A Worm in the Apple?

I just finished reading "The Worm in the Apple: How the Teacher Unions are Destroying American Education" by Peter Brimelow. The book, if you can imagine, is even more one-sided than its title suggests, and in my opinion the chip on Brimelow's shoulder detracts a bit from his credibility. On the very first page he describes a teachers union meeting like this:

They're extraordinarily fat, for a start...You can't avoid the curious feeling that you've stumbled into a sort of indoor rally for human hot-air balloons. An alarming proportion of attendees wobble and waddle through the teeming crowds of teachers...with thighs like tree trunks, bellies billowing, jowls jiggling.

Overlooking the bad taste of page one fat thigh jabs, there is some merit to be excavated from the sensationalism in the rest of the chapters. Brimelow outlines the history and structure of the largest union in the country, the National Education Association. He describes a system led not by educators but by "educrats," yielding unthinkable lobbying power and plaguing the education system with perverse incentives and inefficiencies. For a briefer look at some of the main complaints against teachers unions, see the Teachers Unions Exposed website.

The Georgia branch of the NEA is the Georgia Association of Educators (GAE), second in size to the Professional Association of Georgia Educators (PAGE). PAGE has a membership of 78,000, about twice that of GAE. In total about 93% of Georgia's teachers are unionized, and they sure can rally the troops.

Just this Saturday, they held an "Invest Now or Pay Later" rally at the Capitol. According to the AJC, 300 teachers attended. According to GAE, 1300. The "invest now or pay later" slogan is stylistically representative of the teachers unions' viewpoints and rhetoric: shallowly catchy, mind-numbingly repeated, and of dubious actual meaning. If I had a nickel for every time they used the phrase "brighter future," I could personally fix the state's school funding problems.

Actually, GAE thinks they can fix school funding not with nickels but with half pennies. At the rally, they advocated for a half cent sales tax increase earmarked solely for public schools.

Teachers unions are generally opposed to "pay for performance" if it ties teacher pay to student test scores. In the NEA article "2...4...6...8...How Should We Compensate?" (how could I have forgotten to mention the love of rhyme?!) they tout the merits of

21st Century alternative pay plans that reward teachers—not for student test scores or subjective evaluations—but for doing the kinds of things that actually improve the learning environment. None are intended to replace a strong, single salary schedule, but to enhance it.

They are referring to professional development programs, many of which have disputed merit. One in particular, called National Board Certification, became one of the hottest issues in the previous legislative session, and is likely to return to the spotlight this year. More to come on that soon.

Civil Rights Versus Human Rights

I'd like to explore the relationship and differences between civil rights and human rights. This will be a more philosophical post than usual, and should provide an important framework for considering policy issues you may come across in the future.

Human rights are rights that every person has for their entire life. Civil rights are bestowed upon people by governments upon entering their territory. Human rights are fundamentally based on a moral or religious code, whereas civil rights are based upon a constitutional or legal code-- at least, that's my simplistic way to distinguish them. Of course, attaining consensus on these rights is a continuous challenge.

The United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. The Declaration consists of 30 articles and is definitely worth reading in full.In the United States, probably because so much of our country's early history and identity was centered on the Constitution, civil rights have taken a more prominent role than elsewhere. Some of the most vivid eras of our national history are the civil rights movements. Nearly every generation has witnessed, or is witnessing, the expansion of civil rights.

Currently disabilities rights are being treated as a civil right in the US, while elsewhere the issue is approached from a human rights perspective. The same might be said for issues like health care and employment.

Personally, a lot of what draws me to public policy is my tendency to take a wide view of human rights. This may be my Catholic background speaking. It also seems, with all the talk of globalization and the international economy, that a notion of rights which stop at legal borders is unsustainable.

Atlanta played a crucial role in the Civil Rights Movement from 1940 to 1970. The Center for Civil & Human Rights is slated to open in Atlanta later this year and should provide interesting resources and events to contribute to this discussion.

Ideas?

I'd like to invite some people to contribute articles to the blog so that you can hear some different voices and perspectives.

-Do you have any suggested authors I should invite?

-Would you like to contribute one or more articles yourself?

-Can you contribute some original photography to add visual interest to the blog?

-Do you have any topics you'd like to read about?

Either post a comment here or email me at cconces@gatech.edu. If you want to contribute an article, I can "invite" you as an author and let you post directly, or you can email me your article and I'll post it for you. Thanks!

The Triple Triple

Bond ratings may seem like the world's dullest blog topic, but bear with me, since this is a critical part of Georgia policymaking.

Like nearly every other state government, but unlike the federal government, the Georgia government must maintain a balanced budget. That means spending cannot exceed revenue. For capital outlay projects like infrastructure and new school buildings, however, states may issue bonds. This allows states to fund big ticket projects like infrastructure and new school buildings over the life of the bond, typically five or 20 years.

The three main bond raters, Moody’s, Fitch, and Standard & Poor’s, all gave Georgia's general oblication (GO) bonds the best rating, AAA. This makes Georgia one of only seven states with the "Triple Triple" designation. Our state-issued bonds are deemed safest from risk of default, which means we can sell bonds at a low interest rate, so we pay millions less in debt service.

Most states have the next best AA bond rating, while California's notorious fiscal situation has stuck them with BBB. The rating method is based on debt structure (e.g. the amount of debt relative to yearly revenue), economic conditions, and management and administration practices.

Why don't all states adopt the necessary practices to earn a AAA rating to score lower interest rates? Legislators often choose to finance a lot of project with bonds rather than with yearly revenue, because by paying later rather than now, they can avoid raising taxes on current constituents. Plenty of interest groups encourage legislators to undertake big spending projects which require issuing debt.

Georgia takes pride in its history of conservative debt management that has kept up the Triple Triple. In Gov. Perdue's words,

Our strong bond ratings and sound fiscal management have allowed us to achieve significant budget savings that will continue to benefit Georgia for years to come.

Legislators at the Joint Budget Hearings on January 15 drilled Director Susan Hart-Ridley of the Georgia State Financing and Investment Commission with questions and concerns about the state's potential to fall to AA ratings given this year's financial troubles. While she could not make them any guarantees, she seemed confident that continued top ratings were likely.

Your Salary is Showing

I am excited to be starting a part-time internship with the Georgia Public Policy Foundation! In 2008, Georgia passed the Transparency in Government Act,

to provide for audits and the examination of books and records; to provide for the creation and maintenance of a website which provides public access to certain state expenditure information...

This means there is now a dearth of publicly available data. Citizens can explore the Georgia Transparency website or the Open Georgia website to find extensive data on education, expenditures, salary and travel reimbursements, financial reports, and program reviews. If you play around in the salaries and travel reimbursements search tool, you can actually see a name by name list of pay to employees of the State of Georgia and employees of local boards of education.

For example, UGA President Michael Adams had nearly double the salary of any other University System of Georgia president. He made $607,417.98 plus travel reimbursement of $7,779.14. Some of my friends are graduate assistants, and sure enough, they're in the system too. Somehow it seems creepier for me to check their salaries, though. I even found myself four times (for different positions in different years).

The main purpose of the data is not to allow graduate students to check whose stipend is the least meager. The hope is that transparency will lead to efficiency. Taxpayers in one county may notice that their county spends significantly more per capita for a particular service than other comparable counties. Then they could pressure their local government to find a more efficient way of providing that service in order to lower their taxes. Right now, the data is so many layers deep that it would take a REALLY dedicated and statistically-adept taxpayer to figure out this kind of thing. So one project I may work on is some of the initial analysis and making things more user friendly.

Super Speeders

I guess I shouldn't have implied that I had good street skill on a bike in yesterday's post. This morning I barely made it 100 yards from my building before rolling over a drain, blowing my front tire, and flying over the handlebars. I banged up my knee, hip, and elbows, but other than that I'm fine. I wasn't going particularly fast.

On the highways, excessive speed increases the trauma of accidents. Georgia's new "Super Speeder" legislation, which went into effect this January 1, adds $200 to the speeding ticket fine for drivers going above 75 miles per hour on a two lane highway or 85 on a three lane.

The interesting aspect of this legislation is the incentives involved. The purported primary goal is to slow drivers down to reduce injuries and deaths on the road. Lawmakers anticipate a secondary perk: an estimated $30 million in much-needed revenue in the first year, which will be used for our trauma system. The connection between "super speeding" and traumatic injuries makes this a logical funding stream.

So it seems like a win-win situation. One possibility is that the law will make people slow down and save lives. The second possibility is that the speeding will continue, but at least our trauma care system will improve. The second possibility is less preferable than the first, but still an improvement over the current situation.

The only potential downside is that the state is also running advertisements urging drivers to slow down, and given the state's drastic need for revenue, the advertising might not be as vigorous as it could be. The state is essentially getting paid for a behavior they are attempting to discourage--a kind of perverse incentive. I like to think that this won't end up being a problem, and that everyone involved will be good-hearted enough to keep human life the top priority. It wouldn't hurt for independent groups to run their own road safety campaigns. By independent I mean groups that are not impacted by the revenue gained from super speeders, for example student groups or nonprofits.

I don't know if anyone is reading this yet, but if you are: drive and bike safely!

The Hearing Crashers' Guide

Hearings are meetings held by the House or Senate during Session to discuss the budget, legislation, or other issues. You can check the Senate schedule or House schedule to see what is coming up. Some meetings are more interesting than others, but regardless of the topic, it's a cool way to experience how government works and I challenge you to try it.

Technically you can't crash a hearing, because the general public is invited. Most meetings are held in the Capitol (CAP) or across the street at the Coverdell Legislative Office Building (CLOB). You can take MARTA to the Georgia State stop and walk about a block from there. From Tech, I always go by bike. Be warned, this requires a decent level of street skill. The roads and drivers in downtown Atlanta can be intimidating and on some of the downhills you'll be going near 30 mph! And this method may require you to bring a change of clothes and/or shoes in a small backpack. When you get to the Capitol or CLOB, go into the front entrance. If the security guard recognizes you or you have a badge, you can walk right in. Otherwise you show your ID, put your bag through a scanner, and walk through a metal detector.

Dress like you are going to a job interview. The legislators will all be wearing suits, and you can't go wrong in a suit or one step below a suit. Everyone is very conservatively dressed, and you will blend in perfectly if you are too. I've never seen a bare shoulder or knee in there. Prepare for extreme temperature variation. The rooms are usually very cold, unless there is a big crowd and then it gets hot.

Usually, the room consists of Senators and/or Representatives, agency representatives, legislative staff, the media, and lobbyists. The legislators have assigned seats, and there are chairs in the back for everyone else. You may have to show up early to get a seat in high profile meetings because more of the press and lobbyists come. The Governor was the first speaker at the Joint Budget Briefings I attended today, and after he left, so did much of the audience.

Arriving early is a good idea anyway, as it gives you the chance to talk to other people, which can be the most interesting part of the whole experience. Wear a pin with your school name, if you have one, and look for others from your school. Almost everyone represents their alma mater on their name tag or with a pin. You can see what lobbyists represent (non-profits, unions, farmers, etc.) by looking at their name tags. Don't be shy about talking to them; networking is the heart of their business.

I highly recommend taking notes because it helps you pay attention, remember things for later, and fit in with the rest of the audience. Etiquette is still highly valued in Georgia, so shake hands, silence your phone, and avoid bringing any food or drinks other than water. Legislators and staff will mostly be drinking the endless supply of Diet Coke they receive. You don't have to stay the whole time, but if possible, enter and exit the room as they are changing speakers. Usually each speaker gives a presentation followed by questions and answers, but only legislators can ask the questions (so don't raise your hand).

I hope this doesn't sound like too many rules. There is really nothing to worry about. I guarantee you that everyone will be excited to see a student taking interest in state policy and will make you feel welcome. If you have already attended a meeting, have questions, or attend one this Session, please leave a comment.

The Value of Veggies

My friend Bobby has started an indoor vegetable garden in his dorm room. He's growing chives, tomatoes, radishes, and arugula to save some money and hopefully develop a liking for vegetables. Sounds like a good investment if it works out.

The state makes a similar investment each year, only on a much larger scale: around $87 million. That is the state contribution to the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CAES) at the University of Georgia. To be clear, this is separate from the $46.7 million in state funds for the Department of Agriculture. Today I only want to talk about CAES.

Let me set aside my Georgia Tech bias against anything UGA-related as I consider this investment. I'll admit that the 1816 CAES students, with their 1216 average SAT score and 3.86 average gpa, seem a bright bunch. About 79% are in-state students, and 95% of the in-state freshmen are on the HOPE Scholarship. Of the state funds for CAES, $12.6 million are used for instruction, so the state is subsidizing these students' education nearly $7000 per student per year, above and beyond their HOPE funding.

Instruction is the smallest chunk of the funding. The remainder is split between research ($40.5 million) and Cooperative Extension ($33.6 million). Cooperative Extension refers to community outreach, dissemination of information, testing and diagnostics, and trainings for farmers, ranchers, producers, and the general public. If Bobby wanted advice about his vegetable garden, for instance, he could call 1-800-ASK-UGA1. Or he could take 40 hours of horticulture courses for home gardeners through the Georgia Master Gardener Program.

Education, research, and outreach are theoretically some of the best forward-thinking investments. But often it is difficult to measure the effectiveness of spending in these areas, and more money doesn't necessarily mean better results. But CAES is making a tremendous effort to demonstrate their impact. They have a searchable database of hundreds of Impact Statements. Writing from Atlanta, it's easy to forget that 29% of Georgia's land is devoted to agriculture. I really had no idea why so much continued agricultural research would be needed. But these impact statements, with titles like "Biorational Nematicides," "Blueberry Replant Fumigation Trials," and "Pecan Root Borer Trapping Made Easy" showed me how little I know.

Interested in undergraduate or graduate studies at CAES? Check out their scholarships or make a campus visit.

Intro to the Georgia Senate

The best thing about the Georgia Senate is that they truthfully call themselves a "peoples' legislature." The 56 Senators are not professional legislators, but rather earn their living in trades ranging from farming to orthodontics. The modest stipend they receive is not enough to be the motivation for their service, and neither, for most, is the promise of future power. By and large, intentions are noble. We have a Senate of hardworking Georgians, working hard for hardworking Georgians.

Senators are required to be at least 25 years old, a US citizen, a two-year Georgia citizen, and a one-year resident of the district they represent. Presently, ages range from 31 to 78. They serve two-year terms with no term limits (that's pretty typical--only 20 states have term limits for state legislators). The party breakdown is 34 Republicans and 22 Democrats. The three month Legislative Session (usually just called Session) begins in January.

A list of Senate leadership is headed up with the President of the Senate, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, President Pro Tempore Tommie Williams, and Majority Leader Chip Rogers, all Republicans. The real leaders are the committee chairs, since most of the legislative work is done in committees. There are 30 committees, but here are some of the key ones and their chairs:

-Appropriations, Sen. Jack Hill. Holds budget hearings and approves Senate version of the state budget. This is a BIG task, so they have nine subcommittees. Sen. Hill is a very busy man during Session, and works closely with the Senate Budget Office. A grocer by trade, Sen. Hill has been in the Senate since 1990 and is exceedingly likable.

-Education and Youth, Sen. Dan Weber.

-Health and Human Services, Sen. Don Thomas.

-Higher Education, Sen. Seth Harp.

-Rules, Sen. Don Balfour. This committee places bills on the legislative calendar, thereby controlling the flow of legislative proceedings.

-Transportation, Sen. Jeff Mullis.

Empowering our People to Grow their own Hogs

Georgia's Governor Sonny Perdue delivered his eighth and final annual state-of-the-state address to the Georgia General Assembly on January 13, 2010. You can watch it here or read the text here.

The Governor typically uses the state-of-the-state address to present the year's legislative agenda and spending priorities to state Senators and Representatives. Gov. Perdue is now in the last year of his second term, which perhaps explains why this year's address favored ambitious rhetoric over specific details.

He quoted Alexis de Tocqueville, Thomas Paine, the Apostol Paul, Dr. Michael Guido, General Oglethorpe, and the prophet Micah. All of these are men (the small but growing role of women in Georgia government will be a future post). The only woman mentioned (but not quoted) was his wife, Mary, and this was admittedly sweet.

I want to recognize the one Earthly person who has stood out as my inspiration and guide throughout this journey. Mary, you are the person I hope to become. Your kindness and gentleness have not only comforted me, but changed me. Mary, you have been a constant reminder of our purpose in public office, and I thank you for all that you have done as my loving wife and as the First Lady of Georgia.

He made analogies to the American Revolution, the Great Depression, both World Wars as well as Korea and Vietnam, rugby, and hog farming.

Georgians didn’t elect us to see a rugby match with a scrum on every decision. When we don’t work together, our jerseys get so muddy the people can’t even distinguish which team we’re on. And we all come out with mud on our face.

These times demand that we worry less about bringing home the pork, and more about empowering our people to grow their own hogs.

And while he didn't go into much detail, the key statement was this:

If we fail to do the hard thing now, our government will be spread far too thin to ensure that Georgia is educated, healthy, safe and growing.

"The hard thing," mostly, is budget cuts. Education, health care, and criminal justice make up 75% of the state budget, and Georgia has its share of troubles even in typical years when state revenue grows four or five percent. This year, it is an understatement to say that Georgia must trim its budget. It is not likely to be pleasant, but guaranteed to be exciting. I'll be watching closely so I can share the highlights with you!

Welcome

Hello and welcome to Georgia State of State for Students! In this blog I will attempt to address a need for a central source of state news relevant to people my age. During a yearlong internship in state government, I fell in love with the exciting and quirky world of Georgia policy-making-- a world that is highly relevant to YOU! Here's why:

1. Entertainment: It's hard to beat Georgia for human interest stories. I'll keep you filled in on the quotes, humor, and characters that you just can't make up.

2. Education: Do you attend a public or private university, college, or technical college in Georgia? Did you go to K-12 here, or might your kids some day? It's worth keeping an eye on the decisions that affect student life and what you learn and pay.

3. Opportunities: Whether it's through an internship, volunteering, voting, or voicing an opinion, you can make a large impact at the state and local level. I'll try to keep this blog updated with details.

4. Lifestyle: Transportation, taxes, jobs, hospitals, libraries... Maybe they matter to you now, or maybe they will in the future.

I'll use the first few posts to fill you in on a basic who's who at the Gold Dome, recap of the governor's race so far, and some other overviews. Then I'll continue with other stories as they come up or as you suggest. Your comments and suggestions are welcome!