Category Archives: education news

Donald Trump, education news

First Amendment … in full

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

That is what the nation’s founders wrote when they established has become known as the Bill of Rights.

Every head of our government understood that language, dating back to our nation’s first president, a national hero, George Washington, who took office in 1789; President Washington served two terms, left in 1797 … and died two year later.

The First Amendment makes it as clear as the deep blue sky that government should have no role in any of those things mentioned. Along came Donald J. Trump. He has sought to maneuver himself into an ability to govern all of the items mentioned in the First Amendment. He has endorsed Bible study in public schools, sought to ban Muslims from entering this country … and sought infamously to ban three news organizations from obtaining access to news sources within the White House or any other government building.

Now he is demanding that ABC fire Jimmy Kimmel, the late-night TV comic for making jokes about Trump. Let me be clear: Jimmy Kimmel hasn’t broken a single law, he hasn’t violated a single proposition noted in the First Amendment, hasn’t said a word that would put Trump in any form of danger.

He’s made jokes about the POTUS. He gets a lot of laughs. He’s funny, man.

Trump, who possesses the thinnest skin of any politician in human history, wants none of any of it. Humor not allowed. You wanna laugh … go to a circus and giggle at the clowns.

Trump’s ongoing battle over the First Amendment only illustrates in living color why I and many millions of other patriotic Americans want him far away from the center of political power.

education news, media news

AI … more frightening all the time

If only I knew more about artificial intelligence, well, then I could make a more cogent argument about why it scares the bejabbers out of me.

My knowledge of AI is limited, so I’ll go with what I know. It ain’t much.

I have watched video presentations of people saying things that I know in my heart they never could say. Yet AI providers are filling our screens and I-phones with images of them saying it. The development of artificial intelligence goes way beyond my pointed head’s ability to understand it. All I see and hear is the product they develop.

I made my living back in the day providing information about the communities I called home. From Portland, Ore., to S.E. Texas, to the Texas Panhandle, I relied on actual living, breathing human beings to tell me what they believed to be the truth about our communities and the people who gave them life. I could fact-check them quickly and determine the veracity of what they said. I then could take that verified information and report it to the world.

These days it’s a vastly different game. I can listen to a news report and wonder out loud and consciously whether I was being fed information from a human being or whether it was coming from an AI-generated creature.

I hate having to make that determination. I very well could be all wet in making these assumptions about AI. I don’t making them, as long as I am relying only on my limited knowledge of what AI is, or will become.

I keep hearing that AI has all kinds of benefits. To be candid, I know yet know what they are. Having said that, I guess I will just have to go through my life being constantly wary of what I am hearing.

Is it true or is it the product of artificially produced intelligence?

God help me …

business news, economic news, education news, entertainment news

Falling short in tribute to Dolly

As clear as it now looks, it is obvious that my brief tribute to the late Dolly Parton — and yes, it’s strange beyond belief to refer to her in that fashion — fell far short of the mark. So … I will seek to remedy that with this brief post.

Dolly Parton was a brilliant businesswoman with a heart of pure gold. She was generous with her immense wealth. She had a wonderfully self-deprecating wit that she used on herself without apology.

I did note that she was an extraordinary talent who composed some of pop culture’s most durable music.

She also was a champion for literacy among our children. She came by that desire honestly, as her beloved father never learned to read and write. When Vanderbilt University closed for a time during the COVID pandemic, Dolly donated $1 million to get the university up and running. She reportedly furnished hundreds of millions of books to children around the world, encouraging them to enjoy reading and having the whole world open up to them.

She said she wanted to create a fantasy amusement park near her East Tennessee hometown. She declared she would name it “Dollywood,” and it would cater to families seeking to get away from the travails of life.

I mentioned to you already that I am not a huge country music fan, but I sure know talent when I see it. Dolly Parton was an extraordinary woman whose legacy will live on not just in her music, but also in the lives of children who were blessed to receive the gift of literacy that she encouraged.

The world will miss Dolly Parton’s huge presence, but it also will continue to reap the rewards she left behind.

education news

Trump at war with First Amendment

Let there be zero misunderstanding about this truth, which is that Donald J. Trump has declared all-out war on the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Yes, the ignoramus in chief has taken every provision in that amendment and subjected it to the whims of his desire to create an autocracy in the land founded on the principle that it never should become what Trump desires.

Let’s look at it, one clause at a time …

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof …” Trump has ordered the placement of the Ten Commandments in federal buildings and argued for the placement of them in public schools. Clearly a violation of the church-state separation clause.

“or abridging the freedom of speech …” Trump is jailing people who are speaking out against government policies initiated by the Trump administration. He signed an executive order declaring that anyone who burns Old Glory is subject to a year in jail, despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declares that flag-burning is protected political speech.

“or the press …” Trump has banned certain newsgathering organizations from the White House press briefing room. Why? Because they decline to use certain terminology favored by Trump — such as the continuing to call the Gulf of Mexico by its long-standing name, rather than referring to the Gulf of America.

“or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances … “ Trump has deployed Homeland Security personnel to arrest people for assembling to complain about government policy. He has declared that they are traitors to the government if they disagree with the lame-brained policies put forth by the administration. Any third-grade student in the United States has been taught that this country was founded on the principle of dissent, that our founders were a collection of dissenters intent on creating a government that cherished political dissent as part of the our national fabric.

The first 10 Amendments to our nation’s Constitution were intended to protect our civil liberties. They are the basis for this nation’s very existence. Donald J. Trump is out of what passes for his mind!

business news, education news, local news

Growth explosion: brand new to me

I have lived a long life and I intend to keep living it, but I want to take a walk back briefly through the communities I once called home and explain why my current hometown is so different.

I was born in Portland, Ore., a city that seemed stuck on a certain population of about 375,000 people through the 1950s and 1960s. The Army called me into active duty in 1968 and I returned to Portland, where the population stayed more or less the same through the 1970s and much of the 1980s. My career then summoned my family and me to Beaumont, Texas, a nice city to be sure, but one trapped in the era of “white flight” of residents to the suburbs. The population of Beaumont declined during our nearly 11 years on the Gulf Coast, falling from about 120,000 residents to around 115,000. Opportunity knocked again in 1995 and my wife and I moved to Amarillo, way up yonder in the Panhandle. The city enjoyed slow, but steady growth during our 23 years there. The city grew from about 180,000 residents to just less than 200,000. In 2019, I was retired from daily journalism and Kathy Anne and I moved to Princeton, Texas, a Dallas suburb about 25 miles northeast of Dallas. Then it came, a population explosion the likes of which I never had experienced. We bought our home at the right time, securing a loan for a ridiculously low interest rate. New residents came pouring into our city. The population exploded from 6,800 residents in 2010 to 17,027 in 2020. Today the city estimates the city is home to 40,000 residents. Forty thousand people now call Princeton home! That number is continuing to explode. The city council has invoked a ban on residential construction permits, but it must honor the permits already granted and the housing construction already underway. I am filled with anxious anticipation as Princeton grapples with this growth. Texas highway planners have big projects set for U.S. 380. City public works crews have to install new water and sewer lines. Police and fire departments need to hire more personnel. The school system is building campuses as quickly as it can but they are being overwhelmed by new students pouring into the district. The city desperately needs more commercial development to serve the thousands of new residents who are moving here. Those of us who already are here must watch as the city grapples with solutions to the “problem” officials face. How to cope with the tide of people who realize what many of us knew all along, that Princeton is a nice place to call home. City Hall’s challenge is to maintain Princeton’s desirability.
education news

‘Yes!’ to schools cracking down on cell phone use

I shall refrain from the lament that it took a long time to do the right thing, so I will applaud school districts throughout Texas that are taking direct measures to restore some decorum in our public school classrooms.

They are ordering students to ditch their cell phones when the bell rings to start the school day.

They’re doing it here in Princeton, where I live. Fort Worth is as well. Same for Dallas. And same for a whole lot of other districts acting on legislation approved by the 2025 Texas Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott.

Classrooms must be a place where students are focused solely on the lessons being taught. Teachers deserve that respect. Sadly, they don’t get it when students are sitting in their chairs, cell phones in their laps as they send messages back and forth. The law empowers individual school districts to use whatever disciplinary measures they deem appropriate to punish violators.

And to be sure, this initiative drew plenty of resistance from parents who insist foolishly that they must be in contact with their little darlin’s 24 hours each day. As Col. Sherman T. Potter would say: Buffalo bagels!

education news, local news

Texas GOP goes anti-rural

Glenn Rogers writes a column for the Dallas Morning News and in his most recent submission he makes an astonishing assertion about the direction of the state’s Republican Party.

He said the party has become “anti-rural” in its outlook and its policy priorities.

He writes: Based on my personal experience and discussions with rural-focused organizations, I would say the top priorities for rural Texas are supporting public schools, providing access to quality health care, improving the quantity and quality of water resources, and improving communication capabilities.

I want to focus on the first item he lists, “supporting public schools.”

Texas public education is taking it on the chin, in the gut and maybe even in the groin by policies that strip public money from public school classrooms. The GOP-dominated Legislature recently enacted a bill that allows parents to spend public money to send their children to private schools. I consider that a direct affront on the public school system that, in my view, has served Texas families well since, oh, maybe the beginning of time.

Lawmakers tried to foist this issue onto the books in 2023, but Republican lawmakers representing rural school districts resisted. Many of them represent districts here in North Texas, where life revolves around the health and well-being of the independent public school district.

Something or someone got to those folks during the current Legislature and they climbed aboard the school voucher bandwagon to approve it and sent it to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk for his signature.

This is the kind of action that destroys rural communities. Rogers, a rancher and veterinarian in Palo Pinto County, served in the Texas House from 2021 until this year. He writes that public education is the “backbone and leading employer in rural communities.” He adds that “without their public schools, small towns … would be devastated.”

So, why do Republicans in the Legislature insist on gutting these communities? Why do they knowingly take money needed to bolster public education and allow parents to send kids to private schools?

This is a turn that a once-great political party has taken. I believe it will bite the Grand Old Party squarely in its backside.

education news, local news

Toughest job in North Texas? Yeah, probably!

1 Comment

Donald McIntyre’s name possibly isn’t known much outside of Princeton, Texas, where I have lived for the past six years.

I am going out on a limb, though, with this post and declare that McIntyre might have the most challenging public service job in North Texas. He is superintendent of schools of the Princeton Independent School District.

Where is the challenge? Two words sum it up: rapid growth.

Princeton ISD is on the cusp of a growth explosion many of us have never seen. The school system keeps seeking to project what it believes will be its student population in a given academic year only to have those numbers blown apart by reality.

McIntyre — known as Mac to his friends — has to calculate those numbers and present them to the school board to enable the elected board to decide on how to respond to the growth.

A slight bit of personal history. My wife and I moved to Princeton in early 2019. We bought a home here. The population sign at the edge of town said Princeton was home as of the 2010 Census to 6,800 people. The 2020 Census figure was posted and the sign was changed to 17,027 residents. The 2020 Census figure was outdated immediately. Just recently, I heard Princeton City Manager Mike Mashburn say that, based on the number of water meters on line, the city population today stands at about 43,000 residents.

So, from 2010 to 2025, Princeton has grown sevenfold. Wow!

What’s more, most of those new families are bringing children with them. The kids have to attend school. Princeton ISD, therefore, must provide those students a place to learn.

McIntyre must ensure the kids can attend school. He is the chief administrator of a growing public school system and, believe this, he has expressed a hint of frustration at the many challenges he has to confront. The school district’s voters have stood with the district when it asks for money to build the schools it needs. The problem, though, is that the school system cannot build them quickly enough.

The elementary school built in my neighborhood in 2020 had two portable classrooms installed in the first year of its existence because the school had exceeded its capacity.

I want to doff my proverbial cap to Superintendent Don McIntyre for the examplary job he is doing just to keep pace.

education news

Public ed faces the axe

The Texas public education system is about to feel the budget axe as the Legislature prepares to approve a school voucher plan and send it to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk for his signature.

What a crock of steer manure!

House Speaker Dustin Burrows says the House has enough votes to approve a measure that would allow the state to siphon off public education money and set it aside for parents to use to pay for private education for their children.

Burrows, a Lubbock Republican, is serving his first term as House speaker. I had a glimmer of hope he might have followed the lead of two former GOP speakers — Dade Phelan and Joe Straus — in resisting this gutting of public education.

Frankly, the move to gut public school districts of money runs totally counter to traditional Republican support in rural areas of the state. Many communities represented in Austin by GOP lawmakers, depend on healthy and vibrant public school systems to hold their towns together.

Those systems will be deprived of funds they need from taxpayers’ pockets once this goofy idea becomes law.

Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and many MAGA Republican lawmakers are dead set on depriving public schools of the money they need to strengthen themselves and provide quality education to our public school children.

My wife and I brought two sons into this world and they attended Texas public schools until the early 1990s. I believe they both received good educations that enabled them to attend and graduate from higher education institutions. They both have flourished in their professional lives as a result.

I only can hope that future generations of Texas kids can enjoy the fruits of a solid public education. I don’t feel good about where the state is going.

education news

Why damage public ed?

For the ever-lovin’ life of me I cannot fathom why Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and most of the Texas Republican legislative caucus want to tear the guts out of our state’s public education system.

They want to siphon taxpayer money that pays for public schools and direct it to private schools throughout the state. Why the warfare against the state’s public education system? They contend the public schools are doing a lousy job of educating our children; they say the schools aren’t safe places for our kids to learn.

The solution, though, should not be to yank money out of the system. They want to use public money for vouchers parents can use to enroll their kids in private schools.

Abbott and Patrick say they have enough votes in the Legislature to approve the robbery scheme that Abbott hatched two sessions ago. He ran into resistance from, get this, rural Republican legislators who said weakening public education would damage their communities, where lives revolve around public school activities.

Former Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan agreed with his GOP colleagues and let the measure die in the 2023 Legisalture. He got punished for letting the “will of the House” dictate the fate of the proposal. GOP operatives sought to launch a primary campaign against Phelan in 2024 … but he pulled out of the speaker’s race.

I agree that public education has issues to resolve, but dammit, taking money out of the system doesn’t provide a cure! It only worsens the conditions that our state’s leaders say they want to repair.

It makes no sense to me.