This is going to be a short diary because I have to travel here in a bit to get to another event later tonight.
But I want to talk about something the legislative events that occurred this morning in Kansas, as representatives and state senators met with their constituents.
In Overland Park, in a pay to get in the door meeting at the Double Tree, several senators and house of representative members hashed through the issues both before hand and after a quick breakfast (Decent bacon, BTW).
As the notes went on, though, Republicans kept touting the cuts to the tax rates, why the tax income was growing slowly (in part due to cuts, they acknowledged) but would grow as jobs grew.
When they addressed education, the point was made that the old model (80s/90s) of improving education wasn't shown to work and that Kansas needed to think differently if we were going to start increasing population.
House Rep. Stephanie Clayton (R) of Lenexa had heard enough and delivered something shocking. She told the truth to a room full of businessmen. More shocking? In the only moment of the entire meeting, the business community roared to life and cheered her for it. (She begins discussing of prior Rep's assessment of Kansas status at around 55 seconds)
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As legislators were asked: what can we do about decreasing population? About attracting workforce to Kansas.. they kept coming back to the same buzzwords: cut taxes.
But Stephanie Clayton (Starting at the 1:05 marker) drills this argument, noting that it is getting harder to attract talent in large part due to the perception of Kansas being 'embarrassing'.
This stunning rebuke of her fellow party members on the same panel shook the room up. Every business creator in the room knew the truth - it is becoming harder to attract top tier talent to a state that is perceived as backwards. The moderator decides to end the conversation on that high point, but it was definitely clear how the room felt - a room full of paying members - about the position of Kansas in job recruitment.
An hour later, I attended a legislative meeting in DeSoto Kansas, where Sen. Lynn and Rep. Dove spoke to their constituents.. a constituency that included a LOT of teachers.
While facing several questions about many issues, Senator Lynn promoted the idea of Bill Gates teaching High School Computer Science (think he would take the pay? And is he really qualified?) and took time to blame teachers for hurling 'accusations' and 'lies' while not providing her enough 'love'.
The meeting was cut short as the kind of questions the representatives were receiving didn't match with what the expected.
I admit, I contributed to this, as I rose to state this:
ME:You've just spoken briefly about teacher certifications and you mentioned Bill Gates in a classroom. I have to tell you, I'm one of the few people in this room who has actually met Bill Gates. I think he's an unbelievable manager. But then again, he had the power to throw things at his employees or fire them. You can't do that as a teacher.
Which leads me to my question about the lack of certifications. Imagine if you will you go to an airport and their are three planes. One has a pilot who's certified and trained. The other has a pilot with 30 hours of training, and the last plane has a pilot with life experience.. which flight will you take?
Finally, I want to respond to Rep. Dove's point about the Freedom of Religion Bill. Sir, I know as an African American man you may relate to this. My wife and I have been happily married for quite some time. As an interacial couple, we've had the misfortune of facing at least one facility that wasn't that happy to rent us a room in the south because of our status. For years in the 1950s and 60s, many religious groups made proclaimations against desegregation. Recently in Kansas City, we had a shooter who proclaimed that his religious beliefs compelled him to kill Jews. I am wondering to what end is religious 'freedom'? Does religious Freedom really allow us the right to discriminate, place barriers, and harm others? Where are the boundaries?"
Sen. Lynn took a long pause before saying:
"I See where this is going to go" issued a statement, and then, after also refusing to respond to the next question (regarding her assertion of "facts" which she couldn't back) decided to cut the meeting short, and ask that teachers stop making 'accusations' and 'lying' (paraphrase) about what they are doing.
From a meeting that had political courage to one that had chickens who couldn't face their constituents, we had a little bit of everything this morning in Kansas.
One Addition: This was a meeting scheduled from 10AM-Noon. It was then moved to until 11:30. The legislators closed up shop on the meeting at 10 til 11, deciding they'd rather leave then continue to take part. Whoops!
2:59 PM PT: These are some video updates:
Discussing why the bill was amended for Policy. Representative Dove (R) explains why he wanted more funding for over the wire and private schools. Senator Lynn explains why she favored just dropping all school funding in favor of block grants.
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Here, Senator Lynn argues that we should favor vouchers and end teacher certification. She also notes some students need just a little bit less from education.
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Rep. Dove tells us that Kansas is the 4th worst education in the country (he's wrong, I can't find anything anywhere that lists that) But he's willing to argue the point.