Previously: Rick Santorum (r) in Lee’s Summit, Missouri (February 3, 2012)
Last night republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum held a rally in Lee’s Summit, Missouri as a prelude to Tuesday’s beauty contest primary. Several republican state representatives from the area and Senator Kraus (r) warmed up the crowd before Rick Santorum’s arrival.
One portion of Senator Kraus’ (r) remarks garnered a bit of attention:
@eyokley Eli Yokley
Sen. Will Kraus on KC Schools in Lee’s Summit: “Moms and dads don’t want that urban flight into our school districts.” 15 hours ago
@ssnich Sean Nicholson
Oh wow RT @eyokley: Sen. Will Kraus on KC Schools in Lee’s Summit: “Moms and dads don’t want that urban flight into our school districts.”11 hours ago
The transcript of Senator Kraus’ remarks on the schools in their entirety:
Senator Will Kraus (r): ….Uh, another main issue this year is our, is our schools. Uh, you’re gonna hear a lot about the Kansas City School District and the fact it’s not accredited. And some of those children are gonna be ab, because of, because of the decision called Turner those kids can come out to the suburban school districts. And I’ve heard from a lot of moms and dads out there that they, they don’t want that, that urban flight, if you will, into our school districts. And we’ve got a couple, couple things on the horizon that we’re gonna be trying to do to solve that problem.
And it, you know, it’s really a good thing. Every child deserves an education. And we know [applause] , and we know, uh, Kansas City is not providing that, that, uh, education right now. But two solutions that are on the table, uh, for Kansas City, this is one [inaudible]. The Kansas City superintendents have come to the table and so has the Mayor [Sly James] of Kansas City with a, with proposals to solve this problem. And in St. Louis there hasn’t been one solution come up to solve the problem from the school districts that are there. And so I think [inaudible] we have to commend our Kansas City mayor for willing to take over the school district to try to solve the problem. I don’t agree with that solution, I agree with the supe, superintendents from the, uh, ru, from the school districts that are around here. ‘Cause they’ve kind of come together and said, you know what, why don’t we break up the school district [inaudible] empower districts, the districts that are closest to the Kansas City area to take over the Kansas City District and, first of all, do it by contract, and then if the district wants to, annex it into the districts. And that would break that, that district up in to districts that are accredited. And that’ll get those students into accredited school districts right away and it’ll get school, superintendents that know what they’re doing in, to control those buildings. And it keeps those kids in their neighborhood schools. And I, as a parent I will tell you that I know that when parents are involved kids get a better education. And if we take and bus ’em out here to suburban schools districts their parents aren’t gonna come out to these schools. And their, it’s, that’s not a solution [inaudible] the right solution. And so, I, that’s, that’s gonna be on the horizon. We’re gonna be talking about that in General Assembly this year. Um, amongst other things….
[emphasis added]