The notices of testing failures (Criterion-Referenced Competency Test) are out, and many of our kids will either be left back or will go to summer school.

Apparently our Georgia Department of Education (DOE) did not adequately develop a curriculum that would properly teach our children the required information on social studies or math.

Apparently our DOE did not properly teach the teachers on what the students needed to learn.

And apparently our Georgia state legislature saw fit to cut another $91 million (FY 09) from the DOE budget this year, on top of the $143 million cut last year (FY 08) and the $170 million cut the previous year (FY 07).

In fact, since FY03, approximately $1.5 billion has been cut from the education of our children while our 86-year-old incumbent, Mr. Yates (R-District 73) has been sitting in the state legislature.

It is, therefore, no wonder why 70 percent of our eighth-graders have failed the social studies test and 40 percent failed the math test.

Our legislators failed to provide the DOE with adequate funding, which resulted in the curriculum and the teachers failing our kids. This nonsense has got to stop.

I have been teaching and instructing for over 30 years in the military and in Delta Air Lines as a captain in the training department. The need for funding to train the trainers is self-evident.

You need proper funding to properly build the syllabi and properly staff your teachers. When you get less, you do less.

Our children, our future leaders, suffer — either through summer school, are held back a grade or, worse yet, are allowed to advance without the proper knowledge and skills to succeed at the next grade level.

Education is the number one expense in our state budget, and properly so. If you chose me to represent you and our children as Republican state representative for District 73, I will always vote to fully fund our schools for success, not cut the funding until failure. We cannot attract good companies, to deliver good paying jobs, with a poorly educated workforce.

There is a reason that our Georgia education system is not as strong, vibrant, and successful as we would like: We keep returning poor performing politicians back into office. We must stop this cycle of failure and inject fresh, strong leadership into our legislature and fully fund our children’s education.

On July 15 we can chose to trust this captain in the Capitol to guide the education efforts in Georgia and put our children first.

Rick Williams

Republican candidate for state representative District 73

www.captainrickwilliams.com

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