You know what happens when you cut education in your state? Businesses may start to leave. Basically, Arizona is looking to cut hundreds of millions of dollars to K-12 and University education in order to save money -- despite the incredibly obvious problem that cutting that money means gutting your future work force and depriving them of the education they need to get the high-paying jobs. This did not escape Craig Barrett, a former Intel Chief Executive, who serves on the Arizona Commerce Authority. In that article it's clear he thinks cutting education makes Arizona a less desirable place to set up business. I've often wondered if biomedical research companies would start leaving states that promote creationism over evolution teaching. Now I have to wonder if I was being too narrow in my thinking. I would be interesting indeed if big businesses start telling state legislators that if they cut education funding, businesses will have to look elsewhere for their future employees. Hopefully Arizona will get that message... one that many other states (like oh, say, Tennessee) need to hear as well. I think it's clear that a lot of legislators don't care all that much about education when it comes to actually teaching the kids science (aka reality). Maybe a poke at their bottom line will stir them to do the right thing, even if not for the most important reason.
Tip o' the brow ridge to a) Fark, and 2) Robert Luhn of NCSE for the Tennessee article. In fact, you should use their RSS feed to keep up with their tireless fight against antireality!
