Education: Florida versus Nevada

10 years ago, Florida and Nevada were tied near the bottom of the States Ratings on Education. Since then, Florida has improved drastically while Nevada has remained at the bottom. Why?

Here is the conclusion of a report by Patrick Gibbons of the NPRI.

While it is difficult to ascertain which reforms produce the absolutely best results, it is clear that simply increasing funds for public education will not bring about the successes Florida achieved. We now also know that traditional excuses for public school failure — blaming English language learners, students with disabilities, minority students or poverty — are merely that: invalid excuses.

Since 1999, comprehensive educational reforms enacted by Florida have included parental choice options, incentive-based reforms and instructional reforms. The result has been to drastically increase student achievement in math and reading. Importantly, the reforms allowed minority students to close the achievement gap. Low-income students saw increases in student achievement as well.

Both students and teachers were held accountable for learning achievement. Students who failed were held back or given remedial education. High-quality teachers were rewarded for their efforts. Schools, too, were held accountable by empowering parents with more control over their child’s education while schools were ranked “A” through “F” based on their demonstrated ability to educate students.

No other state with the same challenges in poverty, demographics and English language learners has seen Florida’s gains in student achievement. The improvement in Florida’s education, notwithstanding the challenges, finally lays to rest many of the excuses educators and policymakers have offered over the years as to why schools “cannot” improve student achievement.

Since there is little difference between Florida and Nevada in terms of poverty rates, language barriers, demographics or funding, we have little doubt that comprehensive reforms of the nature implemented by Florida could improve math and reading achievement levels in the Silver State, or any other state, as well.

Florida’s successes, especially with low-income and minority children, should inspire
policymakers throughout the country to replicate the state’s reforms. They demonstrate what can be achieved against all the odds and how to do it. They also prove that failure is no longer an option.

Nevada should quit protecting bad teachers

An E-Bulletin from the NPRI states that

Either Nevada somehow attracts and retains the best teachers on the planet, or the state is packing kids into classrooms with unacceptably high odds they will be taught by ineffective, if not incompetent, teachers.

They make that statement because

Nevada’s school districts terminated or failed to renew the contracts of just 0.2 percent of “untenured teachers” and 0.3 percent of “tenured teachers” in 2007-08. Overall, Nevada kept 99.4 percent of its teachers that year. Only Arkansas, Delaware and Pennsylvania fired fewer teachers.

It also mentions New York City’s infamous “rubber room,” where incompetent teachers sit all day and get paid.

The Center for American Progress recommends that states should change their tenure statutes to explicitly mandate that teacher retention and dismissal decisions incorporate teacher effectiveness data.

Nevada is last in education and we need to start to make changes in the state educational system.

Honor this real American.

You're a 19 year old kid.

You're critically wounded and dying in
the jungle somewhere in the Central Highlands of Viet Nam .
It's November 11, 1967. LZ (landing zone) X-ray.

Your unit is outnumbered 8-1 and the enemy fire is so intense, from 100 yards away, that your CO (commanding officer) has ordered the MedEvac helicopters to stop coming in.

You're lying there, listening to the enemy machine guns and you know you're not getting out.

Your family is half way around the world, 12,000 miles away, and you'll never see them again.

As the world starts to fade in and out, you know this is the day.

Then - over the machine gun noise - you faintly hear that sound of a helicopter.

You look up to see a Huey coming in. But ... It doesn't seem real because no MedEvac markings are on it.

Captain Ed Freeman is coming in for you.

He's not MedEvac so it's not his job, but he heard the radio call and decided he's flying his Huey down into the machine gun fire anyway.

Even after the MedEvacs were ordered not to come. He's coming anyway.

And he drops it in and sits there in the machine gun fire, as they load 3 of you at a time on board.

Then he flies you up and out through the gunfire to the doctors and nurses and safety.

And, he kept coming back!! 13 more times!!
Until all the wounded were out. No one knew until the mission was over that the Captain had been hit 4 times in the legs and left arm.

He took 29 of you and your buddies out that day. Some would not have made it without the Captain and his Huey.

Medal of Honor Recipient, Captain Ed Freeman, United States Air Force, died August 20, 2008 at the age of 70, in Boise, Idaho .

May God Bless and Rest His Soul.


You don't hear about hero's like this passing, but you sure do hear
a whole bunch about people like Michael Jackson and Tiger Woods.



Medal of Honor
Winner Captain Ed Freeman

Shame on the American media !!!

Now ... YOU pass this along to YOUR
mailing list. Honor this real American.

Arizona immigration law

There are 2 articles in the Review Journal on April 27th about the Arizona immigration law.
The first article stated that,

Gov. Jim Gibbons on Monday blamed President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., for failing to stop illegal immigration and leaving Arizona no choice but to pass its own law to prevent the flow of noncitizens across the Mexican border.

If the illegal aliens leave Arizona, where will they go? Do you think that they may come to Nevada?
The second article stated that,
Local immigration reform advocates came back from weekend protests in Arizona with a clear message: what happened there won't fly in Nevada.

"People in Nevada are going to stand up," Michael Flores, Southern Nevada director of Reform Immigration for America, said at a Monday morning press conference at La Iglesia Amistad Cristiana, a church on Stewart Avenue at Ninth Street. "We're going to prevent anything like that from coming here."

I wish that they would do something to prevent illegal aliens "from coming here."

They are breaking the law. Do we really want people who break the law to move to Nevada?

What really was behind the financial crisis?

This letter to the editor in the Sun is a concise explanation of how the financial crisis occurred. It is simplistic, but lists the most important causes. The writer states that,

The crisis was the ultimate consequence of politicians from both parties pursuing the objective of greater home ownership.

Notice that he blames both political parties. Without the influence of congress, the financial crisis may not have occurred.
He continues,

With a wink and a nod, they let Fannie and Freddie know that the taxpayers would pick up the tab if need be. At the same time, they used the Community Reinvestment Act to coerce the banks into making more subprime loans.

The banks did make risky loans and they did make a profit on them. However, the politicians who encouraged if not actually forced them into this position, are trying to put all the blame on the financial institutions.

If we let them get away with it, shame on us.

Bankrupt Social Security shafting the kids

This is a very interesting letter to the editor in the Review Journal. I love the last paragraph which says,

Mr. Olivier and I will continue to cash our Social Security checks every month. The difference between us is that I will do so with a certain discontent and concern (but not enough moral fiber to reject the money), and he will do so adamantly convinced he has an absolute right to every dollar of profit he is wringing out of the kids we are shafting.

It expresses why I am running for State Senator. Our generation should not leave our children and grandchildren with a huge debt to pay because we could not control our spending.

Constitutionalist Revolt

This article was in the Review Journal on April 25th. It is about the Tea Party Patriot's Contract From American that lists 10 planks.

These 10 planks are the results of a survey of 500,000 votes.

The number one issue is to protect the Constitution.

2 of the top 5 mention the Constitution and the remaining 5 concern the limiting of government size, government spending, government health care, government control of the economy, and government taxing.

I would agree. What would you vote?