Student Government Election

We held an interesting student government election at my school today. I'm pleased with the result.

A former student of mine, one who would probably wear the title "geek" proudly, one who had no chance of winning the election, won. And boy, are the "regular" student government denizens pissed!

"He doesn't know how hard it is." "He doesn't know how to get things done." "We've done this for three years, who does he think he is?" Of those comments and others I've heard, I'm sure it's the last one that they're really feeling.

The first election was held before Spring Break. That's right, the first election. However, the votes weren't counted because 14 classes (including mine) didn't get the opportunity to vote. A new election was scheduled for today, and the students running the election did a good job this time.

When the results were announced at the end of the school day, my class (which had a few members of the new President's "campaign staff") erupted in cheers. I was one of the cheering throng.

It's not just that I'm glad the underdog, the outsider, won. He beat an opposition that saw that student government position as their earned right. He ran a campaign, his opposition really didn't--probably assuming that they'd just win because they were supposed to. He worked; they counted on name recognition, popularity, and arrogance.

I saw the winner after school, surrounded by students not on the A-list. He was happy, subdued, a gracious winner. Those around him were ecstatic.

The little guy won today. He may even be ready for the responsibility he's worked so hard to win. I hope he does well.

Fine Display of CTA Professionalism

Watch the so-called "professional" educators who want to compel everyone to give their money for left-wing political causes.

Then go to my May 2005 archives (at left), from May 25th on, and read my posts--and see pictures!--from a union rally at the California Capitol.

If you want to know why I am a proud non-member of the California Teachers Association, those posts and this video are all you need to see.

Diversity

I'm compelled to lift the following from Discriminations (see blogroll at left):

The following depressing tale appears toward the end of John Fund’s most recent column on the Taliban Man at Yale:

Indeed, I was told a chilling story of another Ivy League University that had two applicants from the same inner-city high school. Both were Hispanic. One applicant was a very good student who had participated in school and community affairs. The other was a mediocre student who had frequently clashed with authorities and even had a scrape with the law. A leading graduate of the school was trying to help the former student get admitted. The deciding factor might have come during his senior year when his parents managed to save enough money to move a few miles away to a suburb. “When I heard of their move I told the mother her son was doomed, because I knew how the admissions office thought,” the graduate told me. “Sure enough the more marginal kid got in, because he was viewed as a more ‘authentic’ representative of the Hispanic community.”

“Diversity” is not only built on a foundation of stereotypes; it reinforces them.

Sad, but true.

Are you not aware of what John means by "Taliban man"? I've avoided the topic on this blog, primarily because it sickens me. You can read Fund's post which is linked in the snippet above, but to make a long story short, a former Taliban ambassador-at-large is currently studying at Yale instead of at Guantanamo.

Another Reason To Love The Unions...

...or at least the states that vote heavily Democratic. From Michael Barone, via Newsalert.com:

Public employee unions

My U.S. News column this week is about one force that threatens to gobble up our otherwise thriving private sector economy: the greater-than-economic-growth increases in spending mandated by current entitlement programs like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. But there's another force threatening the private sector economy: public-employee unions. In many but not all states, public-employee unions have been forcing greater-than-economic-growth spending increases on state and local governments—spending that produces very little in the way of public benefit.

And the public-employee unions have been growing stronger. In California last year, they spent huge amounts of money—money that came, via members' dues, from the taxpayers—on trashing Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's job rating and defeating his ballot measures. These leeches on the private sector economy are now in position to keep sucking more and more blood (emphasis mine--Darren)...

[M]any on the political left complain about the disappearance of the middle class, the alleged tendency of our economy to produce hefty income growth for those at the upper end of the economic scale and relatively little income growth for the large number at the lower end. Interestingly, this tendency toward income inequality is most pronounced in states that have been voting Democratic in presidential elections—especially New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and California. Income inequality tends to be much less in many states that vote heavily Republican. New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and California have imported many high-income earners and low-income immigrants and have been exporting many more middle-income earners. This process is accelerated when, as in these four states, high-income earners have been eager to vote for Democrats backed by public-employee unions: The same people who have been complaining about this trend have been causing it.

Teaching Math

The following quotes come from a Seattle Times article, which I surfed to from somewhere:

Research shows kids learn math best when they begin with a thorough grounding in mathematics fundamentals and progress in an orderly sequence, with the help of similar instructional approaches, from class to class and grade to grade.

But in Washington, many kids face bamboozling instruction that can be a mile wide and an inch deep. They endure competing approaches and instructional materials. And many textbooks aren't even in sync with the material kids will be expected to know on the WASL.

Wait a minute! You mean that math should be taught in a sequential manner? That instruction should be for "mastery" and not just "introduction"? Say it isn't so!

This is why I support California's state standards. What's recommended above is exactly how our standards are constructed.

And by high school, kids have spent years marinating in a culture that disses math. Few people in this country boast about being illiterate. But it's long been a laugh line to declare "I'm not a math person." Not so in countries such as Japan and Singapore, where students are expected to conquer math — and keep trying until they do.

And in America, where are the math bees, the volunteer math tutorial corps, the math-is-fundamental public-service campaigns? As a society, we root for reading. But we expect success in math to just happen ... or not.

Ilana Horn, associate professor of mathematics education at the University of Washington, says that makes a big difference. "We have a belief in innate ability. It perpetuates this idea that you either have it or you don't, instead of that you aren't trying hard enough.

"It allows teachers to not question student failure in the same way, and it allows parents to excuse the kids' poor performance, and kids to excuse their own poor performance."

John Allen Paulos, in his groundbreaking book Innumeracy, said pretty much the same thing.

One thing about the above quote, though--should a newspaper really be using street language in an article? Dissing? Come on; a reporter should have a better vocabulary than that.

The state is ramping up its attention to math. A review of curriculum is under way to help districts make choices aligned with state standards. A small cadre of math specialists is helping teachers with instruction and curriculum. And 10th-graders who fail the math segment of the WASL this week will be eligible for extra help, at state expense, before retaking the test.

That's good.

Math matters. Mastering math means learning problem solving, abstract thinking and the ability to make connections between ideas. Math trains the mind. It also pays the bills.

It's a simple formula: The higher the math a kid can master, the higher the wage he or she is likely to earn later on. More than 80 percent of workers in professional jobs, including managers, engineers, doctors and lawyers, got at least as far as algebra II, and more than half of them completed at least some trigonometry, according to a 2003 study by the Educational Testing Service, which creates and scores standardized tests.

I'm beginning to think we should stop this utilitarian line of reasoning. Knowing math has value beyond how much money a person makes. And how many of those managers use the Algebra II or trig in their jobs? I'm sure they use an easy facility with numbers, but let's stop pretending that everyone needs trig to get rich. They need it to be able to think--to have those critical thinking skills about which we talk so much.

To close the achievement gap between whites and ethnic minorities, teachers also have to bring mathematical concepts to students from other cultures in a way that engages them. That can require not only mastery of the material, but a creative approach.

Utter crap. How is it that Asian immigrants to America do so well in our math classes? Every time I read about this subject I get the same answer--hard work. Studying. Not expecting the learning to be easy.

The secret, [Michigan State University math expert] Schmidt said, is coherence. Instruction should progress in a sequence of topics over the grades that is consistent with the inherent structure and logic of mathematics. Kids have to master the basics, such as ratios, decimals, percents and fractions before they are ready to tackle algebra and geometry.

Otherwise, kids get confused and don't see the connections between topics. Clutter — teaching kids topics before they are ready for them — and holes in the logical sequence are traps kids may never dig their way out of.

Here we're again fighting against the mile-wide-inch-deep philosophy that permeated American math instruction for so long. I still hear it at my own school: "Kids need to see this topic in Algebra II so it won't be new to them in trig." My take: they should master the Algebra II standards in the Algebra II class and master the trig standards in trig class. Wacky concept, isn't it?

"We are moving from math taught in a cut-and-dried, calculation-based fashion to more explanation. Teachers weren't trained that way, and it's hard for them to teach it that way in the classroom. It's a huge expectation, it's moving in the right direction, it's just that the students and teachers are caught in the middle."

I'm ok with in-depth explanations. That's what I do--at least I hope that's what I do. My fear here is that people will make the presentation methodology, and not the content, the focus of the class. I've heard this kind of talk before, and it sounds very fuzzy.

But let's assume they're sincere. If so, then Washington State is moving in the right direction as far as math (maths?) education goes.

Mark Steyn on Iran

I haven't quoted Steyn lately, and my readers are worse off for it. Of course, my readers could also use search engines to find Steyn's columns any time they like!

Here's what he recently wrote on Iran, and I do love his analogies:

You know what's great fun to do if you're on, say, a flight from Chicago to New York and you're getting a little bored? Why not play being President Ahmadinejad? Stand up and yell in a loud voice, "I've got a bomb!" Next thing you know the air marshal will be telling people, "It's OK, folks. Nothing to worry about. He hasn't got a bomb." And then the second marshal would say, "And even if he did have a bomb it's highly unlikely he'd ever use it." And then you threaten to kill the two Jews in row 12 and the stewardess says, "Relax, everyone. That's just a harmless rhetorical flourish." And then a group of passengers in rows 4 to 7 point out, "Yes, but it's entirely reasonable of him to have a bomb given the threatening behavior of the marshals and the cabin crew."

That's how it goes with the Iranians.

You can see how I feel about this situation.

This Is Boring

Joanne's quotes and commentary are ideal so I'll just lift them here. Go read all her posts, though--see blogroll at left.

Boredom is educational

Boring lessons prepare children for real life, say British teachers. The Independent reports:

Pupils needed to get used to the idea that life wasn't a constant "Disney ride", said delegates at the Association of Teachers and Lecturers annual conference yesterday. "I don't have the energy to do all-singing all-dancing lessons every day, five-days-a-week, each term," supply maths teacher Zoe Fail explained, to loud cheers. "Children are not bored enough. They are over stimulated. Being bored encourages thinking skills and imaginative play."

I suspect Barry Williams, a lecturer at Hertford Regional College in Cambridgeshire, had his tongue in his cheek, when he defended his dullness:

"When they say to me: 'Mr Williams, that girl is looking out of the window staring at a tree,' I say: 'Do they not recognise the advanced stages of Zen Buddhism which I have brought into my lessons?' I am in fact producing adults who will be able to watch party political broadcasts."

Nobody gets through school without learning how to endure boredom.

I definitely agree that life isn't a Disney ride--and neither should school be. That's a statement, not an excuse.

And why do the British study "maths" while we in America study "math"? If they're shortening "mathematics", shouldn't they write "math's"?

Does This Sound Like Any School District In Which You've Taught?

From an email:

Wisdom says, "When you discover you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount." In business, government and (sometimes) education often other strategies are tried with dead horses, including the following:
· Buying a stronger whip.
· Changing riders.
· Saying things like, "This is the way we have always ridden this horse."
· Appointing a committee to study the horse.
· Arranging to visit other sites to see how they ride dead horses.
· Increasing the standards to ride dead horses.
· Appointing a tiger team to revive the dead horse.
· Creating a training session to increase our riding ability.
· Comparing the state of dead horses in today's environment vs. in history.
· Changing the requirements, declaring, "This horse is not dead."
· Hiring contractors to ride the dead horse.
· Harnessing several dead horses together for increased speed.
· Declaring that "No horse is too dead to beat."
· Providing additional funding to increase the horse's performance.
· Funding a study to see if contractors can ride it cheaper.
· Purchasing a product to make dead horses run faster.
· Declaring the horse is "better, faster and cheaper dead."
· Forming a quality circle to find uses for dead horses.
· Revisiting the performance requirements for horses.
· Saying this horse was procured with cost as an independent variable.
· Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position.

Update, 6:11 pm: Are there any others you've experienced or can imagine? Add a comment!

"Sexual" Harassment?

RightWingProf has the story about a sexual harassment complaint that isn't sexual at all. An Ohio State librarian recommended some conservative books be placed on a reading list and that made some professors feel "unsafe". Feeling "unsafe" is sufficient to proceed with a sexual harassment claim.

Think I'm leaving out some very important parts? I think I've given a fairly good summary, but go read for yourself.

Update, 4/18/06 6:41 am: OSU did the right thing, thankfully.

Will It Be Speaker Pelosi or Majority Leader Reid?

Neither sounds that great to me. In fact, they both sound scary as hell. But if this is the best the Republicans can do, then we've already lost the November election.

Here are some suggestions from li'l ol' me:

1. Talk up the war in Iraq. Focus on the good things that have been done. Use historical comparisons. Americans like a winner.
2. Small government. Right now we have way too much small government--so much so that it looks like big government. We need to cut government, not continue to expand it.
3. Blast socialism. Point out the economic problems in Europe.
4. Talk tough on illegal immigration, but for chrissakes do something about it! Point out the problems France has had with lack of assimilation.
5. Talk up the economy. It's doing extremely well by just about any metric. Of course, government doesn't have much to do with that, but we'd be taking the heat if it were lousy so we should take some glory when it's good--especially in an election year. It would be nice to get away from that foolishness, but the Dems won't let it go so we can't, either.

There, see? Not so hard to come up with real ideas, substantive ideas. These are far better than that crap in the article.

College Visits

The major Sacramento newspaper reports:

[M]any high school seniors are making their final trips to the colleges that have accepted them, as the decision deadline approaches in early May. At the same time, some juniors are using spring break to start their searches.

These prospective college students are among more than 16 million students who will be enrolled in American colleges and universities this fall, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. With the price of tuition, room and board having doubled since 1990, the pressure to pick the right school is greater than ever.

This is good.

By the time my senior year started, I think I'd only ever set foot on one college campus--CSU Sacramento--and that was just to see a play in 9th grade. My family had always assumed that I'd go to college but no one knew how to make that happen and there certainly were no financial plans made. I'm too embarrassed to admit the extent of my ignorance about colleges and universities, even about their freakin' locations. I'm too embarrassed to talk about which schools I applied to, and why I chose the two civilian schools I did. The counseling that students receive at the school at which I teach towers over anything we received at my old high school--and I still stay in touch with my counselor and value the impact he had on my life.

The best way to really get the feel of a college campus may be to shut off the computer and go see it.

"I tell kids, 'If you attend a college you've never visited, it's like marrying someone you've never met,' " says Pat Stokes, a guidance counselor at C.K. McClatchy High School in Sacramento. "I feel very scared when a kid's going to college and they've never seen it."

I had only the vaguest idea of what West Point was like. Then again, that's probably a good thing!

Keep the weather in mind during your visit - could a California kid really handle a school located in a snowy or cold environment?

It was quite a change for me, that's for sure.

I consider myself fortunate. I came tenuously close to not going to college at all. I'm glad so many students today are getting a much better start than I did.

What Did General Zinni Say, And When Did He Say It?

General Zinni has joined the anti-Rumsfeld chorus. I guess he forgets that Rumsfeld works for the President and no one else, and as long as Rumsfeld has the confidence of the President he'll remain the Secretary of Defense.

But what about the claims that General Zinni has made? Is it true that, as he says, there was no real reason to go to war with Iraq? Hmm, let's see what he had to say before the Senate Armed Services Committee in February 2000, 11 months before President Bush took office:

• Iraq remains the most significant near-term threat to U.S. interests in the Arabian Gulf region. This is primarily due to its large conventional military force, pursuit of WMD [emphasis added], oppressive treatment of Iraqi citizens, refusal to comply with United Nations Security Council Resolutions (UNSCR) …

• Despite claims that WMD efforts have ceased, Iraq probably is continuing clandestine nuclear research, retains stocks of chemical and biological munitions, … Even if Baghdad reversed its course and surrendered all WMD capabilities, it retains the scientific, technical, and industrial infrastructure to replace agents and munitions within weeks or months. [Emphasis added]

• The Iraqi regime’s high regard for WMD and long-range missiles is our best indicator that a peaceful regime under Saddam Hussein is unlikely.

• … extremists may turn to WMD in an effort to …overcome improved U.S. defenses against conventional attack. Detecting plans for a specific WMD attack is extremely difficult, making it likely such an event would occur without warning. [Emphasis added]

Lefties won't mind the inconsistency. To them, inconsistency isn't a bug, it's a feature!

First That Spelling Bee Movie, Now This

GeekOlympics are finally taking off! It's about darn time.

(So says the team captain of a 1987 Mathematical Competition in Modeling team designated as Meritorious)

Men and Women

A picture is worth a thousand words.

How Much On Defense?

I'll just copy the whole thing:

Robert Samuelson reports:

The present political consensus is crumbling. For decades higher benefits for the elderly were effectively paid for by reducing defense spending -- not by raising taxes or cutting other programs. In 1960, defense was 52 percent of the budget; in 2005, it's 19 percent. After Sept. 11, 2001, military spending won't shrink much more, but even if it disappeared, the savings wouldn't cover future spending on the elderly. The same, incidentally, is true of President Bush's tax cuts; even if they were eliminated, the resulting tax increases would only curb today's deficits -- not pay for tomorrow's spending.

The seniors know how to get a bigger slice.Can this go on forever? We doubt it.But,we've got to say it's pretty impressive rent-seeking when Warren Buffett can get free medical care just because he's over 65.

Teacher Quality

CNN has a story about the numbers of "high quality" teachers in the nation's classrooms, and what states are reporting in order to comply with the requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Under federal pressure, most states are close to getting teachers who are rated highly qualified in front of every math, history, language and other core class by the end of the school year. Or so they say.

Thirty-three states claim 90 percent to 99 percent of their main classes have teachers who are highly qualified. That means, based on the No Child Left Behind law, that those teachers have a bachelor's degree, a state license and proven competency in every subject they teach.

And here's the stick:

States must prove they have:

-- Set a fair definition of "highly qualified." Although the federal law sets the parameters, states have huge leeway when it comes to qualifying their veteran teachers.

-- Provided parents with a clear picture of how many classes are taught by qualified teachers. This is supposed to happen in state, district and school report cards.

-- Given complete and accurate data about their teacher corps to the Education Department, including the disparities between poor and wealthier schools.

-- Ensured that poor and minority children do not have a higher percentage of inexperienced or unqualified teachers than any other youngsters.

By May 15, states will find out where they stand and whether they will lose federal aid, which is the government's only real enforcement tool.

Weren't we hearing, just a couple years ago, about teacher shortages, especially in math and science? What happened? I haven't heard about a shortage in quite some time. Did these teachers mysteriously appear from the ether?

Apparently they did. And they appeared highly qualified, too.

What am I getting at here? Oh, I don't know. Maybe the teacher shortage was a myth. Or maybe it's not as bad as some people want the public to believe. Or maybe that's only trotted out when it's good for the teachers unions to do so.

Some Facts About My School District

From the Education Intelligence Agency (see blogroll at left) comes data on school district expenditures across the country. I clicked on California and found the following information about my own district, current as of the 2003-04 school year:

Rank: #10 in the state with ~51,000 students (less than 1% of the state's student population, and less than 7% of the size of the largest district in the state, LA Unified)

Enrollment change since 00-01 school year: 1.27%

Per-pupil spending: $7577
California average: $7748
US average: $8287 (and let's not forget the cost of living in the greater Sacramento area compared to the average cost of living across the US)

Change in per-pupil spending since 00-01: 7.66%
California average: 11.24%
US average: 13.77%

Amount per-pupil spent on compensation: $6578
California average: $6500
US average: $6821

Change in per-pupil spent on compensation since 00-01: 6.66%
California average: 12.93%
US average: 13.87%

I'm not doing any analysis here, just posting the information.

My Retirement Money At Work

According to the major Sacramento newspaper:

West Sacramento has landed an investment powerhouse to anchor the city's ambitious waterfront development.

The California State Teachers' Retirement System, the nation's second largest public pension fund, announced Tuesday an agreement to build a $176 million to $186 million office tower for its headquarters at Raley's Landing.

I'm curious how this will improve my retirement.

Unveiled to CalSTRS employees Tuesday morning, the plan calls for building an environmentally oriented 14-story, steel-and-glass tower on 4.57 acres just north of the ziggurat, the pyramid-shaped Money Store building occupied by the Department of General Services.

Here's a picture of the area, looking roughly southeast. No image of the new building was included in the article.

Solomon Amendment Issue

UC Santa Cruz disgraces itself. The students who did this are a disgrace, and the administration that tolerates their actions is a disgrace. What are they learning in Santa Cruz, anyway? I mean, besides surfing and pot smoking?

I'll tell you what they're learning--from the Islamofascists. They're learning that if they become an unruly mob, threaten order (or maybe violence), then the cowards will give in to you. Oh, and wear black. And cover your faces--it looks both cool and scary that way.

It's time for the adults to step up to the plate here. Congress should invoke the Solomon Amendment.

Update, 4/12/06 7:15 pm: Look what I find on Instapundit! Apparently great minds think alike.

BLOCKING MILITARY RECRUITERS MAY BE EXPENSIVE: The Mountain States Legal Foundation is moving to cut off federal funding for UC Santa Cruz after the University permitted students to block military recruiters on campus. (Via Michelle Malkin). The University will presumably argue that this doesn't reflect its policy; I'm not sure how that will play out.

Yet Bill Keeps On A-Comin'

I give Bill Gates credit for wanting to do good. I also give him credit for for putting his money where his mouth is, kicking in millions (as much as a billion) to schools. Where I don't give him credit, where he screwed up, is in taking up the banner of some bogus ed school theory and holding his money out like a carrot to schools/districts who would test out this theory on students.

And the idea hasn't worked. I hope no harm was done to these children while they satisfied Gates' ego.

Carnival of Education

You can find this week's Carnival over at The Magic School Bus.

Teachers

I just watched the new NBC show Teachers. It was truly as bad as I'd heard it was. It's not that I didn't like it because it wasn't realistic, or because it portrayed teachers in a bad light, or because the characters are unattractive. No, I didn't like it because it wasn't funny.

Seriously, I laughed only one time. "You have lobster on Fridays?" "Sometimes we throw in scampi." It was so unexpected that I chuckled. But the rest of the show? Yuck.

And it's by the writers of Scrubs? They obviously used up all their talent writing Scrubs, a truly funny show. Teachers? No way. I can't imagine this will last a season.

Study Says Laptops Don't Improve Education

I've written before about computers and their applicability to education. Many consider me a Luddite, but I don't see computers as the Holy Grail of education. A century ago, Thomas Edison thought that movies would revolutionize education. I'll bet he'd still recognize the classrooms of today, only the students (or the teacher, for that matter) wouldn't be as nicely dressed and the boards would have changed from dark green to white.

Put simply, the Holy Grail of education is hard work. There's no "royal road" to geometry, as the old saying goes.

Computers are a tool, nothing more. They are a means, not an end. They are akin to a pencil, a book, a movie projector. Computers have no inherent ability to improve education; how they're used makes all the difference, if there's even a difference.

At a meeting held in my favorite city (cough! cough!) this week, a report given to the American Educational Research Association shows mixed results at best from flooding the education system with computers.

By Greg Toppo, USA TODAY

SAN FRANCISCO — Give a kid a laptop and it might not make any difference.

That's the message from research presented here Monday, which suggests that spending millions of dollars to bring technology into kids' homes and schools has decidedly mixed results.

Taxpayer-supported school computer and Internet giveaways are political gold, but studies have questioned whether they actually help student achievement. This research, presented at the American Educational Research Association's annual meeting, confirms skeptics' doubts.

In one study, researchers from Syracuse and Michigan State universities examined a program that gave laptop computers to middle-school students in Ohio in 2003. Preliminary findings are mixed.

"Overall, we don't know if it is a worthwhile investment," says Syracuse researcher Jing Lei.

Why are we surprised? Are we surprised? I'm not. And as much time as I spend on my computer, you'd think I'd be a big fan. And I am a big fan--just not in education.

Here's my idea of how to effectively use computers to support instruction. Note that it's a great use, but it's also limited in scope and very expensive!

As I just reread that post, I almost laughed that I used the same words and ideas in this post. Well, I'm nothing if not consistent!

LA Times Gets It All Wrong On "Intolerant Speech"

Note the opening paragraphs:

By Stephanie Simon, Times Staff Writer
April 10, 2006

ATLANTA — Ruth Malhotra went to court last month for the right to be intolerant.

Malhotra says her Christian faith compels her to speak out against homosexuality. But the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she's a senior, bans speech that puts down others because of their sexual orientation.

Malhotra sees that as an unacceptable infringement on her right to religious expression. So she's demanding that Georgia Tech revoke its tolerance policy.

With her lawsuit, the 22-year-old student joins a growing campaign to force public schools, state colleges and private workplaces to eliminate policies protecting gays and lesbians from harassment.

Uh huh.

The LA Times is certainly slanting the news here. Look what they put at the end of the rather lengthy story:

Malhotra said she had been reprimanded by college deans several times in the last few years for expressing conservative religious and political views. When she protested a campus production of "The Vagina Monologues" with a display condemning feminism, the administration asked her to paint over part of it.

She caused another stir with a letter to the gay activists who organized an event known as Coming Out Week in the fall of 2004. Malhotra sent the letter on behalf of the Georgia Tech College Republicans, which she chairs; she said several members of the executive board helped write it.

The letter referred to the campus gay rights group Pride Alliance as a "sex club … that can't even manage to be tasteful." It went on to say that it was "ludicrous" for Georgia Tech to help fund the Pride Alliance.

The letter berated students who come out publicly as gay, saying they subject others on campus to "a constant barrage of homosexuality."

"If gays want to be tolerated, they should knock off the political propaganda," the letter said.

The student activist who received the letter, Felix Hu, described it as "rude, unfair, presumptuous" — and disturbing enough that Pride Alliance forwarded it to a college administrator. Soon after, Malhotra said, she was called in to a dean's office. Students can be expelled for intolerant speech, but she said she was only reprimanded.

So this woman isn't actually suing her university for the right to harass others, or the right to be intolerant (as the LA Times so judiciously puts it). She's suing for the First Amendment right to speak out against those with whom she disagrees. She's suing for the right to be free from official government (university) harassment--from college deans, no less!--because she doesn't share the official school views. "I'm OK, you're OK" only applies to those whom we think are OK, doesn't it? Don't agree with us, and you're no longer OK. In fact, you might get an official reprimand.

Notice how the lefties don't like Ms. Malhotra's views at all, and gleefully stifle her views, but she's the one who's intolerant. I've seen no evidence that she's harassing individuals or causing them any harm. She's tolerating them but not accepting them. Yes, she'd like them to go away, but they'd like her to go away, too. The difference here is that the forces that want her to go away are using the authority of the college to make it happen. That's a pretty big difference.

Generation Me

The Washington Times has a lengthy article on the narcissism of Americans born after 1970 or so. Apparently, I missed the Baby Boom by a few months and I missed being in Generation Me by 5 years. I need to come up with a nifty nickname for those of us born from 1965-1969. I'm leaning towards Generation Awesome, but that sounds too much like what a Generation Me person would call his generation. Anyway....

Americans born after 1970 -- including the so-called Generation X and Millennial Generation -- have become "an army of little narcissists," says Mrs. Twenge, who explains her views in her new book, "Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled and More Miserable Than Ever Before."

Unlike their parents and grandparents, "GenMes" have "never known a world that put duty before self," she says. Instead, they were raised in a culture obsessed with self-esteem and feel-good mantras such as "Believe in yourself, and you can be anything" and "Never give up on your dreams."

The result is a generation of youths who are tolerant, confident, open-minded, ambitious -- and have wildly unreasonable expectations about how they fit into the adult world.

It gets more interesting.

Among Americans who lived through the Great Depression and two world wars, between 1 percent and 2 percent experienced a major depressive episode in their lifetime, says Mrs. Twenge, who bases her book on decades of generational data. Suicide was more common among middle-aged people, not young people.

Today, the lifetime rate for major depression is between 15 percent and 20 percent, an increase too large to be explained by improved case reporting, she says. Suicide is the third-leading cause of death for people ages 15 to 24, while rates have dropped for the middle-aged.

Why should Generation Me feel so much anxiety and pain when it has grown up in relative peace and technological and economic expansion? A big part of the answer is the constant focus on the self, Mrs. Twenge says. "[W]hen we are fiercely independent and self-sufficient, our disappointments loom large because we have nothing else to focus on."

Who's at fault here? Let's lay the fault squarely where it belongs: first on the parents, and second on anyone involved in the self-esteem movement--and that includes the schools. But Twenge's solution doesn't cut it in my book:

She recommends social changes that support two-parent working families, such as paid parental leave, public preschools, tax deductions for child care, and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. school hours.

Why does socialism have to be the solution?

Twenge does support getting rid of the self-esteem crap, but unfortunately is countered by those from the National Association for Self-Esteem. Did you get that? We have a freakin' association devoted to that feel-good crap.

Despite its critics, self-esteem training and character education "are both alive and kicking," says Sharon Fountain, president of the National Association for Self-Esteem (NASE).

NASE defines self-esteem as "the experience of being capable of meeting life's challenges and being worthy of happiness," she says.

Personal competence grows out of self-awareness, accurate self-assessment and self-confidence, which is linked to self-esteem, she says. "If we are prepared to deal with the world in context, with responsibility and accountability, then not only does it improve the quality of our lives, it adds to the world."

Healthy self-esteem is not egotism, arrogance, conceit, narcissism or a sense of superiority -- those characteristics are "pseudo-self-esteem," former NASE President Robert Reasoner says in an article.

Good self-esteem programs are grounded in reality and promote self-worth and competence, he says.

Nathaniel Branden, a pioneer in the field of self-esteem psychology, argues that self-esteem is far more than just feeling good about yourself.

"It is confidence in the efficacy of our mind, in our ability to think," he writes. It is also "confidence in our ability to learn, to make appropriate choices and decisions, and respond effectively to change."

How many times must I say this? Self-esteem is the result of accomplishment, not the cause of it. How can that not be plain? I agree with this next snippet, though:

Ample data now shows that "if anything, Americans tend to overrate and overvalue ourselves," writes Florida State University psychology professor Roy Baumeister. His advice to nonprofits, policy-makers, teachers, parents and therapists: "Forget about self-esteem, and invest in self-control."

Exactly.

Of course we're all painting with fairly broad brushes here, and these sweeping generalizations don't apply to specific individuals--especially generalizations about all the people born in the last 36 years. However, there does seem to be a societal movement afoot, one I'm not particularly fond of.

Environmentalism

Over a year ago I wrote an award winning 5-part series called Environmentalism and the Skeptical Mind. (Full disclosure: I gave myself the awards.) Read this riveting series here:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

I also linked to a story discussing an anti-environmentalist article in, of all places, The New York Times.

In May of last year I wrote a piece called I'm Not The Only One Who Thinks The Kyoto Protocols Suck.

Instapundit now reports that Canada is backing out of the Kyoto Protocols, and that a university in England reports that average global temperature didn't increase from 1998 to 2005.

Why is global warming, and man's fault in causing it, getting so much press lately? Newsalert links to an expose' showing that media companies are large financial backers of extreme environmental groups.

During the early part of the last millenium, there was what scientists now call a mini-ice age, at least in Europe. Then it warmed up. Man had no part in making the weather colder, and he had no part in making the weather warmer. We all know what a tropical paradise most of North America was several (million) years ago. My point is that climate change is a natural occurrence, and there's no evidence that man is causing global warming today--if indeed global warming is occurring. That is not to say that we shouldn't be good stewards of the environment, far from it. But we don't need to throw capitalism out the window and start worshiping the tree goddess, either.

Update, 4/17/06 6:40 am: If you read my series above, you're familiar with Patrick Moore, co-founder of Greenpeace. He penned a column for the Washington Post this weekend.

In the early 1970s when I helped found Greenpeace, I believed that nuclear energy was synonymous with nuclear holocaust, as did most of my compatriots. That's the conviction that inspired Greenpeace's first voyage up the spectacular rocky northwest coast to protest the testing of U.S. hydrogen bombs in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. Thirty years on, my views have changed, and the rest of the environmental movement needs to update its views, too, because nuclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change.

I'm still not convinced on global warming, but I am convinced about the necessity of nuclear energy.

Taxes

Interested in the Census Bureau's estimate of your total tax burden, per capita by state? If so, here's the chart. California ranks 9th. My adopted home of Colorado ranks 47th. Hmmmm.

CTA *Finally* Endorses A Republican--Big Deal

According to the major Sacramento newspaper, the California Teachers Association (of which I am proudly no longer a member) has endorsed Bruce McPherson, the incumbent running for Secretary of State.

There are two key points to be made here.

1. Why is the CTA recommending anyone for the Secretary of State post? What possible tie does that job have to education? CTA spends money (including some of my agency fees) endorsing people for jobs that have little or nothing to do with education--like President, or state Insurance Commissioner--and it drives me nuts.

2. The following statement from CTA President "Boss" Kerr says it all:

CTA President Barbara Kerr said it was the first time she could recall CTA endorsing a Republican for statewide office...

"We looked at the November election, which was about education, and he ran that well," Kerr said. "He was the bipartisan (official) he was supposed to be."

If only CTA could be the bipartisan organization it claims to be. Call me intolerant, but I despise these people with every fiber of my being.

Another Moonbat Teacher

Only this one is running for Congress!

Iraqi Liberation Day

I remember watching Saddam's statue come down. It was a great day to be an American--or an Iraqi.

In honor of that day, and in honor of all those who have served and sacrificed, I link here to a letter from a Gold Star Mother--one of those with "absolute moral authority" to talk about the value of this war in which we are engaged.

Real Dollars, Not "Blog Dollars"

This isn't Blogshares--this is what my blog is supposedly really worth:

My blog is worth $31,614.24.
How much is your blog worth?

Gays In California Education News

I don't toe either party line as far as homosexuality goes. I expect that, after writing this post, the left will call me a homophobe and the right will call me a liberal. They can both drop dead.

I've come around to agree with the philosophy/belief that homosexuality is "what you are", not "what you do". It's kind of like heterosexuality in that regard--you can be celibate and still be homo/heterosexual. It's the people you're attracted to (you cannot consciously control that) that defines your sexuality here, not who you have sex with.

Now the right will counter with, "Pedophiles are attracted to children and that's wrong...." True. It's wrong because a child cannot consent, whether the pedophile is gay or straight. Get a new argument, right wing. A better one.

The left could actually claim the moral high ground in the homosexuality arena, but they don't. Instead, they try to stuff their self-righteous moralizing down everyone's throats--just like they accuse the Religious Right of doing in other topics.

Where this topic is concerned, is everyone an idiot but me? I'm beginning to think so.

A couple of nights ago, a local school district had a board meeting at which they were going to discuss a proposal to give official board approval to the Day of Silence (which I wrote about in this post last year--scroll about halfway through). Of course the gay-haters showed up, but that's par for the course. Unfortunately, though, because they rely on emotion instead of logic to make their point, they come across as fanatical idiots who do more to harm their cause than to help it. But I digress.

Let me be direct: the Day of Silence is a stupid idea. Unless I'm hitting on you, I don't want to know your sexual preferences. And I don't hit on my students. This silly activity is a "pay attention to me!" stunt that takes something personal and throws it in the face of everyone they come in contact with.

At issue was a national Day of Silence on April 26, which aims to call attention to the bullying and harassment that gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered students often face.

Lots of people face bullying and harassment. It's wrong no matter who the recipient is--even if the recipient is a devout Christian, or even a Republican! The problem here is that we're making an issue of only the homosexual students. This goes back to what I said in my fourth paragraph, above. The school board should not be in the habit of supporting events like this.

Reasonable studies put the homosexual population at anywhere from 1.5%-6% of the general population, far fewer than Kinsey's 10% but still not zero. Let's pick a midling value, say 4%. That would mean that one out of every 25 people is gay. That's a minority, folks. If gays want acceptance from the other 24 of 25, in-your-face cannot be the best way to achieve it.

And that brings us to the second article about gays in California educational news. It seems that openly-lesbian legislator (agenda! agenda!) Sheila Kuehl has written a law that would require that school textbooks tell about the contributions of gays in California's history.

History books record contributions by gays but their sexual orientation is often ignored, a situation gay activists say is inexcusable in California, home to a large gay population in San Francisco, a city that briefly made history in 2004 by issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

As I quoted in my post last year on the stupid concept of Ethnomathematics:

Young people need to be shown that they need to accomplish something in their own lives and be proud of that, not to be proud by dubious association with a group hundreds of years and thousands of miles removed from them.

Or with a group with the same sexual orientation.

This is another case of what I said in my fourth paragraph--the left shoving its moralizing down everyone's throats, including the throats of schoolchildren.

I'm all about teaching tolerance--not because I think people should have to like anyone they don't want to, but because society requires that their actions not physically harm other people. That's what tolerance is, tolerating people you'd rather not be around. Tolerance is very different from acceptance, which is what the gay lobby is pushing on the 24 out of 25. Tolerance may eventually lead to acceptance, and that might be a good thing, but acceptance certainly is not something we should enforce on people--especially on those who have religious convictions about what you want them to accept.

And lefties, before you chime in on this, I'd like you to convince your Islamist brothers to accept homosexuality. If you'd try to convince them, or even if you'd denounce them as strongly as you denounce the devout Christians, you might have some credibility on this issue. But the Islamists will threaten to cut your heads off, so you cower and go after the less violent folk. You show no spine, you have no credibility.

Acceptance of homosexuality is an issue that needs to be dealt with in the family, not the school. Some consider it a moral issue, and the family is the appropriate place to deal with moral issues. Schools shouldn't be taking a stance on moral issues that are still controversial. The schools should enforce appropriate codes of conduct, not thought.

That's the difference between toleration and acceptance.

The so-called leaders of the homosexual agenda--HRC and their ilk--assume a kneejerk left-wind stance and are shocked--shocked!--when the right doesn't respond lovingly. That's another part of the problem: homosexuals are almost in lockstep with the Democrats and the far left. The Log Cabin Republicans have marginalized themselves within the Republican Party. Go to a gay bar or coffee house and spout conservative viewpoints and see how far you get. ATTENTION, PUSHERS OF THE HOMOSEXUAL AGENDA: as long as you make a left-wing political issue out of this, the right's going to push back! If these pushers were serious about gay acceptance as opposed to a gay and left-wing agenda, perhaps they'd consider the viewpoints of these non-leftie, non-right authors at the Independent Gay Forum, from which I've quoted before. I love it when people can think for themselves.

I'm Becoming Stossel's New Biggest Fan

"Welcome to my new page: 'Stossel for Teachers.' Every month we will stream a new video segment, designed to be a jungle gym for the mind."

Sorry For The Light Blogging Lately

I know I've been doing mostly links with little commentary lately. I also know that that's not what most of you come here for.

Haven't been feeling well the last couple days, and it was all I could do just to drive home from work today and collapse on the couch. It's gone downhill from there!

I used to have a friend who would sit with me when I was sick. I miss that. I could use a sitting friend right now!

More On A.N.S.W.E.R. And Immigration

This author posits that International A.N.S.W.E.R. was behind the Hispanic protests of last week. Here's a link to all my posts about A.N.S.W.E.R.

And here's where you can read about what "undercover bloggers" discovered when they attended an A.N.S.W.E.R. meeting in Washington, DC recently.

More Filth From the Rethinking Schools People

I've written about them before, here and here.

Now go read their latest, in their own words. Can you say, anti-American? I knew you could!

John Stossel Accepts Union Offer To Teach For A Week

John Stossel had a not-so-flattering report on ABC's 20/20, and teachers weren't so happy about it; I've previously linked to some of Stossel's writing on the topic. The president of the teachers union in New York City, in a show of bravado, challenged Stossel to teach for a week and see what teaching's really like.

He accepted, but in the end, school administrators put the ixnay on the idea, saying it would set a precedent for allowing reporters in the schools.

Imagine that, actually getting to see what goes on in public schools that your tax dollars support!

Here are some snippets from Stossel's "nyah nyah nyah NYAH nyah!" article:

I accepted. I even said I'd let the union pick the school. I thought I'd learn more about how difficult teaching is. Above all, it was a chance to get our cameras into schools -- something the N.Y. bureaucracy had forbidden -- so we could show you what was really going on.

But it won't happen.

Like most of our dealings with the union, nothing was easy. It took weeks of phone calls to make any sort of progress. I suspect this will not surprise public-school parents...

I guess they didn't want me to look at a normal public school.

But this is the school the UFT picked, and I was up for the challenge. Who knows what I might have learned by teaching?

[snip]

My producers went to a meeting at the school to choose a class for me to teach. The union representative didn't come, so we were told no decisions could be made. Lots of people came to a second meeting at the school: four people from the union, one person from the city Department of Education, and administrators and teachers from Beacon [the chosen school--Darren]. They decided I might teach history classes and "media studies," but they would have to talk to more people...

I prepped for my history classes. We had more meetings...

Then there were more meetings. Finally, four days before what was supposed to be my first day of class, they canceled. Officially, "they" were the public school administrators who said it might be "disruptive" and that it might "set a precedent" that would open their doors to other reporters.

Too bad. Letting cameras into schools would be a good thing. Taxpayers might finally get to see how more than $200,000 per classroom of their money was being spent...

I'd like 20/20's cameras to see me struggle to be a good teacher.

I wonder what else our cameras might see.

And remember, it's Stossel who's supposed to be the bad guy here. Just read the union rags, they'll tell you!

School Board Considers Not Following State Law

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

Nearly 500 West Contra Costa high school seniors who have failed the mandatory California Exit Exam could receive diplomas anyway this June if a majority of the school board joins a colleague's call to rebel against the controversial
graduation requirement.

For:

"What can we do for our students who have demonstrated they will have a successful life, yet can't pass the exit exam?" [school board member] Brown asked in proposing the resolution. "There's a work ethic that's needed (for employment) that our students demonstrate that may not show up on an exit exam."

Against:

School board President Charles Ramsey said he will vote against Brown's proposal because of its potential legal and financial ramifications.

"I understand the motivation (for the resolution). It's well intentioned, but that has to be coupled with the reality of the law," he said. "We're a part of this state. We can't secede from California."

He was joined by Trustee Karen Pfeiffer. "We have for a long time passed along students who are not prepared for work," she said. "West Contra Costa has not always been accountable. To continue to pretend that students who can't pass this relatively simple exam are high school graduates and should get a diploma is a disservice to the students and the community."

Uh oh:

State Department of Education officials said Tuesday they contacted Cynthia LeBlanc, the district's interim superintendent, to warn that passing the resolution would violate the law. The Chronicle could not reach LeBlanc for comment.

But Hilary McLean, a spokeswoman for the state education department, said her agency "would look at all possibilities, including enforcement through the courts." She also pointed out other leverage, noting that "the Department of Education is the entity that provides funds for schools."

As my students might say, "Snap."

Comments?

More Bad News About Teachers

At least we don't have education majors here in California.

By the by, check out the literacy scores of those math, science, and engineering folks. Not bad, eh?

This Week's Carnival of Education

Go read it over at the Edwonks.

A Win For My Alma Mater

And considering the "product" that West Point is supposed to produce, this is a pretty good win.

The "feel good anecdote" in the last paragraph was a nice touch.

Redneck Armed Forces

Special Bulletin from the Pentagon
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Pentagon announced TODAY the formation of

a new 500-man elite fighting unit called the

United States Redneck Special Forces.

These Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas boys will be

dropped off into Iraq and have been given only the

following facts about terrorists:

1. The season opened today.
2. There is no limit.
3. They taste just like chicken.
4. They don't like beer, pickups, country music or Jesus.
5. They are directly responsible for the death of Dale Earnhardt.

The Pentagon expects the problem in Iraq to be over by Friday.

This Wouldn't Surprise Me

The author offers no proof for his assertion, but it certainly wouldn't surprise me if he were correct. In fact, I'm surprised I didn't think of it myself.

I've written other posts about these people. Go take a look-see.

My Retirement

I don't pay into social security; rather, as is the way things are done here in the Golden State, I pay into California State Teachers Retirement System, or CalSTRS. Those 14 years I paid into social security--I can kiss most of that money goodbye. And even if Congress repealed the Windfall Elimination Provision, the law that keeps me from getting the social security I paid for, there probably won't be any left for me anyway because of those darned Baby Boomers--the last of whom was born mere months before I was, I might add.

Well, I don't need social security, you say, because I have State Teachers Retirement. Except that's currently underfunded to the tune of 20 billion dollars. That's about $670 for every person in California. There's talk of increasing teacher, district, and state contributions to the program; teacher contributions are already higher than the withholdings for social security!

While CalSTRS points out the fund has enough assets to pay benefits for six decades, trustees want to keep the gap from widening. If left unchecked, the shortfall could grow to $170 billion over the next 30 years as more baby boomers retire.

When do I plan to retire? In just under 30 years. Dang boomers.

Cool Music Video

I heard this song/video being discussed on the radio on my drive home today. The video's nothing much--just the band performing. But the song? You've got to hear it to believe it.


Buy the song for $.99 here.

Illegal Fees Charged in School

After over 2 years of prompting, the paper at my school finally wrote a story about the illegal "lab fees" that students pay for several classes--and activities--at the school at which I teach.

Frankly, I was disappointed in the article. I'd think that catching your school doing something blatantly illegal would be a big deal to a budding journalist--this is even better than rats in the proverbial rats in the cafeteria--but the article was tepid at best. We're clearly violating state law; I provided them with several pages of documents from the state Department of Education, documents which clearly identify what schools can and cannot charge for. Yet, most of the article focused on what classes would have to be cancelled if we stopped breaking the law. So much for thinking outside the box.

I'll post a link if they ever publish the newspaper online, as was done in the past.

The school paper was distributed last Friday. Yesterday, the major Sacramento newspaper had a prominently placed story (front page of the local Metro section) about the very same issue, illegal fees, in a nearby district. The article in the Sacramento newspaper was more pointed than the one in my school paper, a fact that genuinely distresses me. These kids are being treated illegally, and they barely give a shrug!

How do I know this is illegal? I checked with the legal department of the state Department of Education, which sent me a "fiscal advisory" memorandum, several pages long, outlining what schools can charge for and what they cannot. It seemed pretty clear.

Here's the Sacramento newspaper article:

Booster club, parent battle in Folsom

Mother gets back the $4,000 she paid for band participation in a fight with big implications.

By Walter Yost -- Bee Staff Writer

Published 3:15 am PDT Sunday, April 2, 2006
Story appeared in Metro section, Page B1

For the past three years, Donna Kinsella has argued that students shouldn't have to pay dues to participate in Folsom High School band programs.

In March, a Sacramento small claims court awarded Kinsella several thousand dollars in damages, an amount equal to what Kinsella has paid for her children to take part in the high school's various bands.

Kinsella's victory may have impact far beyond the approximately $4,000 she won. The school district is appealing her award and a Southern California legal group is interested in her case.

Potentially at stake are the donations or dues - depending on one's viewpoint - that public schools use to fund a raft of extracurricular activities.

"It's not about the money at all," Barry Vroom, president of the Folsom Music Boosters, said of the small claims court award.

"My personal concern is if it has ramifications for booster programs around the state," he said.

To Kinsella, the judge's decision is a vindication of her efforts to convince school officials at the district, county and state level that charging fees for extracurricular activities is illegal. She said she turned to the court system after no one else would help.

"It's about our rights and protecting our children's rights," the mother of three said. "We pay for our children's education in taxes. To bill us (for extracurricular activities) results in double taxation."

For the Folsom Cordova Unified School District and its music boosters, co-defendants in the case, the court judgment proves no such thing.

"It's our opinion that the judge did not review the state education code regarding this issue," said Mindy Nunes, assistant superintendent of administrative services for the district.

The booster organization, which helps support the nationally renowned music program, has maintained that what Kinsella calls dues are really voluntary contributions, necessary to help pay for field trips to music events.

The boosters and the school district have filed an appeal scheduled to be heard May 19 in Sacramento Superior Court.

"It is important for our image. We don't think we've done anything wrong," said Vroom, the boosters president.

"Without the boosters, the (music) program would be only two concerts per year. We now have at least four field trips per year and we put in thousands and thousand of dollars."

At issue is interpretation of education code sections referencing the authorization of student fees.

According to the co-defendants' trial brief, although the code stipulates that no child shall be prevented from making a field trip or excursion because of lack of sufficient funds, it further states "the governing board shall coordinate efforts of community service groups to supply funds for pupils in need of them."

The brief argues that the Folsom Music Boosters act as the safety net for the district by providing scholarships to any student unable or unwilling to pay for a field trip.

"The district can't provide those funds," Nunes said. "There are times when you have to charge for activities."

But Kinsella also cites state law to support her arguments.

"You cannot charge for curricular or extracurricular activities. You can only ask for voluntary donations," she said.

According to Kinsella, the boosters have made their payment notices look like mandatory bills, not donation requests. She cited the use of words such as "fees" and "dues" in the notices.

Vroom and Nunes said changes have been made to clarify the language by emphasizing the word "donations."

About 450 students are involved in Folsom High's music programs, which include a marching band and color guard, jazz band and jazz choir, orchestra, symphony and concert bands.

Vroom said no child has been denied participation in the music program because of an inability to pay and that in some cases scholarships have been provided.

Kinsella's case is being watched by Richard Ackerman, an attorney with the United States Justice Foundation, a conservative legal action organization based in Southern California.

The foundation has taken part in a number of actions against school districts over what it says are unconstitutional fees. Last year, Ackerman threatened to file a class-action lawsuit against the Folsom Cordova district on Kinsella's behalf.

Kinsella said this week she is no longer connected with Ackerman and has hired a local attorney to represent her.

In the meantime, despite Kinsella's award in small claims court, Vroom said no one else has asked the boosters for their money back.

About the writer:

• The Bee's Walter Yost can be reached at (916) 608-7449 or wyost@sacbee.com.

Important Moment in Life

From an email list of which I am a member:

On Wednesday of this week, at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00 in the morning, the time and date will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.

This happens only once a century so you don't want to miss it. You stayed up for NewYears 2000, didn't you???

The Role of Educators When Students Exercise Free Speech Rights

The definitive word on the topic is here. It's an enthralling essay. Tidbits:

There is obviously a great temptation to pass rules to limit provocative speech, especially when there is a risk that a mob will form and turn violent. It is at precisely those moments that people in responsibility need to act courageously. This is not always easy for educators, who are not used to contemplating physical threats. Almost exactly 35 years ago, my father confronted this problem at the University of Iowa, which then proposed the adoption of rules to guide faculty and staff when there was civil unrest on campus. The draft Statement on Professional Ethics asserted that a “professor’s first priority should be to do all in his power to prevent death and injuries due to violence” during periods of high tension on campus. My father objected strenuously to that formulation, writing then:

[w]hen conditions on campus are abnormal, the threat usually involves a demand for scapegoats, as some tried to make ROTC a scapegoat for last year’s Cambodian intervention. It is at these crucial moments that the first obligation of faculty members must be to act rationally and to stand firmly behind any member of the community whose rights are threatened. Standing firm is a difficult matter, since capitulation often appears to be the only way of averting violence. Nevertheless, every time we sacrifice somebody else’s rights in the hope of avoiding bloodshed we are guilty of unethical and unprofessional conduct and make our own rights less secure and less respected.

One would think that point would be so obvious that it did not need to be stated, but there it is. When rights are involved, avoiding violence can never be the highest priority. Otherwise, the exercise of our rights would always be subject to veto by the first people who threatened violence.

Now, however, high school students all over the country are learning that their rights are worthless if some group prone to violence alleges that it has been insulted. It is no less than nauseating to contemplate.

Finally, it is difficult to see how a school can ban the wearing of a shirt with an American flag -- or a Mexican one, for that matter -- without violating the holding of Tinker v. Des Moines School District, in which the Supreme Court said that schools could not ban the wearing of armbands evoking objection to the war in Vietnam.

There's so much more, and you're doing yourself a disservice if you don't read the whole thing.

A Flag In The Hand Is Worth Two In The Face

From Coach Brown in lovely Ukiah, California (see blogroll at left, A Passion For Teaching and Opinions) comes the link to this SFGate.com (San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner) story, fresh from the AP:

Flag Waving Banned at Colorado School

Saturday, April 1, 2006

(04-01) 05:41 PST Longmont, Colo. (AP) --

Dozens of high school students protested a temporary school policy forbidding students from displaying the U.S. flag — as well as flags from other countries — amid racial tensions following immigration rallies.

Skyline High School Principal Tom Stumpf said American flags were brazenly waved in the faces of Hispanic students and in one case a Mexican flag was thrown into the face of another student.

"When it involves the American flag and its abuse in vilifying other people, we simply will not tolerate it," Stumpf said. "They were using the symbol derisively as misguided patriotism."

Students were warned about the policy Friday and several were suspended, although Stumpf would not provide details. Then, about 100 students protested during lunch time.

Student Dustin Carlson told Denver station KCNC-TV that he was suspended for two days.

"I'm getting suspended for it and personally I think that's uncalled for," he said. "If this country means freedom, then why can't we fly our own flag? It's ridiculous."

Thousands of high school students Friday in California, Texas, Nevada and other states protested the tough immigration laws proposed in the House. Some waved Mexican flags and carried signs saying "We are not criminals."

On Monday, about 150 high school students, including some from Skyline, protested in Longmont.

"People are taking it to a whole other level," said Laura Avitia. "I don't think they know why we were protesting."

It's hard to know where even to begin here. I would think that tossing anything in anyone's face would be against the rules; why we need to inflame nationalistic passions by banning our own freakin' flag is far beyond me. What's next, ditching the US flag on the flagpole and replacing it with an OAS or, God forbid, a UN flag?

I've been silent on these recent protests by Hispanics. I'm not quite sure what they hope to get out of these rallies and protests, but if they don't understand the importance of not breaking the freakin' law, perhaps their presence in this country isn't as necessary as they'd like to think. BTW, that goes for anyone, not just our brown-skinned brethren and sistren.

One of these days I'll do a post on MEChA, one of the most disgusting organizations currently operating freely in this country.

Formatting the Sheep/Wolves/Sheepdogs Post

I figured out how to see the html in that post--I'll email someone the first few paragraphs, with the html tags, if you can show me how to format it properly so it'll look good in IE and Safari.

School System Study

From the major Sacramento newspaper:

California launched what is billed as the most extensive study ever conducted of its public education system Thursday - a yearlong, $2.6 million foundation-funded venture involving 23 separate projects by some of the state's top education researchers.

The bipartisan project had been requested by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's Committee on Educational Excellence, Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell and Democratic legislative leadership - Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez and Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, among others.

I predict the following findings:

1. California isn't spending enough money on education; currently it spends a full 50% of the state budget on education, but that isn't enough.
2. Spending should be increased by at least 40%.
3. Class sizes are too large.
4. Bilingual education should be returned to its former glory.
5. Merit pay will not be recommended at all, except perhaps as a way to get more experienced teachers to teach in low performing schools.

Here's more:

A key portion of the study will take a different tack, analyzing how much money is needed to provide a quality education for each student - not necessarily how much the state can afford.

"It's a very loaded question," Perata said. "Because implicit in the question is that once the answer is there, once it's supported by data, then we have to decide what we will do about it."

Collectively, the 23 reviews will target public education finance, governance and dozens of specific questions, including how money could be spent more effectively to improve student achievement and what barriers exist to placing top teachers in low-performing schools.

The left-leaning newspaper certainly saved the tasty part for the last paragraphs, though.

Jim Lanich, president of California Business for Education Excellence, supported by the California Chamber of Commerce, said a comprehensive and nonpartisan study could be valuable. But the list of researchers involved is "pretty left leaning," he said.

"It would be tragic, for the sake of our kids, if it was driven with an outcome of money as opposed to improving academic achievement," Lanich said.

Yes it would, but I wouldn't be surprised at that result. I hope I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Proof Of American Ingenuity

Chocolate is proof that God exists, since nothing that good could occur by chance. But this post isn't about that.

Today I was at Sam's Club--a division of the evil Wal*Mart chain which, as a teacher, I'm not supposed to shop at but since I, as a non-union-member, couldn't care less what the unions think I shop there anyway--and what did I see on display in the middle of one of the aisles? Why, Twinkies with banana-flavored filling!

If that isn't ingenious, I don't know what is.

Penn Student Admits He's White

Apparently tired of receiving notices for race-specific or ethnic-specific functions, a junior at the University of Pennsylvania pens a column in which he comes out of the closet. He admits, in an open letter to the university counselor who sends him the notices, that he's white.

You invited me to the Wharton Latino Career Conference, but I didn’t come. You invited me to the Minority Internship Panel and the Minority Internship Fair, but I didn’t come. You invited me to an Info Session for students of color, but still I did not come. You even told me of an internship opportunity for Iranian-Americans. I didn’t even know those existed! The point remains though: I did not come.

I have to ask, Aileen: what amalgamation of races did you think I was all this time? Might it have crossed your mind that I was just white, like the vast majority (65 percent) of last year’s incoming class?
...
I’m not going to enter into a debate over affirmative action here -- I do not want to burden your soul with such political nonsense. Regardless, there is no reason to do so: this is not, and should not, be cast in the light of, an affirmative action issue. This is not a question of opportunities – we are all here at Penn and now have the same prospects for the future, regardless of what came before – this is a question of entitlements. There is no need to single out races and treat students like checkboxes. The point of having a diverse campus is so we don’t have to think about ourselves in terms of race. (emphasis added--Darren)

Classic.

Another hat tip to John at Discriminations (see blogroll at left).

Discrimination Against Individuals vs. Groups

John at Discriminations (see blogroll at left) has a rather lengthy post on affirmative action, racial discrimination, et. al. here. In it he makes a point that I repeately make regarding the difference between treating people as individuals vs. treating them as members of groups.

What Michigan, and Bowen and Bok, are actually saying here is that there is no discrimination because there's not much of it, and what there is affects only some individuals, not their groups. Their argument is that discrimination against individuals doesn't count. The only discrimination that matters, that is in effect even worthy of being called discrimination, is against “groups” — and even then, only if its impact is severe enough to make a group “underrepresented.”

We are a long way from Dr. King's vision of a colorblind society. And yes, that is what he was striving for.