American Oil and Gas Reporter - September 2018 - 128

funding made learning the lessons of
spending control "critically urgent." He
cited calculations by the Kansas Legislative
Research Department that indicated without "budgetary gimmicks," the approved
and proposed school funding would create
a $3.7 billion revenue shortfall over the
next four years.

school campuses. "We are the nation's
largest and strongest center-right student
organization," Kirk boasted.
As proof of his success, Kirk recounted
an incident at the University of California-Berkeley, when several hundred students who had come to protest, dropped

Student Radicalism
Kirk expressed concern about "the
rise of anti-Americanism in our universities
and colleges," calling it "a harbinger of
what the Democratic Party will look like
in a couple years."
"You can see it in Manhattan and
Brooklyn, people who are open Marxists
being elected to the U.S. Congress," he
maintained.
"The most assigned and read book in
colleges today is The Communist Manifesto," Kirk declared. "I encounter more
Marxists and socialists on college campuses than I do people who identify as
Democrats even. There are hundreds of
professors who have Mao Tse-tung posters
in their lecture halls."
This has resulted in a majority of students who say they are angry, rather than
thankful, to live in America, Kirk observed,
reflecting, "Think how twisted that is.
This is the greatest country ever and this
is the greatest time to live in this country.
The economy is roaring, wages are going
up and we have more job openings than
workers to fill them. Yet I am being told
by students at Stanford they are oppressed,
because they are being told they are victims.
"We are 5 percent of the world's population, yet we take in 50 percent of the
world's immigrants," Kirk went on. "We
are the most linguistically, religiously,
racially and ethnically diverse country,
yet I hear every day on universities that
we are racist, bigoted and homophobic."
But the good news is, he offered, "We
are winning them over. We are winning
around the very basic principles of free
enterprise, individual initiative, smaller
government and being in charge of your
own life."
He said Turning Point USA, which he
started six years ago in his parents' garage,
has grown to a staff of more than 100
and a presence on 1,300 college and high

AIPRO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Coming In October
The Official Convention Section
for the Permian Basin Petroleum Association annual meeting, Oct. 24-25
at the Midland Petroleum Club.

their signs after his presentation and admitted he had completely changed their
viewpoints.
"I finally realized that it isn't that students are opposed to our ideas," he concluded. "It is that they are not being exposed to them."
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FROM PAGE 115
Arkansas and June 11-12 in West
Arkansas, the association notes.
"The teachers show real interest in
learning more about the industry," Callan
relates. "If we have failed in any particular
area, it is in educating people about what
we do and why fossil fuels are important.
Teachers and their students are inundated
with the message about how bad fossil
fuels are. This gives us an opportunity to
talk about good things such as the standard
of living they provide."
Holding two workshops this year doubled the number of participating teachers
from 21 to 42, Baker notes, but shrinking
the format from three days to two meant
it only cost AIPRO 15 percent more than
what it did before. He explains that the
curriculum also covers a variety of industry sectors.
"Last year, we went to a Little Rock
pipe manufacturing facility that produces
pipe used for oil and gas pipelines,"
Baker recounts. "The teachers did not
realize we had that kind of production
in the state. We did something similar
by giving them an opportunity to see
the oil refinery in El Dorado. Seeing
that sort of thing up close and hearing
experts explain it is very popular with
the teachers."
Baker attended his first Arkansas Energy Rocks! workshop in 2017, he says.
"Two things struck me early in the seminar
and continued to be reinforced throughout,"
he describes. "The first was the quality
of questions from the teachers and their
interest. Secondly, and just as important,
was their interest in what type of jobs the
industry could provide students, particularly those not interested in college, and
what kind of living those jobs could provide. There are teachers seeking jobs for
their students at the same time the industry
is saying 'Give us people who will pass
a drug test, come to work on time and
work hard.'"
Callan participated on the producers'
panel at the West Arkansas workshop, he
notes. "The teachers asked a lot of really
good, pertinent, probing questions," he
describes. "They also wanted to know
about what got each of us, individually,
involved in the industry. I came away

128 THE AMERICAN OIL & GAS REPORTER

with a good appreciation of how in-tune
the teachers were with the subject matter
and their desire to learn about it."
According to Baker, teachers especially
appreciate the seminars' producer panel.
"To have engineers, geologists and government affairs people speaking and participating in a round-table discussion that
allows teachers to ask questions has
proven to be the most popular thing," he
relates. "Providing access to people in
the industry impresses the teachers more
than anything else."
Annual Meeting
Although the agenda's particulars still
were pending in early August, according
to Baker, AIPRO members probably will
find the format for AIPRO's annual meeting to be familiar. Events will get under
way on the afternoon of Wednesday, Oct.
10. The first day will conclude with a reception. "Moving from a dinner format
to a reception last year allowed people to
network more, visit with old friends and
make new ones, so it was a pretty popular
change," he says.
The next day's proceedings are scheduled to run through mid-afternoon and
will include officer elections. Callan will
hand over his presidential gavel at that
point, but he emphasizes that he is most
looking forward to simply seeing his industry colleagues. "I really enjoy the opportunity for industry people from all
the geographic areas to come in and
visit," he says. "I really enjoy talking
with people who make their living in the
oil and gas patch."
And with the 2018 national and state
election less than a month away, Baker
acknowledges, the event's buzz is likely
to be distinct. "Associations exist to represent their members, especially in the
governmental and regulatory arenas," he
considers. "Everybody is curious as to
who is going to be elected. Everyone
wants to know what the new leadership
is going to pursue and what big issues
those leaders identify for us. It also is an
opportunity for some of our members to
meet and network with the leaders that
may not be from their home districts."
r

American Oil and Gas Reporter - September 2018

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