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Minnesota’s Celebrity Farmers
Twin Cities and Northfield area food cooperatives and their farmer-suppliers are featured in a series of videos that are premiering on the National Cooperative Business Association website as part of the United Nations' International Year of Cooperation.
All of the Minnesota-based videos are fun and informative. But the third video, based on the Just Food co-op at Northfield, is especially interesting in that the store features photos of the local farmers who supply and sometimes work at the co-op. This, said video host Kevin Gillespie, an Atlanta-based TV show chef, makes the area farmers "celebrities" in the Northfield area while it further strengthens bonds between producers and consumers.
Other area food co-ops saluted in the NCBA videos include the Seward Co-op Grocery & Deli, The Wedge, Valley Natural Foods Co-op and the Gardens of Eagan.
Posted in Economic Development | Related Topics: Agriculture Co-ops CSA
Unlikely Allies Raise Tough Questions
Any time the American Federation of Teachers, the Education Trust, 50CAN, and the ACLU do something together, it's worth taking notice. John Kline, representing Minnesota's 2nd Congressional District, managed to pull it off with his proposal to replace No Child Left Behind. Granted, he united those groups in opposition to his proposal, but it's still quite the achievement.
Kline's proposal would have eliminated NCLB's requirements that states set performance targets for schools and intervene when schools fail to meet those targets. States would still be required to test students in grades 3-8, but they would no longer have to develop or implement any plans for schools that don't hit testing targets for each subgroup of students.
A collection of 38 different organizations, including the four listed above, wrote a public letter [PDF] to Representative Kline condemning his proposal for walking away from accountability and awareness of the different achievement gaps bringing shame to our school system.
These are tough issues that don't always fall along traditional lines (hence the diverse composition of the letter-writers). While it should be hard to dispute the failure of NCLB, we are still left with the question of what to do next. We want to keep a focus on improving the equity of our educational outcomes, but we don't want to fall into simplistic, test-based “accountability” measures that end up narrowing curricula and hurting our schools' potential to improve.
Part of the problem with trying to address this at the national level is that different states have different attitudes towards education. The letter-writers point to the pre-NCLB era, when very few states engaged directly on the achievement gap, as an example of what we don't want to fall back on. I would argue that NCLB may have raised the profile of the achievement gap, but the states that didn't want to do much to address it could get around the law simply by watering down their tests so that most students passed.
This is the core of the issue. We can't legislate mindsets. A federal education law is not going to change people's attitudes. Instead, we need a broad push by progressives to focus on the achievement gap at the local and state level in a way that's good for students, teachers, and families. Only when most of us are on board with this idea will we actually be able to make it happen.
Posted in Education | Related Topics: K-12 education Education Administration
Childhood Obesity? No Sweat
Recently, we looked at some innovations in Minnesota’s school lunch programs that are fighting childhood obesity, which looms at 23.1%. Better nutrition alone won’t improve the situation, though – healthy kids also require physical activity. Looking closer, it’s obvious that physical education in Minnesota schools could use some work.
Let’s start simple: recess. The US Department of Health and Human Services recommends at least 20 minutes of recess for children in elementary school, but Minnesota does not require recess. Aside from stimulating creativity and letting students burn off some steam, recess is a great opportunity for kids to get moving. Requiring at least one short recess period for all elementary schools is a great first step towards healthy, active students, but we haven’t invested in this simple solution.
Next step: P.E. Physical education is mandated in Minnesota, but there are few requirements for quality in these programs. The state doesn’t have Phy. Ed. standards or any required curriculum, and it doesn’t require fitness testing. So schools teach physical education, but there’s no guarantee that students are benefiting. Without dedicated teachers and strong curricula, P.E. programs won’t encourage physical activity.
We need to acknowledge that physical activity is valuable and necessary to children’s health. Let’s make a firm, statewide commitment to providing opportunities for physical activity for all of our students.
Specifically, we should start by investing in Minnesota’s Safe Routes to Schools project, which is helping kids bike or walk to school by improving pedestrian infrastructure and providing education and promotional activities. That way, it’s safe and easy for kids to get a head start on daily physical activity.
Minnesota schools should also get more involved in the First Lady’s Let’s Move! project, which encourages simple measures to encourage physical activity. Beyond recess periods and high-quality physical education programs, the project recommends active classrooms to get kids on their feet. This means engaging students in activities that require them to move, even outside of PE. Before- and after-school programs are another great opportunity for physical activity. Let’s Move! also urges changes in infrastructure and school policy to allow increased access to physical activity for all students.
Our students deserve better. Healthy food and strong physical education curricula are the first steps towards curbing the childhood obesity epidemic, and schools are the best place to encourage lifelong healthy habits. We need to invest now in a healthier future for Minnesota’s children.
Posted in Health Care | Related Topics: K-12 education Classroom Methods Youth Programs Children's Health
We Should Have a Dream
Last week was Martin Luther King’s birthday. That got me thinking critically about his “I Have a Dream Speech,” in which Dr King said:
“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.
“I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.”
In the first paragraph we hear Rev. King speak of the country honoring the Declaration of Independence claim that all men are created equal. In the second paragraph, he talks of all our people sitting in brotherhood. As a minister I would expect Rev. King to long for a dream of brotherhood, and certainly I would like to see us all promote and strive for brotherhood and sisterhood.
While we have advanced in race relations since that speech, America is still far from truly recognizing King’s dream. In addition to it being the right thing, now there is a pragmatic economic reason to achieve equality.
To make the 21st century another American Century; we need to use all our resources. When many people think of resources, they think of iron, coal, gold, oil and other riches found in the earth. When I think of resources I think also of our people. The United States has become a great nation because of its mineral wealth and its rich farmland, but most of all because of its people.
For much of the 20th century, the world seemed bigger because of older transportation, communication, and production technologies. That made it easier for the U.S. to be among the most competitive nations without getting the most from our people resources.
Today, our world has shrunk because of the advances in those technologies. We face steep competition from all countries worldwide—developed and undeveloped.
While we’ve had an excellent education system in the U.S., those who’ve benefited most from it were typically able bodied, white, male, and not poor. This left several groups behind, creating an education achievement gap. Think of all the great minds that were wasted over the years because of that education gap.
Today things are better, but because generations were excluded from the system, an education gap for the poor, the non-white, and those with disabilities remains. As a nation that needs input from every citizen, we can no longer afford to let those minds miss out on a good education. That waste will make us less competitive, and in today’s environment we cannot afford to be less competitive.
To honor Dr. King we need to work to reduce the education gap, but we also need to work to reduce that gap for our children, our grandchildren, our nation’s future and ourselves.
Posted in News & Notes | Related Topics: Minority Issues Achievement Gap
No Dogs Allowed… Until After the Public Meeting
Someone tried to take public policy into their own hands here in Duluth, trying a line-item veto on the rules protecting the lovely pine forest of Minnesota Point. It’s not going to work.
Minnesota Point is one of Duluth’s more unusual natural areas. It’s a seven-mile-long natural sand bar that crosses the mouth of the St. Louis River and forms the harbor of Duluth and Superior. At the end of the Point is about two miles of undeveloped dunes, beaches and a dramatic tall pine forest.
In 2011, much to the surprise of the dog walkers and bike riders who frequent the end of the Point, signs went up in the pine forest marking off the boundaries and rules of the Minnesota Point Pine Forest Scientific and Natural Area (SNA). It was especially surprising to read the rules that said, among other things, dog walking and bike riding were no longer allowed.
SNA designation is one of the highest levels of protection the State of Minnesota can apply to land. It’s plants first, people second.
So what about those dog walkers? Was this a replay of the creation of the BWCA? Was Big Government coming in and taking away traditional uses of this fabulous natural area, all in the name of the public good?
Within a few weeks of the signs going up, someone took matters into their own hand. On the sign that listed all the prohibited activities, someone had taken a jackknife and carefully scratched out both “dog walking” and “picnicking.” That’s a little like plugging your ears and singing “La la la la la, I can’t HEAR you” when your parents told you to clean your room. Making the text illegible doesn’t change the rule; public process does.
As it turns out, the administrators of the SNA program within the Minnesota DNR are not dog haters. They fully intend that on-leash dog walking will be allowed, and they even admit that the rule was a mistake. They will go through a public process to change the general SNA rules for this specific property. They’ve done the same thing to allow everything from berry picking to shorefishing in other SNAs. There will be a public meeting. And a comment period.
Better to attend a public hearing than to try your own jackknife line-item veto.
Posted in News & Notes | Related Topics: Environment State Parks Government Policy
It’s About Equity
There's a trend building in several states that should be worrisome to Minnesotans. From Texas to Washington, people are suing their states over insufficient support for public schools. These states have provisions in their constitutions requiring the creation and maintenance of a robust public system of education. Of course, Minnesota has a similar provision.
Article 13, Section 1 of the Minnesota constitution says, “The stability of a republican form of government depending mainly upon the intelligence of the people, it is the duty of the legislature to establish a general and uniform system of public schools. The legislature shall make such provisions by taxation or otherwise as will secure a thorough and efficient system of public schools throughout the state.”
This is about “the people,” meaning all of the people. Our stability doesn't depend on the intelligence of the exceptional few, but rather on the outcomes of a “general and uniform system of public schools.” Our task is to educate all of our people. While we haven't done that yet, we must keep working toward it.
People have sued the state over this before, and they will do it again. I'm not particularly interested in the specifics of the legal battles. Instead, I'm interested in whether or not we're still committed to “a thorough and efficient system of public schools.”
How can our system be thorough if we've allowed its funding (after adjusting for inflation) to decline by 13% in less than a decade? How can our system be efficient in addressing the many needs of our students if we constrain more and more teachers with low-quality tests of a handful of skills? How can we raise the intelligence of our people when our state legislators are telling citizens in other communities to cut support to their local schools?
Too many of our policymakers seem content to watch our public schools wither. Some of them think a marketplace approach would do the job better. If free markets haven't created equity in food, housing, or health care, however, what makes us think they can do so in education? Our constitutional mandate is to support strong public schools. It's what's equitable, what's stable, and what's right.
Posted in Education | Related Topics: Courts & Justice Education Funding
Making Progress, One Video at a Time
It's great to see our allies at the Center for American Progress producing more multimedia content that puts real faces on the policy issues. One particular web video that caught my eye is part of a new series called "Faces of Green Jobs," which highlights careers and characters of American workers striving for sustainability. In this video portait below, we travel to an Iowa wind farm to talk with a wind turbine technician.
At the video's 1:48 mark, you'll catch a spectacular view from the top a turbine looking out over the Iowa tundra, who Minnesota currently trails in the wind race.
Posted in Economic Development | Related Topics: Energy Wind Energy
That’s the Wrong Knee
Imagine that you go to the hospital for a knee implant. You enter surgery and wake up to find that your procedure went smoothly. You feel great—only the surgeon operated on the wrong knee!
This is an example of a “never event”—an adverse yet preventable incident that occurs in the hospital. This includes falls, pressure ulcers, and errors with prescription drugs, among others. The frequency of these events indicates the safety and quality of hospital care.
In 2003, Minnesota became the first state to require adverse events to be reported to the Department of Health. The 8th Annual Report on Adverse Health Events in Minnesota (PDF), released this month, has some good news and some bad news about the state of patient safety in Minnesota’s hospitals.
The bad news: The total number of adverse health events went up from 305 to 316 between 2010 and 2011. This trend can be traced back largely to a 19% increase in the number of pressure ulcers and a 63% increase in the number of wrong procedures (from 16 to 26).
While the increase in pressure ulcers may be at least partially attributable to a growing emphasis on recognizing and treating these events, the increase in wrong procedures is worrying. Wrong procedures are mistakes in the type of treatment—for example, the wrong kind of knee implant. They’re usually not serious and are corrected immediately, but these mistakes should never be made in the first place.
The good news: Though the total number of never events went up in 2011, the number of events that lead to serious injury or death decreased from 107 to 89—the lowest since 2007. In particular, there were fewer serious falls. That’s a commendable reduction in harm. A decline in wrong site surgeries (in which, for example, a surgeon operates on the wrong limb) helped improve patient outcomes. An initiative to count sponges and other objects during labor and delivery resulted in no retained foreign objects left in patients.
Minnesota hospitals are doing a good job with patient safety. But to bring down the numbers of never events, they need support for stricter safety initiatives. Procedures and checklists that encourage double-checking and errorless care are imperative for the reduction of adverse events. According to the MDH report, “this means that organizational cultures need to be transformed so that safety, efficiency, and quality are continually at the forefront. Small technical changes or one-off actions will not be sufficient; complex, ongoing, sometimes uncomfortable adaptive change is needed.”
Posted in Health Care | Related Topics: Health Care Professionals Medical Care
Minnesota’s National Headlines
It looks like Minnesota’s presidential caucus might actually matter in 2012.
While most times, I’d welcome the well-lit national news live shots showcasing downtown Minneapolis or the State Capitol, this year I worry what the national media will say about the Land of Lakes.
After all, they’ll be hitting Minnesota just as our legislative session heats up. While coverage will focus on the presidential contenders, national reporters like to provide the rest of the country with the local political flavor. This time they'll focus on conservative issues with Romney, Gingrich and Paul in the race.
Back when Minnesota’s conservatives worked on policy that mattered, you could count on serious discussions of health care, education, transportation and broad economic development.
Now, I fear conservative caucus goers will highlight the social distractions, constitutional amendments and the false rhetoric that Minnesota’s taxes are driving away businesses. No doubt this will be mixed in with a heavy dose of Bachmann and Pawlenty bashing the state they helped govern.
If Right to Work, anti-education or middle-class busing legislation is moving thorough the Capitol come caucus time, you’re likely to see stories comparing Minnesota to Walker’s Wisconsin and file video of Minnesota’s summer shutdown.
This is in stark contrast to when progressive values took center stage during 2008’s tightly contested primary between then-candidates Obama and Clinton. That race complimented Minnesota’s progressive policy vision, focusing on affordable health care, a green energy economy, and expanding access to higher education, among other public policy issues.
Debate about such ideas and policies has always worked to benefit all Minnesotans. When conservative presidential contenders come to town, however, you’ll hear the two big talking points about limiting government and cutting taxes for the rich.
As the last decade has taught Minnesota, that’s not a policy for prosperity. It’s conservative cronyism.
The national reporters who really do their homework for the caucus will highlight a historically progressive state that leveraged natural resources, invested in hardworking people, and established a fair regulatory framework to produce a prosperous Minnesota.
Posted in News & Notes | Related Topics: 2012 Election Conservative Policy Minnesota Elections
What’s for Lunch?
Pizza, sloppy joes, and a tiny serving of overcooked green beans. Yum?
This is standard school lunch fare—not high quality, not particularly nutritious, but appealing enough for all the picky eaters. For a long time, school lunch programs have taken the easy way out by providing junk foods that kids will like. This is no longer acceptable, because 23.1% of Minnesota children are overweight or obese. It’s a problem that we can’t ignore any more—and thankfully, not everyone is. Let’s highlight a few of the programs that are tackling nutrition in Minnesota schools:
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Great Trays Partnership: Run by the Minnesota Department of Health, this program provides the information, tools, and resources that schools need to be able to meet the USDA’s recommendations for nutritious school lunches. The Partnership holds workshops for districts looking to improve their lunch programs, and so far, representatives from 75% of the eligible districts have attended. 109 school districts have come together to create the Minnesota School Food Buying Group, a cooperative that buys affordable, nutritious foods for school lunches.
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Farm2School: Farm to school programs partner schools with local farmers to provide students with healthy, locally grown fruits and veggies. What started in 10 districts in 2006 has grown to include 811 schools in 123 districts as of 2010. Everybody wins – kids get healthy food and a chance to learn about local food production, and farmers get market opportunities by selling crops to school districts. The program reported positive or very positive feedback from 66% of students involved. Minnesota is home to one of the top ten farm to school programs - the F2S program at Native Harvest on White Earth.
- Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools: Part of Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! project, Salad Bars to Schools is an initiative to put a free salad bar in any school that wants one. Salad bars have been shown not only to make fresh fruits and veggies available to students, but also to reduce waste. That’s because when students serve themselves, they are more likely to take just as much as they’ll eat.
It’s great that programs like these are serving Minnesota’s students, but there’s so much more to be done. Kids at plenty of schools are purchasing sugary sodas and French fries every day. It’s our job to make sure students are getting the nutrients they need as well as learning healthy habits for the future. Expanding programs like the ones above and eliminating high fat, high sugar options from school food programs should be Minnesota’s priority.
Posted in Health Care | Related Topics: Nutrition Children's Health Education Administration
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