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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body bgcolor=white lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>We could talk about these issues for a long time. I really regret moves in the Idaho Legislature (coming from people with little or no education experience) putting out carrots to encourage students to rush through high school faster. In my experience, it was hard to get time to develop concepts thoroughly. I have believed that is why students don’t retain and we see so much need for remediation at the college level. The direction legislators take will probably make things worse.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Shirley<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #B5C4DF 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif";color:windowtext'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif";color:windowtext'> Kenneth Marcy [mailto:kmmos1@frontier.com] <br><b>Sent:</b> Monday, October 21, 2013 4:22 PM<br><b>To:</b> Shirley Ringo; 'Sue Hovey'; '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></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal>On 10/21/2013 11:48 AM, Shirley Ringo wrote:<o:p></o:p></p></div><blockquote style='margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt'><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><o:p></o:p></p></blockquote><p class=MsoNormal><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><br><o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'> </span><o:p></o:p></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #B5C4DF 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><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 href="mailto:vision2020-bounces@moscow.com">vision2020-bounces@moscow.com</a> [<a 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</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal> <o:p></o:p></p><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"'>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? </span><o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"'>Sue H.</span><o:p></o:p></p></div></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><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<o:p></o:p></p></div></body></html>