LAS VEGAS (KTNV — A Las Vegas Valley student will get to kick off the new school year with the field trip of a lifetime.
I spoke with local 8th grader Amelie, who is one of 75 first place awardees in a new nationwide scholastic contest called “America’s Field Trip.” She’s also the only first place winner from Nevada!
The contest asked students across the country to submit a video of them responding to the question, “What does America mean to you?” It challenged students to think critically about our nation’s journey to becoming a more perfect union.
In her video, Amelie spoke about the need to make public spaces and architecture more welcoming to people from all walks of life, and to encourage more face-to-face connection and conversation. She says people often feel empowered to say hateful things behind the shield of screens and that we need more in-person discussions with our peers to truly understand one another and to be able to empathize.
“If we’re all stuck in our houses being online, anonymous behind our usernames, we can’t really talk about our issues as well as if we’re in a park, maybe connecting over a conversation you can’t just log off of,” Amelie said.
What really stood out to me was when she told me that kids are definitely taking notice of the political polarization our country is dealing with. In fact, she said she’s seeing fellow students actually mimic the behavior of adults in this incredibly volatile political climate and election cycle.
“Do you think the same divisiveness we’re seeing in adults on both sides of the aisle is even trickling down to young people right now?” I asked Amelie.
“Yes of course, even in my school, there was political debate practically about what kids knew, and I noticed there were little spouts of things that might not exactly be too accurate going on in these conversations. And these conversations are ultimately what will shape our political standing,” Amelie responded.
She and the other contest winners were selected by a panel of current and former educators. It was actually an educator in Amelie’s life, Miss Rush, who encouraged her to enter the contest.
If your child may be interested, another America’s Field Trip contest for the 2024-2025 school year will begin around September. You can sign up for updates here.
For winning, Amelie will get to go on a field trip to Washington, D.C. That’ll include a visit to the National Archives, and she tells me she can’t wait to dig into our country’s history. It’s really the perfect place to reflect on what America means to her.
A recent Review-Journal letter to the editor mischaracterized Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s Southern Nevada Economic Development and Conservation Act, also known as the Clark County Lands bill. As the former executive director of the Nevada Conservation League, I wholeheartedly support this legislation, so I wanted to set the record straight.
Sen. Cortez Masto has been working on this bill for years in partnership with state and local governments, conservation groups like the NCL and local area tribes. It’s true that the Clark County lands bill would open 25,000 acres to help Las Vegas grow responsibly, while setting aside 2 million acres for conservation. It would also help create more affordable housing throughout the valley while ensuring our treasured public spaces can be preserved for generations to come.
What is not correct is that the money from these land sales would go to the federal government’s coffers. In fact, the opposite is true.
The 1998 Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act is a landmark bill that identified specific public land for future sale and created a special account ensuring all land sale revenues would come back to Nevada. In accordance with that law 5 percent of revenue from land transfers goes to the state of Nevada for general education purposes, 10 percent goes to the Southern Nevada Water Authority for needed water infrastructure and 85 percent supports conservation and environmental mitigation projects in Southern Nevada. This legislation has provided billions to Clark County and will continue to benefit generations of Southern Nevadans. Sen. Cortez Masto’s lands bill builds upon the act’s success.
So here’s the good news: All of the money generated from land made available for sale under Sen. Cortez Masto’s bill would be sent to the special account created by the 1998 law. Rather than going to an unaccountable federal government, the proceeds would continue to help kids in Vegas get a better education, bolster outdoor recreation and modernize Southern Nevada’s infrastructure.
I know how important it is that money generated from the sale of public land in Nevada stay in the hands of Nevadans, and so does the senator. That’s why she opposed a Republican effort last year to sell off 200,000 acres of land in Clark County and other areas of the country that would have sent those dollars directly to Washington.
Public land management in Nevada should benefit Nevadans. We should protect sacred cultural sites and beloved recreation spaces, responsibly transfer land for affordable housing when needed and ensure our state has the resources it needs to grow sustainably. I will continue working with Sen. Cortez Masto to advocate for legislation, such as the Clark County lands bill, that puts the needs of Nevadans first.
Paul Selberg writes from Las Vegas.
click to expand photos
Las Vegas High’s baseball team claimed a 3-2 home win over Coronado on Friday.
Las Vegas (9-13-1) next hosts Rancho at 10 a.m. Saturday. Coronado (13-14) hosts Chaparral at 3:30 p.m. Monday.
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Nevada’s jobless rate is holding steady, but the state is still adding jobs.
A new report from DETR shows February’s unemployment rate unchanged at 5.3 percent, with the labor force growing by nearly 3,800 people.
MORE ON FOX5: Nevada unemployment rate rises to 5.3% in January
Nevada now has about 1.6 million nonfarm jobs, up 2.2 percent over the past year and 1,500 more jobs than in January.
“This month’s report shows a strengthening labor market,” said David Schmidt, Chief Economist. ”Compared to the report for January, the pace of job gains in the past year increased from 1.9% to 2.2%, building on what was already the fastest pace of job growth in the country. While the unemployment rate remained stable, the labor force participation rate rose to 63.7%, 1.7 percentage points higher than the national level.”
In Las Vegas, employment ticked up by 1,100 jobs in February, about 0.1 percent, and is up more than 25,000 jobs compared to last year.
Reno added 1,000 jobs on the month, while Carson City shed about 200 but is still slightly above where it was a year ago.
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