To my Montreat community:

Yesterday a certain special person reminded me to smile. It changed my day!  That one thoughtful remark likely changed a lot that happened that day.

You’ve always heard phrases like “misery loves company” and “Smile!  God loves you!” – and many of you are familiar with the phenomenon that when an elderly husband passes, the wife will often soon follow.

There are people studying social influence in social networks (not just online but including that too) and the studies reveal some very startling observations of the impact of an individual’s outlooks, dispositions, smiles, obesity, smoking (seems relevant for today – thanks for the great lunch!)  many other behaviors, on the people around them.

Most importantly, I thought of our own culture here at Montreat in light of the last staff meeting, and about how negative or positive sentiments might affect all of us, and about how important it is to be an active participant in the “Body of Christ” out of which we are made – embodying honesty, humility, transparency, respect, openness, tenderness and joy with one another.  These are at the root the “fruits of the Spirit.”  These qualities are not exclusive to us as Christians but certainly we might have a calling to embody them fully.

If you watch this presentation,  I invite you to consider the question:  “Am I now being a builder-upper or a tearer-downer?”  I realize the degree to which my choices and behavior may  have a direct, tangible, measurable effect on those around me, or more specifically, on those with whom I work.

The Influence of Social Networks

Excerpt:

Similarly, social networks are required for the spread of good and valuable things like love and kindness and happiness and altruism and ideas. I think, in fact, that if we realized how valuable social networks are, we’d spend a lot more time nourishing them and sustaining them because I think social networks are fundamentally related to goodness, and what I think the world needs now is more connections.

I did send him a note asking for his position on mountaintop removal.  So far, I’m not impressed with him. He thinks CO2 isn’t dangerous because it’s essential to life, and doesn’t seem to understand the science behind CO2 and global warming and associated climate change.  He needs to watch Bill Gates’ approachable TED talk on the subject.

Or maybe Mr Howard is smarter than Bill Gates!  That’d be nice to know!

Anyway, my litmus test issue this year is mountaintop removal for coal mining.  That just has to stop. It’s not reasonable to trade something relatively permanent (a mountain) for something temporary (coal for a few months).   I’ll let you know what his website says when he gets back to me!  And if he doesn’t… he’ll get a nice bumpersticker on the back of my car.

Jake, please drop the automated machine phone calls.  There’s REASON why we consumers don’t LIKE THEM.  I do expect a personal reply now.  Personal.  From YOU, Mr. Howard, not from one of your aides.

Thanks!

Mike

Not being an athletic student, none of my teachers took an interest in my capabilities at all, and didn’t notice that at my cross country meets I would always sprint towards the finish line… or realize what that meant.

When I became a freshman in college we had “naked hall races” one day (a typically freshman activity LOL). We took the competition very seriously though, and the hallway was fairly short. Well…. I won my dorm’s naked hallway race. It certainly wasn’t very official!

Later I found out that one of the other freshman was a track star, and I realized that I was a sprinter, and that if any teacher at the athletic program at my school had ever taken a moment to notice me or encourage me in any personal way, I would have been a track star in high school myself. But because I was seen as a geeky nerdy kid with no athletic potential, the teachers there overlooked that aspect of me entirely.

As a teacher now, I do not want to EVER have it said about me that I missed seeing the potential in a kid, and didn’t encourage it. Perhaps because of my own experience my eyes are very sensitive to unrecognized potential. Do you have areas of your life that went unrecognized too? Areas of your own personal capability as a person that were undeveloped? Perhaps you can share your stories with your own students. Perhaps that can inspire them to be their own encourager. Perhaps your own experience can spark a desire in you to find the idle rocket-builders with big dreams and nobody that has noticed them yet.

It’s nice to see that someone else thinks this too! Though it’s a bit vague:

The United States last month announced $150 million in military assistance for Yemen to fight extremists. In contrast, it costs just $50 to send a girl to public school for a year — and little girls like Nujood may prove more effective than missiles at defeating terrorists.

That appears in a New York Times article about Nujood and her new book about being ten years old, and divorced, in Yemen.

I’ve never thought about how mistreatment of women could be tied to extremism.  There’s a loose connection between the poor education of women and polygamy.  If you have lots of households with one husband and two wives, then you have lots of single, desperate men.   Which in turn feeds a male-dominated culture where education of women is supressed.   Perhaps that is a simplistic presentation, but sometimes simple is good.

But one thing seems clear to me:  Books, not bombs, give the loudest and longest lasting boom!

That’s pretty conventional wisdom, right? Seems spot on!

I also need to practice my piano more. I’ve been working at it for 5 years and am in Suzuki Book III. I’m teaching myself alongside my daughter’s lessons and see it as sort of a last chance to master piano before I croak, being that I’m…. you know… pushing down the hill now at 45 and all. Ugh. I know that if I don’t practice every day that I won’t EVER get good, and I know that it’s going to take me 5 more years to get proficient. But piano is cool! It’s like riding a bike – if you lose it you won’t completely lose it!

That’s pretty accepted common knowledge too, mmm?

Well what about this?

“I know that I really HATE math and I do not like school in general. I’m in the 11th grade and am a baseball superstar. I know I’m going to get out of high school and go pro – I already have a scholarship to play baseball for UT! Why do I need to sit here and study old dead writers, poets who never made a dime, and learn all this USELESS trig s&*^*&$?”

Answer: Because you have…. you know… a brain? And if you don’t use it, you won’t have a good one. And it’s growing right now, and now is the time to make it a good brain! You’ll never get another one, after all. You’ll also never get another chance to grow it like you have right now. And what you do with it during these last years will largely determine how good it is… *** FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE ***.

(Though aptitude is slightly plastic all through life, recent studies are revealing)

That needs to be common knowledge too. It, in my view, is the most important reason why we need to be studying lots of different “traditional” subjects.

“We’re so glad you came to worship with us this morning.  What brings you to Mount Zion today?”

“Well, my class full of mostly white teacher wannabes wanted me to come down and see what it’s like to be a minority.  So I’m here!  I’m a minority!”

That sounds SO BAD.  The truth is, I’ve always wanted to visit this church.  I love the worship style of African American congregations.  My kids are going with me.  Not to see the show.  Not to “be the minority” either.  But to dive in to a worship experience with a genuine, loving heart.

So I was looking up directions and came across Google’s street view of this beautiful old church:

Mount Zion Baptist Church - beautiful buildings - Wires courtesy of the City of Asheville and serving utilities.

Yeah so…. I’m embarrassed.  It’s the wires.  The beautiful architecture, replete with rich history and a heritage of a struggling people are still bound by the cables of discrimination.  We need to get this cleaned up.  I hate wires in general, but to have them mar such a public building, such a historical site, is disgraceful.  DISGRACEFUL.  On Monday a letter to the government of Asheville goes out.  It’s not much, but it’s something.

]]> http://www.shatuga.com/2010/02/20/beauty-is-still-bound/feed/ 2 http://www.shatuga.com/2010/02/06/no-child-moves-ahead/ http://www.shatuga.com/2010/02/06/no-child-moves-ahead/#comments Sun, 07 Feb 2010 02:49:46 +0000 shatuga http://www.shatuga.com/?p=107 No Child Moves Ahead
Gifted versus “Special” Education in the U.S. Public Schools

In 2007 the federal government spent in excess of 25 billion dollars annually funding the education of underachieving and handicapped children, in contrast to 7.5 million dollars annually (1/3300) funding the education of the gifted (Ed.Gov, 2007).  John Cloud’s recent article in Time magazine, “Are we Failing Our Geniuses,”  highlights the neglect of our nation’s mentally elite.   “In a no-child-left-behind conception of public education, lifting everyone up to a minimum level is more important than allowing students to excel to their limit.”   (Cloud, p. 3).

If the aims of public education are to educate for political participation, ensure civility, prepare for work roles, promote social responsibility and mitigate social problems, and convey cognitive skills, substantive knowledge and inquiry skills (Hilty Slides, 2009) then the omission of gifted education is not contrary to the goals of  public education.  Absent from these goals is a notion of student attainment to full potential. Indeed, there is an expectation that all children should meet some minimal proficiency, in some cases irrespective of their ability to achieve it.

Walker and Soltis Curriculum and Aims (W&S) detail the philosophy of curriculum development in public schools, including those of Apple and his  Ideology and Curriculum, stating that “schooling functions … to reproduce and sustain an unjust, inequitable, and inhumane maldistribution of power.”  (W&S p. 72 on Apple’s Ideology and Curriculum).  In an odd turnabout of standards, the treatment of gifted children in the U.S. public education system seems to confirm this claim, as the educational machinery exercises its disdain and jealousy of the most endowed minds in our country by denying them an opportunity to pursue their potential.  Knowledge is the currency of power in a culture, and in our public schools, these children are not being taught what they could learn.  They are victims of the “Criterion Steering Group” of Dahllof, wherein “teachers set the pace of a class’s progress through the course material by depending on the performance of some subset of the class”  (W&S p. 75), usually a subset below class average.  “Advocates for gifted kids consider one of the most pernicious results to be ‘cooperative learning’ arrangements in which high-ability students are paired with struggling kids on projects”  (Cloud, p. 5).  By contrast, children who are able to skip grades and proceed at their own pace, even without special assistance, turn out socially well adjusted and achieve academic success. (Cloud, p. 6).

Gifted children by nature may not need the coddling support of the disadvantaged, since they are able to learn independently in many cases.  Educational systems should allow them to proceed through the curriculum at an accelerated pace if necessary, and should provide them with minimal support through that process.  Moreover, an incorporation of personal well-being and the importance of achieving one’s potential need to be incorporated into the aims of public education.  After all, for most of us, our best teachers are the ones that pushed us to achieve to our full capabilities, showing concern and care for us as students even in the midst of their hectic teaching schedules.

The philosophy of “No Child Left Behind” is a blind admonishment to the fast pace of the gifted.  Are they not allowed to move ahead?  While intelligence or giftedness does not make one a better person, given the dramatic range for human intelligence differential abilities should imply differential pacing. To do otherwise is on the one hand a saddling of the disadvantaged with unrealistic expectations, while on the other hand a squandering of the gifts of the gifted.  “No Child Left Behind” by its nature implies that “No Child Moves Ahead.”  Public educational philosophy should be recast as “Every Child To Their Best” instead.

References:
ED.gov, “Title I — Improving The Academic Achievement Of The Disadvantaged” as portrayed by:  http://www2.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/esea02/pg1.html

Ed.Gov, “Jacob K. Javits Gifted and Talented Students Education Program” as seen by: http://www2.ed.gov/programs/javits/funding.html

http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/quiz/quiz1.htm

My first feelings were frustration at being asked to differentiate between statistics as absolute numbers and not as relative values. But then I began to focus on the questions, rather than the answers, realizing that the answers were not so much the point.

Rather, the point is that the perception of the condition of our nation very much differs from the reality, and that our culture maintains and even furthers a wide disparity between class, race, wealth,and orientation.

It makes me sick, frankly.  I am recalling a conversation with a friend who works with lawyers and is helping a judge run for election, and we were discussing why it is that so few judges are ever contested in their elections.  The fact is that most lawyers don’t want to give up their high salaries to serve as judges, because they would trade wealth for power.

I am deeply saddened by the statistics that this quiz uncovers.  And I believe it’s time to become more assertive, more of an advocate for the disenfranchised and underserved, and more vocal about speaking out against the horrible bias in wealth distribution as well as the inequities in law enforcement that are indicative of a sick, perverted culture that advocates luxuriant wealth and self-interest over the well-being of the “huddled masses” that our statue of Liberty requests come to this place.

You picked me out of the cereal bowl!!! nooooo!!!!!

I spent my whole life for just this moment!  I wanted to be digested, not left to rot in some garbage can.

I spent my whole life making myself sweet for you!

And now….

…and now…

….. you’re just going to throw meee awaaaaay.

I am appalled by the lack of social responsibility of companies and the wealthy in our country, and that people actually stand for this. As a shareholder, I’m outraged.  As a citizen, I am too!  Add to that the fact that Republicans are whining (yes, whining) about the increase in Medicare tax on people who make more than $200,000 a year……  I’m sorry. Pay your share, people.  We all built this great nation of ours together.  If your stake in our nation’s profits is that high, your responsibility should be high as well!

Off the top of my head I can think of a hundred thousand lives that would be changed by a gift of half of that money.  Come on, George H.W. Bush, open up your trickle down spigot a bit more, please!