I am a lucky person,
I’ve always had a good job, good health insurance a retirement plan and vacation.
A very good wife, I’ve been married 30+ years. We have two great sons, and two wonderful grand children.
My parents raise me along with two brothers and a sister. They were married for 40 years, and only till death did they part.
The point to this is that I come from a traditional family back ground, and personally I can’t imagine what it would be like any other way.
Many people today cannot say this.
While we have many issues facing us today I feel the single largest issue is the family!
Whether we are talking a two parent family or a single parent family we need to help them through, tough times as a unit.
When I’m elected I plan to work on legislation to.
Create new good paying jobs. Jobs that have living wages and benefits including health care for the family, supplemental retirement.
As well as work to insure that the jobs we stay here in Colorado.
Help develop a health care system that insures every citizen of Colorado young or old the best care possible.
I will work to insure early learning by making pre-school more accessible to all children.
We need to anchor our higher education and get control of cost and help make sure that the children that can go to college have that opportunity, while at the same time offer real training to those that will be entering the work force out of high school.
HEALTH CARE
Let me expand on Health Care
I feel the current health care system is a restricted market and the insurance industry as a whole is a group of profit seeking firms, and customers don’t have a free choice to switch between market alternatives.
I’ve been reading the Governors Blue Ribbon Commission Report. I agree in principle with the report and its findings.
The report says that any legislation needs to encompass three principles and they all need to work together.
These include
ACCESS,
QUAILITY,
AND MOST IMPORTANTLY IT NEEDS TO BE COST EFFECTIVE
The most cost effective approach to health care is based on preventive health care. It cost less to vaccinate a child or adult, than it does to treat the flu, measles or pneumonia after they contract it.
Studies have shown that it IS cheaper to provide prenatal care for mothers, than to care for a premature baby.
In the old testament there is a passage that tells farmer to leave at the time of harvesting a portion of their crops in the field, a portion of the field for the
Widow, the orphaned and the stranger.
So I say to you, to deny health care because of cost is very similar to denying food to the widow, the orphan and the stranger.
We stand at a threshold in this state. We can vigorously move forward with our green economy as the foundation for a new beginning. We can invest in our education system to build a work force eager to live and thrive in our state. But our health care system is now the barrier to our success; however it can be the turnkey to an amazing turn around.
Education:
According to various reports, the national graduation rate could be anywhere from approximately 70% to 86%. This means that anywhere from 500,000 to 1.2 million members of the class of 2003 dropped out before receiving their standard diplomas.
Who or what is the most important school factor in a child’s educational success?
Their Teacher!
We can improve student achievement by enhancing the knowledge, professional status and effectiveness of teachers.
We can also improve student achievement by beginning with a system of high public standards that clarify what we expect children to learn in each subject, each year, backed by a transparent, and fair accountability system.
For this we need the involvement of parents, other civic leaders, and all organizations that are working to improve the lives of children. Focusing intensely on what works is the right thing to do! And it is essential for strengthening our communities and our nation.
WHAT WORKS!
Staffing hard to Staff Schools
Right now, high poverty, low-achieving schools nation wide are losing good teachers. The teachers that are recruited often leave these schools because working conditions make it impossible for them to do the best job they can. This create further problems in as much as there is less cohesive and a less experienced staff.
Survey data as well as conversations with scores of teachers , make it clear that increased pay alone will not get teachers to teach in schools that have historically failed their students and teachers. What is needed is an effective principal, safe and clean facilities, and exciting opportunities for professional development. and the staff and resources to quickly and effectively provide one-on-one and small group work necessary to help struggling students.
SAFE AND ORDERLY SCHOOLS
Fortunately, public schools are among the safest places for children. Studies show that all the violent crimes involving children, only a very small fraction occur in school. We never feel comfortable, however, resting on the knowledge that schools are relatively safe environments for students and teachers. We must constantly strive to make school the safest environment possible.
THE IMPORTANCE OF HIGH-QUALITY READING
Reading is the fundamental skill upon which all formal education depends. Low reading achievement, more than any other factor, is the root cause of chronically- low performing schools, which harm students and contribute to the loss of confidence in the school system.
Simply legislating that they, and their teachers, make better-than-average progress won’t change this reality. If we truly want to close the achievement gap, we have to find ways to make sure these children get a better-than-average education. They will need more, and they will need better: time, teachers, and effective methods-the best we have to offer.
At the beginning of kindergarten, disadvantaged children are three times more likely than other children to score in the bottom quartile on assessments of reading, math, and general knowledge. In terms of specific skills, they are much less likely than their more advantaged peers to be able to identify the letters of the alphabet or to count beyond 10. Middle- and upper-class children not only enter kindergarten knowing more, they continue learning more every summer. As a result, although the evidence indicates that in school, poor, middle-class, and wealthy children actually learn at about the same pace, by fourth grade, students from low-income families are nearly three grade levels below their peers in reading and about two grade levels below their peers in math.
Think about that. On average, disadvantaged children make as much progress in school as their more middle-class peers. They are typically not behind because they have had worse teachers or attended worse schools, but because they entered school way behind
Simply legislating that they, and their teachers, make better-than-average progress won’t change this reality. If we truly want to close the achievement gap, we have to find ways to make sure these children get a better-than-average education. They will need more, and they will need better: time, teachers, and effective methods-the best we have to offer.
