Virginia Tech officials negligent in '07 shootings

Pace horses

Jury Finds Va. Tech Negligent in '07 Shootings (New York Times)

     The parents of two Virginia Tech students killed in a 2007 campus massacre worked for years to prove university officials were negligent for waiting to warn students of a gunman on campus, and a jury agreed with them on Wednesday.
. . .
     The parents' lawsuit argued that lives could have been spared if school officials had moved more quickly to alert the campus after the first two victims were shot in a dorm. The massacre ended later in the morning with the deaths 31 more people, including the gunman, at a classroom building.
. . .
     During the trial, the attorneys for the Prydes and Petersons portrayed campus police as leaping to the conclusion that the first two victims were shot by a jealous boyfriend, and that the gunman was not a threat to others.
     They presented evidence that campus leaders, including Steger, heeded the police conclusion without question, then waited 2 1/2 hours before sending a campus-wide warning that a "shooting incident" had occurred. It did not say a gunman was still at large.
. . .
     A state panel that investigated the shootings concluded that officials erred in not sending an alert earlier. The lag in issuing a campus warning also brought Virginia Tech a $55,000 fine from the U.S. Education Department, which the school is appealing….

The Fool's Golden State

Santa Monica College to offer two-tier course pricing (LA Times)

     Faced with deep funding cuts and strong student demand, Santa Monica College is pursuing a plan to offer a selection of higher-cost classes to students who need them, provoking protests from some who question the fairness of such a two-tiered education system.
     Under the plan, approved by the governing board and believed to be the first of its kind in the nation, the two-year college would create a nonprofit foundation to offer such in-demand classes as English and math at a cost of about $200 per unit. Currently, fees are $36 per unit, set by the Legislature for California community college students. That fee will rise to $46 this summer.
. . .
     Paul Feist, a spokesman for California Community Colleges Chancellor Jack Scott, said the plan does not appear to comply with state education codes, which have been interpreted to permit employers to offer contract courses to fill specific needs. Moreover, state law does not appear to allow students to be charged differential fees for the types of courses Santa Monica envisions offering, Feist said….

Looking out of state for what California once offered (Steve Lopez; LA Times)

Fool's gold (pyrite)

     …I had it good as a kid and didn't even know it. State leaders believed, back when I went to California schools, that a quality, affordable education for everyone was not just a civic virtue but an economic no-brainer.
     Today, the Golden State is making every effort to destroy its own best traditions. At every level of public education, from elementary school to graduate school, constant budget cuts are decimating once-great institutions and devaluing our greatest resource — eager young minds.
. . .
     You cannot fix any of this in a state more inclined to build prisons than schools, despite projections of a huge shortage of college-educated workers by 2025. You can't fix it when you're the only major oil-producing state with no excise tax, and you refuse to correct the huge property tax advantage Proposition 13 extended to corporations. You can't fix it without modest concessions from public employees, including teachers, on pensions and benefits.
     And you certainly can't fix it with three competing and unimaginative tax-increase proposals — one by Gov. Jerry Brown — that would restore some school funding, but are likely to do each other in come November.
     We used to be able to brag about our schools, and maybe we took quality for granted. That's all behind us now, and even mediocrity is fading from sight in the rearview mirror.