Math Wars: News Miner 53
Math in schools, housing updates, corporate welfare, abortion, anemones, and more.
Too Many Students Falling Behind in Math
Complete Colorado published my article, “Colorado public schools failing kids on math.” Here is my review of recent eighth grade math results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, on which students are ranked below basic, basic, proficient, or advanced.
Only 28% of Colorado eighth graders scored at or above proficiency, while 63 scored at or above a basic level. So more than two thirds of students lack proficiency in math, and more than a third bombed the test.
Maybe such poor outcomes are good enough for the Colorado Education Association, but parents should be outraged. True, the pandemic hurt scores, but scores before the pandemic hardly were stellar, with more than a fourth of students scoring below basic.
As with reading, results on math among black and Hispanic students are even worse on average. Whereas 78% of white students scored at or above basic, only 39% of black and 42% of Hispanic students did. Whereas 39% of white students scored at or above proficient, only 10% of black and 11% of Hispanic students did. Those outcomes are shameful. Anyone looking for systemic racism can start by looking at how most minority students fare in the public schools.
Here’s the chart from the NAEP showing the breakdown.
I also briefly discuss the “math wars”—disputes over proper instruction of mathematics—a legislative effort to fund better instruction for teachers and more instruction for students, and my tips for teaching math at home (I love Dimensions Math for younger children).
Read the entire piece.
Housing Updates
I’m not going to reply to the Durango Herald’s weak editorial against 213 (the land use bill) in detail. I’ve discussed this matter several times before. I do want to mention its bizarre complaint that, under the bill, “luxury units could slip in under the radar.” Uh, it’s not a bad thing if more wealthy people move to Colorado! It’s a great thing! Anyway, if builders are free to build, and not strapped down with a bunch of unnecessary restrictions, they’ll build for all markets. As CPR reports, the bill is getting seriously watered down, as by exempting ski towns.
Meanwhile, in ̶ ̶a̶n̶ ̶o̶p̶-̶e̶d̶ ̶ a news article for the Westminster Window, Luke Zarzecki quotes Wesminster Mayor Pro Tem David DeMott on the land-use bill, “The idea of someone at the State Capital deciding what we’re going to build, how we’re going to build it and where we are going to build it, is dangerous.” No. What’s going on here (mainly) is the state is trying to give people greater ability to use and develop their own property, when petty tyrants such as DeMott want local politicians and bureaucrats to control what, how, and where people build.
Denver Urbanism claims, “Denver’s first zoning code dates to 1925 when, under [Klan stooge] Mayor Stapleton, the city was divided into residential, commercial, and industrial areas. The ordinance was to promote the ‘health, safety, morals, or general welfare.’ The predominantly white areas of town were zoned single family while areas occupied by minorities were more likely to be zoned for multifamily housing. The political influence of the Ku Klux Klan prevented minorities from geographic migration.” The article does not offer outside links, and I have not researched the claims.
In other news . . . The “progressives” in Colorado’s legislature are determined to undermine the housing rental market as severely as they can. Bill 184 “would cap minimum income requirements for tenants to twice the cost of rent. It would also cap security deposits to the cost of two months' rent, among other changes,” Colorado Politics reports. The legislature has no business interfering in rental contracts, and, by doing so, it imposes additional costs and discourages the provision of rental housing.
The Supposed Ban on Corporate Welfare
Article XI, Section 2 of the Colorado Constitution explicitly bans corporate welfare:
Neither the state, nor any county, city, town, township, or school district shall make any donation or grant to, or in aid of, or become a subscriber to, or shareholder in any corporation or company or a joint owner with any person, company, or corporation, public or private, in or out of the state . . .
Yes, there are some exceptions after that, but they don’t affect the thrust of the provision.
Yet Colorado governments dole out corporate welfare all the time, as Mike Krause explained for the Hill some years ago.
Now Timothy Sandefur of Arizona’s Goldwater Institute offers more background on the “gift clauses” of many states’ constitutions. Here’s the abstract of his new paper:
At least 45 state constitutions contain provisions barring the government from giving or lending public resources to private interests. Typically called “Gift Clauses,” they are a legacy of the nineteenth century, when many state and local governments were plunged into economic and political ruin as a consequence of subsidizing private industry. Over time, some state courts have essentially eviscerated them by adopting a lackluster “rational basis” standard, but in other states—notably Arizona—courts have diligently enforced these provisions, establishing precedent that lets government spend money for the public good, but prevents it from transferring taxpayer money or giving away other valuable benefits to private interests. This article examines the origins of the Arizona Constitution’s Gift Clause, and compares it with similar clauses in other state constitutions. Part I describes the philosophical and political concerns animating Gift Clauses. Parts II and III examine the history, focusing on the first and second waves of reform that led to the adoption of these clauses. Part IV discusses the origins of Arizona’s Gift Clause specifically, and draws conclusions relevant to today’s Gift Clause doctrine.
Quick Updates
Abortion: A judge has issued a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of the newly signed Bill 190 as applied to Bella Health and Wellness, a Catholic anti-abortion clinic. See reports by the Colorado Sun, the Colorado Times-Reporter, and Justia. My take: I don’t see any problem with the limits on deceptive practices, but the bill also limits women’s access to “abortion reversal” drugs. What happened to “my body, my choice”?
Holtorf: Republican Representative Richard Holtorf has a long history of saying and doing idiotic things, as Kyle Clark reviews. Most recently he rambled about running with the bulls in the context of a bill concerning “civil liability for disability discrimination” (Clark’s summary).
Transgender: In an article that Tobin Stone calls “transphobic bullshit,” Jon Caldara continues to claim that gender reduces to biological sex. I’ve already explained in detail why Caldara is wrong.
Science: The Denver Museum of Nature and Science announced, “A team of paleontologists has made a groundbreaking discovery about the world’s largest fossil deposit of sea anemones, and it has just been published in the journal Papers in Paleontology. The fossils, which have been hiding in plain sight for almost fifty years, were previously misidentified as jellyfish. In this recently published paper, the team demonstrates that countless sea anemone fossils have been hiding in the 310-million-year-old Mazon Creek fossil deposit of northern Illinois. One of the team members is Denver resident and Denver Museum of Nature & Science Curator of Geology James Hagadorn.” DMNS also provided the image.