Ed Rendell and Education Reform

Ed Rendell and Educational Reform

For Governor Ed Rendell reforming/ funding education is one of his key issues. He has an educational reform plan, in which he wants to raise the amount of funding for the public schools, and educational programs. What comes into question is how will his plans be paid for, and will taxes have to go up, for his plans go into effect or to be continued.

During his current term he has increased funding for public schools by over
1.8 million dollars. According to Rendell the 1.8 billion that was provided by the state, has taken pressure off local school districts. In-turn many towns and cities do not need to raise taxes. His plan may have helped some school districts, but not all. Some school districts are still struggling, and towns and cities are still raising taxes. The funding that the states give to school districts comes from state taxes, so the more money that the schools get, the more taxes that Pennsylvanians have to pay. Which will lead to an increase in local or state taxes or both?

For Rendell, education must start early, and investments in early childhood education are key components in helping children succeed. Forty million dollars has already been invested in the Head Start Program, which provides early childhood education for under-privileged children. Two hundred million dollars in block grants has also been provided. For school districts that have established programs that help improve early childhood education. Pennsylvania is now surpassed other states in funding early childhood education. The earlier that we start investing in our children's education the more they will learn and the higher chance that they will succeed. Introducing programs that prepare children for school need to be in place like head Start.

Other programs that Rendell wants to invest in are the idea of class size reduction. More then 20,000 elementary school children are in smaller classes. The average size classes should be around 20-24 students, some class have less some have more. If we reduce the number of students, teachers can be more hands on with more students, and can help more students. Shrinking the number of students in each classroom will also lead to more teaching openings. The only conflict that this plan has is that many schools have limited classroom space, and many classrooms will still remain over crowded. But many schools are solving this issue by either remodeling the present school building or building new schools. Which in-turn will lead to a raise in tax, either at the local or state level?

Rendell not only wants to reduce class size and increase funds for early child education, but also wants to provide more funds for tutoring programs. During his first term in office, over sixty-six million dollars has already been invested in providing tutoring programs. Basically the program will help children improve on their skills and help them to succeed rather then fail. This program should be implemented at all levels of the public school system. The number one reason why high school students drop out is because they can not do the work. If we get these students who are really struggling, some help them may to decide to stay in school...

Besides providing funds for early childhood, Rendell wants to continue to invest in High Schools. He wants to upgrade equipment, like providing laptops in for every student in every English, math, science, and social studies classes. His goal is to start this program in the coming year. Having technology in the classroom is great and it allows students to be more hand-on. But for every classroom to have computers will cost a lot of money, and again we go back to the issue of raising taxes. Still many companies to donate computers and technological equipment to schools. If Rendell offers a tax break for companies, and business and the public in general more people will be inclined to donate either new or used equipment. For this plan to work in will depends on raising taxes, and donations from business, and the public in general.

Many colleges now are offering student's college credits while they are still in high school. In many cases it is the schools or the states that are paying for these courses. Basically what Rendell wants to do is rise the funding for this program and allows more students to take advantage of the program.

Not only has Rendell provided funding for public schools, he also wants to provide tax breaks and scholarships for all college bound students. Thirty-eight million has already been provided for college students over the past four years. The Governor has also made college savings programs tax free, giving families a twenty-five million- dollar tax cut. Rendell has also dramatically improved community college funding, by providing more then fifty-four million dollars educational programs. The programs that the state is investigating in are programs that train Pennsylvanians for well-paying jobs in high-demand fields. Hey I am a college student and the less money that I have to pay for school I am all for it. But this plan will also allow more and more people attend college, and help them to improve their lives

The majority of the reforms that Rendell wants are basically continuations of plans that he established during his current term in office. For Rendell's educational reforms to be continued, he needs money. The money will have to come from state taxes, and even federal aid. When it comes to taxes most people feel they are paying too much. The reason why their local taxes are so high in many cases is to help keep the schools running. Still Pennsylvania's educational system ranks 10th in the nation and the state must be doing something right. For the state to stay in top ten, proper educational programs need to be place, and funds to be put into the proper places.

Sarah Keppen

Holden (D) vs. Wertz (R)

PA District 17 Race

The Pa District 17 race began with Democratic incumbent, Tim Holden, campaigning against the Republican candidate, Matthew Arlington Wertz for a seat in Congress. District 17 was considered a safe Democratic district prior to the 2006 campaign and remains so today because of gerrymandering. It is comprised of Dauphin, Lebanon, Schuylkill, and parts of Berks and Perry Counties. The 17th District includes the city of Harrisburg as well as rural farmlands and coal rich mountains.

Representative Holden sought his eight consecutive term as a member of Congress this election having been the choice of voters since his first term in 1992. He ran unopposed in the primary and is considered a very conservative Democrat. Representative Holden's official website displayed his dedication to agriculture, rural development, and conservation. The website highlighted his memberships in the Committee on Agriculture, the Department Operations Oversight on Dairy Nutrition and Forestry Subcommittee, and the Conservation Credit and Rural Development Research Subcommittee. As of October 5, he raised $804,265 for his campaign. He spent only $349,799 and is currently reported to have $584,312 cash on hand. PACs were responsible for funding most of his campaign providing $515,486. Individuals gave $278,117 for campaign expenses. Holden used no money of his own for his campaign.

Contrary to Holden, Republican Matthew Wertz sought his first term as a member of Congress and faced an uphill battle from the start against his heavily favored opponent. Wertz, a war vet, also ran unopposed in the primary and was quoted saying that he was quite happy about coming home to run for office. Wertz campaigned on three main issues: keeping the middle-class tax cuts permanent, ending our dependency on foreign oil, and supporting the President on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He offered a statement saying, "…and this war on terrorism will be ended on our terms…" Yet, Wertz struggled with financial issues while campaigning. He only raised $12,400 for his campaign. Wertz spent $12,463 and was reported as having $1,231 cash on hand. He received no money from PACs, and only brought in $2,400 from individuals. Wertz used $10,000 of his own money to fund his campaign. This lack of funding may have been due to the fact that District 17 is a safe democratic district with Tim Holden as the favorite choice of voters.

On September 20, Wertz announced his decision to stop actively campaigning for a seat in Congress thus essentially giving the election once again to Tim Holden. Because Wertz did not withdraw before the specified time, his name will remain on the ballot come Election Day. More on Wertz's decision to stop actively campaigning will be presented in the next web log…

Aaron Warchal

Casey vs. Santorum

As the political ads interrupt your favorite television broadcasts,
they send messages either informing you of the
upcoming elections. Between the positive reflection on their own
achievements followed by the many flaws they pull from their
opponents, it becomes very difficult to decipher who is actually
running for which office and for whom you should vote. Currently,
the race for the United States Senate exactly fits that profile. The
public attacks between Rick Santorum and Bob Casey are fairly
recent since November 7th is approaching quickly. These
advertisements seem to be assisting Rick Santorum by lifting his
vote percentage, although Bob Casey still leads by 8%.
To truly appreciate the current standings of the Unites States
Senate race, you need to receive some background to educate
yourself with the history of this race. In March of 2005, the
candidates were just getting thier feet wet and reviewing their
campaign strategies with their managers. Standing at 44% each
with 13% undecided, the candidates had a bit over a year to sway
those votes into their favor.

Moving into the year 2006, the first recorded poll was tallied on
January 15th, where Casey led by 53% to Santorum's 38%. So
what happened to cause Casey to gain 9% of the vote while leaving
Santorum with 6% less of the vote? Although I have yet to find
concrete evidence to support my theory, I believe that the debates
had begun and the voters used for the polls may have changed their
views on the candidates due to their interpretation of the debated
topics, or some of the undecided voters may have changed. Either
way, Bob Casey did something that Rick Santorum obviously missed
out on.

Three months later in March of 2006, the media began to
choose Bob Casey as the face for Senate. News articles read
headlines such as "Santorum is struggling against Casey",
and "Casey adds a 'Santorum Watch' to website", especially since
Casey keeps tight ropes surrounding Santorum's campaign. That is,
until rumors circulated about a third person running for the Senate
seat. Kate Michelman, and abortion rights activist, threatened to run
for office and in doing so, placed quite the pressure on Casey and
Santorum to publicize thier views on abortion. South Dakota, who
bans abortions throught the state, hit the hardest with the issue, but
it still affected Casey's previous 53%, bringing it down to 48%, while
Santorum remained the same.

Looking even farther ahead, summer was approaching. In June
of 2006, Casey was regaining his ground, although he pretty
much had the lead in the first place. His conservative views on gun
control and abortion had seemingly pleased the voters of
Pennsylvania, while Santorum was concentrating on immigration
laws and attacking Casey. At this point in time, Casey was leading
Santorum by fifteen percentage points, a very great lead for a fast
approaching election day.

Currently, it is October of 2006. All of the elections are
gaining speed and adding more fuel to the fire. As a matter of fact,
there was a scheduled public debtate between Bob Casey and Rick
Santorum on September 27th, to which Bob Casey refused to
attend. How did Santorum handle it? He asked to keep Casey's
seat at the table, where he insulted his opponent for not attending
the debate. He sarcastically made remarks to an empty chair
making comments that Casey was "ducking" the questions.
However, according to the campaign spokesperson for Bob Casey,
Casey did not feel that the debate was needed, nor did he wish to
speak at a deabte that favors Santorum through financial assistance
towards television ads. In this respect, Casey made the right
move.

As for a projection as to who will win the race at this moment, I
cannot say. Until the one-sided debate, I would've agreed that Bob
Casey would win the Senate seat. However, if he couldn't defend
his advertising and political aspirations while in office during a debate,
I am not sure how the public will view this sort of tactic. It will be
interesting to see what comes out of the media and into the next
poll for the race of United States Senate

Stephanie Bill

The 6th District, cont.

The race in the sixth district of Pennsylvania is one of the closest races in the United States. The candidates in the race are incumbent Jim Gerlach (R) and Lois Murphy (D) and their goal is to win a seat in the House of Representatives. But, this is not the only time in which these two candidates have gone head to head. In 2004, Gerlach and Murphy were in the same position they are now. Gerlach, however, was doing better in 2004 than he is now. In 2004, Gerlach defeated Murphy by about 7,000 votes. Now, however, numbers show that the race is much closer than in 2004. In late August 2006 numbers indicated that Murphy was ahead of Gerlach 50% to 45%. A September 13-14 poll, however, revealed that these numbers had changed with Gerlach leading Murphy 47 to 36 percent. The most recent poll, released on September 28, shows a slight change in the numbers. This poll indicates that Gerlach is still in the lead, 44 to 41 percent.

These numbers, however, are not 100 percent accurate. A recent article in The Hill, a newspaper dedicated to writing for and about the U.S Congress, expresses that polls are indicative only of current trends but do not necessarily predict an outcome. This means that although Murphy was ahead in August and Gerlach has taken the lead in September, much can happen between now and November 7 which could possibly change the way people think, especially when it comes to the issues.

At this point in the race, neither candidate seems to be concentrating on stressing the importance of issues in their campaign. Murphy is busy trying to tie Gerlach to President Bush in the hopes that Bush's dismal approval rating will rub off on Gerlach. Murphy's campaign strategy focuses mostly on discrediting Gerlach in the eyes of voters, on the Iraq war, and on local issues such as the job market. Her pamphlets are, for the most part, a way of publicly bashing Gerlach. Meanwhile, Gerlach seems to steer clear of any topic which deals with Bush and has publicly acknowledged that when he thinks President Bush is wrong, he tells him so. Gerlach has also concentrated somewhat on the state of the national economy and, more recently, on environmental issues. In fact, Congress passed Gerlach's proposed open spaces bill on September
27. The bill sets aside federal dollars to encourage the protection of open space and farmland.

Public bashing and discrediting may be helpful to Murphy sometimes but when Murphy's hometown newspaper acknowledges that all the public knows about Lois Murphy is that she hates Jim Gerlach, it does not reflect well on Murphy's campaign. Mark Campbell, a Gerlach political director, was recently quoted in The Tribune Review as saying that Murphy's "campaign of accusations" has failed, a fact which may be reflected in the recent polls.

Gerlach can be given a little more credit than Murphy for highlighting the issues. One of his pamphlets highlights all the issues which are important to him and which he believes should be important to voters. Some of these issues include taxes, health care, job creation, education, immigration and farmland preservation. Also on the pamphlet, the words "Jim's Honest, Independent & He Gets Results!" prompt voters to take Jim seriously. The word independent, though, once more alienates him from any connection to President Bush and to the Republican Party.

It is too early to tell who will actually win the election. Both candidates are diligently campaigning, each in their own way, to sway voters to their side. But, if the polls have anything to show it is that this is a very close race. Despite the propaganda and the campaigning each candidate has put out there, it seems that the voters still cannot make up their mind about either candidate. The negative campaigning each candidate has done recently does not seem to have the desired effect. While Murphy works towards destroying Gerlach's reputation, Gerlach is fighting to hold on to it and separate himself from any association with Bush. It will be interesting to see what happens in the month before election time.

Silvia Gutierrez

The Race for Governor

Who will be the next Governor of Pennsylvania? Will Ed Rendell (D) be able to grab a second term or will the former Pittsburgh Steeler Lynn Swann (R) score a touchdown? Before we can make any assumptions on who will win we need to look at who are supporting each candidate, and what areas of the state are supporting which candidate. We also need to examine the careers and political experience of Rendell and Swann. If we examine each candidate's, careers in and outside of politics, and their supporters within the state we can come to a conclusion who will win.

When we begin to examine who supports Ed Rendell, we can see that he has the backing of many Democratic Politicians/candidates such as Bob Casey who is running for the U.S. Senate against Rick Santorum. He also has the support of Lois Murphy, who is running for the House of Representatives against Jim Gerlach. Having their support will help Rendell pick up the Democratic vote, and even some undecided votes. He also has a lot of support from the average Democratic voter and just voters in general. Rendell has been very popular with Democratic voters especially in the cities of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh and their surrounding suburbs. The majority of the voters in these two cites will vote for Rendell, because these two cites tend to vote democratic. So it will be hard be hard for Swann, to win over these two cites and they're surrounding suburbs. Rendell has earned the respect and the appreciation of many of the citizens of Philadelphia. The support of the city and it suburbs is one of the main reasons why he will win a second term in office. Rendell served as a District Attorney in Philadelphia for seven years, and another seven years as Mayor. He has made some good changes in the city of Brotherly Love, and people just love him.

It is not the support from citizens or his popularity; it is his experience in serving the public, which will bring him votes. Again Rendell has a long history of serving the people of Pennsylvania and also has served on many state and federal committees. The fact that he has numerous years of experience will help him pick up many undecideds and even grab some Republican voters. The Quinnipiac poll suggests that 26 percent of Republicans support the governor or one out of four Republicans said that they would vote for Rendell. The Keystone Poll indicates 32 percent Of Republicans would vote for Rendell. He has the support of both Democratic and Republican voters, and he has political experience.

Before we can make any judgements we still need to examine whom Swann is who supports Swann, and also we need to examine if he has any political experience. First off who is Lynn Swann? He is a celebrity, and he earned his famed as pro football player for the Pittsburgh Steelers. In general people know him as the football player, broadcaster, and his charity work with Big Brothers and Big Sister. Swann did not earn his popularity through serving in public office like Rendell. Even though he has not gained his popularity through politics, he is popular and people will vote for him. People will vote for him, based on where he stands on the issues, and because he is the Republican candidate. He does have support by the voters, but it may be enough to win. Swann does have supporters, like President Bush. Bush has endorsed Swann and is major part of Swann's campaign. This could be a good opportunity for Swann to pick up those Republican votes, but he could possibly lose those votes. Many Republicans are upset in way Bush is running the country, and having his backing may not help Swann.


If we examine his political experience, we will come to the conclusion that he does not have any He has never served in public office; he just does not have experience period. Many people will be afraid to vote for him, they will vote for Rendell or not all. Many voters need to feel confident and secure with the people who are serving in public. Having political experience is a major part in showing the voters they can trust you. This is what is going to hurt Swann, and why he will not win.

So who will be the next Governor of Pennsylvania? Ed Rendell (D) or Lynn Swann (R). The person who will win this race, will be the one who has the most political experience, and the trust and confidence of the people. The candidate that has the most experience, is Rendell, and that is why he will win. He has support form both sides, and has grab the majority of voters of both Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and again this is why Rendell will win.

--Sarah Keppen

Governor's Race

Who will be the next Governor of Pennsylvania? Will Ed Rendell (D) be able to grab a second term or will the former Pittsburgh Steeler Lynn Swann (R) score a touchdown? Before we can make any assumptions on who will win we need to look at who are supporting each candidate, and what areas of the state are supporting which candidate. We also need to examine the careers and political experience of Rendell and Swann. If we examine each candidate's, careers in and outside of politics, and their supporters within the state we can come to a conclusion who will win.

When we begin to examine who supports Ed Rendell, we can see that he has the backing of many Democratic Politicians/candidates such as Bob Casey who is running for the U.S. Senate against Rick Santorum. He also has the support of Lois Murphy, who is running for the House of Representatives against Jim Gerlach. Having their support will help Rendell pick up the Democratic vote, and even some undecided votes. He also has a lot of support from the average Democratic voter and just voters in general. Rendell has been very popular with Democratic voters especially in the cities of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh and their surrounding suburbs. The majority of the voters in these two cites will vote for Rendell, because these two cites tend to vote democratic. So it will be hard be hard for Swann, to win over these two cites and they're surrounding suburbs. Rendell has earned the respect and the appreciation of many of the citizens of Philadelphia. The support of the city and it suburbs is one of the main reasons why he will win a second term in office. Rendell served as a District Attorney in Philadelphia for seven years, and another seven years as Mayor. He has made some good changes in the city of Brotherly Love, and people just love him.

It is not the support from citizens or his popularity; it is his experience in serving the public, which will bring him votes. Again Rendell has a long history of serving the people of Pennsylvania and also has served on many state and federal committees. The fact that he has numerous years of experience will help him pick up many undecideds and even grab some Republican voters. The Quinnipiac poll suggests that 26 percent of Republicans support the governor or one out of four Republicans said that they would vote for Rendell. The Keystone Poll indicates 32 percent Of Republicans would vote for Rendell. He has the support of both Democratic and Republican voters, and he has political experience.

Before we can make any judgements we still need to examine whom Swann is who supports Swann, and also we need to examine if he has any political experience. First off who is Lynn Swann? He is a celebrity, and he earned his famed as pro football player for the Pittsburgh Steelers. In general people know him as the football player, broadcaster, and his charity work with Big Brothers and Big Sister. Swann did not earn his popularity through serving in public office like Rendell. Even though he has not gained his popularity through politics, he is popular and people will vote for him. People will vote for him, based on where he stands on the issues, and because he is the Republican candidate. He does have support by the voters, but it may be enough to win. Swann does have supporters, like President Bush. Bush has endorsed Swann and is major part of Swann's campaign. This could be a good opportunity for Swann to pick up those Republican votes, but he could possibly lose those votes. Many Republicans are upset in way Bush is running the country, and having his backing may not help Swann.


If we examine his political experience, we will come to the conclusion that he does not have any He has never served in public office; he just does not have experience period. Many people will be afraid to vote for him, they will vote for Rendell or not all. Many voters need to feel confident and secure with the people who are serving in public. Having political experience is a major part in showing the voters they can trust you. This is what is going to hurt Swann, and why he will not win.

So who will be the next Governor of Pennsylvania? Ed Rendell (D) or Lynn Swann (R). The person who will win this race, will be the one who has the most political experience, and the trust and confidence of the people. The candidate that has the most experience, is Rendell, and that is why he will win. He has support form both sides, and has grab the majority of voters of both Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and again this is why Rendell will win.

--Sarah Keppen