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Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Arkansas government UPDATE State lawmakers: 1 in four did not darken doors of college

Posted by Leslie Newell Peacock on Tue, Mar 12, 2013 at 1:23 PM

The national ribbing continues: Reuters cites a Chronicle of Higher Education study that the Arkansas has the highest percentage of state legislators with zero college education.

There are 135 legislators in Little Rock, 25 percent of whom do not have any college experience, according to the study. Comparatively, 8.7 percent of all state lawmakers nationwide have not attended college. ... The Arkansas legislature mirrors its state's population, said Hal Bass, a political science professor at Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. ... "Our rural, frontier political culture has not traditionally placed an especially high value on academic credentials for positions of leadership in society," Bass said.

UPDATE: This was correct in 2011, when it was written. It's been pointed out to us by a reader that it's not news, though for obvious reasons various news outlets are recirculating it. Who knows what the figures are now.

UPDATE: The D-G found (paywall)that the numbers were incorrect at the time. "At least 106 of Arkansas’ 134 state lawmakers say they have a bachelor’s degree, a number that significantly exceeds what was in a national report that said Arkansas had the least-educated legislature in the county," the D-G reported.

Tags: College education

        
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