Thank you, Editors, for suggesting that now is the time to use the "contingency fund" of $11 million in order to present a balanced budget. That fund is our anti-missile defense system. Collier County Schools has four times the budget that Rockford schools has as well as twice as many people and households. Nevertheless, even with all this new money to manage, our new leadership has decided upon a Chicken Little approach to next year. We do have the capability to deflect the bomb. A recent NDN article points out that we face 8 to 20 million dollars of budget cuts and the FTE of 410 fewer students. It’s perhaps important for Naples citizens to put those numbers in context. $20 million, the worst-case scenario according to Superintendent Thompson, is only 1.5 % of our budget. A less than 2% reduction in income should hardly be cause to claim that the sky is falling. The slashing will mangle us; all connected with the schools will be very miserable for the sake of such a paltry savings. There must be another reason. Should we cut 83 teaching positions, cut the high school schedule, cut 7 ESE counselors, cut 7 gifted teachers, cut $800,000 worth of new administrators? If the Superintendent’s Consolidation Plan has as its objective improved student achievement and development I’d say that all this cutting is a big mistake. Cutting high school courses from 8 to 7 or even 6, cutting required credits from 32 to 28 or even 24, cutting out gifted guidance positions, cutting care givers for the Severely Emotionally Disabled youth in our schools is too much cutting for the wrong reasons. Of course the Thompson Plan is about adding, too. We add 41 reading coaches and 12 math specialists. We add 4 new assistant principals (to use Dr. Abalos phrase) to the tune of $95,200 each. But what is that other reason? We are not a manufacturing town like Rockford. I think the board should reject the Superintendent’s Consolidation Plan. It's too much like dumping the paraplegic out of the wheelchair. I say, don’t Buy the Lie. We've been doing a very good job, regardless of what the flawed tests say about us. Home sales for January are up 12% over last January. Lots of our students have graduated from or are holding their own in the nation's best colleges. If we continue to denigrate our local schools, we will certainly discourage prospective buyers. Naples has always been bomb-proof. Less education is not better—for anyone. Shoot down the Thompson bomb before it enters the atmosphere. School board members, please, vote with Kathleen Curatolo to keep the block. Don't fire anyone who is doing a good job. Keep your eyes on the stars. The moon won't stay dark for long. It’s time to stop Shaking Up the Schoolhouse. It’s time to stop saving money on the backs of teachers and students. It’s time to stop changing the schedule. It’s time to stop the cuts of teaching positions, guidance counselors, and ESE special assistants. It’s time to stop the Thompson 3-year Consolidation Plan. It's time to stop intimidating, humiliating, and oppressing teachers and students. We don’t need to reinvent our nation’s high schools. We don’t need to reinvent 9th Grade. We don’t need to restructure our schedule. We don’t even need any more money. What we do need is to sheathe the knife. Collier County Schools, contrary to what the scores on paper say, is doing a superb job with the flesh and blood of human interaction in the classroom.