For immediate release (706 words with optional cut) Current proposals to increase college enrollments won’t magically increase Americans’ academic abilities. Indeed, there is already evidence that many students — even those who graduate — fall far below the traditional standard for college achievement. That which follows offers a glimpse of the polarization of ability evident today within a university. If college attendance is expanded further, admissions officials will undoubtedly ratchet down the ability roster, and…

For immediate release (546 words) Common sense and lots of statistical evidence suggest that stable two-parent households provide the best environment for child-rearing. Children continuously raised with both parents are less likely to be in poverty, to get in trouble with the law and are much more likely to excel educationally.  Divorce and illegitimacy rates have risen in the United States since 1960. This is well known. What is not as well known is that…

For release March 20 and thereafter (665 words) ISTEP passage rates at the Charles A. Tindley Accelerated School in Indianapolis are among the state’s highest, but the school’s leaders and supporters believe they can be higher still. That confidence lies behind the school’s announcement that it will open an all-boys middle school in 2012-13 with an all-girls middle school to follow. Chancellor and CEO Marcus Robinson has data to show that urban children excel when…

Editors:  Please sub for this updated version. (546 words) Declining social order; rampant promiscuity; conventional morals in shambles; illegitimacy and venereal disease all too common: A description of much of contemporary America according to social scientist Charles Murray’s in his recent book “Coming Apart.”  Murray’s makes a credible case that the problems of poverty and social dysfunction trace to illegitimacy and divorce. A later column will critically review Murray’s thinking and evidence.  Today’s point:  these…

“Don’t just do something, stand there.” — William F. Buckley The timid avoid the large, dramatic errors but are dragged down by the small, persistent ones. That is the story of the Statehouse leadership this year, even and especially with a Republican governor and majorities in both houses. The high legislative offices, wrapped in compromise and purblind to absolutes, dictated the terms of debate for this General Assembly — and a sorry debate it was.…

The free-market works too silently and over such long stretches of time that it is in invisible in most policy arguments. An exception, however, occurred in my section of town when the market acted this week to protect our children from criminal predators. Earlier we had lost a 9-year-old girl whose great tragedy it was to live in the midst of what was described as a “hotbed” of child molesters — about two dozen older…

For release March 7 and thereafter (655 words) The average teen spends 16.7 hours a week on the Internet, not counting time spent with email, according to a survey by Yahoo!and ad agency Carat Interactive. Kaiser Family Foundation says children ages 8 to 18 spend more than seven and a half hours a day using a smart phone, computer, television or other electronic device. That doesn’t count the two hours spent texting or talking on…

For release Feb. 29 and thereafter (654 words) To borrow a phrase from the late Potter Stewart, I may not be able to define the word Hoosier, but I know one when I see him. And Sen. Richard G. Lugar is the quintessential Hoosier. Lugar has spent most of his life in public service on behalf of the citizens of this state. On that point, not even his primary opponent can disagree. Yet the Indiana…

For immediate release (546 words) “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” Psalms 110:10 (KJV) Science and scientific authority are often interjected into political discourse. Two recent letters to the editor in my local newspaper are examples. One author claimed that “… the science is clear: Smoke-free laws have no negative impact on bars or restaurants …” On another topic a writer decried the recent bill allowing schools to teach so-called creationism…