The Town Hall
I always find town halls really interesting – the blend of people, concerns, questions, ideas. I’m always interested in ideas. It’s a great way for people and their elected officials to communicate directly, so when Senator Wendy DeBoer invited me to just such a forum at the American Legion Hall in Bennington, I said yes right away.
There has been a lot of rapid growth in Bennington recently.
A lot of families are moving in and that’s a wonderful thing, it just prompts some important questions on how best to support it. These are good problems to have, really.
Wendy also invited the Bennington Public School Superintendent and the Nebraska Public Service Commission District 3. She wanted to make sure there was a blend of people who aren’t often in the spotlight but who have an impact on people’s lives. It goes without saying I was honored to be there.
And what I heard from the people who came was fascinating.
There were questions about how varying access to internet across the state would affect jobs and education on all sorts of levels. I answered a few difficult questions about tuition and the University of Nebraska at large.
To be frank, people are going to have to pay for education somehow, so we have to get creative and find ways to get that done.
And there are other ways we can look at helping recruit, retain, and support students as well. Our Regent scholarships, for example, don’t charge recipients tuition, but they don’t help to cover the cost of room, board, and books like some other state universities do. For that reason we may be losing out on some really bright talents and minds. It could be something worth looking at.
One town hall attendee told us her friend’s son was transferring to a different University of Nebraska campus from Kearney and that a number of his classes don’t automatically transfer, which makes that process quite difficult.
We need to help students across all our systems. Parents discussed issues with efficiencies and had a number of questions about operations. And I don’t blame them. We have to start talking to each other – it would be wonderful if public schools and universities had better communication to sort through some of these problems that make life and education that much more challenging for our students and their families.
There’s no obligation, per se, but it simply makes sense.
We need ideas. We need discussion. We need to be able to come together – whether at an intimate town hall or on the highest levels across the state – and talk it out. And then make things happen.
I came away from that Bennington town hall with the hope that we can achieve that, one step at a time.
*Barbara’s thoughts as written by Kate based on weekly (fascinating) conversations.
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