I’ve always wanted to be a writer for that satirical rag The Onion, but (sad to say) this story’s headline is not a fake.

For some time now, our local sports talk radio station has been carrying a very clever public service ad campaign warning young people about the dangers of overspending and having one’s credit score downgraded.  Recently, I noticed that this campaign is being sponsored by the Advertising Council and the U.S. Department of the Treasury.

Now, I had always believed that Ad Council projects of this kind were completely free; but, alas, that isn’t entirely the case.  According to two different Ad Council officials with whom I spoke, when a federal agency or non-profit organization contracts with the Ad Council to do a public service campaign, only the creative talent (to come up with the clever ideas) and the air time (to broadcast the ads) are provided pro bono.

All of the campaign’s “hard costs” – for research, recording, editing, studio rental, focus group testing, public relations, etc. – are the responsibility of the project’s sponsor.  According to the Ad Council, these expenses “typically run between $2.5 million and $3 million per campaign.”

While the Ad Council would not divulge (for “proprietary reasons”) the exact amount that the U.S. Treasury Department spent on its campaign to warn young people about overspending, their officials assured me that this project required a significant payout from its federal sponsor. (more…)

More than 50 years after Sam Cooke first sang about his educational deficiencies, many American teens “don’t know much about history.”  Or so their latest test scores suggest.

Only 12 percent of all 12^th graders are “proficient” or “advanced” in U.S. History according to the 2010 National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP).  And less than half of all high school seniors display even a “basic” knowledge about American History.

The latest NAEP scores for civics are almost as bad:  Less than two-thirds of all seniors show a “basic” understanding of our system of government.  And a 2010 study commissioned by the American Enterprise Institute concluded that “civics, once the cornerstone of public education, has fallen off the radar” as teachers have felt increasing pressure to show progress in other areas.

That many educators today give considerable attention to other subjects would not disturb America’s founders.  While we tend to think of them largely as political figures, America’s founders recognized that there are many higher and grander pursuits in life than those in the political realm.

This no doubt explains why the scientifically-curious Ben Franklin went outside in a thunderstorm with his kite – and why the educationally-minded Thomas Jefferson had his gravestone identify him as the founder of the University of Virginia, but not as the third president of the United States.

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When Deric Feacher left Winter Haven, Fla. in 1995 to study at Bethune-Cookman College, he never imagined that he’d end up walking in Mary McLeod Bethune’s footsteps . . . back in his own hometown. Yet, this fall, Feacher is helping launch a new charter school in Winter Haven that has a lot in common with the Daytona Educational and Industrial Training School for Negro Girls that Bethune started in 1904.

Like Bethune’s academy, New Beginnings High School targets a disadvantaged student population often left behind by the conventional school system. It seeks to help at-risk students acquire both higher learning and practical job skills. It tries to cultivate in its students a determination to overcome all obstacles, even if that means putting in an extra-long day.

And, sadly, it too has had to contend with naysayers.

Twice New Beginnings’ application was considered by the Polk County School Board’s Charter Review Committee. And twice the committee voted to deny New Beginnings’ application.

Apparently, some of the review committee’s unease stemmed from a concern about whether the charter school would reduce the “regular” school district’s student population (and its corresponding state funding). For example, in its response to New Beginnings’ application, the review committee asked:

• “Is the proposed school planning to recruit students who are currently in traditional PCSB schools?”; and
• “What % of the charter school’s total population is projected to come from currently enrolled students?”

While it is hard to imagine that these two questions would rank high on prospective parents’ list of concerns, Feacher and his colleagues painstakingly responded to these and other inquiries. In time, they managed to convince the Polk County School Board to overrule the charter school review committee and approve New Beginnings High’s application.

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Virtually all public officials say they believe in government transparency, but well-meaning words don’t always translate into effective government action.

So, several years ago, the national Sunshine Review (SR) began regularly assessing some 5,000 state and local government websites, using a “Ten-Point Transparency Checklist” to measure how well government officials are using the internet for “proactive disclosure” of information (rather than merely responding to citizens’ requests).

SR’s latest transparency grades show that the Florida is living up to its “Sunshine State” nickname.  Consider:

• The number of local government web sites in Florida earning an A grade from the Sunshine Review more than doubled (from 10 to 22) during the last year, and the Sunshine State once again had more top scores than any other state.
• Of the 22 Florida jurisdictions receiving an A from the Sunshine Review, 12 earned a perfect score and one (Miami) became the first Florida city to receive a “Sunny Award” for transparency excellence.
• Overall, the Sunshine State received a cumulative transparency grade of B.  Among other things, Florida’s cumulative grade was held down by a high number of “problem sites” (those earning a transparency grade of D or F), which declined only modestly, from 51 to 46, during the last year.
• Failing to provide citizens good information about how to access government audits and about how to access public records were the most common transparency problems.

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When I went to a meeting last fall about the new virtual school in our county, I publicly praised the local school superintendent for embracing digital education.

I should have held my tongue.

Or so at least says a new report written by Michael Horn and Heather Clayton Staker of the Innosight Institute.  The report, “The Rise of K-12 Blended Learning,” catalogs the exponential growth in the number of U.S. students taking at least one course online – from roughly 45,000 in 2000 to three million K-12 students by 2009.

In addition, the report describes the incredible potential that digital education promises for America’s future.  “Online learning has the potential to transform America’s education system by serving as the backbone of a system that offers more personalized learning approaches for all students,” write Horn and Staker.

So, why should I have held my tongue?

Because the report also warns that much of the promise of digital education could be thwarted if public school systems seek to squeeze new technologies into old frameworks.

“There is a significant risk that the existing education system will co-opt online learning as it blends it into its current flawed model—and just as is the case now, too few students will receive an excellent education,” Horn and Staker write.

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Under the category of “No Good Deed Goes Unpunished,” Florida Gov. Rick Scott can file some news accounts of his recent unveiling of the transparency web site, www.FloridaHasARighttoKnow.com.  The site includes salary information about many key state employees – including those on the Governor’s staff – as well as records from the Florida Retirement System listing every government pensioner receiving at least $100,000 a year.

While this proactive disclosure of frequently-requested information won the Governor brownie points with some “open government” advocates, the head of the AFL-CIO and at least one major newspaper accused Gov. Scott of selectively releasing information to advance his pension reform agenda.  (See: http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/gubernatorial/florida-gov-rick-scott-launches-public-records-website/1157906 and http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/03/19/2124262/pension-battle-overlooks-the-deeper.html).

Critics of Governor Scott considered it foul that he chose to highlight the 542 government pensioners that annually receive more than $100,000 from the taxpayers, rather than releasing the data on all pensioners in the Florida Retirement System.

Yet, many “good government” liberals in Minnesota must wonder what all the fuss in Florida is about.

That’s because Minnesota’s Democratic-controlled Senate joined in passing a 2005 law which requires most local governments in that state to proactively disclose their three most-highly-compensated officials each year.  (See http://freedomfoundationofminnesota.com/minnesota-notifies-citizens-on-top-public-pay).

The logic behind the Minnesota law is simple – taxpayers can typically take one good look at the top numbers and determine whether or not there’s a problem in excessive government compensation.

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Several weeks ago, I watched my son play a high school baseball game on “Jackie Robinson Field” in Cairo, Georgia (Robinson’s hometown).  As I watched, I pondered a provocative question raised by Economic Episodes in American History, a fascinating new supplemental curriculum that ought to be used in every high school social studies department:

Did Adam Smith Have an “Invisible Hand” in the Desegregation of Major League Baseball?

This question is one of 32 raised in Economic Episodes in American History, which seeks to deepen students’ understanding of American life by desegregating the study of economics and history.  Written by Mark Schug and William Wood, this imaginative new curriculum uses illustrations from American history to teach students basic economic principles.

In the case of major league baseball’s desegregation, Schug and Wood invite students to learn about how labor markets function – and, specifically, how the competition for top talent made it impossible, eventually, for Major League Baseball owners to sustain an agreement to deny opportunities to African-American ballplayers.

While heralding the “courage and determination” of Jackie Robinson and of Branch Rickey (the white baseball executive who signed Robinson), Schug and Wood suggest that larger economic forces were at work in baseball’s desegregation – a fact which can help deepen our understanding of this historical episode without diminishing our admiration for the central players in this grand drama.

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A homeowner with a leaky roof may be better off than one whose kitchen is on fire. But he still has a serious problem.

That’s something public policymakers – and everyday citizens – may want to remember as they try to make sense of the emerging debate over pension reform in the state of Florida.

The AFL-CIO recently held a major press conference in Tallahassee designed to minimize the need for pension reform legislation. The union leaders argued – correctly – that Florida’s state pensions are in better shape than those in California, Illinois, New Jersey, and several other states in financial crisis.

But just because Florida’s state pension problems aren’t (yet) a three-alarm fire doesn’t mean that many cities in the Sunshine State can afford to ignore their extremely leaky roofs. Because a number of municipal pension plans in Florida are suffering from the very sorts of mismanagement that have plagued state plans elsewhere. And some city pensions are so seriously underfunded that they will go belly up unless public policymakers step in and take bold action.

According to economist Randall Holcombe of Florida State University, government pension programs get into financial trouble because politicians often make promises today that have to be paid for by taxpayers tomorrow.

“There is always a temptation on the part of government officials to promise increased compensation in the form of unfunded pension benefits, because by doing so they can push the present cost of government into the future,” Dr. Holcombe notes in a new report of The James Madison Institute. “Generous pension benefits promised a decade or more ago are now placing significant burdens on government budgets.”

Or, as they say in Marianna, the chickens are coming home to roost.

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When I met recently with James Gwartney, the highly-esteemed Florida State University economist, I expected Dr. Gwartney to be pleased to learn that my high school son Richard was following up a required semester of AP Macroeconomics by taking an AP Microeconomics course as an elective.

After all, Dr. Gwartney had inspired Richard to study economics at a Milton Friedman Day luncheon last July. And Dr. Gwartney has a passion for helping students share his passion for economic reasoning.

But Dr. Gwartney’s response to my enthusiastic report was rather chilly to say the least. In fact, it felt like a cold shower. And with good reason, I would come to learn.

Dr. Gwartney and two of his colleagues recently published a scholarly article in the Econ Journal Watch which takes aim at the content in both Advanced Placement economics courses. Gwartney & Co. say these courses tend to play down the most interesting and important aspects of economics courses – introducing students to economic reasoning – while overemphasizing the more mechanistic aspects of the discipline.

In addition, Gwartney and his colleagues say AP economics courses need to give greater emphasis to “the integration of property rights, entrepreneurship, and dynamic competition.” And they say that AP economics courses need to correct a serious imbalance in the way that markets and governments are presented.

“’Market failure’ is a component of the courses,” they note, “but there is no parallel treatment of ‘government failure.’”

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Sunday begins National School Choice Week, the annual seven-day period in the middle of winter when kids all over the country dream of either: (1) having the freedom to stay home from school on account of snow, or (2) moving to Florida.

Well, actually, kids dream of those things all the time.  But their parents ought to spend this week dreaming of Florida because the Sunshine State now boasts some of the most forward-looking school choice policies in the country.

In fact, last year a remarkable bipartisan coalition – which included most of Florida’s black and Hispanic state legislators – passed a major expansion of the Sunshine State’s landmark Tax Credit Scholarship Program.  This prompted The Wall Street Journal to marvel at “Florida’s Unheralded School Revolution.”

And last year, not coincidentally, Florida’s student achievement test scores continued to rise, catapulting the Sunshine State into the nation’s Top Five states in K-12 education, according to the American Legislative Exchange Council’s annual rankings.  (Not bad for a state that used to place in the bottom third of annual student achievement rankings.)

While there is much to celebrate in the Sunshine State’s schools, Florida still has its share of education policy problems.  For example, last year Florida’s politically-opportunistic former Governor (Charlie Crist) decided to curry favor with the powerful teachers’ unions by vetoing a merit pay for teachers’ bill that he had previously pledged to sign.

Crist’s political strategy ultimately backfired – he got trounced by Marco Rubio in the U.S. Senate race.  Yet, interestingly, his flip-flop on merit pay would not have even won Crist the 2010 prize for Most Unseemly Behavior by a Floridian in the merit pay debate.

That dubious honor, sadly, would have gone to a government teacher at East Ridge High School in Clermont who sent the Florida Senate President a packet of nearly 100 letters – all of them opposing merit pay for teachers – which his students had written as a class assignment.  In a cover letter, the teacher claimed that he had presented the bill (S.B. 6) to the students with “a neutral connotation.”  And the teacher also expressed “total amazement” that every single one of his students wrote a letter opposing merit pay.

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The Jeopardy category of “Strange but True Facts About Minnesota Pro Athletes” just got a little thicker.  To the recent revelations that Vikings star quarterback Brett Favre is, ahem, an aspiring photographer, comes evidence that Twins star catcher Joe Mauer isn’t exactly a “hometown hero.”

That’s right, according to real estate tax records, Mauer has been a legal resident of Florida, not Minnesota, since 2006.  While some may view this as evidence that Mauer’s well-burnished image is a fraud, I suspect most will conclude just the opposite – that Mauer’s residency status only makes him even more All-American than anyone realized.

You see, Mauer moved his legal residency to Florida for the same reason that LeBron James, Tiger Woods, Shaquille O’Neal, and many other star athletes and celebrities have done so – to benefit from the fact that Florida has no personal income tax.

In fact, fittingly, Mauer bought himself a place on a street named Prosperity Way.

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