Category Archives: art and music

Behind the science

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I found the comments in this post intriguing.   I’m like the others with the post itself, however, not too happy with it.

I didn’t know what STEM stood for, so I looked it up:  Science Technology Engineering Math.

I don’t know why education has to be divided into either/or with Math/Science and the Arts.  They both benefit from the other.  I would say Science benefits more from the arts than the other way around, but that’s just my take on it.

The comment on Darwin’s theory being used to justify power over others is spot on.  I don’t think Darwin meant for it to be interpreted that way.  Robert Shepherd asserts that Darwin saw all of us as interconnected, rather than adversaries as the social darwinists would have you believe.  I believe it, too.  That is one reason I became a vegetarian.  I only went back to eating meat because I had gotten sick and was advised that i should eat meat.  I think that we owe it to the animals who give their lives  for us some respect.  Factory farms do not do that.   Once again, it’s following the golden rule of doing unto others as we would have done to us.

Another comment was striking:

Sharon

September 14, 2013 at 7:22 pm

I think STEM is being oversold and that some skepticism is in order. Here is one personal story on top of those articles and the information provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

My daughter was very strong in math and ended up majoring in chemistry at a top-20 school. After college she was selected to be a paid intern in the research division of a successful pharmaceutical company. One year later she started in the PhD program for organic chemistry at a top University of California system school. STEM-speaking, this would all seem to paint a rosy picture for her future because she’s done everything right. Right?

But what she learned from working at the pharmaceutical company and from talking with other organic chemistry graduate students, was that much of the R&D in that particular STEM field is being increasingly outsourced to Asian countries. Not only that, but the pharmaceutical company was inclined to fill its labs with a large number of imported scientists (to save money). Some people have theorized that the reason for the current STEM push is to saturate the market with extremely educated scientists who then get stuck having to accept lower and lower wages.

In the STEM field of chemistry, American PhD graduates, even those from top universities, are not having an easy time finding work. These are people in their 20s who have been very, very self-disciplined about their schoolwork from the time they were in grade school. So, as far as our children’s futures go, pursuing any old STEM field does not guarantee success. But that is NOT what Arne Duncan or President Obama would have us all believe.

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Okay….here is someone who did everything right….and look what has happened to her.   (working for Big Pharma aside….)

Note the comment on Boeing wanting people getting a well-rounded education so they can “think outside the box”.  If it’s for airplanes, I don’t have a problem with it, but there’s just something wrong with teaching children better arts skills so they can find more creative ways….to kill people.

From the commenter Democracy:

The Sandia Report (Journal of Educational Research, May/June, 1993), published in the wake of A Nation at Risk, examined carefully its specific claims. The Sandia researchers concluded that:

* “..on nearly every measure we found steady or slightly improving trends.”

* “youth today [the 1980s] are choosing natural science and engineering degrees at a higher rate than their peers of the 1960s.”

“average performance of ‘traditional’ test takes on the SAT has actually improved over 30 points since 1975…”

* “Although it is true that the average SAT score has been declining since the sixties, the reason for the decline is not decreasing student performance. We found that the decline arises from the fact that more students in the bottom half of the class are taking the SAT than in years past…More people in America are aspiring to achieve a college education…so the national SAT average is lowered as more students in the 3rd and 4th quartiles of their high school classes take the test. This phenomenon, known as Simpson’s paradox, sows that an average can change in a direction opposite from all subgroups if the proportion of the total represented by the subgroups changes.”

* “business leaders surveyed are generally satisfied with the skill levels of their employees, and the problems that do exist do not appear to point to the k-12 education system as a root cause.”

“The student performance data clearly indicate that today’s youth are achieving levels of education at least as high as any previous generation.”

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He/She goes on to mention an article in Columbia Journalism Review by Beryl Lieff Benderly.    It’s really eye-opening to the myth of scarcity of math;/science majors.  It’s not hard to question who is putting this myth out there and why….especially when they are bringing in foreign workers who will work for lower pay.  Is the myth being created so that they can justify bringing in the foreign workers?  It would appear that way.

From the article:

It is a narrative that has been skillfully packaged and promoted by well-funded advocacy groups as essential to the national interest, but in reality it reflects the economic interests of tech companies and universities.

High-tech titans like Bill Gates, Steve Case, and Mark Zuckerberg are repeatedly quoted proclaiming a dearth of talent that imperils the nation’s future. 

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“When the companies say they can’t hire anyone, they mean that they can’t hire anyone at the wage they want to pay,” said Jennifer Hunt, a Rutgers University labor economist, at last year’s Mortimer Caplin Conference on the World Economy.

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And this, which alludes to the point I was making yesterday on the ageism in the corporate world:

For instance, tech companies that import temporary workers, mainly recent graduates from India, commonly discard more expensive, experienced employees in their late 30s or early 40s, often forcing them, as Ron Hira and other labor-force researchers note, to train their replacements as they exit. Age discrimination, Hira says, is “an open secret” in the tech world.

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I saw yet another blip the other day on the nooz of how many tech jobs are going unfilled because “there aren’t enough tech grads out there”….so now, after reading all of this, I realize they’re actually saying “there aren’t enough tech grads willing to work for minimum wage”.

And the whole debate on Science vs. Arts fails to include the argument for being well-rounded citizens who can think critically, analytically, with creativity of arts’ mindset.  I think art that is unscripted allows one freedom of expression that translates into, for want of a better word, “looseness”.  I think science is rigid where art is not (or shouldn’t be), and that translates into humanity’s acceptance of differences.  Perhaps I’m reading too much into it, but there you go…

 

 

 

A Year at Mission Hill

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Here are a couple of videos highlighting a school that adapts to the students’ needs rather than rigidity.  I would liken No Child Left a Mind to rigidity without creative expression of arts and music.

Chapter 7: Behind the Scenes

This video tells of the struggles of staff to help a student cope with emotional as well as intellectual stuff:

http://www.ayearatmissionhill.com/index.php/chapter7

 

The next one, the world of work, I think is wonderful in that it gives the kids hands-on experience.  I would applaud that kind of learning with books.  I think it takes both to really reach potential.

http://www.ayearatmissionhill.com/index.php/chapter8

 

The lie of privatization and schools

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Two topics that might not seem interrelated popped up this morning–the mindless demands that children perform like cogs….and the privatization of Walter Reed.  Note that the only ones who truly benefit from this are the profiteers.  The children don’t reach their true potential and the most vulnerable–the sick and elderly–don’t get the care we are capable of giving them….

(hat tip Diane Ravitch for Robert Rendo’s comment)

 

 

Labor Day…what unions…?

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Another reader of Diane Ravitch posted this on how times have changed.

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We Do Not Support A War on Syria.

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“You Take Care of Us.  We Keep Everything.  Screw You.”

 

 

Geoffrey, can you spare a dime?

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A reader of Diane Ravitch wants to know if Geoffrey Canada of Harlem Children’s Zone can spare some change from the $200 million in the bank?

“Held up my sign:

“Philadelphia, Mississippi: 1963 Black children not allowed in libraries

“Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: 2013 No school libraries”

Barbara McDowell Dowdall English Department Head (Ret.) A, Philip Randolph Technical High School

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The Racism of Charter Schools

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Ani McHugh, a high school English teacher in New Jersey has a letter to Bill Gates and questions all the evidence pointing to racism.

Also from teacherbiz blog, she has this up–requesting that Arne Duncan and all of the pro-testing, testing, testing reformers take the  tests they require of the kids and publish their results.

…because we need to know if they are qualified to run schools.

NY Times hacked

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I was wondering if this was a joke or the real thing–apparently the site was hacked….but whodunnit?  A Syrian Electronic Army claimed responsibility.  What is really bad is that rival news organizations were taking advantage of the situation instead of…you know…pulling together as Americans against a perceived foreign threat.  Disgusting.

Rupert Murdoch, is a foreign owner (WSJ) and his motives and ethics are highly suspect.  For him to take advantage of a situation like this should be sounding alarm bells.  This is why it was put into Communication and Media laws to restrict foreign ownership of our media.

So I went looking for the latest....and yes, they are trying to *cough* reform alien ownership rules.  Reform is beginning to be a dirty word to me.  It’s doublespeak where the word means something new and progressive, but in real time is a step backward…

From the first link:

The Commission already had in place a policy of reviewing potential foreign ownership in non-broadcast companies where, through a petition for declaratory ruling, a company could seek FCC approval for ownership, and even control, of these entities by non-US citizens or companies. In the recent proceeding, the FCC made such investment even easier, in very general terms easing certain reporting requirements for alien ownership where the interest of a specific alien investor was less than 5% (10 % in some instances), and also allowing an alien individual or group, once approved, to increase ownership without further approval (if the interest is a minority ownership interest, to 49%, and if it was controlling, to 100%), as long as the interest in possibly doing so is revealed in the original request for approval. Allowing investments by affiliates of the foreign owner, and allowing the company that is approved to seek additional licenses, all without additional approvals, was also allowed in many instances.

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And doing things in the public interest is a joke.  It’s not the public’s interest they are kowtowing to….but corporations whom have given less and less to consumers while demanding more $$.  The public interest is not being served.

Education News

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A Chicago Alderman has proposed drones in Rahm Emanuel’s Safe Passage routes.  I kid you not.  If you continue with the next blog of Fred Klonsky, he questions the “none of your business” attitude of CPS on emergency preparedness plans.  At the end, there is another link “continuing the story” which has this:

In a written statement, CPS officials insisted that every school in the district does, in fact, have a plan but said they were limited to “management level staff within the Office of Safety and Security,” building principals and assistant principals, and officials of the Chicago Police and Fire Departments.

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This is ridiculous.  The schools that I have taught at had plans the teachers knew and the children went through drills so they would know what to do.  It is important because their teacher may be incapacitated, so the children all the way up to the principals need to know the plan.    I found it highly ironic one year when we had a small earthquake while I was teaching.  I asked the kids if they knew what to do in case of an earthquake, which they didn’t, so I told them to stay under their desks until the shaking stopped, and then we would leave the building in the usual emergency route.  One of the regular instructors thought that I had needlessly worried the children….all the while they have been  put in “lockdowns” for some terrorist going to attack the school.  <sigh>
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The Indignant Teacher has a post up on a petition to remove David Koch from the board of WGBH Boston’s PBS station.  I have always admired WGBH and WTTW PBS stations, and now that Kochs are trying to control the media, it is even more imperative to get them out.
More moneyed influence on campaigns of the anti-public school crowd.  Good God, this guy is a liar.  A bold-faced one at that.
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More here on John Pelto’s blog that Diane links to:
The evidence is clear that income inequality is a major factor in educational inequality. Children living in poverty experience prolonged stress that affects their brain development in the regions associated with learning. There is a strong correlation between socioeconomic status and standardized test scores. As proven by Stanford’s Sean Reardon, the widening of the achievement gap results from additional opportunities affluent parents provide their children out of the K-12 environment: high-quality pre-K, tutoring, and after-school and summer enrichment. Reardon demonstrated that the test score disparity between low-income and high-income children is not the result of schools.
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See, the pro-Charter $$ folks would prefer to ignore this important fact that impacts learning….it’s much more fun to blame unionized teachers…and watch them scramble to put out fires the Charter proponents deliberately set.
This is pretty powerful.  He puts it so well–that every child develops in different ways and at different speeds and those differences should be honored, not ridiculed by failure of a “skills” test.  (hat tip to Diane Ravitch)
Finally, a wonderful history lesson here by Diane.  She was there on the March on Washington.