tough economic times could start relying on them to help the bottom line.
"The advertisers are paying for something, and it's access to kids," he says.
You know what, Mr. Weissman? Maybe your efforts would be better spent framing your argument that if schools were properly and fully funded, they wouldn't have to turn to advertisers to help offset the costs of basic public education. Math teachers shouldn't be put in a position of having to creatively finance the paper upon which tests are printed. And teachers shouldn't have to fund classroom items out of their own pocket. (The average teacher spends over $400 of their own money on supplies, according to the USA Today article.)
And as the school's principal points out, the ads aren't exactly full-blown commercials by any stretch...
About two-thirds of Farber's ads are inspirational messages underwritten by parents. Others are ads for local businesses, such as two from a structural engineering firm and one from a dentist who urges students, "Brace Yourself for a Great Semester!"
Principal Paul Robinson says reaction has been "mixed," but he notes, "It's not like, 'This test is brought to you by McDonald's or Nike.' "
In the spirit of full disclosure, I should point out a few things. First, I've spent the past 25 years or so as a media strategist in the advertising industry. My whole job was to find ways to connect a client's message with the desired target audience. I like to see creative media placement. But, honestly (talking to you, Mr. Weissman) these little snippets of copy are more akin to public radio underwriting credits and hardly giving some evil marketers unfettered access to innocent youngsters. To criticize this unique effort is mean-spirited at best.
Further, I am proud to point out that I am a graduate of Mt. Carmel High School (Class of 1977), sister school to Mr. Farber's Rancho Bernardo High School in the Poway Unified School District. If I were in high school today, living in our old house in Rancho Bernardo, I'd be going to RB High. It bothers me to know that the community I lived in as a teenager back in the 1970s is so hard up for money that teachers have to find ways just to finance f***ing copier paper!
I'm sure there are complex reasons why the PUSD is in such financial straits that teachers are resorting to alternative funding sources like ads on tests. But, being me, I blame the outgoing Bush administration's stupid "No Child Left Behind" debacle. It's more like "No Child Left a Dime" if you ask me.
Kudos, Mr. Farber! My blog, Kerfuffle, would like to buy a banner ad on an upcoming test. That said, I do drop the occasional F-bomb, so maybe mine will have to say "Compliments of a friend."
[cross-posted on Kerfuffle)