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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 10/21/2013 11:48 AM, Shirley Ringo
wrote:<br>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D">Well,
it reminds me of my former students who couldn’t come in to
get help on their math – with the explanation that they
needed to work after school to get money for college.</span></p>
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<br>
That's another short-sighted, penny-wise and pound-foolish situation
that a well-funded and administered state educational system would
discourage for educational reasons alone, if no other. The students
who don't get the math help they need show up at college wanting to
major in STEM subjects (science math engineering and math) and find
they cannot do well because they are expected to make up their high
school level work simultaneously with taking college level work in
the same or related subjects for which the high school work is
prerequisite.<br>
<br>
College faculty get frustrated because some of them have to teach
kids at the kids' levels, which is high school stuff the kids should
have mastered before arriving at college.<br>
<br>
The kids get frustrated, discouraged, and after doing poorly, have a
worse academic record than that of which they might be capable, and
they have spent the significant resources associated with a year of
college.<br>
<br>
Those kids probably would have been better off, and they and their
parents would be a year's (or two years') worth of college costs
richer, if the kids had stayed home another year (or two), stayed in
high school for another year (or two), and took all of the math,
science, and foreign language classes (for B.A. students) they could
schedule as more college preparation at high school prices and room
and board.<br>
<br>
Of course, it's not all bad news. There continues to be a
substantial list of new and continuing students on Deans' lists in
all of the Colleges, so the message is not all gloom and doom. But
it is still the case that a lot of under-prepared students arrive on
campus, and the fact that they graduated from state high schools in
that condition is not a mark of favorable distinction for those
secondary schools.<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:00ed01cece8e$20e32cc0$62a98640$@com"
type="cite">
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span
style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"">From:</span></b><span
style="font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"">
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:vision2020-bounces@moscow.com">vision2020-bounces@moscow.com</a>
[<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="mailto:vision2020-bounces@moscow.com">mailto:vision2020-bounces@moscow.com</a>] <b>On Behalf Of
</b>Sue Hovey<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Sunday, October 20, 2013 6:42 PM<br>
<b>To:</b> Tom Hansen; Moscow Vision 2020<br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: [Vision2020] State Board members rip
Luna’s K-12 budget<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:black">To
my thinking the most interesting statement made by
Bill Goesling was his comment (not in this
article)that higher education drives the economy and
K-12 education doesn’t. Anyone see any irony in that
rationale? <o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span
style="font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:black">Sue
H.</span></p>
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<br>
Not particularly ironic, no. It has long been the case that
business-oriented people in positions of legislative and
governmental-executive leadership have had difficulties in
distinguishing investments that will do well primarily for people
and secondarily for state coffers, and those investments that might
do well for private enterprises. Usually those investment types are
quite distinguishable and distinct. Failure to invest more in the
former, while loosening or removing rules that govern the latter, is
an ongoing feature, and an ongoing problem, of governmental
organizations.<br>
<br>
The proof that is in the pudding, so to speak, is seen in the
economic performance data that indicate that the national economy
does marginally better under Democratic leadership, and marginally
poorer under Republican leadership. So much for the Rs being the
party that can recognize better investments in the public interest.<br>
<br>
Chronic, persistent, unimaginative education policy coupled with
regressive, retrograde, rationed, regional resources has produced an
educational millieu from which its inmates wish to escape if they
are able. Some succeed, others can not. Idaho voters' inability,
or blatant stubborn refusal, to elect to their state legislature
people who can and will enact policies and fund programs to actually
serve the public interest rather than the interests of private
investors redounds directly back on those voters in the form of
substandard educational outcomes and diminished aggregate state
economic performance.<br>
<br>
If Idaho voters appear more retarded in their electoral performances
than voters of other states, one might reasonably ask what is the
cause of that retardation, and what is the source of the cause?<br>
<br>
<br>
Ken<br>
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