Is This Good News or Bad News?

It was the kind of headline that would normally get a snarky sentence or two in an edition of "Almost the News": Lakeville Students Up in Arms Over Graduation Ceremonies

Except for one unique occurrence, I would have followed that up with something about God's arms coming out of the sky and carrying away the Class of 2010 as they received their diplomas; or, at the risk of somebody going all "Have you forgotten Columbine?" on me, written a sentence about students with guns in the rafters.

The astute reader is now asking him or herself, "What unique occurrence was it that kept Dewey from treating this particular headline with his particular brand of insight?"

The answer, my friend, is not blowing in the wind. Rather, it is in the following statement: I actually read the news article.

[Respectful pause, allowing for the catching of breath and/or regaining of consciousness]

It seems that several families in the South-of-the-River (SOR) city of Lakeville are earning their titles: SOR-Heads. Having grown accustomed to holding their graduation ceremonies at a Twin Cities' premier event center, the recent command of the school board to cut costs by having graduates graduate from school at the actual school from which they are graduating was met with a determined lack of enthusiastic support.

The line of reasoning goes something like this: There's not as much seating available at the high schools. We would fill up the gymnasium, PLUS having people in the auditorium watching on closed-circuit television, and only have 4-to-6 tickets available per graduate. What about all of Johnny's out-of-town aunts and my second cousin's co-workers who are astounded that anyone from our family is actually completing high school?

The line of reasoning fails to take into account one undeniable True Truth: Most of Johnny's relatives would pay good money to NOT have to sit through a high school graduation.

I think I just solved education's problem with underfunding.