Essential Estrogen

Iowans wishing to sound off on House File 2380 will have an opportunity next Monday. The public hearing will take place Monday, March 5, at 6:30 p.m. in the Iowa House chamber. Speakers will be limited to three minutes, and written testimony is encouraged. Those who wish to speak should sign up in the Legislative [...]

The Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics has announced that the competition for the 2010 Carrie Chapman Catt Prize for Research on Women and Politics has an entry deadline of Dec. 1. From the press release: This annual competition is designed to encourage and reward scholars embarking on significant research in the area [...]

I just watched an incredible documentary on the Independent Film Channel about the Milton Hershey School in Hershey, Pennsylvania.  Wow.  What an awesome legacy Mr. and Mrs. Hershey left for their community. An introduction on their website is below.  www.mhs-pa.org . “At Milton Hershey School®, we believe that all students can be successful. We know that [...]

Teen library patrons in Ames will continue to have the opportunity to access accurate sex education materials thanks to a vote Thursday night by the local library’s board of trustees. Members of the board voted 6-to-1 to continue to make copies of the Sex, Etc. magazine available, both on display and for free distribution. The [...]

Mike Lillis of The Washington Independent filed this report from the late-night happenings of the Senate Finance Committee: The Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday night approved an amendment providing tens of millions of dollars to fund abstinence education programs for teens. The proposal, offered by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), would provide $50 million per year [...]

More government money has been spent on the cause of sexual abstinence in Texas than any other state, but it still has the third-highest teen birth rate in the country and the highest percentage of teen mothers giving birth more than once. What else do you need to know? Abstinence-only sexual education has failed our [...]

U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, a Democrat who has represented Iowa since the mid-1970s, made the following statement on the floor of the U.S. Senate this morning in relation to U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat who lost his battle with cancer a few weeks ago: “Mr. President, I look around this chamber, and I [...]

One of my favorite political cartoonists is R.J. Matson, and here’s his gem about the Obama school speech controversy: There has been a lot written about the school speech and I won’t attempt to rehash it all here. But I do think that the population that has taken the most grief and garnered the least [...]

It’s school board election day. Eleven Linn County school districts and Kirkwood Community College in Linn County will be heading to the voting booth, and there are also public measures at play in Cedar Rapids, Mount Vernon and North Linn schools. Here are links to the sample ballots for each district (and broken down by [...]

The Linn County Auditor’s office has the unofficial school board election results available. The most interesting of tonight’s results happened in the Marion Independent School District where voters were asked to select three at-large members from a group of five candidates. While both Diane Bys and Alan Tribble won clear majorities, two of the three [...]