Just as I predicted, this is a rallying the troops agenda.

The more angry parents we get, the more pressure on the legislators to increase funding. 259 is leading the way for school funding.

The problem is that the message will fall on deaf ears. The legislators will more than likely not fund schools the way we would like to see. So out goes the fluff (extra curricular activities that don't generate some sort of revenue), but the meat and potato things stay (football/basketball).

If 259 was truly bent on pressuring our government for an increase in funding, they should have come forward and said ALL sports would be cut. That would get the football/basketball players/fans fired up. It would also bring some national exposure to school finance.

The kicker is that NCLB is not interested in extra curricular activities. They want kids to read and write and do math and science. Advocates of NCLB will say that all the things outside of the classroom are perks for those that do well. Since the students aren't doing well, more money should be spent on helping them achieve that goal.

I'm not saying the activites don't help foster excellence. What I am saying is that the policy is intended to fix what is wrong, not reward what is right. I can provide countless articles of the benefits of sports, but it's all a numbers game. One article I read some time ago said that only 25% of the student body participates in sports. A few years ago, while teaching at SE, I learned only 8 of ever 13 students will graduate high school. I don't know the ratio today. NCLB advocates will say that the money is more wisely spent on raising that graduation rate. Once you have the rate at an acceptable number, then any left over money should go to the fluff.

Before you jump in and say, "well the athletes will just leave then," I know. They will move to districts that can afford athletics, leaving 259 with that 75% that do nothing. Then the dropout rate will increase because sports is what helped kids through school. When the athletes leave, up goes the ratio.

Wichita has been suffering from Urban Sprawl for quite some time. Just look at the growth in one neighboring district, Maize. If memory serves me correctly, Maize was a 3A school some 20 years ago, and now is a pretty good sized 6A. Look at Goddard's growth. Don't forget Derby (they've always been big, but now they are huge). Or Andover.

I wish I had some sort of appropriate answer on how to fix this mess, but I don't. Wichita's problems are unique because they have surrounding districts that the upper middle class are flocking to. This couldn't happen in Hays, or Garden City, or Liberal. Those athletes who's parents can afford the move, are leaving the city to go to places athletically friendly. This is not a slam on the coaching staffs, of which I have great admiration for. Not many would stick around in Wichita - those that do are troopers. SE's football coach Dan Johnson, NW (formerly West) coach Shartz, coach Lentz at North (has yet to have a state champ in all the years he's coached wrestling), Drieden at West, SE's BBall coach Taylor, Niggs - they've all decided to stick around because they knew that Wichita wasn't the "ideal" place, but have stuck it out because in their minds, it was the right thing to do.

It's a shame that it's all come down to this. It's a shame that the metro of Wichita's citizens look more to the pretty astroturf and big gyms on the outskirts instead of the quality of education provided on and off the field in 259. What's worse is that there are multitudes of kids and families that can't leave that don't appreciate what kind of education the student can get in life by associating themselves with "those kids."

Okay, enough ranting.....