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I talked to some legislators and heard part of a debate in the Senate. Actually, that was kinda funny. I was in the restroom and they pipe in the Senate for you to listen while taking care of your restroom business. So it's Missouri's version of CSPAN I guess. They were arguing about whether to increase fines for drug arrests and use the revenue to increase funding for the highway patrol. Seems like a no brainer to me but they were having a fairly lively debate.
We spent some time talking to our congress critter who represents the area where our school is. She is a great solid Dem and is strongly opposing the bills we want her to oppose. She had done some great research and I was impressed with what she knew.
We went to a great workshop on legislative issues and I learned a lot about the 65% proposition. It is a nationwide effort, funded by wealthy Republicans, to take local control over budgets from school boards. (The guy who started Overstock.com is bankrolling it.) There is 65% legislation being considered in 30 states. It varies from state to state, but basically, it mandates that school districts must spend 65% of their budget on instruction. Sounds fair at face value until you look into the nitty gritty details. The services that are NOT considered instructional include nurses, counselors, librarians and principals. Yes, PRINCIPALS. That alone is nuts. Anyone who doesn't realize how much of an impact principals have on instruction has never worked in education. (Cha ching! Kind of like the wealthy Republicans who think this is such a great idea!)
But the 65% proposal in Missouri got very interesting just today. The proposed bill was pulled and revised. It now says that it is VOLUNTARY. So in other words, we have 40,000 kids in Missouri with no health insurance but our legislators are spending their valuable time on legislation that won't even be mandatory if it passes. :grr:
The other interesting bill we need to defeat is a voucher bill proposed by a woman from St. Louis named Cunningham. (One of the NEA lobbyists I met today said that a large part of his job is to make sure that NONE of this woman's bills get passed. LOL) Anyhow, she isn't calling it a voucher bill. They are 'opportunity scholarships'. Some man named Angell from Illinois will be hired to oversee the program, (that is in the bill) so they are called 'Angell Opportunity Scholarships'.
Well, other than a clever and deceiving name, this bill really sucks. The vouchers will only be for students in KC and St. Louis. You know, it's part of that Republican agenda to help the poor. This Cunningham woman spoke to our group and lied through her ass. She claimed that 95% of our high school graduates in Missouri were illiterate! She was just twisting MAP test score data that I am very familiar with, so she didn't fool me. But I am sure she has many supporters who actually believe her bullshit.
So my advice is to be leery of any education bills this Cunningham woman proposes. I would also suggest that each one of you write your reps and ask them to oppose this voucher bill and to stop wasting their time on the 65% bill.
Oh we also got to hear the governor speak to us but I had such a hard time holding my puke down that I tuned out most of what he said. What I heard was BS anyway - he claimed he is helping kids and increasing education funding. He is also a very small man. That kind of surprised me. I pictured him bulkier, being a Navy guy and all.
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