 Hi. Good morning. How are you doing, Chris? I'm Wolf. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, too. Yeah, good to see you. I mean, it's like you're over here. Thank you for calling. Actually, last time I met you, I was cooking food for a fundraiser. Where? At, uh, Dorris Townsend's house. Oh, you didn't get it first. Yeah. This is my other outfit. Yeah, it would have been great. It was really good. I'm in trouble. Yes, I know. Here. This is the first-ditch-step, Christmas Day. Mr. Wolf, Jason Moore, high school magistrate. Nice to see you. Pleasure hearing me speak at the district conference for a small council. See you there. Oh, you were there? Yeah. Very nice, thank you for coming in. You're welcome. Great. How are you? Hi, we're welcome to see you. Hello, Kevin Thomas. Nice to meet you. Yeah. Oh, great. And it, too, you know? Nothing. No. Nothing. No. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. No. We are. Yeah. We are. Do you have anything to say? No. No. Please. It's kind of neat. Well, I really appreciate your allowing me to come visit this Ruffian case, but I'm just visiting a number of schools around the town of Oaks because I want to just make clear what I'm trying to do here. But three things I just want to point out that I'm trying to do in that year for you is what you think about this. But I come from a business background. My business is headquartered in New York, but now I'm 30 states. I know health work and education. We have a limited government democracy. And we believe in the free market where we ought to be. And the best thing we can do is make sure of the best social policies to make sure everybody has a really good job. So working back from that, what is it that we can do, the limited levers that we have in public sphere, education is one of the key investments. And part of what I need to do is make sure that we don't understand that. We understand I need to take a direct involvement in something that actually we need to invest in. We also need to raise money fair. So I'm proposing to put, what, $3 quarters of a million dollars more into this school district. I think the second thing is we need to make sure that we're raising money fair. I mean, one of the things I think we've done with our reliance on the property tax is that we've created real opposition in parts of some people who really shouldn't be opposed to public education. But we have, because we've raised money so unfairly. Pennsylvania, we have a huge reliance on the local property tax. The Economist is a magazine that is fairly conservative. And a couple months ago, they made this case that the United States is one of the, it's not the only developed country in the world that funds its education system with the property tax. And that means that just the math of the property tax, the poor of the school district, and maybe the bigger the challenge is, the less money we give you. And we charge you more for it. We raise your bill each week. That's just the math of the property tax. And the more we rely on that around the country for education, the more unfair the funding. And that's magnified in Pennsylvania because we have relatively small school districts. We have 500. Some states like Maryland have bigger school districts. And I don't like the sizes we have, but it does magnify the disparities between districts, especially to the extent we rely on the property tax. And in Pennsylvania, the state only puts up about 35%, I think, of funding for education, which means that there's some federal funding in there, but a lot of it gets back to the local taxpayer. And in most, outside of Philadelphia, every school district, that means the property tax. So I'm proposing a 50% reduction, a 51% drop in the property tax burden in this school district. So I'm proposing. And I think that's important because it means that you no longer have the case where, at least in Northeast New York County, I had neighbors who were looking at maybe losing their homes to try to keep up with the property tax. They weren't against education, but we were giving them a really bad choice. They're saying, yeah, I want you to pay to educate my kids, and you have to lose your home as a result of that. You'll pay with that. Other ways, I think, a fair way to raise additional funds for education. And then the final thing is, I think we all need to, and this is really a bad word, the A word in education, accountability, because, since now, it has been a really nasty thing. In my business, I think I have a pretty good business, but I'm not perfect. And we need to, we're always looking for ways to improve. We're in an improvement process. I'm a disciple of Demi, and he says the first thing you got to do is drive fear out of the process. Well, what we've done is driven fear into the process of educational approval. So everybody's scared. We have to hide state tests. We have pointing fingers, you know, yelling at educators and saying, you're not doing good. Move the opposite direction and say, yeah, we need to get better. And we need to work together to figure out how we're going to figure out if we're getting better and where we're getting better. We're going to figure out how the streets will do better than others who happen to learn from each other, but take the fear out of it. Take the high stakes out of that. And so what I hope we can talk about today is the state's shared 50%. I want to be able to go back to the taxpayers of Pennsylvania and say, your dollars are being invested really, really wisely. They're going into the classroom. They're going into making the lives of the students better and into a good word. We sort of take the body language, unfold the arms and say, okay, let's work together to see if we can make this better. And that's something that we all need to work together. And I don't have the magic formula to say to the taxpayers, look, here's what you're getting for your investments. Pretty good. We're really proud of what we're doing here. And we need to work together to figure that out. So that's what I'm doing around here. I want to make the case, whatever the arguments are that come from the unfairness. And I want to make sure that we have a system that we can show the taxpayers who are investing in education who are buying into my argument. Okay. So tell me what you're doing here and do Oxford to help me. Sure. I can give you a little bit of background in regards to our district. And we are unique here in our district because we've grown quite a bit. The funding formula that was put in the place in the early 90s, we're still being funded on about 2,800 kids and we have 4,000 children. So that's one of the losers in that. We are wholehearted. We are. And right now, in regards to what we spend for people, because a lot of people will ask us, are you overspending? Are you not being fruitful with your money? I would say no, because right now we are out of 500 districts, 482 in regards to what we spend per child. What do you spend per child? $10,000. So it goes from nine to 30. We're just over 10. But the good thing about it is, is I'm very, very proud. I'm very proud of the fact that when you look at our accountability component of the SPP scores, when you look at it, we did a little study and Adams, York, Franklin, some come in and some doffin. There's only three districts who can claim the fact that all of our buildings are over 83%. All of that. Us, York, Suburban. And so. Northeastern? Maybe. I know. I know. The reason I say that is, is when you look at us compared to the other districts, it's comparing apples to oranges and the investment that we're putting into our students is a great investment. And our teachers, our faculty, our staff are doing very well. We're certainly not complaining. But some of the things that we've had to do over the past, you know, we've had to eliminate a pre-K for, you know, we would like to utilize funds to sustain our full day kindergarten program. Right now, our third graders is the first class that we have going through that we're going through full day. And we're anxiously awaiting the numbers to see how that's fair. Teachers and the administrators say that there's a world of difference. So we understand that we want to utilize the funds that we have to sustain the full day kindergarten. So that's very, very important to us. With the budget condition that we're in, you know, we haven't replaced the entire teachers. So that's caused a stress on our current faculty and administration that we're doing right now is is that we're not becoming irrelevant to our students. That's a grave concern that I have. And because of the budget, you know, we want to make sure our kids are career college-ready. We're currently working with the Gettysburg-Harrie Chamber of Commerce to partner with the local businesses to see how we can help each other out. And it wasn't until a month ago where I had a few business leaders here when we took a tour and we went into our graphics area and I said, I'm going to show you that what it is. So if you look at what we have, we still have the old print presses and things of that nature. We give our kids a solid education and do some great things. But I'm concerned that we have to retrain our kids. Our kids have to reinvest. And because of where we are with our budget, it's caused some problems. But aside from that, we still want to move forward. We want to do some unique things. We are creating a learning center in our high school next to you. I'm really, really excited about that. It's an opportunity for our kids to become an academic hub for our students to be able to do some tutoring, some academic work. So it's a different concept that we're initiating. So we're excited about that because Rootsville is doing some things. Who aren't passing these exams the first time are your lower level kids who may not be college bound students and then they are losing out on the electives that are going to help prepare them. And an instance that I would show that these are qualities that aren't measurable on a key student exam. And he's going to be a good worker for somebody and he's going to be a good husband and a good father. And these are all things that are, the public doesn't always get to see and hopefully that today on your tour you'll see some of the things that some of those kids are doing in our schools. But the impact that we see from the remedial side of it is that those kids sort of lose touch with the things that they're passionate about. That's not always the math and the science. So how would you look at his educational career differently if you didn't have the key study thing? Well, I mean everybody meeting the requirement of everybody meeting the requirement, you know. I'm still, I can still say how Secretary Rivera in terms of being able to work with him as a teacher as a principal. This is the front of the house. What we're going to do here is we're going to we're going to we're going to we're going to take breeze in. We've got a lotta people here. We're gonna take those pieces right there. Hey Kevin, how long has Jason been here from? First ten months. is it based? the president's it doesn't matter on this topic it could be Democrat, Republican it doesn't matter what works best with it. What? tribe Good morning everyone I've been working my way down here. Hi, how's that? How are you? Good. How are you? Good. Now I know each other. And... Mr. Cross, I didn't get to... Oh, did I get to... I didn't see... Erick Castle. Tom Wolfe. Jason Cross, I think he's done it. What did you register here? 2005. So, what's that? Actually, yeah, that's it, yeah. I can remember. Hey, I gave him his diploma at your college. Really? Yes. Before when? All the way back now. Look where we... Look where we've come, huh? Thank you very much. Sorry to interrupt. It's okay. It's kind of a big deal. It was good to see you. So, are you... What are you looking at? Talk to me. They had to rank them. Good old-world news, old-style. Right. And now we'll decide if we're going to rank them. And now we'll decide if we're creating a hybrid monster president. The next president we would have has to have... So, right now, we decided on domestic, and three to two, they picked Clinton for domestic side. Okay. We're right now debating foreign, and it's a Reagan-Clinton... We have one student who's kind of lost her mind. I can't quite... You seem sort of embarrassed, but you're the one who lost your mind. Okay. And then we go... You know, there's... I don't know why I don't see this as a beard. I think that's a key piece to any president. Maybe. Okay. This is great. Well, I'm sorry. Let's go with that. What year are you... June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18. June 18.une 18. June 17. June 18. June 18. June 18. And that, I think, is what the president kind of won against the president. We're trying to talk to him about就uuuuruction. So, how do we know if you're in public or not? So, I'm going to put the situation into order and then we're going to sticky Re empezatron. Yeah. Yeah. It's fine. Right, yeah. We're close to doing it. that's on our work. So how was it? Good. I'm sorry I interrupted. You're welcome. Thanks for coming to see us. Thank you for having me. Thank you and thanks for having me. Anytime. You can come to our house anytime, that's right. See you later. Thanks a lot. Good morning. Alright, so what number were we at? Barry? Wait, now I want to make sense. This is precap. This is right. We just have to find Mary. Is there another 17? Yes, there's another one here. Just like we've done the other ones. Yes, sir. So you're going to end up with capitalism? Yeah. Are you real? What do you want to do with it? I want to be it. I'm looking at Mary. No, I have to do it. You think of them? Keep us. What are you? I'm a sophomore. And you're a math major? I'm a little serious. What is what you're doing? Do these things like this? This is Souter? This is Souter. There's a question for you down here that I can't answer. I didn't even try. I did my part, okay? Okay, thank you. Thanks a lot. Thank you so much. Thanks for the interview. So, two Steelers came in. Mary, anything? Why are you here? May the moon's locked at work. Please, however the moon's locked at work, please remain in the main office. I feel so, yeah, because... You're going to look the theater back where they sit in class and wait for you to get done. I'm sorry. Okay, I'll let me start by apologizing to all the students in this school. You're keeping it from what? Governor, why are you here today? Evidently keeping students from lunch. But no, I'm here to really learn about what's going on. I've been doing this for now three months and it's helpful for me to understand what's going on in the schools, what I need to understand so that I can refine my policies better. It gives me a chance to tout what's going on in public education. I'm trying to convince the voters of Pennsylvania that this is something we really... it's a really smart investment. We need to do it right, but we need to make an investment and so it gives me a chance to make that point. And the final thing is it really... because people like you, it allows me to help show the rest of Pennsylvania the great things that are going on in our schools all across the state. So those are the three things I'm trying to do. I learned that this is a system, our education system that's under stress. We've under-invested in it. We have not taken it seriously enough. We have not appreciated the importance of what goes on here to our futures, all of our futures. Our economy, our communities, our families and I think they understand, they see that here, they see the results of that here and they're asking for help. They think they can do a better job. They'd like to have the resources and I agree with them. I think we need to make sure they have the resources to deliver on the promise we all make to our kids that they're going to get a good education. So what are you going to take back to Harrisburg? That I'm right to think this is really, really important. Can I get you on another topic? Sure. Where do you stand on the marijuana or the decriminalization? I support the decriminalization of marijuana but I had a round table at the residence on medical marijuana and my key thing, I want to legalize that because I want doctors to be able to prescribe the drugs they think their patients need to get better. We give them the ability to prescribe drugs that are derived from opium. It seems to me that we could give them the same right to prescribe drugs that are derived from cannabis or less serious drugs. I also think that it gave me a chance to meet with families and people who are suffering from illnesses that could be ameliorated with drugs, proper drugs and it's quite poignant. So it was a good learning experience. I think we need more information. People need to have access to it. I think the more information we learn about this the more people want to legalize medical marijuana. We're very conservative Republican state senator, very liberal Democratic state senator, both of whom sponsored a bill that was successful in the Senate. So you think it's more important to get medical marijuana passed first before we go into decriminalization of marijuana? I'd like to do both but this has come in first. I think we ought to do both. I think decriminalization right now, what goes on in this school, we're trying to prepare our fellow citizens for really good careers and good jobs. One of the things that we do with mandatory sentencing and we have too many people in prison, we break up too many families, we destroy too many lives and we keep too many people from getting the kinds of jobs they want to get a conviction for a felony which minor drug possession is right now and marijuana possession and they don't want to give them a job it just destroys the futures for too many people. So I think we need to look at that but the first thing to come my way looks like it's going to be the medical marijuana. Thank you. Thank you for your message. That's okay. My question is you were in Upper Deppie yesterday here in New Oxford today from this area but I mean can you just talk a little bit about why you know a single school district needs to be concerned about the education funding that's going on in the state right now and the improvements we need to make. Right, this is sort of in my backyard and I'm from right across the border in York County, this is Adams County but my point throughout has been that I think as I've gone around the state the diversity of our school district is clear. Upper Derby is very different from the New Oxford area but we all have a shared interest in the education that the kids in each of those schools get. The school program needs to be tailored to the kids in Upper Derby and the school challenges for the kids here is different but the outcome has to be a good one for all the kids. We have to make sure as Pennsylvanians that everybody gets a good education that's the return we need so I'm from York County I care about those kids in Upper Derby I care about the kids here they should care about the kids in Northeastern York County and I think if we all look at this as the collective responsibility the shared responsibility that it is we're going to have a better outcome of the education we need to invest not just in our own kids not just in our own grandkids not just in our own school district but in all the schools in Pennsylvania because we care about the outcomes so Governor this is the 26th school you visit across Pennsylvania so what are some key takeaways that you've learned from the state of education I think there's one big one and that is the first one is that every school is different that the challenges the blend of students the things that those students need to learn the way they need to learn are all different and that's why we have professionals in the classroom looking at the students and they'll change from year to year this year's class is different from next year's class so the diversity is amazing we need to make sure that the school districts have the ability to tailor their educational program to the needs of those students so that we can end up all end up at a great place second thing is you can't throw money at any problem you can't keep disinvesting in this process this is something that requires investment we need to make sure the teachers and the educators here and every school have the resources they need to deliver on the promise we all make actually in our Constitution a thorough and efficient education so everything is different and that's great we have local school boards we have management in the buildings and the school districts and we have teachers in the classrooms trying to tailor the educational experience to the needs and challenges they face we need to allow that to happen we need to make sure they're doing a good job we need to make sure that we're investing adequately in what they're doing okay, thanks a lot what are your plans for the more day we can you know what? Monday is going to be my first day off I took Easter Monday off so it's my second day off stay at home and sit and watch the grass grow