Will Branson’s children being educated in 2012 be as blessed as those being educated in 2005?

“Wow Seagull, that’s a lot of money to spend on education.”

“That’s certainly one way to look at it but, in reality, isn’t it an investment in the future of our children and grandchildren?

“Oh, give me a break Seagull, I don’t have a problem with giving our kids the best education possible but why do they have to build a new football stadium when they have a perfectly good one at the junior high?

“I know you asked first but, your concerns about the football stadium aside, where would the education of Branson’s children be if the $35.8 million dollars used to fund the new high school and the improvements to the Cedar Ridge elementary complex had not been authorized by the voters in 1998?”

Hey, here’s an idea, let’s close the new high school that was built with the proceeds of the 1998 bonds, take the students currently attending it and move them back to the “old” high school. Of course to do that the 7^th and 8^th graders currently attending class at the old high school, the “new” junior high, would have to go back to the Cedar Ridge complex. Oh, what the heck, while we’re at it let’s remove that portion of the Cedar Ridge complex that was built or improved with the 1998 bonds.

“Now that’s just stupid Seagull. There’s no practical way that either the junior high or the Cedar Ridge complex would be able to efficiently handle the load under those conditions. Are you suggesting that we move kids back to the old elementary school downtown or add whatever number mobiles it takes, to handle the situation?”

“No, just describing the type of conditions that our children’s education would be challenged with today if the bond issue had not been authorized in 1998 for the new high school and the improvements to the Cedar Ridge elementary complex that it funded.”

Things can always be better managed, particularly in hind site, and will never work out so that everyone is satisfied simply because our personal perspectives, perceptions, concerns, values, and priorities are different. In an Ole Seagull’ s opinion, peripheral issues, what ever they are, should not cloud over what should be the primary concern, the quality of the education that our children and grandchildren are receiving. The quality of the education that is so basic and vital to their ability to effectively live and compete in a much more advanced, complex, hectic, and technical world than any generation before them has ever had to face.

In 1998, as the voters went to the polls they had to answer the question, “Where will the education of Branson’s children be in 2005 if we don’t pass this bond issue?” In Apr. of 2005, as voters go to the polls, the children of the district reap the benefits of the choice the voters made in 1998. An Ole Seagull’s prayer would be that the children being educated as voters go the polls in 2012 will be as blessed.