… it’s easy if you try
Randi Weingarten, the New Yorker who is rising to become president of the American Federation of Teachers, says she wants to replace President Bush’s focus on standardized testing with a vision of public schools as community centers that help poor students succeed by offering not only solid classroom lessons but also medical and other services.
Ms. Weingarten, 50, was elected Monday to the presidency of the national teachers union at the union’s annual convention. In a speech minutes later to the delegates gathered in Chicago, Ms. Weingarten criticized the No Child Left Behind law, President Bush’s signature domestic initiative, as “too badly broken to be fixed,†and outlined “a new vision of schools for the 21st century.â€Â
“Can you imagine a federal law that promoted community schools  schools that serve the neediest children by bringing together under one roof all the services and activities they and their families need?†Ms. Weingarten asked in the speech.
“Imagine schools that are open all day and offer after-school and evening recreational activities and homework assistance,†she said. “And suppose the schools included child care and dental, medical and counseling clinics.â€Â
The dream of unionist teachers everywhere – no parents.
Comment by happyfeet on 7/16 @ 7:30 pm #
Yay! I love that movie.
Comment by dre on 7/16 @ 7:41 pm #
Another f@@kin’ Community Organizer™!
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 7:45 pm #
“Society will undergo extraordinary transformations and tremendous upheaval to get to a communist world. There will be new levels of social cooperation, society will have moved beyond the mere struggle to survive, and people will be able to live as freely associating human beings, sharing the common abundance of their labor, and taking responsibility and caring for each other in ways that are only possible in a world that has gotten rid of all oppressive economic, social, and political relationsâ€â€and all the oppressive ideas that go along with such relations.
At this point, we can only stretch our imagination and speculate about what such a world would actually look like. It is impossible now to say how humanity in a communist world will continue to deal with different contradictions in all the different realms of society. But we can say that human relationships, including sexual relations, and the production and rearing of new generations of children, will be completely and radically different.
And we can also say that the family, as a relatively small economic and social unit which fulfills the functions of raising and socializing children, will no longer exist. It will no longer correspond to economic and social relations in society overall. And it will have become not only unnecessaryâ€â€but a hindrance to the further development of society. Institutions that allow for and enable far richer human relationships and the mutual flourishing of individuals in the context of the whole society will have emerged through the course of long struggle and transformation.”
http://revcom.us/a/055/family2-en.html
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 7:46 pm #
What’s so wrong with that? The parents (and community) certainly should be involved. I know I would much prefer this model, as opposed to the flinty top-down crap we suffer today.
Comment by happyfeet on 7/16 @ 7:47 pm #
You want you can have half my sammich.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 7:49 pm #
Oh, edit to add, as to my thoughts, “from my cold, dead hand.”
I use that a lot nowadays.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 7:49 pm #
cynn
If you think Randi and ilk want parents anywhere near their taxdollar sucking child warehouses, you are hopelessly naive.
Comment by Jack Klompus on 7/16 @ 7:49 pm #
That’s quite the 21st century vision. I think that just about every public high school in Philadelphia already has an on-site day care program bursting at the seams with its pregnant student population. There are rec centers and libraries across the entire city. And still the graduation rate is barely over 50%. Coincidentally the one Philly public high school that has consistently produced excellence is Central High, alma mater of Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
Yes by all means keep pouring dollar after dollar after dollar of public money to expand the reach of government and unions in large urban school systems – why mess with a winning formula, right?
Comment by dre on 7/16 @ 7:54 pm #
One of the main reasons that the Russian Revolution occurred,
. . .
was to abolish economic imbalances throughout society, and to �remove all limits to women�s equality. Tucker claims, �we must allow that a different, non-revolutionary form of further Soviet developmental movement was a possibility . � Organizations such as the Komosol provided women with a place of political interest, and in the early years, their eagerness to join was salient. The goal of the Komosol was to �help liberate women from the oppressed and enslaved conditions they suffered under the capitalist system� . This organization was significant for the youth, because it allowed them to participate in communist party activities. Many of the problems that existed with the parity of the Komosol policies can be seen in everyday life, and obviously cause many problems.
The Bolsheviks were significant, because they were the revolutionists� that advocated for the peasants, and managed to suppress the communists. It has to be said that the involvement and influence of these youth organizations was so prominent during the Stalinist period, and as a result, many became cultural embodiments. A key factor in Stalinism was �culturalizing,� which was the process of reshaping society�s mentality towards certain issues. However, it did not achieve its objective of gender equality in the end, but instead, accentuated the differences between men and women.
In conclusion, it is blatant that the Komosol and the Bolsheviks contributed largely to the Russian Revolution. Youth communist organizations were programs, implemented by the government in order to: familiarize people with the changes that were occurring in Russia and to accomplish the decrease of illiteracy . The Bolsheviks� aim was to �make peace with the majority� and force the changes to occur progressively. Even though politics and life was run by an autocracy, certain significant aspects of that structure malfunctioned.
http://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/31137.html
Comment by B Moe on 7/16 @ 7:57 pm #
“Imagine schools that are open all day and offer after-school and evening recreational activities and homework assistance,â€Â
If we could create some sort of community program where children could go and have educated adults teach them to read and write and do math they would be much better prepared to do their homework when they got to school at night.
Just sayin’.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/16 @ 7:57 pm #
“No Families” is a bit harsh.. The idea of schools that also offer daycare, after school activities, tutoring, even health-care to some extent doesn’t strike me as an attempt to do away with families and would probably be real convenient for all concerned.. Daycare is a reality in a society where both parents have to work to make ends meet.. Most people don’t put their kids in daycare because they want to get rid of them.. they haven’t got another choice.. Combining the services would cut down on the transportation required and offer a little more flexibility to parents. As a matter of fact if the government eventually comes through with some portable school tuition vouchers this would probably be a good business venture…
Comment by happyfeet on 7/16 @ 7:59 pm #
this week has been
full of tv wii
and eating and sleeping
I was the first to rise and I helped Mom make grits*
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 7:59 pm #
I don’t really like these cryptic drop-quotes, because I don’t think they’re useful. Hence dre’s spew,
Comment by dre on 7/16 @ 7:59 pm #
“Imagine reeduction camps
schoolsthat are open all day and offer after-reeduction campsschoolsand evening recreational activities and homework assistance,†she said. “And suppose the reeduction campsschoolsincluded child care and dental, medical and counseling clinics.â€ÂComment by lee on 7/16 @ 8:01 pm #
Looks like an attempted take-over of the foster parent system to me.
Comment by dre on 7/16 @ 8:02 pm #
“#Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 7:59 pm #
I don’t really like these cryptic drop-quotes, because I don’t think they’re useful. Hence dre’s spew,”
As a famous Democrat once said: Communism today, Communism tomorrow, Communism forever!
Comment by Republican on Acid on 7/16 @ 8:04 pm #
Wow, I am completely sure that children will totally love looking forward to spending their entire young lives in some institution. As if knowing you’ll probably die working your ass off isn’t bad enough.
These people are totally insane.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 8:05 pm #
Ouro
One problem… all the bright shiney mandated services is none of the federal government’s business. Period.
Oh, its a great excuse to demand more tax money from citizens already so taxed they can’t afford for a parent to actually, you know, be home to parent…so a vicious cycle keeps escalating, with non-family members raising kids and inculcating them with the “accepted wisdom” of the public education apparachiks.
This is not innocently offered.
No thank you.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 8:08 pm #
… and I don’t get this. I just don’t. It’s hell to get my kid to read these days, whereas that’s what summer used to be about. It’s a new world, and I’m not only trying to survive it, I’m subsidizing it. Shit, I sound cranky.
Comment by lee on 7/16 @ 8:10 pm #
Wow, I am completely sure that children will totally love looking forward to spending their entire young lives in some institution
Well, it would make the transition to prison life easier.
Nah, I’m sure there would be no unintended consequences to this marvelous plan.
Comment by lee on 7/16 @ 8:14 pm #
Shit, I sound cranky.
Yeah, you could post anonymously and we would know it was you.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 8:16 pm #
OK, I just got your drift, Darleen. I take it that the current system or even an enhanced system with additional social service provisions simply makes matters worse? Who gets cut off and when?
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 8:22 pm #
Darleen, I fully agree about the importance of parents’ involvement in their kids’ education. It just seems harder now than it was when I was a kid, if that makes sense.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 8:23 pm #
cynn
First off you get the Feds out of education all together. No Dept of Education, no education “czars”, no NCLB. Schools are strictly a local affair.
And schools need to get back to their mission EDUCATING kids – not organizing field trips to illegal alien laborer sites, not having them rat on their parents if parents smoke or have guns, not using kids as guinea pigs for every post-grad sociological brain fart on a new way of raising good leftist collectivist drones.
Comment by dre on 7/16 @ 8:26 pm #
“every post-grad sociological ”
kids using other peoples kids to bring forth the great collective future
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 8:27 pm #
cynn
it’s harder BY DESIGN
for your own GOOD does people like Randi want 60% or more of your salary, so you are too exhausted and welcome your new overlords who will be happy to take over the raising of you children …. just keep working and paying and working and paying
Comment by BumperStickerist on 7/16 @ 8:32 pm #
The AFT President caveats everything she proposes as being for the “neediest students”.
The problem is this, and I work in special education advocacy, is that a law like NCLB ends up identifying the 15-20% of the students who need extra help for a variety of reasons, ranging from disability/other health impairments to dumbass parents to whatever.
Schools can’t address the needs of those 15-20% of the population specifically and directly *because* that would be tantamount to tracking or doing homogeneous grouping. Therefore, the 15-20% with needs are distributed among the general student population and, as such, you’ve got kids with specific, addressable learning needs not receiving services because putting them with the teacher best able to meet those needs would be … bad. In some sense of the word.
This results in whole hosts of students – like “half to two thirds” – being “taught to the test”, a test which, if they were just given the NCLB test, achieve a proficient or advanced level required by NCLB with about two hours of test prep a day or two before taking the test. For those that don’t know, NCLB testing is *minimal skills testing* – getting an “advanced” on an NCLB test for 5th grade skills means, well, the kid did very well on a 5th grade math skills test. It’s not like the SATs. One problem, among many, is that these kids go through hours of drill-and-kill preparing for a test that they’d pass anyway.
But you can’t pull the “neediest kids” and do something obviously different for them, even if it’s beneficial to the child and a good use of public education resources. Because of the hypocricy … or something.
I weep a little bit everytime I attend a meeting at a district that celebrates the fact that it met NCLB’s AYP Goals – which are Adequate Yearly Progress Goals.
Yes, you read that right – Adequate Yearly Progress.
US Public Education is all about teh adequacy.
-
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 8:33 pm #
I think that this is what feminists mean when they say “affordable childcare.”
Leave the parenting to professionals with certificates from teaching colleges, dolts.
Feh. A gubmint that don’t trust me to raise my own kids is treading ever so close to my field of fire.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 8:35 pm #
Darleen, I totally agree with you. Now I’d like to address the other asshats.
lee, please pull your finger out of your nose and tell me why you think children in institutionsare going to prison,
Comment by BumperStickerist on 7/16 @ 8:40 pm #
First off you get the Feds out of education all together. No Dept of Education, no education “czarsâ€Â, no NCLB. Schools are strictly a local affair.
And schools need to get back to their mission EDUCATING kids – not organizing field trips to illegal alien laborer sites, not having them rat on their parents if parents smoke or have guns, not using kids as guinea pigs for every post-grad sociological brain fart on a new way of raising good leftist collectivist drones.
and, darleen, your views intrigue me and I would like to subscribe to your newsletter. :)
I also work with parents and groups of parents in the “how do we turn this unfocused rage into something that actually accomplishes anything” … my experience is that 80-90% of the parents in any given district simply want to vent about their personal situation rather than do anything specific. It’s like being part of a live action blog comment thread.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 8:40 pm #
Bumperstickerist
I salute you for hanging in there. I know too many good teachers who have just thrown up their hands and walked away because it has become a rigged system more dedicated to keep those Fed $$$ coming in.
Local school systems, small school systems used to be much more nimble to the individual needs of their students. But now its all about everyone being the “same”..meaning teaching to the slowest kid in class.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/16 @ 8:42 pm #
I agree with a lot of what you’re saying, Dar. I’m sure it’s not innocently offered.. a thinly veiled reason to levy more tax.. and we should be getting back to solid basics..
But as a matter of pragmatism it sounds attractive.. When I was a single parent of small children I got up at 4 to get them to a sitter by 5 so I could get to work by 6.. the sitter watched them til 8 then took them to school.. school was out at 3 and they were bussed to a local daycare until I could pick them up at 6.. Repeat 5 days a week.
A single location would have been so much simpler.. and could include some after school activities beyond watching TV and WoW… like tutoring or sports. I would have expected to pay the same fees I paid.. I’m not suggesting everything should be free included in ‘public school’ services..
As far as dre’s objection that it’s merely a cover to indoctrinate our kids, I say we already have mandatory state run schools.. They don’t have to come up with a new plan to indoctrinate the kids if that’s the proggies masterplan.. but they haven’t got their act together enough to teach the kids solid fundamental skills.. I’m not worried about them imparting more advanced and nuanced socialist thought..
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/16 @ 8:42 pm #
“What’s so wrong with that? The parents (and community) certainly should be involved.
- Read your own words, thats what wrong with that, and its the ‘ole collectivist mind hard at work as usual.
- Your sentence should read; “…and the school and the community should be involved, when asked and needed.”
- The Parent, quite the opposite of the Left hand brain thinking, is the basic reponsible agent in their children’s lives, not the school, or the community, or the gov,. or the Social Services, or anyone else.
- Don’t be jealous of parental responsibility. It really won’t kill you.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 8:44 pm #
Bumper
My children are all out of k-12 (youngest is in college) and I was lucky to be a SAHM for 16 years, which afforded me time to volunteer … from PTA to fundraising to room mom to Band Booster parent to Soccer mom and Track mom and Swimming mom…. I saw it all.
My grandsons just completed kindergarten and I’m going to be keeping a sharp eye on things from the trenches all over again.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 8:50 pm #
Ouro
If a particular school’s parents come together and work on getting some daycare/afterschool program going at their school that is voluntary, I have no problem. It’s a voluntary perk.
But some of these “imagine” programs funded by Fed $$ will only be optional for just so long.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 8:51 pm #
Big Bang Prick: Thanx for telling me what I am supposed to say. Pretty apt summation of the rightie epistomology.
Comment by happyfeet on 7/16 @ 8:53 pm #
Don’t have me no truck with socialists myself. Don’t want none.
Comment by maggie katzen on 7/16 @ 8:54 pm #
oh, so you’re a rightie now, Ms. “Oh, it’s a cookie post”?
Comment by poppa india on 7/16 @ 8:55 pm #
Shorter Cynn: Everybody agree with me when I call you names.
Comment by ahem on 7/16 @ 8:56 pm #
The problem is that responsibility for raising kids has transferred from the family to the state. Such a thing can never be good.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 9:00 pm #
poppa india: You’re right; I will cut it out.
Comment by dre on 7/16 @ 9:03 pm #
“As far as dre’s objection that it’s merely a cover to indoctrinate our kids, I say we already have mandatory state run schools..”
School choice may have eased your burden. You however were not given that choice.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/16 @ 9:04 pm #
“Big Bang Prick: Thanx for telling me what I am supposed to say. Pretty apt summation of the rightie epistomology.
- Aww sweetie, you know you’re free to say any self-serving anti-Family bullshit you want to.
- Our Constitution guarantees you the right to make as big a jackass of yourself as your party wants you to.
- In the mean time, if you hate family values so much, then just don’t have any kids, and it won’t be a problem.
- In the mean time, keep your fucking Socialist claws off of mine.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 9:04 pm #
maggie, I was just informed that the word is spelled “epistemology.” Otherwise, it sounds like an intubation or something. Who knew?
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 9:05 pm #
I never spent a single day in the government schools, which all seem so bizarre to me. I simply fail to see how one could educate primary school children without nuns.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/16 @ 9:10 pm #
So how likely do you think it is that the Fed is going to get out of the education funding business? All sides use their trendily named programs as focal points in their grand plans for a new world.. Plus the states are totally dependant on Fed dollars and have shifted their own money out of schools.. It’s about as likely as states dropping Powerball going back to paying for their schools without lotto dollars.. that is to say, no very freakin likely.. I think the fed is dug in and isn’t going anywhere.. Our best bet on getting back control of our schools is to privatize them and pay for them with vouchers.. and I’d love to be the person who starts the first chain of schools open all day.. providing a solid education..qualified teachers..a safe and secure environment.. dependable on-site daycare.. nutritional food.. tutoring.. medical assistance.. sports.. (all with the appropriate fees attached..) a perfect blend of public service, altruism and capitalism.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 9:16 pm #
I have no issue with vouchers as long as my tax money doesn’t support your fundie schools, while my own children have to compete openly. Fix that, and you have my full support.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 9:19 pm #
“I have no issue with vouchers as long as my tax money doesn’t support your fundie schools, while my own children have to compete openly. Fix that, and you have my full support.”
My substantial (Catholic) tax dollars subsidize your school’s teaching 8 year olds to apply condoms to cucumbers. So, you know, chicken and the egg.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/16 @ 9:24 pm #
“Fix that, and you have my full support.”
- Why should we be moved to fix what your side fucked up? You made your bed, now sleep in it, the only people I feel compassion for are the children of your dreck movement.
- From our standpoint, the sooner the “Liberal” indoctrination centers infested with social engineers close up, the better.
- Schools are supposed to be in the business of teaching, not experimental playgrounds for post graduate bird brains that turn children into glorified lab rats.
Comment by cynn on 7/16 @ 9:33 pm #
Alex and Big Bang: As unfortunate as it appears to you, we have a public school system under which your property tax money funds the public schools. If you don’t like it, agitate and change it. Novel, I know.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 9:36 pm #
“Why should we be moved to fix what your side fucked up?”
I guess it never occurred to cynn that if she kept her tax dollars, and I kept mine, we could each raise our respective children as we see fit, without the condoms and the abstinance and the ketchup qua vegetable.
That sounds a bit like “pursuit of happiness” to me.
Comment by Darleen on 7/16 @ 9:38 pm #
It’s about as likely as states dropping Powerball going back to paying for their schools without lotto dollars.. that is to say, no very freakin likely
So, lay back and enjoy it?
sorry for the snark, but pushing back against the gubmint school system, that for all the huge amounts of money can’t graduate 50% of the kids (Los Angeles USD – largest in the nation) has to start somewhere
MORE homeschooling, more push towards vouchers
Comment by Alec Leamas on 7/16 @ 9:41 pm #
“If you don’t like it, agitate and change it. Novel, I know.”
Hence, my statements, supra. Alas, my tax dollars are like Michael Corleone, and your grubby tax hungry educrats are like the family business.
Vouchers start the process of allocating funding for education away from government and directly to people who have actually demonstrated that they can educate children. You can start a school that encourages 8 year olds to masturbate and encourages them to imagine being Gay-Married when they grow up, and possibly receive vouchers, if you wish.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/16 @ 9:44 pm #
- I’ve delt with the system for most of my adult life, raising four children through that screwed up mess, with my youngest just graduating. I’ve watched the steady progression over the years toward soft Marxism, the hive mind. At this point, with the claws of Secular Socialism sunk in so deep, I don’t honestly think its salvageable. Its become a political instrument for the collective to spread its poison, no longer a place of learning.
- It needs to be totally dismantled, de-unionized, de-politicized, and re-Democratized, exactly the way it once was.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/16 @ 9:48 pm #
look cudlips.
SES[socio-economic status] of the surrounding neighborhood is the strong correlate with educational achievement.
Like murray sez, we have hit the wall on boosting educational achievement thru environment.
the Right has failed miserably at mandating all children be “above average”.
Now are u gonna attempt to mandate that teachers be “outstanding”?
vouchers will fail miserably also.
all you will get is regression to the mean, and the “good” schools will become “bad” schools.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/16 @ 9:51 pm #
Educational romanticism characterizes reformers of both Left and Right, though in different ways. Educational romantics of the Left focus on race, class, and gender. It is children of color, children of poor parents, and girls whose performance is artificially depressed, and their academic achievement will blossom as soon as they are liberated from the racism, classism, and sexism embedded in American education. Those of the Right see public education as an ineffectual monopoly, and think that educational achievement will blossom when school choice liberates children from politically correct curricula and obdurate teachers’ unions.
Many laws are too optimistic, but the No Child Left Behind Act transcended optimism. It set a goal that was devoid of any contact with reality.
In public discourse, the leading symptom of educational romanticism is silence on the role of intellectual limits even when the topic screams for their discussion. Try to think of the last time you encountered a news story that mentioned low intellectual ability as the reason why some students do not perform at grade level. I doubt if you can. Whether analyzed by the news media, school superintendents, or politicians, the problems facing low-performing students are always that they have come from disadvantaged backgrounds, or have gone to bad schools, or grown up in peer cultures that do not value educational achievement. The problem is never that they just aren’t smart enough.
u dopey cudlips……NECBAL!
Not Everyone Can Be A Lawyer
Comment by maggie katzen on 7/16 @ 9:58 pm #
so, are you saying we should or shouldn’t public schools community centers?
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/16 @ 9:59 pm #
“…all you will get is regression to the mean…”
- Oh you mean back in the days when people were taught “mean” things like personal responsibility, self sufficiency, moral and social values, work ethic, principles, self and interpersonal respect, “mean” things like that.
- Now replaced with zero responsibility, nanystate cradle to grave goverbment suckle, if it feels good do it, fuck responsibility, respect, morals, principles, thats for suckers. In other words the “good” stuff.
- You sound concerned. You should be. Your movement is imbued with a poison pill, and its just a matter of time.
- When something has been misused, abused, and just generally totally fucked up, regression to a better time is a good thing Sport.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/16 @ 10:01 pm #
Otto West: Don’t call me stupid.
Wanda: Oh, right! To call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people!But you think you’re an intellectual, don’t you, ape?
Otto West: Apes don’t read philosophy.
Wanda: Yes they do, Otto. They just don’t understand it.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/16 @ 10:03 pm #
Apes can be lawyers too.. Just not good lawyers..
Comment by SevenEleventy on 7/16 @ 10:06 pm #
jenn, we’ll shoot the two digits just for you. Feel better?
Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 7/16 @ 10:08 pm #
nishi: hard to imagine a more pertinent example of the failure of the public school system.
Not only is she stupid, ignorant, and illiterate, she’s not even AWARE of these facts.
Comment by Pablo on 7/16 @ 10:12 pm #
Shut up, nishi.
Comment by Aldo on 7/16 @ 10:24 pm #
Have you read River Of Gods yet? I’m going to keep nagging you until you do.
BTW, you forget to provide the link.
Comment by SevenEleventy on 7/16 @ 10:26 pm #
✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡✞✡
Comment by Big E on 7/16 @ 10:33 pm #
“Imagine schools that are open all day and offer after-school and evening recreational activities and homework assistance,†she said. “And suppose the schools included child care and dental, medical and counseling clinics.â€Â
Uh, huh and a bar for Daddy and a mall so mommy can shop and a DisneyWorld on site for the kids and free flying car’s that run on the wondrous hopes and dreams of children for everyone!!!!! And then a monkey is going to jump out of my ass playing the Devil Went Down to Georgia on the fiddle.
What a moron, glad to know someone with absolutely zero clue about how the real world works is setting the agenda for the teachers union.
Comment by Aldo on 7/16 @ 10:47 pm #
What a moron, glad to know someone with absolutely zero clue about how the real world works is setting the agenda for the teachers union.
Are you kidding?
A leader of a public employee union is arguing for a massive expansion in the scope of government into what had previously been a private sphere of our lives for the sake of “the children.” I’m guessing she knows exactly how the world works.
After four years of an Obama administration there will no longer be a private sector that is off-limits to the government.
Comment by JHoward on 7/16 @ 11:00 pm #
Even shorter cynn: But I need it.
cynn, with all respect, you are to thought what one celled organisms are to fetching sticks.
Comment by Lamontyoubigdummy on 7/16 @ 11:13 pm #
Jesus Christ! This is the PTA meeting from hell!
I’m a simple, stupid, single, childless, moron…but I have a thought (put your guns & lawyers away for a second goddamnit)
Imagine the movie “300″…but instead of taking the kids away at 7 and making them “warriors for the state,” the Unions take them away at 3 and make them propganda ridden, freak show “Marxists for the state.”
Don’t have kids yet. But when I do, I’ll drive a ‘79 Yugo and raise them in a cardboard box to pay for a private school of MY choosing. One where they’ll learn all that evil science, math, literature & history.
Cuz, ya know, I want them to be different.
Comment by Aldo on 7/16 @ 11:21 pm #
Don’t have kids yet. But when I do, I’ll drive a ‘79 Yugo and raise them in a cardboard box to pay for a private school of MY choosing. One where they’ll learn all that evil science, math, literature & history.
That’s a Dead White Phallocentric recipe for curriculum disaster there Lamont. How will your kids make it in the real world without a solid grounding in Queer Studies or Marxist Themes in Winnie The Pooh?
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/16 @ 11:31 pm #
- Collective Centers USMR , United States Marxist Republic, pep talk for newbies at the incoming debriefing clinic:
- “Now I know some of you may be concerned with the complete loss of personal identity and thinking for yourselves. But you see, with the great and honorable Government works committee providing you with every possible basic need, you’ll have no reason for “free thought”, in fact after awhile you’ll be very comfortable with this structure, It means never having to compete for anything, or come up with original ideas.
- Besides, for the femunits we balance it by giving you complete choice of how you’ll abort if you should ever become pregnant off schedule. For all of you, male and females, the Workers party provides anthropomorphic companions that are human in every way, and STD free.
- So, if there are no more questions, your indoctrination guide will walk you through the rest of your training.
- Thank you, and welcome to Secular World.”
Comment by Topsecretk9 on 7/16 @ 11:41 pm #
Marxist Themes in Winnie The Pooh?
Heh.
Comment by jon on 7/16 @ 11:41 pm #
Here’s my ideal school day:
It starts earlier than the work day, so parents who work can get there on time, but the first hour isn’t mandatory in any way. It can be organized or not, free play, hanging out, art projects, whatever. Then, at a certain time that gives all the students who aren’t children of working parents with tight schedules, the regular day begins. It’s got history taught by lots of books rather than a single watered-down textbook. Colleges use lots of books and get better results. Different viewpoints are allowed lots of space and time to develop, not just a shaded box on the side of a chapter on the Civil War or the Industrial Revolution. Math involves actual math and practical applications of same. Combine it with science for best effect, but also combine it with phys ed, cooking, carpentry, and even gardening. English should involve books, reading, writing, speaking correctly, knowing the difference between its and it’s and you’re and your and whether or not a lot is two words, not just about expressing yourself. And other languages should be introduced at a young age. French, German, Latin, Greek, Spanish, Finnish, Italian, Russian, Hindi, Arabic, Mandarin, Japanese, Malay, Tagalog, whatever. I don’t care what, just give a start. And toward the end of the day, the academics should peter out and the extracurricular stuff should begin. The band and orchestra, art, sports teams, dance, drama, journalism, yearbook, what have you should be at the end. And those who just want, or their parents just want the academics can be picked up to have the afternoon off. They can go home and watch cartoons, do homework, work, get into trouble, or all of those things, but their parents won’t be forced to get them before five or so. They could get them at two, but they could also work a full day.
I know it’s not the job of schools to babysit children all day, but I look at school schedules and see them as the number one reason working parents can’t work full days, get promotions, and earn promotions. Yes, having a child sure as hell should be a sacrifice, but I don’t think it’s too much for a school schedule and a work schedule to be at least close. And I’d be willing to pay more for that.
Comment by Topsecretk9 on 7/16 @ 11:45 pm #
Waht make Miz Utopia think the kids will want to stay in this hell hole? Sounds like a truancy bait to me.
Comment by Lamontyoubigdummy on 7/16 @ 11:51 pm #
cynn,
You’ve had the shit beat out of you here tonight, so I won’t pile on (your eye ball hanging out, and the busted ribs are nasty btw). Instead I’ll make you a sweet deal. We’ll all give our tax dollars to the Teachers’ Union new deal for all inner city schools.
With one exception.
You let all inner city students with a 3.0 or higher (who could pass for Navy SEALs for fightin’ off “fellow student” crack dealers and dumb shit thug-hallway-and after school beat downs just because they can spell) voucher wherever they wanna go. Let them compete on equal ground.
What? No deal?
Fuck. You.
Comment by GeoW on 7/16 @ 11:56 pm #
#67 Aldo, I agree on the Obama administration (had to force myself to actually type that phrase-eeew) posing a danger to the private sector, especially in this area. Because there is a direct connection in this particular case. I imagine this “Randi” is an acolyte/colleage of Barak’s pal William Ayers. And speaking of which, what kinda country has this become when someone can, at the same time, be both unrepentant terrorist AND esteemed educator. That’s like Sudan, or Iran, or sumthin.
#58 BBH, your line that their “movement is imbued with a poison pill. It’s only a matter of time” is interesting. I hope you mean that their movement, this Marxism/socialism or collectivism to be general, will self destruct. Due to internal contradictions of logic, competing interest groups conflicting (blacks seeking choice vs edu-bureau-Demo-crat unions), or their eventual loss of the ability to reason at all due to the convoluted lies they constantly tell and leading to their inability to function at all in modern society, and thereby the threat recedes? By November of this year?
I hope so, but perhaps you could elaborate on how you believe the poison pill would work. And overall I like your POV in this thread. Thank you.
I haven’t read Ayn Rand in 25-30 years and I’m not a Randian, but many specific points she made in an essay on education, describing the purposeful destruction of the ability to reason logically in an individual as a way to control the public politically by creating the hive mind — as well as her overall point on collectivism creating mediocrity, as reflected in Darleen’s comment #31 about teaching to the slowest — are seemingly all coming true.
I’m counting on that poison pill to save us, brah!
Comment by Topsecretk9 on 7/16 @ 11:58 pm #
Comment by jon on 7/16 @ 11:41 pm #
No offense, I understand what you are trying to say, but I bet your parents and their parents were able to manage just FINE and that’s because one parent worked and one parent stayed home and managed the household.
I have SOOOOOOOOOOO much contempt towards the feminist movement for 1- corrupting the family and 2- making it impossible for a man work, woman “stay at home” environment thrive.
that we have the moniker “stay-at-home” sort of re-enforces the whole point.
Comment by Lamontyoubigdummy on 7/17 @ 12:02 am #
“How will your kids make it in the real world without a solid grounding in Queer Studies or Marxist Themes in Winnie The Pooh?”
They’ll have learned linear topography, geometry, and calculus (important for angle of attack). Combine that with some good philosophy, decent inspirational literature, world and military history (plus the guns I leave them), and I think they’ll do just fine.
I do have that “fuck up” gene though.
I’m told it skips generations.
Fucking Darwin.
Comment by panther girl on 7/17 @ 12:49 am #
I agree that this sounds not good. The problem with either the AFT pres’s or jon’s (#73) version of things ever actually occurring is the teacher’s unions themselves (and I say this as a grudging member of one). They have grand social ideas, but ultimately, they only care about themselves. Who do you think will come early and stay late to indoctrinate our kids further? Certainly not any union members I know. Not the “true believers” anyhow. (There seems to be a strong negative correlation between caring about students for real and agreeing with the union leadership.) 5-day weeks are rare as it is (at least in our district), and when you start to add in all the early release days… Just ain’t gonna happen.
Comment by Topsecretk9 on 7/17 @ 1:08 am #
panther girl
that’s such a great point. Ultimately staffed by un-credentialed part timers? Um the teacher’s union isn’t going for that, same as the teachers who signed up for a certain amount work week and then they are outta there.
It’s just socialized babysitting.
Comment by Rusty on 7/17 @ 5:05 am #
#14
That’s called a prison.
Ultimately it’s about choice. The teachers unions want to narrow the options available to parents to just theirs,the unions. The ideal would be for the family to take their child and tax money and put it where it would do the child the most good.
Children a born with a natural tendency to learn.
Comment by B Moe on 7/17 @ 5:17 am #
As unfortunate as it appears to you, we have a public school system under which your property tax money funds the public schools.
It was that way 40 or 50 years ago, all that Federal money coming into the schools now is not from property tax.
Comment by syn on 7/17 @ 5:22 am #
“community centers that help poor students succeed by offering not only solid classroom lessons but also medical and other services”
The problem with Weingarten’s educational approach is not only that it is incapable of teaching basic fundamentals, it has molded and formed a generation of kiddies diseased with one form or another with STDs; 1 in 4 females between the ages of 14-19 are infected, NYC is above the national average.
Not only will teachers disease the child’s mind, they’ll disease the child’s body.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 5:50 am #
It’s got history taught by lots of books rather than a single watered-down textbook. Colleges use lots of books and get better results. Different viewpoints are allowed lots of space and time to develop, not just a shaded box on the side of a chapter on the Civil War or the Industrial Revolution.
That’s one thing about home schooling that rocks. I only have two “text-like” books; for Math and physics. Everything else uses real books.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 5:54 am #
And, related, yesterday I heard an hour-long interview on the local (Detroit) radio station. Two teachers were fired because they were complaining about how things were run. Specifically – the lush conditions of the “Board of Education” offices, and the dismal state of the actual schools. They made claims that the inefficient system buys stuff it can’t even distribute (lazy?) – books, supplies, etc. They have warehouses of crap that they hoard.
Yea … lets give them more power and money.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 5:56 am #
Detroit schools, for example get much of their funding from the State and the Casinos.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 6:52 am #
maggie, the correlate with achievement in school is SES of the neighborhood.
that is the only wiggle room we have left.
it is not the quality of the teachers.
the state board certifies teachers.
the same standards operate in detroit and in ann arbor and in grosse point heights.
vouchers just lets low SES students drag down the educational system of higher SES students.
so haveing the school be the parent is the only environmental leverage we have left.
still wont be enough to overcome the bellcurve.
the 40percent just arent college material.
Comment by JD on 7/17 @ 6:56 am #
STFU nishit.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:00 am #
I only have two “text-like†books; for Math and physics
Carin
When I went back to college several years ago, I had to retake algebra. I loved the textbook from that class, someone had gone to the trouble of really penning a clear, concise math book.
I’ve saved it for when the grandkids hit jr. high. I figured if we can get them fluent in algebra, all the crap “new math” won’t cripple ‘em. Same with teaching them to read via phonics, start them on music lessons when they’re 7 and cub scouts.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 7:04 am #
Nishi – if you would GO to some of these inner city schools – you would see that the “achievement” bar is low. AP level Detroit material is standard fair (at best) in Grosse Pointe. The problem isn’t that they fail to achieve – it’s that they totally fail. Drop out. Can’t read. Jennifer Granholm may think that everyone needs to go to college, but the reality on the street is that we simply want them to GRADUATE. I personally am not interested in all your bell curve bullshit.
The same standards do NOT operate in all schools because each school is run by it’s own fiefdom. Detroit schools get almost the same amount of money as Grosse POinte, but it is ruled by a top-heavy, hierarchal mentality. Why buy books for the kids when my office needs to be redone? That shit don’t fly in GP. Vouchers would allow parents to voice their displeasure. TEAR it down.
Comment by The Lost Dog on 7/17 @ 7:06 am #
cynn,
There is nothing wrong with it, except that the left has spent the last fifty or so years destroying this exact model, and teaching our children that they are too stupid to be a part of their own community. Only “Teh Government” knows what is best!
You are probably too young to remember when the community took care of it’s own, and the government took care of the roads and America’s defense.
The left has destroyed our communities, our families, and our freedom. This is not the world I grew up in. It is far less compassionate, and far less free than the America of the fifties and sixties. Our schools teach our children to be stupid and ignore facts and logic.
What the left describes as “Utopia” is exactly what they are bent on destroying in the name of their superiorness. It’s taken a long time, but Kruschev was right.
“We will destroy you without firing a shot”
It made me laugh when I heard this during the Goldwater – Johnson election, because it seemed impossible.
I am laughing no longer.
You should sit down and actually read that musty old document, the Constitution, one of the most important (if not THE most important) documents ever conceived and written in the history of the human race. Once we dump it, it ain’t coming back.
It is no more than toilet paper to the left, and they have spent the whole last century making sure that Americans don’t pay any attention to it..
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 7:07 am #
There are some good textbooks out there. Most of ‘em are used by homeschoolers. A friends showed me her kid’s math book from school (she recently switched to home schooling) and I was FLOORED by all the non-math bullshit in it.
Comment by Salt Lick on 7/17 @ 7:13 am #
vouchers just lets low SES students drag down the educational system of higher SES students.
quellcrist — A piece I saw on Chancellor Michelle Rhee and Washington, DC, schools left me with the impression that scores in the private and voucher schools are so much higher than in public schools they are threatening the viability of the entire public system there. I don’t have time to find an article directly on-point, but here’s a general story on Rhee’s work, which includes CLOSING half the public schools in DC and firing just about all non-union teachers.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/15/AR2008051502354.html
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:14 am #
it is laughable that nishimonster, once presenting herself as God Scientist (ethics? we don’t need no stinkin ethics) now is presenting herself as an Education Expert(tm).
Carin
You know the Detroit system, I’m familiar with school systems in the So Cal area. The huge sucking blackhole that is Los Angeles Unified School District, the second largest SD in the country, should be enough to scare reasonable adults around the country. But the scandals, the criminal misuse of funds, the corruption seem to fly just under the radar – partly because it is a huge cash cow for local politicians. Mayor Villar[*] has wanted to “take over” the LAUSD not for the lofty ideals of improving the SD but because of the access to billions of dollars of construction money, which is separate from the billions of dollars of annual budget. LAUSD operating budget alone, divided by student population reveals about $17,000/student, but it is never presented that way in the press.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:15 am #
that is what “educational romanticism” is all about.
the idea promoted by Boosh’s NCLB, that EVERY child can be “above average” if given the proper environment.
that is a lie nutured by dopey cudlip thinking.
there is window of hysteresis around the iron determinism of the genes that can be leveraged by environment.
in public education, we have pretty much exhausted that hysteresis with standards for curriculae and teacher ceritification.
Boosh’s law didnt force all children to be average….vouchers wont force all teachers to be outstanding.
All it will do spread low parent SES into the higher SES schools, and drag the high SES school systems down.
the only place left to leverage is the home environment….make the state the parent.
/shrug
It is the selfish genes that force us to age and die, to promote memetic and genetic kin, to embrace the supernatural in our search for meaning.
like Paglia says–
It is Nature, not Society, that is our greatest oppressor.
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 7:16 am #
While Randi talks down to NCLB, if one strips away the sentiment what she is suggesting is that NCLB didn’t go far enough!
I’m certainly not on board with nishi’s bell curve worship but there is a point buried in the superman argument. As I’ve noted on another thread I’ve had several discussions with educators in my school district, including the coach of our high school’s very successful academic team. Their biggest problem with NCLB is not the standardized tests (although they have problems with the concept of “adequacy” as pointed out above by bumperstickerist) but with the fact that the structure and demands of the program naturally funnel money to the bottom 15%-20% to the detriment of the top 15%-20% of students.
Thus AP programs have all but disappeared in PA public schools and more and more outstanding students are being left in classes where they are supposed to just “get along” with students of lesser academic skills. This is an educational suicide pact on a national level and will be in no way be improved by Randi’s “all school all the time” approach to student homogenization.
I’d be interested in Bumperstickerist’s experience with this particular aspect of NCLB.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:16 am #
ABOVE average
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:19 am #
BJTex is right.
NCLB actually translates into No Child Gets Ahead.
Vouchers is just another way of forcing mediocrity on school systems…..regression to the mean.
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 7:23 am #
nishi just said I was right and I had a Grand Mal seizure. Now I can’t find my wallet.
Let’s be clear, nishi, I don’t endorse in any manner, shape or form your evolutionary concept of human development.
Comment by JD on 7/17 @ 7:26 am #
BJ and nishit sittin’ in a tree …
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:26 am #
BJTex
Yes, it goes to the “teaching to the slowest kid” thing I mentioned.
One other problem is that AP classes started getting a bad rap as ways that [white kids] in suburban settings could get an “unfair” advantage over bright [black] kids in the inner city where AP classes were not offered. It has gotten so that a lot of colleges don’t look at the extra points from AP classes much anymore. Upsets their beancounting.
The politicking in public schools is overwhelming.
One of my main complaints about grades 7-12 is that they are now all geared toward book learning, no vocational classes at all. No more auto shop, wood shop, home ec, business classes, etc. College is not appropriate for everyone. Plumbers make more money than the average lawyer. Why should we demand that some kid who is brilliant when it comes to building or fixing stuff, but is bored by comparative world lit, be scolded-pushed-threatened into college prep classes?
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:29 am #
Actually NCLB DOES force all children to be average…lifting up the lowest achievers and holding the high achievers back.
True egalitarianism.
Like some horrible Procrustean bed that stretches the low IQ students on an educational rack while lopping off the intellectual limbs of the high IQ students.
lol
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 7:30 am #
- Good morning everyone. I saw we burn them all to the ground and start all over again.
- Oh, and STFU nishit.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:30 am #
NCLB has nothing to do with vouchers, nishimonster, fuck off child.
Vouchers means that parents of k-12 get the same opportunity of choice of school that we allow students and parents of post-12 education. My kids were allowed to compete for colleges of their choice, they should have been allowed that for high school (or earlier).
Gubmint monopoly on k-12 has become less about the kids and more about feeding the bureaucracy.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:31 am #
lol, darleen now believes in dr. pournelle’s 40percent.
kk, darleen, how to tell 100 million people that they just arent college material?
hahahaha!
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 7:33 am #
- President Bush is going to speak at Tony Snows funeral today. Good on him, Tony was a class act guy.
Comment by Mr. Pink on 7/17 @ 7:33 am #
Well Darleen I thought we were supposed to look down our noses at all those “little” people that work as plumbers, electricians, general contractors, and construction workers?
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:34 am #
nishimonster
You don’t pay attention. I’ve been saying the same thing for years. YEARs, you narcisstic sociopath.
You are just cravenly attempting to extrapolate what BJT and I am saying into something that supports your brainfarts.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 7:34 am #
- Easy nishit. Just show them your picture and tell them “This could happen to you”.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:34 am #
no darleen, vouchers is educational romanticism just like NCLB.
Vouchers is EXACTLY like NCLB for home environment.
spreading the low achiever environment of parent SES into the high achiever environment.
all that will happen is regression to the mean, and lower the collective SES of high achiever schools.
law of averages.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:35 am #
Mr. Pink
Whose this “we”? ;-)
I say a ‘blessing’ to plumbers everywhere each morning as I jump into a hot shower.
Comment by Mr. Pink on 7/17 @ 7:35 am #
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:31 am #
lol, darleen now believes in dr. pournelle’s 40percent.
kk, darleen, how to tell 100 million people that they just arent college material?
Well you can start by forcing them to read your post. After or two of them I bet they will very glad they are not going to college.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:38 am #
Vouchers = freedom of choice
Freedom of choice doesn’t mean you will always get what you want (ie eveyone doesn’t get into the college of their 1st or even 2nd choice), it just means you are not forced to stay in a school that doesn’t meet the needs of your child.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 7:38 am #
- Ok. Too early for nishits usual bowel movements of the keyboard. Need c.o.f.f.e.e….
- Oh. And STFU nishit.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:39 am #
bring back bussing why dont you?
send high SES students into low SES neighborhoods.
not about racial discrimination……IQ discrimination, SES discrimination.
it isn’t the teachers, dopey cudlips, its IQ and SES.
we cant do anything about IQ, so vouchers is just an attempt to homogenize SES.
but it will only go one way…..down.
since we arent going to bus high SES students into low SES schools.
lol
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 7:40 am #
- Ok poopyhead nishit. Now go fuck yourself.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:41 am #
shorter nishimonster @ 115: blah blah I am right you are wrong blah blah blah
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 7:43 am #
- Speaking of bussing nishit, you should be bussed out to the desert and left for dead.
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 7:46 am #
Do you have any measurable, empirical evidence of this statement or is this another declaration of monomaniacal egocentric evolutionary faith?
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:46 am #
this seems…..somehow personal to me…..i wonder if darleen’s grandsons are disruptive in class?
Possible ADD? or Carin’s kids aren’t top of their classes?
this reeks of the whole, “my kids a genius but has a bad teacher” dealio.
i definitely get a creepy vibe off you cudlips.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 7:48 am #
Ok, let’s pretend this post wasn’t about NCLB. OH YEA, it wasn’t. No every issue surrounding the problems of public schools is NOT about NCLB.
Comment by Mr. Pink on 7/17 @ 7:49 am #
Nishi do you have any idea how elitist and condescending you sound or are you doing it on purpose?
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 7:49 am #
nishi the griefer returns. That last comment was uncalled for and wrong. Stop trying to get in the commentator’s heads because you are consistantly delusional in your conclusions.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 7:49 am #
I knew it was only a matter of time before Dr. Pournelle was brought up.
Comment by JD on 7/17 @ 7:52 am #
BH – Quit flirting with the nishit.
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 7:56 am #
JD: I’m sending a midget clown to your office to give you a massage. No need to thank me.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 7:56 am #
Possible ADD? or Carin’s kids aren’t top of their classes?
this reeks of the whole, “my kids a genius but has a bad teacher†dealio
You get this from what? Honestlyl, the quality of public schools doesn’t affect my kids at all, since they don’t go.
But, Detroit graduates 25% of it’s kids and that is NOT because of NCLB.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 7:57 am #
“Sorry, you’re just not college material. There’s a vocational school over here that has some interesting programs focused on marketable skills.”
Personally, I want to find whoever told nishi she was college material and hear their excuse for lying to the poor child.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 7:59 am #
Cuz poor peeple is stupider.
Comment by N. O'Brain on 7/17 @ 7:59 am #
“Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:26 am #
BJTex
Yes, it goes to the “teaching to the slowest kid†thing I mentioned.
One other problem is that AP classes started getting a bad rap as ways that [white kids] in suburban settings could get an “unfair†advantage over bright [black] kids in the inner city where AP classes were not offered. It has gotten so that a lot of colleges don’t look at the extra points from AP classes much anymore. Upsets their beancounting.”
My oldest son took every AP course he could in (suburban) (Philadelphia) (parochial) HS, and started at Drexel U.
As a sophmore.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 8:01 am #
*snort*
The creep in this thread is the one calling people “cudlips” and constantly shifting identities to different fictional characters.
Comment by Andy Freeman on 7/17 @ 8:02 am #
If they get rid of parents, who will they blame?
Comment by N. O'Brain on 7/17 @ 8:02 am #
#Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 7:46 am #
nishidiot: FOAD.
Comment by Mr. Pink on 7/17 @ 8:02 am #
I do not have kids and have really no knowledge of the educational system except the one I attended, but it is hard for me to imagine a scenario where it would be harmful to the children for a parent to be able to choose which school their child attends. It is just hard for me to see Nishi’s arguments as valid. Common sense tells me that the parent, who has raised the child since birth, knows more about the special needs of the child than a government administrator with a graduate degree in liberal arts. I am sorry though this is only me using common sense since I do not have one of those shiny degrees from grad school.
Comment by N. O'Brain on 7/17 @ 8:02 am #
“#Comment by Andy Freeman on 7/17 @ 8:02 am #
If they get rid of parents, who will they blame?”
Bush.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 8:04 am #
N Ob
Yep, all my girls were in AP classes …but when the youngest was applying to colleges, some of them were not accepting the extra points earned.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 8:06 am #
nishimonster is now flailing for attention
Carin’s kids are not in gubmint school and my grandsons haven’t even started first grade yet.
nishit is a perfect example of nihilistic union teaching.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 8:09 am #
Mr Pink – since you don’t have an advanced degree, you are under serious suspicion of being one of those dreaded 40%ers. A Two digit.
Therefor, any opinions on this matter are better left to those who are better qualified. Preferably someone who has succeeded in one of those rigorous Education Departments programs. You know, that all the football and basketball players in college were ed majors … that doesn’t mean ANYTHING.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 8:19 am #
here u go cudlips.
via dr. yes
i was right about Jefferson’s intentionalism, huh Aldo?
this will cause truble for handsomemormonguy i shud think–
There is a belief abroad in many conservative circles that the U.S. is “a Christian nationâ€Â. This belief is found in perhaps its most extreme form in the Mormon doctrine that the Constitution of the United States is a divinely inspired document.
lol
Comment by Mr. Pink on 7/17 @ 8:20 am #
Carin when I was used to play soccer I had a problem with using my hands if the ball was speeding by my head. To solve this problem and get over my natural instincts the coach made me carry pennies when I played. This caused me to clench my hands into fists and not think about using them during the game. It broke me of my natural instinct to block fast moving objects flying toward my head. I am beginning to suspect that grad school has some sort of program like this to “cure” people of their natural instincts of common sense and reason. This is all totally IMHO by the way.
Comment by Dread Cthulhu on 7/17 @ 8:21 am #
Nishi: “bring back bussing why dont you?”
Bussing was a socio-political chimera — a false solution allowing suburban liberals to assuage their guilty consciences without actually undertaking any of the pain of the solution, most conspicuously in Boston. The state legislature, dominated by Boston suburbs, decreed a bussing solution that impacted the city of Boston (i.e. not themselves). Their solution accelerated white flight and the decline of the city. Astonishingly, the model was repeated elsewhere.
Nishi: “send high SES students into low SES neighborhoods.”
Economic status is a poor indicator of native intelligence and only a fair one of academic achievement.
Nishi: “not about racial discrimination……IQ discrimination, SES discrimination. it isn’t the teachers, dopey cudlips, its IQ and SES.”
You’re naive at best and ignorant in all probability. IQ is one measure of intelligence, but not the only one. Strip you of your creature comforts and you’re naught but another dopey prey animal. See you come Darwin days an’ see if you’re still so smug.
Nishi: “we cant do anything about IQ, so vouchers is just an attempt to homogenize SES.”
No, what vouchers do is provide an opportunity for someone to remove economic status as an educational limitor.
Comment by N. O'Brain on 7/17 @ 8:24 am #
“There is a belief abroad in many conservative circles that the U.S. is “a Christian nationâ€Â. ”
It is.
Michael Medved says so, and he’s Jewish.
I say so, and I’m an agnostic.
Why is it so fucking hard for you to grasp reality?
Comment by syn on 7/17 @ 8:26 am #
“so haveing”
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 6:52 am #
Well quellcrist falconer it would appear you were born with the stupid gene which of course means you should be aborted to prevent your genetic stupidity from breeding. Perhaps you are what is wrong with The Children?
Comment by N. O'Brain on 7/17 @ 8:26 am #
“This belief is found in perhaps its most extreme form in the Mormon doctrine that the Constitution of the United States is a divinely inspired document.”
What’s “extreme” about that, praytell?
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 8:31 am #
Still waiting for an answer, nishi. When are are done changing topics to your favorite strawmen, please give me a response.
Comment by quellcrist falconer on 7/17 @ 8:32 am #
No, what vouchers do is provide an opportunity for someone to remove economic status as an educational limitor.
yup, at an individual level. SES is the last environmental wiggle room we have. But a flood of low SES students into high SES schools will have the same effect as NCLB.
which is…..regression to the mean for the quality of education for the other students.
And you are right, i shouldn’t sneer at the cudlips.
When I started blogging I thought Jeff was the smartest person I had ever read, one of the gods of the blogverse.
I continue to expect the guest bloggers to approximate his quality, and that is unfair.
I apolo.
Comment by N. O'Brain on 7/17 @ 8:39 am #
nishidiot: shut up, the adults are trying to talk.
Comment by JHoward on 7/17 @ 8:49 am #
nuggie, do you have any quotable quotes on when schizophrenia of opinion finally meets gross cognitive dissonance? Sounds fun!
Comment by JD on 7/17 @ 8:49 am #
nishit decided to puke all over a thread today. Someone better tell Karl’s Dad.
Comment by Ric Locke on 7/17 @ 8:50 am #
As often happens, nishi is right on details but wrong on point.
“Regression to the mean” has long been the aim of the educational establishment. Advanced programs have been being killed off for years, long before the institution of NCLB. This is in part one of the unintended consequences of feminism.
Nobody, especially nowadays, becomes a teacher because they’re especially bright. Even back when I was in college, forty years ago, it was a joke — if high-end science was too tough, you could fall back on engineering; if all those hard-and-fast rules offended you, you could either go into fuzzy studies (English, anthropology, etc.) or enroll in the School of Business; and if you couldn’t keep up anywhere else, there was always Education. One of the outstanding characteristics of low-achievers everywhere is resentment of the successful as “unfair”, and as the Education Establishment began to be staffed entirely by people who couldn’t make it elsewhere Teh System began to be strongly biased against high-achievers.
Once upon a time, about the only way an intelligent woman could get any self-satisfaction whatever was by going into teaching. She still couldn’t get paid, mind you, but she could manage to achieve and be recognized for achievement, in her own mind if nothing else. Nowadays an intelligent woman has many other avenues for achievement, and the rewards for good performance as a teacher are anyway fairly (well, extremely) modest, so we don’t get that overrepresentation of the intelligent among teachers. The result is that for the most part teaching is a career of last resort, and it shows in the overall quality. (nishi’s bell curve applies here: there’s nothing in that that says there aren’t any excellent teachers; it only says that the mean has dropped and the standard deviation has increased.)
There is nothing new about that. Back when all or most teachers (as a profession) were men, they got no respect.
The “leveling” or “regression to the mean” aspect of NCLB is there deliberately as a means of getting it accepted politically in the current environment. The prime impetus of NCLB was the discovery that the kids were being taught nothing of any use — the entire schoolday being absorbed by self-esteem and the absolute moral superiority of homosexuality. What “teaching to the test” accomplishes is that something is taught, that some minimum of literacy is achieved or the teachers get penalized. The machete for whacking the tall poppies is seen as a regrettable (infuriating, in fact) necessity for selling the idea at all.
Regards,
Ric
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 8:52 am #
- nishi, the more you ramble the more you show your sheer ignorance.
- You state your opposition to vouchers is based on the contention that it would “dumb” down the better schools by causing a shift of “poor and low performance” students. But your premise is based on a total lie.
- the idea that you can test the “native” intelligence of a person was debunked a many decades time ago. There is no “intelligence test” that shows any value or accuracy to this day. None. Nada. Zip.
- The only people that keep pedaling this crap is bottom feeders like yourself that game the systems bullshit IQ screeds, propagated by elitists.
- I did poorly in elementary and high school, barely passing, and then went on to honors, a 3.92 average, and class president in college, and a doctorate in graduate school, 2nd in 346, and the bitch that beat me out for 1st was a physicists daughter who owned half the dormitory building my frat lived in.
- There are endless factors, both socio-economic, and familial, as well as environment, that effect learning performance that have not a fucking thing to do with native intelligence. you’re full of shit.
- IQ tests are total bullshit, and you’re a total twit. I’m beginning to seriously doubt you even have a college degree based on the asinine things you post.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/17 @ 8:52 am #
Nishi, are you taking your meds for your ‘Half-Asped’ condition? Some days you’re interesting.. even articulate.. some days scattered.. some days freakin nuts.. I can relate.. Today falls in the last catagory.. Pop some meds.. switch back to Nishi (or the long version.. nishishojinjicrocodilio or whatever..) cause that quellcrist name is kinda weird and creepy and confuses casual readers as to how many of you there are.. (One Richard Morgan Cyberpunk Character is enough for any political discussion site..) Thank you..
Comment by JD on 7/17 @ 8:58 am #
I think it was nishicornholio, Ourboros.
Comment by JHoward on 7/17 @ 9:00 am #
Not to engage such mental defectiveness or anything, but nuggie, so if the Constitution isn’t divinely inspired, is anything? After you warp that into my promoting the notion it is, kindly answer the question objectively: Is anything divinely inspired?
Point being that the Mormons, should they believe as much, are attempting to place the C. on the same or similar plane as the B. Or whatever they subscribe to as God’s word. My point, on the other hand, is merely to challenge your immensely closed mind to the concept of inspiration, and from there, to the fact that the C. is in fact inspired.
What I’d like to know is to what reasonable definition of “inspiration” might the C. be “inspired”. Strikes me that if a philosophy of freedom is the key to the mind’s trajectory away from the void of purely self-interested Nihilism — which I believe without further question — those guys were some kinda inspired.
Why I’d ask an idiot like you is another question, but the answer probably has to do with the sheer entertainment value…
Trackback by American Power on 7/17 @ 9:08 am #
Public Schools: Trojan Horse for the Socialist Sta…
What better way for an Obama administration to shift American policy to socialism than by establishing the schools and the center of a new Soviet bureaucratic structure in American education – the trojan horse for the socialist state?…
Comment by Aldo on 7/17 @ 9:10 am #
i was right about Jefferson’s intentionalism, huh Aldo?
Yes
Comment by panther girl on 7/17 @ 9:15 am #
Carin -
Sorry to go OT, but I wonder if you could give me a starting point for homeschool curriculum/ “texts”. Thanks!
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 9:19 am #
Sure – what subject/age are you interested in?
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/17 @ 9:27 am #
Are elementary school co-ops run by multiple families popular and/or legal? just curious..
Comment by panther girl on 7/17 @ 9:28 am #
Wow. I have a 1st grader (not currently homeschooled) so that would be useful, but I’m also interested in what kinds of things are out there for older students (science & math sorts of things). Tx.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 9:30 am #
Anyone else stunned to see the “libertarian” opposed to vouchers?
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 9:33 am #
- nishi, does your mentor think y7ou can matriculate or does he just want you to audit?
Comment by JD on 7/17 @ 9:34 am #
Why does the nishit hate Mormons?
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 9:34 am #
Ya know, I’m actually surprised nishi didn’t chime in to support ‘cleo’s call for the renewal of slavery under the name “mandatory volunteerism”. No doubt she’d have some alternate rationalization.
Probably based on IQ.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 9:35 am #
She doesn’t. She just doesn’t fear them the way she does her co-religionists. Since it’s a safe and socially acceptable bigotry, she revels in it.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 9:36 am #
Ouroboros – in some areas, yes. Laws vary by state.
Panther – an excellent place to start is with Susan Wise Bauer’s book The Well Trained Mind. She uses a classical approach to education, and she both outlines her method and lists resources. It is very extensive – and equivalent (imho) of way beyond an AP education. For us mere mortals (or those with more than one or two children) – it is best used as a guide, or you will feel like an abject failure.
Sonlight is a great source – especially for those just getting into homeschooling because they really lay it all out for you. It is a “Christian” curriculum, but I’ve known atheists that used it with a bit of modification. Most excellent are it’s lists and lists of books.
Comment by Education Guy on 7/17 @ 9:38 am #
First off you get the Feds out of education all together. No Dept of Education, no education “czarsâ€Â, no NCLB. Schools are strictly a local affair.
I’m not quite as convinced. It’s not because I work as a contractor for DoEd, because the part I work for predates the department and would survive the destruction, it’s because I’m not sold on the idea that the quality of your education should be in part dependent on which location you happen to be born in. The differences in teacher quality notwithstanding.
I do think a good first step would be to rework or destroy the teachers union. I like the idea of collective bargaining, but the idea that this should be a permanent group has been shown to cause more harm than good.
Anyway, my .02.
Comment by MayBee on 7/17 @ 9:46 am #
“Imagine schools that are open all day and offer after-school and evening recreational activities and homework assistance,†she said. “And suppose the schools included child care and dental, medical and counseling clinics.â€Â
I’m against programs that make it too easy to not have to parent your kids. I actually think people should have to work a little harder the more they want out of the system.
Darleen is right that eventually these things get so expensive that it becomes difficult to afford to be the people that have one stay-at-home parent.
I used to volunteer at our school’s homework lab. It did serve a valuable purpose but eventually those kids went home to parents that didn’t care about them.
Comment by Dread Cthulhu on 7/17 @ 9:52 am #
Nishi: “yup, at an individual level. SES is the last environmental wiggle room we have. But a flood of low SES students into high SES schools will have the same effect as NCLB.”
Not really and not even a probability. Vouchers benefit those individuals capable of doing higher caliber work *AND* have parents who care enough to want better for their child… not to sound cynical, but I fear, based on the behavior of the local urban centers, that this is a diminishingly small population, especially after a decade orso of “being educated” = “acting white.”
Nishi: “And you are right, i shouldn’t sneer at the cudlips.”
A couple points, Nishi. First, I think you would find you are far more dependent upon those whom you sneer at than they are upon you. Second, I think, were you to do a head-count, there are a hell of a lot more of them than there are of you. Frankly, comes the Darwin Days, you’re just so much dead weight — you’re over-specialized in academic skill, rather than practical skills. Specialization is best left to insects.
Comment by bergerbilder on 7/17 @ 9:56 am #
Let me apologize beforehand if I repeat something that’s already been stated, because I have only gotten about half-way through the comments.
The biggest problem facing teachers today is that 35% of all children born today are born out of wedlock. In the inner cities, it approaches 70% born out of wedlock. Most of these children essential have no father, and I’d guess that only half have a functional mother (for various reasons). These 35% will be given adequate food and shelter because our current level of national affluence allows for that. But they will learn to speak in a childish dialect that will barely resemble the language that the teachers will try to teach them to read and write with. The only math skills they have is what they pick up on the street in order to survive, like counting money.
So we’re talking about a lot of kids who will not be educated either because they cannot be, or the teachers just can’t put that much effort into teaching kids that need so much individual attention. Head Start was an attempt at correcting some of these problems, but for reasons of political correctness it grew beyond what was essentially needed, so now the Head Start teachers are faced with the same problems as the Primary teachers of too many kids and so little time.
I’m afraid that we need a sea-change in our culture before we can even think about getting back to having schools that just focus on doing the fundamentals and doing them well. Some people obviously think that condoms on cucumbers is the way to go, but I fear that it’s a lot more complicated than that.
Comment by MayBee on 7/17 @ 9:58 am #
it is not the quality of the teachers.
the state board certifies teachers.
the same standards operate in detroit and in ann arbor and in grosse point heights.
That’s just silly.
Jeff Immelt was just an entry-level employee once, and GE hired thousands of people in 1982 that met their standards. Yet he managed to be just a little better than most. Teachers are just people, nishi, some more talented than others.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 10:01 am #
You mean, the problems in urban cities is NOT because of the Bell curve? Well, shut my mouth.
BTW, I totally agree. ujjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjhy
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 10:02 am #
snort. That last bit was from my cat. Cat and dog are sorta fighting and he hopped on my laptop to assume a defensive posture.
Comment by Education Guy on 7/17 @ 10:06 am #
When I was in school (public – in upstate NY) we had 3 levels of difficulty for every class available – Local, Regents, and AP. If you did very well in the level you were in, you were given the opportunity to move up to the next level, if you did poorly you moved down. In addition opportunities were available for non college track education in classes like auto mechanics and welding. Ethics and morals were taught in optional religious instruction which was taught off campus by local churches and synagogues, where busing to and from was paid for by the school district. Looking back, it seems that there could have been room for civics, which was basically folded into the history/social studies classes. You also had the opportunity to take drivers ed. No gun safety classes, but I guess you can’t have everything.
It seems to me now that it was a very workable system.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 10:24 am #
It might be odd to an outsider (a martian, for instance) that American discussions about education are almost always actually discussions about other things like bureaucratic institutions, demographic trends, political jurisdictions, budgets, unions, managements, ’systems’, corruption, horsetrading, abstruse pedagogical theories based on overtly political goals, etc, almost anything but the question “what is a good education?”
Has that simple question been satisfactorily answered? If not, wouldn’t the attempt be a good place to begin?
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 10:34 am #
Susan Wise Bauer’s book is an excellent answer to your question, Sdferr.
Comment by Rob Crawford on 7/17 @ 10:41 am #
No problem. More coherent than nishi.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 10:52 am #
I don’t doubt that she proposes an answer Carin. Though I’ve not read her book the mere mention at the link of “trivium” gives me an indication of where she’s headed. I attended this school http://www.sjca.edu/ . What I wondered at and sought to draw attention to, were the interests of the good people here (who, I hasten to add, are not much different in this regard with most other people I’ve heard discussing education). That has been my lifelong experience. I still find it odd.
Comment by Dewclaw on 7/17 @ 11:00 am #
#173
Your cats post is more intelligent than anything Nishidiot has posted EVAH!
MORE CAT POSTS!!
Comment by BJTex on 7/17 @ 11:31 am #
Ask your cat, Carin, If he/she will answer my question from #119, asked again at #145.
It doen’t look like I’m going to get a response from matoko so I might as well get the answer from your pet.
And, no, i don’t have any cat treats.
Comment by panther girl on 7/17 @ 11:35 am #
Thanks Carin! I look forward to reading Bauer’s book and investigating further.
Sdferr- sadly, this is a complaint my colleagues and I (community college) have about our department meetings as well. We rarely hear the word student and when it does come up it’s in an unpleasant way (“How can we retain more students to increase our state funding?”) And when someone does mention teaching or education or students, it’s as if they threw a turd in the middle of the room. Dead silence until someone breaks it by discussing union issues or FTE or some such nonsense. This is why I no longer attend. I’ve learned (slowly) that the best way to teach my students and to feel good about my job is to interact with “the school” as little as possible. Sad, but at least I can always find some small oases of a few faculty (and an administrator or two) who are in it for the students. Sorry for the rant. I am (so far not very successfully) trying to change my “attitude” before I return in Sept.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 11:43 am #
I don’t look on it as a rant, I’m afraid. I’ve known quite a few teachers and many feel as you do. Beyond “tending their own gardens” they haven’t succeeded in meaningful change either.
We have these same sorts of problems in other areas as well. Process trumps content. Equality rules. Liberty, not so much.
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 11:45 am #
dfkkkktjttjtjt’; ;/////////////// a;;k//////////
Wedgeeeeeeeeeeeeee //////////////drpournelle;lkdja;flkj /////// ththththtranshumanlllllllllllllll
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 11:53 am #
Well, then I guess I don’t know what you’re looking for Sdrerr. You don’t mean curriculum? Are you asking how to improve education overall?
Sadly, public education can only be so good. At best (and I went to one of the best public schools) many, MANY kids fall through the cracks. School is only one part of the equation. Education HAS to happen at home. School hours (unless you go to an elite school – like LIgette in Grosse Pointe, which as an entrance exame to get into) can only take a person so far.
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 11:56 am #
In a sense – public school are the education equivalent of welfare. It has taught/convinced parents (many parents) that education happens AT school. By teachers. I can see this by the reaction I get from people when I tell them I home school. YOU CAN DO THAT? Not so much anymore, since it is becoming more common.
When I was student teaching – way back when – kids were sent to school, assumedly by their parents, w/o books, paper, or pencils. They had totally abdicated responsibility for their children’s education to the point that they didn’t even make sure their kids showed up with the basic tools.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 12:08 pm #
- Well Sdferr, the Left seeks to protect its turf that it has wormed itself into, the public school system, in a politically based argument, so we have no choice but to retort in kind.
- But you’re wrong if you think we’re not all pissed off that the act of teaching is nowhere in sight in any of their dogmatic droning rhetoric. We point that out time after time, in much the way you just stated it, but it falls on deaf ears because education, in a general sense, is not what they’re about, they’re about indoctrination, not broad based learning.
Comment by panther girl on 7/17 @ 12:23 pm #
Read the first section of Bauer’s book online Carin and it sounds great! As for home-schooling, it does seem much more common and less “wackydoodle” than it was once thought to be. In fact, we keep seeing ads for Oregon Connections Academy, a “homeschooling” internet program that is accredited (and “supervised” by a small town community school board here in Oregon – I presume so they can get the FTE?). Not sure of the details, but it’s starting to feel like the market system may be starting to work here? We’re seeing a lot more homeschooled students in the college classroom as well both to enhance their homeschooling at the time and after they’ve graduated. I can’t help but think this is all ultimately wonderful for education. But I’m a sucker for the market system. ;-)
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 1:12 pm #
JeffG is a classical liberal. I am as well. See my college’s motto: Facio liberos ex liberis libraque. Many if not most of the people posting to PW may be too. As such, many of us will likely agree as to the content of a good education, though many others may not. I for one do not dismiss curriculum in the least. That should have been obvious. I thought it was.
Are our schools teaching the right and proper curriculum we haven’t defined yet? Will our far more numerous fellow citizens, people not attentive to PW, agree with us as to the good curriculum we haven’t yet proposed?
Let me give a simple example. As one constituent part of our curriculum, I propose we teach geometry. (Many things may be said to recommend geometry to the learner. I’ll leave those things for another time.) I propose we teach geometry with Euclid’s geometry as a text. I propose that the instructor in a class teaching Euclid’s geometry has read Euclid’s geometry, more than once or many times, enough so that that instructor understands what Euclid is getting at. I don’t expect the instructor to be capable of independent geometrical reasoning at Euclid’s level, but in fact, to be inferior to Euclid at geometrical reasoning. I expect just about everyone to be inferior to Euclid at geometric reasoning. Which is why Euclid’s text and not someone else’s. So, you can see, my view of education is necessarily hierarchical and therefore non-egalitarian in origin and expected outcome.
So, more original source texts, fewer secondary and tertiary muddled texts. Let’s put secondary and tertiary text writers out of business as text writers and encourage them to enter teaching to teach the originals they have derived their ideas from.
Many learners will fall through the cracks. They fall through now, they did in the past, they will in the future. There’s not much can be done about it, I think. We can indirectly encourage them not to allow themselves to fall through with examples of educational excellence and the subsequent successes enjoyed by those so educated. Markets in education will be the rule, whether we intentionally create them or no.
Comment by B Moe on 7/17 @ 1:47 pm #
…i was right about Jefferson’s intentionalism…
Because of this?
This is the only mention of religion in the Constitution, which is otherwise completely devoid of religious terminology or references. The point is made much more explicit in the 1796 Treaty of Tripoli, which states:
[T]he Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion
That is why people say a Christian nation instead of a Christian government
Nowhere in the Constitution does it designate English as the official language, does that mean we aren’t an English speaking nation? You might have the most binary brain I have ever encountered, nishi, it is a wonder you can function at all.
Comment by Big Bang Hunter (pumping you up) on 7/17 @ 2:37 pm #
“it is a wonder you can function at all.”
- Her functionality is directly dependent on which alternate personality is commenting at any given time. Picture your mind as a 1000 channel TV set, and your sitting watching and someone is channel surfing, clicking the remote just in time to stop you whenever you start to have a coherent thought about what you’re watching.
- And it seldom, if ever, stops doing that, and you can’t control it. BiPolar is a living hell.
Comment by Ouroboros on 7/17 @ 2:47 pm #
#189 BBH: A good description.. That’s the down side.. On the flip side God himself whispers his mind into your ear.. and nothing is hidden from you. Just cant remember it on the trip down..
Comment by Cowboy on 7/17 @ 3:14 pm #
To give it a nice parochial feel, we’ll call the school “St. Hobbes of the F***ing Leviathan”
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 3:24 pm #
So, more original source texts, fewer secondary and tertiary muddled texts. Let’s put secondary and tertiary text writers out of business as text writers and encourage them to enter teaching to teach the originals they have derived their ideas from.
That’s why I didn’t understand your criticism of Bauer. She is ALL ABOUT original texts. REAL books. You should see her recommended reading lists.
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 3:28 pm #
I mean, WTM has you reading Beowulf out-loud to your first grader.
Comment by Dewclaw on 7/17 @ 3:53 pm #
Carin’s cat is AWESOME!
Comment by Blind Howling Moonbat on 7/17 @ 3:57 pm #
Seriously, all my cat ever does to books is chew the covers off them.
Comment by B Moe on 7/17 @ 3:58 pm #
Mine too.
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 4:03 pm #
My cat may appear smart, but she threw-up a hairball all over my laptop. I’m banning her.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 4:23 pm #
Nowhere have I criticised Ms. Bauer. I said “I don’t doubt that she proposes an answer Carin. Though I’ve not read her book the mere mention at the link of “trivium†gives me an indication of where she’s headed.”
I would further say I imagine she is headed in a good direction. Did you go to the link I provided? If you did, why would you think I’m negatively critical of Ms. Bauer? Classical western education, trivium and quadrivium, that’s what the school is all about. Hooray! Go to the St. John’s link and look up our reading lists.
Sheesh.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 5:40 pm #
For those who may be interested, there is a book review in the online Weekly Standard today entitled “How Teachers Learn: Some unexpected lessons.” by Charles Sahm of the book “Relentless Pursuit:A Year in the Trenches with Teach for America” by Donna Foote. It’s worth a look. http://tinyurl.com/5b79lt
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 6:29 pm #
Nowhere have I criticised Ms. Bauer. I said “I don’t doubt that she proposes an answer Carin. Though I’ve not read her book the mere mention at the link of “trivium†gives me an indication of where she’s headed.â€Â
I would further say I imagine she is headed in a good direction. Did you go to the link I provided? If you did, why would you think I’m negatively critical of Ms. Bauer? Classical western education, trivium and quadrivium, that’s what the school is all about. Hooray! Go to the St. John’s link and look up our reading lists.
Than I just misunderstood what you meant in the original comment. I did go to the link. I just didn’t understand where you were going. Because I think WTM/Bauer, Classical, etc is the way to create an “educated” person. As a method, it only works among with the smart kids, or those that are homeschooled. But, a little part of me believes that even the 40% could understand Beowulf and that exposing them to it, rather than deciding it’s too advanced, is the way to go. Honestly, I could go on and on, because it’s obviously a subject near and dear to me.
As I said, I didn’t understand in what vein you intended your question.
And, FTR, earlier today I threw away all my Grad school Ed stuff. I had kept it, thinking that just possibly there was something useful in there. Today, I made the executive decision that no, there isn’t.
Comment by Carin's cat on 7/17 @ 6:30 pm #
Then. Whatever bitches.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 6:40 pm #
Carin’s cat, I stepped out my back door today and watched as three two week old kittens flew out from under my pickup truck and gamboled across the backyard to the chainlink fence, escaping from me they were, but pulled up short at the fence, arched their little backs and started in to hissing. Hmmm, I thought, that’s odd, they forgot they were getting away from me and now they’ve stopped to hiss at something at the fence. I walked out there, they scattered and I find the source of their new found fear, a tiny, apparently abandoned two week old raccoon baby (smaller than the kittens), covered, as we all are around here this time of year, in mosquitoes. should I take the critter in, do you think, or leave it to find it’s momma or not, as the case may be?
Comment by Carin on 7/17 @ 6:50 pm #
Oye. My children wouldn’t have given the opportunity to decide. That thing would have been inside my house so fast. That’s how I ended up with FOUR cats. I’m desperately close to hitting “cat lady” status, except I’m married and also have a dog.
My cat (three of the four, actually) would have killed it before we ever found it. So there’s that.
The fourth cat – abandoned by my bil on our doorstep on his way to train-up – won’t even leave the kid’s bedroom.
Comment by Sdferr on 7/17 @ 7:01 pm #
I ‘have’ no cats, so long as permitting the feral cats round here to live can be considered ‘not having’. They’re on their own for food and such. I just don’t know quite how to reckon the percentages on the ‘coon.
Finds his mom, a-okay, or at least as much as that sort of thing gets for young ‘coons.
Doesn’t find his mom and left alone outside….. He/she’s dead within a couple of days or so most likely, with all the other critters roundabout.
Bring him in, he dies of fright at my visage or isn’t fed right and dies of vitamin deficiency or whatever. Housetraining racoons? Don’t want to think about it now. I do know ‘coons can be downright mean and smart and troublesome when grown up.
Comment by Darleen on 7/17 @ 7:10 pm #
Carin
Back in the day grade schools provided paper, pencils and books. I remember being paper monitor.
And lo and behold, LA schools were tops in the nation…now they are just tops in having the highest paid teachers in the nation and 50% grad rate.
argh
Comment by Keith on 7/17 @ 7:34 pm #
As a New York City parent I am incredibly sick of Randi. She doesn’t care about the students. She doesn’t care about the teachers. She doesn’t care about the parents. All she cares about is solidifying her power base while grabbing more and more. She wants to turns our schools into community centers? They can’t even teach!
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