i am so discouraged this week... i work with at risk children and am trying to keep a kinder camp going... but the children come from different parts of the valley... we have a grant that pays for the busing during the school year... but it only covers us through April... the bus company wants 300+ dollars a day to transport a handful of children... my grant for camp won't cover any of that... so i am riding the city bus with the kids to and from school... i have to pray that their will be room on the bus for all the kids.... that the parents will be at the stops on time.... when i ask the parents to help each other and they don't... when i ask the parents to help they can"t... and no one helps... you ask the bus company and they want 300 a day... i understand that some of the parents really can't help .... but you know when we have a fun activity at school... when i have snow trucked in... when i have a party... they all get there... ok now my rant is almost over... what i wanted to say is until we as a society look at children as a value... child abuse and neglect will never end... do you know the employees at fast food chains make more money to start then most preschool teachers???? how do you expect to get highly qualified teachers who are educated for min wage????... i am educated... i have one of the higher paying positions in early childhood and i make about 40k less then a prison guard... maybe if we started putting more money into early childhood education... we wouldn't need the prison guards... ok now that i have ranted i don't feel so much like taking it out on myself ... lyn