Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by Janie Hydrick

I love the title of the blog: “It’s the deficit, stupid.” Would that the enemies of children and public education were simply stupid. Unfortunately, they are not stupid. They are evil-minded and smart enough to have garnered the power to wreak irrevocable damage to the lives and futures of countless children as well as the lives and futures of public education employees.

Our legislators who vote against reasonable school funding, perpetuate arcane tax formulas, and line their own pockets and their cronies’ pockets will never hang their heads in shame because shame derives from an acknowledgement that you are doing something wrong. And these legislators zealously believe that most Arizona children have no right to a quality public education and no right to the dreams that a quality public education gives wings to. These legislators believe only in themselves and in their profits.

Case in point: Representative Yarbrough is the sponsor of a bill that makes the corporate income tax for private schools permanent. He has been the Executive Director of the Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization since 1998, an organization that keeps 10% of the money it gets from this corporate tax credit for “administrative purposes.”

Yarbrough claims this voucher program benefits poor kids, yet this statute includes families making nearly 3.5 times the federal poverty level: up to $68,450, which is more than most Arizona public school employees earn!

Are our anti-education legislators stupid? No way. Just evil and greedy, and they need to be replaced with people who care about children, care about public education, and care about a future Arizona that can only prosper when its people are educated and healthy.



Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by Kirk

All of this should be strong enough rhetoric to get our members and our colleagues in the profession to act and react strongly. But, will educators continue to complain about something and do nothing or will this be the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back? Only time will tell.

The information and the education on these issues that AEA provides is beyond valuable and needs to continue as Arizona works through the budget crisis.

Keep up the good work and the vigilance at the legislature.

Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by Buzz

Janie reminded me of a few issues that need to be exposed to the public. In fact, if the public would rise up and force the legislature to just two things, our deficit problem would be gone.

First - the greed of Representative Steve Yarbrough in Legislative District 21 in Chandler. He is the Executive Director of the Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization. Last year he collected over $10 million of our tax dollars, distributed $8 million of those dollars to private schools in the form of scholarships for kids who, for the most part have parents who have the money to pay their own way rather than rely on our tax dollars to supplement their income in for form of tax credits. Here is the worst part. The law allows Representative Yarbrough to keep 10% of the $10 million - a cool million for him to use as he pleases. And, the records show he has another $1 million of unexpended funds that he has no responsibility to disperse within any timeframe, allowing him to invest it if he chooses. Guess who wrote most of these laws - Yarbrough.

Want to help solve the deficit problem? Eliminate the tuition tax credit scam in Arizona that is costing Arizona taxpayers $51 million a year.

Second - If the richest 1 % of people in Arizona paid the same level of taxes as the poorest 20 percent do, Arizona would have $1.4 billion in additional revenues… money that would resolve the budget deficit with revenue left over to hire about 7,000 new teachers. That would not only help reduce class size, it would stimulate the economy. Teachers spend their pay checks on new cars, houses, and other consumer goods, not send it overseas in investments.

Perhaps you feel sorry for these wealthy Arizonans. You shouldn\\\'t. Let met tell you another story. A couple of years ago our state legislature slashed $330 million in tax cuts that resulted in overcrowded class rooms and stagnant wages and benefits for school employees. Do you know who got the benefit of this tax cuts? Almost two-thirds of the benefit went to top 20 percent of income earners in Arizona.

Kirk - if parents, teachers, education support professionals and most of the hard working wage earners in Arizona knew this, do you suppose they would vote out the extremists in the legislature like Jim Weiers, Steve Yarbrough, Russell Pearce, and the gang?


NCLB mandate by mel

How are we as parents supposed to trust the educational system? When teachers are fixing tests to make their students pass exams due to the “No Child Left Behind” mandate. This is ridiculous. Check out dailycents.com at http://blogs.dailycents.com/?p=819

Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by Thomas C. Carey

I\\\'ve got a great idea! It\\\'ll save a lot of committee work, task force efforts and agonizing at the Legislature and in Governing Board Rooms of school districts. Simply petition the Congress to have the State of Arizona dissolved. By doing so, we\\\'ll move from the 50th \\"smartest state\\" to 49th - in a tie with Mississippi. With some effort, we might even move to #48 or #47 with New Mexico and Nevada. Thus, we\\\'d improve our \\"station in life\\" among education systems and save all of the money that, according to the dimwits who control our Legislature, is wasted on our public schools. And....some of us could breathe a bit easier every January knowing that those same dimwits were going to stay home and spread their lack of intellect throughout the \\"territory\\" rather than condense it in one place at the Capitol.

Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by Julie Horwin

We Arizona educators celebrated the defeat of vouchers in Utah. Many of us said, "Well, that's a strong statement of how people feel about vouchers." Unfortunately we are wrong when we say that. It was only a small percentage of Utahans who went to the polls to vote overwhelmingly against the country's first universal voucher program. It is my opinion that the result says less about how they feel about the program itself than about the difficulty of winning an off-year referendum in the face of activist public-school employees (way to go! Public education activists are the best "boots on the ground" grassroots organization that exists!). I believe the average Utah-an was also averse to risking another TABOR-like parameter.

The voucher program is dead in Utah, but school choice is not dead,and it will continue to be a frontier where folks will try to find a gold mine (Sen. Yarbrough is a great example). Tax credits for donations to scholarship organizations will be sold to the Arizona voter on the false grounds that they can help support school choice for lower-income families, and personal-use credits can help middle-class families. Tax credits reduce the amount a taxpayer owes the government for each dollar he spends on education. For instance, if a business owes the state $4,000 and donates $2,000 to a scholarship-granting organization, it would pay just $2,000 in taxes. Similar benefits for donations can be applied to individuals. This means the Arizona General Fund becomes that much smaller during a time when the budget deficits seem to grow during a low-spending (not quite recession) economy. When gas becomes more expensive, so do other commodities affected by high gas prices; transportation of food across highways, manufactured goods are examples. Who has less discretionary funds to spend on a child's education at such times? You guessed it - the low income families. These tax credits during this economic time are only helping to create a stronger divide between the "haves" and "have nots". Instead of investing in public schools, where all children can have access to a free state-of-the-art education system, tax credits are going to the wealthiest students so that they can build their own schools - not known for diversity, by the way.

Three states have weaker forms of personal-use tax credits than AZ: Illinois allows families to claim credits worth 25% of their educational expenses up to $2,500. Iowa allows 25% up to $1,000, and Minnesota allows 75% of non-tuition expenses up to a maximum credit of $1,000 per child. Five states -- Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island -- have more powerful donation credits. Pennsylvania allows a 90% credit for donations and Florida allows a 100% credit. It is amazing given the data, that people still buy into the myth that these tax credits go to low-income children, and the bigger myth that they fund schools that are "better" at educating than public schools. So much data debunks both these myths, yet it is hard to get rid of the emotional urban legend.

Education tax credits are less controversial than vouchers, so they are an in-road in places where it would otherwise be difficult to pass school-choice programs. Broad-based education tax credits that combine personal-use and donation credits to cover most kids are preferable. I bet that were Arizona educators to begin to speak up in great quantities of people and words, we would reframe the conversation and actually put to rest the myth that private schools are better than public and that low income children are realizing school choice.

Tax credits also have bipartisan support. It is widely trumpeted that "with the support of a Republican legislature and the signature of a Democratic governor, Arizona, passed tax-credit programs last year".

Donation credits also look different to the average voter than vouchers. The credits are seen by many as an extension of existing tax benefits for charitable giving. A donation credit expands choice through tax incentives and private money. Voters don't see tax credits as giving to the government to support private schools.

Credits offer individuals and businesses the feeling that they can support the kind of education they prefer (with no research about where their money is actually going, and what kind of statistics the schools actually have around testing and educational achievement.) Tax payers who vote yes on tax credits believe that they are helping to ensure that their education dollars are used effectively. Tax credits can bring parents, nonprofits, taxpayers and businesses together to hurt and curtail public education's ability to offer free and accessible high quality education to all students by shrinking the General Fund.

Finally, donation tax credits create political direction that help reinforce school-choice programs, making it easier to expand them in the future. In Pennsylvania, for instance, the 183 scholarship organizations have become a permanent institutional base for supporters and beneficiaries, and a serious political force. These institutions, which exist in most of the state's legislative districts, organize parents and children for yearly letter-writing campaigns and rallies, and keep businesses who donate connected with families and politicians. Individuals, businesses and scholarship organizations that participate in the program will have a direct interest in defending and expanding the law. And, believe me, it has expanded: The program has more than doubled to almost $45 million this year from $20 million in 2001!

Arizona educators need to inform, engage and expand the conversation by framing the message. In my job, and in my social activities, I take advantage of every opportunity to explain the real truth of what tax credits do, who they benefit, and who they hurt.

Utah educators can be proud of a well-fought battle against overwhelming odds. Now is the time for Arizona educators to think, plan, take action, and fight parity through education tax credits. If you want to know how best to get involved, contact the AEA organizational consultant in your school district to find out how you can help the GrassRoots Educational Activist Team (G.R.E.A.T)


Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by leighiashon@yahoo.com

I have talked with co-workers who are not members and they have such a complacent attitude about our failing funding “well that’s just how it is.” I think finding a supportive reporter/writer for The Arizona Republic call out to all teachers to fight our legislatures to improve our national ranking in PUBLIC Education Funding maybe, just maybe enough readers and “other” teachers will support our fight and AEA will not have to be the sole fighter in this admirable quest.

Re: It’s the deficit, stupid by Adeana

Public education is not, and never should be evaluated as a business. The true impact of what we do cannot be measured by a scannable test every year. The most touching stories we hear are about how years later, former students thank their teachers for how they made them feel, how they helped them through a tough time, how they challenged and inspired them. Children are children because they do not process things in an adult way. That is why we try so hard to protect them. The student that yells at you when he is 13 for making him show all his work in math will come back 10 years later and apologize for yelling at you because you taught him how to work. Parents, please stop forming your opinions about education based on your own experience. Education has changed. Yes there are still those who are not fully on board the ship of the future, and yes there are still people that get hired that make poor decisions, but do not judge us based on their actions. Isn't that only fair, to judge people individually, rather than lump them all together, you don't want that done based on skin color or gender, right? Then don't do it on proffesion either. A public school, unlike a production factory, cannot choose what raw materials come in. That is the beauty of them. They give all families an opportunity to better their futures through education. Just because a child doesn't learn something as well as another child, does not mean that teachers are not teaching it. Children sometimes refuse to learn. Look around you, look at the ideas on the tv shows we watch. All these messages saying "party party party", "smart people are nerds, loosers, outcasts who are not paid attention to until they do something silly, or stupid. Children whose parents express faith (or at least don't express negative attitudes) towards schooling in have children that do better in those schools. Please read the story here, and after you are done with that, look at the rest of the information on this site:
http://www.jamievollmer.com/blue_story.html

Can you carry that many books well?

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