Cheers: Clark County school districts are joining others throughout Washington in transitioning to all-day kindergarten programs — in advance of a state-mandated change-over by the 2017-18 school year. And, as a Columbian story from Susan Parrish recently noted, “It’s been a long time since kindergarten was synonymous with nap time, graham crackers, stories and playtime. Today’s kindergarten classrooms are more academic than ever.”
Many a study has quantified the long-term benefits of a full-day academic program for young students, as such programs can provide a solid foundation for a successful academic career. The anecdotal evidence supports that notion, as well. Scott Munro, executive director of elementary education for Evergreen Public Schools, said: “There’s no question in our minds that moving to all-day, every-day kindergarten was absolutely the right thing to do. We’re placing a higher emphasis than ever on early learning.”
Jeers: Making laws and writing budgets can be a difficult and often thankless job. We can empathize with lawmakers who have been toiling for the past 104 days in the state Legislature, wrestling with a particularly daunting budget. But lawmakers are deserving of jeers as they head into a special session to begin next week.
Despite being fully aware of the task ahead of them when the session started, they have been unable to reach agreement on a state budget for the 2015-17 biennium. The protagonists are Democrats who hold the majority in the House of Representatives, and Republicans who hold sway in the Senate; perhaps most disappointing is the fact that both sides have expended plenty of energy in the past week blaming the other for the overtime session.
Cheers: Garbage used to be simple. When you were finished with a product or a food wrapper, it went in the trash and was hauled away. Simple, but unsustainable. So society, demonstrating a bit of concern for the planet, grew increasingly interested in recycling products that can be reconstituted and used again. Difficult, but conscientious.
Now, for everybody who sometimes wonders which items should go in the trash and which can be recycled, a new app provides the answers. Developed specifically for the city of Vancouver, Clark County, and Waste Connections of Washington, the RecycleRight app also has information about trash pickup schedules and how to dispose of difficult-to-handle items. Doing your part for the environment just got a little easier.
Jeers: We will resist the temptation of saying that if he wants the water, he should just beam it up, or suggesting that this sounds like a Klingon plot. Really, we will avoid doing that. But something sounds screwy about William Shatner’s plan for a water pipeline from Seattle to Nevada’s Lake Mead to solve California’s drought problems.
The erstwhile Captain Kirk is planning a Kickstarter campaign to raise $30 billion for just such a project. “Say, from Seattle — a place where there’s a lot of water. There’s too much water,” Shatner said. As Spock might add, that is highly illogical.
Cheers: Because we can never get enough of stories that restore our faith in humanity, we bring you this item: An anonymous donor has paid off the mortgage for a victim of last year’s Oso landslide.
Tim Ward lost his wife, Brandy, and his house in the slide that killed 43 people and devastated a community. Ward still owed $360,000 on his home — money that needed to be paid even if the house was no longer there. After seeing a media account of Ward’s plight, a benefactor paid off the mortgage.
