News – Politics – Opinion – Podcasts
There is a political spat brewing under the Golden Dome regarding a $700,000 appropriation – or lack thereof – for a childhood literacy program called Read Vermont. In a nutshell, the program funds “literary coaches” who train teachers how to use phonics, phonological awareness, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension to teach kids how to read. This … Read more
For the past two years, Vermont politicians have been telling Vermont property taxpayers that they heard us after 2024 and are working to reform our education system to provide property tax relief. It’s not happening. The debate today as we close out the 2026 legislative session is whether to pay for 4%-plus increase in spending … Read more
I’m not sure what the East-Kingston and Kenisington School Boards want to keep hidden so badly, but they are spending a lot of tax dollars on legal fees to keep it that way. Taxpayers proposed a warrant article to create a non-taxpayer-funded committee to explore ways to save taxpayers’ money. The school budget is out … Read more
Garry Rayno just dropped over 1300+ words to explain just how little he actually knows or understands the problem of education funding in New Hampshire. I know. Veteran journalist. Longtime reporter covering NH State politics and the legislature. I’m sure he’s a great guy and knows a lot of stuff, but decades of experience are … Read more
Stop Giving It More Money! As Vermonters gear up for Town Meeting Day and prepare to vote on the local school budgets that will determine our statewide property tax bill, please consider that the post-Act 60 public school system we have created is destroying our state. It has become a money-sucking vortex of incompetence eating … Read more
Parents, your leaders have paid a high price for failure. The United States spends over $900 billion annually on K-12 education. Funds controlled by the Education Mafia (the “EM”), the creators and the administrators of the psychological poison that indoctrinates our children with the curricula created by UNESCO and the Department of Education, chosen textbooks, … Read more
I believe it was Seymour Papert who said that often the best way to think about something is to think about something else instead. Given how quickly and completely people’s brains tend to shut down when thinking about education, https://granitegrok.com/new-england/nh/2025/06/feeling-instead-of-thinking-about-education he may be especially right for that particular subject. Let’s look at a couple of … Read more
Remarks delivered at the 12/16/25 meeting of the Wilton-Lyndeborough School Board I’ve attended many school board and budget committee meetings over the past six years in person and online, and I have read all the minutes from both boards since August. I was surprised when an administrator at a recent meeting mentioned some recent standardized … Read more
New Hampshire’s public schools have problems. No matter how much money we pour into them, the results get worse. Money, therefore, mathematically, economically, academically, and scientifically, is not the answer. Money, practically speaking, leads to worse outcomes. This fact aligns two problems in a common solution. Schools are the reason why property taxes are so … Read more
Someone mentioned to me recently that Rep. Hope Damon has introduced a bill to change the way school superintendents are credentialed. It’s classic Damon: Some parts of the bill refer to other sections of the bill that don’t exist. And the bill makes no reference to the Ed Rules that already exist. The bill reads like … Read more
4th Highest Per-Pupil Spending Growth As New Hampshire’s K-12 public schools experienced the largest enrollment decline of any state this century, they enjoyed the fourth-highest increase in per-pupil spending, according to a new analysis from the Reason Foundation’s K-12 Education Spending Spotlight. Per-pupil public education spending in New Hampshire grew by 60.5% from 2002-2023, the fourth-highest … Read more
The abysmal state of Public education cannot be overstated—an increasing investment in declining results. Sorry. I’m presuming things, like the purpose of the buildings and the system, is to teach kids to learn. As observed here, So we’ve been told for years, that we have to fund schools. And what about the teachers? And what … Read more
A Citizen’s Call to Reclaim the Bill of Rights and Local Control of Schools For thirty-two years, New Hampshire has lived under a judicial decree that most citizens have never heard of, yet it reaches into every wallet and every classroom in the state. In 1993 and 1997, in a pair of rulings known as … Read more
This is not breaking news but deserves repeating. Mill Moore, writing for Campaign for Vermont exposed this startling new reality earlier this month in a terrific article highlighting Vermont’s decade-long public school performance nosedive, which has coincided with an upward trend in math and literacy scores in Mississippi. Yeah, that Mississippi. The (formerly) “Thank God … Read more
How power quietly shifts when no one’s watching A mafia and a school board seem like total opposites. One rules through fear and secrecy; the other is supposed to represent voters in the open. But look more closely at how decisions are made, and a strange similarity emerges. In both cases, a small, organized group … Read more
The Committee on the Future of Public Education is circulating an online survey to gauge public awareness and opinions regarding Act 73, the public education reform law that intends to restructure and consolidate Vermont’s school districts. While the introduction to the survey references that “The law was enacted in response to residents’ concerns about high … Read more
Remember Ruth Ward, who helped repeal the only RSA that actually required schools to bring students to proficiency in reading and math? She’s at it again. She has proudly announced a new bill that would allow the Claremont school district to collect its adequacy funds before attendance is confirmed, at the beginning of the year. … Read more
Many districts in New Hampshire have not elevated math education in our public schools.
Several parents in Pelham have reached out to me about a newly elected school board member who ran on a platform of improving public schools. Pelham students have been struggling academically for years, and teacher retention continues to be an ongoing issue. I know this personally—former teachers have contacted me directly to describe the poor … Read more
The financial website Wallet Hub just came out with state rankings for public education, and Vermont came in overall 19th out of the fifty states. Pretty “meh” on the surface. But the overall score was based on components of outcomes and safety, and purely on the outcomes side, Vermont ranks 25th. That’s more like a … Read more