Advance Evening News
This evening, kids are eating their fresh-grown vegetables at Falmouth Elementary School, and Washington Avenue has been, and continues, to bustle with activity this month.
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Falmouth Elementary Celebrates Project Learning Garden Grant
By Adele Uphaus
Twenty elementary schools in Northern Virginia received Project Learning Garden grants from Cox Enterprises and the Captain Planet Foundation this spring, but only one—Falmouth Elementary in Stafford—was chosen to host a special event Thursday morning highlighting the program.
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This Spring's Showers Bring Flowers, and a Bustle of Activity along Washington Avenue
By Martin Davis
Virginia’s First Lady, Suzanne S. Youngkin, paid a visit to the Mary Washington Monument site on May 1. On Memorial Day, a ceremony commemorating Revolutionary War Hero Hugh Mercer will take place at his monument on Washington Avenue.
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The FXBG Advance cuts through the talking points to deliver both incisive and informative news about the issues, people, and organizations that daily affect your life. And we do it in a multi-partisan format that has no equal in this region. Over the past year, our reporting was:
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An editorial written a day or two ago by Martin Davis referenced a “movement” to “dismantle public education” without further describing or identifying such a movement. He used other pejorative words such as “amassing its forces”, “attack”, “undermine”,” upend”, and “destroy”. He further accused the Trump Administration of being the culmination of such attacks. Throughout, he seems to confuse the fate of public education with the fate of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE).
Unfortunately for Mr Davis, some of his evidence was inaccurate or misleading and his analysis of the proper role of the Federal Government in education policy and funding is incoherent, since he takes both sides of the issue. Recently, Mr Davis's Advance outlined what would happen should Title I funding and Head Start funding be stripped from the federal budget, as Trump has proposed. In fact, the official 2025 Budget proposal does not end Head Start funding and Title 1 is maintained at the current level of $18.4 billion. Two specific grant programs under Title I, totaling $428 million annually, would be eliminated. These programs support migrant students.
Mr Davis also includes a graph which shows the growth of school attendance in the U.S. over the past 175 years. He does not point out the obvious fact that practically all of that growth occurred before the advent of the DOE nor does he point out that not all of this growth is due to public schools, but also includes private and home schools.
After arguing that cuts in federal funding would have significant effects on local school districts, he admits “the relatively scant number of dollars the federal government dispenses.”
Mr Davis acknowledges that U.S. public schools have fallen behind during the last 60 years of Federal funding and control, while decrying the Trump Administration’s efforts to restore state, local, and parental control of their schools. Public schools are not and will not be harmed by those advocating for alternatives such as private, charter, and homeschooling. Just as in business, sports, entertainment, competition drives everyone involved toward excellence.
Out with the old and in with the new. Which reminds of Stafford VA sitting on a gold mine and letting it slip through the cracks. I'm talking the proposed Wildly popular gas station Buc-ee's that wants to locate in the Rt 630 corridor. Already lost out to Rockingham County VA who will be the first location in our state. 200 jobs and an investment of more than 60 million dollars in Rockingham County. It will include over 120 fueling stations, 600 parking spaces and 20 electric vehicle charging stations. Those who tried to stop it have one choice. MOVE!!