I just spent the day serving on jury duty at the Ventura County Courthouse as I do every year. During that time, I had the opportunity to do a little thinking. Allow me to demonstrate using some basic math.

There were at least 100 people there. They only started one trial that day, which required 12 people. There are 58 counties in California, all with at least one courthouse. So using the roughest of numbers, that's 5,800 people summoned each day.

Multiply that by the 200 or so days per year the courthouses are open and eight hours per day.

That equates to 9.28 million people-hours annually. Only 12 percent of the people summoned were required.

Let's be generous and double that, which is about 25 percent. Using that percentage, I figure about 7 million hours are wasted in jury duty every year in this state.

I have plenty more thoughts about this wasteful, ridiculous system, but rather than complain I'd like to offer up an idea for others to consider.

In a day and age when our educational budgets are being slashed and convicted criminals are being set free early because there's not enough room for all of them in prison, why can't I have the option of getting pre-qualified for a day of volunteer service in the educational system instead?

I, for one, would be happy to be summoned for such a task (jury duty, not so much).

And imagine this: If that were the case, maybe all those wasted hours could be put to use helping educate our children so they don't end up in the criminal justice system in the first place.

Just a thought. Rudy Poe Thousand Oaks