Think about the impact on our society. Most of these  dropout will end up in jail, not paying taxes, etc. Do you all think it is too much rap music at home ?

http://www.americaspromise.org/uploadedFiles/AmericasPromiseAlliance/Dropout_Crisis/SWANSONCitiesInCrisis040108.pdf

It's irresponsible parenting, Teacher's Unions, and the Urban Democratic Machine.

It's definitely too much rap music.  

OTOH, think of the alternative - do you want to listen to that weird fucking Chinese music, shit like "The East is Red" twanging-ass shit?  Or do you want to listen to some Havanah Gila shit all the time?   And the Japanese, why they don't even HAVE music - well, except for the rap shit they copy from us.

So we could go muslim, and ban music altogether.  That could be good, I suppose.

But what I'm thinking about most is the impact on your brain housing group, and I'm thinking it's probably way too much for you to handle.   Quit it!   Give your brain a break!

Bush the Lesser, and Dickhead Cheney.

Don't need no fucking statistics to underestand that one.

Who cares. Lets just throw more money at the problem. DC's schools are a perfect example of money well spent - highest per student spending in the country, yet its war zones are ocassionally mistaken for schools, it still ranks among the highest drop out rates in the nation (#22 acording to one link), and trails abysmally in scholastic tests.

Yup, more money is the solution.

as our friend, Charlie Darwin, would say: "The problem is that too many Republicans are only working two jobs even though there are 24 hours in a day. If they got off their asses and worked three, that third income could all go to taxes and a "smart" libbie could use the money to solve the problem."

Schools don't teach crap these days. Let me take it back, schools only teach crap these days.

I teach a local college and it is horrible to see Freshmen in Math class don't know how to convert between fraction and decimal, can't multiply and divide without a calculator and I am supposed teach them College Algebra in 12 to 14 weeks.

This is the only country in the world that I know of that doesn't prepare school students for a college education. Take look, the school curriculum and college curriculums are not in sync.  In  a country with some of the best colleges and universities in the world we don't prepare our students in school for college.

Here is a simple fix. Teach every one fundamental Math, Science and History till tenth grade. Allow the students to choose between college, trade, or technical schools after 10th.

too many hairy and inebriated Republican social security receipients cluttering up Willie's bar, drooling in their beer and hallucinating about other people's problems."

Well, WillieBoy, when the other people have their hands in my pockets all the way up to their elbows, "their problem", i.e, being lazy, shiftless, and dishonest, becomes my problem and my tolerance for the bastards wanes. If I were going to "hallucinate" about "their problem" it would be in the form of shooting everyone of the stinking libbie trash, doing them, the world and their not to be born offspring, all a favor. In the meantime, Willie, drink up those mistakes, I'm sure you poured a martini when a beer was ordered.

the original welfare.  

Now get your face off the bar or I'll cut you off.

at least until George the Lesser, the product of the most expensive private schools available, came along and started shooting us in the foot.

What you're advocating seems like a more old world model.   Legitimate, but question how well it would fit here.

I've seen schools teach crap, and other schools in the same district do a pretty good job - understanding that perfect is the mortal enemy of good enough.

I think one of the biggest issues in public schools is the idea that you can predict students by psychologically categorizing them.  That idea doesn't have shit for proof or a track record, but people still think it feels good.  We need a few more accountants here, and fewer shrinks.

When I was in elemetary school, I remember being drilled in simple addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. We would take these tests with 100 simple problems to be added, subtracted, etc, and were timed on how quickly we could do them. We did a drill like that every single day.

A few years ago, when my youngest niece was in 5th grade, I was telling her about the drills we did in order to learn the multiplication and division tables. She looked at me like I was crazy. I asked her, well then how do you do your math? She pulled out her calculator.

Just unreal. The children graduating from high school today can't do anything more complicated than add 2+2 without a calculator.

If getting drunk on social security means continuing to pay the bastards approximately $20,000 per year and receiving nothing in return then you are indeed correct. If the thieving bastards just gave me back half of what I have paid them, even without adjustment for interest, I would retire now and join you down at your swill joint so we could talk about how we are getting screwed by the government for not stealing enough from the neighbors to maintain us in the style of life we want. Drink up Willie and pour yourself another "mistake."

If you ask a school district to teach a subject, chances are good they will go with a statistic like, test results versus dollars spent, instead of something totally immeasurable, like character - and  there's nothing wrong with that accountant's approach.   Generally, it gets us in far less trouble than the theologian's approach.

I happen to agree that drills are important, maybe because people seem to think in analog terms, not digital ones; and a certain amount of drilling seems critical to making people understand where a  specific calculation is going, and allows them to monitor for errors throughout the calculation.

For the same reason, I like people to be able to use a slide rule, because it allows a person to visualize what is going on, and monitor for errors throughout.

That said, I've seen different schools handle it differently, and results vary among teachers and even among kids.   I think generalizing has limited use, and one of the things that alarms me the most is psychiatric approaches to education, precisely because they are based in unfounded generalizations.    Eg, calling a kid ADHD is about as scientific and useful as calling him a Scorpio.

But somehow it seems that everybody has their racket, and the fellow making 6 or 7 figures on subprime loan commissions is always crying bitterly about the woman who claims her nephew is her dependent so she can get another $20/month in food stamps.

Me, I just like to get out of town on the weekend, so I can admire the rusting wrecks of cars in the beauty of nature!

May be in the past not now. If you honestly look at the situation you will find it not to be true.

95% of Phd students for math and science in elite schools are foreigners.

Well, we are still arguing about creationism vs. evolution and whether global warming is something promoted by Al Gore.

Real problem is our ego believing that we are better than everyone else.

We are kicking everyone's ass by borrowing money from the Chinese to pay Saudi for Oil and to fight war in Iraq. Our total foreign debt today is 96 trillion dollars which translates to 140,000 dollars for every man, woman and children alive.

But who needs math and science when we have our iPod, PSP and Wii and Crap Music.




-- Modified on 4/2/2008 10:23:24 AM

We should put tax on parents who doesn't make their kids learn. We always talk about tax credit for education. I think there should be expectations attached to it.

Throwing money is always been our method for solving all our problems. In reality, it only exasperates the problem. There is never enough money for anything.

We should kick all the current politicians out and elect folks who can really solve problems without spending more money.

all for that in this corner.  i've "enjoyed" decades of success, with the young charges entrusted to my care, for decades using basic drills.

ah, memories, memories.

You know how Harry gets when he starts drinking!  You don't want to talk politics with him when he is drunk since he starts calling people childish names. Not that he makes much sense anyhow when he is sober!

our esteemed yellow-bellied commander-in-chief, dry drunks are way more dangerous than wet ones!

that a democracy includes the right to fuck off, and shit the bull.

I would hope that, as a matter of policy, we'd have a good laugh and either make the smart choices, or let people live with their choices.  Problem is, life isn't that clearcut, and while eggheads are trying to make life perfect, Joe 6-pack goes & elects a dry drunk as president, and World's Biggest Asshole as his VP.

Yes, we have a lot of foreign math/science PhD students.   Question, is that because they come here to go to the best schools - or what?  Is that really a function of globalization, or what?  I'm sure you know that export of education is so profitable that many schools subsidize the native students by soliciting foreign students; and that around half of those foreign students stay in the USA, and the other half go back and subvert their native cultures with rap, etc.  OK, some of them make bombs, too, and not movies.

We'd all like all our kids to be the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs, but a reasonable parent is equally glad none of his kids are in jail or the asylum - IMHO, one of our biggest problems is trying to pathologize every behavior less than a 3.5, instead of connecting actions to results.   We have half our universities involved in specious philosophical studies, and god knows we start believing that shit after a while.

Yes, Americans have an ego problem.  Some of that is justified, but none of it is smart.

Yes, we are in a heap of shit, and about half of it can be traced to the present regime, people who are pimping the Jesus mob to inflate the next quarter's figures.  

I'm not so sure I'd blame the crap music though, since I lived thru the 60s when conservatives told us that music would makes us into nigger-loving commies and bound for hell.  When you're actually in hell, you don't worry so much about sharing your ammo with some black dude, as long as he's a decent shot.

""We should put tax on parents who doesn't make their kids learn"""

I'd add, fine em if they send their kids unprepared to learn. ie; (fed, rested, homework done, scared to death of going to the principals office, etc)

IOM, this is a result of poor parenting. Not just in how they send their kids illprepared but in allowing administators to shit away their tax money.

that is not ALL i give to my beloved students. and to all comers -- my love in Christ is boundless., and i don't discriminate. Giving, charity, one of the great Christian virtues. Oh God, the joys of a religious education!

All this social good me and my bretheren produce; i just can't wrap my arms and mind around exactly why the RC church in America is viewed so dimly.  Must be those God-awful, skreechy, out-of-key guitar masses?

sounds like someone has issues...

so many minors...

so little time...

so much LE surveilance...

the obsessive-compulsive magazine collector?

he had a lot of issues!

was'nt he a congressman?

did'nt he BenDover the pages?

I know exactly what you mean Sins.  I'm tutoring one of my college classmates who can't add 800+500 without a calculator.  

And don't get me started on handwriting!  When I was in elementary school we spent time everyday tracing cursive letters.  Twenty years later, none of my professors will accept anything handwritten because they're sick of having to decipher chicken scratch.

You mean that arrogant, narcistic, self-centered, pig-headed, yellow-bellied, moronic, intelletual drop-out, draft dodging, piece of shit, mental midget, clown of a President of ours??  Harry's hero??  No wonder Harry drinks so much!!

Admit it; You love me!!