The Courier
NEWS
News from the Heart of Idaho Camas • Lincoln • Gooding
December 9, 2020
Vol 44 Num 50
Grant Funds Books & Backpacks State Wide Mask Mandate?
In November, the Camas County School Library received $5,000 in grant funding from the Idaho Commission for Libraries (ICfL) for the 2020-2021 school year. Along with helping purchase quality, age-appropriate fiction and nonfiction books, this funding also ensures that kindergarten and first-grade students are allowed to checkout at least two books per week. The goal of the ICfL’s Supporting Beginning Readers Mini-Grants are: to increase the amount of reading done in the home; to increase access to age-appropriate, quality, fiction and nonfiction titles in elementary school libraries; and to increase the number of children reading on grade level. Camas County School Librarian Roxanne Bell said, “Because of this grant, we will have enough books for our littlest, and often most underserved, students to be able to take at least two books home per week to read with their adults.” To keep these books safe, students have been working on “Book Care Rules” since August. One of those rules is to keep books in the backpack unless they are reading. However, Mrs. Bell said the most important rule is... Enjoy your books! ICfL Youth Services Consultant Staci Shaw said, “Research verifies that children who are not reading on grade level by the end of first grade only have a one in eight chance of ever catching up without costly direct intervention. ”Scores from the 2017 Idaho Reading Indicator* show that 49 percent of incoming kindergarteners recognized fewer than 11 letters of the alphabet, and of low-income children, that number rose to 63 percent. The availability of reading material in the home, whether owned or borrowed from the library, is directly associated with children’s achievement in reading comprehension.** The 2012 “Idaho Public Elementary School Library Study: Children’s Access to Books,” conducted by Boise State University literary expert Dr. Roger Stewart, determined that just over a quarter of Idaho public elementary school libraries received $100 or less from their school to purchase new books for the entire 2011 -2012 school year. ICfL School Library Consultant Jeannie Standal said, “The majority of Idaho’s public school libraries do not have the funding to provide enough fiction and nonfiction books to meet the needs of Idaho’s students. ”State Librarian Ann Joslin said, “A child’s educational foundation is established early, and the amount of reading done in the home is the single most important factor in the development of a child’s literacy skills.” Joslin added, “With this grant funding, which was appropriated by the Idaho state legislature, we are helping our Idaho elementary school libraries develop and foster critical early literacy skills in our next generation of Idahoans.” *Idaho State Department of Education **National Center for Education Statistics, 2001
Last Friday, State Representatives Toone and Davis sent out a request to District 26 citizens to write Governor Brad Little asking for a statewide mask mandate. The stated reason for this request was, “Idahoans are dying in record numbers and urgent, meaningful action is required.” Since the pandemic started, there have been about 100,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus in Idaho and approximately 1000 deaths attributed to this disease. If these numbers are correct, that is a death rate of about 1%. However, when you factor in co-morbidity (death of individuals with pre-existing conditions) which is about 95%, the real death rate from coronavirus is around .05%. In a recent study by Rutgers University in New Jersey, nearly 90% of those who died of Covid-19 in at least two New Jersey hospitals had prior “do not resuscitate” orders. While it is difficult to obtain current overall death rates, an analysis of CDC Excess Death data by Dr. Genevieve Briand (an economics professor at John Hopkins University) shows Covid-19 “has relatively no effect on [total] deaths in the United States.” Her analysis also showed a huge drop in deaths attributed to heart disease, respiratory disease, influenza and pneumonia, in some cases as much as a 95% drop. Part of this drop may be due to recategorization of deaths. “What we should have observed is an increased number of heart attacks and increased Covid-19 numbers. But a decreased number of heart attacks and all the other death causes doesn’t give us a choice but to point to some misclassification,” Briand said. The heartache of losing a loved one (no matter what the cause) can not be minimized, but the hyper-politicalization of this disease is producing vast amounts of misinformation. If Idahoans are in fact “dying in record numbers,” a statewide mask mandate might be appropriate. However, if the data shows that Idahoans are not dying in increased numbers, a mask mandate is simply a politcal placebo. While the majority of people are not wearing masks (regardless of mask requirements), many small businesses are suffering from shutdown policies. Some of these businesses may never return. Also, many of our elderly are dying earlier than they should because of isolation. Humans need to socialize. They need to touch each other. Taking that away is a death sentence.