SteamedPress

Well, a family member just informed me that she “hates budget cuts!”

If you’ve been following the fiscal fiasco taking place in California, then you’ve heard the stories about all the budget slashing that is proposed and taking place. Social programs, our beautiful state campgrounds, prison staffing, public health and safety…they’re all staring at the chopping block. And education? Seems like it’s always facing the sharp edge of the ax no matter what promises the politicos make.

My aforementioned family member goes to a local state university. Not only has the cost of a semester gone up over $200 (now exceeding $2,000 for 12 or more units), but the school has apparently chopped much of the History Department, my family member’s major.

Here’s the part that really gets me up to a full head of steam: the former head football coach of our “Fighting Whatevers” receives an annual salary of OVER $715,000.  Think about that, sports fans. Nearly three-quarters of a million bucks for showing supposedly smart young athletes how to throw a ball to a team mate and then run to the other end of the field. Or how to stop that opposing player from getting to the other end of the field. (And I say “supposedly smart” because, after all, they are in college, right? I mean, the school administrators wouldn’t let a kid into the school if he wasn’t smart, would they?)

Now, some pundits would counter my outrage by saying that professional college football adds millions of dollars to a school’s bottom line from admissions and advertising (oh, and don’t forget beer, nachos, and roasted peanuts). My point is, college is supposed to be teaching our precious youts (see a hilarious movie My Cousin Vinny for an explanation of “youts”)  to be smart and get a good job and make a good salary.  Our schools should not be wasting god-knows-how-much $$$$ on the 0.001% of the college population that’s using their college experiences to get into the grinder that is the NFL.

How many professors and how many classes could be made available for nearly three-quarters of a million bucks? Hmmm? Class? Anyone?  The answer is A LOT!  And now here’s the kicker: the former head football coach, known for being one of the losing-est in the school’s long history isn’t even coaching, not this season, not next season…because he’s so lousy. Yet he’s still getting paid. Who were the lunkheads who signed off on that contract, I wonder.

School officials want to stress that taxpayers’ money is not being used to pay off the coach. Instead, generous local benefactors have pledged nearly $1 million of the $1.4 mil still owed the guy. Had I been in on the contract writing, I’d have put in an incentive clause: You Don’t Win, You Don’t Get Paid.  I guess I don’t get it, but there’s something seriously wrong with the entire picture, folks. Something seriously wrong when a useless coach gets paid a king’s ransom of a salary and a hard-working, training-our-future leaders professor gets a pink slip.

I  could go on but the steam is starting to scald…

Your thoughts?