Behold, The Power Of Fear

In today's Spokesman Review we have an article about arming District 81 Resource Officers by January 2014.

What better way to demonstrate the power of fear than to have armed resource officers within your public schools?

We're telling our children that school is a dangerous place that requires armed guards. Yet the presence of armed guards is no guarantee for preventing a mass shooting. The expense of such security to counter a highly unlikely threat is illogical and wasteful. And if this is a must, why aren't we protecting shopping malls, churches, and other locations where mass shootings have taken place?  

Newtown triggered the recent changes, “but there have been other reasons for considering arming our resource officers,” said Jason Conley, the district’s safety, security and transportation director. “It’s those outside threats that are driving us to this next level of safety. In a criminal’s mind, a school resource officer would be the first target to eliminate to get into the school.”

What are these outside threats? What is their likelihood of happening?

The goal of arming the school resource officers, district officials say, “is to assist in better protecting the safety of students and staff … and provide a greater level of safety for the District’s School Resource Officers.”

We have to arm the resource officers for their own safety? How often have District 81 Resource Officers been in a school situation where they needed a firearm?

Riverpoint Academy

This year the Mead School District opened a new high school called Riverpoint Academy. It's a STEM school that includes the arts and it's been in the making for over two years now. We were excited when we first heard about it last February. After attending the open house, Stephanie decided she wanted to go there. Attendance was opened only for juniors this year and limited to seventy-five students from Mead and Mount Spokane High Schools. If more than 75 students applied then they said they would have a lottery. They didn't draw names so I guess the numbers worked out okay.

Today was the grand opening for the school, attended by Governor Gregoire, Spokane Mayor Condon,  Mead school district leaders and teachers, local business leaders, and us parents. Lots of speechifying and well-deserved words of praise from all the speakers for everyone involved in making Riverpoint Academy happen.

 

 

The last speaker was Dean Allen, Board President of Washington STEM and CEO of McKinstry. I enjoyed his frank talk of having a company with so many STEM jobs that has no problem finding employees but with the problem is that they're not necessarily from Washington State. Much of what he and the school district speakers talked about was partnering schools with businesses so the students would be more prepared for college and able to take on a career in a STEM-related field.

Then came the part that surprised me--asking for donations. One local Mead mom and dad who have a successful biomed-related business announced they were donating $25,000 for the third year in a row. Dan Butler, Mead School District Deputy Superintendent, and one of the key players in making Riverpoint Academy happen announced he was donating $5,000.

Back when we first talked to Dan and the Riverpoint Academy staff, I asked about funding for the school. I was assured the Mead School District had "enough funding to sustain this for the next five years". (bolding mine) But after seeing all the iPads with wireless and cellular service issued to each student--they contain the textbooks--and a mess of MacBooks on a cart, I have to wonder what "this" means. It's commendable for a person to give $5,000 to a cause he is personally and professionally vested in, but since he's in a position to know what funding the school needs, for me it begs the question--does the school need that $5,000 in order to function?

I'm also a little uneasy about businesses contributing money to a public school. Call me cynical, but in this day and age I see too many businesses/people giving money and expecting something in return.

I think this school is a great opportunity for Steph and the other 70+ students. So far she has had days where it was fun and energetic and days where she was swamped with homework. And she has yet to start her online German course and her EWU-taught math class. This will be an interesting year.

Welcome To The Pastafarian Academy

Valarie Hodges is an elected state official representing Louisiana's District 64 in the state legislature. She voted for HB 976--and the legislature passed it--which creates a voucher program allowing students to attend schools run by religious organizations. She was dismayed to learn that "religious" includes more than the church she goes to.

“I actually support funding for teaching the fundamentals of America’s Founding Fathers’ religion, which is Christianity, in public schools or private schools,” the District 64 Representative said Monday. “I liked the idea of giving parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian school,” Hodges said. Hodges mistakenly assumed that “religious” meant “Christian.”

"Unfortunately it will not be limited to the Founders' religion," Hodges said. "We need to insure that it does not open the door to fund radical Islam schools. There are a thousand Muslim schools that have sprung up recently. I do not support using public funds for teaching Islam anywhere here in Louisiana."

Never mind that the Founders had varying and differing beliefs quite unlike the lock-step belief system Representative Hodges subscribes to. Louisiana's public school system is ranked #49 in the nation. A thousand Muslims schools in Louisiana would easily move them up a couple of notches. Instead, they're playing Follow The Leader on a quest for the big five-oh.

I Must Be A "Commun-ist"

I'm not that familiar with Charles Hurt, but I happened across his recent piece in the Washington Times about Capitol Bikeshare in Washington, D.C. He refers to it as "broken-down socialism".


That is because across the street from my house on Capitol Hill is a loud, clanging “Capital Bikeshare” docking station. It is one of the locking ports for those fat, red communal bicycles you see peddled all over town by commune enthusiasts. (Say that fast, and it sounds like you are saying “commun-ists.”)
...
Having people pedal around on these bikes, they say, means fewer people riding pollution-emitting city buses and fewer cars clogging the roads. And healthy riders means less of a burden on socialized medicine. These people get very excited talking about all the upsides.


As you can see he's a real fan and he's looking at Capitol Bikeshare with an unbiased eye. He's not done yet.

But there are problems.

The most obvious one is that you can check out a bike and pedal yourself anywhere your heart desires — so long as it happens to have a docking station for your bike. (The bikes don’t come with locks, and these geniuses haven’t yet eliminated bike theft — even of crappy, fat red ones.)

If your destination just so happens to have a handy-dandy bike-docking station, you better get there early or hope that not everybody is going in the same direction at the same time. Such as what we happen to call “rush hour,” which only occurs every single weekday, twice a day.

What's interesting is the parallel between his nonsensical complaint about lack of space at the docking stations (go see the stats for yourself) with the very real lack of space and increased cost of parking for vehicles.

Map of Bikeshare stations

Hurt mocks what he does not understand. The bikeshare program is both economically and environmentally ideal for short trips in Washington, D.C. Those are precisely the type of trips you want to reduce because they increase wear on the roads, increase congestion, pollute the air, and increase the personal cost of vehicle ownership. 

I've been to D.C. Waiting and idling at those many six-way intersections throughout the city looks like fun. Top that off with trying to find parking and then paying top dollar for it. Hurt is welcome to it.

The Da Vinci Exhibit

We checked out the Leonardo da Vinci exhibit at the MAC today. It must have been something to have been one of the brightest stars during the Renaissance. Da Vinci's ideas, inventions, mastery, and the time and energy he put into his work were simply incredible.

Ya Gotta Believe

Some folks were ecstatic that the new Miss USA was one of two contestants who supported teaching evolution in school. That's two out of fifty-one contestants. A reflection on our science scores? Maybe. Check out Alyssa Campanella's remarks in response to the question, "Should evolution be taught in schools?"



I do believe in it. I'm a huge science geek. I like to believe in the big bang theory and the evolution of humans throughout time.

Sorry, but if she was such a huge science geek, I think her explanation would have been a little different. Evolution is not something you believe in. It's not a faith system. It's a scientific theory that provides the best explanation we have for the variance we find in life forms. The Big Bang theory is unrelated to evolution. Evolution is not anti-religion but some of the religious are anti-evolution.

For more fun, check out the other contestants' answers to the interview questions. Our own Miss Washington gives a particular dreadful answer. If nothing else, the questions and answers highlight the vacuousness of beauty pageant competition.



She ain't no Little Miss Sunshine.

Students Paying Other Students' Tuition

I've been stewing over the news about the University of Washington is proposing raising tuition rates by 20 per cent.

Tuition is skyrocketing because the Legislature has dramatically cut funding to higher education. Over the last three years, the amount of money the UW receives from the state has fallen 50 percent. The UW has eliminated hundreds of positions, cut classes, increased class sizes and frozen faculty salaries for the last two years. Under the current budget, faculty salaries will be frozen for two more years.

College is a very expensive deal nowadays and I appreciate the school has taken steps to help offset the decreased funding from the legislature. Here's the part that really irks me.

In addition, [vice provost Paul] Jenny outlined a proposal to the regents that about half of the money raised through the tuition increase be added to the financial-aid pot. That would raise enough money to cover the tuition increase for the neediest students and also provide enough to award grants of up to $4,000 for as many as 1,000 students, going beyond what the state required for financial aid and helping some middle-class students, Jenny said.

In other words, the students--and parents--that can either afford the tuition or are able to borrow the money to pay for tuition will now subsidize other students.

I can appreciate the need that the neediest students have. And I understand that our state's sales-tax-based economy is hurting in this Lesser Depression (Disclosure: My uncle's site).

But it bothers me a lot that the cost of my child's education is being increased and then half that increase--instead of being an actual cost for my child--is being diverted to someone else.

Interesting Presentation On Education

By Sir Ken Robinson.

Music To Get Suspended By

Read the lyrics here.

Go Highlanders!

Learnin' Smarter

It's Education Week for Cathy McMorris Rodgers and she's got it all figured out.

As Congress considers education reform, my three goals are:

1. Help each child achieve his or her full and unique potential
2. Give students the tools and knowledge to succeed in the 21st century
3. Ensure America’s educational system is the best in the world

To achieve these goals, several actions must be taken. First, we have to accurately measure the results that are being achieved in each school.

Second, administrators must have the authority to hire and fire teachers along with the flexibility to set their salaries.

Finally, we must encourage the growth of charter schools and voucher programs to provide real, immediate, alternatives to students in failing public schools.

Perhaps she is anticipating more failed public schools once they receive their new textbooks.

Who Says The American Education System Is Second Rate?

The Texas Tribune asked 800 registered voters their views regarding evolution.

Nearly a third of Texans believe humans and dinosaurs roamed the earth at the same time, and more than half disagree with the theory that humans developed from earlier species of animals....

You can read the entire survey here (PDF). And there's a crosstab showing which candidate for governor the survey respondents support here (PDF).

Apparently the purpose of the survey was to help determine the effect of religion on politics and politics on religion and show which respondents support which candidates running for governor.

However, I think it's more notable that these are presumably educated adults. 98% of the respondents have at least a high school education and only 41% disagree with the statement that humans lived with dinosaurs.

Happenings I'm Going To Miss

The Complete Streets organizing meeting takes place this Wednesday at 5:30 pm at the YMCA, 930 N. Monroe.

Also on Wednesday, Michael Pollan is speaking at WSU.

I hope I read about both occasions somewhere.

Watering The Tree Of Liberty

A fellow named Gary Warren has a letter in the Spokesman Review today.

Will we accept our democratic republic coming full circle into functional, if not oppressive bondage? The willful usurpation of both the Constitution and the lawful desires of the plurality of the people corruptly morphs representatives into rulers, liberty into servitude.
It is tragic how many of our originating 28 grievances towards the Crown can be objectively leveled against the federal government. Must “We the People” again be forced to restart the eight-stage cycle by watering “the tree of liberty?”

The Declaration of Independence has a laundry list of grievances that I suspect most Americans, including me until this morning, are unfamiliar with. After all, not many of our citizens have a complete history of their country thoroughly embedded in their minds let alone at the forefront. Reading through the list of grievances, I am unable to find a single one that applies to our government today. Curiously, I do find a similarity between the very first grievance, refusing assent to laws and the practice of signing statements that presidents, beginning with Ronald Reagan, have used to challenge or interpret the law as passed by Congress. George W. Bush's statements contained 1100 challenges. But other than that, I don't see that any of the other grievances apply.

At the end of his letter, Mr Warren mentions watering "the tree of liberty" which makes reference to a letter Thomas Jefferson wrote not long after the new U.S. Constitution was completed, some eleven years after the declaration was issued. In that letter, Jefferson makes reference to a single insurrection.

The British ministry have so long hired their gazetteers to repeat and model into every form lies about our being in anarchy, that the world has at length believed them, the English nation has believed them, the ministers themselves have come to believe them, & what is more wonderful, we have believed them ourselves. Yet where does this anarchy exist? Where did it ever exist, except in the single instance of Massachusetts? And can history produce an instance of rebellion so honourably conducted? I say nothing of it's motives. They were founded in ignorance, not wickedness. God forbid we should ever be 20 years without such a rebellion.

Jefferson complains about the lies printed in British newspapers claiming that America is in a state of anarchy. Then he makes light of the Shays Rebellion which he says was founded in ignorance. I don't understand what he means by saying we shouldn't go 20 years without a rebellion borne of ignorance. His next two sentences are prescient.

The people cannot be all, & always well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive.

The parallels to the nonsense coming from the Tea Party are striking.

If they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. We have had 13. states independent 11. years. There has been one rebellion. That comes to one rebellion in a century & a half for each state. What country before ever existed a century & a half without a rebellion? & what country can preserve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon & pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is it's natural manure.

We have always had plenty of people who preserve the spirit of resistance. The Ku Klux Klan, the John Birch Society, the Aryan Nations and the Watchman on the Walls to name a few. There are more out there and they all have one thing in common. They are borne of ignorance. Yes, I am being selective. I'm leaving out those who protest government actions such as war, violating civil rights, making unfair trade agreements, etc.

Jefferson said we should set them right as to the facts and then pardon and pacify them. But if a few die then so what? It's the natural manure for the tree of liberty. I take that as a calloused remark.

Gary Warren should not be so hasty to have the tree of liberty watered. Not that giving him the facts will make a difference to him.

NOVA Program

Last night the kids and I watched Nova's Evolution: What Darwin Never Knew. While I could do without the drama, repeated DNA graphics, and weak attempts at suspense building, I did find it fascinating when it finally got to the meat of the program. (Sloppy editing moment: The narrator said, "From leopard" while the video clearly showed a cheetah. Oops!)

The first half hour or so was pretty basic stuff and a bit boring for me, but I suppose the program was geared to a lowest common denominator. The hour after that was the most interesting and I learned a little more about control genes and their role in how life forms develop. Pretty cool stuff.

The next forty years or so of genetic science should be very exciting.

Ignorance And Irony

The Charge of the Light Brigade by Lord Alfred Tennyson is a poem that honors the soldiers led in a misdirected cavalry charge because of a miscommunication. For me the poem brings out the folly of following orders without question as well as the tragedy and waste of war. The general, the Earl of Cardigan, who led the charge survived. With 118 of his men killed and 127 wounded, Cardigan didn't bother to find out what happened to those who survived. He left the field and returned to his yacht in the harbor.


Shamelessly stolen from Talking Points Memo.

With that in mind, I'm certain Congresswoman Michelle Bachman has no clue about her reference to The Charge of the Light Brigade. And from the cheers, I believe the crowd is also unaware that the brigade was senselessly led by a general who did not care what happened to those who followed him. The unnecessary sacrifice prompted French Marshal Pierre Bosquet to note, "It is magnificent, but it is not war. It is madness."

Red Lining The Irony Meter

From an article (registration required) in today's Spokesman Review about a rally held by the Tea Party yesterday here in Spokane.

Too many people are uninformed about some of the nation’s big issues, such as health care reform or cap and trade, said Darin Stevens, a local businessman who arrived at the microphone wearing an Obama mask.

“Get involved and get informed about what’s going on,” said Stevens, who urged the crowd to vote against Sen. Maria Cantwell in 2010. The crowd cheered, not realizing, apparently, that Cantwell isn’t up for re-election until 2012.

She Blinded Me With Science

Here's a little science knowledge test from the Pew Research Center. I sincerely hope you ended up in the top 10 percent.

What A Neat Idea

I most certainly would have benefited from something like this when I was young. When I joined the military I knew nothing about drinking alcohol except you weren't supposed to stop. Although there were a few "incidents" as a result of my drinking--okay, a lot of "incidents"--nobody ended up injured or dead. Was I lucky or what? I'll leave out the details of all the stupidity. There isn't enough room here anyway.

As an example to our children, Kathy and I drink moderately and responsibly. We also talk to the kids about responsible drinking and so far it seems to be working. The idea of a provisional license to drink alcohol appeals to me as an opportunity to provide experience which would presumably help young people make better decisions later on.

Ya Sold Me!

So I'm browsing the Salt Lake City Tribune (interestingly, they have a whole section just on polygamy) and I happen to see an ad about a woman in Spokane who lost 47 pounds. My curiosity is piqued and I click on the link which takes me to Rachel Ray's blog and an article and picture of Alyssa Johnson who is presumably from Spokane.

You can guess what effect that had on me so I did a search for the name of the image file showing her before and after picture and found this link on Rachel Ray's gift blog. Lo and behold it's the same article and picture but now her name is Destiny Collier of Spokane. The comments are even more remarkable.

On March 16, 2008, Dana posted this in response to Alyssa:

Thank you Alyssa for posting your story. It was very motivating. I have the same struggles with food. I want to make a change. Sometimes it is so hard. But I am working toward it now. I ordered the two diets and it should be here any day. I feel like I am on my way to weight success. I am going to keep daily entries and hopefully I can make a motivational page too and help others reach their goals. I just found out that Rachael Ray does promote these products and I will try it immediately. I will post more when I have progress. Again thank you so much.

Dana

On Jan 15, 2009, Dana posted this in response to Destiny:

Thank you Destiny for posting your story. It was very motivating. I have the same struggles with food. I want to make a change. Sometimes it is so hard. But I am working toward it now. I ordered the two diets and it should be here any day. I feel like I am on my way to weight success. I am going to keep daily entries and hopefully I can make a motivational page too and help others reach their goals. I just found out that Rachael Ray does promote these products and I will try it immediately. I will post more when I have progress. Again thank you so much.

Dana

No updates on either one so apparently no progress.

Lina and Jess, one on one site and one on the other, posted:

That is a good idea.. I hope you reach your goals. So far so good for me. I am at 11 pounds and I am one hot mama. At least that’s what my boyfriend says.

What a coincidence!

This is on both sites from Sandra:

I HAVE JUST FINISHED MY FIRST WEEK ON THIS DIET AND I FEEL SO ENERGIZED. BUT IT HAS A GOOD KIND OF ENERGY NOT LIKE WHEN I USED METABOLIFE. IT ALWAYS MADE ME FEEL HIGH OR SOMETHING. THIS STUFF JUST MAKES ME FEEL ALERT LIKE I HAVE HAD LOTS OF VITAMINS. THANKS FOR THE MOTIVATION.

THANK YOU RACHAEL! YOU ARE THE BEST.

SANDRA

Other than that, you can pretty much believe everything else on the Internet. Take my word for it.

Well, not quite everything else.

Third World States?

My son, Geoff, shared this article with me where the author compares the fifty states with other countries using the human development index.

This map is based on numbers from this table, which come from the American Human Development Report. It gives a good sense of regional patterns of human development in the US and the comparative relationship of states to each other. But the numbers in the abstract don't tell us much; to see what these numbers mean, we need to compare them to other countries. And when we do that, we see that the HDI of many states are comparable to some of the most developed countries in the world. However, other states have HDI scores well outside the range of the developed economies of Europe and Asia.

To illustrate the point, I am now going to make a long list. These are the 76 top countries ranked by human development index score, with the 50 states interposed to show their relative level of development, based on the two tables linked above:

...

8. Japan - .956
9. Luxembourg - .956
10. Switzerland - .955
11. France - .955
Vermont - .955
Washington - .955
Alaska - .955
...
67. Belarus - .817
Tennessee - .816
Oklahoma - .815
Alabama - .809
68. Macedonia - .808
69. Albania - .807
70. Brazil - .807
71. Kazakhstan - .807
72. Ecuador - .807
73. Russia - .806
Arkansas - .803
74. Mauritius - .802
75. Bosnia and Herzegovina - .802
Louisiana - .801
West Virginia - .800
Mississippi - .799
76. Turkey - .798

Our state seems to be doing well, but I can't say the same for Mississippi, state number 50 in the list. During my six years in Alabama I noticed they were always thankful for Mississippi because when it came to anything good for people, Mississippi always ranked below Alabama. Not, as you can see, that Alabama was a whole lot better.