Idaho School District Levy Fails, So Kids Will Take P.E. Classes Online

Here's what you get when school funding meets the No Taxes Ever crowd: In the microscopic school district for the town of Lapwai, Idaho (population 1137), the voters turned down a supplemental levy last week, the second failure of a school funding levy this year. And so kids in the district will have to take their Physical Education classes online . Yes. Online P.E. classes:

Lapwai School District Superintendent David Aiken told the Lewiston Tribune  [paywall link -- Dok Z.] the district can't afford to hire a physical education teacher, so students will have to take PE through the Idaho Digital Learning Academy, a state-sponsored online school.

Students will have access to the school gym and equipment, "but the teacher is on the other side of the computer," Aiken said.

That should go well. We're not sure if the students will do this all together, or on a study-at-your-own-pace basis, or what, but it's pretty goddamn depressing, and this is coming from a Doktor Zoom what hated P.E. because he was a wimp who'd rather sit and read. Presumably, the online classes will not include a smartphone app that yells at you to run laps, though if students are in need of being called a faggot-assed weakling, they can still go read YouTube comments.

In addition to the switch to online gym classes, the funding shortfalls have resulted in staff cuts, including the loss of

four and a half teaching positions, a mental health counselor, three para-educators, a bookkeeper, an attendance secretary, a custodian and a bus driver.

And on top of that, all foreign language instruction will be done online, and the district hasn't had a music program in two years. One thing that will be kept: classes in the Nez Perce language, since Lapwai is the capitol of the Nez Perce reservation.

In a sane world, school funding would be state based and not subject to the whims of local voters, but that would probably be tyranny, because who in their right mind would ever agree to their tax dollars funding a bunch of Native American kids' education when they're just going to end up a bunch of welfare-dependent takers anyway? Besides, if there's any extra money for schools (and this being Idaho, there isn't), it needs to go to a tax cut.

And once again, let us continue our Molly Ivins celebration with a relevant quotation:  

"You can't say throwing money at public education won't work," an East Texas senator used to say. "Because we've never tried it."

[ Associated Press ]