Polling places are open for early voting for the May 8 joint election. Richardson voters can vote in the Civic Center. There are two elections on the ballot. First is the $66 million city bond proposal to fund streets, parks, municipal buildings and neighborhood revitalization projects. Second are three places on the Richardson ISD board of trustees.
After the jump, a quick look at the election campaigns.
For years, the non-profit organization Children At Risk has sought to "improve the quality of life for children across Texas through strategic research, public policy analysis, education, collaboration and advocacy." As part of their mission, they've collected data on almost all public schools in Texas. Now, The Texas Tribune makes that data available and easily accessible.
"Using the Children At Risk data, The Texas Tribune has built a searchable database to help parents judge schools and help educators and policy makers examine the relative performance of groups of schools and districts. And we've constructed a detailed page for each school, separately laying out the data used to compute the rankings of more than 5,800 campuses."
After the jump, what the data tells us about Richardson ISD schools.
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| From 2010 04 HS Baseball |
In a big District 9-5A game, the Berkner Rams easily handed the Richardson Eagles only their second loss in district play this year. The Rams won 12-1 in six innings by the ten-run rule. Starting pitcher Stephen Spurlin scattered five hits for the complete game win while Berkner batters pounded out eleven hits. Richardson didn't help their cause any by committing four errors. The play of the game was a 5-6-3 double play by the Rams in the third inning that broke up a Richardson threat while the game was still close. With one game left in the season, Berkner, now 10-3, trails district-leading Richardson, 11-2, by only one game.
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Sean Carroll, a physicist at Caltech, has been on a media tour promoting his latest book, "From Eternity to Here." You might have seen him on "The Colbert Report". Or maybe read the New York Times interview.
After the jump, why it's exciting to see a scientist get some media attention.
The Council of PTAs and League of Women Voters sponsored a forum for Richardson ISD school board candidates Tuesday evening in the RISD administration building auditorium. Six candidates for three seats participated. I don't intend to endorse or oppose any candidate, but I do want to make some random comments about what was said at the forum. I won't be mentioning names. If you want anything more specific, check out the recorded video of the forum when it's posted at the RISD website.
After the jump, my impression of the forum.
With the grand opening of ALDI in Richardson scheduled for April 22, we finally got a piece of the pie. Literally.
"Smarter shoppers go to smarter stores. Smarter shoppers know better than to pay extra at stores where baggers bag groceries and employees chase carts in the parking lot, or the cost of national brand marketing raises prices. So smarter shoppers shop where select-assortment inventory increases buying power and lowers prices, saving them up to 50% over supermarket prices. Smarter shoppers just 'get it.' And they get it at ALDI."
After the jump, how ALDI is just the latest in a series of redevelopments for an aging neighborhood in east Richardson.
Did you just finish wrestling with your income tax forms April 15? Don't take too much time to catch your breath. Richardson has a bond election coming up May 8. Various claims about the impact on your property taxes are making the rounds in the blogosphere. Let's try to wrestle some of them to the ground.
After the jump, how the same data can tell two different stories.
Suppose you're a candidate for school board in Texas. Suppose further that a reporter for the local newspaper asks you this question, "Are you in favor or opposed to the teaching of Creationism in science classes?"
The question sounds like a simple yes/no question, but it's anything but simple. Importantly, the question is not equivalent to asking, "Do you believe in Creationism?" Also, it's not equivalent to asking, "Will you attempt to include Creationism in the curriculum for science classes?" To do the question justice, it's important to provide both a yes/no answer and answers to the questions, "Why?" and "How will your beliefs influence your behavior as a school board trustee?"
So, how would you answer? After the jump, I examine the different tacks that might be taken.
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| Future Allen Stadium |
What makes politics endlessly fascinating and intractably difficult is how two sides can look at the same objective facts and reach diametrically opposite positions. Or how one side can effortlessly forget its argument on one issue as it moves onto debating a related issue. Or how one body politic can deal with an issue without controversy while another body politic is hopelessly divided over similar issues.
After the jump, examples from Richardson's upcoming bond election.
Mark's Stylebook: When reporting threats to controversial plays about gay Jesus, don't use the words "terrorist" or "jihad" or even "yahoo".
The Dallas Morning News' Jacquielynn Floyd broke that stylebook rule big time this week in her column about a student production of the controversial play Corpus Christi that presents Jesus as gay. She starts off breaking the rule in her column headline, "North Texas zealots score in jihad on 'gay Jesus' play" and the infractions only rack up from there.
After the jump, the other rule that caused Floyd to break Mark's Stylebook rule.