by Theodore Wiesehan

    District 24 Senator Elaine Stuhr knows that the future of the good life rests with the state's children, as she spent much of her Feb. 15 legislative breakfast discussing proposed education bills to interested citizens at the Seward Civic Center.
     LB 690 seeks to encourage smaller schools work together to share teachers and programs by awarding grants of up to $75,000 to cooperating schools. Stuhr hopes the grants will foster the development of more occupational curriculum and dual credit programs. The bill would set aside $450,000 for such grants.
     "We're trying to help schools share teachers, especially in the vocational areas, because those seem to be the first to be cut," she said of the bill. "If students can start exploring that (vocational education) and even have some work opportunities by the time they're seniors, that will help."
     Stuhr selected LB 690 as her priority bill and urged constituents to write to the Unicameral Speaker to bring the bill to the floor. Forty-nine priority bills remain before the legislature, Stuhr said, and lawmakers will not have time to address all of them in this session.
     In the past, the unicameral debated priority bills in the order in which they were filed. Last year, however, Speaker Kermit Brashear broke with precedent and began determining the order of priority bills to be discussed, Stuhr said.
     Another bill dealing with education, LB 821, would require Nebraska schools to accept part-time students and allow them to participate in extracurricular activities. Under this bill, homeschooled children or children attending parochial schools could enroll in a minimum number of weekly hours and be allowed to participate in sports, musical groups, drama productions and other after-school activities at a public school.
     "Right now schools have their choice," Stuhr said. "What this says is that each board shall accept part-time students. It would be a mandate of allowing these students."
     Stuhr emphasized that part-time students would be figured into the state aid formula.
     Stuhr voiced support for LB 1208, a bill that would provide funding for distance education equipment and programs. Over $2 million in money from the state lottery would be earmarked for distance education, she said.
     Other bills dealing with education before the Unicameral are LB 228, which would require schools to have all-day kindergarten by the 2009-2010 school year; LB 1203, which would create a 14-member board to oversee civic education; and LB 1074, which would make high school graduation requirements include 40 hours of math, science, language arts and social studies each.
     Stuhr opposed the change in graduation requirements set forth by LB 1074, stating that the proposal fails to leave room for options in students' schedules.
     "I believe in academic rigor, but I think some of the students need some choices," she said. "I think they need that connection between the academic and the vocational and sometimes those application classes are very important for them."
     Other proposed legislation Stuhr mentioned included:
     - LB 975, an amendment to the Livestock Waste Management Act;
     - LB 366, which allows immediate enrollment of newly-hired public employees into state or county retirement systems;
     - LB 173, which deals with abandoned gift certificates;
     - LB 1024, a bill to create one educational service unit for a metropolitan-class city comprising the county in which the city is located and every adjoining county;
     - LB 783, which would ban hunting over the internet;
     - LB 933, a natural resources bill allowing certain municipalities (though none in Seward County) a water allotment, namely, 200 gallons per person per day in the specified eastern communities and 250 gallons in western communities;
     - LB 478, which would exclude certain military retirement benefits from income tax for Offutt Air Base workers with specified technical backgrounds; and
     - LB 72, which would license security personnel in Nebraska.
     Stuhr's legislative breakfasts are held monthly during the legislative session at the civic center and are open to the public.