Budget provision would block state funding for Common Core standards

There are two reasons for this move.
1. The standards - even though they were created by the Governors and Chief State School Officers - will improve schools while Obama is in office. Kansas cannot allow a Democrat to get credit for that even if the Democrat had nothing to do with the improvement.
2. Remember when Rick Santorum criticized Obama for saying every child ought to have the opportunity to go to college? "He wants everyone to go to college. What a snob!" You see, education is "elitist." We need to become a nation of undereducated teapublicans willing to vote against our own economic self-interest.

This budget, if this proviso is approved, will dismantle education in Kansas in three ways. First it will stop the implementation of career and college readiness standards aligned with the other states and college entrance; then it will flat fund K-12 education which is essentially a funding cut since inflation will eat away at the buying power of that flat funding; and finally it will reduce funding for post-secondary education forcing up tuition and pricing more students out of our community colleges, tech colleges, and universities.

Brownback and the 2013 legislature represent the most anti-education collective in the history of this state.

May 17, 2013 at 7:41 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Conservatives at odds over budget, taxes as wrap-up session drags on

The Koch brothers and their affiliated organizations - the Kansas Chamber of Commerce and Americans for Prosperity - should have been satisfied to get their Brownback income tax bill. But they got greedy and bought as many seats in the legislature as they could. Unfortunately for them - and worse for us - is that fact that these newest Republicans have no loyalty to anything or anyone. They are essentially anarchists ready and willing to destroy the state to satisfy their delusional ideology. Not just by eliminating all taxes and the services that go along with them but in the meantime imposing their ideology on government services. See what they are doing to education - banning common core standards, mandating a "celebrate freedom week" to teach their version of Americanism. Add to this voter registration, takeover of the judiciary, insane and unconstitutional gun laws, requiring physicians to lie to women patients, etc., etc.

And this so-called "staring contest" between Merrick and Wagle/Brownback is costing the taxpayers about $35,000/day, keeping idle legislators in Topeka and paying them for a few minutes of resolution passing on the floor of the House and Senate. This is the sixth day of this madness. $210,000 down the toilet.

May 15, 2013 at 7:40 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Ad campaign accuses Kansas schools of low academic standards

And Trabert's organization argued in favor of multiple authorizing agencies just this year in the Kansas legislature. KPI has no interest in a quality education for every child. They simply wish to privatize all education and end public responsibility for education. First, get vouchers, corporate tuition tax credits, and unaccountable corporate run charter school laws enacted. Then move as many kids into those private schools as possible. Finally phase out public support for these programs and lower corporate taxes accordingly. Trabert, ALEC, and the current Kansas GOP believe everyone deserves all the education they can afford.

May 7, 2013 at 7:38 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Mediation in school finance case unsuccessful

Sam and his anti-government allies - who spent much of this session seeking legislation to privatize public education - claim that state revenues don't allow for funding schools. State revenues do apparently allow for massive tax cuts for the wealthiest Kansans. That's what the district court said - "You had the money to fund schools; you just chose to give it away in tax cuts."

And just a point of clarity - the court has not told the state to spend MORE on schools. They told the court to fund what they passed in 2008 but cut in subsequent years. Just fulfill your promises.

May 2, 2013 at 7:31 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Brownback proposes using bioscience funds to pay for adult stem cell center at KU

Since the legislators who passed this idiotic piece of legislation chose not to fund it, then don't fund it at all. The Kansas legislature and governor are embarrassments to the great idea of American democracy - an idea that has apparently atrophied here in Kansas.

April 30, 2013 at 7:21 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Kobach testifies against immigration bill before U.S. Senate committee

Still, he does not say he is NOT REPRESENTING the state of Kansas - "I come chiefly in my capacity as former..." He says he is the KS SOS, comes "chiefly in another capacity." He needs to say that he does not represent the state of Kansas in this hearing.

April 24, 2013 at 11:07 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Kobach testifies against immigration bill before U.S. Senate committee

And I guess we paid this xenophobic fascist while he was doing this. I want to know for a fact that his pay and benefits were docked for the time he spent on this including travel time. I saw no where in the article any mention of telling congress he was there as an individual and not representing the state of Kansas.

April 23, 2013 at 11:35 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Sound Off: Teacher contracts

To MattBaker05's points:
1) The union DOES have the interest of all teachers in mind when they negotiate. Unions are required to represent ALL at the bargaining table and so bargaining positions are created by surveys of ALL bargaining unit members.
2) School districts are permitted to pay teachers more based on any number of motives - they can pay more for high demand or hard to fill areas, more for specialized training (ESL, for example), more for teaching in more challenging schools. Such "bonuses" are outside of negotiations by law. What they don't typically do is pay more for student performance because teaching is a collaborative effort. A middle school math teacher with excellent student performance is building on the K-5 teachers who developed earlier math skills in those students; A literature teacher doesn't have outstanding student achievement without the efforts of all the reading and English teachers who came before.
3) The union - KNEA and NEA - is the one group that consistently argues for more accountability, demanding more than just single day, fill in the blank state assessments. The problem with accountability that pushes it to that single metric comes not from the unions; it comes from policy makers who demand simple answers to complex questions. Accountability systems based on those tests were created by legislatures and ed department bureaucrats, not the unions.
4) Schools and businesses are not the same and can't be evaluated the same way. A business that gets substandard raw materials, sends it back to the supplier. No one requires GM to build a quality product with flawed steel. Alchemy is not required of any business. But schools do exactly that. They take each and every child that walks in the door and they seek to transform that child into a productive citizen ready to pursue a good job or post secondary education. Poverty, hunger, sickness, physical or developmental disabilities, lack of English, behavior disorders - it doesn't matter. They schools take on that responsibility and strive to perform academic alchemy. No business can compare.

April 8, 2013 at 7:46 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Public airs questions over $92.5 million school bond issue

And in the one room school house days we didn't care about children with disabilities or who were still learning English, or even often even minority children (Kansas was a little better on this that some other states but still...). And those one room school house kids weren't all expected to go on to post-secondary schools or even to go much past 8th grade. Don't let the books of Laura Ingalls Wilder make you think the one room school house days were some sort of educational utopia. They weren't and they would be terrible failures in meeting today's challenges.

March 27, 2013 at 6:53 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )

Public airs questions over $92.5 million school bond issue

So our businesses (the local chamber) are the enemy and overpaid government workers are the enemy. If management and labor are both the enemy, who's not?

March 27, 2013 at 6:48 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )