A Four-Day Work Week for Higher Ed?

State Representative Don Marostica (R-Loveland) has put forth a proposal for legislation to create a four-day work week for state employees in an effort to diminish greenhouse gases, alleviate highway congestion and cut the state's utility costs.

In response, last Saturday's edition of The Rocky Mountain News stamped its collective editorial foot and denounced the plan. Some of the newspaper's arguments were absolutely valid, citing agencies that deal directly with the public - driver's license offices, public assistance, taxes, public safety, emergency services, courts and parks - in which customer service is a cornerstone. (Of course, with some of these agencies, when mentioning "customer service" it's a good idea to keep one's tongue firmly planted in one's cheek.)

However, a key state agency the newspaper avoided mentioning is higher education. A four-day work week for colleges and universities has several advantages, especially for the majority of community colleges and rural four-year institutions that have a student body largely comprised of commuters. For example, while Adams State College in Alamosa has student dorms, well over half of its student body commutes from points all over the San Luis Valley, meaning some students drive 80 to 100 miles around trip to attend classes.

Similarly, students attending community colleges in Fort Morgan, Sterling, La Junta, Lamar, Trinidad, Pueblo, Colorado Springs, Rangely, Craig, Fort Collins, Greeley or the numerous campuses of Colorado Mountain College or Western Colorado Community College or those enrolled at technical colleges in Cortez, Montrose, Aurora or downtown Denver or at Western State College in Gunnison or Mesa State College in Grand Junction could all benefit from a four day school week. To a lesser degree, that holds true for students attend any of the five Denver Metro Area community colleges, Metropolitan State College of Denver, or the University of Colorado Denver.

For colleges and universities to shift many courses to a Monday through Thursday schedule would be relatively painless. In some case, of course, this wouldn't work.   Medical school training or clinical experiences for nurses, x-ray technicians and other healthcare professions that depend upon the availability of space in hospitals, clinics, care facilities or other institutions, which is often limited and must be accessed when there is available supervisory staff, would have to be an exception.

Then again, it would be difficult to make an argument that not holding Friday classes in say law school, the humanities, mathematics and sciences, and other areas would somehow damage a student's educational opportunities.

Frankly, a four-day work week for Colorado higher education could achieve some of the savings Marostica hopes to achieve for the institutions and their faculties, staffs and students.

But let's be honest. It'll never happen. The Rocky Mountain News sums it up in its editorial screed: "We're confident that with a full public vetting, lawmakers will conclude that giving state workers an extra day off is no bargain for most Coloradans."

The truth is, if a four-day week was enacted for higher education, the knee-jerk radio hate commentators and newspaper hate mongers would whine like scalded children. They already despise public higher education in general and its faculties in particular and take every opportunity to malign them. One can only imagine what they would do if suddenly the object of their revulsion was granted a four-ten work week.

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Carpetbaggers' Greed Will Kill the Colorado Promise Scholarships

Coloradans for a Stable Economy, the oil and gas industry's lobbying group opposing the Colorado Promise Scholarships initiative, has suggested that if the measure passes in November, the industry may cut back on oil and gas production in the state.

Ah, yes, a threat by any other name...

If approved by voters in November, Governor Bill Ritter's Colorado Promise Scholarships would be funded by removing a sweetheart tax break that allows the oil and gas industry to shirk paying their fair share of property taxes, while extracting finite resources from the state. At a time when the industry is enjoying record profits and Americans are paying exorbitant prices for all their energy needs, the oil and gas people again show their underlying avarice, greed and treachery.

In opposing the initiative, Coloradans for a Stable Economy had no trouble raising nearly $500,000 from five companies. One can only imagine those phone calls.

"These yokels want us to pay property taxes."

"Who the hell do they think they are?"

"Exactly! Think you can pony up a hundred grand to save yourself $60,000,000 in taxes?"

"That's why the call it chump change, pal."

Last week at the monthly meeting of the Colorado Commission on Higher Education, Coloradans for a Stable Economy's Bill Ray intimated that the cutback in production might be the direct result of a winning vote for the scholarship initiative in the fall. It's really not likely, however, given that they can't pull up stakes and find Colorado's oil and gas somewhere else.

Earlier this month, the oil and gas lobbyists suggested voters won't support a new tax, as if the oil and gas property taxes will be levied against taxpayers and not a greed-driven industry; an industry, by the way, that not so many years back raped Colorado's Western Slope when it abruptly pulled out of oil shale operations and abandoned hundreds of workers - workers imported by the same industry - leaving them destitute and all but killing the communities of Parachute and Battlement Mesa. Of course, these days Western Slope politicians, their long-term memories stunted, are buzzing around the industry like flies on a dung heap.

Maybe it is too late to save the Colorado Promise Scholarships. After all, opposition extends beyond the oil and gas industry and its bought and paid for politicians to include many of the CEOs of the state's public institutions of higher education and Republicans trying desperately to embarrass and humiliate Governor Ritter under the spotlight of the Democratic National Convention.

Still, it's sad that Colorado - a state once proud of its individuality and integrity - is willing to allow a group of carpetbaggers the right to extract finite resources while cheating the state's citizens out of due compensation that could aid thousands of students in pursuing a higher education.

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Concealed Weapons on Campus: A Logical Option to Prevent More Slaughter

he massacres at Virginia Tech University in April 2007 and at Northern Illinois University in February of this year, have triggered a wave of initiatives around the country to allow faculty, staff and students duly trained and with appropriate permits to carry concealed weapons on college campuses. Among the leading proponents of this effort is Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC), a national umbrella organization with representatives in every state.

 

SCCC will hold its first national conference, Aug. 1 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. with guest speaker Dr. John R. Lott, a well-known scholar and author of More Guns Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws.

 

The idea of concealed weapons on campus often brings out a knee-jerk hysteria from people opposed to the Second Amendment in general and guns of any kind in particular. However, these same people are often strong proponents of the Bill of Rights - the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The Bill of Rights is not nor should it ever be a cafeteria menu. "Oh, I like free speech and freedom of religion, but a free press, I dunno, maybe it should be reigned in." Or, "The First Amendment is sacrosanct, but that Second Amendment, well that's just got to go."

Sorry, but the Bill of Rights is an all or nothing proposition. If we allow changes to one amendment, then logically we have to allow changes to any and all of them. Do we really want politicians, fanatics and out and out kooks fiddling with our rights to be free of unreasonable search and seizure - a right often abridged by overzealous police and municipalities - or our right to speak freely or to have a fair and public trial? Routinely, a crop of zealots appear calling for a new Constitutional convention to amend those pesky rights. And it's always a bad idea fraught with hidden agendas and dodgy motives.

As to the idea of conceal-carry on college campuses, looking beyond the initial knee-jerk reaction, there are strong arguments in its favor. For example, since 2006, the State of Utah has allowed individuals holding concealed weapons permits to carry guns on all nine of its public university campuses. For nearly 14 years, Blue Ridge Community College in Virginia has allowed concealed weapons on its campus. None of these institutions has had any gun violence, gun accidents, or a single gun theft.

 

One point that opponents of conceal-carry often make is, "I don't feel safe on campus knowing people are carrying weapons." Colin Lundholm, a Red Rocks Community College student and one of SCCC's Colorado advocates, answered the question quite simply: "Do you feel safe going to the movie theater, the bank or to church? There are people in all of those places carrying concealed weapons."

 

An argument offered by opponents is that in the instances of the Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois shootings, there was considerable chaos and someone with a gun trying to stop the shooter might have hit innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire. That argument implies that it is better to have an armed psychopath gunning down people hiding under desks or fleeing down hallways than to have individuals who have been trained to use weapons and vetted by the state as stable and responsible returning fire and likely stopping the aggressor before killing more people.

The argument that more guns means more crime and violence is refuted by state and national statistics that reveal people with conceal-carry permits are highly responsible and law-abiding.

Some opponents worry that a person with a conceal-carry permit on campus will go nuts and start shooting. However, the United States Secret Service Threat Assessment Center's study, "Safe School Initiative: An Interim Report on the Prevention of Targeted Violence in Schools," found that school shooters do not suddenly go berserk, but rather turn dangerous and violent after a spiraling descent that draws the attention of one or more people.

According to SCCC President Michael Guzman, last week's Supreme Court ruling on the Second Amendment "won't have much impact" on conceal-carry on college campuses. Scott Moss, associate professor of law at the University of Colorado School of Law, agrees.

"I don't know that the Heller ruling impacts regulations of guns on campuses, because Justice Scalia's majority opinion said, ‘...nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings...'"

However, no one wants another bloodbath like Virginia Tech and only the most obtuse want college campuses to become walled compounds or fortresses as opposed to open and accessible communities. Nor are we suggesting some Hollywood western mythos where people walk around with a holstered .44 Hogleg tied down on their thigh. Allowing individuals with proper training and holding a concealed-carry permit on a college campus is reasonable and prudent and should not cause undo concern for those squeamish about guns. For one thing, the term "concealed" means that no one will know who's carrying a weapon and who's not.

No amount of wishful thinking, reasoned rhetoric or prayer vigils will stop a determined and armed psychopath. As gruesome as it may sound to some, occasionally one must fight gunfire with gunfire.

And for those Coloradoans alarmed by the prospect of guns on campus, consider this: Colorado State University in Fort Collins has allowed conceal-carry on its campus for close to six years and, like Utah's nine public universities and Virginia's Blue Ridge Community College, there has not been a single incident of gun violence, a gun accident or a gun theft.
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Amendment 46: Racism By Another Name?

mericans have struggled with the issue of race and racial relations for decades. It is a complex and complicated issue that is always seething just below the thin veneer of our national psyche and civility. It is not an issue that lends itself to quick fixes or magic bullets. At its heart it is about people understanding one another and that takes time, effort and commitment. And while they are learning to live together, it is often important to give the minority a bit of an edge to thwart of tyranny of the majority.

Since Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, there have been forces trying desperately to convince us that anti-discrimination laws are unnecessary. Now, Coloradoans are faced with Amendment 46, which, if passed by voters in November, would, among other things, end affirmative action in public higher education. In fact, the Amendment's proponents make it sound remarkably reasonable: 

"An amendment to the Colorado constitution concerning a prohibition against discrimination by the state, and, in connection therewith, prohibiting the state from discriminating against or granting preferential treatment to any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting..."

Of course, the reality is a little more jarring. This amendment is patterned after similar efforts in California, Michigan and Washington and initiated by American Civil Rights Coalition, a California-based movement that focuses on ending affirmative-action programs. Established by Ward Connerly, a wealthy conservative African-American Republican, the American Civil Rights Coalition advocates a colorblind America. That's noble ideal and we don't often find conservatives advocating such sweeping idealism. And we won't find them in Amendment 46.

In attempting to achieve this alleged ideal, the proponents of the Amendment simplify the multifaceted and complicated racial issues with the blatantly absurd assumption that the American playing field is level for everyone regardless of their race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin.

Really? It the playing field really level? Is a smart and talented Hispanic kid from San Luis on a level playing field with a smart and talented white kid from Cherry Hills Village? Is the smart and talented African-American kid raised in project housing on a level playing field with the smart and talented Asian-American kid from Boulder High School? Is the kid from South Park High School on par with the kid from Denver Kent School?

The assumption that everything is hunky-dory and that all Coloradoans have equal footing would be to believe that racism and bigotry in and out of higher education has been eradicated; it would be to assume that the 66 percent white majority in America that controls between 80 and 90-plus percent of everything is willing to concede equal rights to people of color struggling for a modicum of respect and justice. Eliminating affirmative action and similar programs that help level the playing field for minorities and women is a knee-jerk solution fostered by racists and bigots.

The real hope for a level playing field lies not with an insidious, racist-driven amendment disguised as a simple solution to a complex problem, but with the Millennial Generation that has already shown itself to be racially color-blind and, in fact, indifferent to the absurdity of white superiority. Colorado doesn't need to incorporate veiled bigotry into its constitution.

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