I knew education was bad, but I had no idea about this.  I started out laughing at the conflations and Spoonerisms, until I started being concerned, and then a little appalled that students could actually believe what they wrote.

It's at BlondeSense.  Go read it.

From Colorful Colorado, home of tourism, shiny metals and the team that used to be led by John Elway, an object lesson in zero-tolerance:

Eight-year-old Eathan Harris was originally suspended from Harris Park Elementary School for three days. Principal Chris Benisch reduced the suspension to one day after complaints from Harris' parents.

Harris used a black Sharpie marker to color a small area on the sleeve of his sweatshirt. A teacher sent him to the principal when she noticed him smelling the marker and his clothing.

"It smelled good," Harris said. "They told me that's wrong."

I think at this point we're going to have to suspend every kid in America.  I don't know of a one, from my childhood to present day, who hasn't whiffed one of those fruity magic markers, or played with glue, or observed that some art supplies smell better than others, or cut their own bangs in class (okay; the last one might've been just me).  Really.  He's eight and it's a sharpie.  I think suspension is a tad extreme here.  But wait, there's more:

In his letter suspending the child, Benisch wrote that smelling the marker fumes could cause the boy to "become intoxicated."

A toxicologist with the Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center says that claim is nearly impossible.

Dr. Eric Lavonas says non-toxic markers like Sharpies, while pungent-smelling, cannot be used to get high.

The toxicologist goes on to say that maybe, if the kid had 50 bags of sharpies, maybe he could "get creative" and figure something out.  The school was completely nonplussed by the whole science-speak thing, though:

"Principals make hundreds of decisions everyday based on our best judgment. And in that time, smelling that marker, I felt like, 'Wow, that's a very serious marker,'" Benisch said.

Despite the medical evidence, Benisch promised to draw an even clearer line on markers.

"We've purged every permanent marker there is in this building," he said.

Time well spent, I say.  Can't be too careful with those sharpies.

There remains so much wrong with the No Child Left Behind act that I hesitate to even begin to address it. One of the most deplorable chasms, and, coincidentally, most easily addressed by the federal Department of Education, has, however, been the law’s allowance that individual states may calculate graduation rates in any way they desire. Many states initially took advantage of this disconnect between the law-as-written- and the law-as-applied and have, since 2002 at the law’s inception, relied upon a variety of inaccurate formulas producing misleading data, thus artificially inflating their graduation rates.

Georgia is one of these states.

In September of 2007, State Superintendent of Schools Kathy Cox released a statement on the Georgia Department of Education website publicizing an overall graduation rate of “an all-time high of 72.3 percent.” Were our education system in even adequate shape, this figure, and its attendant crowing, would be woeful enough. Our education system is in a shambles, however, and deeply, possibly systemically, flawed, and Georgia takes advantage of the law’s ambiguity in the state’s favor in order to preen its own ragged feathers. By this I mean, of course, that the figure on the website is inflated, vis-à-vis the meaning that the average parent would expect that figure to reference, anyway.

   

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I have come to the conclusion that Older Son, now recovered from pneumonia, weekly injections of salmonella thanks to my outmoded loyalty to Peter Pan, and strep throat, more than likely has some form of dyslexia.  His reading is functional, though significantly below grade level, and the concomitance of other symptoms has had me preoccupied with devouring whatever material I can find on dyslexia, special education, SLDs, IEPs, IDEA, and getting him the help he needs to perform to the level of his substantially higher cognitive ability - all despite the school's lackadaisical attitude regarding his specific troubles.

I'm sorry for the absence, dear reader(s), but I have been entirely consumed, and dejected, and frustrated and - dearest Maude - overwhelmed by this completely unexpected, totally unfamiliar landscape.  My boy, my beautiful, sensitive, kind and thoughtful boy.  The pipes call and yet I do not know the language of response.  He pipes; I drum.  And nothing in my history teaches me the language of birds.

Thanks to the Badger for bringing me out of hibernation.  Readers will probably see much more on the politics of education, as it has become more visceral of late.  :)

For those of you neither from the MidSouth nor interested in the country music business, Belmont University, located in Nashville, TN, is the place to pursue your degree if you want to make it in the Music City.  It is also financed by the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), a highly fundamentalist brand of Christianity which, while very wealthy here, is generally incompatible with those who gravitate toward the entertainment business.

As such, Belmont doesn't have a majority SBC enrollment in their student body (it's about 1/3), though their trustees are 100% SBC.  In light of their diversity of enrollment, their status as a feeder to the country music industry, and their need to raise additional funds, Belmont is attempting to reduce its SBC trustee load from 100% to 60%.  The Convention, however, had other ideas, informing the school that if they let other so-called Christians (that would be any denomination other than SBC, including but not limited to Primitive Baptist or Bible Baptist or Old Regular Baptist), then Belmont could expect to stop finding $2MM annual checks in the mail.

Belmont responded with refusing to accept any additional funds.

The Tennessee branch of the SBC subsequently filed a suit in October seeking reparation of the $57MM it's given the school since the Convention took over in 1950. 


Interesting, since Belmont didn't actually want to sever the connection completely, just loosen the stranglehold a bit.  But what else can we expect from a dogma sees most everything in black and white?  If the SBC doesn't own that college lock, stock and barrel, then just hanging on to the lock and the barrel don't count, and they'll spend countless thousands getting that freaking stock back in their pockets.

Belmont is still looking for a way out of being held at SBC gunpoint.  I've got a great idea for them.  They should do what Georgia's Mercer College did earlier this year and host a campus "Coming Out Day."  The Southern Baptists dropped Mercer like a sackful of unblessed snakes, no lawsuit required.

And it had the added benefit of being the right thing to for their students.  Funny how that worked out.

"Think Tank Will Promote Thinking," read the headline in WaPo's politics section this morning - on the Federal Page, no less.

Wow, thought I, that's kind of an oxymoron.  Let me click on that and read more.  So I bypassed a handful of articles detailing how Nancy Pelosi screwed up by writing that letter supporting Murtha, even if she didn't mean it to be taken literally and secretly wants Hoyer to win, and clicked through to read about this strange new species - the think tank that wants people to think.

Scientists, the really good ones, have long been noted for their quasi-detachment from the world.  A shining attribute in scientific study, dispassionate observation does not usually lend itself well to political activism unless that activism is somehow triggered by certain stimuli such as progressive  and unrelenting encroachment, spearing, or repeated facemasking.  Which is to say, it can take a little something to get them to notice that the other team is trying to take the ball, stab 40 holes in it, set it on fire, and bury it in a nuclear waste dump.  Well, some scientists have finally both noticed that "science" has come to be acquainted with "evil," (which is a ridiculous comparison both on its face and under its hood), and decided to do something about it.  They've formed a Washington think tank to attempt to influence public policy regarding the principles of separation of church and state (SOCAS): the Center for Inquiry-Transnational.

Since our arrival on these shores, religion has always attempted to interfere in our public policy.  Though a constant undercurrent even at its weakest points, religion's success in informing said policy, relative to the percentage of widely accepted initiatives grounded in secular human and civil rights as opposed to those founded upon the religious imperatives of the nationally dominant genre (i.e., Christianity) irrespective of empirical data or socioeconomic impact, can be viewed in waves, many of them tied to conflict and political and national uncertainty.  Among other items - in 1864, after an upsurge of religious feeling during the Civil War, Congress approved the addition of "In God We Trust" to coins.  It appeared there on and off until 1956, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower (R) approved a Congressional joint resolution declaring "In God We Trust" the national motto of the US.  Eisenhower also signed the 1954 law adding "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance - the campaign for which was spearheaded by the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal group.  Government-sponsored prayer in public schools, ruled against between the 1850s and 1948, saw a resurgence during the Eisenhower years before being ended again by the Supreme Court's 1962 decision in Engel v. Vitale.  Not coincidentally, Eisenhower's presidency also saw the height of McCarthyism, the Korean War, the Suez conflict, the entrenchment of the Cold War and the beginning of intervention in Vietnam.  Religious influence on public policy relative to perceived security could be a dissertation in and of itself.

While the wave of the 50s briefly abated during the 60s and 70s, it began to rise again in the 1980s concurrent with the ascendance of Reagan conservatism and has since faced little orchestrated opposition from the scientific community.  Though scientists thought it a disease of national import, AIDS research failed to obtain early funding because it was a "gay disease," according to (uninformed) public perception.  "Gay" was evil, and therefore did not merit study or cure the way, say, measles (primarily a "kid" disease) did, even though it was exponentially more fatal.   

The push has become greater since fundamentalist George W. Bush became president, and entered its ascendancy post 9/11 as economic pressures, national instability and concerns over daily security increased.  As though presenting Marshall Applewhite as on equal footing with Einstein, the media, in their over-earnest attempts at "balance," will promote the dissent of 1% of the scientific community on any given issue as on par with the agreement of the significantly larger 99%.  Movements to add the newfangled creationism euphemistically referred to as "Intelligent Design" were largely ignored until a spate of them achieved national notoriety just within the last 5 years.  In the latest developments to come to light the public has discovered that FDA, environmental and health policies have been subject to Christian review and religious affirmation.

The last item is, no doubt, the proverbial straw on the complacent camel's back.

It is high time scientists joined with other SOCAS supporters in providing basis and impetus for pushing back the rising tide of religious fundamentalism undermining a nation founded on secular freedoms.  Leaving aside, for the moment, the question of civil rights infringed upon by religious zealotry, it is reprehensible that this administration has thus far been permitted to either ignore or hide science where it disagrees (as it frequently does) with their theocratic agenda on matters of basic earth science or public health.  And, if we pick civil rights up again, we find the religion extremists no better - attempting to codify discrimination and legislate morality, absent logical reasoning, based entirely upon their interpretations of a collection of stories they deem as "holy" while rejecting any conflicting data - including but not limited to proven science, basic human decency, and anyone else's concept of "holy."

While even the extremists have a right to believe and live their personal lives as they see fit, their religious fervor should give them no additional standing in a country predicated upon equality.  To be balanced and to live up to the egalitarian ideals upon which we claim foundation, health and environmental policies, as well as human and civil rights, must be grounded in the secular and based on facts.  To do otherwise is to grant both political and personal ascendancy to one collection of mythology over all others, even though all have equal basis for belief, nullifying the rights of every citizen.  Because, even though the Christian fundamentalists have found themselves with the power thus far, other faiths in the US are growing and may well one decide to usurp that power for themselves.  Better for all of us, even the fundamentalists, to leaves religion out of government, lest we one day find ourselves subject to a religion not our own.

I look forward to the Center's efforts and seeing the results thereof.  The passion of the dispassionate may yet be something to behold.

Via PSoTD, we learn today that:

In an attempt to save the state money on university spending, a proposal a Senate committee passed unanimously Monday would require college students to start paying 75 percent more for tuition once they have accumulated 24 credits more than they need to graduate.

I have long recognized that today’s politicians, and the neo-con-ridden Republicans in particular, would prefer the dumbest population they can lay hands on. It is far easier to herd a group of ill-informed, deliberately ignorant people than a raucous group of inconvenient questioners. What’s the homily? "In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king." Politicians would have an easier time of it if they were really the smartest people around, instead of just thinking themselves so.

I did not imagine, however, that we were so close to penalizing education or punishing those who seek it out.

"This is not about punishment," said the bill's sponsor, Sen. Lee Constantine, R-Altamonte Springs. "We need to reach the kids who continue to stay in school when they no longer need to be there.

While the emphasis is PSOTD’s, I happen to agree. First, it is absolutely about punishment, otherwise the esteemed committee would have found another way. Second, I object to the phrase "no longer need to be there" with regard to education. People should be educating themselves, whether formally or informally, for their entire lives. The lack of education, formal / informal / continuing or otherwise has, in fact, significantly contributed to the pass our country now faces. As a nation, we’re xenophobic because we don’t know any better, we’re protectionist because we can’t think of a better alternative in the face of our underlying xenophobia – except where we outsource because we simply cannot compete. Extremist religio-fanatacism has Congressmen excusing the killing of judges because portions of our population have simply abandoned logic – if they ever had more than a passing acquaintance with it. The list could go on, and does, but I won’t do so here.

Suffice it to say, education is always necessary. There is no point at which any person should ever say, "That’s it; I’m done learning now, thanks."

"I think students will see this and say, 'I'm not paying more than I should. I'm going to graduate and become a productive member of society.' "

Since when is paying tuition, which then employs professors and HR professionals and food service people and janitorial personnel and librarians and sometimes even entire communities, not being a "productive member" of society? Since when is learning the difference between human rights and a punch in the nose superfluous?

Ah, that’s right, since a generally educated population became an inconvenient thing to the ruling party. They wouldn’t have to explain if people would just stop trying to understand.

US District Judge Clarence Cooper ruled in favor of science and SOCAS yesterday, ordering the Cobb County, Georgia, school system to remove the inane yellow warning stickers from their high school biology textbooks.

:does the happy dance

The stickers stated, "This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a ...   

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Still nothing from the judge in Cobb County, Georgia on the science textbook stickers labeling evolution "just a theory," but 11 parents, along with the ACLU, have taken the Dover school system to court over their recent decision to require the teaching of creationism / intelligent design in high school ...   

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I'm still waiting for a verdict on the Monkeys Reloaded case in Cobb County, Georgia. Meanwhile, it seems the insistence on teaching creation mythology on par with scientific theory is not restricted to the South. The Yankees can now hang their heads right along with those backward Rebels they often love to hate...   

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The school system in Cobb County, Georgia, recently placed stickers on their science textbooks stating that "This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the evolution of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered."

The statements are almost laughable in their combined weak grasp of science, scientific language, and thinly veiled call to reject science altogether in favor of literal interpretation of religious creation myth.   

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In 1956, Alabamians added certain language to their state constitution. Some of that language provided for poll taxes and mandated (that word again) segregated schools. In reaction to the Supreme Court�s Brown vs Board of Education decision of 1954, the clause also states that Alabama residents have no right to education at public expense...

But we live in a more enlightened time now, right? I wouldn't put any eggs in that basket yet...   

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