SM1'S BLOG 4 U: One Citizen Speaking...

Thursday, September 5, 2013

One Citizen Speaking...

SYRIA: PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA AND FRENCH PRESIDENT HOLLANDE ARE THE COALITION TO STRIKE SYRIA

Posted: 05 Sep 2013 04:22 AM PDT

The leaders …

And advisers …

California Education: dumber and dumber to benefit the unions!

Posted: 04 Sep 2013 08:12 PM PDT

California administrators, teachers, and the unions have made a mockery out of education; turning out decades of functional illiterates who can barely graduate if not for relaxed test scores. And, it is about to get much, much worse. Instead of testing for competencies in individual subjects, the administrators, teachers, and unions that desperately want to hide the fact that, in spite of the billions and billions of dollars spent on education, students are ill-educated, have concocted a new scheme to hide the truth from the public.

California accelerates shift in student testing -- The plan to hasten use of computerized exams would upend LAUSD effort to use scores to evaluate teachers.
In a major shift in how California's 6.2 million public school students are taught and tested, state officials plan to drop the standardized exams used since 1999 and replace them with a computerized system next spring.
The move would advance new learning goals, called the Common Core, which are less focused on memorizing facts. They are designed instead to develop critical thinking and writing skills that take formerly separate subjects — such as English and history or writing and chemistry — and link them. Forty-five states have adopted these standards.
California is moving up its timetable for the new computerized tests by a year, leaving some school districts scrambling to prepare.
Schools must have enough computers available on each campus to handle the testing, for example. Until now, state standardized tests were conducted entirely with pencil and paper.
The new exams also would upend plans in the Los Angeles Unified School District to use student test scores to evaluate teachers. Such performance reviews would be impossible because the results could not be compared to previous years.
The plan emerged in written form Wednesday afternoon,after intense negotiations that included the governor's office, state Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, legislative leaders and the state's powerful teacher unions. Source: California accelerates shift in student testing - latimes.com

Since when do the “powerful teacher unions” deserve a say in curriculum, testing, or other administrative matters when they are the proximate cause of the educational catastrophe that has befallen California children.

When close to 50% of children fail produce acceptable test scores, the powers that be simply change the tests or the scoring criteria. Fooling the public into believing that teachers are educating children when the teachers are simply going along to getting along.

The unions don’t give a damn about the children, it’s the big money in the management of teacher’s healthcare and pensions. Examined closely most of the money funneled into California education has gone to a build-out of the infrastructure to satisfy the special interests and personnel costs – including outrageous payments to teachers who should not even be in the classroom.

Even worse, most Boards of Education are simply political stepping stones for professional politicians. Incompetent to manage anything, most of these well-credentialed progressive socialists sit idly by and watch hundreds of millions of dollars go down the drain – with only a little public handwringing.

Ten months after installing a new computerized payroll process that has been roiled by glitches, Los Angeles Unified officials now say costs for fixing the system and completing its rollout could top $210 million.
The system, with an original price tag of $95 million, has underpaid or overpaid thousands of employees, and last week district officials said hiring consultants to fix it has already ballooned the cost to $132.5 million. And some officials are questioning the district's transparency on all the costs associated with the system, noting that at least $6 million will be forfeited by allowing some overpaid teachers to keep the money. <Source>

Bottom line …

Until the final fiscal crash, the progressive socialist democrats and their special interest unions will keep milking the public treasury without being accountable for the poor education received by most California children. To switch curriculum and testing procedures is little more than a smokescreen for introducing even more progressive education into the public schools and to cede additional power to the teacher unions without holding anyone, politicians, administrators, teachers, or union officials responsible for the abysmal state of California education.

The progressives speak of producing students that can compete in a global economy, when the truth is that they can’t compete in their hometown.

-- steve

SYRIA: SINCE WHEN IS THE UNITED STATES A MUSLIM MERCENARY FORCE FOR SALE?

Posted: 04 Sep 2013 05:42 PM PDT

I knew that politicians could be bought by foreign sovereign nations, but I didn’t know that the United States military was for sale to Arab nations who might be guilty of covertly supporting terrorism and those who routinely suppress human rights when it comes to religion or women’s issues.

Kerry: Arab countries offered to pay for invasion
Secretary of State John Kerry said at Wednesday’s hearing that Arab counties have offered to pay for the entirety of unseating President Bashar al-Assad if the United States took the lead militarily. “With respect to Arab countries offering to bear costs and to assess, the answer is profoundly yes,” Kerry said. “They have. That offer is on the table.”
Asked by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) about how much those countries would contribute, Kerry said they have offered to pay for all of a full invasion.
“In fact, some of them have said that if the United States is prepared to go do the whole thing the way we’ve done it previously in other places, they’ll carry that cost,” Kerry said. “That’s how dedicated they are at this. That’s not in the cards, and nobody’s talking about it, but they’re talking in serious ways about getting this done. Source: The House’s Syria hearing: Live updates

Bottom line …

I have no problem with Arab nations contributing to the cost of defenses in the region, but I strongly object to these Arab nations being able to purchase an attack on a foreign sovereign nation using American military assets. Perhaps Israel should start collecting donations to purchase a strike on Iran?

The is unseemly behavior and dishonorable to the men and women who fight to keep America and her citizens safe and secure.

-- steve