Great Expectations

I am registered at a professional web site called Linkedin. At this site I am a member of several groups, including an alumni group for Governors State University (GSU), where I earned my Masters of Science in Science Teaching. Through a group, members can initiate a discussion thread by posting a question or comment. Last week a comment was posted from a disgruntled alum who is upset that he spent “thousands of dollars” on an education, but can’t find a job. He claims he has sent out over 1000 applications/resumes, but has only been offered a job that pays $9/hr. His degree is in “Interdisciplinary Studies, (IDSS).”

The economy is as bad as I have ever seen in my 50+ years, many recent grads being unable to find gainful employment in their fields of study. I just can’t help but wonder what a degree in IDSS qualifies you to do. I went to the GSU website and attempted to find out what IDSS was, but after reading all the information there am still clueless. Apparently, IDDS is for students who started college at some point, but quit before finishing a degree. IDSS allows a student to use previous credits, “life experiences”, and at least 60 hours at GSU to earn a degree. Nowhere on the GSU site does it say exactly what area the 60 credits must be in. Apparently they can be in anything; so with no area of concentration it is no surprise that graduates of this program have a college degree, but no skills to land a real job.

I attach significant blame here to any university that would offer such a worthless degree and charge tuition for it. Have they no shame? I suggest he take the $9/hr job where he might actually gain some marketable skills.

The situation reminds me of a student I taught in the mid 80’s. She was brilliant, one of the best I have ever taught. After graduation, she went off to university where she planned on studying to become a doctor. I ran into her mother several years later and was surprised to find that the girl had changed her major to “Women’s Studies”, graduated, and began working in a woman’s shelter as a counselor. The mother was understandably upset, feeling her daughter had thrown away a chance to make something out of herself, and asked be to talk to the daughter. I contacted her and we had a long, interesting conversation. The young woman argued that the women she worked with needed help and she felt responsible (as a woman) to assist them. I pointed out that if she went to Med School or Law School she could be much more helpful as a doctor or Attorney/Advocate for the women at the shelter. She replied that if she went to Med School or Law School she would not be able to help these women for many more years, and they needed help now. I never saw her again and don’t know what she is doing now. Fortunately she is the exception; most promising students actually do get a degree that really qualifies them the get a job and actually help people in a meaningful way.


The expectations students have for their lives illustrates how little they know about life and how to prepare for it. Last week my homeroom class filled out a questionere concerning their “life goals.” One of the questions asked them to state their goals. Most comment were reasonable. Things like; “I want to be successful”, “I want to be healthy and happy”, and “I would like to stay religious, and keep in touch with my friends and family.” Others were not quite so realistic. One boy wanted to live in a castle. Another girl wrote, “I want a splendid, unforgettable, remarkable, perfect life.” The most interesting comment was by my worst student that period. She is in Honors Chemistry and has gotten the lowest grade on each of the first three exams—though she is not the least capable of my students. Her comment was, “I want to be a doctor or a lawyer. I want to live in a huge house, at least three floors, and have three maids, a butler, and a chef.”

She will probably end up working in a woman’s shelter.

Sometimes You Get the Bear, and Sometimes the Bear Gets You.

It is Labor Day, and I am writing this while watching a show on Scandinavian cooking. The meal he is fixing consists of cooked carrots, baked celery root, and grilled pork chops. It was served with a cool glass of beer and looked grand.

Except for Friday, when I apparently made two young ladies cry, last week was a pretty good week. The crying had nothing to do with anything I said; it was, apparently, induced by a particularly difficult homework assignment. The first girl approached me before class to inform me that she could not do several of the problems on the assignment that was due that day. She asked for some help, her eyes swelling up with tears as she spoke. Being a man, I am not very good at dealing with an upset woman. I tried to comfort her by pointing out that the problems in question were worth only a few points in a 50 point assignment. This did not seem to make her feel any better as she said, in a breaking voice, “I never wasn’t able to finish a homework assignment before—not ever.” At the end of class another girl came up to me and said that she needed help; informing me that her homework was a mess and she did not understand anything. She wanted to know if I was going to send her down from honors chemistry to a regular level class. Then she began to cry, saying that she did not want to drop down. I told her that it was too soon to make that decision and that she should wait, at least, until she took the first exam. Both girls did much worse that the average on the assignment.

I am sure that I appeared quite hard and unemotional to both young ladies. What I wanted to say to both was, “Stop! There’s no crying in Chemistry!”, but that would have been insensitive. I am not an insensitive man—even if I don’t know how to handle a crying female. I tried to comfort each; letting them know that it wasn’t as bad as they thought and that many others had trouble with the same problems. Both of these statements were lies. The problems they had trouble with were simple density calculations, and the fact that they were completely stumped by them was a sure sign that neither belongs in Honors Chemistry; as well, most other students did them without turning into jelly. If either of them does poorly on the exam Wednesday, I may have to recommend that the drop down; though, I will not demand that they do.

The main problem each had difficulty with is given below:

Oxygen gas has a density of 1.43 g/L at a given temperature and pressure. What mass of oxygen gas is contained in a spherical balloon with a diameter of 15.0 cm? The formula for the volume of a sphere is 4/3∏r3.

In order to solve this problem you have to recognize that mass can be determined by multiplying density and volume. The density is clearly given in the problem, but the volume has to be calculated by using the formula for a sphere that was given, and knowing that the radius is half the diameter. Since these are all honors students, and all of them have to be in honors math, I would expect that they could make their way through the calculation without help. While this was true for most of the students, it was not for these two girls. We covered standard density problems in class the day before. After the exam on Wednesday I will have to check for other students who might benefit from some extra help, or by dropping down.

Summer vacation is over and I am back in the routine of waking at 6 o’clock each week day. The first full week of classes is done and I find myself comfortably into the swing of a new school year. The students I have been assigned appear to be both bright and enthusiastic—at least up to this point. With the first exam coming up soon I should know if appearances are deceiving; though, their honors Biology teacher from last year says that these students are very good workers.

Class sizes are reasonable, with the exception of advanced placement chemistry which has 30 students. A young man wanted to change his schedule the first week of school and come into my AP class, but the registrar and I told him no; the class being filled to capacity. Actually, 24 students would be ideal. They took an exam over the summer homework assignment I gave them in May and the scores were about average. In my mind, these scores are never high enough. I will need to step up the pace this year as the Chemistry exam is the first of the AP exams in May, giving me two weeks less than last year.

We did the first lab with my honors classes on Wednesday, and second period was quite exciting. About ten minutes into my explanation of the procedure I heard a thump, and turned to find one of my students flat on the floor. She had fainted, coming to almost immediately. We helped her up, and I found a stool for her to sit on while I evaluated her situation. She said that she had never fainted before, but declined a trip to the school nurse, insisting that she felt fine. I honored her request. About two minutes later a different young lady collapsed. Her situation was visibly different, looking like a seizure rather than simple fainting. Her eyes fluttered and rolled, her hands were clasped together and held tightly to her chest. The whole episode lasted about a minute. When she snapped out of it, she complained of blurry vision and a headache. Alarmed, I had her taken to the office to see the nurse. I have had other students faint before, but in all my years of teaching never two in the same period. I followed up with the school nurse the next period; telling her about my suspensions that it was a seizure, not simple fainting. She said that the girl seemed fine, but was picked up by her father and taken home all the same, adding that she had a doctor’s appointment for the next day. I reported the other girl who did not want to go to the office and the nurse decided to call her down to check her out too. Both young ladies showed up in class the next day, no worse for wear.

Thursday evening was the yearly “back-to-school” night where parents run through their student’s schedule during five minute periods. The evening was uneventful for me, but some teachers reported unpleasant encounters with parents. One Spanish teacher recounted how he was ambushed by a parent. Her daughter has a D, based on a single recorded assignment the first week of school. He admitted that he would not be entering grades as quickly in the future based on his encounter with the ridicules parent.

My evening was much tamer. After 35+ years, most of the parents I encountered were either former students, or parents of former students. Being a known commodity works in your favor—unless you have been an ass.

My favorite Woody Allen movie is “Love and Death”, hence the picture above. One of my favorite lines in any of his movies was not in it, but in another whose name I can’t remember. “Those who can, do, and those who can’t, teach-- and those who can’t teach, teach P.E.”

Sadly, it is true that many people believe that someone goes into teaching because he or she could not hack it in the real world. As well, most people believe they could do as good a job or better teaching students anything they happen to know (or think they know) something about. The Chicago Public Schools use this widespread feeling among the populace to lower their costs. Experienced teachers are fired, usually when a school is being “reorganized” because of poor performance, and replaced by new teachers recruited from industry to enter the teaching profession. This happened to a friend who taught in the CPS system. When his school was reorganized all the teachers had to re-apply for their positions; most of those hired back had five or less years of experience. He had taught for 20 years and was too “expensive” to rehire. His replacement was a woman who had left her job as a chemist in the private sector to become a high school teacher. She was paid at the level of a first year teacher, saving the school tens of thousands of dollars. He found out from a colleague that she quit after three weeks. Depending on who you talk to, this practice may occur frequently. School administrators get away with this by convincing the media that there aren’t enough teachers when no such shortage exists.

Recently, the federal government has proposed a new multi-billion dollar stimulus package which they claim will save the jobs of many fo the teachers that have been laid off. In reality, the money, if allocated, will be used to hire additional first year teachers—the experienced teachers that have been laid off will not be getting their jobs back. Make no mistake about it, many public school administrators believe that a trained monkey could do as good a job as many teachers; and would hire one if they could get away with it. With teaching salaries being 75% or more of school budgets, the incentive is high to purge the highest paid staff whenever possible. Union contracts usually prevent this from happening; but when a CPS school is deemed failing by the central office teacher tenure and seniority are canceled. It is a puzzle to me why the teacher’s union doesn’t put up a fight when these things happen. Maybe they don’t care; union dues are the same for everyone, regardless of their experience.

Don’t get me wrong here; I’m not implying that experienced teachers are always better than inexperienced teachers. Many experienced teachers have given up and are just “phoning it in” until they have acquired enough years to retire at full pension. I feel that decisions about teacher retention should be made based on effectiveness, not seniority or, on the other hand, how cheap someone is to employ. Seniority and salary are both easy to measure, so they are easy to use in retention decisions. Measuring effectiveness is much more difficult. In my mind, the best measure of effectiveness is to pre and post test students; measuring effectiveness by student improvement.

Allow me to illustrate. You are asked to determine which of two cars is faster. Both are on I-80, making their way to California from Chicago. You locate each vehicle using their GPS system and determine that one is near Denver, the other is in Omaha. You report that the car near Denver is the faster of the two; Denver being closer to California than Omaha. This is the equivalent of using post testing only, something like exams on state objectives, to measure the effectiveness of a teacher. Maybe the vehicle in Denver left Chicago a month ago, and the vehicle in Omaha left yesterday. Now which one is faster?

I am going to test my method this school year. Over the summer I generated a test consisting of 50 multiple choice questions that cover the major concepts in chemistry. I will give this exam to my students the first week of school and again the last week of school. By doing this I hope to verify that the students actually learned something this year.

The family reunion last week was an enjoyable Sunday. Seeing my cousins is always a treat—especially since I see some of them only once a year at this event. My cousin Lori wanted everyone to tell a story about our grandmother and we each recounted a fond memory of her. The older cousins, me included, remember her old house; while the younger ones remember the home she moved into in 1974 when the old house was taken by the city to build the new city hall parking lot. I remembered walking the 2 blocks from my grade school to have lunch with her and my great aunt from time to time. I also remembered watching the yearly Christmas Parade that went past her home from the comfort of her front porch. My uncle, her youngest child, remembered sitting around her kitchen table with his friends when he was in high school eating pasta. His friends loved to visit because my grandmother would always feed whoever showed up. My cousin Kathy remembers how dark and scary her basement was, while my cousin Michael, the problem child, remembered how he would try her patients with his child-like mischief.

One of the things I look for when my wife and I shop antique stores and estate sales are old math and science books. My uncle knows this, and when he runs across one he usually picks it up for me. On this day he presented me with three finds that turned up at an estate sale. They were purchased for a total of $1.50.

One, “Primary Arithmetic” published in 1902, was intended to be used, in the words of the author,“ by boys and girls who know the numbers from one to ten thoroughly.” The two year program was based on the belief that students should learn by reading about a topic. The preface contains the following quote from an address to the National Association of Education in 1896 by W.T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education.
“If a child learns how to use the text-book, he learns how to make use of the experience of mankind. The text book enables the child to do individual work for himself, and helps him to become independent of oral teaching.”

In my mind, this is probably the most important concept in education ever proposed. As my former high school English teacher and a retired colleague told me a long time ago, “The word education comes from the Latin root ‘educo,’ which means ‘to draw out from’ not to pour into!”

In another of the books titled “Graded Work in Arithmetic—Eighth Year” published in 1902, the author outlines a set of 91 lessons for the 8th grade student to master. I found the following problem in lesson 6;
A dealer bought a lot of tinware for 19/16th of its value, and sold it for 11/12th of its value. If his loss was $32.50, how much did he pay for it?
The correct answer is $142.50. I am planning on giving this problem to my advanced placement chemistry students to see how they do on it. My guess is that almost none of them will be able to solve it correctly. Email me if you want to know how to solve the problem.

The last of the books was titled “Manu-Mental” Computations, published in 1904. The author is Woodford D. Anderson who was a professor at Missouri Wesleyan College and the University of South Dakota. One of the most interesting things about this book is that it was autographed by the author on the inside front cover with a note of appreciation to one of his professors. I haven’t yet figured out what the process is all about, but it has something to do with multiplying and dividing using the joints of the fingers and the positions of the tips of the fingers. When I get some spare time I plan to read the book (94 pages) and figure it out.

Picture Day

Picture day went off without any significant problems. I signed up to monitor the picture line for both morning sessions, fulfilling my two extracurricular activities for the year. Our job was to check that students were in appropriate dress code for their ID photo, which is also their yearbook picture. Both boys and girls are required to wear a collared shirt; what they wear below the waist is not an issue. The boys are required to be clean shaven and have a proper hair cut--we are a private school. We sent one girl home that had died her hair pink--no outrageous hair colors allowed, 6-8 boys who had not gotten their hair cut short enough, and several young men who did not shave.

One of the boys approached for not shaving was accompanied by his father who objected, asking the teacher, who has a mustache, why his son had to shave when he did not. The teacher did not want to make a scene, so he got another teacher, who was clean shaven, to take over. At this point the father became angry and left with the son. Later they returned and he tried to sneak onto the line again. Those of us who were there noticed and I suggested that we back off and report the incident to the assistant principal in charge. The assistant principal pulled the boy and his father out of the line and sent them home. While most parents are respectful and cooperative, this is an example of the other kind we sometimes have to deal with.

My bike riding this summer has been relaxing and has improved my average blood sugar levels. The cell phone I found earlier this summer was returned to its owner. The next few weeks turned up some found change and a few tennis balls in the street across from a local court. Yesterday I found a credit card at the curb in front of an apartment complex along my regular route. I took it home and called the bank on the card to report I had found it. They took the information and asked me to destroy the card.

On my father’s side of the family I am the 5th of 12 grandchildren. Two of my older cousins have passed away, and another is gravely ill; having contracted a malignant form of brain cancer. She is on her 70’s and has been given only a couple of months to live. Tomorrow I will take my only surviving aunt--my father’s sister--to see my cousin (her niece) in the nursing home where she is living. I promised my aunt I would take her to see my cousin several weeks ago, as much for myself and for her. My cousin’s sister-in-law will also be coming. I don’t know what to expect when I see her. We hope that she will be feeling well enough to go to lunch with us, having been told by her children that she is able to make short trips if she is strong enough that day. At any rate, I am fairly certain that it will be the last time I see her alive.

The To-Do List

Last Monday marked the end of a very uncomfortable week at our home. On the 4th of July our central air conditioner broke, leaving us exposed to the oppressive summer heat. It was a failed weld on the heat exchanger that allowed all the Freon to escape. The part was still under warranty, but a replacement had to be sent from the warehouse and could not be installed until Monday. The house is cool now and everything is back to normal.

Yesterday I was able to access my AP Chemistry scores from the College Board website. Almost all of my students did quite well. Those who did not achieve as I would have liked were no surprise. On a national basis, somewhere between 50 and 60% of students taking the exam get a high enough grade to receive some kind of college credit for taking the class. In my two classes almost 80% scored this well. Every year I invite all my students who score well enough to receive college credit out to dinner sometime during the next school year. There will be 30 students who qualify from this year’s class. Last year 15 out of 24 students who qualified went to dinner with my wife and I in March. I would like to have the dinner earlier this year, maybe as part of the homecoming week celebration in September.

Tomorrow, a new garage door is being installed. I have spent the last three days cleaning out the garage of all the accumulated junk so the door can be installed. Most of the junk in the garage consisted of left over materials from our home remodeling; including 17 interior doors that were replaced. The old doors were solid wood with an oak veneer. They proved too difficult to refinish and we ended up replacing all of them instead. I hate throwing anything away, so they were stored in the garage in the hopes of finding some use for them. I wanted to cut them in half and use them for wainscoting in the finished basement, but my wife said no. I ended up advertising them on Craig’s List and found someone who wanted them to build a privacy fence in his back yard. I kept one, along with the two parts to an old vanity to make a new workbench. After the doors were removed I purged four garbage cans of junk and useless building materials leaving a clean, organized, and almost empty garage. With the instillation of the new garage door tomorrow most of my summer projects will be complete.

My summer routine has slowly evolved. I get up at seven and have coffee and something to eat; on the deck if the weather permits. I work on school related things for next year for about one to two hours on my laptop—on the deck as well—then go for my daily bike ride. When I return I check my blood sugar, eat lunch, and shower. The rest of the afternoon I work on my summer to-do list until dinner. Once a week, usually on Monday, I go out for breakfast, go to school, work for several hours, then run errands. On those days I usually skip the bike ride. My next home project will be to order some mulch and spread it around where needed in the yard, and then make some needed repairs on the storage shed. If all goes well and my wife doesn’t add any new jobs to my list, I should have two or three weeks of complete rest before the grind of a new school year begins.

Summer's Half-Way Point

The 4th of July is my birthday. In my younger years, the 4th was always a family get-together. The event started at the home of my mother’s cousin who had a home on 2 acres and attracted from 50 to 60 relatives. Most of those people are dead now and as my mother’s cousin became ill the event broke up into several smaller parties. My uncle took over about 25 years ago; the attendance becoming my grandmother and her 5 children, 20 grandchildren, and 12 great grandchildren. Twelve years ago we stopped getting together on the 4th and replaced it with a family reunion later in July. This is run by my two uncles on my mother’s side, and will eventually fall to their sons when they leave us. Only 3 of my grandmother’s 5 children are still with us, my mother and one of her sisters having passed away. Since the death of my older cousin in a car accident 30 years ago I have been the oldest of the grandchildren. This reunion is literally the only time I see some of my cousins because they live out of town and don’t come in for Christmas. We get together again this year on July 25th and I am looking forward to it.

Most teachers at my school consider the 4th of July holiday the half-way point in the summer vacation. We just received information about picture day, July 23rd. Every summer, on the last day of summer school, the school schedules new ID pictures for all students. The students come in and have a new photo taken; the photo is used to generate a new student ID for next school year and doubles as their yearbook photo. At the same time, students pick up their new schedule for September, and find out who their teachers will be for the next school year. Students who have a problem with their schedule, or just want to change it have an opportunity to speak with the registrar. Needless to say, the line outside her office is 20 deep for hours.

The next several weeks after ID day I will field numerous calls to have students moved from one level of Biology to another. Usually, the parent wants her son or daughter moved into Honors Biology. The reason given for the placement request is that the feel that their student belongs in a higher level. In reality, it is because they have found that their son or daughter has been placed in a particular teacher’s class and, because they have heard bad things about this teacher, they want them moved to another. The registrar will not move students because of a request like this--only the principal has the authority to change teachers within a level, so the parent contacts me (department chairman) to request the level change; which would result in the teacher change they wanted in the first place. We are aware of this ploy, and I turn their names over to the Honors Biology teacher who makes the final decision--which is almost always no.

I usually volunteer to help supervise the picture line on this day; giving me a chance to visit with former students as they line up to have their photo taken as well as catching up with colleagues I don’t have contact with during the summer. Teachers are required to “volunteer” for two activities every school year, and since we all have to come in to have our ID photo’s taken anyway, my attendance takes care of one of these. I also hope to meet with the new Physics/Chemistry teacher on this day and get her up to date with the Chemistry syllabus. She has already meet with the Physics teacher and been brought up to speed with him. If things go well I will be home by noon.

$6.26

For those of you who are pay attention to those things; this is my 100th post.

The beginning of the summer has been very productive so far. I have completed several minor projects, began my summer riding program, and arranged a short vacation for my wife and myself.

The school community suffered a tragic loss when a sophomore girl was killed in a car accident on Memorial Day. She was not one of my students, but everyone tells me that she was a wonderful young lady. The wake was so crowded that people waited in line for almost an hour to view the body and speak with the family. The accident occurred during a thunderstorm, her boyfriend losing control of the car on the wet pavement. He was not hurt badly, but she received significant head injuries. Reportedly she never came out of the coma. I can’t imagine the pain her parents must be going through.

My yearly physical resulted in my doctor recommending that I began taking insulin for my type II diabetes. I just began taking 30 units of Lantus every day. Actually, tasking the insulin was my idea, my blood sugar being more and more difficult to control with oral medication. When I mentioned to my doctor that I thought it was time to begin the Lantus, he agreed and wrote my first prescription. After a week I am comfortable with giving myself the injections.

The weather being rainy last week, I cleaned out the garage--one of the major items on my to-do list. I still need to set up my work bench, but first need to get rid of 17 interior wood doors that are left over from the major remodel we did over the last three years. As soon as these are gone I will use the old vanity to make a base for my new work bench; maybe keeping one of the doors for a bench-top.

The last three bike rides I took resulted in me getting soaked when a sudden thunderstorm showed up. Each time the weather report said it would be fine and each time I got caught in a downpour. Today it was overcast and the predictions were for strong storms in the early afternoon, so I stayed home and planted some perennials around the house. As you might guess, not a drop of rain fell.

My bike riding has turned up some interesting finds this year. In the past ten years I have found cell phones, a police scanner, various tools (screw drivers, wrenches, and even a rather nice aluminum carpenter’s square), CD’s and the odd change as I ride. I have been able to return every cell phone to its proper owner and the police scanner to the city. I have kept the tools, CD’s and change for myself. This summer I have found another cell phone and will return it to the owner this evening. I managed to find the owner by calling the last number he dialed. Last week I found a $5 bill in the gutter along one street I bike on. Another day I found 85 cents (three quarters and a dime) along the curb in front of a home. Yesterday I found another 41 cents in various places. The total for the year so far is $6.26. This type of minutia occupies my mind in the summer; relaxing me and relieving the stress of a hectic year.

Tomorrow afternoon I take my wife to the eye doctor. Afterwards, we plan on meeting my friend from the Theology Department for an early dinner. On Thursday my wife and I leave for Michigan on a short vacation--leaving my adult daughter in charge of the house in our absence.

The tulips I planted last fall are in full bloom today. I am on “Easter Break” as are most other Catholic schools in the area and I had hoped to get out for a bike ride every day, but cold rain has been falling since early this week and I have been inside working on the computer every day. I have accomplished much this week, but still have a few things to do. On the first day of the break I finalized my search for a new car, trading in my 2001 Saturn with 118,000 miles for a brand new 2010 Honda CR-V. This is the newest car I have ever owned; having only 11 miles on the odometer when I drove it off the lot. On the second day of my break I went to city hall to register my new vehicle and obtain a new city sticker, then meet with my insurance agent to arrange to transfer the policy. This was followed by a shopping trip to buy some new clothes.

We are looking for a Physics teacher again. The one we hired last year has a PhD and was hired by a local university for next year. We had hoped that he would stay for at least a few years, but that was not to be. Finding a suitable replacement, even in this time of school staff cutbacks, will be a problem because of the fact that our AP Physics is Calculus based.

Aside from the Physics teacher I do not think anyone on the staff is planning on leaving or retiring this year. The job market for teachers is tighter than I can ever remember. Almost no schools are hiring additional staff; almost all are cutting to save money. The Chicago Public Schools are facing a deficit that could be 1 billion dollars, if the worst of the predictions come true; and many local suburban districts face equally crippling financial woes. The state will not be able to bail out the districts this time because of their own multi-billion dollar deficit. The only solution will be cuts in programs and an increase in class size. The teachers unions would like you to think that a small increase in taxes would solve the temporary problems—but their past greed has caused this problem and tax increases will not be able to make things right. Their pension entitlements alone will bankrupt the state in a few years if these obligations are not revised. It is altogether possible that most of them will never see their pensions funded in full. Thankfully, my retirement is not dependent on the state’s ability to fund my pension. As a private school teacher, my pension is based on my conservatively invested 401K and whatever I get from social security. While my probable retirement income is less that the public school teachers have been promised; it is probably more that many of them they will ever see.

The weather during our current break has been terrible; either rain, cold, or both every day. Today is looking better and I may be able to take a bike ride later. It is about 9 am on Friday morning and I will finish my lesson plans for next week after I save this post. Over the last two days I have been stuck inside because of the weather so I have completed most of my to-do list during the break; contacting the local regional office of education about changes to my teaching certificate, contacting the Illinois Toll-way site to register my new car on my IPASS account, order some accessories online for the Honda, and resolving some problems with my antivirus software with the publisher. I then installed my Income Tax program and completed my 2009 tax return. The only thing on my to-do list not yet completed is the outside work I planned in my garden; but this should be finished Saturday of Sunday if the weather improves.

My wife and I are planning to go out to dinner tonight with my friend from the Theology Department and do some antique shopping tomorrow. All-in-all I would say that this break has been one of the most productive in years.

Loyality to your Team

My uncle, a former high school teacher, is known to say, “When I become King . . . . ,“ followed by some edict that could not be enforced because of our constitutional rights. Most of the time he is correct concerning the problem, but he suggests an unworkable solution. I have my own list of things I would do if I were King, and on the top of that list is getting rid of high school athletics.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not against children taking part in sports activities. I am opposed to the school being responsible for their organization and funding. Especially in these cash strapped times, money spent to pay a coach should be redirected to seeing that the advanced language teacher isn’t laid off or the Biology class size doesn’t rise to 40 in order to save money. Most serious high school athletes play club sports outside of school, so why duplicate costs by allowing schools to run programs as well.
Some would argue that club sports are expensive and that would price many deserving athletes out of the market. Schools, they would argue, allow everyone to take part in organized athletic activities at little or no cost to the parent. I would argue in response that they are wrong. Many club teams charge huge fees to take part, as high as $5000+ for some elite teams. When my daughter played club volleyball we paid about $1200 for the season, plus the cost of equipment and expenses when the team traveled out of town. At the time I was surprised to find out that some of the girls on her team paid nothing. These young women were extremely talented and were recruited by numerous teams, having all fees waived if they agreed to play for the club. The cost of this “scholarship” was paid for by the others who, because they lacked exceptional talent, had to pay to play. If your child has exceptional talent he or she can play for a club team at no cost to you; if not, try your local park district, or pay to join a club. Clubs recruit paying players by claiming that they will improve the child’s skills; while in reality they take the money and give special treatment and playing time to the elite members of the team.
My interest in writing about this topic today is because of a conversation I had with a student last week. The girl informed me that she would not be in school Friday because she was leaving town for a volleyball tournament. I asked which team she played for and we talked for about five minutes about her upcoming tournaments. I found out that the big national qualifying tournament was going to be on the weekend of Prom, and she expressed sadness that she would have to miss the dance because of her commitment to the team. I praised her for her loyalty to the club and asked if the team would be as loyal to her. She looked puzzled and asked what I meant. “Suppose a new girl moved into the area and joined the team” I asked, “and suppose she was a better player that you, or the coach thought she might be a better player, would you lose your starting position to her?” She agreed that she would lose her position if that happened. “That wouldn’t be very loyal to you would it?” I asked. She didn’t answer, but looked confused and uncomfortable. “Why would you be more loyal to the club than it would be to you?” were my final words to her before she made her way off to lunch.
If you go away with nothing else from this, remember that any coach on any level is only concerned with winning. Their loyalty to a player is based only on what that player can do for them, and lasts only as long as nobody else comes along who can do it better.

thx 4 txtN M abt yr prob . Ill gt bac TU soon

Recently my daughter convinced me that texting would be a good idea. I would regularly call her on the cell phone to see what was going on, only to have her complain that I was interrupting whatever she was doing. She explained to me that expecting people to answer their phone every time it rings was unreasonable; adding that many times she is busy. She suggested that I text instead and she would reply when she had time. Old people, like me, have trouble understanding youth and their slavery to new technology. I still like to talk to people from time to time; and besides, my fingers are too big to text easily.

I agreed to text her when I just wanted to find out what was going on, trying out my new skill on New Years Eve at about 11:45. She was out with friends at a party and I texted her a “happy new year” message instead of calling like usual. Within five minutes she replied, returning the greeting and letting me know that her girlfriends also sent their regards. We now text regularly, unless it is important enough to require a conversation; and I have realized how effective and convenient this method of communication can be, especially when I don’t want to actually speak to someone.

I have known for many years that email is an effective way to contact parents. Just like most teachers, I dislike having to talk to parents. Email is a way to send and receive information without having to actually have a conversation. In the old days, when a student misbehaved in class, I would have to contact the parent by phone to discuss the problem. Many times this would take several days as we played phone tag with each other. When we finally did connect, built up frustration would often make our contact less than satisfactory. Now I just email, and wait for a reply. When I hear back from them my rule is not to reply for at least an hour, the cooling off period being an effective way to keep the “conversation” civil. It has worked quite well so far for me.

Last semester I attended a conference on using the internet in the classroom. One of the topics was using “wikis” with students. I have never used one, but a wiki appears to be a web page where students can collaborate on an assignment without being physically together. The last NSTA newsletter gave examples of how actual teachers use this technology in their classrooms. I am skeptical. A woman at the conference told the presenter that she was overworked already, and didn’t need another thing to do every day; resulting in agreement among the rest of us. I have always felt that the best way to solve problems collaboratively was to sit around a table together and work things out, face-to-face. Why students, who are physically together in the school building every day, would need to wait until they are home and apart to work “together” on a project seems to be ass-backwards; but apparently I am just another old guy who isn’t “with it.”

I guess I shouldn’t complain too much. Two days ago I texted the father of one of my tutoring students’ letting him knows that he forgot to leave me a check for the last session. I reminded him when I was coming next and let him know how much to make the check out for. It was waiting for me at my next visit, and I never had to have an awkward conversation with him about the problem, or for that matter even see him. For better or worse, technology is here to stay.

Alliance for Climate Education

Last Wednesday I got a message from a school administrator on the east coast concerning the Alliance on Climate Education (ACE). ACE had proposed to do a presentation for their students and the administrator, being responsible, checked their web site and found that they had us listed as a school that had hosted them before. She was interested in finding out how I felt about the ACE presentation before she committed to them. Below is the text of my email to her…

We had the Alliance on Climate Education present in the fall. Our science staff is split on their feelings. Some of my teachers feel it was an excellent presentation and would take their classes again. Several others feel (like I do) that the presentation was very light on science and very heavy on propaganda. While I would not oppose them returning, I would not be bringing my classes to see the presentation.

Specifically, I was disturbed by the speakers request that our students get their cell phones out and send a text. I do not recall the reason he gave, but it was clear he was attempting to generate a "call list" that could be accessed later. I believe that he intended, later, to contact everyone on the list and ask them to contact government officials, industry, the media .....in order to influence their actions. I am very non-political, and this tactic bothers me to no end--they are children. After the first period presentation I warned two other classes I was bringing not to send the text when asked, and decided not to bring my Advanced Placement students, feeling it would be a waste of their time.

On the other hand our students enjoyed the presentation--it was well done and very professional. It might be more appropriate for a "Social Justice" class than a "science class." I hope this helps. If you have any other questions feel free to reply.


She got back to me about 30 minutes later with this reply . . . .

Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to my inquiry. I agree with your feelings about putting students in a situation where they might be used by an organization. This information is very helpful to us and I will share it with our teachers.
Best regards,

Tens of thousands of children, poised to become part of the “solution” to the environmental crisis when contacted to do so is a powerful tool for those who want to influence the debate. I have no feelings one way or the other whether they allow ACE to present at their school. I do though have feelings about the insanity surrounding the current debate on global warming, and the immoral tactics employed by both sides. The insanity is so deep-seated that anyone who even suggests that there is a debate will be angrily denounced by both sides as a dangerous extremist, each side insisting that the evidence is overwhelming for their point of view. The ACE presentation our students were exposed to treated the “fact” of global warming as so undeniable that someone would have to be a very bad person, stupid, or possibly a Republican to deny it. I have seen presentations by the other side as well, and they are equally loathsome.
How do I feel? I don’t know. The debate has been so corrupted by lying and exaggeration on both sides that even someone like me, who was trained in science, doesn’t know who to believe. Falsifying data and intentionally instilling panic in the populace can’t be excused because you had some higher purpose. The politicians and scientists involved in this circus have no one to blame but themselves. To paraphrase; the pursuit of money is the root of all evil, and, no doubt, whoever is successful will make a fortune. And in either case, that fortune will come out of your pocket and mine.

The Permanent Solution to a Temporary Problem.

In thirty five years of teaching at my present school I have unhappily experienced the tragic death of students on several occasions. Two young men died at athletic events; both times because of an unknown heart condition. Back when I taught Biology, I lost a student to a severe brain infection. There have been numerous car accidents that unfortunately took young people’s lives. To date, no student has been murdered. I don’t know the exact number, but I would estimate the total in 35 years as around 20.

The death rate among people 15-24 is about 0.08% per year, about 15% of those are suicides. Our average student population predicts we should experience about 1 death a year, and we are a little below that number. These statistics do not dull the hurt of any single incidence, especially when the young man involved is your former student.

Last week at school we were in crisis mode because of the suicide of one of our seniors. The principal sent out a group voice message to all faculty members last Sunday night announcing the tragedy; and the next morning we had a meeting before school to apprise us of the facts, as they were known at the time, of the incident. My freshmen and sophomores were relatively unaffected by the news, very few showing any signs of grief. Most of them did not even know the young man. Many of the staff, including the principal, were visibly shaken, including one of his present teachers who could not stop crying. For me, it was difficult to get through first several periods as he was my student two years before. I remember him as a quiet, but gentle young man. He was a very good student, an athlete, and had many friends. He was dating a young lady at that time who I also had in class. Apparently, they had been together for almost three years before they broke up last year, remaining friends. I passed her in the halls just after the faculty meeting and, surrounded by friends, she was visibly sobbing. Word has it that he had been going out with another young lady and they recently broke it off. It would be easy to assume that this might have been the trigger that pushed him over the edge.
Not getting into too many details, he shot himself. The family is rumored to have several guns in the house and the word is that he shot himself with his own weapon. Over fifty percent of teen suicides used a gun—80% of those are males. Information also has surfaced that he was taking “something” for some unspecified “problem” and had recently gone off his meds. The combination of an untreated emotional/physiological problem with access to guns is a prescription for disaster.

Personally, I find it difficult to believe that he shot himself. I still suspect that it was an accident, thought everybody else thinks I am completely wrong. I can’t imagine how devastating this has been for his parents. As a parent myself it fills me with fear and panic—it could happen to anybody. At the wake, the line of students and parents was out the door; some reporting a wait in line of 40 minutes. The funeral at a local Parish filled the church to capacity with his grieving classmates, teachers, and administrators from school.

Our school community has always rallied to the challenge presented by a tragedy. In the week after this heartbreak almost twenty students came forward to report their concerns for a friend who they feared might be on a similar path. Each of these students were seen with their parents in order to inform them of the concerns and offer assistance getting help if it was deemed necessary. I hope I never have to see this happen again.