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Our new Governor is a Chris Christie clone and one of the first things Christie killed was a planned second Mid-Town rail tunnel to Pennsylvania Station in New York. Penn Station has not had an expansion of rail tunnels to New Jersey since the 19th Century and its a real bottle neck to East Coast RR transportation .
Christie didn't want to pay for it . I think you can kiss the Purple Line goodbye (You know some people in Chevy Chase and Bethesda don't want it) and probably the same for the Red Line which whites out in Baltimore County view as Loot Rail bringing the great dark unwashed population of Baltimore City out to the suburbs. The reason Anthony Brown lost was his failure to carry Baltimore County like O'Malley and Glendenning did. Brown lost it by a margin of 200,000. Canceling the Red Line would likely improve Hogan's re-election chances!
I very much doubt Hogan views himself as a Christie clone. Christie has one of the worst records in the country when it comes to economic and job growth. And, no, O'Malley didn't win Balt County in 06. Nor did Glendenning ever win Balt County (lost it both in 94 or 98), so it appears you don't have any idea what you're talking about.
I very much doubt Hogan views himself as a Christie clone. Christie has one of the worst records in the country when it comes to economic and job growth. And, no, O'Malley didn't win Balt County in 06. Nor did Glendenning ever win Balt County (lost it both in 94 or 98), so it appears you don't have any idea what you're talking about.
Well, as long Hogan does not divert funds earmarked for the Purple Line to build those roads he was talking about....(if you are familiar with The Hudson Expansion Tunnel project that Christie shot down-mentioned in the mwruckman snip you quoted-my comment would make more sense).
Politics in New Jersey are different considering that elections swing back and forth between R and D quite frequently. The Maryland GOP does not have the luxury to push a hardcore GOP agenda or to have someone like Christie in the Office, especially if they want to keep a Republican in Office after 2018. Granted, they could go balls to the wall if they assume this election was a fluke and they have no chance to win in 2018 again anyways; a sort of middle finger to Maryland Dems, but I don't think that will happen.
My guess is that Hogan is going to focus primarily on Western, Eastern, and Southern Maryland-areas largely ignored by O'Malley while remaining moderate with Central Maryland. He can do the Republican 'thing' with the counties who favored him, and will vote Republican in 2018 regardless, but he's going to have to throw Montgomery County and Prince George's County a bone every now-and-then to keep everyone happy.
Well, as long Hogan does not divert funds earmarked for the Purple Line to build those roads he was talking about....(if you are familiar with The Hudson Expansion Tunnel project that Christie shot down-mentioned in the mwruckman snip you quoted-my comment would make more sense).
Politics in New Jersey are different considering that elections swing back and forth between R and D quite frequently. The Maryland GOP does not have the luxury to push a hardcore GOP agenda or to have someone like Christie in the Office, especially if they want to keep a Republican in Office after 2018. Granted, they could go balls to the wall if they assume this election was a fluke and they have no chance to win in 2018 again anyways; a sort of middle finger to Maryland Dems, but I don't think that will happen.
My guess is that Hogan is going to focus primarily on Western, Eastern, and Southern Maryland-areas largely ignored by O'Malley while remaining moderate with Central Maryland. He can do the Republican 'thing' with the counties who favored him, and will vote Republican in 2018 regardless, but he's going to have to throw Montgomery County and Prince George's County a bone every now-and-then to keep everyone happy.
Yes, recognizing that Maryland is a diverse state with regions who have very different realities and thus no "one size fits all" governing policy is going to work from Friendsville to Rockville to Towson to Berlin would be a good first step for Governor elect Hogan. MOM actively rejected MD's regionalism and it created a lot of bad blood that was purged last Tuesday.
Let's work past that, and accept that public policy that works for some of the densest, most wealthy parts of the United States are not applicable, and often ruinous, to rural depopulating Appalachia.
Last edited by westsideboy; 11-09-2014 at 09:46 PM..
Okay, you show a study where that is not the case. Does that invalidate the studies I have provided? Obviously in some cases, pre-k works and in others it may not. Are you suggesting that we should scrap early childhood education and let parents wing it until their kids reach 8 years old? This is not Finland unfortunately. American culture has no room for that level of parental involvement.
Actually, the majority of longitudinal studies do not demonstrate long-term benefits of pre-k. Any benefits it may have washout when the kiddos enter elementary school. Universal pre-K will just be state-subsidized daycare.
Your last sentence demonstrates the problem in the US. School has become daycare for children, and for many, parents do not feel an obligation to play any role in their child's education. Academically successful kids tend to be the children of very involved parents.
Do such benefits last? In the 1960s a group of vulnerable pre-schoolers in Michigan were randomly selected either to enroll in a programme of daily coaching from well-trained teachers plus weekly home visits, or to join a control group. The early results were amazing: after a year the kids who took part were outscoring the control group by ten IQ points.
Disappointingly, that difference faded by the age of ten, leading many to doubt that the Perry project (named after the school where it took place) actually worked. However, even if it didn’t boost their IQ scores for long, the intervention appears to have taught them other useful skills, such as self-discipline and perseverance. The Perry pre-schoolers were far more likely than the control group to graduate from high school on time (77% to 60%). And by the age of 40, they were more likely to earn $20,000 a year or more (60% to 40%) and less likely to have been arrested five times or more (36% to 55%).
Perry generated $16 of benefit for every $1 spent on it, by one estimate. Another pre-school programme in Chicago showed a benefit-to-cost ratio of 10 to 1; the Elmira project in upstate New York was five to one; the Abecedarian project in North Carolina was four to one.
All this suggests that, when it comes to education, the best returns will come not from pumping yet more money into schools but from investing in the earliest years of life. And that includes lending a helping hand to parents who struggle.
This is an article from the Economist, not some hippy-dippy liberal think tank. I read this and thought of this insane thread.
Two things:
1. As we have seen with our countries school system, schools are not created equal. Even if you were able to create a curriculum that is designed to produce those same results, it would be unlikely to be replicated across the country, or in this case, the state. How do they even began to ensure that the quality of the schools will be the same? If they can figure that out, then why not do the same for our country's public school system?
2. Something mentioned in this article that should be noted:
Quote:
In a study in 1995, Betty Hart and Todd Risley of the University of Kansas found that children in professional families heard on average 2,100 words an hour. Working-class kids heard 1,200; those whose families lived on welfare heard only 600. By the age of three, a doctor’s or lawyer’s child has probably heard 30m more words than a poor child has.
Well-off parents talk to their school-age children for three more hours each week than low-income parents, according to Meredith Phillips of the University of California, Los Angeles. They put their toddlers and babies in stimulating places such as parks and churches for four-and-a-half more hours. And highly educated mothers are better at giving their children the right kind of stimulation for their age, according to Ariel Kalil of the University of Chicago. To simplify, they play with their toddlers more and organise their teenagers.
Are pre-school programs going to really make up that much of a difference? Hypothetically speaking, let's say Hogan decides to adopt Brown's plan of creating this pre-school program, wouldn't the same issue still exist? Are you going to be able to assure that the quality of education is on par with what wealthier families are able to afford? Or at least recreate an environment of learning that wealthier families are able to provide for their kids? It seems to me, that there will always be a deficient based on a family's economic status, which is why I wonder if adding more costs is actually going to solve the deficiencies that poorer students may face.
Note: The Economist is considered a modern liberal leaning news source. Not that it really matters, but I thought it was worth noting since it's political leaning was brought up.
1. As we have seen with our countries school system, schools are not created equal. Even if you were able to create a curriculum that is designed to produce those same results, it would be unlikely to be replicated across the country, or in this case, the state. How do they even began to ensure that the quality of the schools will be the same? If they can figure that out, then why not do the same for our country's public school system?
2. Something mentioned in this article that should be noted:
Are pre-school programs going to really make up that much of a difference? Hypothetically speaking, let's say Hogan decides to adopt Brown's plan of creating this pre-school program, wouldn't the same issue still exist? Are you going to be able to assure that the quality of education is on par with what wealthier families are able to afford? Or at least recreate an environment of learning that wealthier families are able to provide for their kids? It seems to me, that there will always be a deficient based on a family's economic status, which is why I wonder if adding more costs is actually going to solve the deficiencies that poorer students may face.
Children of educated, wealthy parents, will always have advantages, particularly over people in poverty. Why does this mean we shouldn't bother figuring out ways to help less advantaged children? Did you miss the part where this saves money in the long run? Here it is: Perry generated $16 of benefit for every $1 spent on it, by one estimate. Highly unequal societies are stagnant, dysfunctional, and economically less vibrant. If spending money on preschool now saves money on prisons and welfare 20 years from now, isn't that an outstanding investment for our society? We need at the very least to be investigating whether this is true very very carefully, not dismissing it outright.
1. As we have seen with our countries school system, schools are not created equal. Even if you were able to create a curriculum that is designed to produce those same results, it would be unlikely to be replicated across the country, or in this case, the state. How do they even began to ensure that the quality of the schools will be the same? If they can figure that out, then why not do the same for our country's public school system?
Howard County is a perfect example: standardized curriculum without 'magnet' schools, relatively standardized resources devoted to each school. The variable are the kids and their families.
Wilde Lake High School and River Hill High School are separated by about 3 miles geographically. World of difference if you look at test scores, 4 year matriculation rates, # of APs, etc. etc. etc.
River Hill's catch area is the most well-off portion of HoCo. Wilde Lake is the least.
Okay, you show a study where that is not the case. Does that invalidate the studies I have provided? Obviously in some cases, pre-k works and in others it may not. Are you suggesting that we should scrap early childhood education and let parents wing it until their kids reach 8 years old? This is not Finland unfortunately. American culture has no room for that level of parental involvement.
I actually have no real problem with Pre-K if we can afford it but folks need to stop over selling it. It's not the panacea people like yourself are making it out to be.
Children of educated, wealthy parents, will always have advantages, particularly over people in poverty. Why does this mean we shouldn't bother figuring out ways to help less advantaged children?
Didn't say we shouldn't, I just don't think funding pre-school is the answer. I don't think it changes the overriding issues that children in these types of setting deal with at home. There are economically disadvantaged kids in grade school who struggle, not necessarily because of the school, but because of their home life. When my wife was teaching in PG County, she had students that would miss days of schools so that they could take care of their younger siblings, while their mother was at work. If the younger sibling is 3 or 4, then of course they could go to these pre-schools, but if they are younger, then what?
Having pre-school does not eliminate the disadvantages that poorer students will face. Yes it will give them more opportunity than perhaps they would have normally had in the same circumstances, but at what cost? So their parents can still work? It doesn't changed the issues they deal with on a daily basis as poorer students. It gives them an outlet, not necessarily a solution to their conditions.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Zimar
Did you miss the part where this saves money in the long run? Here it is: Perry generated $16 of benefit for every $1 spent on it, by one estimate. Highly unequal societies are stagnant, dysfunctional, and economically less vibrant. If spending money on preschool now saves money on prisons and welfare 20 years from now, isn't that an outstanding investment for our society? We need at the very least to be investigating whether this is true very very carefully, not dismissing it outright.
A similar program in MD would be subsidized and who do you think will pay for it? Yes it will be inexpensive for those families but middle class and even some working class families will have to pick up the bill to fund these programs.
Saying that preschool will save money on prisons and welfare, is a giant leap. There is nothing that suggest that even those kids were not in these program that this is where they would have been going so let's not make such an assumption because there is absolutely no basis to support it.
There is no investigation that needs to be done, the article itself showed clear, concrete evidence that students that spent more time with their parents gained more. If you look at statistics about not only parents spending time with their kids, but also kids growing up in a two parent home, they show how much more children succeed compared to just about any other situation. Enabling parents to have to work more and keeping them out of the homes is not necessarily full-proof for the kids and does not in anyway promote maintaining a strong family structure in anyway. Instead it's promoting this idea that other people do a job that parents are best fit to do, and that's raising their own kids.
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