Columnist Susan Snyder: We are hooked on ratings

Friday, Dec. 27, 2002 | 4:08 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION

December 28-29, 2002

Susan Snyder's column appears Fridays Sundays and Tuesdays. Reach her at snyder@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4082.

Humans probably have been sizing up each other since we could measure a tiger's saber tooth -- or about as long as we've been waiting for downtown Las Vegas to thrive.

Although rankings don't paint a detailed picture of who we are, they can be useful in tracking our general direction. As we conclude this year let's take a look at some of the ratings we received in 2002. Maybe we'll want to plot a different course in 2003.

January: The Children's Advocacy Alliance ranked Nevada 44th in per-student funding. We were $1,000 per student behind the national average.

February: The conservative Manhattan Institute for Policy Research ranked Nevada 45th in educational choice, citing large districts, few charter schools and a lack of tax credits for sending kids to private schools.

March: The Kids Count child advocacy group ranked Nevada fifth nationally in reducing the number of children at risk for living in poverty.

Clark County's coroner's office recorded 292 suicides among people of all ages -- the largest number in history.

April: Bloomberg Personal Finance magazine rated Nevada third nationally in terms of tax burdens on wealthy families and ninth for taxes on retirees, making it one of the country's most wealth-friendly states.

May: Nevada ranked 34th -- falling eight places from 2001 -- in a national livability survey by Morgan Quitno, a Kansas research firm. The rating takes into account 43 factors including crime rates, living costs, teacher-student ratios, traffic deaths and health insurance coverage.

June: Remember, I am only the messenger. An American Federation of Teachers survey ranked Nevada 12th nationally in teacher salaries. The study showed our teachers were paid an annual net of $43,137, on average. That was $6,227 higher than the national average.

July: U.S. Census Bureau's Annual Survey of State and Local Government Employment and Payroll (first among "Most Pedantic of Government Report Titles") ranked Nevada first in the percentage of public employees who work in jails and prisons. Must be a lot of folks behind bars. Read January again.

Census figures show Nevada remained the nation's divorce capital, with 13.8 percent of residents divorced. The national average is 9.7 percent.

August: The Education Trust, a minority student advocacy group, ranked Nevada ninth in the number of classes by teachers instructing outside their fields of study.

September: Nevada's summer was the driest on record and a hair shy of being the hottest, National Climatic Data Center officials said.

Joblessness was lukewarm. U.S. Labor Department figures ranked Nevada 24th with a 5.1 percent unemployment rate.

October: Census figures released before Halloween show Nevada led the nation in small business growth, rising 7 percent from 1999.

November: The National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy said the pregnancy rate among Nevada girls ages 15 to 19 dropped to 56 per 1,000. It was 61 per 1,000 in 1999.

December: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration ranked Nevada 17th worst for the number of fatal crashes involving drunk drivers.

Bet we could do better there -- starting Tuesday.