6664 Week 2 Blog: Keeping up With Global Competition

I agree with Thomas E. Friedman’s statements about what America needs to do to be number ONE (Freidman, 2010). Infrastructure being one of the three suggestions on what our country needs to focus on. “A governance infrastructure is the collection of technologies and systems, people, policies, practices, and relationships that interact to support governing activities” (Johnston, 2010). At this point, America needs to realize that reducing the education budgets cannot end in a positive increase of students’ gains. Every year less and less money is given to education, when the rest of the world is creating more innovative ways to increase technological advancements. I believe taxes should not be cut, and those funds need to be contributed to students. Another way to promote STEM in schools would be raise sales taxes by two percent and those funds would go to education. The reason for this suggestion is because in our county there are many renters that move to our county for the education, but they do not contribute by paying property taxes, therefore, there are more and more students, but not funds from the county (not taking into consideration the funds given for each child from the state). In addition, our county does not have public transportation and having it would allow more people to have jobs.

Lastly, Thomas E. Freidman states that our country needs to focus on governance to make laws, protect social security, change investment laws, and energize our society (The New York Times Company, 2006). Banks, appraisers, credit card companies, and realtors brought this country down by inflating values of properties (at least in Florida). Laws need to put into place to ensure a crash like this one will never happen again (Davis, 2009). In addition, they should support American rejuvenation. Furthermore, from personal experience no other country allows for money advancements like America. Maybe the proper security is not in place. Car loans, home loans, college loans (which I am very thankful for), credit cards, personal loans, and equity lines of credit to purchase other luxuries need to be better controlled. Such opportunities are very expensive in other countries, so pricy that a family most families use public transportation until they save enough money for a car because getting a loan would mean 15% interest and gas at $7.00 per gallon.

Giving aid to China and India in the amount of ten billion dollars to cut down their emissions is another extreme (Alingod, 2009). We owe money to countries like China and Japan, but yet we are giving away money and they are getting more advanced in technology. There are over 650,000 homeless in the United States, where is their aid (National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2010)? Not to mention all the children without a family.



Science education requires funding, I agree, but there are ways to provide quality education without heavy sums of money. Allowing students to solve local problems would encourage leadership skills as well as confidence in making a difference in their own community. In conclusion, in my opinion we need to focus on our future, our students, first. According to C. Bonk, we need to complete, innovate, connect, and collaborate (Bonk, 2010). In addition, setting a purpose to create a “sputnik” like world event would bring out country together for a common goal.



References:
Alingod, K. (2009, November 30). All Headline News: Obama, Australian PM To Meet About Copenhagen; India Pledges No Emissions Cuts. Retrieved on March 10, 2011 from http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7017131240?Obama,%20Australian%20PM%20To%20Meet%20About%20Copenhagen;%20India%20Pledges%20No%20Emissions%20Cuts

Bonk, C.J. (2010, Januray 21). The world is open: Now, we all learn with web technology [Video file]. Retrieved from http://educase.mediasite.com/mediasite/SilverlightPlayer/Default.aspx?peid=b718b052224357b32a96d07d591720

Davis, K. (2009). Where has all the money gone? Economic Papers. 28(3), 217-225.

Johnston, E. (2010). Governance Infrastructure in 2020. Public Administration Review (PAR). 70(1), 122-128.

Friedman, T. L. (2010, January 17). What’s our sputnik? [Op-Ed]. The New York Times [Late Edition (East Coast)], p. WK.8.

National Alliance to End Homelessness (2010). Annual Report. Retried on March 9, 2011 from http://www.endhomelessness.org/section/about_homelessness/faqs#people

The New York Times Company. (2006, April 24). Intro: What is the flat world? [Video file]. Retrieved from http://video.nytimes.com/video/2006/04/24/opinion/1194817106242/intro-what-is-the-flat-world-.html