Well, I just heard on the news today that nothing was resolved while all of you were in session.  Tell me why, and can I just say, “Come on!”  This is frustrating. You have to agree to cut something.  If not now, then when?  I will feel totally disillusioned by the entire system if you dare to go on your undeserving extended break and resolve nothing. 

Today, I went to an IB presentation.  This is exciting stuff.  And I think our principal can pull this off with the support of the district office and community members. We have great teachers who can offer great things to kids! BUT the principal’s hands are tied until the legislature does SOMETHING so that we have numbers to work with and can plan accordingly.  Our lives are at a standstill and you tell Governor Patterson NO.  Our jobs are in jeopardy and you don’t come to Albany prepared to do some tough work.  The public perception of all of you is getting worse and worse.  Please do something.

So today we are feeling the first squeeze of the impact of our economy. Although New York State representatives have told us it was coming, it still hurts to think that our financial support is being slashed mid-year.  Nothing has been set in stone, but it is on the table.  Everything is on the table!

I have been an avid watcher of Morning Joe for almost a year now.  One thing that really caught my attention (from Mika and Joe) this past month as we all watch the economy go down the tubes is that NO ONE at the federal level has told us that we need to tighten our belt buckles and live differently and accept that things are going to be hard.  I give Governor Patterson kudos for taking a look at everything at the state level; he is asking us to live differently.  But it affects our district in SO many ways.  Not only do we receive state aid that will be cut, but we also have a Teacher Center and we receive a Mentor Teacher Internship Program Grant through our State Education Dept. Both of these grants are proposed to be cut as well and deep cuts they are!

Talk about living differently. What really has struck me the most in this onslaught of economic bad news is that I am watching my mother’s retirement dwindle.  She did not have much to start with and now this has hit her hard.  How long will she have to work to make up what she lost? Why didn’t I see this sooner and pull her money out and put it somewhere safer?

Another item that I can’t seem to overcome is that I can’t stand the idea of Medicaid and Healthcare expenses being cut.  Who will this affect?  It scares me because I feel this will hurt a lot of people who don’t have the resources to make up this loss.   I personally feel that the Health Insurance Companies won’t feel the pinch.  This really will just be passed on to the average person or worse.

Someone told me today that in her own perverse way that she sees this as an opportunity, a challenge and that we will be okay.  We just have to think differently.  I sure hope so because this is a very uncomfortable feeling.  We already have a hard time complying with unfunded state mandates.  The grants and state aid help us to meet the bare minimum expectations, and times are changing.  Now what?

So, I have continued to work on my Facebook page, and I have discovered why so many find it a cool way to network and keep in touch with friends.  First of all, I find it FUN to go to my friends’ pages and see what they are up to on a daily basis.  This is SO much easier than email.   I found out that Katie is remodeling today and that Antoinetta has a new job.  Barb and Tim are in Texas, and Colleen is connecting with her children.  AND a lot of people are cleaning their houses this weekend, and they know that I was at laundromat washing my GIANT comforters.   The joy of all this is that it took me less than 5 minutes.  No email needed.  Email seems so archaic now.  I checked the home page and found out the status of my friends, and they can do the same with me!  AND I found some new friends today.  I now see why kids love this web 2.0 tool.

So, the other thing that I love is that I can see the potential for so much more.  I started a visual book shelf. This is where I track what I have read, what I want to read and what I am reading now.  Although this has limited use right now because I am still just playing with the tool, I like to see what others are reading and how they rate the books.  AND the other part of this is that I am no longer limited to just my friends.  I can see what everyone in the network is reading and read their reviews.  Another GREAT tool for an avid reader like me. 

I joined a group of educators using Facebook.  I am not sure how much dialogue this group engages in around this web 2.0 tool, but I am hoping to hear their connections for educators such as principals and teachers in the classroom.  There is so much potential.  I noticed one of our teachers has an account and many of her students are her ”friends.”  She is such a great model and continues to connect with kids using these tools.  I can’t wait to talk more with her about how she uses this with her students.   

Okay, can you tell I am excited?  And yet I still wonder why I am so excited?  Maybe because it is easy.  Maybe because I am a social person in my heart, so it is a wonderful way for me to stay connected.  BUT I think it goes beyond that.  Stay tuned.

I started a Facebook account today. So here is what I am noticing:

·     It is private.  You can only see my account if I invite you or if you ask to be invited/to be my friend.  As I perused the sites, I noticed that many are private, but I am also seeing that some aren’t.    Hence, I can see how this would be a danger to some students.  Where do they learn how to discriminate who to ‘accept’ as a friend and who to block?

·     This is all so new to me.  I also got the essence of Facebook and MySpace, but I never tried it for myself. I am doing this so that I can see why many of my friends and many of our students love it so!  As soon as I added my high school and college info, Facebook did an automatic search for me and I saw names and faces of people who are on Facebook and I KNOW THEM!  I only invited one person so far. She is my trainer from the BAC.  I am sure kids LOVE that Facebook does some basic networking for them.  That was WAY cool!  I saw people from college that I have not seen in 17 years.  I noticed that one of my friends that I found on Facebook by conducting a very simple search has 99 friends.  Friends of friends of friends…you can see how fast this can travel and how much you can learn from one’s page.  Be careful what you publish!

·     After spending the last two hours, trying to figure out what I want to do with my page, I began to add pics.  That was fun, but took a while as I am a bit choosy about what I want published and what I want for my private folders.  I wonder if and how students discriminate between published and non-published materials.

·     Am I supposed to write something?  I can’t wait to start delving into others’ pages to see what they publish.  

Another thing I noticed today, my Clustermap on this blog suddenly got a few more dots, and one dot is pretty big.  All of a sudden, I am WAY more conscientious about what I am writing.  I wish more of our students blogged in school about their work.  It is so meaningful to know that others are taking a look at my work.  I am not getting comments, but I am getting some hits, so that brings a level of higher expectation in my work.  Before, I was writing for myself, and now it feels as if the whole world could be watching.  How fun is that?!