Gov. Schwarzenegger Explains California School Cutbacks On Kimmel (VIDEO)

"Jimmy Kimmel Live" returned from a short break last week just in time for all the back-to-school talk. Kimmel mentioned that due to budget restrictions in California, 16 school districts are cutting the school year by five days, which will save the state around $250 million. To get some inside information about the cuts, Kimmel checked out a video from California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger addressing just that. Let's just say, the governor relies on his past film credits to explain how he's going to "terminate" the budget problems with a two-day school week.

WATCH:

Comments

[formerroadie]

03:19 PM on 09/08/2010

Arnold: "I'm a Republican. We have no money. The first thing we must cut is Education. That is correct, right? I mean, we Republicans hate education."

[Cyke101]

12:59 PM on 09/08/2010

Old jokes, but still funny

[noob1]

12:30 PM on 09/08/2010

Working only 2 days a week sounds pretty sweet!

[woody7]

12:40 PM on 09/08/2010

Yea, I gave up 6 days already, without pay I might add. I guess next year I will pay the school district for the right to work for free.

[havenner]

04:24 PM on 09/08/2010

My wife is a teacher at LAUSD. She has picked up Saturday classes every day in the semester to make up for furlough days. She's working 6 days a week except for the furlough weeks (where she is working 5).

She also picked up department chair without extra pay, because at 5-years she's the only one that has survived layoffs and relocations long enough to take the job.

In the meantime, young teachers are losing their jobs by the thousands or substituting for themselves for little pay and no benefits. No new teachers are getting jobs at all because tenured ones are being relocated to fill vacancies.

My wife's room is infested with bugs and rodents. The kids have no supplies. There are few books. Her classroom holds 30-40 kids. And the LA Times is publishing the names of teachers who are scoring poorly compared to other teachers without taking into account principal bias, classroom conditions, or behavior problems.

The district failed to pay my wife 2 months in a row and the overtime she worked to make up for furlough came in 60 days late.

Now the district wants to tie compensation into test scores that have been proven to be inadequate, misleading, and arbitrary.

Our household is barely afloat.

It's not sweet. It's a crisis.

[FrankenPC]

01:01 PM on 09/09/2010

The really sad part of our education crisis is that the ramifications won't be seen for about 10-20 years.

Americans can't remember what happened 48 hours ago. How are we supposed to vote a conscience issue which will only pay off in one to two decades?

[cjaco]

07:12 PM on 09/11/2010

And unfortunately, your wife is one of many. I too have the same experience in LAUSD - and we have seven more furlough days this year. Sigh.