Idaho asserts education as lowest priority
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It seems America took four steps forward while Idaho took eight steps backwards this election. I don’t mean one party is or will be better than the other. I mean that folks were tired of the same, tired lines from one party and elected a new direction, a change up.
America’s change ups that are viewed as four steps forward include party change of the House and Senate, party change of the majority of governorships, and Donald Rumsfeld resigning (let’s acknowledge he was fired).
Idaho’s actions that are viewed as eight steps backwards include voting down the education funding, electing “G.E.D.” Jones over “Masters in Finance” Twilegar for the top financial position, electing a businessman with a correspondence degree (who is unqualified to teach in any Idaho school) over a career educator (with three degrees in education) for the top education position, and going with blind ideology in stacking our state government with one party.
We apparently felt it important to restrict human rights in our constitution, and re-affirmed that we like paying more sales tax to lessen the tax burden for big corporations and out-of-staters with Idaho vacation homes. Finally, we elected a governor who admitted he wasted the last several years as our congressional representative (sponsoring only 3 bills in 6 years), and elected an “Absolute Idiot” as our replacement congressional representative.
Of all these things, the one that sends the strongest message, I think, is that Idaho overwhelmingly preferred a person with a G.E.D. for our top state financial officer over a person with a Masters degree in Finance. It was not even a close race at 59-41%, despite “G.E.D.” Jones’ refusal to even debate her opponent. Idaho truly deserves any and all financial screw ups that Jones delivers to us in her term.
The anti-education messages sent to Idaho youth in this election were crystal clear. Education is not valued here, and in Idaho education even becomes a handicap.
In Idaho it apparently matters not what you know or what you have achieved, it matters more the clique you belong to.
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Comments
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0 
0 Joe - I was working on an entry that mirrored this one, but you put it so much better. Well done.
I don’t think the education funding measure was a good idea (mainly because it allowed for too much pork spending) but you’re right on about Luna and Jones. It’s unbelievable.
This year’s election reveals an inherent backwardness in Idaho when it comes to what and whom we will support - we will choose an (R) over what’s (Right) any day.
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0 0 I know I wrote this in the chat box, but I want it to be here too, so it can be permanent. I am now living in the 51st State. It is known as the State of Denial.
I cannot believe ID elections this year! Why oh why can’t anyone from eastern ID get elected? Jana Jones - just about brings me to tears (seriously). It’s only education.
And I personally think Brady wouldn’t have forgoten eastern ID compared to Clem.
Well, now I’ve said it. I’ll return to my quiet State of Denial again.
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0 0 Joe, that hit the nail on the head. I’m new to this forum so hello to all. We just moved back to SE Idaho, and are scratching our heads on our move back, and on what happened at the polls. I can’t figure out for the life of me why there were only republicans running unchallenged for most of the spots in Bingham County??
I can’t figure out why the people of Idaho voted for a person with a GED over a person with a Masters??? Not only did the people vote to shoot down education, they backed it by voting in someone with no freakin education!!
All I can hope for is that Idaho will catch up with the times in two years for the next election. Maybe more out of staters will move here and set some modern movements on this sometimes backwaters state. (without selling all of the land - thanks Otter)
DJN
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0 0 The Jana Jones loss brought me to tears. The dismantling of public education will begin when Marilyn Howard retires.
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0 0 How about a persistent fight to end local, state government (domestic & overseas) overspending, bloatedness, exaggerated staffing, uneeded items and newer items and take THAT money SAVED and spend some of it on education. No - most want to keep dumping money into education, when the dollars of the past and present have not or are not being efficiently spent. How about making government AND education accountable? No - this is America where more money is the solution to everything. That is why we have crossed the line of financial sustainability. Republicans and Democrats alike better wake up and choose a corrective course. I believe it will only buy us time, but after all we have to have the will to live in the face of dismal odds.
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0 0 I am sorry to say to y’all that I am happy to now be in Oregon, where at least I can feel represented. I still struggle to believe that the qualified individuals for controller and superintendant of public instruction lost. I suppose it is because we want to believe in an informed electorate, but apparently all these people were informed about was a referendum for more discrimination in our Constitution (and better follow the rest of the ballot with those [R] candidates too).
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0 0 I was thinking about moving to another state this afternoon on the way home from work. I find the outcome of the elections “believably unbelievable.” I watched this political season with some interest and found myself hoping that Luna would crash in flames, that money would be spent on education, and that a gay marriage amendment would fail. Maybe not all three, but Tom Luna? His degree from Thomas Edison State College can only be in Arts or Science. Qualified for the top spot in education? Hardly.
I’m nervous for my 6 year-old daughter who started school this year. If this trend continues, where will she be in 6 more years?
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0 0 You want to know what else is really sad? We have seniors in our high schools right here in Idaho Falls who cannot do fractions yet! They also are having trouble with adding and subtracting integers. That is how do we solve a problem that is like this: 4-(-5). It is beyond some ofour kids. And they’ve been in school for over 10 years!
The problem, as I understand it is, funding never gets to where its supposed to get, TO THE KIDS’ EDUCATION. Are we in it for ourselves, or our kids? Are we going to continue letting teachers leave? SURE they get the yearly 1 1/2 percent increase in living raise, but the premiums on their insurance rises by 2.3% annually also. The paradox is, they are making more money each year, but having less to take home! Until we begin putting someone in public office who will do something about it, we are never going to get this solved.
Just my two cents worth……
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0 0 Home schooling is looking more and more attractive every day!
I say that but I’m not so sure I’d go ahead with it. My parents home schooled my younger brother. He’s smart and ended up with a good job making just over 65k a year last year, but as far as common sense goes and the ability to deal with people …..not so much in that department!
Home schooling has its good points, but kids need that social interaction with others to be able to fully develop mentally and emotionally. At 27 he still acts like he’s 16 sometimes.
ok…so we need another option! 
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0 0 I’m not so sure I could homeschool my kids, but I knew a lady who homeschooled her two youngest kids. She did a lot of field trips or other group educational activities with other people who were homeschooling their kids. This way they still got the social aspect of the education. It seemed to work well for them.
I don’t think it would be easy, but if done right maybe it could work for some.
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0 0 I think everyone should frame their kids’ education as primarily homeschooled, and then treat public education as secondary education.
When I taught computers, one of my students was homeschooled, but only came to school for my class and one other (can’t remember what it was). I thought that was awesome that his parents obviously planned is education so strategically.
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0 0 http://www.congress.org/congressorg/power_rankings/index.tt
Shows power rankings of the states based on a bunch of things like committee assignments of our senators and representatives, their power position in their own party, their influence on other members (like can they sway votes their way), and substantive legislation passed.
You can see Idaho is ranked … 53rd out of 54! Only Puerto Rico has less power than Idaho does. Idaho’s all-Republican government wields less influence than even non-states like Guam and American Samoa!
We reap what we sow, isn’t that a favorite conservative saying?
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0 0 Haven’t had time to really go over their numbers and methods of coming up with the rankings, but is North Dakota really the most powerfull state politically? I think the lower or declining populations of some states and territories are skewing the numbers a bit. I’ll have to look at it more carefully later
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0 0 I liked Kerry’s Post on #9…it leads me to a point that is overlooked so often…what portion of the state budget has stayed constant over the years, even in budget holdback years? What portion of the budget also usually enjoys increases too? Give up?
Education of course. Too many people have equated spending more money with results. It has not added up…which is why Kerry’s point about seniors not being able to do fractions would be comical if not so serious.
So, Marilyn Howard and her darlings have not been able to change much after years and billions of dollars spent. Why not? Because the Education Establishment is run by a bloated bureaucracy. While I am not totally thrilled by Luna, I am eagerly hoping that he will add a business like approach to educating. Namely, slacker teachers will be canned and/or forced to perform. Students get graded…why not teachers. At your work, if you fail to produce what happens? (Or what should happen?) You get canned, or a work plan is set up to help you succeed.
Good teachers should get rewarded. Bad teachers should not. The way contracts are set up an negotiated even dead weight teachers get drug along with the pack that does care about teaching. This is wrong and subverts the education of young people in so many ways.
Perhaps if more government services were run on a business model we wouldn’t get taxed to death. Perhaps government would have to be just as responsible to the people it serves! Novel idea…I hope Luna pushes the issue. In this thread Education has been treated as a sacred cow…we see the results. Wake up and hold educators accountable!
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0 0 I agree educators should have performance measures, but the problem lies in how to make them objective and transferable to all subjects.
Every merit pay system I’ve heard of sounds great, but comes down to forcing teachers to try dumping their lowest-performing students, the mentally-challenged kids, and the kids from broken homes who just need a little extra help.
So how to measure performance in a way that does not penalize teachers for the challenges that their kids bring to the classroom?
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0 0 Mike - I agree on your point about the government working as business model. In fact, as a future educator, if the chance to work at a private school (non-religious … I have my standards) comes up, I’d take it.
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This year’s election results remind me of Chris Rock’s joke about Marion Barry getting reelected as D.C. mayor after getting busted on tape buying crack. His joke was the message sent to kids about drugs:
“Kids, do you know what happens when you mess with drugs?”
“Apparently I can be mayor!”
“Kids, do you know what happens when you don’t get an education?”
“Apparently I can get elected (if I belong to the right clique)!”
“Kids, do you know what happens when you are a jerk and alienate your co-workers to the point of publicly being called an absolute idiot and threatened with being thrown out the window?”
“Apparently I can be a congressman!”
“Kids, do you know what happens when you advocate growing marijuana on your land or admit to your bosses that you wasted six years on the job?”
“Apparently I can be governor!”