The AZ Legislature is Busy…How Will Education Fare?
Several bills on education have been introduced recently in the Arizona Legislature. Some will help support the majority of our students (almost 90% whom are enrolled in traditional public schools.)...
View ArticleAZ Legislature Continues to Discriminate
April 9, 2013, the AZ Legislature unanimously adopted House Concurrent Resolution 2036[i] titled “Boy Scouts of America.” Eighty legislators sponsored this bi-partisan bill[ii] whose intent was...
View ArticleTime to Face the Facts!
A Casa Grande Dispatch article dated April 26, 2013 and titled “Gubernatorial race: Melvin’s bid shuffles the deck in District 11” contained a misleading statement. The sentence started with “Melvin’s...
View ArticleIn the Public Interest
As a school board member and locally elected guardian of public education, I am concerned that those who would dismantle it are making headway. Senate Bill 1363 [empowerment scholarship accounts...
View ArticleAZ Rep Steve Smith Should Stick to LD11 Issues
In the past two years, LD11 Representative Steve Smith has made zero progress in his pledge to build the border fence other than raising a mere $275,000 (less than 10% of the GAO estimated cost to...
View ArticleThe State of Education in Arizona
From 2008 to 2014, our state enjoyed the third highest change in K-12 per pupil spending (down 17 percent) in the nation.[i] Two out of three children don’t attend preschool, 27 percent live in...
View ArticlePredatory Privatization
Education reformers would have you believe the best way to improve the American public education is to privatize it. Senator Al Melvin, candidate for Arizona Governor, thinks the solution is to give...
View ArticleA rose by any other name…is just as thorny!
It is no surprise Arizona Legislators continue to seek expansion of Empowerment Scholarship Accounts AKA, vouchers. The concept is model legislation for the American Legislative Exchange Council...
View ArticleTime to Act Against Arizona’s Axis of Evil
Nope, not referring to North Korea or Iran, but the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), The Goldwater Institute and The Center for Arizona Policy led by Cathi Herrod. All of Arizona’s GOP...
View ArticleWhat about MY choice?
UGH! Right on the heels of my last post about why school vouchers are a bad idea, comes the Arizona Supreme Court ruling yesterday that private-school vouchers are legal. Okay, so there goes my...
View ArticleSurvival of the Fittest Mentality Won’t Keep Our Nation Great
Properly educating all Arizona’s children isn’t just important to parents, it is important for all of us. Our state simply won’t progress if we don’t start focusing on improving the educational...
View ArticleDefinition of Insanity
I recently found myself thinking about the whole idea of “trickle down” economics. Aside from the discussion about whether or not it works, I wondered how the American public ever bought into the idea...
View ArticleAngry About the Apathy
Ever since election day, I’ve been very frustrated about the low voter turnout. After working very hard on two state legislative campaigns for the better part of a year, it is very disheartening to see...
View ArticleScrew you, I’ve got mine
Now that it looks like the AZ Legislature will be successful in finally opening the floodgates on vouchers (empowerment scholarship accounts) for K-12 education, I’ve got some other ideas they should...
View ArticleThe color of accountability
I wasn’t surprised by The Republic’s recent findings that during the 2015-16 school year, the vast majority of funding ($20.6 million) for vouchers was taken from public schools rated A or B, but only...
View ArticleLiving in La-La Land?
Not one to give up on any ALEC-concocted or promoted government shrinking effort, AZ Senator Debbie Lesko, R-Peoria, managed to gain traction this week on her latest version of this year’s voucher...
View ArticleMad as Hell and You’re Not Going to Take it Anymore!
Okay fellow liberal southern Arizonans, I get it. You are mad as hell and you aren’t going to take anymore. Prop 123 is a bridge too far, a river too wide and the proverbial final straw breaking the...
View Article“Someone to Shine Our Shoes”
In a recent article titled “Chartered Cruise” on knpr.org, the author Hugh Jackson wrote: “Today’s charter industry, much like Nevada’s voucher plan, reflects a chronic civic defeatism. Echoing the...
View ArticleProp 123 deal was hard-fought
In a recent AZ Daily Star op-ed, former educator and school board member Jim Christ compared the Old Testament story of Esau trading his inheritance for a bowl of lentil soup as an example of a “beyond...
View Article
More Pages to Explore .....