I have never liked organized religion on principal: Religion is MY set of beliefs, not what the Pope tells me. Of course i agree that there can be moral "experts" or people to come to for advice, much as you have a consultant in buisness. I could make a many page blog on the subject, but todays is on two recent acts infuriate me: "the Catholic aid agency Cafod is bound to uphold the official teaching of the Church, and it makes clear that it does not fund or advocate the supply, distribution or promotion of condoms."
So the church is against condoms. That is perfectly fine with me. But the idea that 1. the pope would go so far as to condemn them and 2. Ensure that people who cant afford them otherwise wouldnt get them is appalling. Who in their right mind can actually advocate the spread of AIDs? Even if we believed in a perfect world, there should be no condoms, we are far from living in this perfect world and people will have sex. To believe otherwise isnt just ignorant, its well behind the times. The church needs to stand up and say "We do not like condoms, and in a perfect world they should not be used. But if youre going to have sex, use a condom." And fund the condoms, even if they dont like them. Its the only morally correct thing to do.
The other thing is my problems with Brazil:
1. Many people by now have heard about a 9 year old girl being raped and getting pregnant with twins by her step father. "a Church spokesman says all those involved [in the abortion], including the child's mother and the doctors, are to be excommunicated." Is this a joke? There is evidence that proves nearly without a doubt she would have died if she didnt have an abortion. But wait... just when you think the church is bad enough, the step father was not excommunicated because repeated rape of two young people for many years WAS NOT as serious as abortion. This is just beyond my comprehension...
and 2.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7913981.stm
A priest was suspended for advocating contraceptives and talking about problems in the church. Clearly the church needs to be open to discussion - We need contraceptives in some areas, letting priests have sex will stop some of the rape cases that happen. it will also bring people like the pope to realize that people do have sex, and need contraceptives.
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Thursday, March 19, 2009
School System continued
The next school post will be on four topics: Tenure, Colleges, private vs public education and the school in the modern day world. #4 also divulges on the other areas a little, as well as provides my main part of this post.
The first of these is tenure. As mentioned by one of the comments on my last post, teachers who people complain about cant be fired and new teachers work their asses off for less pay. I agree that at the college level there needs to be tenure for controversial professors, but at the high school level there really is very little need for it - this
was a good publication i liked. My belief is tenure might be needed to give adequate financial security for teachers in a public school system, but in my third point it will be addresed as why this system should be changed. Tenure can cause teachers who need to be fired to not be - teachers who are incapable of teaching are still being paid due to a lack of ability to fire them. This is a clear example of some of these problems - 200-450,000 bad teachers putting a drag on a system that constantly "needs" more money. Most of these teachers cant teach - and that is beyond the adequate needs for a school with tenure. Therefore, a school should be able to fire someone for adequate reasons:
1. If the teacher molests/rapes/sexual abuses kids in any way
2. Teacher deals drugs/alcohol or any illegal substances
3. Teacher uses the above in front of students
4. Teacher comes to school with hangovers on a regular basis.
5. Anything that results in jail time
6. Attacking a kid/ physical violence
7. Must meet basic skills test tri yearly (i propose tri yearly as it seems cost effective yet within reason to make sure on top of the game).
As well as any other requirements i missed.
Also competency should be factored into their merit pay from my last post, and new teachers who pass with flying colors on their competency tests should get higher raises. Those with lower need to be monitered yearly at the least to make sure they dont hurt students future growth (from the first article).
For colleges:
This was brought up briefly in my Macro Economics class - we arent doing long term solutions to problems as they arent beneficial to companies. This is where i believe universities need to come in. Universities are mainly non for profit to begin with. I like how the system works as is in essence(not some policies, but on balance), the changes i propose are small:
Have colleges design alternative fuel - government funds for that, as well as private and corporate donations
Work on vaccines - same ways
Other long term projects that will greatly help the environment and our economy in the long run, but arent cost effective to companies. The reason for this is simple - they will open the research to the public allowing it to be worked on and made better for everyone at the cheapest way. It will lower future medicine costs as generics can instantly be made, and alternative fuels will lower carbon emissions fastly and cheaply.
For private vs public - a continuation
My belief as i said previously is this:
We need public and private together. There should be no distinction besides public schools are needed in areas where private companies wont go. Each student has money granted to a school - i propose that money can go to whatever school they go to. Thus a private school will be as "free" as a public school. This will start to level out the school system providing an equal opportunity as well as provide more reason a school will have to keep above the curve. Ones that dont dont get money and are put out of use.
My last and final point for today is about internet. This is mentioned in the school video briefly, and i would like to highlight the one main point that I greatly believe:
Sparknotes is in the real world. People can just get the information. Its why my firm belief is AGAINST memorizing in schools - in fact i believe we should be encouraged to use sparknotes and the like. They will help us understand, and clearly dont give us everything. Proposals: maybe adapt to the current idea of students - short stories that arent on spark notes and that also fit attention spans. Or, drop active reading. Its a joke... It has been, no teacher has even given me the slightest reason otherwise besides its in the system. "If its not broken, dont fix it". My response is twofold: 1. Its miserably broken, and 2. If we wait till the system collapses, we are starting over. We should instead salvage what we can and move forward. And also, the topic for today was horrible - the internet is here to stay, the pros and cons dont matter...
My school system as a whole is this:
Class 1 - Research. Learn Research skills to do projects in all sorts of subjects, and learn search engines, how best to not plagerize, cite sources, best sources, etc. Research is a key skill necessary for the current world.
Class 2 - Technology. Learn about the kindle, types of computers, how best to use many of the different programs on computers, how technology helps us and how to best apply it. Also, programming. Most if not all current jobs require recent technology, almost all will require it in the future.
Class 3 - Writing/Reading. This class is age old and actually is useful with modifications. There will always be a need for papers. For resumes, newspapers (maybe blogs) etc. Also analyzing data, interpreting bias, etc.
Class 4 - Math. This class is needed up to algebra and maybe geometry with changes. Higher levels could be taught, as an encouraged elective. Math is necessary for computers, for most jobs and can be taught with a logical aspect to teach us basic logic skills.
Class 5 - Life skills. Balancing budget, Relationships, Common teen problems - this needs to be a class in any society. Just basic skills for life.
Class 6 - History/Language. I feel for a good many years in school we need to learn the history of the world and how we became who we are. I really dont care about if we give kids the full impact of Columbus in 1st grade, i believe in that.
Other classes: Give basic classes in other areas throughout middle school and junior high to teach kids the areas as 1. they arent ready to choose, and 2. its good to get them out of their areas for a little while if only to socialize with other groups of kids. Clearly these classes can change, and are only a very brief basic outline, but i believe we need to change the core classes to a modern society, in fact i believe technology should always have been a core class.
The rest of the current classes can be electives - if there is a demand for them they will be taken and taught if not, they wont. Provide a surplus of offerings and then ask kids to switch if their class isnt offered. Can merge like classes if needed, or other options provided by the administration.
There is so much more to say, but so little attention span of my readers to do it. So thank you for your time and please provide any feedback you would like. I read all comments.
The first of these is tenure. As mentioned by one of the comments on my last post, teachers who people complain about cant be fired and new teachers work their asses off for less pay. I agree that at the college level there needs to be tenure for controversial professors, but at the high school level there really is very little need for it - this
was a good publication i liked. My belief is tenure might be needed to give adequate financial security for teachers in a public school system, but in my third point it will be addresed as why this system should be changed. Tenure can cause teachers who need to be fired to not be - teachers who are incapable of teaching are still being paid due to a lack of ability to fire them. This is a clear example of some of these problems - 200-450,000 bad teachers putting a drag on a system that constantly "needs" more money. Most of these teachers cant teach - and that is beyond the adequate needs for a school with tenure. Therefore, a school should be able to fire someone for adequate reasons:
1. If the teacher molests/rapes/sexual abuses kids in any way
2. Teacher deals drugs/alcohol or any illegal substances
3. Teacher uses the above in front of students
4. Teacher comes to school with hangovers on a regular basis.
5. Anything that results in jail time
6. Attacking a kid/ physical violence
7. Must meet basic skills test tri yearly (i propose tri yearly as it seems cost effective yet within reason to make sure on top of the game).
As well as any other requirements i missed.
Also competency should be factored into their merit pay from my last post, and new teachers who pass with flying colors on their competency tests should get higher raises. Those with lower need to be monitered yearly at the least to make sure they dont hurt students future growth (from the first article).
For colleges:
This was brought up briefly in my Macro Economics class - we arent doing long term solutions to problems as they arent beneficial to companies. This is where i believe universities need to come in. Universities are mainly non for profit to begin with. I like how the system works as is in essence(not some policies, but on balance), the changes i propose are small:
Have colleges design alternative fuel - government funds for that, as well as private and corporate donations
Work on vaccines - same ways
Other long term projects that will greatly help the environment and our economy in the long run, but arent cost effective to companies. The reason for this is simple - they will open the research to the public allowing it to be worked on and made better for everyone at the cheapest way. It will lower future medicine costs as generics can instantly be made, and alternative fuels will lower carbon emissions fastly and cheaply.
For private vs public - a continuation
My belief as i said previously is this:
We need public and private together. There should be no distinction besides public schools are needed in areas where private companies wont go. Each student has money granted to a school - i propose that money can go to whatever school they go to. Thus a private school will be as "free" as a public school. This will start to level out the school system providing an equal opportunity as well as provide more reason a school will have to keep above the curve. Ones that dont dont get money and are put out of use.
My last and final point for today is about internet. This is mentioned in the school video briefly, and i would like to highlight the one main point that I greatly believe:
Sparknotes is in the real world. People can just get the information. Its why my firm belief is AGAINST memorizing in schools - in fact i believe we should be encouraged to use sparknotes and the like. They will help us understand, and clearly dont give us everything. Proposals: maybe adapt to the current idea of students - short stories that arent on spark notes and that also fit attention spans. Or, drop active reading. Its a joke... It has been, no teacher has even given me the slightest reason otherwise besides its in the system. "If its not broken, dont fix it". My response is twofold: 1. Its miserably broken, and 2. If we wait till the system collapses, we are starting over. We should instead salvage what we can and move forward. And also, the topic for today was horrible - the internet is here to stay, the pros and cons dont matter...
My school system as a whole is this:
Class 1 - Research. Learn Research skills to do projects in all sorts of subjects, and learn search engines, how best to not plagerize, cite sources, best sources, etc. Research is a key skill necessary for the current world.
Class 2 - Technology. Learn about the kindle, types of computers, how best to use many of the different programs on computers, how technology helps us and how to best apply it. Also, programming. Most if not all current jobs require recent technology, almost all will require it in the future.
Class 3 - Writing/Reading. This class is age old and actually is useful with modifications. There will always be a need for papers. For resumes, newspapers (maybe blogs) etc. Also analyzing data, interpreting bias, etc.
Class 4 - Math. This class is needed up to algebra and maybe geometry with changes. Higher levels could be taught, as an encouraged elective. Math is necessary for computers, for most jobs and can be taught with a logical aspect to teach us basic logic skills.
Class 5 - Life skills. Balancing budget, Relationships, Common teen problems - this needs to be a class in any society. Just basic skills for life.
Class 6 - History/Language. I feel for a good many years in school we need to learn the history of the world and how we became who we are. I really dont care about if we give kids the full impact of Columbus in 1st grade, i believe in that.
Other classes: Give basic classes in other areas throughout middle school and junior high to teach kids the areas as 1. they arent ready to choose, and 2. its good to get them out of their areas for a little while if only to socialize with other groups of kids. Clearly these classes can change, and are only a very brief basic outline, but i believe we need to change the core classes to a modern society, in fact i believe technology should always have been a core class.
The rest of the current classes can be electives - if there is a demand for them they will be taken and taught if not, they wont. Provide a surplus of offerings and then ask kids to switch if their class isnt offered. Can merge like classes if needed, or other options provided by the administration.
There is so much more to say, but so little attention span of my readers to do it. So thank you for your time and please provide any feedback you would like. I read all comments.
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