Yeah, you know what it is. It's Saturday. Bustin some pencils. Dr. Johnny Lippinati. Jacob Chairman of the board. Me. Dr. Tim Slecker.
Slecker, whether you're up in Hayward, in Racine, somewhere over there, you know, anywhere on the western side of Wisconsin Prairie.
Prairie, what Jacob Prairie to sack. Prairie to sack. Yeah. Pleasant Prairie Prairie to sack. Prairie to Shane. We got a lot of prairies around here.
Well, you know, it's little house on the Prairie. Come on. Everybody knows that Melissa Gilbert or that would be Laurel Ingalls Wilder. Yes.
Yeah, she wrote those books on the Prairie and those prairies were in Wisconsin. Oh, but it is a Saturday show. I mean, it's one hour of busted pencils. And again, we always appreciate listeners, whether you're driving around listening to us.
If you're, you know, out in the shed, cutting wood, whatever, whatever it is, you got your earbuds in you're like, man, I can't wait to listen to these three guys talk some education.
Because my neighbors been asking me questions and that's the thing to remind everybody to, yes, this show. No, this isn't insiders. Well, we might be insiders.
But we're bringing education topics so that your neighbor can finally say, oh, now I know what they're talking about.
So there we are. But before we start today, got to check in. Start with Jacob. Jacob, how are you doing on a beautiful, extremely cold Saturday that, you know, I mean, I used to live in Wisconsin.
So I remember, I got to tell you, though, here in Pennsylvania, we're hitting the negatives right now. So I'm not so sure that you got anything up on, you know, the Mid Atlantic States right now, Jacob.
Usually when people move south to get away from the weather, they don't go like one standard deviation south Wisconsin. Oh, here I am in the sunny plains of Pennsylvania here in January.
I'm cold Tim. I'm freezing out here every day, walk into my car, go at home. It is too cold. There's too much snow. I don't know what I'm going to do about it.
But what has warmed my heart, Dr. Tim Slecker is I know it's a big situation. It's very complicated still. It's very much in flux. But by and large, I've seen really good democratic action going on in the country lately with people protesting largely safely, largely peacefully.
And that warms my heart because when you see things on the news, it can get you down and you start to think, am I the only one who thinks this is bad? But no, there's a lot of people out there and we seem to be behaving pretty well about it. So that warms my heart, even in the middle of a frigid Wisconsin winter Tim.
Wow. Johnny Lupinati, how are you doing, man?
I'm doing good. You know, I think you touched on it. It's cold. We are, you know, a month into 2026 and, uh,
woo, man, it's been a lively month. As Jacob said, uh, warmed also by, you know, the people exercising their civic responsibilities to speak truth to power and to do so, you know, by and large, peacefully. It's the idea being that like peace is not passivity. So it's not, you know, silence.
Uh, when we, you know, as citizens experience, uh, you know, something that we take issue with is that, you know, we have a civic responsibility to speak out to say, hey, these things ought not to be this way, um, to be more specific. If anybody listen is a what?
Protest in the United States, you know, what's going on? I'm a, hey, just in case, right? We've seen in the month of January.
Uh, you know, protesters, you know, driven by outrage over intensified immigration enforcement, specifically ice, ice being, you know, someone asked a great question yesterday in class. And I love great questions because sometimes it's the most simple question. That's a great question.
Somebody said, what does ice stand for? And a whole lot of other people look like, hey, I'm not sure either. So hey, a little mini lesson to start Saturday. I was we're talking about, you know, the specific protests targeting ice is immigration and customs enforcement.
Right. So and what are they specifically protesting? What are folks specifically protesting? Um, I believe by and large, if we're to put like, you know, blanket over it is the intensified immigration enforcement, but more specifically, you know, what people
seem to be identifying as, you know, the increased raids and shootings, right?
Accountability, calling for accountability for federal agents, actions, you know, protesting the unjust treatment of immigrants and advocating against, you know, Trump administration's policies regarding the immigration and customs enforcement also referred to as ice.
Ice, ice, well, I'm glad Johnny ice, ice, baby, you asked that question because yeah, I sat there in class so many times going, oh, thank God, Johnny asked that question.
I didn't ask. No, no, no, I don't have a conversation in a group of undergraduate college students. And we're going to get into that today because sometimes it's the simplest questions we assume we know the answers to or that, you know, people who
ought to know the answers have those answers. And, you know, I mean, even with chat GPT and, you know, all your AI buds, you know, at our fingertips, there are a lot of things that we just don't know.
And maybe, you know, it feels like there should be shame for not knowing them, but we're also not asking the questions and often saying, hey, here's what this means or here's what this is.
So I like any question is a great question. You know, it's great to live in a state of inquiry, a curiosity.
Is that the 51st state state of inquiry with a capital being questions?
Well, we're going to we're going to get into that because
love, love for tests and exams. I love tests. I love tests. And in fact, so big fan of those big standardized tests and what I really like most about those types of tests when you make the consequences, public and
and shaming because man, if you're going to put together a test, you got to have severe consequences and public shaming because without that, how are kids ever going to learn to live in the real world. Jacob, you know what I'm saying.
Yeah, I feel shame every day. Tim, especially when I come in here and we do our education show and I think we could have done so much better.
Everyone, everyone sees the results. I interrupted him. He had something great to say and I just started blabbering out. I got to do better next time.
Well, maybe we won't go all there, but no big test. We're kind of hinting around it like I should I know what I stands for is that a key requirement to live in a democracy in America.
You know, that question of well, what does it mean to be an American? Can you prove your Americanness and people have been asking that kind of question for a long time.
And in fact, if you are legally using the immigration system with the intention of becoming a citizen, we do require that you take a test that proves that you know something about American history.
And maybe more importantly, American government or what some people remember is that horrible class in high school civics.
Oh boy. Oh, it's a great class coming from coming from two social studies.
I know it was great class. It was like to be it was that class where I was like, oh man, I finally get to look like I know something.
I don't want to sit there and it was like, well, why do you know this stuff? I don't know. It's just I think it's really important. But yeah, civics and, you know, the fact that we ask immigrants who are becoming citizens of this country to demonstrate a mastery of a certain knowledge of our history and our civics.
You know, that really seems to make a lot of sense. And in fact, there was a point to during all of the high stakes testing that really, really kind of exploded in, you know, the the odds and through that.
All of a sudden, I remember some legislators somewhere said, you know, I don't think these kids take enough tests.
We should in fact immigrants have to prove they know their stuff. Why shouldn't high school kids have to prove they know their stuff.
And there was a movement in the country with some states that said, yeah, you know what, let's take questions from the immigration and naturalization test and let's administer it to high schools.
And in fact, let's not let kids graduate unless they can pass an American civics class.
And everybody was like, well, that's a good idea.
Legislator.
In fact, it was such a good idea, Wisconsin at that time, Jacob, when I lived in Wisconsin, Wisconsin said, that's a great idea.
And me being there, as you pointed out, I went, what a horribly stupid idea to add one more level of stress.
You're going to publicly put the scores out there. And more importantly, you're going to deny graduation.
And I got to thinking at that time, Jacob, and I wrote some blog posts and, you know, even got on a couple of talk shows and even did the again at that time, busted pencils was just a podcast.
And so you know what, I will support this me. And in case Wisconsin legislators in the governor wanted to know, if you want my buy in, I will give it to you on one condition that all of the legislators in Wisconsin have to take the test and pass it and make their scores public first.
And then they can make that test a requirement for high school seniors. And Jacob, you know how many people.
Why is this coming at me this whole story?
Well, I'm just saying, Johnny knows a little bit about that.
I got you.
Let me, let me point out the popularity that created around me.
Scott Walker was really coming for your vote. So he must have really welcomed this challenge.
Scott Walker. And then it was governor Evers too at the time. And yeah, I did not make a lot of people happy. In fact, I think I even went on Wisconsin public radio and talked about it.
And yeah, like boy, that's a good idea. Needless to say, the Wisconsin legislature never took me up on the idea of putting together a civics test for themselves and instead passed without my consent.
But man, check it out.
Almost 10 years later, a legislature and one of America's 50 states Nebraska, uh oh, they might be requiring their legislators to pass a civics test.
Oh, I'm loving that. Talk more about it when we get back.
No, that is not the jingle from schoolhouse rock. That's busted pencils music right there. You know, maybe I'm just a bill.
On Capitol Hill. That's what we're talking about civics. Oh, no, Tim Slecker was not successful at getting the Wisconsin legislature to administer their own civics test. But hey, check it out.
74 million dot org comes out right away. Should Nebraska legislators be tested on civics knowledge. New bill says yes.
Uh, so in Wisconsin Lincoln Nebraska teens under a 2019 state law must clear a civics requirement to graduate immigrants must pass a test on civics and US history to gain US citizenship.
Uh, but now a bipartisan group of Nebraska state senators wants to write into law that new members of the officially nonpartisan legislature take a 20 questions civics test and publicly post the scores.
Oh, my god, they were listening and reading busted pencils back in the day. Johnny Lupinachi, is this a good development.
Well, Tim, interesting development to focus on right now. But to me, I mean, you know, uh, the having your legislators take a test.
I mean, I think it seems like I'm going to try out the sarcasm and incredibly good use of everybody's time.
But, uh, but, you know, I think understanding what the nature of this test is, right, the civics test, which is history and government questions generally, you know, 10, whether they're random or not, but 10 questions from a set of 100 questions about how the US government.
Basically works and general questions about, you know, history and the government and, you know, like grabbing random 10 and I think Tim, it's.
It's going to be 20. It's going to be 20, they say, okay, so 20 of them that then I'm basing this on the fact that I, they're rather elusive about what's going to be on the test saying that it's going to be drawn from the United States naturalization.
exams, you know, so that's part of like you mentioned earlier in the show, what people have to do if they're, you know, an immigrant in this country and they're going through the process of working towards citizenship.
So Tim, I mean, is it you passed me as a good or is it bad? I mean, I don't think the test itself is bad. I don't think it's necessarily great. I would hope that anybody in the political process or making decisions about the political process like voters, I like all have a general working understanding of the basics of the government and right and that's what these questions are right just randomly like.
But shouldn't we have proof, shouldn't we have proof about what you said you us, you should assume why shouldn't there be proof if they're demanding proof of 18 year olds, shouldn't we also as citizens have proof that our legislators themselves have a basic knowledge of American government civics, because I know you think this might be off topic, but the reality is is that as you can.
As we talk about and see the ice protests, the ice potential use of maybe too much force issues of saving.
Of course, I know, maybe that's, I mean, it's horrible, but you hear, you hear people come on and make statements about what people have a right to do what they don't have a right to do.
And now, particularly with this last killing of a citizen, now you've got second amendment people that are kind of going like, well, wait a minute.
Second amendment isn't negotiable. I mean, the whole conversation around the right to peacefully demonstrate, you know, comes down to understanding this.
And so when you have talking heads coming out and making statements about what are supposed to be facts or laws that might be suspect or, or them trying to push an agenda.
Well, maybe part of the problem is is that they didn't know their civics to begin with. And this is just, you know, hey, if you're going to enforce the law, maybe ought to know the law, maybe ought to know the questions. Jacob's agreeing with me.
Yeah, I've got a thought.
Well, maybe we need to get a fellow civic media contributor, Jim Santelon here to answer my question, but I'm thinking if I'm a legislator and I answer a question about how civics works and how the law works.
If I later go on and break that constitutional law, can they bring out my test answer that they published in public and saying you knew that you knew that that is not what the constitution says you answered here on your test.
That's my plot.
Well, and, and Tim, I think I get what you're saying except, you know, because I'm familiar with the test and maybe we could share a little bit about the test with our listeners, the, you know, the kinds of questions that are on a naturalization test.
And I'm assuming that they're going to derive those 20 questions from that. That's what they say in the description of the bill.
You know, these aren't necessarily complicated questions. They, they don't show whether or not you understand the like the like the differences between, you know, rights and responsibilities, the like the application of freedom of speech or the complexities of, you know, a right to bear arms.
You know, they're more in general, like, hey, which of the following for our rights, you know, freedom of speech, you know, right to bear arms. So you're kind of have like it's pretty simple.
And I would say like a lot of middle schoolers, I know can crush this exam. So let's get into it a little bit more. And I'm still kind of, I'm still not convinced it's great use of legislative time.
But, but, but I, but I'm here to be, you know, to be learned. So teach me why you think it's a good idea when we get that bus to pencils.
Oh, that'll wake you up. Busted pencils fully-led education, educated, educated talking education, Dr. Johnny Lupinaji, Jacob chairman of the board, me, Dr. Tim Sleger, talking civics, Nebraska, putting forth a bill to require the passage of a civics test.
And, um, Johnny, yeah, let's, if we get time because, you know, anybody who's sitting there going like, Tim, Johnny's right, man, this is supposed to be substantial stuff and you're worried about, no, I actually made that point.
I mean, at years ago, what I actually want to came out this though, um, Nebraska is officially a non partisan legislature.
And I wonder if I was in your class of undergraduates, like you were talking about not knowing what's ice mean.
I wonder how many people understand or know what a non partisan legislature is because potentially I could see somebody using context clues and going like, like, like they're elected people aren't from a party or something like, like, like, unicameral.
Let's, let's later on the questions that in your classroom hands go up because, you know, good teaching you have, you know, an environment where it's okay to ask a question.
And I think that's a valid one because so many of our listeners are familiar with, you know, partisan elections, where, you know, there is a political party affiliated, but usually, like, there's some of part, some local elections, some, you know,
like, electing a judge, right, these, these, these, these elections generally are non partisan, like, you don't have a political party affiliated with you.
And in Nebraska, Tim, it's, right, it's not just a legislature, which is referred to as unicameral, further like the nerds out there like us.
Those are two different things. Those are the non, the non partisan means you can't have a party affiliation to run, unicameral means there's only one house.
It's only a Senate or, or representatives, they don't have two houses.
And that's what they have in Nebraska, yes, unicameral non partisan.
But hey, just for reference, you made a point, you know, certain judges in Wisconsin, hiring or voting for the, the superintendent of public instruction, DPI, that is, quote, a non partisan election.
The candidates, what happens in Wisconsin for that election is, is if you want to run for the state superintendent, you are not running with any party endorsement, you yourself are not running as a party candidate.
So there, there's some, you know, an example. So I think listeners out there going like, yeah, there are examples of non partisan, right.
I just wonder, you know, what, what does that actually mean because I can think, you know, we've interviewed some candidates for the state superintendent in Wisconsin.
And they definitely have positions on.
Yeah, I mean, that's the thing is, is to try to help people on, it's like, you know, well, if I'm going to get elected to this position, does that mean I have to have no principles or no position.
No, no, no, yeah, yeah.
But I, you know, so, so that is, you know, whether it's the terms, it's, it's interesting.
But, but no, even the, the, in a quote, non partisan individual legislators will definitely identify with a set of political beliefs.
And there can be, oh my god, a diversity, I just use the word, a diversity of political opinions in a non partisan legislature.
Yeah, and I think Tim, like you point, you make a good point. I mean, every, everyone has a set of positions, right.
And, you know, those are influenced, certainly strongly by, like, by political parties, right.
But the whole impetus of this, really being, you know, originating from the idea that we're becoming increasingly more and more familiar with government shutdowns.
But it's like it's an effort to eliminate those partisan gridlocks, right.
Yeah.
You know, to have more, more individual mayor and, and community focused work, rather than, you know, influence from a formal party leadership.
Right. So there's the, you aren't necessarily beholden in theory.
And we get to in practice, but to say like the party line, right. It's more about how are we folk functioning, especially on a local level with, you know, with coalition with working together with not requiring, you know, or with hopes of avoiding the gridlock of like, well, there's just about an even amount of Republicans, there's just about an even amount of Democrats and they're automatically opposed one another.
So I think, you know, that's like the idea or the spirit behind having a nonpartisan legislature.
Is it, you know, when, when you talk about, you know, you've talked about it in the past quite a few times, is, is this an attempt to make, you know, the common good, be more of a focus.
In this idea of saying we're nonpartisan, and therefore, you know, we hope to be largely influenced by what's best for the common good.
Uh oh, I stopped him.
Well, I mean, I just some trying to think of an instance where the focus shouldn't be the common good.
So my, my simons is yes, yes, I, I, I don't know necessarily that I think nonpartisan is the, is the answer.
I definitely haven't experienced a lot of it. Honestly, not spent a lot of time focused on Nebraska legislature or other nonpartisan places.
But I certainly like it, I like it better, I say this to me, I like it better than bipartisan and a two party system.
I think two is, is a dangerous, you know, a limitation.
I think non is also impossible. So I like that, because like you said, it could have many, right?
It can shift in change. It could be more fluid based on an in theory based on local needs, based on a closer commitment to what it, what is the common good?
What's in the interest of the common good?
I think that's a, I think, I think yeah, my, that was my longer answer to yes, I think it gives us an opportunity.
Potentially to focus more closely on a common good, because you're not beholden to say, you know, a two party system.
One side better, better to the line, the other side better to the line, and they're going to probably oppose with one another or they'll agree and it'll pass through with no problem.
So it allows for more, more disagreement, more difference, which is the democratic process, right, Tim?
So I say yes, I think nonpartisan, I like better than bipartisan, but I think, you know, all like there should be, you know, a whole lot of perspectives on any given issue.
Listen to those perspectives and they should ideally write in a representative democracy, stem from or originate from the constituencies, concerns, perspectives and experiences.
Because in a true democracy decisions are being made by those directly impacted by the decision.
So when we have a representative democracy, which is, you know, a way of handling, you know, valuing true democracy, but scaling it up to larger, you know, populations and saying, well, we can't have everybody participating in the decision making.
So we'll elect a representative who will bring their constituencies, concerns, experiences and interests there, their focus of the common good to the larger deliberation.
So I'm a big fan of, you know, more than a two party system and elections, especially, but also in the legislative process.
So nonpartisan is exciting to me, Tim, I know that opens up the possibility for there to be, you know, getting math nerd out and number of parties involved.
And I like to think about this like N for Nebraska.
So the medical denotation of N.
The state of Nebraska.
And the end of the partisan.
So I'm kind of day.
They're rocking it.
Well, you know, you said don't like to and that made me think of my one of my favorite songs that I used to play for my son from Jack Johnson, three.
Three is a magic number.
Yes, it is.
You know, three, three.
You know, that was also a schoolhouse rock.
My man.
Three, three, three, three, three.
It's a magic number.
Yeah, there you go.
Whoa.
Bro, that's a schoolhouse rock.
I'm going to have to look up Jack Johnson's version of that because I bet.
Oh, but he's a cool dude.
Yeah, he's a cool dude than the film strip we dab rolled into our classroom.
We're dating ourselves now, Tim.
I'm trying to.
Oh, I'm younger there, saying Jack Johnson, saying three is a magic number.
Three, three is some.
But you know, back to nonpartisan too.
I mean, that the idea that it's supposed to be, you know, a more representative of everybody.
Again, I'll use the state superintendent Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
One of the reasons you want that, quote, to be a nonpartisan.
The position is this person is, you know, the chief of public schools in Wisconsin.
And we want those decisions to be made in the best interest of all children of all families.
And so the nonpartisan, I know people are like, Tim, that's all theoretical crap.
You know, I know, but it's worth thinking about.
Okay, though, here we go.
You know, before we end this break, Jacob.
Yes, Tim.
What stops one branch of government from becoming too powerful?
I'm going to go with a system of checks and balances or separation of powers.
Either those probably easily answered.
Johnny, what do you think?
Should we give that to Jacob?
I would say yes.
Okay.
That was the answer.
That was the, that was the answer.
However, real time application with Johnny was saying, um, is that true today?
Ideally.
I, yeah, it's like, what is the practice?
I mean, I think so.
I think so.
I mean, we still have.
System of checks and balances input.
I mean, you know, no, this is getting back to going.
Okay, great.
I know the answer to this question.
Sure.
And in fact, there's nuance to it, right?
And what I'm watching potentially in front of me right now is, is actually one branch of government
really trying to, um, thwart the balance of powers.
Absolutely.
And I would say, and again, I don't want to sound like I'm an apologist for that branch of government
right now.
But that's exactly why the system of checks and balances is written into how, you know, things work
because at any given time, if that branch asserts too much power or believes it's got too
much authority, the system of checks and balances puts it back into order.
And I think that's where we're at is the need for the health of that system of checks and balances.
And when it's, and when it's massively imbalanced, not only are those elected officials held responsible,
but the people speak.
And we're seeing that in masses right now around our country.
People are saying, this is not how we'd like things to be.
Oh, yeah.
We're back.
Hey, and just, it's Tim Johnny, Jacob, it's three of them, you know, three is the magic number.
That's what we were doing during break, finding renditions of the classic schoolhouse rock song.
Jack Johnson did a little bit of a twist on it.
And Jacob, who were you playing there during the break?
Be la soul.
Dayla soul.
So Johnny, I don't know, maybe we, we just need to admit it.
We need a three party system.
It's a magic number, man.
No, I said it's, it's either a nonpartisan or multipartisan.
It's an N number of parties represented based on the needs of the constituencies constituencies.
Man, I am struggling with annunciations today.
Were you an unciated an unciation?
You know, I, I have recently increased my teaching load during the week.
And I love it because I love, I mean, educated educators talk and education.
Well, we love teaching.
Yeah, we do a big chunk of the week when we're not coaching.
So my between coaching and teaching, I am talking way too much.
And then I get on this thing called buster pencils, where we talk even more.
And so you got it.
You got to talk.
You got to talk.
It's the end of the weekend.
I'm talked out him.
I'm all talked out.
That's all right.
That's all right.
We got you.
Jacob and Jacob and Dr. Tim, we can, we can handle it.
Oh, man.
So civics.
Yeah, maybe let's not mandate legislators.
But hey, if a nonpartisan legislature in a unicameral state like Nebraska wants to do it,
well, then by golly, let's let them do it because.
Hey, they must have been listening to busted pencils back in the 2018's anyway to come up with such a brilliant idea.
But how do we, you know, yeah, is civics knowledge though required or something that is.
You know, can you prove your civic values and your depth of understanding?
I think is what we're really saying with random factoid based questions.
And yes, I'm like, Jacob, yes, oh my god, yes, because I did really well.
You numerically do so.
I passed that test when I graduated from Wisconsin and darn it.
I know me some stuff.
No, it doesn't get at the practical.
What does it mean to live in a democracy?
What does it mean to live in a state of ambiguity and nuance when it comes to these?
As you point out, who's in power?
How do they interpret the Constitution?
My goodness, wait, interpret.
I'm a, I'm a traditionalist.
Oh, whatever it is, but trying to understand this, I think, you know what?
We absolutely as a society need way more opportunities to practice civic values to practice what it means to live in a democracy.
And actually the requirement of a high stakes factoid based test as if that's some kind of legitimate proxy for ensuring that citizens are going to, you know, live harmoniously in a democracy.
No, no, so just in case you guys were wondering like Tim, you're all over this.
No, I'm back to where I've always been any mandated high stakes standardized test that requires recall information is never an indicator of any type of knowledge that can be practiced.
The fact from the day I became an opt-outer, it was for that biggest reason, which is reducing learning, reducing experience, reducing a lived life into a question and an answer was always going to short change the education that we provide in this country.
To see legislators now mandating this on themselves.
Whatever, I mean, it's one of those things.
I just got one question for you, Tim.
What happened to you in a camera? What happened all there? What happened all the other camels? What happened?
Hey, my question is, is that the camel with one hump then or is that, is that a word?
So what do you call a two humped camel?
And Texas, maybe you have a Tennessee, too, you've got one camel hump.
The point is you can't have two humps.
God, that's epic, epic.
And now from the chairman of the board now for your moment of sin.
Democracy depends on citizens being informed.
And since our media, especially television reports mostly what people in power do and repeats what the people in power say, the public is badly informed.
And it means we cannot really say we have a functioning democracy.
Thanks for listening to the Busted Pencil's broadcast today.
And remember to grab great podcasts, chalked bull with more fully-ledged education talk on Apple podcasts, Spotify, and of course on the civic media website.
Hey, and don't be late for home room on Monday and make sure you catch next week's class and session on Wednesday and find us on Friday for producer's choice.
And of course, just like today, you can catch the Busted Pencil's broadcast at 3 p.m. Central time every Saturday across all the civic media network stations for that one hour of your favorite blue colors colors.
Give it Johnny and keep Busted Pencil's.