Saturday - April 16, 2011
test. what state requires by law the teaching of fag history?
Oh good grief.
Can anyone say ... Reading, Writing, Rithmahtik? Jeesh.
Maybe we won’t be going back to Calif. after all.
What a load of rubbish.
And take a look at the list of all the ‘special’ groups that must now be recognized. It isn’t enough to recognize individual achievement and honor those who contribute. No. Now we have to recognize and pay homage to the group they come from.
Fair enuff but I don’t see Jews on that list and heaven knows that group has contributed out of all proportion to it’s numbers. Who do I sue?
Didn’t I tell BMEWS I wasn’t certain Ca. would be where I wanted to be with Gov. Moonbeam in office.
The worst part? We still could end up there. My head hurts and reading this hasn’t done anything for the stomach either.
California set to teach gay history and rights in schoolsCalifornia is set to become the first US state to require the teaching of gay history and rights.
By Alex Spillius, Washington
Children would take lessons on issues affecting gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people, with schools granted discretion about what age to start the lessons.
The law was passed by the state’s senate and is likely to pass the assembly easily, which is also controlled by the Democrats, before being signed by Governor Jerry Brown.
The legislation, sponsored by Democrat Mark Leno of San Francisco, passed on a 23-14 party line vote.
“We are second-class citizens and children are listening,” he said. “When they see their teachers don’t step up to the plate when their classmate is being harassed literally to death, they are listening and they get the message that there is something wrong with those people.”
Republican state Senator Doug La Malfa opposed the bill saying: “I’m deeply troubled kids would have to contemplate at a very, very early age, when many of us are teaching abstinence ... what is sexuality.”California law already requires schools to cover the contributions to the state and nation of:
Women
African Americans
Mexican Americans
Entrepreneurs
Asian Americans
European Americans
American Indians AND
LABOR ACTIVISTS!
AND
A new bill will also add:
The Disabled, to the list.
How many states will follow this crap I wonder. And here we thought the Brit govt. was loopy. I guess my home state now becomes UK Pacific.
What q queer fuckin world we inhabit.
Posted by peiper
on 04/16/2011 at 10:48 AM
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Permalink • Sunday - April 10, 2011
A Sex-Ed story
I was just reading Dennis Prager’s column The $50,000 Orgasm. For some reason it reminded me of my first time...the first time I was introduced to ‘Sex Ed’.
You see, I never had to take ‘Sex Ed’. I took Health and Anatomy in high school. My sisters weren’t so lucky. They had to take ‘Sex Ed’.
Now BMEWS and BMEWSetts, I’m pretty certain that we could all figure sex out in the back seat of a Chevy. Especially if the movie sucked. No pun intended.
Back to my story.
So, there I was, sans a date, at a high school dance in 1977. My health teacher was one of the chaperones. We were standing together watching the action and drinking the sadly un-spiked punch. My health teacher asked me:
“Do you have a younger sister?”
“Yes. Why?”
“Is she in my Sex Ed class?”
“I think so. Why?”
“I’m still chuckling over an answer she gave on today’s test.”
“Oh?” Note how non-committal I was…
“The question was ‘what is the average amount a man ejaculates during orgasm.’”
Mind you, I’m a) 17 years old, b) we’re talking about my sister, c) who measures these things?
I fell into it. I had to ask. “What was her answer?”
“She put down ‘a half-pint’.”
I thought about this possible view into my sister’s thoughts. How could I use this? But I finally answered: “That’s my sister, always expecting more than a man can give.”
For some reason my health teacher doubled over in laughter. I was saved from further conversation by a hot cheerleader who decided she was drunk enough to dance with me.
Posted by Christopher
on 04/10/2011 at 10:38 PM
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Permalink • Wednesday - April 06, 2011
Larnin me some stuff
ISOPYCNAL ADVECTION
Whereas convection means the vertical movement or circulation of a fluid (air, liquid, magma), advection means the horizontal movement.
Similar to the other iso-s (isotherm - areas of equal temperature, isobar - areas of equal pressure, etc), an isopycnal is an area of equal density. Well, potential density actually, which is what the actual density of the isopycnic (no, that isn’t an outdoors lunch for one) substance would be if it were at a standard pressure and temperature. And to be completely correct, any “iso” is merely the mapped line that shows the edge of any such area, but common usage allows the line term to be used to refer to the whole thing.
We all know that pure water is incompressible; it’s liquid state density does not change when subject to pressure or temperature changes except when it is at the very edge of state transition (about to freeze or boil), when it’s density decreases. This is not the case for salt water. The more salt in the water - it’s salinity - the denser it is, given equal temperatures. Surprise surprise, while the salinity of the oceans are fairly constant, the salinity of the various seas around the edges can vary significantly. This is because many of them are fed by freshwater rivers. The Baltic Sea and the Caspian Sea are much less salty than the Atlantic Ocean. So there can be areas of less dense less salty water that float over areas of more dense more salty water. These areas can be measured and plotted, and because they tend to layer they are called haloclines. “halo” from halide, meaning salt. “cline”, meaning layer.
There are several different clines involved with large bodies of water, such as thermoclines and chemoclines. And yes, there is such a thing as a pycnocline; water stratified into layers based on density.
A rough example of isopycnal advection would be to take a gallon of well mixed paint and to pour it out on the dining table. Because the density of the table top is much greater than the density of the paint, the paint flows out to the sides, horizontally. Don’t try this example at home, or you’ll be having your own isopicnic in the doghouse for a long time.
I have no idea how I got there, but I found myself reading the Wiki page on the Black Sea. The Black Sea is an odd place, a relatively shallow (7200’ max) brackish lake with a significant underwater shelf mostly on the north side. It is only slightly connected to the world’s oceans via the narrow Straits of Bosporus at Istanbul. Fed by several of the major European rivers, the Black Sea has lots of isopycnal advection. The fresh water comes in at the surface, floats only around the sides of the sea, and sneaks out into the Aegean and from there into the Mediterranean via the Bosporus, and then the tiniest sea in the world called the Sea of Marmara, and then through that little passage there by the Dardanelles (the Hellespont) at the feet of ancient Troy. Meanwhile, while the fresh water is flowing out, salt water is flowing in. The Aegean Sea is a bit of an isolated zone in the northeast corner of the Mediterranean, so because of less mixing due to gentler currents it is slightly less salty to begin with. Quite a bit of mixing goes on in the Marmara and it’s two connecting rivers, so the salt water that does get back to the Black Sea is considerably less salty and sinks right to the bottom. And it stays there. Forever. The Black Sea is one of those few bodies of water that is actually anoxic (oxygen limited), and this is all due to the isopycnal advection. Nicely aerated fresh water comes in, and supports abundant life, but the deeper you go the deader it gets. A special kind of bacteria - an extremophile - lives at the medium depths (~200m) right at the pycnocline, and eats up all the remaining nutrients and uses up all the remaining oxygen. It poops out hydrogen sulfide, which sinks into the local abyss. So not only is the deep water of the Black Sea devoid of oxygen and life, it’s also poisonous. If there were a massive earthquake or a big meteor strike that brought those deep waters to the surface, the gas released could kill half the continent. And it’s all completely natural and humans had nothing at all to do with it.
Because the Black Sea has only one drainage point and a small one at that, it can be thought of as one of the world’s largest lakes. Actually, it has been a lake in the geologically recent past, more recently than the last Ice Age. Human dwellings have been found in a number of areas on the northern shelf, so what was once dry land is now 100m underwater. Anyway, the term for lakes where the surface water does not mix with the deeper water is meromictic, and that applies here as well. So water comes in, flows on top due to isopycnal advection, and flows out, and the end result is a meromictic body of water.
Ok, time for recess!!
Posted by Drew458
on 04/06/2011 at 10:01 AM
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Permalink • Saturday - March 19, 2011
Thank who?
A couple of days ago I got an email from my high school buddy in Afghanistan:
If you can read this, thank a teacher.
If you can read this in English, thank a veteran.
American by birth, Soldier by choice.
Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Then I started thinking about the underlying assumptions…
Here’s my reply: I’ve edited the names so as to protect my friend.
I hate to disagree. If I can read that, I’ll thank my parents. My mom used to sit me on her lap and read to me. By kindergarten I knew the alphabet and most of the phonetic sounds.
If I can read that in English and not German? Well, guess I’ll have to thank Grandpa Burgdorf, a first-generation German who ended up fighting in WWII. Admittedly, in the Pacific theatre. Guess it didn’t take too much time to conceive Mom. He was on Navy leave, Mom was born in ‘43. He wasn’t discharged until VJ Day. Family legend says he didn’t even see his only child until after VJ Day.
The fact that I can’t read it in Spanish? Thank Davy Crockett, Col. Travis, David Bowie, Sam Houston, President James Polk, future President Zachary Taylor, Gen. Winfield Scott…
The fact I can’t read it in French? Thank Gen. James Wolfe in 1759. Brits beat the French.
Hmmm, guess I should thank veterans.
Do I thank teachers? Yes. Do I thank members of the NEA union? NO!
Why?
_____, I married a girl with one child still at home. I had to do major tutoring to get him to graduate high school. I complained constantly to the school administration, and the Dayton Board of Education. I showed the letters from the functionally illiterate English teachers. Then I’d get calls from those teachers in the middle of the night threatening me. Ditto for the social studies teachers. I give the math teachers a pass; I couldn’t find that they were negligent or incompetent. My step-son just needed more ‘instruction’. (It’s in quotes because I still do not believe he couldn’t do it, he just didn’t want to. So he ended up with more instruction and homework from me. For once, his mother backed me.)
My point is that they weren’t teachers, they were incompetent union thugs pulling down a paycheck twice mine, and I didn’t get summers off.
I remember one time me and my wife met with the school superintendent and his staff. The subject was ‘bullies’. Not what I called them, what I called them was far less civil. Basically, there was a small group of ‘students’ whose goal was to disrupt classes. Classes my step-son was in, and having trouble with. He wasn’t their target.
My question: ‘Why are they not expelled for disrupting classes?’
Answer - from school superintendent Franklin––can’t remember if that was his first or last name. All I do remember is that he moved on to be superintendent of Washington DC schools. I’m sure you saw a huge improvement during his tenure in Washington!
Anyway, his answer was: “They have a right to be educated too.”
Translation: We need them to be enrolled so as to collect state and federal funds for the government school system.
Christopher
My point? Thank the parents who care enough. The NEA would have you believe the country would go to hell without them. Funny. The United States got along just fine without any unions, much less a teacher’s union.
Personally, my opinion is this: If you graduate high school, you are qualified to teach your children, or any other children, to high school level. If the teachers’ union objects, (you’re not qualified to teach) then they are providing a lousy product. You should sue the NEA, and individual teachers, for false advertising.
At the very least.
Posted by Christopher
on 03/19/2011 at 09:56 PM
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Permalink • Friday - March 18, 2011
Momma Moonbat
Oh God, how many times have you seen that damn video with the little schoolboy bullying the bigger kid, who finally runs out of patience and body slams the little bastard? It’s everywhere. And what gives me hope about the human race is that, no matter what the hand wringing namby-pamby talking heads on the tube are saying, the whole damn PLANET is saying “good for the big kid, the little d-b had it coming, I would have slammed him again had it been me!” which gives me a small hope that all this PC indoctrination may not be quite so effective after all.
But now the mother of the little twerp is saddling up her high horse and trying to take it for a ride, demanding an apology that her son the bully got his ass handed to him. And the entire world’s reaction is pretty much the same: Go eFf Yourself. Right on baby, right on. Over 1100 comments on this one link alone, and at least 8/10 express that view.
Mother of Bully Body-Slammed in Video Demands Apology From Her Son’s Victim
The mother of an Australian bully who’s become an Internet sensation for being body-slammed on video by one of his victims says she wants an apology.
Footage of the fight shows seventh-grader Ritchard Gale tormenting, shoving and punching 10th-grader Casey Heynes at Chifley College in St. Marys North before the much-larger Heynes body slams Gale and walks away.
But Gale’s mother, Tina, says she and her family are the victims, now that the video has gone viral, and she says Heynes owes her family an apology.
“We don’t need this posted everywhere,” she told Australia’s Seven Network on Wednesday. “I would like him to apologize.”
Tina said she while was “shocked” at Ritchard’s behavior, she didn’t think he deserved to be slammed to the ground. Neither boy suffered serious injuries in the fight.
“Violence is never the answer!”, well true, except when violence is also the question.
Posted by Drew458
on 03/18/2011 at 10:01 AM
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Permalink • Wednesday - March 09, 2011
SKOOL DAZE - SKOOL DAZE … an unsettling update …
English pancake breakfast and then ham and lots of coffee with Bailey’s Irish Cream, not too much of that, and I believe I may be set for the day.
Back on the third of this month I posted something I called Skool Daze (and benefits) and a few of our regular commenters had some things to say.
Like cbullitt who says;
Wow. Learning how to use the phone to be a beggar is the same as physics? Now I know how those Climate Scientists got their degrees.
And Rich K always cracks me up with things like;
HEHE. OMG, Im laughing so hard at this I think Ive wet myself.
So exactly HOW long will it be till Britannia sinks below the waves????
Our Wardmom had a lot to say on that post of March third but I’ll just quote this line. For now.
And how does it benefit the kids, the society and the future to limit their minds and education to learning out how to fill out Nanny State forms?
Well folks ... as the great Jolson once remarked. “ You ain’t heard nothin’ yet.” In our case, you ain’t read anything like the following yet. Or have you?
I’m saving the most gross for the last. In the meantime, take a look at this.
Not exactly a new issue here but this came up only yesterday so another school joins the madness. Or perhaps not? You decide.
(£1 worth approx. $1.60)
School under fire for offering nine-year-old pupils £1 ‘bribes’ to attend extra lessons
By KATE LOVEYSPUPILS as young as ten are being ‘bribed’ to attend extra lessons in a desperate effort to improve a primary school’s exam results.
The under-performing school has resorted to paying youngsters £1 every time they attend 45-minute cramming sessions before regular lessons begin.
The workshops in reading, writing and mathematics are held between 8am and 8.45am three days a week and are designed to get pupils through national exams in May.
But the tactic has met with dismay among education experts.
A spokesman for the ATL teaching union said: ‘It is desperately, desperately sad that schools attach such high stakes to these tests.
‘Children this young need time away from school. Time to be children. Time to be with family and to play. They shouldn’t be attending extra lessons outside of school hours.
The pressure is also likely to lead to pupils and teachers underperforming.’
That’s pretty mild I think. You may not think it’s smart, but I doubt you’ll pull your hair out in frustration.
Well friends, the next article get a tad murkier. Still ... you may scratch your heads and wonder what rocket scientists came up with it, and it certainly belongs in the category that CBullitt refers to. You’ll love this one. Can’t wait to see what you folks have to say on the subject, but stay tuned cos we aren’t done.
How to… shoplift! University newspaper’s guide to STEALING without being caughtBy Daily Mail Reporter
A guide produced by student activists on the ‘art of shoplifting’ has outraged retailers who say it could cause them financial costs.
The document funded by the taxpayer urges cash-strapped students to ignore any moral concerns and follow its step-by-step stealing techniques.
It coaches would-be thieves on how to swipe goods without being spotted by staff or CCTV.
Tips include how to exit stores without attracting suspicion and suggestions of what lies to tell if caught by police.Legal experts say that the student activists behind the guide - from Queen Mary College, University of London - could face prosecution over its publication.
Some of them took part in the infamous recent riot at the Conservative Party’s Millbank HQ and retailers have branded them ‘highly irresponsible’ for producing the guide.It features prominently in their new student newspaper ‘The Paper’, whose front cover shows rioters occupying the roof of the building.
The newspaper was put together with money from the Centre for Ethics and Politics at the college’s School of Business and Management, which is ultimately funded by the taxpayer.Around 9,000 copies were printed and distributed at a recent student demo in London against higher tuition fees and it is now available online.
It is introduced in the paper as a ‘regular series of DIY and how to guides for making trouble.’
Queen Mary has defended the shoplifting advice by claiming it is ‘satirical’. But there is little hint of humour in the thieving tips.
Examples include: ‘Try to find where the video surveillance monitors are and who is watching them’.They advise: ‘It is a good idea to keep your back to the camera as much as possible without looking suspicious’.
Another tip point out: ‘Display units can make perfect blind-spots’.
If caught by shop staff, the guide suggests: ‘Beg them not to call the cops. ‘If the cops do arrive, it’s a good idea to act scared sh**less because they may assume you’re a first offender and not bother to check your record’.
They add: ‘Don’t antagonise the filth. It is their personal discretion as to how bad you get busted.’Andrew Dodd, spokesman for trade association the British Retail Consortium, raised the possibility of the editors being prosecuted for inciting shoplifting.
He said: ‘This guide is extremely irresponsible, if not illegal. Everyone involved in it should be ashamed of themselves for encouraging people to steal from shops.
‘Shop crime is no laughing matter because it imposes a huge financial cost on retailers and then on to honest shoppers who end up paying more for their goods.
‘There is also significant human cost to thousands of incidents each year where shop staff intervene to try and prevent shoplifting and are physically or verbally abused.’The guide was originally published in an Australian student newspaper whose editors were prosecuted although charges were later dropped.
‘That taxpayers’ money has been used to fund these newspapers demonstrates the contempt the taxpayer is held in by left wing academics and the students they teach.
‘This celebration of criminality portrays the university in its worst light however the vast majority of students here are sick to death of the tiny number of far Left students who see political posturing, rather than education, as their main purpose at university.
There’s a bit more to read HERE
Hold on to your hair cos this last one takes the gross prize. I don’t understand this. True, there are a lot of parents who don’t much tend to their offspring, don’t pay much attention to what they watch. For example, parents who may view porn and don’t hide what they’re looking at from a child in the same room.
Whatever the reasons .... I still think of 5 yr olds as toddlers. There’s a lot of things that are given much exposure and kids can’t help but see things. In movies, on the net and in advertising and TV shows. Things are far more open then in my day. So perhaps kids of a certain age do need sex-ed from some source, so they don’t grow up believing having kids themselves when they’re 12 is ok. Anyway ... I’m not one to get all prudish over too many things but this really is over the top. I think way over.
Whatever happened to something called The Children’s Hour? It was radio and TV. Does anyone remember “LET’S PRETEND?” If yes, then you’re my age.
Things sure are different today.
Take a look at how different.
Should five-year-olds be taught about sex in such an explicit way?By KATE LOVEYS and HANNAH ROBERTS
Last updated at 10:18 AM on 9th March 2011
Explicit cartoons, films and books have been cleared for use to teach sex education to schoolchildren as young as five.
A disturbing dossier exposes a wide range of graphic resources recommended for primary school lessons.
The shocking material – promoted by local councils and even the BBC – teaches youngsters about adult language and sexual intercourse.
‘If public bodies believe these resources are suitable for young children, there is clearly a problem with their judgment and more control needs to be given to parents.’
The Christian Institute identified 16 councils which have recommended explicit books and videos to schools.These include Derby City, Devon County, Gloucestershire County, Swindon County, Worcestershire County, Hampshire County, Birmingham City and Brighton and Hove, many of which have links to the material on their websites.
At present, primary and secondary schools have to teach pupils ‘age-appropriate’ science lessons about the biology of sex.
Couldn’t make it up and if ya could, you’d be a very ill person.
Posted by peiper
on 03/09/2011 at 05:50 AM
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Permalink • Thursday - March 03, 2011
school days and the benefits culture
And speaking of benefits ....
How’s this for skool dayz? Prepare the kids early so they can be knowledgeable and understand how things work.
Now that’s not a bad idea. Right?
Take a look.
Now that will be useful… students take exams in how to claim the doleBy KATE LOVEYS
HEY! Don’t ya love this already? Talk about preparation for life.
Thousands of children have taken GCSE-style exams which teach them how to claim unemployment benefit.
The subject was one of many ‘Mickey Mouse’ courses exposed in a damning report on how the vocational education system is failing Britain’s children.
The Certificate of Personal Effectiveness level 2 was taken by 10,843 youngsters last year, putting it in the top 20 most popular non-academic courses.
Its material states: ‘Find out what benefits you are entitled to if you are unemployed’. It also teaches how to ‘obtain information’ from ‘using the telephone’, the ‘internet’ or ‘newspapers/magazines’, and even how to ‘host a tea party’.
Launched in 2004, the course was given the equivalent academic rating to a rigorous physics GCSE in 2005.
Today’s report by Professor Alison Wolf found up to a third of the soft, non-academic courses introduced under Labour and taken by 400,000 16- to 19-year-olds are ‘pointless’, while others actually harm their employment chances
In some cases, courses may even make students less employable, the report suggests.
Another course, the level 2 Certificate in Preparation for Working Life, was taken by 29,689 pupils and is worth half a GCSE. It includes a compulsory section on ‘hazard identification at home, on the roads and at work’, which involves a required understanding of ‘self-concept’.
The General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) is an academic qualification awarded in a specified subject, generally taken in a number of subjects by students aged 14–16 in secondary education in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Posted by peiper
on 03/03/2011 at 01:49 PM
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Permalink • Sunday - February 27, 2011
Yet another challenge facing government schools.
Honestly, you can’t––well, I couldn’t––make this stuff up! Here’s the headline:
You can lead kids to broccoli, but you can’t make them eat
Students’ reaction to healthier lunches highlights challenges for schools
Lunch poses a challenge? The government schools are already overwhelmed by the challenge of teaching
…reading, and ‘riting, and ‘rithmetic.
(taught to the tune of a hick’ry stick!)
No, the government schools, and by extension, the teachers’ union, can’t teach reading, and writing, and arithmetic. So, with the help and approval of Moochelle Obama, the wife of the First Mongrel, the schools are now going to teach the kids what to eat. Chicago is leading the way, but, like Obama trying to force lead the rest of us into the heaven-on-Earth promises of ObamaCare, the Chicago schools are having problems forcing cajoling kids to eat what the elite want them to eat.
Anyone who has ever tried to sneak healthy food into kids’ lunches knows what Chicago Public Schools is going through.
Sometimes kids openly embrace the new food. Sometimes they eat it without realizing the difference. And sometimes they refuse it altogether.
CPS has met with all three reactions this school year, when it stopped serving daily nachos, Pop-Tarts and doughnuts and introduced healthier options at breakfast and lunch. But in a sign of how challenging this transition can be for schools, district figures show that lunch sales for September through December dropped by about 5 percentage points since the previous year, or more than 20,000 lunches a day.
Surprised? I actually am. My parents never tried to ‘sneak’ healthy food into any meal. They just said ‘eat what’s on your plate.’ ‘No, you can’t have seconds of anything until you eat what’s on your plate.’ Unlike Gollum or the Government, my parents weren’t ‘sneaks.’ (I’m also surprised at having Pop-Tarts on the menu. When did that happen? Donuts? When I was in school you could buy an eclair, or cheesecake, or fruit Jello. No donuts.)
So, sales are down 5%. Why is this bad?
Posted by Christopher
on 02/27/2011 at 04:32 PM
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Permalink • Thursday - February 24, 2011
football for the kiddies banned as too dangerous. future olympic spongeball champs now in training.
So here I am again with nothing to say because .... I can’t find the right words. There’s quite a few I can think of but it would only reinforce the fact that my vocabulary is less then sufficient. I do tend to turn the air blue with frustration.
When I was a kid, I once broke my forearm at school. And btw ... it was set by a vet as we had no GP nearby. We were in farm country in the hills and the vet was at the bottom around the corner in a manor of speaking. My mom didn’t sue either. In those far off days, I doubt anyone would have thought of it.
Ppl who read BMEWS on a regular basis and have for awhile, know that I’ve often posted stories about the ridiculous Health and Safety rules and regs here.
Haven’t presented one to you in awhile. Hasn’t been much. Thought maybe the new govt. had done away with elf ‘n’ safety dept.
Guess not.
Take a look.
‘Elf and safety brigade slaps ban on footballs in the PLAYGROUND… because they’re too dangerous
By JAMES TOZERFor decades, the nation’s playgrounds have echoed with the thud of a firmly-struck football.
But children living in the streets where England football star Steven Gerrard grew up are being denied that innocent, wholesome pleasure - and it’s all in the name of health and safety.
Pupils at a primary school in Huyton, near Liverpool, have been banned from bringing modern synthetic or leather footballs into the playground and told to use balls made of sponge instead.
Teachers say the heavy balls are unsuitable for an enclosed space where young children may be playing, saying it risks injury.
However amid fears over Britain’s childhood obesity epidemic, as well as worries over where our next generation of sporting champions is going to come from, critics last night slammed the edict as an absurd over-reaction.
The rule was spelt out in this month’s newsletter sent out by Malvern Primary School in Huyton, a deprived area with Britain’s second worst obesity record.
The district has nevertheless long been regarded as a hotbed of footballing talent, having produced the likes of Liverpool captain Gerrard in addition to former Everton hero Peter Reid - now manager of Plymouth Argyle - and notorious Newcastle United player Joey Barton.
It informed parents: ‘Please can we request that only sponge balls are brought into school. This is to ensure the safety of all our pupils when on the playground.’
But Tam Fry, chairman of obesity prevention charity the Child Growth Foundation, said: ‘Children must be exposed to risk, otherwise how can they be expected to learn?
‘It may think it is protecting the children, but they could just as easily fall over playing with a sponge ball.
‘Policies like this mean our children are in danger of becoming cocooned cotton buds.’
Critics say it is just the latest obstacle created by political correctness to stand in the way of the exercise and life skills children can gain from taking part in sport.
Last summer a primary school in Devon banned playground football altogether, saying pupils were copying the cheating and fouling displayed at the World Cup.
Shortly afterwards, brothers Henry and Alex Worthington, 12 and 11, were threatened with antisocial behaviour orders by three police officers while having a kickabout in the cul-de-sac where they live in Timperley, Greater Manchester.
Mr Fry added: ‘We do have a litigation culture, but you can’t tell me Steven Gerrard did not play football in the playground - I bet he even fell over a few times.’
And Adrian Voce, director of Play England, which advises schools on safe, fun pastimes, pointed out that last year’s review on health and safety by Lord Young recommended a common sense approach to managing risk in children’s play-times.
‘Research tells us that children need to play adventurously and test themselves, yet many children don’t get the opportunity to do so in our risk-adverse society,’ he said.
‘Children must be allowed to encounter some risks for themselves as a natural part of their play and growing up.’
Knowsley, Huyton’s local district, has among the country’s worst GCSE results, and in 2004 was ranked behind only Hull in a league table of Britain’s fattest towns.
Malvern Primary School yesterday insisted the football crackdown was not new, saying the reminder had been issued after a parent complained that a child was nearly hurt.
It pointed out that its cramped playground was shared by pupils of all ages but stressed it was supportive of sport and backed the importance of physical exercise.
In a statement it added: ‘Malvern Primary School treats the health and safety of its pupils as a top priority and has for a long time had a policy of protecting children by recommending sponge balls in the playground before school starts and during breaks, especially as the playground accommodates children from the age of four to 11.’
I was tempted to put the moonbats on this article till the thought struck me. What if they’re doing this to avoid any future lawsuits? What if some little kid broke his arm on the playground or anywhere on school property?
OK so .... future sponge ball champs?
Posted by peiper
on 02/24/2011 at 03:50 PM
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Permalink • Tuesday - February 22, 2011
Moron Wisconsin
No, I don’t believe in unions. Thanks for asking. And the unions that I don’t believe in the most are the ones that “represent” government workers. Excuse me, you buncha tax leeches, but you work for us. All of you. Work. For all of us. And we’re a much bigger union than you are.
Hey Wisconsin: Fire them all and hire new teachers across the board, from the ranks of your state unemployed. Find anyone with a college degree and give them a 60 day course in teaching. Take the top 70% of those people and put them them to work. At half the current average pay. And a 5 year open ended contract, with performance analysis caveats. Which means the new teachers get canned if they don’t do a good job, but if they do do a good job you can negotiate to keep them after the 5 years is up. For the newly hired, it means a guarantee of 5 years of work, if they don’t mess up. What more can you ask in this economy? Raises and benes? Sure, give them family health coverage for which they contribute $200/mo. 5 tier review after 90 days, 6 months, 1 year, and each year after. 5-3-1-0% raise at annual marks. 10-7-4-2% raise at 6 month mark*.
* for those of you fortunate enough to have never been exposed to the corporate practice of “quartiling” or “quintiling”, it’s a performance review where you get rated into one of several slots along a Bell curve. The biggest raises go to the best performing people. The lowest quintile or quartile? They get fired if they’re still in that category in 90 days. The folks in the “you almost suck” category get nothing for a raise, but they still have a job. You’d want to do a new version of this horror, because the usual corporate one has massive latent history. Which means that once you’re “3rd quartile” once you’re 3rd quartile forever, no matter what. So it sucks.
In theory, a top notch unemployed person under my plan could come in, become a teacher, start out at 50% current average pay ($53,000 IIRC that current ave is $106K), go to $58,300 at 6 mo, $61215 at 1 yr, $64275 yr 2, $67489 yr 3, $70864 yr 4, and $74407 yr 5. And they’d have 5 solid years being an ace teacher at that point, which should be a very good bargaining position. And the state would have saved nearly $200,000 on that one salary in the 5 year period compared to the current union pay average. Plus the health benefit contribution of $12,000 the employee made during that time. You would have to design in a top level where the pay flatlines though. No 3rd grade teacher job on the planet is worth more than ... say $85,000. And I think that’s rather generous.
Posted by Drew458
on 02/22/2011 at 02:33 PM
Filed Under: • Education • Unions-Labor •
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Permalink • Tuesday - February 08, 2011
AH, THE WONDERFUL ADVANTAGES OF SOCIALISM WHERE ALL IS EQUAL.
Nothing wrong with helping out kids who can qualify with good grades who need help. But this does not read that way, unless I misunderstood something.
Oh well, never mind. Commissar will see to things so that comrade students of the oppressed proletariat will be made equal even if they aren’t.
Nick Clegg orders universities to lower entrance requirements - but only for poorer students
By JAMES CHAPMAN
Deputy PM declares class war on ‘instruments of social segregation’
Nick Clegg is to make an explosive attack on British universities as ‘instruments of social segregation’ as he orders them to stop taking so many middle-class students.
The Deputy Prime Minister will this week insist that top institutions must ‘throw open their doors’ and lower their entrance requirements for the less well-off.
It could mean top institutions such as Oxford and Cambridge, that usually ask for three As at A-level, accepting disadvantaged students with only Bs and Cs.
Universities that want to charge tuition fees of £6,000 or more will be forced to sign up to ‘access agreements’, ensuring they admit more students from disadvantaged backgrounds.
The move will prompt fears that bright pupils from good schools or middle-class homes could lose out on sought-after places.
Cambridge University today revealed it is planning to charge students the maximum £9,000 in tuition fees from next year.
Poorer students would be offered reductions of up to £3,000 per year, plus bursaries of up to £1,625.
Mr Clegg will on Thursday write to the Office of Fair Access – the body set up by Labour to police university admissions – setting out the new system.
Institutions are expected to be allowed to draw up their own methods of broadening their intake.
But critics fear teenagers from comprehensives will increasingly be given easier A-level offers than candidates from fee-paying schools.
One headmaster suggested to the Times that universities that usually ask for three As at A-level from candidates could accept disadvantaged pupils with Bs and Cs.
Posted by peiper
on 02/08/2011 at 12:41 PM
Filed Under: • Commies • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Education •
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Permalink • Wednesday - February 02, 2011
Tiger Mom Say Study Harder
Here’s a link over to Burning Hot, where Scott has the best of the Tiger Mom supermotivators on display. And the Asian Dads ones too, who I’m guessing have a reputation for pinching the pennies until they scream.
In case you haven’t been following the Tiger Mom story - it was on the cover of lefty Time Magazine last week - it’s the meme about Asian moms who push their kids really hard. One of them wrote a book about it, and she’s got rather a negative opinion about the American school system. Soccer moms everywhere are all worked up. I gather that Asian parents have high expectations for their children, and labor under the assumption that the kids have both the ability to achieve, and the drive to succeed, as long as the parents set high standards. Really high standards. Like “Get straight A’s in everything or I’ll burn all your toys”. Yet somehow the kids survive, and excel in school. Whether they have any imagination or freethinking ability is up for debate.
It’s the polar opposite to the coddling crap that goes on in US schools and households today. But it’s fun to have fun with Tiger Moms. Let the beatings begin!
Posted by Drew458
on 02/02/2011 at 03:00 PM
Filed Under: • Education • Humor •
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Permalink • Saturday - January 29, 2011
Mom Got Schooled
Ohio mother convicted of felony because she said her kids lived with their father so that they could attend a better, safer public school. Now she’s a felon, and her career as an aspiring teacher is over.
Kelley Williams-Bolar, a 40-year-old mother of two, was convicted of a felony last week and sent to jail for 10 days. Her crime? Falsifying records so her kids could attend a safer school in the district where her father lives.
Uh-oh! Sounds like two little girls were trying to get a free education off the back of hard-working tax payers, and if that’s not worth a felony charge, I don’t know what is. Williams-Bolar, according to the prosecution, lives in subsidized housing in Akron, Ohio, and not with her father in Copley Township—as she claimed on several official school forms when she enrolled her two daughters. The Copley schools are, it seems, better and safer than the schools in Akron. (They are also whiter. Williams-Bolar is black. But obviously race has nothing to do with this case!)
The school district grew suspicious enough about the Williams-Bolar kids to, apparently, hire a private detective, who filmed Williams-Bolar dropping her children off at a bus stop near her parents’ house.
According to the presiding judge, Patricia Cosgrove, who spoke with The Akron Beacon-Journal, “the state would not move, would not budge, and offer Ms. Williams-Bolar to plead to a misdemeanor,” despite several pretrial hearings.
Williams-Bolar, a teaching assistant, is working towards a teaching degree, but her felony conviction will likely derail that.
Looks like the father and grandfather are also in a bit of trouble over this. Williams-Bolar was released early from jail and is now making a big fuss and demanding complete exoneration.
A whole bushel of links on the story can be found here.
Interesting situation. A black woman wants her kids out of the lousy and dangerous local black school, so she says they live with the other parent, who has an address in the better, whiter school district. Both districts are within the city of Akron, so it isn’t like neither parent was paying school taxes into the city system. Or were they? I would assume Mom is on some level of public assistance, since she lives in subsidized housing, but she works at least part-time. Does the father work? He lives elsewhere, with his father, but everyone still seems to be on speaking terms. Are they married? Were they ever married? Is he working but living with his father only so that she and the girls can get rent free housing? Did the Copley Township schools only push this case to court because she’s black? (a dozen cases a year like this come up, but none ever go to trial, much less conviction). Had Williams-Bolar tried for a waiver before this, or did she just decide to falsify things from the get-go?
If you try to make things better for your children by following the rules and get nowhere, is it Ok to bend or break the rules to get what you want? This case is a victimless crime, isn’t it?
Or perhaps the whole thing is a big miscarriage of justice. According to one article I read,
The effect of divorce on a student’s residence also is a factor for districts. A child in joint custody with parents in different districts has a right to go to either, said Russell Chaboudy, superintendent of Coventry school.
Any $2 lawyer could get “divorce” interpreted as “living separately” considering how rare actual marriage is these days. If Chaboudy is paraphrasing actual law, then this case may have been really poorly handled if certain legal priorities exist. By which I mean the “divorce” rule overrides the “actual residency of the child” rule, which it certainly could if parental custody was exactly 50-50.
I read several articles about the case, but not all of them, and it does not look like she is overtly playing the race card. That in itself is interesting, because a quick look at the other dozen cases per year that come up would point out any racial bias, and you’ve got to wonder about it, since the Copley school board hired a private detective to make their case, which is something they’ve never done before. And with all the other cases clogging up the court system, and plea bargains buzzing around like mayflies, the prosecutors were 100% unwilling to make any kind of deal on this case? So maybe she ought to be playing it for all it’s worth. Or maybe it’s in play just by having her picture in the paper. Or maybe, just for once, race is merely coincidental to the case.
h/t to careyb
Posted by Drew458
on 01/29/2011 at 09:02 AM
Filed Under: • Crime • Education • Racism and race relations •
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Permalink • Thursday - January 20, 2011
Time To Ramp Up Production
Hillerich & Bradsby, the company behind the Louisville Slugger brand of baseball bats, turns out about 1 million bats per year. If they turned production over tomorrow and made nothing but ClueBats, they’d never be able to make enough. Case in point ... here we go again ...
No, not guns that shoot fingers. He stuck out his thumb and index finger and went “pow pow pow”. Like every little boy on earth does. And got thrown out of school for it.
A seven-year-old child was suspended from his elementary school after making a seemingly harmless gesture many see everyday. Meet the little boy and see exactly what he did.
Patrick Riley was simply trying to distract himself during an assembly at his school. The first grade student formed a gun with his hand and pretended to shoot the wall with a fellow student. That’s when he was asked to go home.‘Him and a little girl were just getting bored at an assembly and doing some target practice at the wall,’ Lydia Fox, Patrick’s mother, explained.
The school disagreed with Fox’s interpretation and issued a statement regarding Patrick’s misbehavior.
‘A student has repeatedly used his hands to simulate a gun and act as if is shooting fellow students,’ Parkview Elementary clarified.
Fox says the principal told her the boy would be placed in in-school suspension for the rest of that day and threatened a longer suspension if it happened again.
Midwest City-Del City Schools spokeswoman Stacey Boyer confirmed the incident and says the district’s policy is to “address the disruption of the learning environment.” Boyer says Fox’s son “has repeatedly used his hands to simulate a gun.”
Fox said her son, Patrick Riley, who is in first grade at Parkview Elementary, was asked to go home after he formed a gun with his hand and started to pretend he was shooting at a wall.
School leaders said Riley was misbehaving during the assembly. Fox said she was outraged at the reason why her son was suspended.
“One of the things I’ve always been able to brag about Oklahoma is that common sense still rules here. Unfortunately, I don’t think I can say that anymore,” Fox said.
...
Parkview Elementary said Riley was not suspended anymore.
Posted by Drew458
on 01/20/2011 at 06:42 PM
Filed Under: • Education • Stoopid-People •
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