Monologue Of A Preschool Consultant
By Brad Pike
Listen kids, I’m not here to ruin your preschool experience or dismantle the preexisting educational infrastructure; no, no, I’m here only to streamline this institution, to clean out the rust and grime slowing the conveyance of letter/color/number/shape curriculum into your adorable little brains. I’m here to upgrade your preschool from preschool 1.0 to preschool 2.0. That’s two, as in two eyes, two hands, two feet, 2 Fast 2 Furious, and so on and so forth, you get it.
First of all, from now on, you’ll all be performing data entry work for ManagedOutsource.com, so I hope your tiny fingers are fleet and nimble. In this way, we can complete two tasks at once: instill a basic understanding of numbers and exploit — excuse me — utilize a supplementary revenue source. That is to say, your ability to type and your need for validation from authority figures. Will this be arduous, mentally draining busy work? Yes, of course. But will it be any more banal and irritating than your usual cutting and pasting, matching, and tracing the same letters over and over? I submit that it may in fact be an improvement.
Are you paying attention? I can see your eyes lolling about as if from extraocular muscle spasms. Okay, everyone gets Adderall. Have all the Adderall in my pocket. Do not choke on the Adderall.
As I was saying, we’ll be selling off the brand name toys and replacing them with cardboard boxes from the dumpster behind Best Buy. You see, I have two cats. One day, I realized no matter what expensive remote control mouse or kitty pirate ship play set I buy them, they’ll still be more entertained by bottle caps and bits of string. Like my cats, you also have tiny undeveloped brains incapable of appreciating more sophisticated, nuanced toys — or, as your parents would say, you have limitless imaginations. Your unintelligence makes you susceptible to simple forms of stimulation like blocks and that weird rollercoaster toy in pediatrician waiting rooms; even a soft high pitched voice mesmerizes you, hence why none of you is upset by what I’m saying right now. I predict the cardboard boxes will receive universal approval.
And it goes without saying, the teachers, with their bloated salaries and penchant for unionizing, will be summarily terminated — yes, even your beloved Miss Rosie. She’ll have to find some other outlet for her “boundless joy” and “inspirational teaching style like Miss Honey from Matilda.” Instead, your new teachers will be an irregular rotation of freelance, early 20’s postgrads who will lecture you via Skype, each of them paid 1/10 the salary of a fully employed, onsite teacher. They’ll teach you how to tell time while they eat ramen noodles in sad unlit apartments, dressed only in sweatpants.
Furthermore, the playground is now called the Premium Outdoor Recreational Facility, and it costs 5 dollars for use during recess. Those who choose not to participate or lack necessary funds will stand in a pitch black room for one hour without speaking. For 10 dollars, children may take a nap on a yoga mat with the Toy Story blanket. For 20 dollars, I will drive them to Chuck E. Cheese and leave them there for the remainder of the day. You should also be aware the bathroom is now called the Premium Waste Disposal Facility, and it costs 2 dollars per use.
Don’t worry though because snack time will still be free. However, the snack will always be rice. One measuring cup of rice in a Styrofoam bowl alongside a Dixie cup of sugar water. Through my research, I found that tiny children’s physiologies require astonishingly few calories to operate, allowing us to reduce overhead on starvation prevention, particularly since we only need to do so until your parents arrive. Besides, our main focus is nourishing your tiny minds, not your tiny bodies. After all, bodies die. Minds live forever in the cosmic ether.
The class gerbil will be quietly suffocated, removed from the premises, and replaced with this AIBO I purchased at a garage sale.
All arts and craft supplies will be replaced with a single Magna Doodle to be shared amongst you.
No more field trips to the roller rink or the zoo. From now on, field trips will only be to the field next to the school. You must tuck your pants into your socks though because the field is full of chiggers and ticks.
Ah, but I hear your balking. Do not balk, children. You must understand: the previous business model of government funded early education that includes lemon cookies and such was fiscally irresponsible and unsustainable. You were merely riding a bubble of outrageous luxury, not unlike David Siegel, the Timeshare King, and it’s time to confront harsh budgetary realities, my dear sweet babies. Hold on, did any of you see Queen of Versailles? No one? Nobody? No? Oh well. Everyone get in your adorable little cubicles and start “learning.” Those reports aren’t going to type themselves.