Introducing GPS Chromebook Insurance! Gilbert Public Schools Superintendent Christina Kishimoto has a new revenue stream so she can scoop up more and bigger bucks for her off-budget *necessities* such as catering her countless official GPS meetings and other accoutrements for her extravagant lifestyle supported by public funds. Although new Chromebooks are under warranty, Christina Kishimoto has figured out a way to squeeze $50 from parents for every student who is issued a GPS Chromebook — even a brand new one. Students are not allowed to use their own electronic devices at school.
Wouldn’t you know it: Chromebooks are back at the forefront of controversies because GPS administrators apparently don’t have the ability to learn from past mistakes. In another post that writes itself, here’s what parents and teachers have to say about the stupidity of the 2016 Chromebook rollout to GPS high school students, with special hatred and ridicule for Kishimoto’s new revenue stream:
Another point about the ‘protection plan’ offered for $50….. What if it’s purchased and never used? Where does that money go? The high schools are rolling out to 9th and 10th graders…. So approx 1400 kids per school? That’s $70,000…. Per school. Times all the high schools and junior highs…. Significant money. What’s the plan? Use that money to replace Chromebooks as they fail? Keep in mind that depending on which board meeting you attended, these devices have a life span of 2-4 years, which means they’re already at 25-50% of their useful lives, so those Chromebooks will need to be replaced. The override funding is supposed to pay for them.
*****
We already paid for these Chromebooks with our tax money. If we these are replacing textbooks, we are not legally obligated to pay either for insurance, or repairs, as we wouldn’t have to pay for wear and tear on physical books. Parents can’t be required to pay for a ‘free and appropriate public education.’ I’m going to write on the permission slip. “I do not have the ability to pay for the insurance plan, and will not cover the cost of repairs. I am not financially liable in any way. My child does have my permission to receive a Chromebook with the understanding that GPS maintain the device and assume the financial responsibility.”
*****
So, did I read it right? pay $50 for a protection plan that doesn’t cover the Chromebook if it is lost or stolen, in which you have to pay $200. So, buy the insurance, lose the device, and now you’re out $250.
Yes, parents can see through Christina Kishimoto’s new revenue stream gambit. We’ll have more information about how Chromebooks have become a flashpoint in GPS since school started … only a week ago. Sheeeesh.
Further, Kishimoto requires that students and their parents sign a nefarious Technology Device User Agreement that allows GPS technicians to decide how much parents will be charged for any repairs to GPS issued Chromebooks. To make things worse, GPS has a one-sided Use of Technology Resources Agreement, again requiring both parent and student signatures. There’s a big long list of *My rights* that people who sign this agreement give up. In return, GPS does nothing to protect the rights of students (or their parents).
BTW, the agreements apply only when GPS wants them to be applicable, and they NEVER apply when Christina Kishimoto’s sycophant Irene Mahoney-Baloney-Paige violates these policies and agreements. The newest bit of advertising on GPS property is shown below … we sure hope Irene Mahoney-Baloney-Paige was appropriately rewarded with some plastic surgery for herself in return for placing this ad at GPS Technology Services facing west bound traffic on Elliot and where car/bus traffic enter/exit GCA and Greenfield Elementary School. If this is the case, maybe we will give GPS a pass on more free advertising for Friends of Irene since it was for such a good cause.
What a racket! These circumstances call for a digression so the smoke obscuring Westie’s keyboard can dissipate.
A long, long time ago, I can still remember how … Bonus points if you recognize the opening of American Pie. When Don McLean decided to sell the manuscript of his famous song, he told Christie’s (the auction house handling the sale): “Basically in ‘American Pie,’ things are heading in the wrong direction. It is becoming less idyllic. I don’t know whether you consider that wrong or right but it is a morality song in a sense.” Examples of moral behavior have been conspicuously missing in GPS in recent years while the Loose Zipper Brigade roamed freely through the halls of the White Castle, but Christina Kishimoto’s *alleged* inappropriate relationship with her subordinate Charles Stevin Smith took that immoral behavior to a new height. Westie has the remedy: How The Morality Of ‘Star Trek’ Could Help Today’s Chaotic World.
There is a point to Westie’s stroll through American musical and cultural tradition as School Year 2016-2017 begins: Gilbert Public Schools, at least, the top levels of the administration and most of the members of the GPS governing board, have lost the concept of morality in crucial ways. The way that is most concerning as school begins involves issuing Chromebooks [again] to students in Kishimoto’s vaunted 1:1 technology extravapalooza. It seems that Kishimoto and her minions are determined to one-up last year’s Worst Technology Rollout EVER!
Christina Kishimoto’s policy changes are very concerning: the board gives her everything she demands. Events often prove Westie is on to something: at the board meeting just a few days after the Westie post featured below was published, Kishimoto’s Three Votes extended her employment contract (which still had a year to run) until 2019. Perhaps Westie’s prognostication scared the daylights out of Christina Kishimoto:
Members of the community are rallying to the cry “Fire Kishimoto!” ahead of the November election with three school board seats on the ballot. It looks like the run-up to the election might be hotter than the record-setting temperatures of the Summer of 2016. While taxpayers and citizens are trying to cope with triple digit temperatures, Christina Kishimoto is out to make HUGE changes in district policies. Many of of those changes will truncate the rights of parents and students in the district. Teachers don’t fare any better, BTW.
Gilbert Public Schools: one hundred years of tradition unhampered by progress. Or morality. Vote for Westie for Superintendent on Tuesday, November 8, 2016.
**************
Note to Irene Mahoney-Baloney Paige: Please contact some image consultants and give them lots of free advertising in return for some makeovers of the women at the top levels of GPS. They should start by banning Silly Jilly’s silly red hat.