Coffee with Cascade
237 episodes - English - Latest episode: 8 days ago -Are you wondering why homelessness is up in Oregon? Or why traffic is just never-ending?
Grab an Oregon-roasted cup o' joe, sit back, and listen to Cascade Policy Institute explain the latest research on Oregon issues.
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Episodes
Providing Homes Oregon Families Can Afford Should Not Be a Problem
April 17, 2024 20:10 - 1 minute - 1.38 MBThis month, Cascade Policy Institute is releasing a new report explaining why government-mandated “affordable housing” doesn’t actually make housing more affordable. In The Affordable Housing Scam, author Randal O’Toole writes that while “U.S. taxpayers spend tens of billions of dollars a year subsidizing housing for low-income households,” those units cost “about 20 percent more per square foot than unsubsidized homes.” Developers, not low-income households, capture most of the benefits of...
QP: The prudent person principle should be applied to all publicly funded projects
April 10, 2024 19:26 - 1 minute - 1.43 MBLast week, Cascade Policy Institute provided suggestions to the Board of Portland Public Schools to reduce costs on the Jefferson High School modernization project. The project is paused due to the budget ballooning from $311 million (approved by voters in a 2020 bond issue) to $491 million. Cascade’s primary advice for the PPS Board can be applied to all publicly funded projects: practice common sense prudence. The prudent person principle provides perspective on three cost-prohibitive as...
QP: By 2027, All Alabama Students Will Have Educational Choice
March 28, 2024 14:41 - 1 minute - 1.29 MBThis month, Alabama became the most recent state to increase education options for students through Education Savings Accounts. Alabama’s CHOOSE Act gives families access to up to $7,000 per child to use at participating private schools or for other education expenses. Families who homeschool may receive up to $2,000. Low-income students have first priority, with eligibility expanding to all children by the 2027-28 school year. Finding the right fit for their children’s education is increas...
QP - More Money is Not the Solution
March 13, 2024 16:24 - 1 minute - 1.32 MBThe Oregonian recently reported that “Oregon students as a whole have failed to regain either math or reading skills” lost during the COVID-19 pandemic, unlike students in 29 other states included in an analysis published in January. The article points out that, despite $1.6 billion in federal pandemic aid being spent in Oregon schools, Oregon students are experiencing three to four times the learning deficit of other states. Each school district spent the money differently, but whether it ...
Legislative committee wants to extend commuter rail to Salem at a cost of $118 per ride.
February 28, 2024 18:35 - 1 minute - 1.44 MBOn February 22, the Joint Committee on Transportation of the Oregon Legislature unanimously approved SB 1572, which would appropriate $250,000 to ODOT to study the feasibility of extending TriMet’s Westside Express Service (WES) train from Wilsonville to Salem. The committee did this despite the fact that average daily ridership on WES was down to 370 in January. With so few riders, the average operations cost per ride was $118. By comparison, the average operations cost per ride for TriM...
QP: Oregon Needs More Than Tiny Homes
February 16, 2024 21:53 - 1 minute - 1.8 MBFull-text: The 35-day session of the Oregon Legislature opened last week, and a hearing was held on the Governor’s top priority, Senate Bill 1537. Her goal is to increase the supply of housing. Unfortunately, this goal is undercut by Oregon’s Urban Growth Boundaries, which are designed to limit urban growth. Under SB 1537, cities will be allowed to add tiny amounts of new land inside the boundary, but only if the proposed development meets stringent criteria. In the Portland region, new ne...
QP: Oregon’s highway freeze is not about the weather
February 08, 2024 22:53 - 1 minute - 1.37 MBFull text: The last segment of Oregon’s Interstate Highway system opened in 1982. One would think that since Oregon has a nationally prominent planning system, there would be efforts underway to plan for the next generation of great roads. But that is not the case. Planners almost universally hate highways, so they have made sure that the Interstate system remains stagnant. Even where changes are being contemplated, such as a new I-5 bridge over the Columbia River, they are not designed to ...
QP: Survey: 72% of Parents Said They Considered a New School Last Year
January 31, 2024 20:51 - 1 minute - 1.41 MBFull-text: The National School Choice Awareness Foundation conducted a survey of parents of school-aged children in early January. The results indicate that parents “increasingly see school choice as the ‘new normal’ in a post-pandemic world.” The survey report, New Year, New Schools: U.S. Parents View K-12 School Choice as the “New Normal” in 2024, shows 72% of parents said they considered new schools for their children last year. According to Andrew Campanella, President and CEO of Nation...
QP: Local Celebrations Highlight All the Ways Oregon Students Learn
January 17, 2024 22:38 - 1 minute - 1.41 MBFull text: January 21-27 is National School Choice Week, the world’s largest annual celebration of parental choice and effective education options for all children. In 2024, 183 Oregon schools and organizations will participate in National School Choice Week to raise awareness about K-12 education in our state. The landscape of options for Oregon students includes district public schools, public charter schools, private and parochial schools, homeschooling, magnet schools, online learning, ...
QP: Three Ways Oregon Can Help Kids Get the Education They Deserve
January 10, 2024 23:40 - 1 minute - 1.44 MBFull text: In 2023, eight states passed universal or near-universal educational choice laws. Education Savings Accounts, vouchers, and education tax credits are different policy approaches; but the goal of each is the same: to put parents “in the driver’s seat” of their kids’ education. A strong majority of voters agree that parents should be able to choose among schools and resources they believe will best meet their children’s academic and developmental needs. Here are three ideas for exp...
QP: Oregon’s Reliance on Fossil Fuels Is Growing, Not Shrinking
January 04, 2024 17:37 - 1 minute - 1.39 MBFull-text: During the holidays, the Oregon Department of Energy quietly updated a chart it maintains showing where Oregon’s electricity comes from. The chart shows that from 2012 through 2021, Oregon’s dependence on fossil fuels increased from 44.7% to 46.3% of annual electricity consumed. This may come as a surprise to people who thought Oregon was phasing out fossil fuels. Indeed, the Oregon legislature banned coal in 2016 and natural gas in 2021, and mandated that most new electricity co...
QP: Pennsylvania’s Christmas Gift to K-12 Students
December 27, 2023 23:45 - 1 minute - 1.29 MBFull text: Christmas came early for children and parents in Pennsylvania when the state legislature expanded funding for their K-12 education tax-credit programs in mid-December. Almost 80,000 lower-income children receive scholarships to attend private schools chosen by their families through Pennsylvania’s two school choice programs. The approved increase reportedly will fund about 35,000 more scholarships. Pennsylvania has two school choice programs that help children from low-to-middle-...
QP: Why 2023 Is the “Year of Universal School Choice”
December 20, 2023 19:29 - 1 minute - 1.37 MBFull text: Nationwide polling this year revealed seventy-one percent of voters say parents should “have the right to use tax dollars designated for their child’s education to send their child to the public or private school which best serves their needs.” State policymakers should note it’s increasingly important to families to match their children’s educational needs with school environments that serve them best. Oregon should expand students’ education options, and many ways exist to achi...
Student-Focused Solutions Can Address Pandemic Learning Losses
December 13, 2023 17:43 - 1 minute - 1.45 MBFull text: The New York Times published an editorial November 18 regarding learning losses experienced by K-12 students since the COVID-19 pandemic. The editorial board’s recommendations are predictable: spend more money, combat chronic absenteeism, and increase teacher compensation. CATO education policy analyst Colleen Hroncich takes a more incisive approach. “We’ve spent a lot of time and money on the system‐focused approach,” Hroncich writes. “Let’s try focusing on the kids now…. “Po...
QP: Why More Money Won’t Solve the Problems in Portland Public Schools
December 08, 2023 17:46 - 1 minute - 1.33 MBFull text: At the Portland Public Schools board meeting last week, the Portland Association of Teachers and the school board members were united on one issue: They all blamed the state legislature for the November teachers strike. However, parents should be aware of the following sections of the new PPS contract: “Bargaining unit members who participated in the strike will receive their full pay for November 2023 and the remainder of the 2023-2024 contract year….” (Page 2, paragraph N) “Al...
QP: TriMet’s Existential Crisis
November 27, 2023 19:23 - 1 minute - 1.36 MBFull text: For those of us who came of age in the 1970s, the conventional wisdom was that cars were gas guzzlers and the environmentally correct way to travel was via transit. That is no longer the case. Last month the Federal Transit Agency (FTA) released its 2022 National Transit Database. According to Oregon economist Randal O’Toole, the results show that transit used more energy per passenger-mile than the average car or light truck in every urban area. Transit vehicles also emitted mo...
QP: Oklahoma’s Education Tax Credit Puts Families First
November 22, 2023 22:24 - 1 minute - 1.51 MBFull-text: Oklahoma’s Parental Choice Tax Credit Program is the first universal, refundable tax credit for K-12 education expenses. Education Tax Credits: Restoring Trust in Families, a new report published by yes. every kid., explains how education tax credits can be a direct, unbureaucratic approach to expanding education options for all students. “Personal education tax credits,” the report says, “are tax credits received by a parent or guardian for educating his or her student outside o...
QP: What The New Homeschool Demographic Means For School Choice
November 08, 2023 23:31 - 1 minute - 1.36 MBFull text: The homeschool landscape is changing. Our approach to school funding should, too. A recent Washington Post study found that homeschooling is booming in popularity. In districts with available data, the homeschool population has grown on average 51% since the 2017-2018 school year. Homeschooled students do not come from one ideological, racial, political, or religious background. The reasons families choose homeschooling are also diverse. Homeschoolers come from liberal districts...
QP: We don’t need a Ministry of Truth
November 01, 2023 22:55 - 1 minute - 1.46 MBFull text: Last August, Oregon Secretary of State LaVonne Griffin-Valade issued a Request for Proposal for services to identify and mitigate “harmful information online as it relates to elections” (to see the full RFP document, click HERE). The Secretary is concerned with what she refers to as “misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation”, or MDM. According to the RFP, the selected vendor shall review social and online media for alleged instances of MDM on a 24/7 basis, and share rel...
QP: It’s Time to End Home Equity Theft in Oregon
October 25, 2023 23:08 - 1 minute - 1.38 MBFull text: It’s time to end home equity theft in Oregon. In Oregon, if a property has unpaid taxes, the county can legally seize and sell the property, and keep the proceeds. Pacific Legal Foundation found that, most of the time, property owners’ tax liabilities are minuscule compared to the value of their homes: 75% of homes seized by Oregon counties had tax debts less than the price of a 10-year-old Ford F-150. Yet, the average homeowner lost $237,000 in equity beyond the debt owed. Ore...
QP: School Choice Programs Don’t Cause Tuition Inflation
October 18, 2023 21:49 - 1 minute - 1.4 MBFull-text: A long-standing question about taxpayer-funded school choice programs like vouchers, education tax credits, and Education Scholarship Accounts is whether such programs would cause tuition to rise at private elementary and high schools. A new study by the Heritage Foundation shows that school choice programs have kept elementary school costs from increasing in their states and had no impact on high school tuition. Lucy Graves at The Daily Signal reports: “Over the past 10 years, s...
QP: North Carolina Becomes the 9th State to Offer Students Universal School Choice
October 12, 2023 16:33 - 1 minute - 1.46 MBFull-text: North Carolina has become the ninth state to enact universal school choice for K-12 children. The Opportunity Scholarship Program, created in 2013, offers vouchers applicable to private school costs, including tuition, fees, transportation, and necessary expenses. In September, the General Assembly expanded eligibility to all families through an income-based system. Lower-income households have first priority. Middle- and upper-income families may apply as funding remains availab...
QP: Offshore Wind Takes a Blow
October 04, 2023 21:46 - 1 minute - 1.34 MBFull-text: Lawmakers and activists across the country continue to push for massive increases in renewable energy, and here on the West Coast, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has unveiled a plan for large scale offshore wind farms. Representative David Gomberg of Oregon’s 10th district hosted a listening session on September 28th in Newport to hear the thoughts of his constituents on this subject. The response was overwhelmingly negative. Over the course of two hours, c...
QP: It’s Time to Bring Transit into the Twenty-First Century
September 27, 2023 23:06 - 1 minute - 1.57 MBFull-text: Portland’s TriMet transit agency and the Metro regional government have long tried to shape the city’s growth and transportation landscape. But it’s abundantly clear the current transit model is woefully outdated, a relic of the early 1900s. The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated this situation, accelerating trends like telecommuting, job dispersion throughout the suburbs, and increased car ownership among low-income commuters. Cascade Policy Institute’s new report by Randal O’Toole, ...
QP: Portland Students Could Strike Out Because of Teachers’ Union
September 20, 2023 23:20 - 1 minute - 1.56 MBFull-text: Have you heard of “No-School November”? Portland Public School (PPS) students could be away from their desks for a long time this fall. The district is bracing for a potentially imminent teacher strike at the behest of their union. This is a classic example of how taxpaying families have lost power in public education. Despite the union’s heavy demands, including a 23 percent hike in teachers’ compensation packages, the union stated at a September school board meeting that they...
QP: Westside MAX, Still a Dream at 25
September 12, 2023 22:36 - 1 minute - 1.37 MBFull-text: TriMet’s Blue rail line to Hillsboro opened on September 12, 1998. Westside MAX was unlike any light rail line previously built in America: It was deliberately routed through vacant land with the expectation that it would be a catalyst for so-called “Transit-Oriented Development” (TOD). TriMet planners claimed, “The success or failure of the public’s nearly $1 billion investment in Westside MAX will be determined in large part by what happens around its 20 stations. Unlike the E...
QP: Parents Say They Want More School Options for Their Children
September 06, 2023 16:31 - 1 minute - 1.51 MBFull-text: As K-12 students return to school, more than four-fifths of them will attend a district public school. However, recent polling by EdChoice shows that only 29% of parents say their zoned public school would be their first choice, and about one in four parents say parental choice is one of their top three K-12 education issues. Here are three ways Oregon can expand options for K-12 students and parents: 1. EdChoice reports that 11% of parents polled would prefer a charter scho...
QP: 2023 – An Outstanding Year for School Choice
August 30, 2023 22:31 - 1 minute - 1.49 MBFull-text: 2023 has been an outstanding year for school choice. Utah, Iowa, Arkansas, and Florida enacted universal school choice programs for K-12 students. Families who opt into these programs may use a portion of their state education funds to pay for education costs including tuition or other education services. Indiana expanded eligibility for its school choice programs, making its voucher program available to 96.5% of families with school-aged children. Nebraska’s Opportunity Schola...
QP: RealClear Opinion Poll Shows 71% of Registered Voters Support School Choice
August 23, 2023 17:13 - 1 minute - 1.34 MBFull-text: A June 2023 RealClear Opinion Research survey of registered voters shows public support for school choice has increased seven points since 2020. Seventy-one percent of voters—up from 64% three years ago—say parents should “have the right to use tax dollars designated for their child’s education to send their child to the public or private school which best serves their needs.” Support for school choice commands a strong majority across political affiliations. Sixty-six percent of...
QP: Let Oregon Voters Reconsider Nuclear Power
August 16, 2023 20:01 - 1 minute - 1.38 MBFull-text: Earlier this year, Oregon lawmakers proposed legislation allowing voters to reconsider their 1980 decision to effectively ban construction of new nuclear power plants in the state. The bills never received a hearing. That was unfortunate, because state law requires electricity generation in Oregon to be 100% emissions-free by 2040. In order to phase out coal and natural gas, utilities will need other fuels that can provide clean, round-the-clock power; and nuclear is the only tec...
QP: Making Driving More Expensive Won’t Fix Oregon’s Congested Roads
August 09, 2023 17:28 - 1 minute - 1.34 MBFull-text: Metro is the regional government of the greater Portland region. It is tasked with managing regional issues like transportation, land use, and public parks. Metro’s Regional Mobility Policy guides the region’s transportation investments toward its goals—directing investments in roads, bridges, bike lanes, light rail, and more. One of Metro’s proposed policies for 2023 is the use of congestion pricing, meaning imposing tolls on users of high-traffic roadways. Cascade Policy Insti...
QP: Cascade Policy Institute’s Bill Expanding Access to the GED Exam Is Signed into Law
August 02, 2023 19:16 - 1 minute - 1.29 MBFull-text: During the 2023 session, the Oregon Legislature passed Cascade Policy Institute’s bill to ease state-level restrictions on taking the GED. Governor Kotek signed HB 3068 into law August 1. General Educational Development (GED) tests are standardized exams that measure proficiency in science, mathematics, social studies, and language arts. When passed, the GED provides certification that the test-taker meets high school graduate-level academic skills. Higher scores demonstrate coll...
QP: The Ghost Train
August 01, 2023 17:56 - 1 minute - 1.4 MBFull-text: Metro’s 2023 Regional Transportation Plan calls for expanding many different high-capacity transit lines but includes no mention of reducing the most costly ones. As of this spring, the WES commuter rail from Beaverton to Wilsonville only sees 450 daily boardings. That is only 225 riders, assuming a round trip. To put that in perspective, the least popular of the five MAX rail lines, the Orange Line, has more than 5,000 daily boardings. Meanwhile, the Blue Line has almost 30,000....
QP: The Memory Problem of Portland Public Schools
July 26, 2023 18:43 - 1 minute - 1.43 MBFull-text: For decades, Portland Public Schools (PPS) has tried to close the “achievement gap” between white and non-white students. “Race,” they wrote in their 2013 Racial Education Equity Policy, “must cease to be a predictor of student achievement and success.” To do this, they began dedicating 8% of their yearly budget to General Fund Equity. This fund has taken various forms, first as “action plan” reporting, then as professional development training, now as “transformative curriculum a...
QP: Oregon's 2040 Electric Utility Mandates Rely on Future Technology--or Buying Electricity from Other States
July 12, 2023 17:43 - 1 minute - 1.4 MBFull-text: Two years ago, the Oregon Legislature passed House Bill 2021, which requires Oregon’s investor-owned electric utilities to phase out fossil fuels by 2040, producing all electricity from renewables—mostly wind and solar. But renewables have a problem: Wind and solar are notoriously unreliable. They must always depend on on-demand “dispatchable” resources, which in Oregon means natural gas and hydro. New hydro is nearly impossible to build, and with other dispatchables outlawed, O...
QP: Metro Nature Parks are Hidden by Design
July 10, 2023 20:03 - 1 minute - 1.28 MBFull-text: Last week the elected Auditor for Metro published a report showing that the agency misled voters when it promised that funds raised from the $475 million bond measure approved in 2019 would be used to make Metro’s nature parks more accessible to the public. It’s nice to see this concern validated by the Auditor, but it’s been obvious for decades that Metro was more interested in acquiring park land than inviting people to use it. Since 1995, Metro has spent over half a billion do...
QP: Portland Needs More Than a Small Tax Break
June 28, 2023 18:50 - 1 minute - 1.25 MBFull-text: Two weeks ago, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler announced plans to give a 2.6% tax break to businesses threatening to leave Portland. This is a win for businesses and could encourage some to stay. But it may be too little, too late. Even after the worst of the pandemic, hundreds of businesses moved their headquarters out of Portland. And it’s not just businesses; people are fleeing, too. In 2022, Portland had a net loss of 8,000 people. Mayor Wheeler finally learned one basic principl...
QP: School Choice States Open Doors of Opportunity for Generations of Children
June 21, 2023 19:36 - 2 minutes - 2 MBFull-text: Three states recently expanded education options for K-12 students through school choice laws. States that are empowering families to find the right fit for their children’s educational needs are opening doors of opportunity for generations of students. In May, Nebraska passed the Opportunity Scholarship Act. The tax credit-funded program provides opportunities for children to attend private schools chosen by their parents. The average scholarship amount is capped at 75% of state...
QP: A Nightmare Waiting to Happen: Parking at 3000 SE Powell
June 14, 2023 18:01 - 2 minutes - 2 MBFull-text: “3000 SE Powell Boulevard” is the name of Home Forward’s 6-year-old low-income housing development with a massive expenditure: $87 million, $75 million of which came from government tax credits and bond monies. Burdened by building height and design constraints, soil contamination worries, and delayed materials delivery, the expected opening date has been pushed back to next winter. But perhaps the most distressing thing about 3000 Powell is parking, which seems tragically inadeq...
QP: The Oregon Senate has been shut down for a month. Does anyone care?
June 07, 2023 17:07 - 2 minutes - 1.87 MBFull-text: Most Republican members of the Oregon Senate have refused to participate in floor sessions since May 3, in a show of opposition to Democratic leadership. As a result, hundreds of bills are waiting for floor votes, which may never be taken before the mandatory adjournment date of June 25. While this is frustrating for legislative insiders, the average Oregonian probably doesn’t care. Most people have no idea what is going on in the Capitol, for good reason. Bills are usually intro...
QP: More Money, Same Result
May 31, 2023 18:15 - 2 minutes - 1.94 MBFull-text: “More money, same result” is what Oregon’s Senate voted for this March. Now, the bill enters a different chamber, but faces a similar fate. If passed, Senate Bill 442 allows government contractors to grant preferences to in-state bidders if the “goods or services cost not more than five percent more than [out of state] goods or services.” Normally, when the government uses taxpayer dollars to purchase goods or services, it grants favor to the lowest bidder who offers an accep...
QP: A Failure of Political Leadership
May 24, 2023 17:38 - 2 minutes - 1.89 MBFull-text: The Oregon Senate has come to a standstill over the past several weeks. Most Republican Senators are boycotting floor sessions due to objections about both policy and process. Media accounts have portrayed the missing Senators in a negative light, but voters should ask why the majority party has driven Republicans to such extreme measures. Democrats hold all the power, so only they can broker a compromise. They’ve been unwilling to do that. One of the most basic rules of politic...
QP: Money for Nothing
May 17, 2023 20:11 - 2 minutes - 2 MBFull-text: Over the next five weeks, the Oregon legislature will decide whether to make a down payment of $1 billion to replace the I-5 Interstate Bridge connecting Portland with Vancouver, WA. The total cost of the bridge is unknown, but is estimated to be at least $6 billion. The legislature should reject this request. There is no immediate need to replace the Interstate Bridge. It has decades of useful life remaining. The much bigger need is to accommodate growth by adding two new brid...
QP: With New Laws in Florida and Indiana, 7 States Have Universal School Choice
May 03, 2023 19:51 - 2 minutes - 1.99 MBFull-text: Two more states recently expanded their school choice programs, bringing the total number of states with universal or near-universal student eligibility to seven. In March, Florida became the fourth state this year to enact a universal school choice program for K-12 students. All Florida children now have the option to choose an Education Savings Account (ESA) funded at about $7,500 per year. Families who want to opt into the program may use ESA funds to pay for non-public-school...
QP: Homeowners, Business Owners, and Retirees: Multnomah County is Coming for Your Life Savings
April 27, 2023 17:24 - 2 minutes - 1.95 MBFull-text: If you’re a Multnomah County homeowner, business owner, or have a retirement account, watch out for the May election. There’s a measure on the ballot that’s coming after you. Measure 26-238 imposes a capital gains tax on Multnomah County residents. If you sell your home, you will pay the tax on the increased value since you bought it. If you sell your small business, you will pay on the gains from that sale. If you have a retirement account, every time you withdraw money, you wil...
QP: Oregon’s Last Mask Mandate Has Been Lifted, But State Policy Guarantees More Lockdowns in the Next Pandemic
April 19, 2023 19:56 - 2 minutes - 1.97 MBFull Text: Earlier this month, Oregon lifted its mask mandate for hospitals and other health care facilities. For many, it’s one of the last steps indicating the COVID-19 pandemic is behind us. But, it’s also a reminder that one state policy caused so much damage during the pandemic. That policy is Oregon’s “Certificate of Need” laws. If a health care provider wants to open a new facility or significantly expand an existing facility, the provider must get permission from the state and demon...
QP: Oregon Legislature Lines Up a Spending Blow-Out
April 12, 2023 20:45 - 2 minutes - 2.13 MBFull-text: While Oregonians are filling out their tax returns, their elected legislators are lining up some blow-out spending. Last month, the Democratic co-chairs of the Legislature’s Ways and Means Committee unveiled a budget “framework” that proposes more than $6 billion in new general fund spending—a 24% increase from the last budget. The biggest increases are in K-12 education and human services, which includes Medicaid. Even though Oregon public school enrollment has dropped b...
QP: Portlanders Are Voting with Their Feet
April 05, 2023 23:11 - 2 minutes - 1.9 MBFull text: Oregon’s economic engine is losing steam. For the second year in a row, Multnomah County lost population. The U.S. Census Bureau reports the county now has 21,000 fewer people than in 2020. In contrast, Clark County, Washington added more than 11,000 in population. It’s not an accident and it’s not a mystery. Over that time, housing prices in the Portland region have increased by 30%. But, it’s more than just housing prices. Portland now has the second highest tax burden of any ...
QP: Educational Freedom: A Tale of Two Governors
March 15, 2023 19:48 - 2 minutes - 2.05 MBFull-text: Last November, voters in Arkansas elected Republican Sarah Huckabee Sanders as their new Governor. Oregonians elected Democrat Tina Kotek. On March 9, Gov. Huckabee Sanders signed the Arkansas LEARNS Act, her top legislative priority. The new law creates Educational Freedom Accounts for all K-12 students, to be phased in by 2026. Individuals choosing a Freedom Account will get 90% of what public schools get per student in state funding from the previous school year, equal to $6,...
QP: HB 3068 Allows Students to Take the GED for a High School Diploma
March 08, 2023 21:32 - 2 minutes - 1.96 MBFull-text: Cascade Policy Institute’s bill to make it easier for Oregon high school students to graduate early by passing the GED is getting a hearing this week. We hope you will reach out to the committee to voice your support for the bill. This Wednesday, March 8, the Oregon House Committee on Education will hold a hearing on HB 3068. Currently, it is almost impossible for an Oregon high school student to take the GED exam. In most cases, students must drop out of school before they’re a...