Waiting for Superman

I am currently watching "Waiting for Superman" and I am just getting angrier and angrier! American's are just plain out screwed just thought I'd let you know. There are those who want to make things work they want to progress but they can't this country would rather spend money on prisons and teachers who just don't care whether children pass or fail.

According to the Portland Press Herald "States are not doing what it takes to keep good teachers and remove bad ones" "States were given letter grades in the study, earning a D-plus on average. The group gave its highest overall mark, a B-minus, to South Carolina"

Can you believe this!? Our country can't score one A not a single A in fact earning a D average.  That is pathetic and shows why we rank so low when compared to other countries.

Out of top thirty countries we rank twenty fifth in reading and twenty first in science, and LAST in math.  Yet out of those studied we rank first in confidence.  So that means if asked how they've done American's think they're smarter and think they've done well when actually they're failing.

This makes it so that private and prep schools are the only ones doing a decent job, that plus a handful of teachers and schools in different districts. Now these schools that are centered around a district require a lottery to fill the openings meaning that seven hundred students try to get one hundred slots meaning that six hundred students will be required to enter into a public school with failure rates off the charts.

Charter schools are the new answer the true NO STUDENT LEFT BEHIND.  Charter schools are sending near one hundred percent of their students into a four year schools. Kipp schools are redefining schooling, these hardworking people are actually trying to make it so that those who live in an area where schooling is falling behind can receive a real education.

Can you imagine what this country would be like if every single school had these kind of requirements, had these kind of teachers, had this much commitment?  Education, I know I've spoken about it before but this is the key and American's need to understand this!

"Money, laws, and the latest reforms, but those who work in trenches know you can't have great results without great teachers" - Waiting for Superman

We know it's possible to give every child a great education and we know everyone is teachable it just requires the teachers!  If not for a certain math teacher in my elementary school, if not for another science teacher my middle school, if not for an English teacher my junior year, and three amazing college professors, I would not have the education I have today.  I know others who HATE math or HATE science. Why?  I say it's because you have never had the chance to learn the way that is best for YOU!

I am not against unions, I never have been. Unions are amazing but I have a bone to pick with ANYONE who fights to keep a BAD teacher.  If you don't want to teach, don't care to teach, you should be FIRED! No one should be protected from not caring.  Yes, tenure does stop a vendetta against you but so does a lawsuit and if you feel you have been unjustly singled out, file a complaint.  If you are a teacher and you sit back reading a newspaper not teaching, YOU ARE THE PROBLEM!

I never really had seen how far our educational system had fallen but it's worse than any of you could imagine.  Most of those I know received a decent if not good education, many people abuse it but I was lucky enough to have had teachers that cared, teachers that gave a damn! It makes me sick to know that this kind of thing is happening.  How can Teacher Unions NOT SEE what is happening?! Do they not see the results?  Do they just love money? How can you not see children are our future and the future of the success of this country.

I recommend that you take your time and look into the matter yourself. See the changes according to Students First "This year 161,000 teachers will lose their jobs. Whats worse: Some of our best teachers are on the chopping block. Why? Because of a bureaucratic, seniority based policy "Last-In First Out" We can stop it join the fight"

Waiting for Superman opened me up to look beyond just my educational experience and makes you look at those who really don't have a choice. Children who are born into a district where they have no say but to go that district's school or maybe a charter school if you are lucky enough to get into one, that or you have to pay. If you don't want to pay, good luck only ten percent graduate inner city public high schools and go onto college. I hope that this country takes a good look in the mirror and prepares for changes, because education matters.

Are you not entertained

Entertainment! Ah amusement or diversions, as humans we are all very diverse get a couple people together from different age groups and what do we have.... a Mexican stand off!  One wants the romantic drama, or comedy, another the latest action flick sans emotion, the next wants a cerebral science fictional story and there you have it who will win! I've always found these dilemmas entertaining in their own rite. Because the young don't want the squishy romance and the old don't want the action, blood, and gore.  

Ah at last we must come to some sort of compromise.  This is where I believe there are those who stick to their beliefs of "I hate so and so" or "I won't watch that!" And then their are those who guilt you into their side with "It's OK I don't need to watch that, you watch yours". And lastly there are people who fall into the category of  "I don't care as long as there is something entertaining me!"

Entertainment can be so tricky! Music, television, theater, Internet, you name it someone you know has a very interesting opinion.  Some may even fight you if you disagree with their opinion.  Opinions are judgments ruled buy those who give them as being the absolute end all be all.

So I ask Are you not ENTERTAINED!

Education

School, that word is dirty isn't it?  You hear it and automatically you're not feeling so well.  Why is it that we hate education so much? While we're there we can't wait till we're out, it's always how long until the weekend? How long until vacation? How long until next year? How long until I graduate?

Here in this country we are given education and yet we scoff at it, get annoyed, angry even, while other countries it's a privilege to gain an education and they earn it. Every year it seems that the requirements for graduating gets easier and easier.  In my experience some teachers could care less and if you show up you pass. Guess what!? They were the favored teachers on my campus, as in "Hey Mr. Blank's Lit 101 is the best you just need to show up! Tests are simple easy A!!"

Once I graduated I got a job and met another guy from Bulgaria.  He told me about their schooling and how rigorous the testing was.  Compared to my elementary and high school experience their's was grueling.  Yet by the age of twenty one he was on the verge of a masters degree and a very smart individual.

It seems as though in our society someone who wants a good education needs to go out and get it themselves.  Press your teachers look for the answers to unsolved problems and move your education forward.  I often wonder what it would be like if they stopped making schooling mandatory? Instead of a public system have a system in which one needs to apply to get accepted.

Maybe when faced with the option that if I don't get an education I'll become dumb and illiterate.  Maybe then, if they see those who choose education succeeding and using it then the education will matter but as long as our system accepts failure as an option, graduating those who don't actually know what they just learned our system will continue to decline.

The Job Hunt

The illustrious job hunt has begun in earnest, with applications out to every corner of the state.  What ever happened to the day of going to an office asking to see someone from human resources handing them a printed copy of resume.  Giving a good handshake, a look in the eye, something to remember you from.  Now I found fifteen applications one allows applying in person the other require e-mailed resumes.

With fewer and fewer opportunities it seems as though the world is out to crush the blue collar workers.  Soon every job left will be retail or entertainment.  We are all buying, buying, buying, no one makes anything anymore why bother, it's cheaper for companies to leave, make their products, then sell their junk back to us.

Now I am left to troll the Internet looking through one search engine to the next, while I ask those I know if they know of any openings.  Soon I'll have to open my eyes to the possibility of moving somewhere other than here in my little corner of Maine. 

Unemployment

I am currently one of the fourteen and a half million US unemployed.  I prefer to think of it as I was born in the wrong century.  Had I been born in eighteen eighty four as opposed to nineteen eighty four I may have been useful.  Currently the wonderful U S of A is finding less and less use for us blue-collar workforce, and the current jobs out there are held by individuals closer to my grandfathers age.

The part I don't understand is that they are all eligible for retirement yet keep their jobs because they want something to do.  And as a young person out of college making significantly less money and working twice as many hours trying to attain the prowess of those who have come before when times get tough the first ones let go are the younger generation who are attempting to get started.  It doesn't sit well with me.

Now my conclusion do I attempt to stay in my current situation fill out application after application send in resume after resume to e-mail addressee after addressee?  In the current market it appears that in order to get a start one needs to begin as a temp with no salary no insurance.  Or do I attempt going back to school retrain for another position take on more debt in order to get into another company that would sooner throw me away as look at me.  Lastly do I give up on the idea that I can struggle on alone and move to another state to live with my parents, giving up my idependance so that I can save money and try to make a start somewhere I'd rather not be?

If only I could go back in time, back then I may have been able to make a living anywhere throughout the country.  When experienced carpenters where appreciated not asked to work for a measly eight bucks an hour and no insurance.  The only thing people keep telling me is move to where you're needed but why can't I choose where I want to live?  Should I be forced to leave?  Or should I change with the times?

Beginnings

For all things there has to be a beginning for without beginnings there is nothing. This alone will lead me into what will inevitably be rantings.

What is a beginning? Webster defines it as the point at which something begins: The Start; The first part; The origin, the source.  But how does one truly begin?  I started writing when I was in preschool does that count as beginning?  Or at my first thought?  Some scientists claim that mental activity begins as soon as 6 weeks. So is that when I began this? Beginnings can be tricky but semantics aside let me begin. 

I chose the composition layout for a reason, this being that in life there are lots of things that run through our heads and this is my outlet for those ideas.

If you, the invisible you, follow this you'll find I can be erratic and even chaotic at times jumping from one conclusion to another completely opposite view point.  This being what I think lacks in some people for if we are going to excel whey not challenge our own ideas with others ideas.  And if you post something contradicting something I've written I won't take it down and hide your idea under the rug it may just inspire intellectual conversation.  (As a warning I will not tolerate abusive or violet rhetoric this will be erased)

So I will bid you adieu and look forward to ranting to you more often.