Often attributed to Voltaire, Evelyn Beatrice Hall wrote the phrase, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it” as an illustration of Voltaire’s beliefs. Under the bedrock principle within the United States Constitution, the First Amendment free speech protections have always been recognized as an...
Over the weekend, James Quintero, director of the Center for Local Governance, wrote about the false narrative emerging in Austin “that public schools are underfunded and the state is to blame.” Many today, in alignment with various education associations, assert that public education suffers from a lack of resources. But the data tells a different...
An old photo on my Twitter stream captured my attention. It was of a German military parade in occupied Warsaw in 1940. My interest in history led me to think about the scene and how it represented a reality far removed from the average American’s experience. The Germans were marking the one-year anniversary of...
President Trump and his senior advisor Jared Kushner have spent their lives beneath the glare of the bright lights of Manhattan, but it is the nation’s darkest and most forgotten locations that have recently peaked their interest: America’s prisons. On Feb. 28, the administration released a document entitled “Principles of Prison Reform and Reentry” that puts the administration...
Austin’s education lobby is pushing the narrative that public schools are underfunded and the state is to blame. Though imaginative, this account falls short in several ways. To begin, public schools have sufficient funding. In the 2015-16 school year alone, Texas school districts spent a total of $64.8 billion on 5.3 million schoolchildren. That...
The Gallup-Knight Foundation recently completed its latest survey of college students nationwide. The results are less than encouraging. On the one hand, the majority of students surveyed continue to believe that protecting free speech rights (56 percent) is extremely important, while 52 percent answer that promoting a diverse and inclusive society is also extremely important to...
If the shooting in Parkland, Florida was a call for us to consider the sometimes substandard selection and training of our police officers, then the dramatic end to a serial bomber’s reign of terror in Austin, Texas was the gold standard of what we are looking for in a police officer. The contrast between the responses...
Even though the historic tax reform took effect only recently, almost 450 businesses nationwide have announced “pay raises, bonuses, utility rate cuts, or 401(k) hikes,” according to a detailed list maintained by Americans for Tax Reform. The pay and benefit increases have helped pad the pocketbooks of an estimated 4.2 million working Americans —...
College students and their parents find it increasingly difficult to cope with tuition hyperinflation and historically high student-loan debt. Over the last 30 years, the average tuition for a U.S. bachelor’s degree at a traditional four-year college increased more than 15 times faster than the average household income in the United States. Students who borrow...
03262018 Senate Ed Committee Teacher Pay Testimony by texaspolicy on Scribd
Ronald Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation from extinction. We didn’t pass it on to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children...
The following was a testimony before the Texas Senate Committee on Education. Chairman Taylor and Members of the Committee: My name is Emily Sass, and I represent the Texas Public Policy Foundation, where I serve as the K-12 education policy analyst. I appreciate the opportunity to speak today. Texans can all agree that the focus...