|
Post by Aunt Arlene on Jun 7, 2006 17:20:51 GMT -5
Your History Professor's not exactly .... unbiased, is he?
I minored in history in college. A couple more classes and a paper and I probably could've majored in it. It was rare to have a teacher that didn't have some sort of bias. Not always political, but they all seemed to have some sort of agenda.
Usually they didn't like to listen to new information that contradicted their personal corner of history. They had based their careers on a certain viewpoint of history and didn't want to hear anything that might muck up their prestige.
|
|
|
Post by quantumcat on Jun 7, 2006 17:59:55 GMT -5
It was the same in my day,Auntie.
The odd part was finding myself swayed by the somewhat opposite perspectives of some of my instructors.
One teacher was very much of the Kenneth Clark 'Civilization' school.
Everything was about the impact on Western culture.
Another had a very Christian (the religion-not the faith) view of things.
Add the input of the artists,ecologists,business majors,etc. and you had folks bemoaning the Blitz for ruining good arcitecture, people grumbling about the Great Fire of London for depositing particulate matter into the air, complaints about literacy because it 1. crippled oral tradition and 2. promoted do-it-yourself heresies, and folks who saw slavery as an economic disaster.
You can't say we were force-fed a single opinion.
That ideological mosaic made us a little skeptical and very critical of anyone that claimed to have all the questions (much less all the answers).
We caught on that everything and everyone sent ripples into their world whose significance might not be recognized until long after their origin was forgotten.
History might see importance in things that escape our notice today and the stuff we deem vital might not even count as trivial to people in the future.
You gotta remember that we were just then escaping from the concept of history as the study of dead white European males.
The geologists and Biblical scholars might tell us that all seven continents had been around a long time but the historians seemed convinced that we only had Greece,Rome and their neighbors starting around 800 b.c. and that was just the warm-up for North America to rise from the sea in the eighteenth century.
Asia,Africa,Australia,etc. apparently materialized whenever a British,Spanish or French vessel appeared on the horizon then vanished like Brigadoon as soon as they had left.
I got whiplash going from that rather limited view to one where the past seemed more in flux than the present and all the names and borders were done with dry erase markers.
"Who can tell me the combatants in the Boer War?"
"The teal green place and the kinda magenta one."
If it gives your brain a hernia trying to keep up with all the places,people, dates,resources and motives,it can hurt a lot more if you don't know what all is affecting the events going on around us.
|
|
|
Post by Rebelman on Jun 8, 2006 9:26:21 GMT -5
I don't necessarily agree, but I don't have the energy to argue it, either. Well spoken, tho, Reb. Okey dokey, I still have some more things I am going to point out later. Like more on Iran, some info on Education in the states. I know primilarily how my own state is handling it. And more immigration. I am using what I know about US history to compare it up to how history is currently going on right now.
|
|
|
Post by Aunt Arlene on Jun 8, 2006 23:46:12 GMT -5
I've always found it fascinating that immigrants always want to close the door behind them.
The Irish getting established and then wanting to keep the Chinese out.
Arnold becoming governor and wanting to keep everyone out.
That sort of thing.
|
|
|
Post by quantumcat on Jun 9, 2006 0:17:33 GMT -5
Agreed. But then if my ancestors had been pickier about letting immigrants come here,settle,neglect to learn the local language,etc. we might still have our buffalo herds.
|
|
|
Post by Rebelman on Jun 9, 2006 9:50:20 GMT -5
My history professor pointed out some things for education reform. Things that are far different than what is going on today.
Lets take a look at education. Basically it is going quite horrible right now. In the elementary school years things are actually doing pretty good. Students get tested and we actually see results. But once 6th - 12th grade roll around everything goes to pieces. You can't get them to sit down must less pass a test.
There are 2 major reasons schools are not doing so well compared to our major universities excelling around the world with high degrees.
I'll point out what my professor said. He said that we need to take the federal government out of the public school system. They don't control the private and look how much better they are? And look how poorly the government handles the public schools. He said we should start a voucher program. Where we give a certain amount of money to parents for their children to "pick" a school to go to and not be forced to pick one. And take government out completely. Then all the bad schools will go away or either clean their act up. Because believe it or not many students are forced to go to bad schools because of redistricting in many county areas. This hurts them and puts them among horrible students.
Why have that when you can give them more freedom of choice to pick a new school. A school with credentials and status to actually give them a chance to succeed and fulfill an american dream.
Also he pointed out that teacher unions are the reason for a lot of the bad schools. That is why we have a lot of "worksheet teachers" and not enough learning ones. Any idiot can teach and make a paycheck. And if they get blamed for something all they got to do is complain to the teacher union and that will make a strike form. Teachers wont' strive for better because the union would get mad and never support the voucher idea and this is within the Democratic party. I do stand that something does need to be done about this since education isn't getting better in the Middle/High school years in the public arena.
Now lets take a whole new approach. Before all these unions and federal government being so strong in the education world, lets look at families. This is the reason students have no motivation. I, for one, grew up in a lack of motivation house. I know how devistating it can be for a student once they get to the teen years and feel like garbage. They dont' want any better because they don't feel it in their hearts. A way long time ago education was better. Overall families had a bit more morality in the home. People had a bit more values in the home and believe it or not we didn't have all these suicide rates and drop out rates. But look what happened after the 60/70's period of legislation acts. All of this started. Schools got worse, suicides got worse, drop outs started among teens. Why? Lack of family values. People started expecting the school to correct your kids. And you honestly think a school is better than you are?
We're suppose to teach our kids values not the school. We're suppose to motivate them to succeed and fulfill a dream not the school. The school is full of money hungry people who could care less if your lone child does anything as long as their school record looks good in the paper. Now this is not every school but it is a majority of them. We dont' have family dinners anymore. We have tv dinners and children have no family closeness anymore. No wonder they dont' care and we did all of this ourselves.
Families with kids need to seriously talk to their kids and teach them something instead of just throwing them out to the fields and expecting them to know how to act. They aren't deer and fish but people who actually need to be taught something. Their is no instinct to learn unless you teach them how to act. Parents have gotten lazy and if you think your child is better taught real genuine love and honesty and virtues of morality at school then dont be suprised if they commit suicide and kill other people because it will be your own fault for not being a parent. Is that mean? probably but the sure fire truth.
Look at a private school with no federal invovlment and look at the public with 100% involvment and you can ask yourself what the problem is. But I hold true those 2 things I mentioned are playing major parts in childrens lives today.
|
|
|
Post by tjaman on Jun 9, 2006 10:34:44 GMT -5
Well, I graduated with honors from a private school and a state university. I will be paying student loans for another five years, and I'm making a third of the median income for my position and experience.
I don't feel my education is to blame for any of this, and I don't feel unmotivated. Mostly what I feel is overwhelmed. It's all I can do lately to work and get some time in at the gym and keep things in -- well, right now my apartment is several sizeable projects. I don't know how people with kids do it.
Parents should be teaching morals. But they're not, so the schools have jumped in. But they have to keep the morals nondenominational because that isn't really the purview of the public school. Kids aren't learning about sex from school or parents but rather the media, and they think no one cares about them because in way too many cases no one does.
And how exactly is a voucher program not a death knell for small, perfectly capable schools with slightly older computer systems and history books that look ahead with bated breath to the first NASA shuttle launch planned in the early 1980s?
Yeah, all schools need to be better, but I'd so much rather have Democrats in charge of them than Republicans, under whose tutelage I fully expect that through corporate sponsorships the first president of the United States will have been named "Coca WalMart."
|
|
|
Post by Dr. Purple Goddess on Jun 9, 2006 11:25:40 GMT -5
It seems to me that cause and effect is a bit skewed. It's not necessarily the governments fault that schools are bad. Oh don't get me wrong, it doesn't seem like they do anything right....
But, perhaps the reason public schools are so "bad" has more to do with the fact that anyone can be placed in them. Private schools are generally attended by people who can afford to go to them, and thus someone has an interest in seeing their child further their education. Likely that interest isn't just with the parents, but the student as well.
Unfortunately not everyone can afford to send their kids to private schools. So, they have to send them to school with various types of people who are there for various reasons. The largest being that they can't afford a private school.
My older brother lived on the streets of Memphis for 6 months so that he could pay his daughter's tuition for private school because the public school she would have to go to had 5th graders trying to fight with knives on the playground. Education becomes a complicated issue when there are deeper issues.
If we decide to privatise all schools, how would we pay to have all children go there? And if we aren't going to worry about those less fortunate, where will they go to school?
Perhaps the government isn't doing the best job...but I never would have made it to highschool without public school and I never would have gotten my Masters degree in the #1 Psychology/ counseling program in the state of Oklahoma.
|
|
|
Post by quantumcat on Jun 9, 2006 12:28:33 GMT -5
I wouldn't know where to begin about fixing the problems.
I know it all hinges on motivated people with the right values.
My aunt saw that some schools in her area were dismal and she saw the light go out of promising students' souls when they were put on a fast track to failure and self-hatred.
She took her naive little self (think early Willow and Aunt Bea Taylor) and asked the bigshots to provide new buildings,books,etc. for these poor children.
They pretty much told her that if she could get elected superintendent and coax a 1.5 million dollar referendum out of the barely-getting-by locals,she could get schools with roofs and floors and water and cafeterias for her students.
A year later,every kid in Bedford County attended a brick school with plumbing, electricity,the whole nine yards...
She went door-to-door and told families and civic groups what was needed.
She taught the same group from 6th grade to high school so they wouldn't feel lost and discouraged when they went from a school with no heat to the one with the shiny gymnasium.
Yes,she won the top spot and we had no problems with desegegation because all the schools had decent plants,books and instructors.
During her time in office,the little schools were closed and everyone attended the same schools in town ,black and white.
When the city and county consolidated,she was out of a job but she urged it because it was the best choice for the kids at the time.
She cared and she made her constituents care.
If the people had left her twisting in the wind,no improvement would have been made.
But they responded to hope and the idea that someone cared.
Once they had that (for free),they could get the dollars and cents stuff for themselves.
You can't give your sons and daughters what you don't have.
If you have no idea of right and wrong and no sense of direction,you can't bestow that on your children.
Once you know how to be a human being,you can get the three R's and anything else for yourself- even if Hell itself tryies to keep it out of your hands.
During her last illness,(when my aunt didn't know her family or even herself),she was able to identify every student she had at the mill,where they sat and what years they attended.
She recognized them even when she hadn't seen them in over 30 years.
Monies and policies do no good without the dedication of people like Feigy's brother and my aunt.
But that fervor to give our children all the safety,nurturing and enlightenment they need,will produce worthwhile adults even if all they start out with is one voice and a spot on the ground to sit and listen.
|
|
|
Post by quantumcat on Jun 9, 2006 13:24:17 GMT -5
Oh,and if you want my hare-brained scheme,try this:
You don't get out of school without proving you have life skills.
(Preparing healthy meals,grocery shopping,balancing a checkbook, creating a budget,etc.etc.
Sewing,gardening,driving,computer literacy and carpentry are optional but highly recommended.)
If you can't tend to yourself,a pet or a baby,you don't graduate.
If you can't grok a basic contract,you don't graduate.
If you don't know basic work skills,you don't graduate.
If you can't prove that you could follow a doctor's instructions, figure out a warning label or an appliance manual or understand your local newspaper,you don't graduate.
If you CAN'T do any of these things,you need some kind of professional assistance.
If you WON'T,you need a swift kick in the area you keep your head.
Either way,you don't get set adrift.
The folks who can tend to themselves but refuse to learn or to perform don't get in the armed service.
They don't get public housing.
They don't get to marry or keep their kids.
They don't get permission to work or drive.
Anyone who is impaired gets all the help in the world.
Anyone who has the ability to do but needs a hand gets all the support he needs.
The rest don't get anything from society until they show a readiness to give something back or,at least,participate in taking care of themselves.
We have to stop warehousing people until a certain age then dumping them to fend for themselves.
We have to stop letting people slide at 2,4,6, and 8,looking askance but doing nothing at 10 and 12, grumbling when they are less than perfect at 14 and 16 and expecting them to suddenly be completely responsible and accountable for themselves at 18.
If we are humane enough to train our critters to be housebroken and heel before we take them off-lead, then we ought to do the same for our young.
It's a crime to take a non-human animal,prevent it from learning how to survive in the wild and then abandon it later.
Once you've made it helpless,it's yours to take care of for life.
The penalty is the same for humans.
You either choose to keep them as living furniture that you must maintain or you insist that they have the means of supporting themselves.
Society has enough people to look after with the very young,the very old and the injured without creating cripples out of those who would otherwise be assets..
Self-sufficiency and community service should be so much a given in our society that we'd have no people who feel useless and incapable.
We'd have no career victims or parasites.
Give folks life skills and the knack for critical thinking and we'd have a lot less of our budget going to correct self-sabotage and a lot more going to enhance the lives of folks who are doing all they can to be the solution and not the problem.
|
|
|
Post by tjaman on Jun 9, 2006 13:34:17 GMT -5
Intrigued ...
|
|