Come back Mr. Kotter.
Somehow or other I got added to distribution for Fox and Hounds. This is good stuff. Go there and subscribe to stay abreast of happenings in the Golden State.
1 in 8 Americans live in CA. The state in inordinately influential nationally and even internationally due to the presence of Hollyweird in SoCal. Wherever you hail from, what happens in CA has strategic implications for the entire nation and even globally.
New media like Fox and Hounds may prove to be a big deal for California in terms of propogating conservative message and ideas through the state. So far I'm enjoying the news and editorials. I alluded here to how challenging the media/message problem is in California. It is a large state with many independant geographically distant media markets. This amplifies the power of leftist incumbency and the left (which have inertia and the MSM in their favor).
Good article yesterday by Scott Harris on the problem with California government schools.
Excerpts and paraphrase:
Here’s a simple True or False test for our California public educators and the CTA (California Teachers Association, more powerful force in CA politics)
Education is more important than tenure. (T/F)
A high school diploma should represent 12th grade level abilities. (T/F)
The stigma of a lifetime without the ability to read and write is worse than the stigma of failing a grade. (T/F)
California taxpayers deserve accountability for our $68 billion. (T/F)
Good teachers should be rewarded; bad teachers should be fired. (T/F)
The CTA has everything to do with teachers and very little to do with education. The CTA can take comfort knowing that our CA teachers are the highest paid in the country -- regardless of our low student acheivement.
Read the whole thing here.
2 comments:
God how education has changed in Calif. My Aunt Elsie taught 2nd grade for 32 years in the little town of Dinuba in Tulare Co. Retired in 1964. That was when Cali schools were the best in the nation. She must be rolling over in her grave these days.
A little neat story you might appreciate about "small world" things and the reach of a teacher. I was stationed at DaNang in '68 flying out of the 366TFW. One afternoon I was body surfing out at China Beach after a particularly rough msn north that morn and struck up a conversation with one of the young Navy seaman lifeguards at the beach. Where ya from sailor, I asked. "Oh, came the reply, a little town in the central valley in California that you've never heard of," he replied. "Don't be so sure," I replied. My Aunt taught for some thirty years in the little town of Dinuba, so I know that area fairly well." "Dinuba!" he exclaimed, "that's MY hometown, what was her name?" "Elsie Bryant, " I replied, "she taught 2nd grade." "Elsie Bryant!" he laughed, "she taught ME in the 2nd grade!"
So here we were, literally 10,000 miles away on the other side of the world, and the only Navy guy I talked to that day had been taught by my Aunt Elsie! LOL! Small world indeed. Kevin "6 degrees" Bacon would be proud!
virgil xenophon
6 degrees of separation and all that is wild. I sat down at midrats on the Connie somewhere in the Indian Ocean in the 80's, looked across the table and recognized a guy I'd ridden the school bus with and even at same church for a while (our folks were good friends). We'd been on the same ship for over a year!
There's cracks showing in the CA public school wall. Charter Schools are making big waves. LA parents practically rioted recently and got the LA City School Board to approve conversion of about 250 of the 800 or so LA city schools converted to charters. Ya think the Teachers Union is going nuts? /heh
Even the union sees the handwriting on the wall. Apparently, they've decided they can't stop the movement. Now they're trying to find a way to get their nose under the charter school tent wall and organize.
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