A firm no on pay raises for the Assembly, bullying by leftists (a liberal speaks out), and should others pay for your choices?
A raise for Colorado Assembly Members? I join the Gazette Editorial Board in saying no.
With all due respect to how intense the Assembly session is (I've not been in the Capitol during one, but I have seen and heard and the hours are long, especially as it nears the end of the 120 day session), I don't want to either pay our legislators more OR invite them to work more.
To me the point of part-time legislators working only part of the year is twofold:
1. I think having legislators have day jobs is a good thing. There's nothing like having to earn a living independent of the government to give you perspective on just how well government works, how efficient it is, and its capacity to make lives better.
2. Have you ever heard of Parkinson's law, that work expands to fill the time alloted for it? If not, I included a little graphic in the screenshot to give you a sense of what it is. My concern would be the panel on the far right. If we expanded the Assembly session or gave legislators more money so they could spend more time legislating, my concern would be that some ambitious, eager-beaver lawmaker (of either party) would look at the extra time they have on their hands and decide they could fill it with yet more regulations and laws. I.e. that he or she would look at the dip in the graphic on the far right and want to fill it in.
Government's big enough with quite enough rules as it is right now thank you. Nothing like a time constraint to make you sit and consider priorities.
https://denvergazette.com/opinion/editorials/editorial-no-raise-for-colorado-s-part-time-legislature/article_fef89df5-673b-5b6a-9b29-2dadda0d52bf.html
It'd be harder to get more liberal than Mr. Sondermann and yet,
and yet,
the op ed below.
I was pleased to read it. I found myself agreeing strongly with the quote I put in the screenshot.
I personally wouldn't run my website company or cake bakery (or any other business) in the way that the people in the courts have, but I support the ability of people to do OR NOT according to their conscience.
I support people not being beaten about the head by their government because they don't comply with the wishes of some.
I commend Mr. Sondermann's integrity and bravery in standing up in this way. I am guessing he's getting a ton of heat from people on his side of the ideological divide right now.
One last thing. Commending others for something is nice, but it's better in my opinion to follow their example.
I would like to make more of a point of this in the future and hope you do too. If you see someone or some group in your "tribe" who is not behaving in a way you like, speak up about it.
https://denvergazette.com/politics/live-and-let-live-and-contemporary-liberalism-sondermann/article_f688f11a-4b26-5e5c-9a9b-5b64ac03b2e6.html
Should others have to pay for your choices?
What are you owed out of life? What are you owed out of your job? What role do your decisions play vs. the circumstances you're in?
The article below sparked some interesting questions for me and I thought I'd share. If it does so for you too, please add your thoughts to the comments if you'd like.
It details a new bill that would allow adjunct professors in the state to qualify as "full time" educators for the purposes of Federal student loan programs (right now, they're considered part time educators and thus cannot apply for a grant from the Feds that forgives student loans for full time educators). As is often the case, the details of the bill are clothed in the story of someone struggling (who coincidentally enough) would presumably be helped by the new law.
That's what spurred my thought, and it raised the questions above. Let me start with a quote from the Sun article to help illustrate:
"Does she [Felicia Brown--the instructor profiled] prioritize car maintenance when her 11-year-old Honda Civic needs new tires so that she doesn’t slip and slide on icy roads? Or should she take care of her health and get a dental cleaning? What happens when she needs new glasses? Brown, an adjunct professor at the Community College of Denver and Arapahoe Community College, never thought she would have to ask herself those kinds of questions after she graduated college about 10 years ago. 'I really believed that education was going to set me free in that way, and I still feel stunted,' she said."
When I entered college it was mainly with the idea of studying physics or pure mathematics. Physics won out after the first semester; the "pleasure of figuring things out" (as Feynman puts it) was too alluring. Feynman is right about the joy in learning, but figuring things out doesn't pay the bills--at least not for a long time. I knew I'd need a way to turn that joy into a living. Teaching seemed the most obvious.
I also needed a way to fund my education. My parents helped some, but they didn't have enough to (nor did I want them to) pay for everything. I worked as an undergrad and worked hard at my studies so that when grad school came around, I got a position as a TA with full tuition and a stipend.
When it came time to leave grad school, the job market for full time college instructors then (and even now) was not pretty; full time jobs were (are) few and far between. I had seen and heard enough to know that trying to make a living as an adjunct instructor was a non starter. As you'll see if you read the article, this is not (repeat not) a way to make a living.
High school teaching jobs were available, however. I took one there. It was not my top choice (interestingly enough and to be fair to the school that hired me, I wasn't their first choice either!), but it was full time, with a decent salary and benefits.
In one of those twists in life where you look back and learn that what happened was exactly what you needed at the time, teaching at that school taught me a tremendous amount and was a wonderful opportunity. I stayed there 11 years. When the time came to move on, I looked again at college teaching and opportunity knocked in the form of a full-time college teaching job in a faraway school in a rural area. This was a big change, but as I did in my first teaching job, I leapt at it and haven't looked back or regretted my decision.
When I read the article, then, I find myself wondering the questions I put at the top of this post:
What are we owed out of life? What are you owed out of your job? What role do your decisions play in your life?
I am not going to present myself as a shining example to the world. There are many ways to succeed in life and some of them include borrowing to finance an education. I want you to also remember that I did have some help and good counsel along the way. I haven't spoken to the young woman in the article and don't know her story. She may have some mitigating circumstances that help explain where she is today.
That said, I struggle to understand why this young woman (or anyone) would borrow so heavily for school. I especially struggle when it's a field that has so few jobs and so many people (it's bad in physics and hugely worse in the social sciences/humanities). Did she research the job field? Did she consider the money spent vs. return?
Similarly, I wonder if she expected magic out of a college degree. I read the quote "I really believed that education was going to set me free in that way ..." and think back to my own time in college. I remember being excited to learn physics, I remember dreaming of a life that would be comfortable. I don't remember (and to be fair to this young woman there is no indication in any quote of hers that indicates she believes this--I am just speaking in general) thinking that this would come without work and time. I don't remember feeling that my future was guaranteed if I got a degree: I'd scrabble for my degree, scrabble to find a job, scrabble to afford to live and (with hard work and some luck) attain a decent standard of living.
Lastly, I wonder what this young woman, the bill's sponsor, and the committee members that recently (the bill passed its first committee hearing on a party line vote after this article went to print) would say to the idea that by forgiving her loan debt, others will have to pay more. I mean, whether Federal or state, when loans are forgiven the debt doesn't disappear, it's just paid by someone else--that someone else being you and I. Should we bear the cost of her decisions?
**couple last quick notes:
1. This young lady chose her path, both in terms of the education she got and the jobs she sought. This doesn't, however, negate the fact that I think adjunct instructors are treated fairly for the work they're expected to do. If you know of someone who thinks that it's a path to opportunity or any kind of full time living, go upside their head and tell them a firm no. It's not. It's a cost saving measure that colleges have adopted to keep tuition low to keep customers happy and it doesn't often work well for students or instructors (with the exception of part-timers who are experienced, who teach specialized classes, and realize what they're getting into).
2. With regard to this young lady and others who get a degree and can't find a full time college level job, what in the hell is wrong with teaching at high school. How many times do you hear about high schools needing instructors. As I say above, it's a solid job with solid benefits. Even if one, as I did, doesn't quite give up on teaching college, it gives you a living while you look. It might also turn out to be a passion and uncover a talent you never knew you had (again, as it was for me).
https://coloradosun.com/2023/02/09/colorado-adjunct-professors-student-loan-forgiveness/