Nancy Hamant: Teacher layoffs will have devastating impact

From Nancy Hamant, May 8, 2010
Subject: Fwd: ....and "they" think that the schools will go along with a 2.5% increase...

Literally, thousands of teachers are being laid off across Ohio. Among them, the youngest and most technologically astute group. The impact for Ohio students will be devastating and will affect their futures totally.

The impact for the STRS retirement and healthcare funds will be insurmountable when added to the economic crises losses incurred by the STRS funds. In light of Thursday's wild ride of the stock market, Ohio and the nation are still in the grips of one of the worst recessions/depressions to face our citizens.

Whether our nation and Ohio will recover from this mess is yet to be seen. It certainly appears that STRS will be facing unbelievable losses to the pension and healthcare funds for years to come. We all need to demand that our elected congress members, both Ohio and federal, work together to get us out of this mess and to stabilize the economy and to sustain a path of recovery. To continue the partisan fighting will only exacerbate the problems Ohio and the nation are facing.

Nancy (Hamant)