Headline News Thread

[goldy_331]

Re: Headline News Thread

This is the best case, IMO, when the parents are talented enough to teach all subjects. There are those cases where the aim is to replace the whole curriculum with Mt. Ararat archaeological studies. It takes very dedicated parents to do it well, but I can see doing it as an improvement/expansion over the public curriculum.

This family depended on the mom to do the lion's share of the education and she readily admits she's no professional educator. Thirty years ago I'm sure it would not have worked nearly as well for most families, but there are enormous resources available to parents now.

 

[geezer]

Re: Headline News Thread

I definitely worry that home schooled kids are simply being programmed by their parents. To some extent, parenting is programming -- the inculcation of values, religion, etc. But it shouldn't extend to matters of fact or of association. Parents should not be gatekeepers who unilaterally decide to prevent their children from learning things which they don't agree with or meeting children who they're suspicious/afraid of. But I'll admit I think 90% of the people who homeschool are doing it to shelter their children from scientific refutations of religious myths (evolution, sex ed, cosmology), and/or because they're terrified of an environment that includes people who they are prejudiced against (blacks, browns, liberals). The people who homeschool have all the best intentions, but I think it's wrong to limit your children's exposure to what are, after all, mainstream scientific ideas. If your faith is really all that it ought to be able to sit in the same room with science.

What homeschooling is doing is turning back the clock to a time when many places were isolated and not exposed to any outside influences that contradicted parental teaching. That's the "Real America" that these people pine for. They are creating a parallel fantasy world.

The family I mentioned have not even pretended to be religious for about 6 or 8 years. Their motivation was simply to accelerate academics (mistrust of the value of factory education). But IMO the social and developmental cost was huge to that child. But it wouldn't surprise me to learn that more than half the home-schoolers are religious.
In fact, the reason they quit association with the home-schooling group they belonged to is because of the religiosity of the other members.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

What about basic fears? Sex, drugs, violence, bad influences leading to other issues like crime.

This isn't going to be nice, but the people I mostly see homeschooling (rural and suburban whites) have little or no substantive reason to fear. Not to put too fine a point on it, it's mostly racist. A school with non-whites must by definition be a school with {fill in parade of horribles}. They're only partially to blame, though, since their worldview has been created by the GOP strategy of the last 40 years of promoting racial fears in order to exploit white voters.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

The family I mentioned have not even pretended to be religious for about 6 or 8 years. Their motivation was simply to accelerate academics (mistrust of the value of factory education). But IMO the social and developmental cost was huge to that child. But it wouldn't surprise me to learn that more than half the home-schoolers are religious.
In fact, the reason they quit association with the home-schooling group they belonged to is because of the religiosity of the other members.

Sure, it may be true that this family is doing some sort of J. S. Mill experiment. I'm arguing that my many anecdotes trump your one anecdote. I'm not aware of any real homeschool data, but the companies that provide the materials seem to overwhelmingly push a religious agenda. I think the latter portion of your anecdote actually supports my point.

Homeschoolers (as well as the TX and KS schoolboards) are literally rewriting history and science because reality conflicts with their myths and prejudices. That is not healthy.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

This family depended on the mom to do the lion's share of the education and she readily admits she's no professional educator. Thirty years ago I'm sure it would not have worked nearly as well for most families, but there are enormous resources available to parents now.

Those resources are part of the problem. They're written to appeal to the political and social beliefs of their customers. That's not education, it's companies cynically profiting from indoctrination.

I had a discussion with a co-worker who both was homeschooled and who now has homeschooled his kids. He literally was not aware that Creationism is a fringe belief -- he thought scientists broke down "about 50/50" and that schools shut out the scientifically equally respected religious theory because they are pushing atheism. He also thought that "the majority of scientific advances of the last century support Biblical sources, and it was only the 19th century Communist-controlled schools who made mistakes that gave the temporary appearance that science conflicts with the Bible." This is a really smart guy with a lot of common sense, but he just doesn't know. If you take a great brain and poor crap into it, you get crap back out.

 

[goldy_331]

Re: Headline News Thread

This isn't going to be nice, but the people I mostly see homeschooling (rural and suburban whites) have little or no substantive reason to fear. Not to put too fine a point on it, it's mostly racist. A school with non-whites must by definition be a school with {fill in parade of horribles}. They're only partially to blame, though, since their worldview has been created by the GOP strategy of the last 40 years of promoting racial fears in order to exploit white voters.

You haven't been in the schools much lately, have you? The district I am talking about is widely recognized as one of the top in the country. Quite white and suburban. There is still a huge issue with drugs in the schools, certainly in the middle schools and high schools. Sure, it's no where near as bad as in the inner-city schools but it's still a big issue. Kids can still get exposed to the influences even outside school, but it's a little easier for parents to have some control if the kids aren't in school for 6 hours a day well away from any parental supervision.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

You haven't been in the schools much lately, have you? The district I am talking about is widely recognized as one of the top in the country. Quite white and suburban. There is still a huge issue with drugs in the schools, certainly in the middle schools and high schools. Sure, it's no where near as bad as in the inner-city schools but it's still a big issue. Kids can still get exposed to the influences even outside school, but it's a little easier for parents to have some control if the kids aren't in school for 6 hours a day well away from any parental supervision.

I guess we see the seriousness of influences differently. For me, observing the kids who got into drugs in school was all the proof I needed that drugs were for losers. Same thing for Ayn Rand, actually.

It is because I love my daughter, but know she's going to eventually face the real world outside of my control, that I believed she had better start developing observation and judgment as early as possible in a relatively controlled environment. Bad models are important, too. But I do recognize that everyone feels differently and obviously we all love our kids and want what's best for them.

I worry that just as we are self-segregating in neighborhoods and on internet sites, so we are in our actual mental furniture, much of which is put in place during our education. We are accelerating towards a world of Eloi and Morlocks, and the stock would be stronger if we crossbred them.

 

[geezer]

Re: Headline News Thread

Sure, it may be true that this family is doing some sort of J. S. Mill experiment. I'm arguing that my many anecdotes trump your one anecdote. I'm not aware of any real homeschool data, but the companies that provide the materials seem to overwhelmingly push a religious agenda. I think the latter portion of your anecdote actually supports my point.

Homeschoolers (as well as the TX and KS schoolboards) are literally rewriting history and science because reality conflicts with their myths and prejudices. That is not healthy.

Oh, I agree completely. I actually know more of the religion-driven home schoolers myself. But there are all kinds of oddballs out there.

They're only partially to blame, though, since their worldview has been created by the GOP strategy of the last 40 years of promoting racial fears in order to exploit white voters.

Also, I don't see it as the GOP reaping what they've sown, as some long-term strategy. They're just politicians, professing to hold views that they see being prevalent in those regions.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

Also, I don't see it as the GOP reaping what they've sown, as some long-term strategy. They're just politicians, professing to hold views that they see being prevalent in those regions.

I don't think the GOP had a long-term strategy. They are to blame for their tactics which created the Frankenstein's monster on the far right, but that monster actually threatens them the most by driving them so far into nutbar territory that they need electoral miracles and voter suppression schemes to win nationally. I believe the GOP expected they could pen off the rubes to be forever entranced. They didn't expect the inmates to actually take over the asylum.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Headline News Thread

Home schooling is just a way for parents to pass on their ignorance to their children more directly.

That really depends a great deal upon where a person lives. In some neighborhoods, home schooling is a way to prevent your children from getting killed in gang crossfire.

I know some people who home-schooled their children through 8th grade, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with trying to foist their beliefs onto their children. The neighborhood school was terrible, no discipline in the classroom, 4th graders having knife fights during recess, maybe 20% of the children at grade level, if that.

I thought you were a progressive who believed every child was entitled to a quality education, no matter their circumstance in life?? Your intolerance of others' perspectives can be quite mind-boggling at times.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Headline News Thread

That's precisely why we don't allow people under 21 to buy or possess alcohol. But many drink anyway. That's not a valid reason to legalize pot for the 21+ set, but the continued costs of enforcement are obvious - crowded jails, unnecessary criminal records for simple possession, and the overwhelmingly slanted conviction rate of poor blacks.

I think we are in full agreement. Keeping drugs illegal is way too costly.

Teen age minds have "plasticity" until early 20s or so, which is part of the reasoning that led to the drinking age being raised from 18 to 21, if I am not mistaken.

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Headline News Thread

This is the #1 reason I want my kids in public school: the social experience.

Agree (as priority # 2) once it came to high school, after we had moved to a much safer community. In elementary school, we went private school because the public school in that town was not as safe as we'd have liked (which eventually became a big part of our decision to move as well). The # 1 reason to send kids to school is to learn, and having class constantly disrupted by a few trouble-makers inhibited learning. The teachers were more like day-care providers than educators there. Neither one of us had the inclination nor the ability to home school.

 

[FlagDUDE08]

Re: Headline News Thread

I definitely worry that home schooled kids are simply being programmed by their parents. To some extent, parenting is programming -- the inculcation of values, religion, etc. But it shouldn't extend to matters of fact or of association. Parents should not be gatekeepers who unilaterally decide to prevent their children from learning things which they don't agree with or meeting children who they're suspicious/afraid of. But I'll admit I think 90% of the people who homeschool are doing it to shelter their children from scientific refutations of religious myths (evolution, sex ed, cosmology), and/or because they're terrified of an environment that includes people who they are prejudiced against (blacks, browns, liberals). The people who homeschool have all the best intentions, but I think it's wrong to limit your children's exposure to what are, after all, mainstream scientific ideas. If your faith is really all that it ought to be able to sit in the same room with science.

What homeschooling is doing is turning back the clock to a time when many places were isolated and not exposed to any outside influences that contradicted parental teaching. That's the "Real America" that these people pine for. They are creating a parallel fantasy world.

People are home schooling more today because they believe public school kids are simply being programmed by the government. Look at common core and what's included within it.

In an ideal world, my kids would be home schooled, my work would be telecommuting, and my family would live on the road in a RV travelling the country. I bet there are plenty of migrant families out there, and oh how technology makes even social interaction more and more feasible.

 

[St. Clown]

Re: Headline News Thread

Those resources are part of the problem. They're written to appeal to the political and social beliefs of their customers. That's not education, it's companies cynically profiting from indoctrination.

It depends upon the state. I have a friend who was home schooled through 8th grade. Yes, her family is deeply religious, and that was the basis for the home schooling. The however to this bit comes in here - however, her parents were required to provide their children with a minimum of standards set forth by the state of WI. So she'd complete her assigned math, English, science and civics, and then she'd get a big dose of Bible stuff.

When she went on to high school, it was a private school at which her father both taught and eventually became principal. She was given some placement tests and ended up in the advanced courses. Her brother has a PhD now. Her sisters all became Haus Fraus.

 

[walrus]

Just rehashing the joke of when people have issues with a PC, it's the inevitable response. I thought it would be funny here as he's running an Android phone and a Mac is certainly not a phone.



I'm thinking Germany might step in through back channels to make a plea with the EPA to not be too hard on VW. The company is huge in Germany, like 1960s GM big for the US equivalent. It could seriously damage an already shaky European economy.

It's huge worldwide, not just germany

 

[FreshFish]

Re: Headline News Thread

This is really eerie....

The Pope coming to NYC is big news, but actually being in midtown Manhattan is a bit more somber. There are 10-foot high chain link fences near St. Patrick's Cathedral on 5th Avenue. The letter collection boxes on street corners all have locks on them. Plainsclothes police are going along the streets inspecting the trash cans.... and this is all seven or eight hours before his arrival. The estimates are that over a million people will be crowding a very small space.

How to navigate through all that to get back to the train station tonight will be a challenge.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

With the Papal visit to DC, OPM recommended all government workers who could just stay home and telecommute. NYC is a little different, because stuff like this happens frequently, and frankly the city doesn't even notice when 2 million gawking visitors converge on it. Their name for that is "Thursday."

I'm hoping for a communion wafer version of pizza rat, however.

 

[bigblue_dl]

Re: Headline News Thread

The news now is that the German government knew about the VW emissions regulation circumvention, which I have to believe puts an end to any "take it easy on them for the sake of the German economy" argument.

The EPA statement on it has more detail than I expected: http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/bd4379a92ceceeac8525735900400c27/dfc8e33b5ab162b985257ec40057813b!OpenDocument

Essentially, within the engine calibrations that Volkswagen engineered, they had algorithms, and tables that detected when an emissions test was being performed. The cals automatically switched over to performance tables that were optimized for emissions during this mode of operation, injection timing (pre, primary, and post) would be changed, along with fueling, and fuel pressure, to drastically adjust engine performance, resulting in a lower emissions output. Everyone (well, everyone with a CPE background) knows that low emissions and high efficiency don't go hand-in-hand, so hitting those low emissions targets while still maintaining an efficient engine is a huge challenge. VW was apparently not happy with their efficiency on the low-emissions cal, and came up with this illegal plan to switch out of "low-emissions mode" to a dirtier, "high efficiency" mode for normal operation. This is about as bad as it gets, as far as the EPA is concerned. Not only did fail emissions tests, they knowingly and willfully engineered calibrations designed to circumvent emissions regulations.

Based on my reading of 40CFR, the EPA could fine around $50,000 per engine, revoke ALL of VW's certs, and prohibit them from re-applying certs for 3 years.

 

[Kepler]

Re: Headline News Thread

Everyone (well, everyone with a CPE background) knows that low emissions and high efficiency don't go hand-in-hand, so hitting those low emissions targets while still maintaining an efficient engine is a huge challenge. VW was apparently not happy with their efficiency on the low-emissions cal, and came up with this illegal plan to switch out of "low-emissions mode" to a dirtier, "high efficiency" mode for normal operation. This is about as bad as it gets, as far as the EPA is concerned. Not only did fail emissions tests, they knowingly and willfully engineered calibrations designed to circumvent emissions regulations.

My first thought is we better audit the software of every system in every industry that undergoes environmental testing. The BBC interviewee from a testing site said "this will go beyond VW and beyond Diesel." I assume it goes beyond automobiles and into everything. It's exactly the sort of thing an energy company or agribusiness would do, for example.

 

[joecct]

With the Papal visit to DC, OPM recommended all government workers who could just stay home and telecommute. NYC is a little different, because stuff like this happens frequently, and frankly the city doesn't even notice when 2 million gawking visitors converge on it. Their name for that is "Thursday."

I'm hoping for a communion wafer version of pizza rat, however.

SACRILEGE!!!
(filler to keep it all caps)

You're playing with fire on that quip, Kep. A consecrated host IS the Body of Christ.