Frustration Station

Frustrated. Irritated. Slowly liking the sounds of Socialism (kidding. kind of). Whatever title you want to put on it, I'm over it today.

Grant writing - that's cool. Grant searching - that's some bs.

Tell me if this should make sense to anyone...

There is a foundation (I will leave it unnamed in case I ever need anything from them!) that has a lot of money. A LOT. More than they will ever know what to do with. Let's just say their charitable contributions from 2002 to 2010 were $690 million. $690 MILLION. After they spend $1 million, they still have $689 million left. I can't even wrap my mind around that. You know what else I can't wrap my mind around?

These are two of their areas of focus:
1. Healthy and Active Lifestyles: to support access to exercise, physical activity, and nutritional education programs, programs that motivate behavior modification, and programs that encourage lifestyle/behavioral changes.
2. Education: to support scholarships, school drop-out prevention, access to education programs, and other education initiatives.

That sounds really great, right? Then why the hell don't they support local sports or athletic teams or, my personal favorite, SCHOOLS?!! Don't want to support sports teams? Fine. There are a lot of them and the benefit of each team could be disputed. Whatever. But schools? Is this real life? I know that no one from this particular foundation has ever visited this part of MS (or likely any part), but let me explain something --- if kids are getting any help, participating in any activity, and, for the most part, getting any supervision, they.are.at.school.

Another organization I ran across today wants to reduce poverty, but doesn't fund after-school programming. Brilliant. What do they think children living in poverty do once school is out? Jump in their car and run to the mall with their friends? That would be really cool if this town had a mall. Or kids that could afford cars.

Needless to say, today I'm a Negative Nancy. I hate knowing money is out there and basically not being allowed to have it because we are a school. Heaven forbid we educate children in a sufficient environment. Additionally, a woman near me cleared her throat 13 times in 4 minutes. It took every ounce of self-control in my body not to slam my face into my desk.

Weren't 4 day weeks supposed to be better?