| "You should know that the spouse lunch every Tuesday is really fun," she said. "We're putting on a Health Fair on November 9th and I'm helping with the Blood Drive. So we were getting a briefing on screenings for women's heart disease."
"Someone asked 'what's the test?' to which the woman replied 'your height, weight and body mass index'," Franni related. "So I said 'you just lost us'. The woman then came back with 'but there'll be refreshments' to which I said 'they better be fat free'."
"Here's something else I learned that I think is amazing," Franni said switching subjects. "Minnesota is 49th in school counselors to students ratio. I was scared to ask who was 50th."
"That works out to 1 counselor for every 800 students," she exclaimed. That's just astounding. With all the unfunded mandates from Bush's disastrous No Child Left Behind program to all the state and local budget cuts, this isn't actually surprising. Maybe surprisingly sad is a better descriptive.
"Anyway, Blanche Lincoln's bill will help fix this," she said. Lincoln is the senior Democratic Senator from Arkansas. The bill is S 538. Al is a cosponsor.
U.S. Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) today introduced legislation to increase the number of school counselors, school social workers and school psychologists in high-need school districts, many of which are located in rural and lower-income areas.
"School counselors, psychologists, and social workers play an essential role in helping students achieve a bright future. However, many schools have limited access to these crucial support service personnel," said Lincoln. "Each day, teachers in our schools are tasked not only with addressing the academic needs of students, but also the behavioral, social, and emotional needs. When they are left to address these emotional and behavioral issues, they have less time to deliver high quality academic instruction to the rest of the students in their class. Additionally, teachers often do not have the training or expertise to deal with many of the emotional issues their students face. Children overcoming mental illness or family issues need the assistance of a trained professional, such as a school psychologist, school counselor, or school social worker."
(lincoln.senate.gov)
The bill would issue grants to districts to help them address their dearth of counselors. For example, it would provide grants to hire counselors. Any student who becomes a school guidance counseling or school psychologist would qualify for loan forgiveness programs.
"I also sat in on a mental health parity bill briefing by Lauren Gilchrist," she said. Gilchrist is the ASPH Public Health Policy Fellow for the Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee. "This bill is going to be implemented in 2010. I'm interested in how this bill is going to be codified."
Her inner policy wonk was most definitely Codification is the process of determining what is a recognized disease or disorder. She's especially interested because of her interest in treating eating disorders and addiction.
I asked about the breakfast at Al's office.
"Oh my God, it was packed!" she exclaimed. "We had to move some people into Al's office to accomodate everyone. It was great."
By 9 a.m. this morning, Sen. Al Franken's office in Washington, D.C., was already overflowing with nearly 100 Minnesotans.
The occasion happened to be the junior senator's third official "Minnesota Breakfast with Al." ...
...
Franken's wife, Franni, and his daughter, Thomasin, were also at the event, which drew about double the people of the previous breakfast.
"We are absolutely delighted [with the turnout]," said Franni. "It's another opportunity to meet more Minnesotans."
And, if nothing else, it was another opportunity for Minnesotans to meet their new senator.
(MinnPost) |
"I'm just tremendously busy," Franni Franken responded. I'd asked how it was going. I then asked about how Rosh Hashanah went, the Jewish New Year.
