Rob Bishop: “I wish to present a situation to the body that is somewhat unique which we in the West will be talking about in greater…”

“I wish to present a situation to the body that is somewhat unique which we in the West will be talking about in greater detail and more frequently as time goes on. I feel competent in being able to address this issue, because before I joined this august body I spent 16 years in the Utah legislature as Speaker at the end; but all 16 years I was a member of the Public Education Finance Committee, or Appropriations Committee. I also, as I have frequently mentioned on this floor, served for 28 years as a high school teacher before I joined this group. Even though I recognize that money does not equal education excellence and we can do many things to improve our education system without money, at some time, we still have to build schools, and teachers at some time still have to eat. So I wish to present before the body three factual phenomena of which my colleagues may not be aware. First of all, the fastest growth in the student population happens to be in the States of the Mountain and Pacific time zones. Twelve of the 15 fastest growing States are in the West. In the West we have an average growth in our student population of 7 percent, where in the East, the average growth is a negative 2.6 percent. Ten of the 13 States with the highest teacher-student ratio are also in the West. And as the map that I am looking at right now shows, as far as growth in expenditures per pupil, 12 of the 15 slowest-growth States also happen to be in the West.”