(Opinion) Sometimes lessons learned in school are about how we run the schools themselves. Consider two stories currently in the news One is about the ongoing ceiling, mold, rodent, and HVAC problems plaguing city school buildings. The city has arrived at a consensus that we need to wo rk harder to get on top of those problems. The larger lesson came this week from a former school board chair, Carlos Torre. He noted that when the state poured $1.5 billion into the city a generation ago to build and rebuild new schools, nobody included money to maintain the buildings. So systems broke down fast. The lesson: When we undertake big public building projects, maybe we can put a little less money into the overall construction and move it to ongoing preventive maintenance. Another lesson came from a funding problem that has already emerged with a brand-new citywide after-school program. The city announced the new program with (deserved) pride. But it didn’t do the advance work to make sure it could be paid for: Just three weeks in, its near-term funding future is in doubt. That’s because the Board of Alders, which needs to OK contracts over $100,000, had never said OK to two such contracts for the program. And it declined last week to fully approve those new contracts, because it had concerns that needed addressing before the program began. One lesson: Do your budget homework in advance. Second lesson: City government’s social-service division, the Community Services Administration, seems to be having trouble in general getting work done right these days. Those are among the lessons considered in this week’s opinionated vlog local news roundup direct from the New Haven Independent assignment desk — er, compost heap. Click on the above video to watch it. Reminder: As always, this video represents the opinions of one person, not the Independent itself. The post Lessons Learned At School — About School appeared first on New Haven Independent. ...read more read less