Check out this article from Yahoo News about Pickerington Schools up in Columbus.
Source article from Yahoo News:
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Administrators at the Pickerington Local School District in Ohio are gearing up for an August levy vote to avert the need to make $7 million in budget cuts. Superintendent Karen Mantia estimates 30 more educator jobs will be cut during the 2012-13 school year if the levy does not pass. While some school administrators and staff are blaming the planned state funding cuts for the district’s financial woes, there is a lot more to consider than the lack of availability of taxpayer funds.
According to the fiscal information on the school website the projected $5 million state funding cuts for this school year would only scale the district back to 2008 funding amounts. The districts experienced at least $5 million per year in increased taxpayer funds since 2000. The school garnered $15 million in state assistance in 2000 and $45 in 2010.
Unsustainable spending is an issue for not just the Pickerington Local School District, but public schools and agencies throughout Ohio. A business as usual approach to funding schools and entitlement programs is simply not feasible without drastically increasing taxes. The fiscally responsible measures detailed in Ohio’s Jobs Budget and Senate Bill 5 are not meant to punish schools or attack public employees, but to ensure districts and agencies can remain solvent without adding to the burden of taxpayers.
Voters residing in the Pickerington Local School District said “no” to a levy increase last year. Residents currently pay $1,303 in property taxes on homes valued at $100,000 and a 1 percent income tax to support the school district.
Even if the 2011 levy gains approval the $500 per student extracurricular fee per sport will still stand. The proposed levy would generate nearly $6 million and add $168 to the average property tax bill. Salaries and benefits comprise the largest portion of the budget. Administrator salaries range from $75,000 to $144,000 per year.
Beginning in 2007 the district initiated a plan to reduce operational expenses by $7 million. During the same time period the district opened three new school buildings. The taxpayer-funded federal stimulus plan added funds to the district’s coffers last fiscal year when the Strickland administration funding formula reduced state assistance by $2 million for the district. Cost saving measures enacted by the district include nearly $3 million for non-replacement of resigning or retiring employees, more than $1 million in transportation cuts and in excess of $300,000 by eliminating positions.
Unlike the Columbus City School District, Pickerington Local does not have audit findings, ongoing fraud investigations or low test scores. Parents within the school community are concerned about access to extracurricular activities with the $500 price tag per club or athletic team. Although school officials are skirting the subject, there is fear that district enrollment will drop as parents exercise the open enrollment option to transport their children to nearby schools so they can continue to enjoy sports and academic clubs.
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Sounds good doesn’t it? Well, I thought that was what schools were doing all along.
Read more about Global Integration Models here:
http://www.pickerington.k12.oh.us/school_NewsArticle.aspx?artID=1781&schoolID=16
It’s really a progressive program designed to teach our kids to move into a globalized government, which I’m against as a tax payer. Here’s what it’s really about:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/20729275/Poverty-Reduction-Policies-and-Global-Integration
Rich Hoffman
https://overmanwarrior.wordpress.com/2010/12/04/ten-rules-to-live-by/
http://twitter.com/#!/overmanwarrior
www.overmanwarrior.com
The Gunfighter's Guide: 
I have been following the comments at the Columbus Dispatch regarding newspaper articles about this Karen Mantia. Lots of people are angry about what Pickerington has done, both in hiring her, paying her a king’s ransom, and then allowing her to have her way and now she’s bailing out while they are trying to wring more tax money out of the people. Pickerington used to be a nice, quiet little rural community but it quickly turned into a bedroom community for Columbus and then it started turning into a ghetto annex. The taxes have gone through the roof and the people who have lived there for years are being taxed right out of their houses. Mantia just got an award for installing Globalism into the elementary school in Pickerington so Big Brother likes her.
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Well, this woman (Karen Mantia) has been poluting minds for a long time. She is following in the footsteps of Kathy Klink, who pushed this agenda during her tenure at Lakota. If people had paid attention to me and to Helen Shumaker while we were on the school board some of this indoctrination could have been avoided. People labeled us as “kooks” and listened to those who did not have the best interests of the children on their minds. Klink brought many “change agents” into the district, but Darryl Root and Tom Hayden were on the same track.
These things started with the “death and dying education (kids wrote their own obituary at the lower elementary grades, made a coffin and visited a cemetary, some even visted a mortuary),” explicit sexual indoctrination including putting a condom on a banana in the lower grades, blaming the United States of Ameriva for the problems of the world, etc.
Phyllis Schlafley has written about the “Child Abuse in the Classroom” for years. She puts out a monthly “Education Reporter.” She even lists the horrible items supported by the NEA.
Most have to do with explicit sexuality, homosexual endorsements, women’s rights, abortion and many other communistic ideas that serve to destroy the family. Some pretty horrible people are in charge of the NEA, AFT, state and local teacher’s unions.
This “Globalization” strategy serves to alienate our children against our country, puts them on a guilt trip for all of the poor in the world and destroys their love of family, God and country. Remember this is not new. This has been tried thoughout history.
I’m afraid that these rules of indoctrination are implemented in the private schools too. The only way to avoid the indoctrination of your children will be to “home school” them. This is much easier than you think. Most schools serve us as “babysitting services” anyway. If people truly love their children, they will pull them out of government controled schools. I foresee that eventually “home schooled children” will be required to pass state/federal tests to make sure they are “believers” of the mandated thinking.
Welcome to the New World Order. You get to pay for the destruction of your children and your country in the process.
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I am in the Pickerington School District. Everyone in Lakota needs to be aware of this person. I do not believe she left Pickerington for Lakota. She left because she was feeling the heat for her unethical treatment of my son. He stood up to her and told everyone at a school board meeting that she was not to be trusted as her actions were different from her words. 22 days he was told that his truck had been hit on during a “random” search. No drugs were found. He did have a small package of K2 and I had forgotten to take my mace out of the truck which is mine. The police didn’t even make a police report. The dog hit on a student walking by and the police made the dog sit back down. My sons truck was the only one searched. “Doctor” mantia decided that the K2 was a look a like drug agaist the police findings and held my mace against my son. My son, a senior< was expessed for 55 days. He had ZERO points on his record. He tried to commit suicide. He did not graduate. When he returned to school on May 16 his classes were switched around. This happened for three days. On the third day he was told that he was going to have 5 days charged with truency. He was approved for his senior project during this time. He went home and cut himself. He went to graduation to play in the band. After graduation he was talking to a teacher Mantia walked by. She looked nhim in the eyes and gave him a great big "I got you" smile. Mantia laughed about it. I drive a bus for the district and had been in fear for my job as she does get even with anyopne who speaks out against her. Monday at the board meeting I finally spoke up and let the community know what she and the school board had done to my son. The next day she emailed the board to say she was resigning for personal reasons. She had been confronted by numerous people about her behavior. A teacher told me she quit because I had spoken up. I do not believe she was on Lakota's short list. (You may be able to find that out.) WEdnesday it was denied that an email was sent out to the board. Thursday she was hired by Lakota. What school district wouldn't want the "Superintendent of the Year"? This is a joke by the way. There are no stats for her Global Learning Hub. It is expensive and she hired even more administrators after firing teachers. She left because she had to get out of the fire she had created from her"gopd" complex. lakota needing a superintendent was just a bonus. Good Luck your district is going to need it.
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I can’t tell you how many of these types of comments I’ve heard about her. She sounds like a really bad person, aside from being very expensive. That’s a shame.
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Dear Betty,
Your story is a story we hear often. Our current superintendent has been doing similar things to students. He upholds bad teachers and coaches against the students. There will be several law suits against the district because of his lack of managerial skills. They will always take up for the teachers, parents and students that follow their line and work for their levies. I suspect that even the scholarships are handed out per rigging of the GPA’s. Seems funny that the kids whose parents serve on their “committees” and work for the levies in a big way end up receiving the top awards, get picked for the teams and the parents even get
nice jobs. One in particular works in the central office here. They get away with their evil because so few are aware of what is going on and too few are as brave as you are to tell the story for us to know how things work.
Sad to say, these are the people whose “only concern is the children.” Yah, right!
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