13 thoughts on “Open Line Friday!”

1. Clan Brophy sans the guns is a little better. Nobody died!

   

   Log in to Reply

   1. EEEW!!!  Still kinda creepy looking.

      Log in to Reply

   2. Look, that nice lady and her kids found a creepy-ass ventriloquist's dummy by the side of the road, and thought it'd be funny to take a picture with it…..

      Log in to Reply

2. Rush ain't drinkin' any Kool-Aid . . . that isn't Viagra flavored !!!

   Log in to Reply

   1. As usual, set up a straw man and knock him down.  I have never heard anyone except Rush say that either Obama or Clinton were the smartest people in the world.  They aren't and have never claimed to be.  I think both are smart, even very smart.  But, come on Rush.  Who ever said what you disagreed with???  The answer is that no one ever said it.

      Log in to Reply

3. This is why newspapers are losing readership.

   Log in to Reply

4. A warning to college profs from a high school teacher
   

   As a retired public school teacher, I believe I have a responsibility to offer a caution to college professors, or perhaps to make a plea.

   Please do not blame those of us in public schools for how unprepared for higher education the students arriving at your institutions are. We have very little say in what is happening to public education. Even the most distinguished and honored among us have trouble getting our voices heard in the discussion about educational policy. The National Teacher of the Year is supposed to be the representative of America’s teachers—if he or she cannot get teachers’ voices included, imagine how difficult it is for the rest of us. That is why, if you have not seen it, I strongly urge you to read 2009 National Teacher of the Year Anthony Mullen’s famous blog post, “Teachers Should Be Seen and Not Heard.” After listening to noneducators bloviate about schools and teaching without once asking for his opinion, he was finally asked what he thought. He offered the following:

   Where do I begin? I spent the last thirty minutes listening to a group of arrogant and condescending noneducators disrespect my colleagues and profession. I listened to a group of disingenuous people whose own self-interests guide their policies rather than the interests of children. I listened to a cabal of people who sit on national education committees that will have a profound impact on classroom teaching practices. And I heard nothing of value. “I’m thinking about the current health-care debate,” I said. “And I am wondering if I will be asked to sit on a national committee charged with the task of creating a core curriculum of medical procedures to be used in hospital emergency rooms.”

   The strange little man cocks his head and, suddenly, the fly on the wall has everyone’s attention.

   “I realize that most people would think I am unqualified to sit on such a committee because I am not a doctor, I have never worked in an emergency room, and I have never treated a single patient. So what? Today I have listened to people who are not teachers, have never worked in a classroom, and have never taught a single student tell me how to teach.”

   During my years in the classroom I tried to educate other adults about the realities of schools and students and teaching. I tried to help them understand the deleterious impact of policies that were being imposed on our public schools. I blogged, I wrote letters and op-eds for newspapers, and I spent a great deal of time speaking with and lobbying those in a position to influence policy, up to and including sitting members of the US House of Representatives and Senate and relevant members of their staffs. Ultimately, it was to little avail, because the drivers of the policies that are changing our schools—and thus increasingly presenting you with students ever less prepared for postsecondary academic work—are the wealthy corporations that profit from the policies they help define and the think tanks and activist organizations that have learned how to manipulate the levers of power, often to their own financial or ideological advantage.

   If you, as a higher education professional, are concerned about the quality of students arriving at your institution, you have a responsibility to step up and speak out. You need to inform those creating the policies about the damage they are doing to our young people, and how they are undermining those institutions in which you labor to make a difference in the minds and the lives of the young people you teach as well as in the fields in which you do your research.

   Log in to Reply

   1. Yes! This!

      Log in to Reply

   2. Thanks, Daft.

      Log in to Reply

5. "Have not drank"-Rush Limbaugh                                                                       Any more questions about which party supports education and which one doesn't? 

   Log in to Reply

   1. Clearly, Rush is not even the smartest dipshit in the room…

      Log in to Reply

6. Hick reveals true colors.

    

   First let us remember what Lord Acton said.

    

   "Absolute power corrupts absolutely" Edward Dalberg Acton, first Baron Acton (1834–1902).

    

   Hubbard would have swept this, thanks Vinnie.

   http://www.denverpost.com/editorials/ci_23824372/gov-hickenlooper-off-base-transparency-comment-time

    

   Log in to Reply

   1. Is there a cogent thought in your post?  This certainly doesn't further any coherent point you may be trying to make.  The original Nock may have disliked autocrats and believed governments are inherently corrupt, but Hickenlooper doesn't even approach being an autocrat.  Governments are reflective of all the vagaries, the good and the ill in human nature.  They always have been and always will be. Politics often can be a dirty business, hoping for a little balance, an understanding of how modern economies work, and a sense of pragmatism is the best we can hope for.  You are not helping.  Most of the people who post here are smart and informed. That is why I usually don't post here, but I do check in on occasion to learn something.  And this topic was discussed on Wednesday.  But referencing Coloradopols, perhaps you are still peeling yourself off the ceiling after learning that not everyone believes that there is, or even should be, total transparency in government.  Hickenlooper certainly must know that there is not, and that is what I find interesting in his comment.   Jane    

      Log in to Reply