The Road to the White House

[Ned Ryerson 94]

On that note, off to the Magic game... For an $8 beer.

[KillingInTheNameOf 63]

quote:

Originally posted by JonBoy418:

The problem now is that administrators and superintendants now focus on the lower level student to increase his test grades, therefore raising the schools grade. With all that focus, the overacheiving student is being lost. If a child gets an A on the FCAT, then there really much emphasis put into further developing his education. Whereas an F student gets school sponsered tutoring sessions, he gets streamlined (which you are probably describing Smack), and gets a lot more teacher involvement.

 

For this reason above, I do not agree that each child's education should be equal. A child with a 140 IQ should not have the same education, teachers, ciriculum and tools as a child with a 90. Education should strive for each student to try and reach the next level his or her intelectual potential, but because of the FCAT and No Child Left Behind, all the focus is on the lower level student.

 

It's causing our low level students to become average students, our average students to stay average students and our great students to become good students. Frankly, we're creating an education system that perpetuates and strives for mediocrity.

 

That's a great point regarding NCLB which reflects the impact top-down social eng is having on our entire society.

 

quote:

WP: Smack, can you agree that teachers should be paid more?

 

It depends. I think Florida ranks pretty low in this regard compared to other states. I have cousins who teach in Vegas and wanted to move to Florida, but would have had to take a huge pay cut.

 

My girl makes 50k with advanced degrees, & has in all about 4 months vacation time. In fact, she considers teaching her part time job. She certainly doesn't feel she's underpaid.

[KillingInTheNameOf 63]

quote:

Originally posted by EnFuego:

I'll be brief. I used the markets as an example of an institution that you would work to improve rather than abandon. Contrast that to the idea that you don't support social programs because of the abuse that occurs among participants. I say we need to be better at uncovering abuse, not eliminating the help.

 

Who is committed to this goal?

 

The emperical evidence shows that every assistance program in this country develops into a dependency program defined by fraud, waist, and mismanagement.

 

I have never said the free market system needs reform. It's law of the jungle and reforming that basic, fundamental principle is what produces problems.

 

quote:

Where did I say we need to eliminate poverty? I say our system should HELP the working poor. And to the point made by Osprey, make it $7.50, Thats $15,600 a year. Should we have programs that help those people? Because I don't know how you interpreted my post, but that there will always will be poor people was the point of my post. KITNO, you posted my post right before you went on to explain how poverty can never be eliminated, read my paragraph again.

 

I didn't misunderstand your position. The point is there will always be poverty regardless of what you do. You believe society should directly fill that gap for the working poor, I don't. Why are these individuals exempt from personal responsibility?

 

We currently attempt to fill that gap and what is the result? Are we successful?

 

What would benefit the working poor above everything else is a thriving economy that dictates higher wages through supply & demand and increased opportunity.

 

By putting your hand out, you limit the potential for that opportunity.

 

Your ideal has been given exponentially more resources for 40 years and has failed to deliver on it's mission. Yet, the solution is always mo monies. Which ironically limits the economic growth in this country that would benefit all Americans.

 

Guarantees or opportunities, that's the fundamental choice we have in this country. The more guarantees we provide, the less opportunity we'll have.

[Fultz4thewin 2,464]

quote:

Originally posted by JonBoy418:

The problem now is that administrators and superintendants now focus on the lower level student to increase his test grades, therefore raising the schools grade. With all that focus, the overacheiving student is being lost. If a child gets an A on the FCAT, then there really much emphasis put into further developing his education. Whereas an F student gets school sponsered tutoring sessions, he gets streamlined (which you are probably describing Smack), and gets a lot more teacher involvement.

 

For this reason above, I do not agree that each child's education should be equal. A child with a 140 IQ should not have the same education, teachers, ciriculum and tools as a child with a 90. Education should strive for each student to try and reach the next level his or her intelectual potential, but because of the FCAT and No Child Left Behind, all the focus is on the lower level student.

 

It's causing our low level students to become average students, our average students to stay average students and our great students to become good students. Frankly, we're creating an education system that perpetuates and strives for mediocrity.

 

Our great students are still continuing to overachieve as schools keep including programs that deal with competition.

 

The biggest instance of this is the late elementary-middle school math program. My youngest sister just went into 6th grade at the same middle school I went to. From 4th grade on if you can test into the advanced math section you get to learn in an honors type of setting.

 

Right now in 6th grade she's taken Pre Algebra(something that wasn't offered to me in the gifted program until 8th grade). Now shes on track to be taking Algebra I in 7th grade, Algebra II in 8th grade, Pre-calc as a freshman, Calculus AB as a sophmore, Calc BC as a junior, and whatever math they decide to make available as a senior.

[fan for too long 16]

The working poor's problems in many areas would be greatly reduced by actually having a minimum wage that is decent. If the minimum wage was tied into the cost of living this problem would have been solved.

[JonBoy418 0]

quote:

Originally posted by Lewis4thewin:

quote:

Originally posted by JonBoy418:

The problem now is that administrators and superintendants now focus on the lower level student to increase his test grades, therefore raising the schools grade. With all that focus, the overacheiving student is being lost. If a child gets an A on the FCAT, then there really much emphasis put into further developing his education. Whereas an F student gets school sponsered tutoring sessions, he gets streamlined (which you are probably describing Smack), and gets a lot more teacher involvement.

 

For this reason above, I do not agree that each child's education should be equal. A child with a 140 IQ should not have the same education, teachers, ciriculum and tools as a child with a 90. Education should strive for each student to try and reach the next level his or her intelectual potential, but because of the FCAT and No Child Left Behind, all the focus is on the lower level student.

 

It's causing our low level students to become average students, our average students to stay average students and our great students to become good students. Frankly, we're creating an education system that perpetuates and strives for mediocrity.

 

Our great students are still continuing to overachieve as schools keep including programs that deal with competition.

 

The biggest instance of this is the late elementary-middle school math program. My youngest sister just went into 6th grade at the same middle school I went to. From 4th grade on if you can test into the advanced math section you get to learn in an honors type of setting.

 

Right now in 6th grade she's taken Pre Algebra(something that wasn't offered to me in the gifted program until 8th grade). Now shes on track to be taking Algebra I in 7th grade, Algebra II in 8th grade, Pre-calc as a freshman, Calculus AB as a sophmore, Calc BC as a junior, and whatever math they decide to make available as a senior.

 

That's great for your sister, it really is. However, you're just mentioning Math classes as her accelerated accomodation. I ask you to test her school and see if the same opportunity exists within English, Literature, Sciences like Biology, Chemistry and Physics. What about History or Communications?

 

The state of Florida requires each school to have a "gifted accomodation" in at least one subject. Most schools offer just one, as it is the minimmum requirement Usually it's in Math or English, seeing as those are core classes.

 

Now it sounds like your sister is gifted, if she's on such an accelerated path. Now, another question is her teacher in those course have her gifted endorsement? A lot of teachers in that position are just thrown into a gifted class to teach. But in relaity, how do you teach a ciriculum to a student with a higher IQ than yourself? That's exactly what happened with my wife. As I said earlier, she taught 7th grade English and got thrown into a gifted class (her school did not offer an accelerated program for Math). She used that as motivation to get her gifted endorsement through Ornadge County (she had to pay for those classes, BTW). Now with those classes and endorsements she better equipped and prepared to reach, challenge and motivate those students. Without it, the students got bored and turned "lazy."

 

Another question: does her class have a student or two that really don't belong in that class? Are they failing because they can not grasp the information or the connections being made? They are typically the ones with behavioral problems, act out in class, are unmotivated and need excessive time to "catch them up" to the rest of the class. This is called main streaming (I called it streamlining earlier, my apologies). This is where an average or good student(s) are placed in a class above their intellectual skill level in hopes of challenging their education. Obviously, through the examples cited above, they tend to bring down the rest of the classes quality of education.

 

Okay, one more question: does your sister have specialized tracking in her gifted education where she gets one on one attention with her teacher? In my wife's school lower level students (or the PC term ESE students) have an ESE teacher that follows the same group of ESE children (approx. 12) around the entire day, from class to class and co-teach with each regular teacher in an attempt to main stream these children. This ESE teacher helps these students by organizing their school work and homework for them (entitilement complex?), is available for one on one sessions, and of course this teacher must be ESE certified so she is prepared and equipped with the tools to help each and every student.

 

So it's great that your sister is lucky enough to coincidentally attend a school that has gifted classes towards her gift. If she wasn't gifted in Math but gifted in English, she'd be stuck in normally taught English ciriculum with no possibility to move to a school that offers gifted math. It's painfully obvious to see where the priorities lie and I think it's wrong. All it's doing, as I said before, is breed a mediocre education and guarentee that the next great business man, or scientist, or inventor will not be coming from the United States.

[SmackDaddy 30]

Anybody care to comment on the newly surfaced Obama association with Khalid Al Mansour?

 

Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers, Tony Rezko, Bernardine Dohrn, Percy Sutton, Acorn...

 

Are they all a simple matter of coincidence, or the signs of a very alarming trend of associations that have yet to surface entirely?

 

[Secretly Space Jesus 670]

quote:

Originally posted by SmackDaddy:

Anybody care to comment on the newly surfaced Obama association with Khalid Al Mansour?

 

Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers, Tony Rezko, Bernardine Dohrn, Percy Sutton, Acorn...

 

Are they all a simple matter of coincidence, or the signs of a very alarming trend of associations that have yet to surface entirely?

 

 

When he was a freshman in college, my best friend had a roommate named Curtis.

 

Curtis transferred to a different college during his sophomore year. During his junior year, Curtis kidnapped a girl, tortured her, raped her, and then killed her. He later committed suicide in prison while awaiting sentencing.

 

Now, my best friend lived with this man for 9 months in a dorm room the size of a large walk-in closet. What's to suggest to me that he isn't a rapist/kidnapper/murder sleeper agent that was warped by his association with this crazy, crazy man named Curtis?

 

Answer: Common sense. Obviously.

 

In my life I've had neighbors who ranged from, and I'm dead serious about this, a heroin dealer, a white supremacist, 2 former black panthers, a prostitute, a convicted sex-offender, and a man who was convicted of corporate fraud to the tune of around 20 million dollars. Does any of that speak less of me? Should it?

[SmackDaddy 30]

LOL DOM. I thought you were more intelligent than that.

[Ned Ryerson 94]

Considering Townhall and Newsmax are the two "media" outlets going after this, well, I think that answers itself.

[SmackDaddy 30]

These aren't periphery associations as you intimate. These people have had closer relationships with Obama than will ever truly be exposed.

 

A more accurate analogy would be.

 

Curtis the rapist is college roommates with your best friend. During the 9 months they shared a dorm room the size of a closet, Curtis encouraged your friend to participate in taking advantage of female coeds under the influence of drugs/alcohol. Then Curtis transferred schools during his sophomore year, and your best friend had a new roommate move in who was selling drugs out of his dorm room and convinced your best friend to make a few harmless delivereis for him. Then this roommate moved away, and during your best freind's junior year, yet another roommate came to share that coset sized dorm. The new roommate was a brilliant student that wrote term papares for profit. because your best friend had more contacts among the student body from attending two previous years, he brought 50-100 students in need of purchased term papaers to his new roommate in an agreement where they split the profits. Then came the final senior year where yet another new roommate moved in. This character never attended class and spent his drunken evenings vandalizing the school campus. Your best friend didn't actually participate in vandalizing the campus, but he knew of his new roommates actions and didn't disapprove.

 

Is your best friend a rapist, a drug dealer, an enterprising student bending the rules to sell term papers, or a vandal? Nope. But he certainly is a person of extremey questionable character that not once did the right thing in regards to these witnessed and slightly involved indescretions.

 

Then your best friend goes off to grad-school and the same pattern of behavior and associations continues.

 

And is that person someone you would vote into a presidential position.

[Secretly Space Jesus 670]

quote:

Originally posted by SmackDaddy:

LOL DOM. I thought you were more intelligent than that.

 

My point is that it's very easy to list a person's questionable associations. If someone listed the names and histories of the neighbors I listed, by the logic often being presented with the Ayers/Rezko stories, it would mean that I am a pro-drugs, pro-prositution, sex-offender sympathizing white supremacist, who is inexplicably also a black panther.

 

The reality is that if you show me someone who's never associated with a questionable character as some point, I'll show you someone who's unqualified for office because they've likely never been out of their own house.