KEY POINTS The summer situation for the Texas grid is actually better than advertised, but winters are becoming a bigger and bigger problem with no clear solution on the horizon. Legislators took some baby steps with HB 1500 to eliminate the last vestiges of state subsidies for unreliable electricity and move toward real market reform....
Gov. Ron DeSantis brags that Florida “is where woke goes to die,” but in the legislative session that just ended, Texas lawmakers passed the strongest legislation in the country to end DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) and its ideological framework mandating a belief in systemic racism, non-binary genders and pronoun police, men playing women’s sports,...
Debate over “the future of American education” has reached a fever-pitch of late. But too often these debates resolve nothing, because none of the competing sides can agree even on what “education” means—or should mean. Without initial agreement on this most fundamental question, it’s less than surprising that the resulting disputes generate far more acrimony...
Choosing whether and where to attend college is the most important financial decision of a young person’s life. Yet, in general, we withhold the information that would allow students to make informed decisions. The most blatant example is hiding the cost of college. In 2018, Stephen Burd, Rachel Fishman, Laura Keane, Julie Habbert, Ben Barrett,...
Sky-high public sector salaries have become a sore spot for many Texans, especially considering how much tax bills have grown in a relatively short period. But you may be wondering—exactly how much are these elite few making? In a previous post, we looked at the highest paid superintendents in Texas (with the top administrator raking...
Politics is often hard to follow. This year, more than 7,000 bills were filed in the Texas Legislature, and a lot can get lost in that mix. For the average parent or teacher, tracking education legislation is simply not possible—we have more pressing things to do, like work, raise our children, and teach them to...
Over the last few legislative sessions, policymakers have entertained a variety of proposals to place reasonable limitations on public sector administrator salaries. Such proposals—i.e., HB 1476 (88R), HB 1740 (86R), HB 4627 (86R), and SB 721 (86R)—have been driven, in large part, by growing public outrage over supersized superintendent salaries. While lawmakers have yet to...
As an education researcher, too often I find myself compelled to report bad news: poor learning outcomes, including declining civic literacy; political indoctrination taking the place of reasoned scholarship; shout-downs depriving speakers and their intended audience their First Amendment rights; grade inflation, as well as other maladies afflicting American education. But today I’m happy to...
While the federal government is missing in action as Texas border towns are overwhelmed by illegal immigrants, the Lone Star State is taking action. Since the inception of the Texas busing program more than 20,000 migrants have been relocated from the Texas cities to “sanctuary cities” to include Chicago, Denver, New York City, Philadelphia, and...
Two of Hannity’s lines of questioning were extremely illuminating. Sean Hannity’s interview of California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom aired Monday night. That Fox News would seek to interview Newsom—and that he would accept (the last time was in 2010)—suggests that 2024 is shaping up to be far more interesting than most pundits and voters realize. America’s political...
The city of Dallas recently asked the public to attend a budget workshop to discuss its finances—and apparently, not that many people showed up. Now, I’m sure Dallas taxpayers had many good reasons why they couldn’t make this particular meeting, i.e. work, school, taking care of family, etc. But the public might want to make...
After months of preliminaries, the long-awaited Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russian forces occupying Ukraine kicked off on June 8. Understanding what’s happening as both sides work to shape the information battlespace can be a challenge. During my 24-year career as a U.S. Army intelligence officer, with most of that time serving in armored units, I constantly trained...