Kelly in Kansas

FrontPage magazine.com: "Two, Three, Many Bake Sales
By Brendan Steinhauser
FrontPageMagazine.com | September 29, 2003


This past Thursday, September 24th, was a dark day for freedom of speech on college campuses. An Affirmative Action bake sale organized by The Young Conservatives of Texas was shut down by the administration at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. The idea of the bake sale was to show that discrimination is wrong by selling cookies at prices that corresponded to the consumer’s race. While white males were asked to pay one dollar, hispanic and black students paid less.
The administration responded to this act of protest by closing the bake sale down because a few students claimed to be offended. At least one black student filed a grievance with the university. Tim Moore, director of the Hughes-Trigg Student Center at SMU remarked, “This was not an issue of free speech. It was really an issue where we had a hostile environment being created that was potentially volatile.' According to this Orwellian reasoning, free speech only applies to issues so dull or meaningless as to generate no controversy. By these standards, Martin Luther King Jr. would not have been allowed to give his “I Have a Dream Speech.” Everyone knows how volatile the civil rights movement was in America, but should the concept have been suppressed because narrow-minded redneck hatemongers were offended?

Once again the hypocrisy of the academic establishment has been exposed. To them, free speech only applies to “politically correct” ideas, like support of Affirmative Action. The paradoxical aspect of leftist beliefs is that any speech that does not fit into the paradigm of liberal thought must be prohibited in the name of “tolerance” -- a tolerance that excludes toleration of conflicting views.
"

Reagan, Man of Letters: "ritics who judged Ronald Reagan a regrettably ordinary man, disengaged even when he wasn't on stage as president of the United States, may be surprised to discover that he was dedicatedly dashing off thousands of letters to a wide assortment of pen pals, political allies and even a few global enemies. A sampling from decades of letters has just been published, revealing a hunger for contact with all manner of people.
His hand-jotted observations on practically everything in life — from the simple joy in a starry night to executive imaginings of a Star Wars missile defense — hardly present a threat to Marcus Aurelius's 'Meditations' for introspective angst and wisdom in a leader. But they do reflect an egalitarian curiosity, affability and humility before fellow humans. His letters confirm not greatness so much as exultation in ordinary life."

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The first president I was eligible to vote for . . . and did . . . although I voted for Bush 41 in the primary. If you hadn't already figured out my political predilictions, they're wide open now. :}

It's nice to see history at least giving Reagan a chance at getting a fairer treatment in the history books. Too many of today's historians came of age when he was governor of California and didn't realize they were behind the trend and Reagan was the one ahead of it.

The Role of the Delete Key in Blog: "s a blog still a blog if someone else edits it? A recent policy change at The Sacramento Bee has raised questions about whether taking an editor's pen to a Web log before it is published detracts from very nature of Web logs, or 'blogs,'' as the online diaries are called. "

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Isn't it interesting that the folks making the biggest claims to freedom of speech - no matter whom it hurts - are behind the gun on editing blogs?

@princeton Loader

This is another step toward true interactivity. Via jill/txt

Crooked Timber: The street finds its own use for things

More good stuff on blogs and teaching. The class I"m trying it with is down to two people - one on campus and one virtually. Not sure if it's a good test with only two people but we'll see.

Was working outside (planting more ivy from Mom and Dad's) and went inside for a phone call (Cathy from MN - switched computers and still experiencing some glitches) - she wanted to congratulate me on the grant. :} I"ll be up to see her in a few weeks.

When I went back out, I wasn't looking but the turkeys were all within 20 yards of the house - over by the stone fence. I was talking to Shadow and scared them off and heard them flying into the trees before I looked up to see them. I"ll have to remember to do a better job of "sneaking" outside. I've seen them right at the house on the other side so it's interesting as I figure out their patterns.

Critical Mass: Bake sale doesn't sit well: "Bake sale doesn't sit well
In response to my post yesterday on SMU's censored anti-affirmative action bake sale, a reader writes:


I am a 22 year-old African-American college student attending a small private college in Central California, and I believe that the bake sale demonstration by UC Berkeley's College Republicans clearly presented the unfair advantages minority students are given when it comes to college admissions and job placement. I am against affirmative action in some aspects of what it stands for.
As a college student, I would like to believe that I was accepted because of my educational background. And as a working citizen, I would like to believe that I was hired by a company that believed that I was truely qualified for the position that I applied for. With affirmative action, how will I ever know the truth?
By continuing to allow affirmative action to be used in school admissions and job placement, people that support affirmative action are sending a message that minorities need a 'boost' over whites or qualified applicates just because they are minorities. Sending a message like that makes it harder for minorities to prove that they are qualified and they truely deserve to be where they are.

On the other hand, prejudice still exist in our unperfect world. Thou affirmative action may give minorities an unfair advantage over whites, it is still giving minorities a chance to prove themselves in an environment that was mostly dominated by whites.

Now, more minorities are applying to universities and corporate jobs, becasue they know that affirmative action will protect them from prejudices and discrimiation that would have kept them out.

Until someone presents an alternative to affirmative action in a non-colorblind society, people that are totally"


This is not a perspective that gets much play when affirmative action is debated. It ought to. Thanks for writing in.
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An excellent example of theory being illustrated by applying it to the real world. This is a great response.

Conversations with Dina: "Thought for the day:

'Who you really are is enough.'

- Oriah Mountain Dreamer"

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I need to remember this more often!!!

Amy Wohl : Why a Weblog: "Why a Weblog
Via Newgator (have I told you it's one of my favorite new tech toys?) I came across a non-weblog (but it sure seems like one at http://info.org.il/weblog/. It brings up a host of issues you may find interesting.
One of them is certainly my issue:
How often do you have to post to your weblog to be a 'real' weblogger?
Sometimes I'm really good and I post several times in a week. Some times life gets in the way and I don't post for several weeks or longer. Usually I post when I read something that I react to strongly and I want to share it RIGHT NOW. So I guess I think a Weblog is about sharing interesting thoughts -- some I've found that belong to other people, some that I've thought up myself, usually because I've something I've read on the net."

ScrappleFace: Hillary's Chinese Publisher Calls Cuts 'Honest Mistake': "Hillary's Chinese Publisher Calls Cuts 'Honest Mistake'
(2003-09-24) -- The Chinese publisher of Sen. Hillary Clinton's 'Living History' said that editorial cuts made to the official Chinese edition of the memoir were not censorship, just an 'honest mistake.'

Mrs. Clinton said she is 'amazed and outraged' by Yilin Press' deletions of most controversial mentions of China, including references to human rights violations.

But a spokesman for Yilin said, 'We thought we were doing Mrs. Clinton a favor. Since she didn't devote a lot of space to writing about Clinton fundraisers Johnny Chung, Charlie 'Yah-Lin' Trie and John Huang, we assumed the references to China which remained in the book were oversights. After all, if they didn't want to waste space on possible financial connections between the Chinese Army and the Clintons, why would they want to talk about how China treats women?'"

Tightly Wound: In Other News, Some People Just Never Recover From High School: "In Other News, Some People Just Never Recover From High School
Yep, they're taking their toys and going home like the petulant little whiny-pants they are, and all because their audience didn't leap up to declare them the second coming of Christ when they acted like boneheads.
I suppose no one can possibly understand the pain of being the only three people in country music with the correct ideology. If I strain myself, I can hear a sad tune playing on the tiny Violin of Martyrdom.
Here's a big heaping helping of 'What' with a side of 'ever,' ladies. If you come up with a political idea that isn't taken directly from Indymedia, we'll talk. In the meantime, have fun competing with Britney and Justin. Maybe if you're really lucky, Madonna will soul kiss you for ratings.
Posted by Big Arm Woman at September 22, 2003 11:05 AM | TrackBack "

USD 503 receives history education grant

Here's a better way to explain what I'll be up to the next three years. I'm getting over the shock that it's actually happened but now it's hitting me how much work it will be - but it's a good thing!

Paige Announces $98.5 Million in History Grants, Launches Partnership with The History Channel

We're there!!!!!!! :}

The Morning Sun: Sebelius talks education 09/23/03

I was there and I hope this is a serious effort to improve education in our state. The early childhood education advocates were very well organized. Our university president also spoke. Time will tell . .. .

ScrappleFace: Grasso Reluctantly Accepts $75 Trillion Severance

ScrappleFace: Bush to Appoint Kennedy Defense Secretary

NGA|Jackson Pollock|artist 1 I'm watching a movie on Bravo about Jackson Pollock - portrayed brilliantly by Ed Harris with Marcia Gay Harden as his wife and Amy Madigan as Mrs. Guggenheim. One of the many great things about the internet - I knew I had heard the name but didn't know much about him - I googled his name and found a National Gallery of Art slide show about him. As with many geniuses, he was very troubled. The slide show includes some Quicktime video of his artistic process and his talking about his work. It is also interesting to see how it changed over time until he made his painting his own. I also learned of his connection to Missourian Thomas Hart Benton.

LexisNexis(TM) Academic - Document

The Annals of Improbably Research published this study earlier this year. I was recently at a territorial sesquicentennial meeting where they mentioned this "rejoinder" and also explained that the editor of the LA Times is from Kansas . . . .

I grew up in Missouri and am still very proud of my "show me" attitude. But I also greatly enjoy my adopted state of Kansas and its much wilder spirit and how it sits on the edge of the Plains and almost on the edge of the Ozarks. Nearby Woodson County has some pretty terrain to drive through - the last time I went through it was time for the wheat harvest . . . .watching each Kansas Farmer feed over 125 Americans . . . . :}

Tightly Wound: Can of Worms

can lead to over-crowding at other schools, according to a New York Times article today. More students but no new resources - including chairs for them to sit in . . .

Georgia Tech Game Morphology Project - Overview

interesting

United States remembers Sept. 11 victims - The Washington Times: United Press International: "NEW YORK, Sept. 11 (UPI) -- Much of the U.S. eastern seaboard will fall silent Thursday morning in memory of the 3,000 victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The biggest commemoration will be at Ground Zero in New York at the exact times when each of the twin towers was hit by hijacked aircraft marked by moments of silence.
Children who lost parents will read out the victims' names.
The New York ceremony begins at 8:30 a.m. EDT and concludes at noon.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said children had been chosen to lead the service because 'it is in them that the spirit of our city lives on.'
President Bush will remain in Washington to lead services for the 184 people killed at the Pentagon, where a memorial garden in honor of victims will be dedicated.
A service will also be held on the Pennsylvania hillside where 44 people died after passengers stormed the cockpit of Flight 93, overcoming the hijackers.
Thousands of smaller remembrance services will be held throughout the country."

We should all remember today . . .

Bush says terrorism on the run - The Washington Times: Nation/Politics: "Two years after President Bush vowed to defeat terrorism in an unprecedented global war, the White House has issued a detailed report showing significant progress in the ongoing offensive.
The 22-page report, released yesterday, points out that the United States and its allies have 'dismantled the repressive Taliban, denied al Qaeda a safe haven in Afghanistan and defeated Saddam Hussein's regime.' "

FrontPage magazine.com: "The Democrats Plan to Lose the War
By Ann Coulter
FrontPageMagazine.com | September 11, 2003


Vermont Gov. Howard Dean has been issuing diatribes against the Bush administration that would surpass even Tariq Aziz with severe menstrual cramps. This strategy has made him the runaway favorite of the Democratic Party. Even Mr. War Hero, John Kerry, is getting shellacked by Dean. At times Kerry seems almost ready to surrender, making him look even more French. (If only Kerry had a war record or an enormously rich spouse to fall back on!) "

Ann Coulter always presents food for thought - even when we don't always agree with her.

This week's lesson plan: Try to make sense of 9/11 | csmonitor.com: "No matter their distance from ground zero, schools around the country were put in the difficult position of serving as emotional triage units in the weeks after Sept. 11. With the passage of time comes a different but still challenging task: how to recall the painful day and yet also step back to assess its historical significance."

9-10-03 -- Jack of All Trades -- Education Week: "This is a story of ambition. Gentle ambition.
A former school custodian rises to the principal's chair.

A man takes a job as a school janitor and works his way to school principal, never blind to either the good or the harm he might do. The man, dogged and easy-going at once, finds his true métier. He makes scores, then hundreds, of children happier, and many look up to him.
Jack Yates says he managed those feats through the help of many people along the way. But, questioning him in his moderately large office at Hawkins Elementary School here, you know there's more to it than that. He was the one who did double duty as custodian and student-teacher, sat through more than a dozen years of night school in two decades, and left his 3rd grade classroom to take the job that, he jokes, hoar-frosted his full head of brown hair. At 42, he may not have more than the usual load of debts, but he's unusually ready to acknowledge them."

9-10-03 -- Iowa's Move Toward Pay-for-Performance
On Verge of Collapse -- Education Week: "'The Right Ideas'
Pay-for-performance models have been piloted in schools and some districts, such as Cincinnati and Denver, but Iowa was the first state to adopt such a comprehensive law. Most states are taking 'baby steps' toward paying teachers based on student performance, said Michael Allen, the program director for the Teaching Quality Policy Center for the Education Commission of the States in Denver.
'Someone has to be able to take a really big step in terms of pay for performance,' he argued, adding that Iowa's plan has been the most progressive state effort."

They're also doing this with the over-emphasis on standards as in most other states.

9-10-03 -- Snapshot of 'Highly Qualified'Teachers Is Fuzzy -- Education Week: "Whether the national picture is of states taking baby steps or giant steps toward meeting the 'highly qualified' teacher provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act remained anyone's guess last week. "

Where the Girls Aren't

Great contrast between "MTM" and "Sex & The City".

Where the Girls Aren't

Great contrast between "MTM" and "Sex & The City".

Where the Girls Aren't

Great contrast between "MTM" and "Sex & The City".

http://chujoe.net/

Another take on the Beloit survey (from www.scrappleface.com)

List Shows Mindset of Incoming Freshmen
(2003-09-04) -- Beloit College has provided its professors with its annual Mindset List, to give them a sense of the worldview of incoming freshmen.

Here are some excerpts from the list illustrating the perspective of students born in 1983.

-- From their point of view, Ronald Reagan is an airport.
-- Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Martin Sheen are the only presidents they have ever known.
-- The childhood tackling game "smear the queer" is a hate crime.
-- Pornography and flag desecration are protected speech.

-- The Second World War was directed by Steven Spielberg and starred Tom Hanks.
-- Weapons of mass destruction (WMD) include second-hand smoke and sport utility vehicles, and there are none in Iraq.
-- The great political minds of this generation include Sean Penn, Johnny Depp, Barbra Streisand, George Clooney and Janeane Garafalo.
-- Dinner with the family happens only in the minivan.
-- Elections determine who gets kicked off the island.
-- Everyone remembers where they were when the Oslo accords were signed, bringing everlasting peace to the middle east.
-- America has always been the greatest threat to world peace.
-- Islam is a religion of peace.
-- Since Oprah has not yet recommended their books, today's freshmen don't know the names Alexis de Tocqueville or Adam Smith.
-- Although they've never heard of Ozzie and Harriet, they think Ozzy and Sharon are the ideal parents.
-- Everybody remembers where they were when they heard that John F. Kennedy's plane had crashed into the ocean.
-- For girls born in 1983, freedom means getting an abortion.
-- For boys born in 1983, freedom means not having to care for one's offspring.
-- They have never sprayed on deodorant.
-- Self-evident truth is an oxymoron.
-- Liberal means progressive.
-- Conservative means extremist.
-- They'll never read this list, since it's too long to IM.

Requiring highly qualified teachers: unfair and unwise?

As part of No Child Left Behind, states are now required to report what percentage of their teachers are "highly qualified"—in other words, what percentage has a bachelor's degree, state certification and clear knowledge of the subject they teach. It's that last clause that has many teachers and union officials up in arms. For middle and high school teachers throughout the country who do not have a degree in the subject they teach (who majored in education, for example), this requirement means they must pass a subject area test to prove they are "highly qualified." Despite the increasing volume of research that shows a high correlation between content-area knowledge and student achievement, and the lack of conclusive evidence linking traditional certification requirements with pupil achievement, teachers and their unions are decrying this as "unfair" because it "changes the rules in the middle of the game," and unwise because it "[lowers] the requirements for what it takes to actually teach these children." The same groups also condemn provisions in NCLB that allow teachers to work in traditional public and charter schools without having graduated from an ed school preparation program if they pass a rigorous test of both content and pedagogy (like the newly launched American Board Passport Certification). Holding teachers to higher standards and giving them more options to help meet these raised expectations might sound to most Americans like sensible steps for raising student achievement. But then again, most Americans don't work for the NEA.

Here's the latest on No Child Leaps Ahead:

From Checker's Desk (editorial by Chester E. Finn, Jr.)
The Trials of NCLB

The No Child Left Behind rubber is hitting the education road, where it's producing a lot of screeching brakes, skid marks and, especially, honking. A flock of noisy Canadian geese makes less noise than American public education griping about NCLB, the changes it is forcing, the injustices it is said to be inflicting and the difficulties of implementing it as Congress intended. To wit:

*The NEA has declared war, via the courtroom, voicing many grievances centered on the law's "unfunded mandates," i.e. the claim that NCLB will make schools do things for which Washington is not fully compensating them.

*The annual Kappan/Gallup survey appears to show wide public discontent with many NCLB strategies and assumptions, beginning with the enlarged federal role itself.

*Some states are gaming the "adequate yearly progress" (AYP) system and other NCLB monitoring-and-accountability systems, rigging their goals, manipulating their measurements, fiddling with their standards and reworking their definitions.

*As a News Hour segment with John Merrow made plain the other evening, one state after another—this one focused on Maine—is griping that NCLB is making them do things differently, asserting that all was hunky dory without this federal intrusion, and demanding waivers and special conditions.

*Summer's end revealed wide discrepancies that have more to do with where states have set their standards and how they measure performance than with "true" differences. Just 400 of Florida's 3000 public schools, for example, made AYP in 2002-3, but only 144 of Minnesota's 2000 schools did NOT. Similar contrasts are to be found in state reports on how many schools are persistently dangerous. (Under NCLB, children may exit such schools.) Ohio found none last year and New York only two. Tell that to the parents of Cleveland and the Bronx.

*Confusing gaps are emerging between which schools are doing OK according to NCLB and which are satisfying their states' pre-existing accountability schemes. It's easy to find schools that the state says are in "academic emergency," but that NCLB says are making adequate yearly progress—and vice versa. Florida's "A+" system, for example, designed by Jeb Bush, gives honor grades to a bunch of schools that are flunking according to the NCLB system designed by his brother.

*As in fall 2002, NCLB's cramped school-choice provisions are proving exceedingly hard to put into practice, particularly in places that need them most. A quarter million Chicago pupils, for example, are now eligible to transfer to higher-performing public schools, yet the city has only 5000 available places in such schools.

*State officials report widespread confusion over what exactly is entailed in trying to comply with NCLB's "highly qualified teacher" requirements—and whether it's even going to be possible. Rural states and communities are especially unhappy.

*There's widening concern that NCLB's single-minded focus on reading, math and science will unintentionally marginalize such subjects as history and civics—and shield them from needed public scrutiny.

This list could easily lengthen. But how much is just honking and which are real problems that somebody should be solving? I see five things going on:

First, NCLB expects big changes across a wide spectrum of ingrained practices and entrenched assumptions. It's a deeply behaviorist law, meant to alter behavior via a series of incentives and punishments. But people, institutions and—especially—bureaucracies don't like to alter their behavior, no matter how badly the old practices have failed-or how much better the changed practices may work. Keep in mind, too, that the griping isn't coming from kids. It's from grown-ups. The well being of America's children is the reason for changing but, at least in NCLB's early days, the law's most profound effects are on adults and institutions that resist changing.

Second, NCLB's authors loaded an awful lot into it. That's why the law runs a thousand pages, of course. But was this really the best place to deal with, say, school safety as well as student achievement and teacher quality? NCLB expects people to dance and cook and fly and yodel at the same time. That's hard to do well.

Third, NCLB's authors invited discrepancies when they layered a uniform nationwide accountability system atop fifty different sets of state standards and tests, and when they left key definitions (e.g. dangerous schools, fully certified teachers) to states while micro-managing others (e.g. the disaggregated demographic categories according to which AYP must be measured).

Fourth, some of NCLB's built-in political compromises have hobbled its effective implementation, such as giving kids the right to exit a bad school for a better one while limiting that selection to other public schools within the same district.

Fifth, Americans are of two minds about much of this. People crave better schools and higher achievement but don't want to be pushed around by Washington. They want better teachers yet adore Ms. Jones. They believe in "the basics" but hate it when their kid doesn't get music. They want Johnny to succeed in school but grump when someone tells them he needs to work harder. Because of this ambivalence—much of it shared by educators—it's not hard to manipulate survey questions and poll results to "prove" just about anything. (The recent Kappan/Gallup survey did an especially deft job of biasing the findings by how it phrased the questions.)

The word in Washington—from executive branch and Congress alike—is grin and bear it, stay the course, don't even dream of changing NCLB, it'll be worth it in the end. There's no political stomach for re-opening this complex statute, particularly in an election year. The bipartisanship that is perhaps NCLB's greatest asset would crumble. If amending is needed, that process can start in January 2005.

Which may be just as well. It's obvious that the country would benefit from some fine-tuning of NCLB based on experience with it. Every major government program needs that. Congress never gets it exactly right the first time around. But much of the current squawking has to do with start-up difficulties and confusion, the friction of changing familiar practices and the pain of stretching long-idle tendons. Another year of experience will see some difficulties resolving themselves, states and districts (and schools and educators) beginning to grow accustomed to doing things differently and, perhaps, more imagination in resolving implementation problems. Mainly, though, it's important for everyone to recognize that a new day has dawned in American education and that it simply won't do to go back to sleep.

"Flunking out: Bush's pet education bill is in serious trouble," by Alexander Russo, Slate, August 28, 2003

"Cuts put school law to the test," by Sam Dillon, New York Times, August 31, 2003

CNN.com - Quality check unsettling for some teachers - Sep. 1, 2003

The difference between a law's intent and how it is actually implemented . . . The bigger problem is low teacher salaries.

CNN.com - Quality check unsettling for some teachers - Sep. 1, 2003

The difference between a law's intent and how it is actually implemented . . . The bigger problem is low teacher salaries.

Tightly Wound: Fools, Damn Fools, and Folks I'd Like to Slap

Ditto!!!

Wormtalk and Slugspeak Here's another professor blog . . . . :}

Boston.com / A&E / TV / 'Villa' presents a revolutionary use of spin via The Cranky Professor.com

ScrappleFace: Vouchers Free Public School Seats for Congressional Kids

ScrappleFace: France, Germany Offer to Pay for Rebuilding Iraq

The Morning Sun: Documenting the storm 09/08/03

The area is going to be on the weather channel . . . !

ScrappleFace: Bloggers Release Statement on Hillary '04

Thanks to mamamusings for pointing this out.