Laboratories of Innovation

Yesterday, a new bill was signed by the Governor of South Carolina. Now, South Carolinians have never been known for their education. In fact, we are constantly falling into the bottom five states in the nation. It's quite sad. This is one of the myriad of reasons we opted for virtual school. Anyways, thanks to our State Superintendent of Education, Mick Zais, and our Governor, Nikki Haley, charter schools are receiving more recognition. They just passed house bill 3241 which will allow all charter school students the opportunity to participate in sports and clubs at their local brick and mortar public school.
This is exciting to a lot of virtual school students, however, the brick and mortar public school students are not quite as happy. They are worried of the competition and they feel that they will lose money to the virtual school students. They shouldn't b/c my son is zoned for "Blank Blank" Elementary School. Our taxes go to support that school and if he went to that school then those funds would be spend on him. Instead, I keep him home with the virtual school. Less money is spent on him. He has a few teachers, he has an IEP but none of these teachers or therapists have to drive anywhere. They all help teach my son from the comfort of their own home. They are all paid less. No lunch ladies or janitors have to be paid because there is no school to clean and no students to cook for. There are minimal utilities to pay because they have one little office of administrative people in Columbia. Less money goes towards this charter school and for my son so to keep it all even, yeah, he should be able to participate in the local school. My son probably won't unless it's the science club or martial arts or something but he has that option. =o) I think it's pretty awesome!
So, time for the speeches. The first two speakers I pretty much spaced out for. Not really sure if they were interesting or not. Once Dr. Zais started speaking, I couldn't draw my ears away. He spoke about many of the reasons we chose this path for our children's education. I loved it! So, here is a youtube video of it and enjoy. Dr. Zais doesn't start speaking until about 3 1/2 minutes into it and then Governor Haley is after him -- her speech is good too. :) YAY!!