Backstabbing, that is.

These are Florida state senators, and they have an idea: Senate bill would tie teachers’ pay to students’ performance

Florida Senate Bill 6 is not popular among local teachers, to say the least.

The education reform bill would eliminate existing teacher contracts and replace them with contracts that base more than 50 percent of a teacher’s wages on student achievement.

Only the contracts for Wall Street bankers are safe from government meddling. Contracts negotiated by workers are ignored at will. Let’s see, there couldn’t possibly be a problem tying half of a teacher’s pay to student achievement. I mean, students certainly wouldn’t use that to manipulate teachers, and teachers wouldn’t feel pressure to get creative with the FCAT… No reason to worry at all about all of the A average students coming out of Florida schools unable to read.

This should really help to find teachers to work in the poorer schools in the state. 😈

A bad day for empires and emperors.

In 44BCE Julius Caesar was stabbed in the back by Senators. This was the first time, but definitely not the last time, this would happen.

In 1848 the Emperor of Austro-Hungary discovered he wasn’t the beloved leader of the Magyars, as revolution broke out in the Hungarian side of the Empire.

In 1917 Tsar Nicholas II decided that it was probably a good idea to hand the crown, mace, and scepter to his brother Michael, Prince of Lvov, who promptly turned it down. Unfortunately, Nicky wasn’t bright enough to get out of the country, and received the Julius treatment in the following year.

The 15^th of March is a bad day to be Emperor.

Good news: Whitey, the 3-year-old dog of rookie Justin Savidis, was found late Sunday and the two are on their way home.

The news is not so good for Judy Currier (72), who had to scratch at Galena because she can’t take standing on the runners and taking care of her dogs with a back injury from earlier in the race.

Unalakleet is waiting to greet its mayor, William “Middie” Johnson (16), who is currently running 35^th in his rookie race. Middie is a Native Alaskan and the grandson of Henry Ivanoff, a musher in the 1925 diphtheria serum relay to Nome which is considered the founding event for the Iditarod.

In the front, Lance wants to be the first to win 4 in a row; Jeff wants to be the second to win 5 overall; and Hans wants to be the second to win the Quest and Iditarod in the same year. Meanwhile, 69-year-old Jim Lanier (43) is consolidating his hold on being the oldest musher to finish the race is in 28^th place.

Beyond Elim
1 Lance Mackey (49)
2 Hans Gatt (20)
3 Jeff King (15)

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