Footing The Bill For Gifted Kids

Oct. 7, 2002

[...] Of course, sending a kid to college costs money, even if the kid is only 11 years old. But since the state requires children to attend school, parents of gifted children say the state should pick up the college bill.

Levi and his mother took their case to California State legislators. Many lawmakers were convinced that kids who outgrow grade school deserve help.  [...]

I can easily sympathize with the plight of families who have young, highly-intelligent children.  These children do not fit into the normal school system socially or intellectually, and have genuine special educational needs.  And there's no denying that college tuition is expensive - and for many of these extra-gifted children, college is the only place they can find the challenges their minds need.

I'm not sure, however, that it's appropriate for the state to pick up all of the tuition costs that are involved in sending them, especially since the cost of a college education varies greatly on which college you decide to attend. I have no problem with the idea of the state contributing to the cost of educating these children, and agree that there probably is some liability given that children of those ages are required to attend school, and since the state would be footing the cost of the child's education in the public school system.

There are, however, a couple options that I think might be good compromises - providing parents assistance with the costs associated with a student in college (especially since, in most cases, parents have 18 or so years to save up for college tuition, while parents who have a child prodigy don't have nearly as long - through no fault of their own, unless you could the way their genes combined), without putting the state on the hook for full tuition for some of the more prestigious, more expensive and privately run schools.  One option would be to grant parents an allowance equal to the amount the school would pay for a student's public school education that can be used at any college they choose.  Another option might be to allow gifted students to attend state colleges at no cost, and give an allotment equal to 4-years in-state tuition for parents who want to send their students to private universities.

One thing to keep in mind is that in most cases, the student is leaving the public school system entirely, and, frequently, for more than four years.  That could lead to another option - the state could calculate how much they would spend on the child for however much time there is between their current age and when they would be legally able to leave school if they chose.  For example, in a state where a school is required to go to school until they are 16, if a child enters college at age 11, there would be 5 years during which the state would be paying for the child's public school education.  Assuming that it costs $4,000 a year for a public school education (and that's a figure I just pulled out of the air, in all honesty, I have no idea what that figure would be), there would be $20,000 for those 5 years.  That money could then be alloted over the 4 years of college the student would be attending, and the parents could us it as they see fit.  Since the money would be parsed out over the 4 years of college, if the amount the state pays for public school students changes, then the allotment could be modified accordingly.

I'm sure there would be other options that could also help the parents, without costing the state significantly more than they'd be paying for any other child, and still allow the student the opportunity to choose an appropriate school for their education.

Wichita to revisit brutal slayings as testimony begins

By Valerie Richardson
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

[...] The case also has added its chapter to the culture wars by fueling a backlash against hate-crimes laws and feeding resentment against the national media for avoiding coverage of the case because, many in Wichita say, of political correctness.

The Carr brothers are black, and each of the five victims was white. At the time of their arrest, Sedgwick County District Attorney Nola Foulston refused to charge them with hate crimes, explaining that the main motive was robbery, and that Kansas did not have a hate-crimes law.

This case illustrates one of the problems I have with hate crimes legislation - the fact that its application sometimes appears to be somewhat arbitrary.  It's fairly easy to claim that a white-on-minority or straight-on-gay crime is a hate crime, but it seems to be tricker to claim that minority-on-white or gay-on-straight, since it is often consider inappropriate to suggest that minorities might feel hatred towards the majority they view as their oppressors - or, at the very least, to imply that they are not justified in doing so if they do.

The bigger problem I have, though, is that the primary concept of a hate-crime is that a person should be punished because of what they thought or felt about whatever group they felt their victim represented. 

Hate crimes are not inherently more vicious or brutal than other crimes (though this particular case is an exceptionally brutal crime), nor are they even necessarily distinguishable from other crimes.  In some cases, the perpetrator may leave some kind of sign that the crime was committed out of hatred for some group or minority, or may make comments that give away their state of mind, but whatever the case, it is what's in their mind that the hate crimes laws addresses.

It's not uncommon to hear civil libritarians to caution that someday we may be prosecuted for what are called "thought crimes", yet these are often the same people who demand prosecution for hateful thoughts under hate crimes legislations.  Granted, you cannot yet be prosecuted for simply thinking hateful things, but you can have your sentence increased based on your thoughts, and I'm not so sure that's a road we want to start walking down.

One other issue I have is this:

Her decision touched off an outcry in Wichita and on the Internet among hate-crimes law opponents, conservatives and others. The online publication FrontPage, founded by author David Horowitz, said the Wichita case illustrated a national double standard. 

"The indifference of government, media and civil-rights leaders to crimes such as those alleged to have been committed by the Carr brothers send a clear message across America that some lives matter and some lives don't," the magazine said shortly after the murders.   [...]

In a sense, this is the message hate crimes legislation itself sends.  By saying that someone should be more harshly punished because they killed a minority out of hatred sends a message that the life of that minority is more important than the life of a non-minority person, even if that person had been killed in the same manner.  I think its fair to say that every crime against a person has more than a bit of hate to it to begin with - is it really necessary to create special punishments based on what kind of hate that is?

A couple months ago, a friend of mine, Lisa Keele, moved to Egypt as her husband was beginning a new job there.  Since she's been there, she's had an opportunity to see how the United States - and our government - look to people in a Middle Eastern country.  Recently, inspired by the Armed Forces Day celebrations, she wrote about her observations of how America is viewed in Egypt.  I found it very interesting and asked if I could republish her comments here:

Yesterday, the 6th of October, was a holiday here, Armed Forces Day. Which means, practically speaking, there was a three day weekend, which most folks took advantage of by getting the heck out of dodge, or at least out of Cairo (this despite the fact that the weather absolutely lovely).

Politically speaking, however, it meant the celebration of the anniversary of kicking Israel's butt. (Except the 1973 victory wasn't *that* decisive. However, Egypt did win back the Sinai peninsula, which it had lost in the 1968 war with Israel).

Which, of course, leads me to all manner of political thoughts. Don't know if you've noticed, but I've more or less been staying away from political topics in my LJ, even though they've been primary in my thoughts most days. Though god knows, I do my best to try to avoid politics when and where possible.

So, politics.

First, the obvious, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

It is horrific. As I always thought reading about it from the other side of the ocean. And of course, many of the papers are slanted towards Palestine, folks here have great sympathies for the suffering of the Palestinians under Sharon's brutal rule.

Yes, brutal. I have mixed feelings for the history of the area, it's so damned complicated. But it is hard to have mixed feelings about the last two years, about how the west bank & gaza strip have been treated since 2000. It's horrific.

And the worst part is, the country I come from, the United States, appears to all to be supporting this terrifying regime. Sharon uses the US war on terror as an excuse to continue his brutal tactics (despite the fact that he began *his* war on palestinians a full year before 9/11...), US still supplies funds to Israel, the US hasn't come out openly condemning Sharon, despite the many UN resolutions Israel is currently in violation of...

And I want to know why. Why we don't declare our condemnation of these practices, why we don't stop funding Israel until they stop the occupation. There are probably many reasons, many answers to my questions, that make sense, but we should be hearing more about them. US silence on the issue of Palestine, given our previous support of Israel, looks like we're fully behind these practices, whether we are or not. And it seems pretty clear that Arab disgust with this appearance of approval was at least one factor behind 9/11. Do we really support Israeli tactics?? If not, we should say so. If we do, we should explain ourselves to the world.

OK, there's one. Second. Iraq.

My first reaction to hearing the full story behind our current tensions with Iraq was "Why didn't we do something about the weapons inspectors earlier?" And, I fully see the need to check Iraqi weapons especially now of all times. But I have to say, Iraqi is playing the political game here beautifully, and Bush is playing it badly. He comes off to the world as a war-monger, as someone who doesn't care about the UN, about consensus, about weapons inspectors, about anything but war, pushing war, encouraging war, a blind determination to depose Hussein no matter what the cost. Yes, I know from reading US papers that it's more complicated than that -- but he's fumbling the political ball on this one, and it looks bad.

And, personally, I hope I hope I hope we don't go to war with Iraq right now. As a pacifist, I do not support war in general, but the tensions between America and the mid-east are bad enough right now. At the very least, we need to get more world support before we go stomping around the world with our very heavy boots. And for goodness sakes, we need to try to make friends with the Arab world, instead of pissing them off at every turn!

OK, that's enough politics for today. You may all return to your regularly scheduled programs. See you on the next political holiday.

Law Bars a National System for Tracing Bullets and Shells

By FOX BUTTERFIELD

The technology exists to create a national ballistic fingerprint system that would enable law enforcement officials to trace bullets recovered from shootings, like those fired by the Washington-area sniper, to a suspect.

Such a system would have been of great use in the Washington case, in which six people were shot to death, because so far bullet fragments are virtually the only evidence.   [...]

Gun control advocates and some law enforcement authorities like Mr. Vince have long advocated taking the next step, requiring gun manufacturers to keep an electronic record of the markings from bullets and shell casings when new guns are test fired. This data would be kept with the serial numbers of the guns.

With this information, the agency would be able to trace bullets and shell casings found at a shooting site to the gun maker and eventually to the buyer, said Mr. Vince and another former high ranking firearms bureau official.

But the National Rifle Association has opposed this, calling it tantamount to a national gun registry. The group succeeded in getting a provision in the 1968 federal Gun Control Act outlawing any national gun registry.    [...]

I understan that the Second Amendment gives people the right to have guns, but I have a much harder time understanding where, exactly, is says that people have the right to have guns and that the government can't know that they do.  Even if you accept the belief that the "well-regulated militia"  - which provides the basis and justification for the right to bear arms - refers simply to the individuals who possess guns, and does not require that there actualy be any kind of structure or organization to the militia, I would think that part of being 'well-regulated" could reasonably include the concept of the government knowing who has guns, and therefore is a member of this militia.

The NRA, however, doesn't like the idea of the government knowing who has guns and who doesn't, and have managed to get laws established that prevent a national gun registry from being constructed. Sadly, the only people this really benefits are criminals, since it makes it harder for the police to connect the criminal to the a gun used in a crime - often a vital bit of information in getting a conviction. Personally, I think the idea of a ballistics registry is a great idea - test firing bullets from each gun and keeping a record of which ballistics markings go to which gun would be an excellent tool for law enforcement officers and agencies to have available to them, an would be of great use in helping solve a crime.

One of the more interesting ironies I've seen in the intense interest in "security" since 9/11 has been that virtually all of the focus has been on securing us from terrorism, with litte to no attention paid to the normal, everyday crime we've suffered with for years.  The FBI wants to be able to infiltrate mosques and other religious organizations so that they can keep their ears open for any possible plots, librarians are being told that the government may need them to give information on who checks out which books, Ashcroft wants to get utility workers and postal workers to spy on peope who's homes they provide service to, there's been talk of a national ID card, registering anyone who wants to fly on an airplane and so on... more and more restrictions on our rights and freedoms, more invasions of our privacy, all in the name of preventing terrorism.

And yes, the 9/11 attacks were horrific, and yes, we do need to take reasonable steps to prevent such attacks from happening again.  But when you get right down to it, more Americans are killed every year with handguns, rifles and other firearms than are killed by terrorism - even taking the approximately 3,000 dead from the WTC/Pentagon attacks. Where is the urgency to protect us from the common criminals that strike every hour of every day across the USA?  In light of the steps being taken to prevent another WTC/Pentagon-type attack, it doesn't seem unreasonable at all to require that all guns be test fired before leaving the store, and the ballistic evidence provided by those test firings kept on record with the serial number of the gun, so that if the gun is ever used in a crime, it can more readily be traced to its owner.

[Edited 12:06pm - please be sure to take a look at the comments for this entry - The Raven brings up an excellent point regarding illegal weapons, which I've attempted to answer, giving more details of how something of this nature might be able to work.  Thanks - kj]