Crossroads of Civilization
Posted in Arts, Community, Culture, Education, Food & Drink, Humor, Self on Jun 29th, 2012
Well, my time in China is nearly at an end – one book closes, another opens. I’ve been thinking about how to write a blog that in some way summarises my time in this confusing, confounding, amazing country but to no avail. As ever, though, fortune favours the fortunate, and the local ex-pat / loawai [...]
Posted in Education on Jun 20th, 2012
When it comes to fixing public education, you tend to hear a lot of simple solutions. What we need is merit pay. What we need is to get rid of unions. What we need is to fire every teacher and then hire all of those qualified teachers who are practically banging on the door but [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Mind, Politics on Jun 16th, 2012
I have been without internet access for a few days on Amtrak, where I have had a number of interesting conversations. In one, we talked about how some prefer sources of information that change their minds by introducing interesting speakers/writers who have a variety of well thought out ideas. If you too like to learn [...]
Way back in 2008 while discussing educational options for young people, Joy Behar made the now infamous remark, “A lot of [home-schooled kids] are demented.” At the time a number of people brought up that students like Nathan Cornelius, winner of the 2005 National Geographic Bee, 16-year-old mathematician Michael Viscardi, winner of the prestigious [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Humor, Man, Mind, Nature, Self, Woman on Jun 1st, 2012
Spring didn’t happen in Mianyang this year. One week it was 3 degrees outside and three days later it was 30 and 100% humidity. The change didn’t just take us by surprise – the insects didn’t quite know what to make of it either. The occasional Cicada ventured out of its burrow and let off [...]
Posted in Community, Culture, Education, Lifestyle, Man, Self, Sport, Woman, World on May 23rd, 2012
Meet John. This is a picture of a man who, until last semester, worked with me at a university in Sichuan, China. He is, one might say, at the downward end of a down-on-his luck downward trend which began pretty much as soon as he arrived last September. But don’t feel too sorry for him. [...]
Posted in Community, Culture, Education, Law & Legislation, Nation, Politics, Public, War on May 19th, 2012
We really do debate the same things over and over. As WWII was coming to an end, the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944 (now known as the GI Bill) was being debated. It was barely passed by Congress. As historian Michael Beschloss noted….. The bill had been passed by a slim margin, and, said historian [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Humor, Law & Legislation, Politics, Woman on May 3rd, 2012
Obama released a campaign ad, The Life of Julia, that clearly shows how he, and the Democrats, view women as weak, delicate little things that cannot thrive on their own. Indeed, women need constant nurturing and assistance from cradle to grave. (While I’ve never experienced womanhood, I thank the Lord every day that I’m a [...]
Posted in Education, Ethics, Health & Health Care, Lifestyle, Mind, Self on May 1st, 2012
A week of finals separates me from summer. A year of classes separates me from my bachelor’s degree. Beyond that, it is scary for me to think about how much time and work it will take to achieve my dreams of becoming an orthopedic surgeon. I know I can put in the work, I am [...]
Posted in Community, Culture, Education, Lifestyle, Nation, Politics, Public on Apr 29th, 2012
Our local high school held its invitational tournament for Speech and Debate yesterday. The tournament has been growing yearly. I believe this is largely due to the efforts of the director. Our son participated in Speech and Debate for all four years of high school. We believed that this was good preparation for later in [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Ethics, Law & Legislation on Apr 25th, 2012
The trouble with long drives (712 miles yesterday through today) is that one tends to listen to the radio while drilling a hole in the air. Since I tire of most music rapidly and my wife does not particularly like listening to music while driving, we listen to various talking head shows, mostly NPR or [...]
Posted in Community, Culture, Education, Family, Nation, Politics, Public on Apr 22nd, 2012
This year’s prank piece for April Fool’s Day on NPR was on preschools. They attempted to do a piece that was so far over the top, that people would clearly recognize it as humor. Instead, many believed it to be true, including the following. As the segment begins, the host Guy Raz is greeted by [...]
Posted in Community, Culture, Education, Gods, Law & Legislation, Media, Politics on Apr 21st, 2012
Country Thinker’s post, It’s Time to Repeal Marijuana Prohibition Laws, touched on a pet topic of mine, the grossly large percentage of our population in prison. The post included a bar chart that showed an incarceration rate of 760 per 100,000 in the U.S. for 2009, compared to the UK with a rate of 153, [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Food & Drink, Lifestyle, Sport on Apr 18th, 2012
I am weary of political battle so my wandering mind has struck out in a new direction. Robert Heinlein once commented that “specialization is for ants.” Humans, not being ants should not specialize nor aspire to do so. So what brings this to me rather free flowing thought processes? Blame it in part on Sara [...]
Posted in Education, Public, Technology on Apr 13th, 2012
I’ve noted elsewhere some exciting developments in online education (most interestingly, this year, the opening of MITx, which is worth checking out). This recent article about educational badges available online helps me to formulate, a bit more, a thought that has been gelling in my mind: If lower information-sharing costs help to make distributed systems more [...]
Yesterday, I encountered two articles regarding teachers having sexual relations with their students. In both cases, the teachers have been arrested and charged with crimes related to statutory rape and abuse of their positions as teachers. The commentary following the two articles caught my attention. The comments (mostly from men) in regard to an English [...]
Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear, the days specifically of the World War II and Korean War GI Bill. You probably don’t remember it, but take my word for it, it moved an entire generation into the middle class—college education (and the jobs that went with it), home ownership, and medical [...]
Posted in Commerce, Community, Culture, Education, Food & Drink, Gods, Humor, Law & Legislation, Man, Media, Mind, Nation, Politics, Sex, Woman, World on Mar 19th, 2012
Sometimes I amuse myself by reading articles written by liberals. It’s sheer fun to watch them start with a wrong premise, apply faulty logic and then arrive with an obviously mistaken conclusion – indeed so mistaken, that a 5 year old girl could immediately detect it if she were not busy playing with dolls. I [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Ethics, Mind, Science on Mar 7th, 2012
Due to Mr. Wired’s health problems, the Wired Family spends a lot of time watching educational TV. National Geographic, Smithsonian, History and History 2, PBS, and of course, the Science Channel lead the pack. Last week, on the Science Channel, we had a chance to revisit a cultural milestone I hadn’t thought about in a [...]
Posted in Commerce, Culture, Education, Ethics, Law & Legislation, Technology on Mar 7th, 2012
In economic vernacular, a bubble is what happens when the debt you owe on a commodity is way more than the commodity itself is currently worth. We are most familiar with the term in the context of real estate. You buy a house on a $400,000.00 mortgage, and three years later, your balance on the [...]
Browsing through Facebook a week ago, I found this new picture of my 18 year old son and his girlfriend. They’ve only been dating a short while and I’ve spent some time with him and her a couple of days. She’s smart, friendly and funny. The type of girl I’m thrilled for my son to [...]
Posted in Education, Ethics, Lifestyle, Man on Mar 1st, 2012
I had an interesting conversation with some friends about something that is going to happen for me next year, and has happened to some of them already. The high-school ten year reunion. I, for one, can’t wait, whereas some of the other people I’ve talked to are dreading it or just didn’t go. They argue [...]
My son, Logan, is over eighteen months, and he’s starting to speak now. Sure, it’s just a few words here and there, but the point is that he’s learning to communicate with me. For the most part, the conversations consist of him telling me that various cars are cars, or that he wants me [...]
Posted in Community, Education, Family, Food & Drink, Law & Legislation, Nation, Politics, Public on Feb 18th, 2012
While we wait for different versions of the Raeford lunch story to filter in (I expect a few more interviews with parents of other 4 y/o kids before we hear from the mysterious state agent, teachers and cafeteria workers), I would like to explore the role of the state in running a pre-school. In particular, [...]
Posted in Culture, Education, Ethics, Politics on Feb 15th, 2012
Tim Cavanaugh’s daughters attend a school 15 miles from Miramonte School of sex scandal fame. Yesterday my daughters brought home copies of a flyer containing the principal’s thoughts on the scandal. I guess this page of skylarking was intended to reassure us or something. I wouldn’t take note of it at all except that one [...]