Wyoming Education Assn
In past years my campaign was "Education Friendly." I have long followed the Education Committees work.
Making Change
Just a few days ago I observed an example of California School System failure. A young 8th grader whose family moved to Wyoming after the Covid-19 California School shutdown was a cashier in a store. This young person had a problem making change... I was buying a cup of coffee: $1.75 and I handed her $2. This young person had real trouble figuring out that the correct change was a quarter... she ended up giving me two dimes and a nickel after I quietly said 25¢.
A few years ago I was in a Denver area Sams Club. I bought a pizza slice and two sodas for my self and my wife... the cost was $4.30... I handed the cashier a 5 dollar bill and 30¢... this cashier then got out a calculator to figure out the change...
My perception is that our young people are better prepared by Wyoming's education system... but we must keep our eyes on things...
Solving a Complex Problem
The House & Senate Education Committees, both in regular session and interim meetings, struggled with how do you shoe horn in one more computer course?
They were always running up against two problems: The breadth of information required to be provided to students on computer science and the already required courses in a curriculum. I stood back from the problem and asked why can't we figure out how to spread the elements of computer science across more grades? The reality is many of our young people are already computer literate by 4th or 5th grade.
So as I reflected the issue became one of how many grades could absorb computer science elements and could the curriculum of those grades be adjusted to then use computers on a regular classroom basis. The answer seemed to lie in what is being done with some foreign language instruction: Total Immersion.
The Committees liked the thinking and sent it on the the Wyoming Department of Education who developed it into a fully fleshed out revised curriculum across all grades. In the 2018 Budget Session Senate File 29 then put this into legislation and Gov Mead signed it into law..
