"Middle School Advocacy at the State Legislature" - GIPS Cast, Ep. 066

If you give students the opportunity to speak-up, they will.  And they’re going to remind you that they’re astute, observant, and every bit as invested in their experiences as adults are – if not more so. 

On this special episode of 'The GIPS Cast', you'll hear a conversation between some 8th Grade students and their State Senator.

Senator Dan Quick is a Representative for District 35 in our Nebraska State Legislature.  He’s a Grand Island guy.

Last week, he visited Barr Middle School.  He shared a bit of his story during an assembly, students asked him questions, he visited a science class, he explored hallway passing periods, and event got to experience a fire drill. 

The highlight of Senator Quick’s visit was when he sat down with three 8th Graders for an interview.

Mya, Dezirae, & Jaxsen are student leaders.  They’re supportive of their classmates, involved in a number of extracurricular activities, and all three of them are deeply invested in making their school as great as it can been.

So, they took advantage of an incredible opportunity:  They sat down with Senator Quick to interview him for this podcast.

As you’ll hear, the students were professional, but they asked the Senator good questions about how their voices can be heard, how their student experiences will be impacted by the legislature, and how Senator Quick enjoyed the chance to speak with students.
 

Listen to the latest episode above or subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast platform.

(Transcript may be found below the episode player.)

#WeAreGIPS  

--

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT: 

Podcast Intro  00:00

This is Grand Island Public Schools podcast, and these are our stories. We are learners. We are educators in teaching hearts as well as minds. We are 10,000 diverse voices, and we're changing the world together, one classroom at a time. These are our stories. We are GIPS. We are GIPS. Somos, que y pe ese. We are GIPS. Somos GIPS. We are GIPS. And this is 'The GIPS Cast'!

 

Mitchell Roush  00:31

Welcome back to the GIPS cast, a conversation based podcast exploring the voices of Grand Island Public Schools in Nebraska. I'm your host, Mitchell Roush, the Communications Director here at GIPS, and I'm grateful, as always, to bring to you new stories from all corners of our district, because here we're driven by our mission of every student every day, a success.

 

Mitchell Roush  01:01

Now if you give students the opportunity to speak up, they will, and they're going to remind you that they are astute, observant and every bit as invested in their experiences as adults are, if not more so, and that's why I'm excited to share this podcast episode with you. Senator Dan Quick is a representative for district 35 in our Nebraska state legislature, and he's a Grand Island guy. Recently, he reached out and was interested in gaining more first hand experience inside schools. After all, if he's going to represent his community in the best interest of schools at the state law making level, having a good idea of what the student and teacher experiences look like is, well, a good idea. So last week, he visited Barr Middle School. He shared a bit of his story during an assembly. Students got a chance to ask him questions. He visited a science class. He explored hallway passing periods, and he even got to experience a fire drill. But the highlight of Senator quick visit was when he sat down with 3/8 graders. Mya, Dezirae, and Jaxsen are student leaders. They're eighth graders at Barr Middle School. They're supportive of their classmates. They're involved in a number of extracurricular activities, and all three of them are deeply invested in making their school as great as it can be. And so Mya, Dezirae, and Jaxsen took advantage of this incredible opportunity. They sat down with Senator Quick to interview him for this podcast. Now, truth be told, this project was awesome. I was fortunate enough to sit in the room for the conversation as I was recording everything for this episode. Now, you'll hear these students were professional, but they also asked the senator some good questions about how their voices can be heard and how student experiences will be impacted by the legislature. And Senator quick with a genuine smile on his face, he enjoyed the conversation too. He even said, I need to hear from students more. Was so cool. So give a listen to this episode.

 

Dan Quick  03:19

I'm Dan Quick. I live here in Grand Island, and I'm a State Senator for district 35 here in Grand Island.

 

Dezirae  03:26

I'm Dezirae, and I'm an eighth grater from Barr Middle School.

 

Mya  03:30

I'm Mya Bernal and I'm an eighth grader from Barr Middle School.

 

Jaxsen  03:33

I'm Jaxsen Battershaw, and I'm in eighth grade in Barr Middle School.

 

Dezirae  03:39

You had the chance to visit our school today. What stood out to you during your visit, and why is it important to visit our school?

 

Dan Quick  03:44

Yeah, well, for starters, just visiting the school to get to see what what you go through every day, you know, and be in the classroom. I got that experience being right in the classroom the we were working with magnets, and I actually got to work with the students, you know, and we were measuring how far the magnets would push each other apart, and so that was a fun experience for me. Plus, I got to experience the fire drill. You know, I haven't done that since I was in school, and that's back in the 60s and 70s, so that's been a long time ago, but that was a great experience. I loved being able to talk to the students this morning as a group, and really the best part was when they got to ask me questions. So I got to answer actually what they were interested in. So I think this is will be great. So when you guys are asking me questions, yeah, I just love having that conversation with with all of you.

 

Mya  04:33

So when the state government talks about new laws for schools, like, what classes we have to take that impact our schools today? What is the best way for us as students to share what we think before they vote on those new rules?

 

Dan Quick  04:47

Yeah, and that's a great question, because, you know, we we hear from people all the time when we're when we're drafting a bill to bring to the legislature. I like to have input from everyone so as. Students, we could get input from you as well on on how that might affect you in the classroom. You know, we have a lot of school funding bills, and so we want to make sure that we're sending the appropriate amount of funding to our school so you guys can get the best education you can. You know, want you to have good teachers and and nice buildings to be able to learn in and so it's just really important for us to hear from everyone. We talked to the teachers, we talked to the school administrators. Sometimes we don't get to talk to the students. So if you ever felt the desire to reach out to us, we do have websites so students can if you want to research that, you can research that go to our legislative to the legislative website, find your state senator, and then you can reach out to them and say, Hey, I have a question. I get questions from students all the time. They might have a school project. So they'll reach out and say, Hey, can you send me the information on this bill? I saw that you had this bill in the legislature. Could you, could you send me all the information about it and why you brought the bill, and if it passed, and they want all that information because they're doing a class project, so those type of things happen too. So, but I just love hearing from from like, like students, like yourselves. And you know, if you want to reach out, will always respond, so yeah.

 

Mya  06:22

And then you talked about, like, the funding is there, like, anything that, like, you're you really, like, feel strongly about when it comes to funding, whether it being like activities, like sports or like the music program or like stuff like that.

 

Dan Quick  06:37

Yeah. And those are all important. I you know, when my kids went to school, my son played in in the orchestra, so he played violin. And our daughter, she didn't play in the school, but she played piano, so she took piano lessons. Those are all important, all of our kids, all of our we had three kids. They all played sports. So yeah, those those type of activities. They were also in the school plays, and I probably loved that the best, because I didn't even know our son could sing. And we went to the school play, and here he's singing. He's got one of the lead roles in the play, and we didn't even realize it until, you know, they kept it a secret from us, and so we got to go watch them. I know I have a granddaughter at West ridge, and we're going to, she plays the violin, so we're going to go to her orchestra concerts. So making sure those type of activities are are funded. I know some, some of the schools through their budget, sometimes are looking at and maybe the parents put some some funds into it too. Now, I'm not sure how that all works, but, but, you know, the education piece we got to make sure we're actually funding, that we're actually bound by the state constitution to provide tax dollars or provide dollars for for education. So I'm always making sure that we're not cutting those funds making sure that Grand Island gets their their portion of the tax dollars to make sure that we're keeping our kids educated.

 

Jaxsen  08:08

What are some other ways we may share our voice or get involved to help you in our community better support school?

 

Dan Quick  08:14

You might have heard me talk this morning too about, you know, when my son was in school and they went to the city council, you know, and asked, because they we didn't have a skate park, and so they wanted to get that skate park going. And so I think there was probably, I know, my son, testified in front, or if it's really testimony, but they went before the city council, there was like, three or four of the students, and then they also reached out to some of the developers who were going to build it, so they'd know exactly how much money it was going to cost. So they brought all that information to the city council. And that's just way that ways that kids can get involved in it's it was a great experience for him, and we love being part of it as well, you know. And I think I just talked a little bit about on those legislative side, you know, if you ever want to reach out, or if you have concerns, you know, maybe what's happening. I mean, we have kids reach out. We have people from all walks of life reach out to us about concerns they have in their community. You know, from anything from, you know, the justice system, to schools to, you know, jobs. You know, I have people reach out to me all the time about, you know, what's happening in their workplace, and if I can be of assistance, and I don't always have the answers, but what I do is I direct them to people who do have the answers, like with people who have workplace issues. I direct them to the Department of Labor, and maybe I reach out on their behalf to try to help that, move that along so and that's the same way in all the all the systems, if I if there's issues with juvenile justice or something like that, then I reach out to our county judges, and I sit down and talk to them about those issues and how we can be helpful. So your voices are are powerful in the community, and you. And I encourage them to use them.

 

Jaxsen  10:01

Why are public schools important to you?

 

Dan Quick  10:06

Well, they're extremely important to me. I know it just from my own personal experience. You know, I didn't go on to college, but if I didn't have those basic skills to be able to, you know, learn my, you know, to read and write and do math, but also helped me build my social school skills. So, you know, they call them soft skills. So learning how, you know you have to work with your teachers and, you know, follow all the rules Well, you do that those type of things when you when you go to to start employment, when you start working in jobs, you know, you have your bosses that you got to make sure you're following all the rules and all those things. So those are public schools. Teach every aspect for life. They prepare you to be successful and have you have great outcomes. So I've you know, my kids went to public school. They did go to a private school when they were in high school, but they went to public education as grade schoolers. And you know, my, my public education was in a small school. You know, we had a K through 12 school, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. You know, that experience of going to school and and learning, I'm I'm sure we all have our issues once in a while with school and but for the most part, I really enjoyed it.

 

Dezirae  11:18

Is there anything you would change about public schools and why?

 

Dan Quick  11:22

That's a great question. I can't think of anything right off the top of my head, other than just to make sure that within our communities, that there's there's a lot of input from because every school is different in every community. So you look at a rural school, you know, they have different, different issues than than a school like Grand Island, or schools like an Omaha or Lincoln, you know, the bigger schools. So I would just make sure that that the people within that community have a have a voice at the table, and make sure that that their kids are getting the best education they can. And, you know, as a legis, as legislators, we have to listen to the people, because we work for you. So we're working for our constituents. So when I hear from people in the community, or if I hear from the school board, you know, or if I hear from you know, super superintendent Fisher, or, you know, things like that, or from teachers, you know, we try to address those issues, but I'd love to hear from more students too. So yeah, anything I could do to help improve public schools I'm on board with.

 

Mya  12:31

What Bill Do you think right now will affect students the most?

 

Dan Quick  12:37

I look at what we do for funding schools, and we're trying to find ways that we can do I don't know how much you know about property tax relief, but we're doing property tax because property tax is what funds the schools, mainly in each community, and so we're trying to give some property tax relief to homeowners and people who own land, but then on the other side of it, then we have to come up with revenue to replace those dollars. So it's, it's a, you know, you're trading one thing, one tax, for another, and so we're trying to find out that balance so we can make sure we're appropriating the proper, proper amount of funds to the schools to make sure that all of you get a great education, and sometimes what we do with those when we change how we tax, we might be affecting a different group of people. So let's just say that, you know, property taxes, the bigger your house, the probably the more taxes you pay, the more more expensive your house, the more taxes you pay, and the less expensive, the lately, the less you pay. So that kind of helps people who are maybe have live in poverty or something that they don't pay as many taxes as people who are who are wealthy and then, but then, if they want to move it to sales tax, that affects everybody, pretty much across the board. So it'll affect people in poverty just as much as it might affect people who who are wealthy, except that they might buy more expensive things, but it could affect people who live in poverty a little bit more so it causes, maybe an adverse effect. And then then we have the income tax portion of it too, where we're we're reducing, and my opinion is we shouldn't reduce the rates. The wealthy and the corporations were reducing their tax rates down and so it's more even though they make more money, it's more of an equal, equal tax for everyone, except for people who live in poverty. I feel like they're they're still paying some tax. I think the tax bracket should stay kind of where they're at. So we're bringing in enough revenue to really help fund the schools and help fund a lot of the projects we have do, like, I don't know, the new road, state highway that's going out west of town. Those are all tax dollars that we collect. So. So, yeah, I just want to make sure that that's probably one of the most important pieces in my mind, is to make sure that that funding formula for schools stays in place. So Grand Island gets the same, gets an appropriate amount of tax dollars for the students that they have, compared to someone like Lincoln and Omaha, and then you have your rural schools too. So that's a long, long answer to a short question.

 

Jaxsen  15:26

what do you prioritize for future education?

 

Dan Quick  15:29

Okay, yeah, well, I did have a bill last year in education, and it had to do with community schools, so and they provide resources for me. Excuse me, for maybe schools that don't have all the resources I know grand Allen utilizes a little bit, so like when they had had VSP come out and check kids for eyeglasses. So these are a lot of kids who don't, maybe don't, don't have the opportunity to go to an eye doctor to find out if they need glasses. So grand Allen is able to do that through its type of a community school. Smaller schools out in rural Nebraska probably don't have that opportunity. So my bill would establish what they call community schools to allow them to go through the Department of Education to get information on how they can apply for for grants and loans in order to provide those type of opportunities for their students. That's probably one of the, one of my priority bills. It's still, it's still sitting in education committee. The Education Committee doesn't agree with me, so, so I'm still trying to get that bill out. It doesn't cost any money, so it does. It's not, you know, sometimes in the legislature, if you have a bill that that requires tax dollars, they're trying to find ways to cut taxes. So they don't want to let us have some, let us have some of those bills. But my bill doesn't require any tax dollars, and it'd be great way to help kids, maybe in rural Nebraska, get some of the same opportunities that you were provided here, maybe in Grand Island. So, yeah, so that's one of my, probably one of my priority bills. I should ask you kids, I guess I did think of something. So what's and I don't know if you each want to talk about it, but your experience going to school in Grand Island, is it been a good experience?

 

Mya  17:20

Like you said about, like, the like getting our eyes checked for glasses. Like, that's very good. And I like, even, like getting just all those checks and PE like learning our height, and like all that, and getting, like, hearing checks, I think too. So I think that's like, good to have to make sure that we, like, have all the resources that we need, because a lot of times in classrooms, like, kids can't see the board from the back, or, like, they can't hear the teachers from the back, so they had to, like, move forward. So I think that that's good, that we have like, all those checks. And, yeah, I do agree that we should have them for everywhere, because, like, it happens everywhere where kids may need to, like, move forward to, like, cure the teachers and such. So I think that's good. And then I also, like, went to school in Omaha for a few years, so like, I can see, like the differences, and like the funding and like the way that like, like, how much money like each school gets, and I do think that like, because of like, the amount of people in Omaha, I do think that they get like, a lot more money than like here, compared to because I feel like we had a lot like more resources in Omaha compared to here.

 

Dan Quick  18:37

Yeah, I would agree with you on the resources. Places like Lincoln and Omaha have a lot more resources than Grand Island, but Grand Island has a lot more resources than, let's say Scott's bluff or North Platte. But, yeah, those resources are really important, especially for families. And it's not just about the student, but it's also about the whole family structure and making sure we're we're helping everyone to kind of uplift that family so that they can support their support their kids when they're going to school. Do you guys play any sports?

 

Mya  19:09

I do track and volleyball, and then I do show choir and band.

 

Dezirae  19:16

Then I do track and I'm an orchestra.

 

Jaxsen  19:19

I do football, wrestling, basketball, track, in orchestra.

 

Dan Quick  19:24

Wow, yeah, yeah, my kids all they did most of sports. And I actually helped when my kids were really little, before they started school, they had, like a wrestling program for for little kids. And I guess there was some grade school kids in there too. But I too, but I actually kind of helped with the wrestling program just to help, you know, facilitate. I wasn't one of the coaches. I just kind of helped organize the program, and then we would take kids to wrestling meets all across the state, you know, in different communities, and you. I really enjoyed. I enjoyed going watching my kids do all those activities. I remember my daughter when she she was our youngest, and I think I cried at the last track me she was at because that was gonna be the last time I was gonna get to see her, you know, play so, but now I get to go watch my grandkids, so that's made up for it.

 

Mya  20:18

Do you visit schools very often, or

 

Dan Quick  20:22

No, actually, this is the first time I've actually did a school visit. I mean, I have done it in the past, but it was, you know, when the fourth graders come down to the Capitol, I would always speak to the fourth grade classes, and, like, this next year, it's a short session, so we'll be done, like, in April, so there's still going to be classes that are coming out after we're out of session, so we aren't always there. So in the past, I have gone out to I remember, I went to wasmer and I talked to the fourth grade classes because they weren't able to see me at the Capitol, so they still did their visit to the Capitol. But I went to the school. I took them the little books, you know, that talks about the LEDs, the unicameral and all of that. And then I got to speak to the kids, and they got to ask me questions. And I also went to a summer school program here at Walnut one year, and I brought my staff out, and if you're, if anybody's ever interested in that, I could do that. But I brought my staff out, and they talked about what it was, what their jobs were working for me in the legislature, what they each did. And then I got up and talked about, you know, making a bill, and what it was like to be a state senator. And then the kids got to make a bill. So they got to, like, write what they wanted, whether it was chew gum in school, you know, I, you know, I heard it. Heard that this morning, you're not supposed to chew gum in school. So they also, I think one of the bills was they only wanted to go to school four days a week. So those are some of the bills that they kind of put together.

 

Dezirae  21:49

So did you ever think about considering any of those bills?

 

Dan Quick  21:53

Yeah, well, no, I probably didn't do we probably didn't take them, take them on, but they were bad. They were great ideas. Yeah,

 

Mya  22:02

yeah. We're all three from wasmer.

 

Dan Quick  22:06

And my, two of my grandkids went to wasmer when they were younger, but they're in their 20s now, so yeah. And then my grandson, he went through the career pathways, the welding program, and he's now welding. He's out working. And my granddaughter, Sierra, she's actually she wants to be a teacher. So she went to Southeast Community College, and she graduates from southeast this December, and then she's going to transfer to UNL to finish up and get her teaching degree. Maybe she'll come back to Grand Island and be a teacher. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'd like you to thank you for having me here and to and for asking me the questions. I love talking with people. You know, my wife and I, when we campaign for office, we knock a lot of doors. We get to talk to a lot of the lot of your parents, and sometimes we see maybe you out in the yards, maybe, but, but it's always fun to get to talk to your parents and get to know them better.

 

Dezirae  23:06

So my parents mentioned liking talking to you.

 

Dan Quick  23:09

Oh, well, thank you. Yeah, yeah. We got, we what? We knocked over 12,000 doors. My wife and I, so we got to see a lot of people.

 

Mya  23:19

Thank you for coming. I I know that I really enjoy when guest speakers come. I don't know. I think the Full Grade enjoyed.

 

Dezirae  23:26

I learned a lot, and I really appreciate that you took the time to come and visit our school.

 

Jaxsen  23:31

Yeah.

 

Dan Quick  23:33

Well, thank you again.

 

Mitchell Roush  23:41

Thank you so much listeners for joining us here on the GIPS cast again. We want to thank Senator Dan quick for not only visiting Barr middle school, but for being generous with his time and sitting down with a few of our students to interview for this podcast. It was a great opportunity, and I think Jackson Maya and Desiree did a fantastic job with this opportunity. Thank you again, listeners for joining us on this podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, or you enjoy this show, give us a rating or a review on your favorite podcast platform, and that'll help other people discover us along the way. Of course, visit gips.org That's www.gips.org our district website that is your hub for trusted information, updated news stories and resources from Grand Island Public Schools. Thank you for joining us, listeners, and we will be coming back at you soon with some more great stories from our district.