All Things Education with Heather

Welcome back to A Beautiful Jess! We are so glad to have you back after our extended break.

 

I want to apologize again for the technical difficulties we experienced before the Holidays, as you will hear, we recorded and intended to release this before the Christmas break. Our team appreciates your patience and understanding.

 

Heather joins us on her second episode to discuss topics from Jane Eyre, listening and understanding students with different religious beliefs, and sharing her faith in her classroom without violating any of the guidelines that are in place. We also discuss our experiences with the education we received as children, which ultimately, we were both well-educated and prepared for college and our careers, despite some flaws in the system. I would challenge anyone to bring an education system without flaws to our knowledge. Heather also credits the Gallup StrengthsFinder 2.0 with helping her focus in on her strengths and use those in her ministry.

 

Heather and I then discuss the school voucher program, a widely discussed state issue which our legislature has voted against implementing (for now). Heather and I reference this article TIME: How School Voucher Programs Hurt Students. Heather and I agree that we do not think school vouchers are presented fairly to the public (whether in Texas, or in other states), and we also do not think that it would be in the best interest of our state to implement a school voucher program. We do encourage you that if this issue does come up again to inform yourself by talking to teachers, educators, and others who are working in our various school systems (public, private and charter) and get input from various resources before making your decision to support, or not, this issue. Here is another link which details the $6,160 per student public schools currently receive. Texas Tribune While both Senate Bills mentioned (1 and 2) passed the Senate, neither bill made it through the Texas House. TEA Financial 2021 - 2022 Actual Financial Data State Total (All Districts) “Unassigned Fund Balance” $17,101,381,769, or $3,403 per student. There are several different ways you can cut the money, but essentially, the TEA has unassigned funds that it could give to public schools.

 

Here is a link to the voter results in Brazos County for the November 2023 elections from our local newspaper, The Eagle. This is where I quote that less than 16% of registered voters came out for this election. Only around 10,700 votes were cast on the CSISD Bond Proposals. The population of College Station was over 120,000 in 2021. Schools are allotted very little funds from the state to implement security measures which are many times mandated by the state. They are allotted almost no funds for any improvements, additional buildings, updates to resources, etc. Many smaller projects are funded by athletic booster committees, PTO organizations, or local community members donating the time, materials, and resources of their small businesses.

 

As the host of A Beautiful Jess I do have a focus on local issues that touch my heart and affect those around me in my community. If you aren’t local to the area, I hope that you are still blessed by the wisdom Heather shares as an educator and a follower of Christ shining His light to those around her, especially her students. All links in this write up can be accessed by following the link in our bio to the episode information our hosting website, Podbean.