Wednesday, June 15, 2005
News and Notes
Just a few important tidbits...
Schiavo really was a vegetable
An autopsy revealed that Terry Schiavo, media darling, really was completely brain dead. No amount of therapy would have helped. She was brocolli. And while Michael Schiavo was unavailable for comment, sources indicate his response was something to the effect of "Oh, thank freakin' god."
At the time of her death, Terry's brain was about half that of a normal person, she was blind, and she would never have been able to feed through the mouth.
So, yeah, it was probably time for her to go.
Asthma suprises some atheletes
Which I find surprising, as you'd think you'd hear asthma coming from a mile away...what with all the wheazing and coughing.
...
Sorry, lame joke. Carry on.
Military: Gitmo detainees treated well
According to military, Gitmo promises:
Which, I think, is really a good thing. Getting rid of PM and going with an all AM day seems good on the surface, but some people just aren't morning people. A good portion of the Canadian population would certainly be dissatisfied, and that doesn't really go well with their socialist policy of pleasing everybody equally (or nobody, depending on the legislation).
...and to be filed under "seriously annoying":
Principal urges teachers to pass seniors
...and no, this has nothing to do with drivers' ed (get it? pass, like when driving). No, a principal has invited his teachers to "re-evaluate" certain senior with failing grades and see if maybe, just maybe, they didn't really deserve a D. And why? To try and meet No Child Left Behind requirements. Jones, the principal, indicated that their school needed to graduate 95% of seniors to meet federal standards. In actuality, they only needed to graduate 82.8% of seniors.
...
So what's the scary part, here? That the principal didn't even know the number of students he had to graduate? No, that shows either deceit or incompetence, but isn't too scary. How about the fact that only 82.8% of seniors are expected to graduate? Yeah, that's a little scary, but this might be an unusually bad school system. No, what I find scary is that some bureaucrat in Washington decided that education is a success should the school make a cutoff of exactly 82.8%. 82.7%? Nope, that's failure. These sort of rigid, arbitrary standards are just a symptom of what is wrong with public education right now, and No Child Left Behind in particular. I think we've forgotten what is really important in education and what we want to expect out of our teachers.
I'll give you a hint. It has nothing to do with ISAT, SAT, ACT, or whatever set of vowels and consonants you want to put together and capitalize. This drive to teach towards standardized tests is going to kill public education.
Forget capturing a kid's imagination or giving him an intuition! Get me another worksheet!
Schiavo really was a vegetable
An autopsy revealed that Terry Schiavo, media darling, really was completely brain dead. No amount of therapy would have helped. She was brocolli. And while Michael Schiavo was unavailable for comment, sources indicate his response was something to the effect of "Oh, thank freakin' god."
At the time of her death, Terry's brain was about half that of a normal person, she was blind, and she would never have been able to feed through the mouth.
So, yeah, it was probably time for her to go.
Asthma suprises some atheletes
Which I find surprising, as you'd think you'd hear asthma coming from a mile away...what with all the wheazing and coughing.
...
Sorry, lame joke. Carry on.
Military: Gitmo detainees treated well
According to military, Gitmo promises:
- 40% better pee to Quran ratio than your average gulag
- Prisoner stacking is down almost double from last year
- Anal probing only when absolutely necessary or fun
- Tuesday is Spa day!
Which, I think, is really a good thing. Getting rid of PM and going with an all AM day seems good on the surface, but some people just aren't morning people. A good portion of the Canadian population would certainly be dissatisfied, and that doesn't really go well with their socialist policy of pleasing everybody equally (or nobody, depending on the legislation).
...and to be filed under "seriously annoying":
Principal urges teachers to pass seniors
...and no, this has nothing to do with drivers' ed (get it? pass, like when driving). No, a principal has invited his teachers to "re-evaluate" certain senior with failing grades and see if maybe, just maybe, they didn't really deserve a D. And why? To try and meet No Child Left Behind requirements. Jones, the principal, indicated that their school needed to graduate 95% of seniors to meet federal standards. In actuality, they only needed to graduate 82.8% of seniors.
...
So what's the scary part, here? That the principal didn't even know the number of students he had to graduate? No, that shows either deceit or incompetence, but isn't too scary. How about the fact that only 82.8% of seniors are expected to graduate? Yeah, that's a little scary, but this might be an unusually bad school system. No, what I find scary is that some bureaucrat in Washington decided that education is a success should the school make a cutoff of exactly 82.8%. 82.7%? Nope, that's failure. These sort of rigid, arbitrary standards are just a symptom of what is wrong with public education right now, and No Child Left Behind in particular. I think we've forgotten what is really important in education and what we want to expect out of our teachers.
I'll give you a hint. It has nothing to do with ISAT, SAT, ACT, or whatever set of vowels and consonants you want to put together and capitalize. This drive to teach towards standardized tests is going to kill public education.
Forget capturing a kid's imagination or giving him an intuition! Get me another worksheet!
# posted by Jason @ 4:51 PM 
Comments:
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Speaking as one just out of the public education nightmare... you've hit it right on the head Jason. Creativity? Spontenaety? PLEASE! These have no place in today's paradigm and yet it is those things that used to draw good teachers. Now education will draw people who were not qualified to become postal carriers.
Sail on!
Scott
Sail on!
Scott
# posted by 
: 7:48 PM
: 7:48 PM
I couldn't help but notice all of the issues related to Asthma that were lacking in the CNN article, such as how it is widely believed that industrial pollution is to blame for the recent rise in cases. The west side of Chicago has one of the highest death rates for asthma in the country, which has been atributed to two older power plants which are exempt from the standards of the clean air act [link].
The article also failed to mention the millions of asthmatics like me who work full time, but are cheated out of health insurance by our employers, and are unable to get private insurance as a result of our condition. Because of a lack of proper preventative treatment, our asthma is considerably worse, putting us at high risk for serious, possibly fatal attacks.
The writer of the CNN article obviously did almost no research on the subject, otherwise he/she would have known that the inhaler prescribed to the player was Albuterol, not "buterol".
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The article also failed to mention the millions of asthmatics like me who work full time, but are cheated out of health insurance by our employers, and are unable to get private insurance as a result of our condition. Because of a lack of proper preventative treatment, our asthma is considerably worse, putting us at high risk for serious, possibly fatal attacks.
The writer of the CNN article obviously did almost no research on the subject, otherwise he/she would have known that the inhaler prescribed to the player was Albuterol, not "buterol".
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