Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
In fact, I don't prescribe to a bell curve solution. When I was teaching, which was many years ago, I was a stickler for teaching the curriculum and setting an inflexible standard. But in the failing school systems of out-of-control inner cities, there comes a point where it just doesn't work. Pittsburgh's program is reasonable. It still sets a standard, but allows some chance of success. Paul On Sep 25, 2008, at 9:21 PM, Bob Blakely wrote: Well, we disagree. It's clear that the solution that you were part of (and, apparently, still subscribe to) just (hopefully-maybe) keeps students in building, but to who's ultimate benefit? Not the students, they're still uneducated. They're still unprepared for life. Not our society, it's not getting it's young competent for adult life. Further, students know when what they're getting is crap. They'll never value crap! The school system philosophy you describe, regardless of the reasons or intentions, has abdicated it's responsibility which is to offer a competent and useful education to our young. If it doesn't, it's no more than very high priced day care for students who don't value education and have no reason to. Apparently, our public schools, having failed their first responsibility, have taken on some other responsibility that I, personally don't wish to pay for. I attended public elementary school in Rutland VT. and public high school in New York. In those days (I'm 61) my grade school was (apparently) excellent, as I, with only average grades, had no problem entering and competing at university for bachelors and advanced degrees. My children and all my grand children attend private school. I scraped and my children scrape to do this. We do this because your thinking is rampant in public school systems and would cheat them. Now, many - if not most - of the students you may be describing may not be blessed with parents who care, or if they do they can't afford to get out of school you describe. Well then, it's up to you, the education professional to at least not cheapen their education and waste our money in the process. Day care workers are cheaper than educators. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) - Original Message - That's all well in good in theory. But there are times when pragmatic decisions must be made. I taught ninth grade in a Chicago inner city high school. If I had taught the curriculum as provided by the board of education and failed anyone who didn't achieve 70%, NO ONE would have made it beyond ninth grace, and the school would have become non- functional. Sometimes you have to deal with the reality of the situation you're confronted with. Paul On Sep 25, 2008, at 2:44 PM, Bob Blakely wrote: 1.The mandate of any school system, public or private, is to EDUCATE our children. 2.The level of education MUST be such that our childrenhave what is necessary to compete in the REAL world. 3.It is NOT the job of ANY school system, public or private, to adjust the truth concerning student performance to meet some local curve chosen using rather dubious assumptions. The standard is the REAL world. 3.After the students graduate, they will automatically be - in the community, - in their search for higher education, - in their school of higher education - if they can get in, - in their competition for employment, - in their performance on their job by a curve that represents not just their community, but the entire country and also the best of many other countries. 4.It's just not ethical to cheat students, their parents and their community out of a realistic assessment of their preparedness for adult life. 5.FYI, the REAL curve is often bimodal. The result of cheating students out of a real assessment of their preparedness for life is to fill the world with dependent fools. The just desert for those who cheat them and for those who abet in this process is to later be governed by the fools they've created. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) From: Paul Stenquist [EMAIL PROTECTED] Based on my ten years of experience teaching in inner city Chicago high schools, I'd say it's a realistic policy. Percentages alone mean nothing. The curriculum should be based on real needs, and the success ratio has to come close to resembling a bell curve. The alternative is little or no success for any
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
You have said it so much better than I have. Our children deserve to be treated with respect. Instead, our government lies to them regarding their performance. Lying to them and to their parents is disrespectful and ultimately more damaging to them because our government is (in effect) saying they are intellectually and/or morally deficient. After all, it's important to lie to them (our children) so that they will (perhaps) keep coming to class. What does this accomplish? Certainly not education! It does, however, keep them watched and occupied and (hopefully) out of trouble. This provides parents with false hope and little more than day-care for their adolescents. It provides the school with bodies so that they can keep their funding up to pay (essentially) day-care providers relabeled as teachers, administrators to manage them and the all important political power that comes with numbers and funds so that the bureaucracy can be maintained. Graduating illiterate youngsters only adds them to the roles of those who must be supported by the state, thus insuring an ever increasing ignorant, dependent electorate who will vote to support their dependence. A fellow walking down a city street noticed a man sitting on the sidewalk snapping his fingers. Seeing that the man had been doing this for some time, the fellow walked over to him and asked, Sir, why are you snapping your fingers so fervently? It keeps the tigers away., replied the man. But sir, this is New York City! There are no tigers here!, said the fellow. To this the man replied, Effective, isn't it. - Old joke, author unknown. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) - Original Message - From: William Robb [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Original Message - From: Paul Stenquist That's all well in good in theory. But there are times when pragmatic decisions must be made. I taught ninth grade in a Chicago inner city high school. If I had taught the curriculum as provided by the board of education and failed anyone who didn't achieve 70%, NO ONE would have made it beyond ninth grace, and the school would have become non- functional. Sometimes you have to deal with the reality of the situation you're confronted with. My father taught at Scott Colleigiate here in Regina. For those who get McLean's magazine, Scott is in the heart of what polite society refers to as North Central Less polite people have some rather racist labels for it, but I digress. The school board fiddled with all sorts of strategies to keep kids in that school, everything from dropping programs that were considered Euro-Centric, and therefore culturally assimilative by the largely native community, putting in what they considered to be culturally friendly programs, dropping requirements so that students wouldn't have to live woth low marks and high expectations, putting a funded daycare into the school so that the student mothers could have their infant children close at hand, the list goes on. Pragmatic decisions indeed. At best, Scott has a 10% graduation rate, and this number hasn't changed significantly for many decades. I think that the less of a challenge you give, the less able people become to be challenged. I also think that it is an insult to any particular group, be they predomonantly black kids (correct me if I am wrong) in a Chicogo inner city school or native kids in a Regina inner city school to lower their educational standards below the median. Lower standards is telling them at an institutional level that they are less smart, less intelligent, and less able to cope in society, and then making truth out of it by graduating them without the skills required to become contributing members of mainstream society. We slap them in the face from the time they enter school, and then wonder why they are bitter young men and women 12 years later. The end result is high unemployment, more poverty, more crime, and more hopelessness. If you happen to live in a welfare state, the result is also higher taxes to support an unemployable group of illiterates, and a lot of ill will from the taxed group who work very hard to support a multi-generational life of leisure, as disfunctional parents beget disfunctional children in this sort of society. If you apply the same standards to the entire population, those that fail have at least failed honestly rather than passed dishonestly, and the ones who pass dishonestly generally end up in the same boat anyway, since they are not only less prepared for their post educational life, they have gone through their schooling having it drilled into them that they aren't smart enough to cope. Or perhaps it really is OK to graduate kids from grade 12 who can neither
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
Sounds like a whopper. Scott Collegiate is a public school. No public school in the US could turn out a 10% graduation rate and retain funding. You're saying ninety percent of the parents and students are okay with their kids never graduating? I love how people who've never taught wax philosophical about how education should work. If you haven't stood at the front of an inner city classroom, you don't have a clue. Paul On Sep 26, 2008, at 2:21 PM, Bob Blakely wrote: You have said it so much better than I have. Our children deserve to be treated with respect. Instead, our government lies to them regarding their performance. Lying to them and to their parents is disrespectful and ultimately more damaging to them because our government is (in effect) saying they are intellectually and/or morally deficient. After all, it's important to lie to them (our children) so that they will (perhaps) keep coming to class. What does this accomplish? Certainly not education! It does, however, keep them watched and occupied and (hopefully) out of trouble. This provides parents with false hope and little more than day-care for their adolescents. It provides the school with bodies so that they can keep their funding up to pay (essentially) day-care providers relabeled as teachers, administrators to manage them and the all important political power that comes with numbers and funds so that the bureaucracy can be maintained. Graduating illiterate youngsters only adds them to the roles of those who must be supported by the state, thus insuring an ever increasing ignorant, dependent electorate who will vote to support their dependence. A fellow walking down a city street noticed a man sitting on the sidewalk snapping his fingers. Seeing that the man had been doing this for some time, the fellow walked over to him and asked, Sir, why are you snapping your fingers so fervently? It keeps the tigers away., replied the man. But sir, this is New York City! There are no tigers here!, said the fellow. To this the man replied, Effective, isn't it. - Old joke, author unknown. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) - Original Message - From: William Robb [EMAIL PROTECTED] - Original Message - From: Paul Stenquist That's all well in good in theory. But there are times when pragmatic decisions must be made. I taught ninth grade in a Chicago inner city high school. If I had taught the curriculum as provided by the board of education and failed anyone who didn't achieve 70%, NO ONE would have made it beyond ninth grace, and the school would have become non- functional. Sometimes you have to deal with the reality of the situation you're confronted with. My father taught at Scott Colleigiate here in Regina. For those who get McLean's magazine, Scott is in the heart of what polite society refers to as North Central Less polite people have some rather racist labels for it, but I digress. The school board fiddled with all sorts of strategies to keep kids in that school, everything from dropping programs that were considered Euro-Centric, and therefore culturally assimilative by the largely native community, putting in what they considered to be culturally friendly programs, dropping requirements so that students wouldn't have to live woth low marks and high expectations, putting a funded daycare into the school so that the student mothers could have their infant children close at hand, the list goes on. Pragmatic decisions indeed. At best, Scott has a 10% graduation rate, and this number hasn't changed significantly for many decades. I think that the less of a challenge you give, the less able people become to be challenged. I also think that it is an insult to any particular group, be they predomonantly black kids (correct me if I am wrong) in a Chicogo inner city school or native kids in a Regina inner city school to lower their educational standards below the median. Lower standards is telling them at an institutional level that they are less smart, less intelligent, and less able to cope in society, and then making truth out of it by graduating them without the skills required to become contributing members of mainstream society. We slap them in the face from the time they enter school, and then wonder why they are bitter young men and women 12 years later. The end result is high unemployment, more poverty, more crime, and more hopelessness. If you happen to live in a welfare state, the result is also higher taxes to support an unemployable group of illiterates, and a lot of ill will from the taxed group who work very hard to support a multi-generational life of leisure, as
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
1.The mandate of any school system, public or private, is to EDUCATE our children. 2.The level of education MUST be such that our children have what is necessary to compete in the REAL world. 3.It is NOT the job of ANY school system, public or private, to adjust the truth concerning student performance to meet some local curve chosen using rather dubious assumptions. The standard is the REAL world. 3.After the students graduate, they will automatically be judged: - in the community, - in their search for higher education, - in their school of higher education - if they can get in, - in their competition for employment, - in their performance on their job by a curve that represents not just their community, but the entire country and also the best of many other countries. 4.It's just not ethical to cheat students, their parents and their community out of a realistic assessment of their preparedness for adult life. 5.FYI, the REAL curve is often bimodal. The result of cheating students out of a real assessment of their preparedness for life is to fill the world with dependent fools. The just desert for those who cheat them and for those who abet in this process is to later be governed by the fools they've created. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) From: Paul Stenquist [EMAIL PROTECTED] Based on my ten years of experience teaching in inner city Chicago high schools, I'd say it's a realistic policy. Percentages alone mean nothing. The curriculum should be based on real needs, and the success ratio has to come close to resembling a bell curve. The alternative is little or no success for any student. It's a fact of life. Doesn't make me puke. Paul On Sep 24, 2008, at 10:11 AM, Scott Loveless wrote: OK, so this isn't photo related at all. Try not to puke. http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08266/914029-298.stm -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
That's all well in good in theory. But there are times when pragmatic decisions must be made. I taught ninth grade in a Chicago inner city high school. If I had taught the curriculum as provided by the board of education and failed anyone who didn't achieve 70%, NO ONE would have made it beyond ninth grace, and the school would have become non- functional. Sometimes you have to deal with the reality of the situation you're confronted with. Paul On Sep 25, 2008, at 2:44 PM, Bob Blakely wrote: 1.The mandate of any school system, public or private, is to EDUCATE our children. 2.The level of education MUST be such that our children have what is necessary to compete in the REAL world. 3.It is NOT the job of ANY school system, public or private, to adjust the truth concerning student performance to meet some local curve chosen using rather dubious assumptions. The standard is the REAL world. 3.After the students graduate, they will automatically be judged: - in the community, - in their search for higher education, - in their school of higher education - if they can get in, - in their competition for employment, - in their performance on their job by a curve that represents not just their community, but theentire country and also the best of many other countries. 4.It's just not ethical to cheat students, their parents and their community out of a realistic assessment of their preparedness for adult life. 5.FYI, the REAL curve is often bimodal. The result of cheating students out of a real assessment of their preparedness for life is to fill the world with dependent fools. The just desert for those who cheat them and for those who abet in this process is to later be governed by the fools they've created. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) From: Paul Stenquist [EMAIL PROTECTED] Based on my ten years of experience teaching in inner city Chicago high schools, I'd say it's a realistic policy. Percentages alone mean nothing. The curriculum should be based on real needs, and the success ratio has to come close to resembling a bell curve. The alternative is little or no success for any student. It's a fact of life. Doesn't make me puke. Paul On Sep 24, 2008, at 10:11 AM, Scott Loveless wrote: OK, so this isn't photo related at all. Try not to puke. http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08266/914029-298.stm -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 2:44 PM, Bob Blakely [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: 1.The mandate of any school system, public or private, is to EDUCATE our children. 2.The level of education MUST be such that our children have what is necessary to compete in the REAL world. 3.It is NOT the job of ANY school system, public or private, to adjust the truth concerning student performance to meet some local curve chosen using rather dubious assumptions. The standard is the REAL world. 3.After the students graduate, they will automatically be judged: - in the community, - in their search for higher education, - in their school of higher education - if they can get in, - in their competition for employment, - in their performance on their job by a curve that represents not just their community, but the entire country and also the best of many other countries. 4.It's just not ethical to cheat students, their parents and their community out of a realistic assessment of their preparedness for adult life. 5.FYI, the REAL curve is often bimodal. The result of cheating students out of a real assessment of their preparedness for life is to fill the world with dependent fools. The just desert for those who cheat them and for those who abet in this process is to later be governed by the fools they've created. Do you really think that school prepares students for the real world? I've known idiots who still graduated with outstanding marks. I've known people who barely got through school (or didn't!) that have succeeded mightily in the real world. While real marks may in some way, in some cases, be predictors of performance in the workplace, the fact is that school grades or class ranking only give HR execs something to hang their hat on when their hireling fizzles: Hey, he was top of his class, great GPA, who knew he'd swindle the bank for millions? Please don't fire me, I covered my ass! cheers, frank the cynic -- Sharpness is a bourgeois concept. -Henri Cartier-Bresson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
- Original Message - From: Paul Stenquist Subject: Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh That's all well in good in theory. But there are times when pragmatic decisions must be made. I taught ninth grade in a Chicago inner city high school. If I had taught the curriculum as provided by the board of education and failed anyone who didn't achieve 70%, NO ONE would have made it beyond ninth grace, and the school would have become non- functional. Sometimes you have to deal with the reality of the situation you're confronted with. My father taught at Scott Colleigiate here in Regina. For those who get McLean's magazine, Scott is in the heart of what polite society refers to as North Central Less polite people have some rather racist labels for it, but I digress. The school board fiddled with all sorts of strategies to keep kids in that school, everything from dropping programs that were considered Euro-Centric, and therefore culturally assimilative by the largely native community, putting in what they considered to be culturally friendly programs, dropping requirements so that students wouldn't have to live woth low marks and high expectations, putting a funded daycare into the school so that the student mothers could have their infant children close at hand, the list goes on. Pragmatic decisions indeed. At best, Scott has a 10% graduation rate, and this number hasn't changed significantly for many decades. I think that the less of a challenge you give, the less able people become to be challenged. I also think that it is an insult to any particular group, be they predomonantly black kids (correct me if I am wrong) in a Chicogo inner city school or native kids in a Regina inner city school to lower their educational standards below the median. Lower standards is telling them at an institutional level that they are less smart, less intelligent, and less able to cope in society, and then making truth out of it by graduating them without the skills required to become contributing members of mainstream society. We slap them in the face from the time they enter school, and then wonder why they are bitter young men and women 12 years later. The end result is high unemployment, more poverty, more crime, and more hopelessness. If you happen to live in a welfare state, the result is also higher taxes to support an unemployable group of illiterates, and a lot of ill will from the taxed group who work very hard to support a multi-generational life of leisure, as disfunctional parents beget disfunctional children in this sort of society. If you apply the same standards to the entire population, those that fail have at least failed honestly rather than passed dishonestly, and the ones who pass dishonestly generally end up in the same boat anyway, since they are not only less prepared for their post educational life, they have gone through their schooling having it drilled into them that they aren't smart enough to cope. Or perhaps it really is OK to graduate kids from grade 12 who can neither read nor write, and can't identify their own country when handed an atlas. William Robb -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
Well, we disagree. It's clear that the solution that you were part of (and, apparently, still subscribe to) just (hopefully-maybe) keeps students in building, but to who's ultimate benefit? Not the students, they're still uneducated. They're still unprepared for life. Not our society, it's not getting it's young competent for adult life. Further, students know when what they're getting is crap. They'll never value crap! The school system philosophy you describe, regardless of the reasons or intentions, has abdicated it's responsibility which is to offer a competent and useful education to our young. If it doesn't, it's no more than very high priced day care for students who don't value education and have no reason to. Apparently, our public schools, having failed their first responsibility, have taken on some other responsibility that I, personally don't wish to pay for. I attended public elementary school in Rutland VT. and public high school in New York. In those days (I'm 61) my grade school was (apparently) excellent, as I, with only average grades, had no problem entering and competing at university for bachelors and advanced degrees. My children and all my grand children attend private school. I scraped and my children scrape to do this. We do this because your thinking is rampant in public school systems and would cheat them. Now, many - if not most - of the students you may be describing may not be blessed with parents who care, or if they do they can't afford to get out of school you describe. Well then, it's up to you, the education professional to at least not cheapen their education and waste our money in the process. Day care workers are cheaper than educators. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) - Original Message - That's all well in good in theory. But there are times when pragmatic decisions must be made. I taught ninth grade in a Chicago inner city high school. If I had taught the curriculum as provided by the board of education and failed anyone who didn't achieve 70%, NO ONE would have made it beyond ninth grace, and the school would have become non- functional. Sometimes you have to deal with the reality of the situation you're confronted with. Paul On Sep 25, 2008, at 2:44 PM, Bob Blakely wrote: 1.The mandate of any school system, public or private, is to EDUCATE our children. 2.The level of education MUST be such that our childrenhave what is necessary to compete in the REAL world. 3.It is NOT the job of ANY school system, public or private, to adjust the truth concerning student performance to meet some local curve chosen using rather dubious assumptions. The standard is the REAL world. 3.After the students graduate, they will automatically be - in the community, - in their search for higher education, - in their school of higher education - if they can get in, - in their competition for employment, - in their performance on their job by a curve that represents not just their community, but the entire country and also the best of many other countries. 4.It's just not ethical to cheat students, their parents and their community out of a realistic assessment of their preparedness for adult life. 5.FYI, the REAL curve is often bimodal. The result of cheating students out of a real assessment of their preparedness for life is to fill the world with dependent fools. The just desert for those who cheat them and for those who abet in this process is to later be governed by the fools they've created. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) From: Paul Stenquist [EMAIL PROTECTED] Based on my ten years of experience teaching in inner city Chicago high schools, I'd say it's a realistic policy. Percentages alone mean nothing. The curriculum should be based on real needs, and the success ratio has to come close to resembling a bell curve. The alternative is little or no success for any student. It's a fact of life. Doesn't make me puke. Paul On Sep 24, 2008, at 10:11 AM, Scott Loveless wrote: OK, so this isn't photo related at all. Try not to puke. http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08266/914029-298.stm -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
You're absolutely correct. One may be well educated, yet have no common sense. One may be well educated, but be immoral. One may squeek through high school due to any of a variety of reasons, yet do well with what was retained (like me). An education is a necessary tool. An education is non the only necessary tool. One may own the best of carpenter's tools and be skilled in using them, but have no lumber. One may have lumber, be skilled in carpentry, but have no tools. One may have carpenter's tools and lumber, but not be skilled. With all three, the house is built. To be successful, one must have: The appropriate education. Common sense. A decent morality. A modecum of bravery. The first is (generally - hopefully) taught in schools. The second is arrived at through trying, failure is often the teacher. The third is instilled (hopefully) by parents and moral peers. The forth comes from the capability of believing in something. This is spiritual and may perhaps be arrived at in a variety of ways. An education is only a part of the picture. I greatly value mine. From the way you talk, it would seem you - not so much. There's a lot to nitpick here. In fact, you can do it so much that the point is completely lost. Regards Bob... --- I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them long winter evenings. -- Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) - Original Message - From: frank theriault [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Pentax-Discuss Mail List pdml@pdml.net Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2008 2:18 PM Subject: Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 2:44 PM, Bob Blakely [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: 1.The mandate of any school system, public or private, is to EDUCATE our children. 2.The level of education MUST be such that our children have what is necessary to compete in the REAL world. 3.It is NOT the job of ANY school system, public or private, to adjust the truth concerning student performance to meet some local curve chosen using rather dubious assumptions. The standard is the REAL world. 3.After the students graduate, they will automatically be judged: - in the community, - in their search for higher education, - in their school of higher education - if they can get in, - in their competition for employment, - in their performance on their job by a curve that represents not just their community, but the entire country and also the best of many other countries. 4.It's just not ethical to cheat students, their parents and their community out of a realistic assessment of their preparedness for adult life. 5.FYI, the REAL curve is often bimodal. The result of cheating students out of a real assessment of their preparedness for life is to fill the world with dependent fools. The just desert for those who cheat them and for those who abet in this process is to later be governed by the fools they've created. Do you really think that school prepares students for the real world? I've known idiots who still graduated with outstanding marks. I've known people who barely got through school (or didn't!) that have succeeded mightily in the real world. While real marks may in some way, in some cases, be predictors of performance in the workplace, the fact is that school grades or class ranking only give HR execs something to hang their hat on when their hireling fizzles: Hey, he was top of his class, great GPA, who knew he'd swindle the bank for millions? Please don't fire me, I covered my ass! cheers, frank the cynic -- Sharpness is a bourgeois concept. -Henri Cartier-Bresson -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
Re: Seriously OT - school system shenanigans in Pittsburgh
William Robb wrote: I think that the less of a challenge you give, the less able people become to be challenged. I'm not a parent, but I agree 100% with this. I've never had an employee get better when I coddled him, only when I've challenged him. -- Thanks, DougF (KG4LMZ) -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
