Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 19, 2024

The 2024 Wyoming Legislative Session. Part 6. After the Party

 


The legislators are home, but the Governor is still acting on bills.

And the session can now start to be assessed.

March 12, 2024

The Governor vetoed the charter school grant authorization bill.

None of the election bills survived the session.

Joan Barron, in a Trib op ed run today, has noted how the Senate is now being influenced by the far right and becoming less congenial.

The Wyoming Educational Association, in the same issue, ran a full page age against Casper's Jeanette Ward, a member of the Freedom Caucus, which read:

Ward is from Illinois and relocated from there to Wyoming under the far right's persistent mythical belief that Wyoming's conservatism is the same as the Rust Belt's, although their influence in the state is making the latter true.

The same group voted against increasing funding for police retirement, and did it the day of a Sheridan policeman's funeral.

And it wanted to send unallocated ARPA funding back to the Federal government.

FOR RELEASE Immediately 

DATE March 11, 2024

CONTACT Ryan Frost, Legislative Information Officer

TO REACH 307.777.7881

2024 Budget Session Concludes

CHEYENNE - With the sound of the gavel, the Wyoming Legislature wrapped up the 2024 Budget Session on Friday at the State Capitol in Cheyenne. 

At the start of session, a total of 366 bills and resolutions were numbered for introduction. The Wyoming Legislature passed a total of 126 bills. Of the 107 pieces of legislation that were introduced in the Senate, 71 of those bills passed both the House and Senate. The House introduced 84 bills and 55 of those garnered the approval of both bodies. Sixty-one percent of committee bills passed both chambers, while 20 percent of the individually sponsored bills passed both bodies. Legislation that passed both houses has either been acted on or is waiting to be acted on by Gov. Mark Gordon. 

The Legislature also adopted the State's biennial budget on Friday, and the bill has been sent to the Governor for his consideration. He will have 15 days to consider line-item vetoes and sign the bill. The appropriations and transfers in the bill for the 2025-2026 fiscal biennium total $11 billion. Of this, $3.4 billion is from the General Fund, net of de-appropriations and including $170 million of discretionary transfers to savings. 

Both the House and Senate have addressed a broad range of issues affecting Wyoming residents and while some of these laws will take effect immediately, many will not go into effect until July 1 of this year. Lawmakers will begin their interim committee work in the coming weeks. The Legislature’s Management Council plans to meet and assign interim committee topics April 1. Wyoming’s Sixty-Eighth Legislature will convene next year on Jan. 14 for the 2025 General Session.

The Wyoming Legislature encourages the public to participate in interim activities. The public can use the Legislature's website at www.wyoleg.gov to find information about interim legislative committees, including live video streams of committee meetings, committee rosters, dates and locations of interim meetings, and minutes from those meetings. The website also provides a free email subscription service for all interim committee information. -END-  

March 13, 2024

Ward was the subject of a second major ad in the Trib.


Ward also drew a lengthy letter to the Editor in the Trib.  Usually I don't post those, but I will here as this is interesting.

Ward wasting time with culture wars

Representative Jeanette Ward,

House District 57, has been doing a poor job of representing her constituents and listening to their needs. She has voted against numerous bills that would have helped Wyoming citizens and instead wasted valuable time during the legislative session touting culture war issues. House Bill 50, the “What is a Woman” act, is a prime example of this. During a budget session the legislature has 20 days to pass a budget. That is literally the only job that legislators have during the budget session. It takes a 2/3 majority to get a non-budget bill to the floor for debate. Knowing this, Representative Ward introduced a bill that wasted time and resources and was completely unnecessary. That bill rightly died because it failed introduction.

This session, she also voted against bills that committees had spent many hours considering during the interim period, which was disrespectful to their work and slowed down the legislative process. She voted against funding the 988 suicide hotline even though Wyoming has one of the highest suicide rates in the nation, literally voting against saving lives. Last session she voted against most of the bills that would have helped families and disadvantaged Wyoming citizens, including Medicare for Moms, which helps low-income women provide for their babies. Fortunately, other legislators understood the issue and the bill passed. Representative Ward is not interested in helping Wyoming’s most vulnerable citizens, she would rather propose bills that are solutions looking for problems.

This is not acceptable. House District 57 deserves a legislator who listens to constituents, focuses her time on the budget during a budget session, and understands what genuine issues matter to Wyoming. She is not it. We need someone who has solutions to Wyoming problems, not someone who fans the flames of culture wars. Voters need to remember this on election day.

Judy Trohkimoinen,

Casper

This would suggest that perhaps there's a rising effort against Ward, who was endorsed by her predecessor, now Secretary of State Gray, because of her far right views, even though she had next to no connection with the state when she arrived, or people are getting tired of her.  

In some ways, this reflects a rising feature of Wyoming's politics in which the old Party is beginning to react more strongly to the Trump Party.

March 15, 2024

Governor Gordon Signs Bills That Help Reduce Housing Costs, Protect Critical Infrastructure

 

CHEYENNE, Wyo. – Governor Mark Gordon signed two bills today, one that helps protect key infrastructure in Wyoming from foreign adversaries, and the other that lowers the cost of constructing housing

SF0077 - Homeland defense-infrastructure reporting and investigating requires the state to annually identify “critical infrastructure zones”.  Any property transactions within those zones will be shared among the county clerks, the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security and the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation. Those agencies will then determine if the transaction  involves a foreign adversary or a state sponsor of terrorism that could pose a threat to national or state security or to critical infrastructure.

“Our nation has never faced graver threats from adversaries both foreign and domestic,” Governor Gordon said. “Protection of Wyoming infrastructure and identifying potential threats to our state or national security must be among our highest priorities. I want to thank sponsor Senator Tara Nethercott, whose experience and insight were invaluable in the drafting and passage of this bill. It is imperative that we protect our precious property rights, while we also ensure we are aware of any potential threats within our state’s borders.”

Senate File 114 - Contractor licenses-reciprocal recognition requirements require local governments in Wyoming to recognize contractor licenses issued by a Wyoming county, city or town. This ensures that qualified contractors don’t have to go through additional, time-consuming and expensive licensing requirements when working in Wyoming communities. The bill emerged from the interim work of the Regulatory Reduction Task Force, which explored a range of ideas that could help expand housing opportunities for Wyoming’s essential workforce. The Task Force identified a patchwork of state and local licensing requirements that contributed to additional construction costs, which were then passed along to Wyoming home buyers. 

“My administration has been passionate in reducing red tape, and while there is certainly more work to be done in addressing Wyoming’s housing shortage, this new law is a small step towards streamlining unnecessarily redundant and costly requirements,” Governor Gordon said.

Both bills are effective July 1, 2024. 

March 15, cont:

Governor Gordon Vetoes Bills to Prevent Legislature From Overstepping its Authority and Creating Confusion for the Public

 

CHEYENNE, Wyo. – Governor Mark Gordon took action on 18 bills today, vetoing one bill that encroaches on the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches, and one that could create confusion for consumers, meat processors and producers.

SF0013 - Federal land use plans - legal actions authorized would have duplicated funding for legal actions by the State and have been unconstitutional. The bill authorized the Legislature to take legal action against the federal government, and provided a whopping $75 million in borrowing authority for it to do so. In his veto letter, the Governor lambasted the bill as a “clear attempt to cross, blur and trample the line of separation between our equal, but separate, branches of government.” 

Governor Gordon criticized the bill as not being fiscally conservative, pointing out that $75 million represents 67 percent of the Attorney General’s office biennial budget. He said that the bill would only “enable duplicative Legislative litigation safaris that would be counterproductive and contrary to Wyoming’s well established practice of cooperation between branches.”

The Governor also expressed concern about the confusion that would be created in the courts over who represents Wyoming. It is the Executive branch that “is uniquely designed to provide one voice when it is necessary,” he wrote.

At best, competing litigation efforts would only serve to confuse courts as to who represents the State of Wyoming, and at worst it would enable frivolous and political pursuits,” the Governor wrote. 

The Governor also vetoed SF0103 - Wyoming PRIME Act, which as a “trigger” bill, would only become effective if the federal PRIME Act is passed by Congress. The Governor noted that while he is supportive of food freedom legislation, the Wyoming PRIME Act could create confusion among consumers, meat processors and livestock producers. Early media reports demonstrate the potential confusion created by the bill. Currently, an attempt to use the provisions of SF0103 by Wyoming producers before the federal PRIME Act is passed by Congress would put them at risk of fines and license revocation, and imperil Wyoming’s primacy for its meat and poultry inspection program. Finally, if the federal PRIME Act is passed by Congress, but is amended during that process, Wyoming statute would likely need to be changed to conform, which could unnecessarily delay state implementation.

The Governor’s veto letters are attached and may be found on the Bills page of the Governor’s website. 

Governor Gordon signed the following bills today: 

SEA0034 SF0014 State fair board-powers and responsibilities.

SEA0035 SF0113 Light and high profile vehicle closures-2.

SEA0039 SF0096 Trusts and bank assets in bankruptcy-clarification.

SEA0040 SF0080 Solid waste management-definition amendments.

SEA0043 SF0053 Sixth judicial district-number of judges

SEA0046 SF0026 Special district vacancies

SEA0047 SF0035 Public records-DOC investigations.

SEA0053 SF0023 Public utilities-energy resource procurement.

SEA0059 SF0100 Prompt payment of insurance claims.

SEA0063 SF0083 Revisor's bill.

SEA0064 SF0090 State-managed local government equity investment pool.

SEA0069 SF0042 Low-carbon reliable energy standards-amendments.

HEA0043 HB0126 Child care is a residential use of property.

HEA0046 HB0058 Forensic genetic genealogy pilot program.

HEA0047 HB0029 Cold case database and investigations.

HEA0051 HB0138 State funds-pool A participation and fund limits.

-END-

March 16, 2024

After a break of one day, the WEA resumbed its advertisements on Jeanette Ward.


March 19, 2024

After a hiatus of several days, the WEA resumed its ad campaign against Jeaette Ward.

Friday, March 15, 2024

Saturday, March 15, 1924. Passing symbols and elections.

Today In Wyoming's History: March 151924  The wreck of the six masted schooner Wyoming was located off of Pollock Rip, Massachusetts.  She went down with all 18 hands.


Maj. Gen. DeRosey Cabell, age 62, Chief of Staff during the Punitive Expedition under Pershing, died.  He had been retired since 1919.

Cabell.

Brig Gen. Richard Henry Pratt, former head of the Carlisle Indian School and advocate for cultural assimilation of Native Americans, died at age 83.  He coined the word "racism", but also advocated for the policy that he expressed as "Kill the Indian...save the man."

An election was held in the Dominican Republic for its president and Congress.

Kenya held a legislative election under its new constitution

King Fuad I opened the initial session of Egypt's first constitutional parliament.

Thursday, March 7, 2024

The Agrarian's Lament: What's wrong with the world (and how to fix it). Part 4. A Well Educated Society.

The Agrarian's Lament: What's wrong with the world (and how to fix it). ...

What's wrong with the world (and how to fix it). Part 4. A Well Educated Society.

Each new generation born is in effect an invasion of civilization by little barbarians, who must be civilized before it is too late.

Thomas Sowell

Civilization is not inherited; it has to be learned and earned by each generation anew; if the transmission should be interrupted for one century, civilization would die, and we should be savages again.

Will and Ariel Durant

A democratic society, let alone a just, functioning society, can't survive or function without its citizens being solidly educated.  And that means learning things you (or your parents), don't want you to, and some will fall behind, and drop out.

In envisioning how a more just society, in every fashion, and one that comports with reality, might be constructed, we have to concede that it can't be if people operate in a state of ignorance.

Unfortunately, we live in a manifestly ignorant age.  This year's national political contest is ample evidence of that.  On one side we have a body that's contemptuous of human nature and thinks it can be existentially and individually remade.  On the other, we have a group that effectively assumes that everything that came after 1958 is existentially wrong, including every real advance in science or knowledge.

We let one generation somehow proceed into barbarity, and it's running the show right now.  As part of that, one of its pet projects is to create a system where younger generations can be prevented from being educated in anything that suggest that it's really not 1958.

Getting back on track won't be easy, but it needs to be accomplished immediately.

Now first of all, we have to admit that this is not universal by any means. Contrary to what people like to assert, and often the poorly educated, there's no one educational system in the US and therefore there are school districts that are excellent. Wyoming has long been blessed by those, but even in Wyoming, modern inroads of limited education are advancing.

All of this may seem bold when we consider that high school graduation rates and university education is much more common than it used to be.  The national high school graduation rate is 87%, which is massively high. The Wyoming rate is 82%.  Consider this chart, for a moment (which will be hotlinked to its source).

Table 110.High school graduates, by sex and control of school: Selected years, 1869-70 through 2019-20
School yearHigh school graduatesAveraged freshman graduation rate for public schools3Population 17 years old4Graduates as a ratio of 17-year-old population
Total1SexControl
MalesFemalesPublic2Private
TotalMalesFemalesTotal
1234567891011
1869-7016,0007,0648,936 815,0002.0
1879-8023,63410,60513,029 946,0262.5
1889-9043,73118,54925,18221,88221,8495 1,259,1773.5
1899-190094,88338,07556,80861,73733,1465 1,489,1466.4
1909-10156,42963,67692,753111,36345,0665 1,786,2408.8
            
1919-20311,266123,684187,582230,90280,3645 1,855,17316.8
1929-30666,904300,376366,528591,71975,1855 2,295,82229.0
1939-401,221,475578,718642,7571,143,246538,273604,97378,2295 2,403,07450.8
1949-501,199,700570,700629,0001,063,444505,394558,050136,2565 2,034,45059.0
1959-601,858,023895,000963,0001,627,050791,426835,624230,973 2,672,00069.5
            
1969-702,888,6391,430,0001,459,0002,588,6391,285,8951,302,744300,0005 78.73,757,00076.9
1970-712,937,6421,454,0001,484,0002,637,6421,309,3191,328,323300,0005 78.03,872,00075.9
1971-723,001,5531,487,0001,515,0002,699,5531,342,2751,357,278302,0005 77.43,973,00075.5
1972-733,034,8221,500,0001,535,0002,728,8221,352,4161,376,406306,0005 76.84,049,00075.0
1973-743,073,3141,512,0001,561,0002,763,3141,362,5651,400,749310,0005 75.44,132,00074.4
            
1974-753,132,5021,542,0001,591,0002,822,5021,391,5191,430,983310,0005 74.94,256,00073.6
1975-763,142,1201,552,0001,590,0002,837,1291,401,0641,436,065304,991 74.94,272,00073.6
1976-773,139,5361,551,0001,589,0002,837,340302,196 74.44,272,00073.5
1977-783,128,8241,546,0001,583,0002,824,636304,188 73.24,286,00073.0
1978-793,101,1521,532,0001,569,0002,801,152300,0005 71.94,327,00071.7
            
1979-803,042,2141,503,0001,539,0002,747,678294,536 71.54,262,00071.4
1980-813,020,2851,492,0001,528,0002,725,285295,0005 72.24,212,00071.7
1981-822,994,7581,479,0001,515,0002,704,758290,0005 72.94,134,00072.4
1982-832,887,6041,426,0001,461,0002,597,604290,0005 73.83,962,00072.9
1983-842,766,7972,494,797272,0005 74.53,784,00073.1
            
1984-852,676,9172,413,917263,0005 74.23,699,00072.4
1985-862,642,6162,382,616260,0005 74.33,670,00072.0
1986-872,693,8032,428,803265,0005 74.33,754,00071.8
1987-882,773,0202,500,020273,0005 74.23,849,00072.0
1988-892,743,7432,458,800284,943 73.43,842,00071.4
            
1989-902,574,1622,320,337253,8256 73.63,505,00073.4
1990-912,492,9882,234,893258,095 73.73,417,91372.9
1991-922,480,3992,226,016254,3836 74.23,398,88473.0
1992-932,480,5192,233,241247,278 73.83,449,14371.9
1993-942,463,8492,220,849243,0005 73.13,442,52171.6
            
1994-952,519,0842,273,541245,543 71.83,635,80369.3
1995-962,518,1092,273,109245,0005 71.03,640,13269.2
1996-972,611,9882,358,403253,585 71.33,792,20768.9
1997-982,704,0502,439,0501,187,6471,251,403265,0005 71.34,008,41667.5
1998-992,758,6552,485,6301,212,9241,272,706273,025 71.13,917,88570.4
            
1999-20002,832,8442,553,8441,241,6311,312,213279,0005 71.74,056,63969.8
2000-012,847,9732,569,2001,251,9311,317,269278,773 71.74,023,68670.8
2001-022,906,5342,621,5341,275,8131,345,721285,0005 72.64,023,96872.2
2002-033,015,7352,719,9471,330,9731,388,974295,788 73.94,125,08773.1
2003-047 3,054,4382,753,4381,347,8001,405,638301,0005 74.34,113,07474.3
            
2004-053,106,4992,799,2501,369,7491,429,501307,249 74.74,120,07375.4
2005-063,122,5442,815,5441,376,4581,439,086307,0005 73.44,200,55474.3
2006-073,198,9562,892,3511,413,7381,478,613306,605 73.94,297,23974.4
2007-083,313,8182,999,5081,466,3031,533,205314,3105 74.74,436,95574.7
2008-098 3,318,7703,004,570314,200 74.74,336,95076.5
            
2009-108 3,306,2202,991,310314,910 75.64,311,83176.7
2010-118 3,251,7202,937,170314,550 
2011-128 3,221,9902,905,990316,000 
2012-138 3,200,1302,890,740309,390 
2013-148 3,176,3002,868,100308,200 
            
2014-158 3,170,5602,872,470298,090 
2015-168 3,201,0602,906,330294,730 
2016-178 3,223,0002,933,220289,780 
2017-188 3,273,6902,988,630285,060 
2018-198 3,265,0202,984,530280,490 
2019-208 3,245,9002,953,060292,840 
—Not available.

That's great, right?

Well, maybe.

But maybe not.

People have to know how to read statistics and what's behind them.  A really well-educated friend of mine who is in obviously very poor physical shape is an example of this.  HE takes his age, and likes to cite the "at my age, X% of men make it to age 90".

Well, that's because you kill off a certain percentage of men every year, meaning that your odds of making it to 90 are poorer every year.  At age 90 100% of men make it to age 90, if they've lived that long.  It's a diminishing number every year.

With education, the fact that 87% of people graduate from high school means, quite frankly, that extraordinary steps have been taken to make that occur. Some of the steps are good, some of them are bad, some of them are mixed. The rate itself, 87%, is pretty good proof that we run people through high school who really don't have the capacity to graduate a rigorous educational system.

As noted above, Wyoming's schools are very good.  I was stunned, for example, when my daughter was in high school, and she came home and prepared for a test of Weimar Germany that was unbelievably advanced.  This speaks well of our system.  Also speaking well of it is that it offers advanced certificates for high school degrees, something it did not do when I graduated there in 1981.

And frankly, our community college system is excellent as well.  We have only one university (which is another topic) but its good as well.

Still, I think it can be maintained that compared to the mid 20th Century, certain things have dropped off as mandatory subjects.  I have around here somewhere a German novel that was my father's, from high school, and a Latin primer that was one of my uncle's (from a much different school system).  There was a time when learning languages was mandatory in high school , and learning a language broadens out the welatanshung considerably, n'est pas?

One thing that had very much occured is the rise of homeschooling.  People have done this for a long time, but it was almost freakishly uncommon in most areas and often due to remoteness.  Starting in the 90s, however, it really grew for a variety of reasons.

One is that in some areas people lived in bad school districts where there was little opportunity for a good primary education.  But another one is that, particularly amongst Protestant Evangelicals, and then spreading to Catholic Trads, who ironically sometimes hold very Protestant Evangelical societal views, that the education system was educating the young in vice and perversity.  Most recently this has seen its expression by inroads onto school boards by populists who use names like "Mom's For Liberty" for their organizations.

What often characterizes these organizations is a desire to prevent education in something.  It started off as early in the 1960s with an effort to prevent education on matters sexual.  Interestingly, when I was in high school, in spite of living in the least religious state in the US, and one that has always had a rough and transient population, community standards remained so high that what there was in the way of sex ed was pretty minimal.  I can recall that when I was in grade school we were supposed to watch films in 5th and 6th Grade, just as we were hitting our early teens. We watched one of them, but it conveyed so little information that it was truly harmless in the extreme, much less harmful than the information that was later distributed on the playground about what the next installment, which we never saw, was supposed to contain (which was, I'd note, biologically inaccurate).  The next time this came up was in junior high, and then again in high school biology class, in which we were required to tell our parents they could opt us out.  Nobody did.  I think we received a day of education, or not more than two, on the topic, which was biological and accurate.

Of course, I grew up in the 70s for the most part, and most of the kids in school with me were locals.  That might have made a big difference, as even the poor kids were from pretty stable families.  Divorce was incredibly rare.  A significant minority were from ranching families who were well aware of how biological processes worked (that Agrarian thing again) and therefore the knowledge wasn't shocking.  As for the impact, I can recall five girls that I knew to some extent getting pregnant in high school, and one of them was married.  One of the other ones was from a family where that ran through it like wildfire.  The graduating class was 500 or so students, so that's not a huge number.

It's not just sex ed that caused the boom in alternative learning, however.  By the 1970s evolution was an established scientific fact, even if still termed a theory, and it was taught in our schools outright.  The resistance to it being taught, at that time, didn't seem to exist, but it rebounded strongly later on in much of the country.  Overall, moreover, a decline in science teaching set in the U.S. during the 1980s thanks to Ronald Reagan, whose administration didn't support it.

Indeed, the Reagan administration was big on local control of things, and that has an impact here. As a Distributist, it might seem that this is one of the areas where we'd be big backers of that sort of thing, but in reality, the principal of subsidiarity advocates doing a thing at its most local effective, efficient, and just level.  As knowledge is literally global, it calls for large scale.  Physics and science are the same in Brooklyn as they are in Botswana.

A person might also note that our sometimes romantic attachment to Agrarianism recalls a day when less than 50% of males graduated from high school. That's quite true, but they also lived in an age in which many of them had been already well armed by their educations for the lives they would lead, so it was not accurate to suggest they were uneducated.  One of my grandfathers left school (a Christian Brothers school) at age 13, and yet ran a business successfully and could do calculus.  A major office building in this city is named after a man who was sent here in his early teens to open a branch of his father's pipeyard business and who went on to become a multimillionaire.

Additionally, if we go way back, we'll find that yeomanry, while they could be completely uneducated, could also be relatively well educated as well. Some were educated in basic matters through local churches, but often they were educated through community funded or subscribed schools.  John Adams, who started off life as a yeoman, was educated in that fashion, and his wife ran such a school (integrated, we might note) later on.

While on it, we might as well additionally note that the American South, at least since sometime prior to the Civil War, has been a real backwater of education, something that used to horrify northerners.  Little noticed, however, is that there's been a mini Great Migration of white Southerners out of their native region and into the rest of the country, where they've brought their views, including about education, with them.

And part of this is the byproduct of the 1960s.  Up until the 60s, while education was massively uneven in a country that has no central education system, there was a general consensus on what a person needed to learn in order to graduate from high school.  That can't really be claimed from region to region anymore.

So here, applying the principal of subsidiarity, the national government really needs to take a hand and set some basic standards, including learning the truth on scientific and historic matters.  And it needs to be rigorous.  If that depresses the graduation rate, so be it.

And there's really not a moment to lose.