The Opinionated Bastard

I agree with you on the teacher’s comments, but NCLB is wrong for 2 reasons. In the first place the fed’s have no business in Education. Second, you can’t teach with tests. I’ve heard more than one teacher say “Oh, we don’t teach that because it’s not on the test.” The only fault GWB has is trying to cozy up to the liberals and Teachers Union. Maybe he won’t have to do that in his second and final term.?

Well, NCLB is actually based on ESEA which is 30+ years old now. However, much of NCLB is actually left up to the states, and its all optional. So whether the feds have any business in education or not, they’ve been there for years now. Personally, I think NCLB is born out of national frustration with the education “system”, and its a blunt instrument, but it really is up to the states as to how they respond.

And some things (like testing) really do need to be done on a national level.

As far as testing goes, it depends on what you’re testing. At the elementary school level, you’re testing reading and basic arithmetic. Strangely, the teacher I was talking to didn’t have a problem with that (though others do) as she felt that at least the kids would be learning something. In California, regardless of whether there was a test for it, there was the “statewide curriculum” that you were supposed to teach.

It seems obvious that OB didn’t actually read the bill, because it isn’t based on anything. It’s a huge hodgepodge of a variety of programs, all tied together with a little bow, and with the (unfunded) mandate to test children twice as much as they do now (from three years worth of multiple guess to six).

How do you avoid fixing problems? Say we need more data. More tests provide that data. Has there been much research into children, and what is effective? Sure! Is it ignored. Sure.

The Smurf administration is toting the same line with global warming, for example.

I think you like Bush the most because, over and over, he lied right in your fucking face about how much of a threat Iraq was, and you believed him.

I think your favorite moments in history will be watching re-runs of Bush telling you lie after lie after lie, and you scarfing them all up.

Damn it, Jim, you aren’t a doctor, but I knew there were no weapons, and, even if something had existed, it could not have been the stockpiles that Smurf was talking about.

Heck, they were hypothetical stockpiles in the first place (Hussein said he had made X volume with chemical facility Y, but UN scientists say he could have made Z, where Z>X, ergo, there was “unaccounted for” quantity Z-X). Don’t even mention that all those chemicals would have turned into useless sludge 5-10 years ago.

He just lied and lied and lied, and you, and all you idiots, just watched your TV, your CNN, your FOX, and ate it up.

No wonder politicians lie to you idiots, they CAN!

At least Dan Rather has to fess up. Bush, No way! He never has to admit he has fucked up everywhere.

How’s Afghanistan? An assassination attempt against former UNOCAL representative Karzai in the last week, and an assassination attempt against the VP today?

FUN!

You are a sucker.

THANK THE UN!

Did Bush, or any administration fuckface, ever say “Thank you, United Nations, for completely disarming Iraq? Thank you for PREVENTING a massive chemical weapons attacks, via your assiduous inspections?”

Never.

THANK TO THE UNITED NATIONS, ON BEHALF OF THE ARMED FORCES OF THE UNITED STATES, FOR DISARMING SADDAM HUSSEIN AL-MAJID, DESPOT OF IRAQ.

How’s the DESPOT OF EQUATORIAL GUINEA doing?

Actually, I’ve read a lot about NCLB.

First off, there is funding for testing. Second, Title I funding (which the feds were already doing increased by 50%) Third, most of the states were already testing and paying for it themselves, so having national tests are a good thing and will save them all money in the long run.

Finally, you can say that people were ignoring tests, and you’d be right, but part of NCLB is to force the bureaucracy to pay attention. See my other postings on NCLB.

Go read www.ed.gov to at least get the government’s viewpoint.

As for Iraq, read the UN reports from Blix himself. It wasn’t just theoretical, there were also weird attempts to produce biological weapons (look at the camelpox production facilities for instance). Lookup the statement by Putin on warnings he’d given Bush about terrorist attacks Saddam was planning.

On No Child Left Behind (Left Behind being the Number One selling series of novels in the 1990s, about the Rapture)…

Only a small section of the bill was about testing, and the new tests were not funded.

The stockpiles in question were theoretical, but other aspects were just plain bullshit, you are right.

Putin and Yeltsin, combined, have slaughtered 150,000 Chechens, and the US media picks up the story when 300-600 Ossetians suffer for it.

150,000 bud, where were you then? Where is Putin now? A’slaughterin’ we will go, A’slaughterin we will go, High Ho The Merry-O, A’slaughtering we will go.

I’ve heard camelpox has the same fatality rate as, say, chickenpox. Not to mention it doesn’t spread quickly. Saddam’s Camelpox threat was to zero living humans.

I think you get sickly and whiny when you realize you are on the ropes, but I appreciate it, because it helps me realize that you are realizing I am right.

Funding, smunding. What you mean is that they have not taken my money and wasted it yet. To that I say “COOL!” It’s like the $18 billion set aside for Iraq. Some pinko was complaining that they have only spent $1 billion. Again, I say “COOOOL!” It’s not funding, and it’s not appropriations, it’s not an allotment, it’s not a subsidy, nor aid. It’s just my tax money and I hope they don’t spend it like a drunken sailor.

As far as NCLB goes, go read:

http://www.ed.gov/nclb/landing.jhtml?src=ln

As far as NCLB funding goes: http://www.ed.gov/about/overview/fed/10facts/index.html

Remember, NCLB is optional. You’re also missing the point that the implementation of pretty much all of NCLB (or ESEA round 2 as some people call it) is up to the states.

Ex:

Standards and assessments are the foundation on which state accountability systems are built. These critical ingredients are developed, designed, and determined by states. States have always had and continue to have at their discretion the determination of their content and achievement standards and the design of their assessments.

So: NCLB doesn’t mandate. If you don’t want the federal money, you don’t have to do any of it. It doesn’t even insists on testing, that’s just the most obvious way to enforce standards and assesments.

I don’t know how you got from NCLB to Checnya, but ok: Two wrongs don’t make a right. 150,000 dead Chechen’s don’t justify 600 dead schoolchildren.

Anyways, your statistic is suspect, and you’re trivializing a complex issue: http://www.chechnyafree.ru/index.php?lng=eng&section=historyeng&row=3

I don’t see 150,000 anywhere in there.

Camelpbox: It’s true that Camelpox isn’t fatal, that’s not the point. The interesting thing about the camelpox production facility is that Saddam had a lot of weird WMD programs he was funding. Even the Hans Blix report calls it an attempt to produce WMD.

When I read the UN report, it actually convinced me that the Iraq war was justified. That may seem strange to you, but it made me realize that Saddam was actively trying to both fool the inspectors and produce WMD. The fact that the inspectors mostly caught them is somewhat moot, because what if they missed something? One of the reasons Bush gave up on Blix was the UN teams refusal to use US intelligence on WMD.

Also, the production facilities for camelpox and smallpox are almost identical, it would have been easy to switch over if sanctions were lifted. So the fact that they had the facilities to begin with was a violation.

Finally, given that the Blix report is full of sneering at the “poor iraqi and their pitiful attempts to build WMD” disturbed me greatly. They only had to be right once.

P.S.

If you really want to know my thoughts on NCLB, you should read this posting instead, and comment there:

http://www.opinionatedbastard.com/archives/000057.html

I’m cutting veggies for stirfry while I do this, apologies in advance.

I discuss the Chechnya thing in your “evil” post.

Despite Schwarzenegger’s RNC convention LIE that California has handled its debt (it is only by issuing 16 billion in bonds, a debt instrument, that this year’s budget is balanced), California is in debt, as are more than half the States, closer to 45 last I checked (except Vermont, I’ll note).

Your argument “they can just throw away the millions from Washington if they don’t want to follow Washington’s rules,” makes it clear you haven’t had to balance a state budget (neither have I, for that matter).

If, for example, a particular State were to STOP TEACHING, then the funds could easily be withdrawn, and I would agree (for instance, Kansas might soon rely only on the Bible, one might guess).

But more importantly, the testing was only a tiny bit of No Child Misses the Rapture.

I don’t care if your Mother loves phonics, there are, by my simple reckoning, at least five methods…

“In the first years of the 20th century, then, there were names for the many methods of teaching reading: alphabetic, phonetic, phonic, look-and-say, word, and sentence[.]”

The important thing, and as a supposed Republican, this should be important to you, also, is that the Federal government should be in the business of telling teachers what methods must be used. You probably want the Dept of Education of the US Federal Government abolished, but at least don’t make it a anathema to State’s Rights in the meantime!

Bye, I must cook.

Actually, the Federal Government isn’t really mandating any method. (That would be stupid, IMHO).

They are mandating that you try something, test to see if it works, and stop doing it if it doesn’t. It never says the words “phonics” anywhere. The feds don’t claim to have the answer, they just claim that you have to use the scientific method. The whole language vs. phonics debacle in our schools is just an example of why you need to test your theories in practice, not just implement blindly.

That’s what all that blather about “accountability” is about.

Its very obvious what needs to happen to fix our school:

1. Put more people in the classroom.
2. Put more materials in the classroom.
3. Keep discipline in the classroom so teachers can teach and students can learn.

However, the trend in education has been away from this for the last 50 years as the “State Board of Education” has increased in power.

Bottom line is that just throwing money at education has always been the easiest thing to do, and its been the worst thing for the schools. In a capitalist society, you have to watch out for what you reward. If you reward incompetence by giving the incompetents more money, soon you end up with nothing but incompetents.

My prediction: If NCLB is left alone, in 10 years, a classroom will consist of:

1 teacher 2 teachers aides hired/fired by the teacher A per-classroom budget of $5000 controlled by the teacher New textbooks that are interesting to read instead of being politically correct. An empty district office.