Hello! I hope you all had a wonderful week.
All right, so, one area that's very important to the Chamber is education. Governor Doug Ducey has always supported the idea of rewarding high-performing schools and the Chamber agrees with this initiative. One article I read concerned the governor's budget plan for fiscal 2018. Extra money from last year's Proposition 123 added to his budget and increased it to $9.8 billion. One interesting aspect of the budget that has garnered both support and criticism is its slow phase-in. Many of the changes the budget contends occur at a slow enough rate that the full impact of the budget is diluted over the next few years.
One specific area that I read about in an article this week discussed how the Governor's Office has rolled out a program that will allow K-12 district schools and charter schools to apply for and subsequently receive extra funds. Called the Public School Credit Enhancement Program, it helps these schools "get lower interest rates on construction projects to expand successful schools or build new ones" (Rau). The application process will apparently rely heavily on how financially stable these schools are.
In the article I read, the writer asserted that this program will benefit charter schools the most. Moreover, the lower interest rate could help schools expand the existing school, build a new school, expand other school programs, and so on.
Another area that's important to the Chamber is NAFTA. An article I read this week discussed how updating NAFTA would be a good option that would benefit Canada, Mexico, and the United States since it would enhance North America's competitiveness in the global market through an increased focus on innovation and entrepreneurship. One of the updates the article proposed was increased protection of intellectual property, which has been a problem we've had to tackle as technology has advanced. Going with this advancement in technology, the article identified that some areas that would benefit from a NAFTA revision would be agriculture and energy. The writer also warned against altering NAFTA while also imposing tariffs on Mexico since doing that could affect Canada negatively too.
Anyways, that's pretty much what I did/learned about this week. Let me know if you have any questions and I'll get to them in the comments! Thanks for reading and have an awesome weekend! I'll see you all next week for another post.
Sources:
Hansen, Ronald J., Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, and Mary Jo Pitzl. "Arizona budget: Gov. Doug Ducey pitches small steps toward big education goals." Azcentral. The Arizona Republic, 13 Jan. 2017. Web. 25 Mar. 2017.
Martinez, Arturo, and Carol Guensburg. "SXSW Panelists: Updating NAFTA Could Aid All 3 Signatories." VOA. VOA, 15 Mar. 2017. Web. 25 Mar. 2017.
Rau, Alia Beard. "Gov. Doug Ducey releases plan to shrink wait lists at high-performing schools." Azcentral. The Arizona Republic, 18 Mar. 2017. Web. 25 Mar. 2017.
Hi Shreya! Sounds pretty interesting! I am glad we have someone like you to give us this important information! What are the possible side effects of the proposition? Looking forward to the next post!
ReplyDeleteHi Brent! If you're talking about Prop 123, one criticism was that it would take too much of the money from the land grant very quickly and provide too little to schools and its teachers. Thanks for reading!
DeleteHi Shreya!
ReplyDeleteI'm always so interested by what you learn on site! I loved reading about how the lower interest rates could benefit a school so much! I don't have any questions at the moment but looking forward to next weeks post!
Hi Anjalee! I'm so glad you found this interesting! Thanks for reading!
DeleteHey Shreya! Its really interesting to learn more about this information. With regards to NAFTA, what would they change in the agriculture and energy areas?? Would it mainly be on intellectual property?? I was also wondering how your research is going? Again great post! Can't wait to read more!
ReplyDeleteHi Anirudh! So agriculture and energy still face a lot of restrictions so NAFTA revisions would help free trade of these products by resolving disputes over things like sugar, fruit, and vegetables. I'll include more about my research in a post this coming week! Thanks for reading!
DeleteHey Shreya. It sounds like you read looked at some interesting topics this week. I have a few questions that I would like to ask regarding NAFTA though. First off, how specifically, how would agriculture and energy improve compared to their previous state? Also, how would imposting tariffs on Mexico hurt Canada negatively as well?
ReplyDeleteHi Alex! So agriculture and energy still face a lot of restrictions so NAFTA revisions would help free trade of these products by resolving disputes over things like sugar, fruit, and vegetables. With the tariffs, the new administration is planning on imposing a full border adjustment tax. This means that the tariffs would not be directed solely at Mexico, so our trade relations with Canada would be severely affected as well. Thanks for reading!
DeleteHi Shreya. Did they mention about how they will improves school's performance. It seems kinda dumb to expand schools rather than putting the money to improve the quality of education.
ReplyDeleteHi Javier! So the construction projects are what allow the schools to make better use of their money through lower interest rates. Like I said, they could then choose to put the money they then save towards strengthening the school's programs, potentially increasing the quality of education too.
DeleteHi Shreya. Just wondering what is considered to be "financially stable." This matter seems important considering BASIS is a charter school. Keep up the interesting blog.
ReplyDeleteHi Michael! According to the governor's Office of Education, being financially stable refers to a "sound financial plan that contemplates operational costs and future enrollment growth." Thanks for reading!
DeleteHi Shreya! On the article discussing NAFTA that you read this week, were there any negative sides of NAFTA included in the article, given that most of our current government isn't in favor of this trade agreement? Once again, great job on all of the memes. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteHi Marvin! You're right about there being negatives to NAFTA that we need to remedy. That's why the article discusses revising the agreement. Things like intellectual property rights, for instance, are not covered as it should be in the agreement, so the article asserts that modernizing NAFTA is a good idea. Thanks for reading!
DeleteHi Shreya! I love reading your blog posts. They are always so educational and I can tell you have put a lot of work into researching each subject. How has all this research affected your view of the government/lobbyists? And how's your project research going? Can't wait to read more!
ReplyDeleteHi Stirling! I'm so happy to hear that you find the blogs interesting and educational! I think this research has really given me more respect for what lobbyists do. There are so many sides and details to consider when looking at just one bill that they can get heat for any decision they make (which is what I think contributes to the negative view the public seems to hold of them). I'll include more about my research in a post this coming week! Thanks for reading!
DeleteHi Shreya!
ReplyDeleteOne comment that caught my attention was the fact that the governor rewards high-performing schools. Meaning that schools are doing well are going to do better because of the extra cash, but isn't this counterproductive, because it is usually the schools that aren't performing so well that need money rather than the schools that are performing well. So on a more personal note do you believe the governor's policy towards education is good or not, and why?
Hi Kevin! So what you're proposing is something most of the nation is already doing: providing more funds to lower-performing schools in hope of improvement. We've tried this method for a while and now its effects are sort of stagnating. So Governor Ducey wanted to try a different approach and see if that changes things for the better. He believes that giving more money to high-performing schools allows them to keep up what they're doing and incentivizes lower-performing schools to see what's working and implement those methods instead. Then, those lower-performing schools will improve because they're following methods that are working and with that, they will earn more funds. That's sort of the train of thought. Personally, I think since we've already tried that first way, it can't hurt to try it this way and see how things go so that, in the future, we can take the best of the two approaches instead of sticking to one way of doing things and letting things stagnate. Great question!
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