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I’ve recently returned from Germany. I was there for nine weeks studying abroad, and it was one of the best experiences of my life. As I reflect on it now, though, I still can’t quite believe I made it there. I don’t know a lot, and the longer I live the less that I feel I know. There is ...
As the Kansas Child Welfare System Task Force is about to begin its important work of examining in a holistic way the entire child welfare system, I would like to take this opportunity to share with you the role of the Kansas Department for Children and Families (DCF) on the task force and some ...
In the waning days of this year’s legislative session, Kansas lawmakers agreed to put together a task force to determine how best to shore up the state’s reeling foster care system.This is good news. Advocates for abused and neglected children should be thrilled. They’re not. They’re ...
An editorial published in the Lawrence Journal-World on July 13 raised concerns about the proposed property tax mill increase given the growth in assessed valuation. Those concerns need to be addressed for all city taxpayers to understand the 2018 recommended budget. The statement that “the ...
Recent articles have acknowledged Peaslee Tech’s benefit to our community and the value for economic development to Lawrence and Douglas County. Several aspects of the July 17 editorial, however, missed the point about Peaslee Tech’s role for Lawrence and the county. The editorial stated ...
At this moment, two events crowd my consciousness, requiring some comment. First, Donald Trump Jr.’s dalliance with a Russian lawyer in hopes of getting dirt on Hillary Clinton. Second, the Trumpcare bill pending in the Senate.An email chain unabashedly reveals the Russian government’s ...
For all the focus on our nation’s schools, community colleges get short shrift. In the debates about the role education plays in our nation’s economy and democracy, we too often overlook our two-year colleges.Created more than a century ago, arising from a variety of forces including ...
My last column was about Arlo Guthrie singing “This Land is Your Land.” The song says we’re all in this together, togetherness is necessary to our well-being, and such togetherness requires fairness and equality. It won’t work any other way. This land was made for all, not the few. But ...
You really have to wonder what kind of health care system we have when Micah Fletcher, the sole surviving hero of Jeremy Christian’s racist attack in Portland, Ore., needs a Go Fund Me page to cover his medical expenses. Think about it. What kind of society do we live in when people go ...
The Trump Administration’s new budget proposes massive cuts to Medicaid and other programs that benefit the poorest Americans, while rewarding the super rich. This is to be expected, but there is more. The proposal forecasts 3 percent annual growth in the coming years: about twice what ...
An open letter to the Kansas congressional delegation:Dear Reps. Marshall, Jenkins, Yoder and Estes, and Sens. Roberts and Moran,A moment of truth for each of you is at hand. President Trump has proposed a tax plan that looks and sounds remarkably like the Brownback experiment now playing out ...
I have The New York Times from May 10, 2017 — the real print edition. I’m reluctant to throw it away. Mark you, I’ve trashed lots of newsprint: KU winning two national championships and even the Chicago Tribune the day after the Cubs won their first World Series in 108 years, but I’m ...
Last week our governor and some members of the Legislature gathered at the Statehouse to experience a day of prayer. Participants prayed that the work of the Legislature would serve the will of the Lord. There were also prayers that the Legislature not enact laws that reinforce a dependency ...
Over the last several months, there has been considerable debate surrounding the nomination and confirmation of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. Questions have been raised about her knowledge of education, management experience, policy positions on issues such as school choice and willingness ...
The headline read “Governor tightens waterslide regulations” (Lawrence Journal World, April 25). Caleb Schwab, the son of Kansas Rep. Scott Schwab, R-Olathe, was killed last summer riding a waterslide at the Schlitterbahn waterpark in Kansas City, Kan. Less than a year later the ...
Shortly after Gov. Sam Brownback took office in 2011, there were almost 5,200 children in Kansas’ foster care system. Today, there are more than 6,900. The prospect of adding 1,700 kids to a system that was already stretched thin was beyond most policymakers’ imagination six years ago. ...
I recently talked to a national reporter who came to Kansas to cover the Legislature’s wrap-up session. He wanted to know how we arrived at our current Rubik’s Cube of revenue, funding and budget issues.Here’s my story of how Kansas arrived in its current circumstances. From the early ...
I am submitting the following letter of resignation from the University of Kansas in light of the looming July deadline to allow concealed carry in college classrooms, a policy that will do irreparable harm to higher education in Kansas and the well-being of Kansans. To: Dr. Eve Levin, chair, ...
Sen. Susan Wagle, R-Wichita, serves as president of the Kansas Senate, first elected to that post in 2012 and re-elected last December. She has served in the Legislature for more than one-quarter of a century, elected to the House in 1990, before moving to the Senate in 2000.For most of her ...
Women who worked for him accused Bill O’Reilly of sexually harassing them. He denied all of it, said the stories were made up. Someone else, who will come into this later, might have called it “fake news.” Then recently, the New York Times reported that O’Reilly and Fox News had paid ...