Sunday, June 5, 2016

Logan Jenkins on EUSD's $800,000 yoga program

Logan Jenkins in the U-T:
A raspberry — the Leaving in the Lurch award — to the Sonima (formerly Jois) Foundation, the classroom yoga benefactor that sucked the Encinitas Union School District in by underwriting yoga for several years and then yanking the funding for the 2016-17 academic year.

The district must now decide if it values its custom-designed yoga program, the one it fought for in court, highly enough to pay $800,000 for it.

[...]

Short of Sonima reversing course, Baird and the board are facing a hard political test. If they bow their necks and insist upon funding yoga at the current level, blowback will be harsh.

Yoga offers measurable benefits as physical (and mental) exercise, but elevating it above science and art?

That’s a stretch.

16 comments:

  1. The question that needs to be asked and answered and hasn't been so far, is, When did Baird know this was going to be defunded and when did he ascend to the advisory board of the yoga foundation?

    Answer that and something might be found to be relevant.

    This nonreligious, purposefully designed practice, will serve the students through their whole lives in a positive manner. What a shame that deception has become a part of this program.

    Who knew and when did they know? What were the instructors paid per month, per day, per season, however one wants to define their contribution.

    The foundation pulling the rug out after successfully fighting the religious zealots who always had the option to not participate for their kids appears to be a very questionable move if there original intentions were ever sincere in the first place. That appears to be the crux. I leave to others to fill in the blanks. Please contribute to the discussion if you have anything 'concrete' to add.

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  2. I find it disgusting that in the midst of this yoga controversy, Logan Jenkins feels the need to put in a last ditch plug for GASpar who is running for a seat on the Board of Supervisors. Out of all the hundreds of parents and he had to mention that one. What a horny old fart!

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    1. Jenkins also claimed she was the winner of the debates between Gaspar, Abed and Roberts. So much for journalistic impartiality. The old geezer is obviously enamored with Bsrbie.

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  3. 12:15pm.You must be new around here to expect anything more than what Logan is so well known for, going back years to his days with the North County Times. He was a hack then and still is. He can be bought and paid for with the easiest of persuasion. This is nothing new. We all can expect the same for as long as the Tribune sees fit to employ him. 'All The News That is Fit to Print' does not apply to Logan or the Tribune.

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  4. 12:43 I agree with your comments. Does 40 years plus of being here count for not being new?

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  5. Baird and the board has known this from the beginning. It was a three year grant. That's it! They knew this was coming and Baird deceptively put the preliminary budget without one mention of yoga on the agenda for a special board meeting at 2pm. This is nothing new for this crew but this time they were caught.

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  6. 1:38pm Yes, you like myself, do count for your time here. The NC Times used to tossed for free on my driveway and it never made it pass my trash cans after I took a quick look at Logans feature and some others. I never recall reading through any of his columns a second just to see if I had missed something of value. I never did. Logan never did either. Nothing has changed since the Trib took him on. He is a hack and always will be.

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  7. 2:46- Can you share more about what Baird knew? If he knew this and didn't disclose this to the public, I think some action should be taken against him. I have no idea what action, but a lot of time and money were dedicated to fighting to keep yoga in the schools. Yes, I know Dave Peck was a pro bono attorney for the parents, however, the school district's attorney didn't work for free, nor did the judge, court officials, etc. If this was known from Day 1, perhaps a different decision might have been made?

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    1. I knew, because I read the newspaper articles about the Jois/Sonima grants. There was no promise of future money.

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    2. The grant was never an open-ended grant. It was an inital $533k grant that was extended for a few more years with an additional $1.4 million. Jois/Sonima's plan is to spread their yoga program (which EUSD helped develop) to the entire country. There is no way they can start up new programs in other schools if they continue to fund EUSD, and every other school district in the country. Our district has provided Sonima with info to help their advertising efforts. Apparently yoga has helped EUSD see "an overall increase in district attendance by 0.386" Yep folks. Not sure how they came to that conclusion that yoga=better attendance. But (insert sarcastic voice) $800k is well worth seeing attendance go up by .386%. Right?! http://www.sonimafoundation.org/sonima-approach/encinitas-union-school-district-san-diego-county-california-results/
      sigh....School board meeting Tuesday the 7th. They vote on the budget June 21st.

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  8. Logan, Schmogan

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  9. "All the news that's fit to print" NOT! More likely "All the news that fits".

    Primary is Tuesday. Get out, vote and make your voice heard.

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  10. Baird is supposed to consider what is best for the students and not what is best for his own self interest. How did we ever end up with such venal leeches in leadership roles? Encinitas must be cursed!

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    1. Don't forget the leeches in retirement - there are dozens now. A group of 5 retirees cost the city a million a year - this is escalating. A referendum is needed.

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  11. 9:14am How did we end up with what we have on the EUSD board? The only answer is the lack of public awareness of who these people are and how they act toward their constituents. The public bought into the large campaign signs plastered illegally all over town with the three candidates listed as the choice of all the teachers in their district.

    Not even close but the truth mattered little. The bigger the signs, the larger the deception appeared to be. Will this year be any different?

    Just maybe, and even though a majority won't be possible this go around, hopefully a new breeze will start to blow, with eventually outing the superintendent and his so amenable board.

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