Acting Citizen: Czech Republic 4, U.S.A. 1

By James Knudsen

What would your reply be to the following statement? “Donald Trump was right.”
    That’s rather broad. Allow me to rephrase. “Donald Trump was right about immigration.”
    No, not the golden escalator moment; I mean when he was actually President. And to be fair, he really didn’t know he made a statement that included a milligram of truth. It was early January of 2018, and the former, one-term President (we cannot say that enough) was doing what he does best, complaining. Specifically, he was complaining about immigrants who come from— At this point, the former, one-term President used an expletive to describe the sort of country that, in his mind, most immigrants hail from. Statistical figures from the Pew Research Center show that in that same year, 2018, the top five countries of origin were: Mexico, China (including Hong Kong and Macau), India, The Philippines, and El Salvador. I know, the former, one-term President still hasn’t said anything accurate, but bear with me. The former, one-term President also suggested that the United States should be allowing immigrants from Norway. Hmm.

Are Children Too Smart for Their Own Good…

Or Just Too Smart for Disney?

By Paul Clark (aka motomynd)

[The first installment of this story, with the subtitle “Or Just Too Smart for Adults?,” appeared on October 30 last year.]

When my son was 2-years, 8-months old, he and I were getting on an elevator in Anaheim when a 40ish woman joined us. She was headed for Disney and was decked out in a bulging yellow and black tightly stretched lycra mouseketeer-like outfit and some sort of bee-like pseudo-princess headband with flashing lights - apparently a Junior Leaguer who had not taken an objective look in a mirror in quite a while. She looked at me, looked at my son, and practically screamed: “Is your grandpa taking you to Disney?!!?”

Are Children Too Smart for Their Own Good…

Or Just Too Smart for Adults?

By Paul Clark (aka motomynd)

In using the word children, instead of kids – I was raised with the saying “baby goats are kids” or something like that – I’ve already put the age thing out there, so let me just say it: I’m 65, whatever. And I’m trying to homeschool my six-year-old son. Yes: 6, not a typo, whatever. And it isn’t going well. The method, as schools demand it, and as I originally envisioned it, has basically been blown to hell, but the results from the as yet undefined Plan B sort of seem to be happening. Which is a blow to the system I know and have long resented yet still believed in.

The Loneliest Liberal: Misguided Paths

By James Knudsen

Do you remember electives? I recently learned that one of the community colleges I’m employed at has made the decision to implement a program that eliminates one of the most cherished aspects of community colleges.

The Loneliest Liberal: Bon mots

By James Knudsen

Late May is that time of year when graduation fever is in the air. Caps, gowns, pomp, circuitous routes to a bachelor’s degree are all on the minds of parents and students alike. Having been a student until well into my mid-thirties, I can understand at least one side of this. More recently, I have become acquainted with the matter of financing education. Teaching at a community college, I have, on more than one occasion, had a student explain that their recent spate of absences was due to being homeless. And each semester I encourage students who are looking for a cause to take up the issue of textbook prices, because, make no mistake, it’s a racket. On the national level, the subject of college expensiveness has become a talking point for some. And on the very local level, for the fourth year, a Bon Mot Morris Knudsen Memorial Scholarship has been awarded.

Four Years Ago Today: Ne’er so well expressed

Learning from English epigram

By Eric Meub

[Originally published on October 29, 2013, not one word different, but more urgent than ever.]

Words are like leaves; and where they most abound,
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.
                            –Alexander Pope
    Here is a sentiment that many of today’s high school students might heartily commend, at least according to Kyle Garza’s overview of the state of teaching English (see “Tuesday Voice: Our amusing age,” October 1). Our educators are the canaries in our cultural coalmine: we ignore them at our peril. Some of today’s students will go on to lead entertainment and media corporations, or programs for the endowment of the arts, or institutes of higher education. Some will be news anchors or reviewers. A few will become Speaker of the House, or President. Any malaise affecting our youth has potentially drastic ramifications for the culture at large.

Interview: Carolyn Richardson on Math-U-See (and other schoolings from life)

Interviewed by Moristotle

My wife and I have for many years purchased seeds for our bird feeders from the Wild Bird Center in Chapel Hill. That’s where I met Carolyn Richardson and her younger son, Nolan, both of whom had started working there a few weeks earlier.

First Saturday as the World Turns

Education and hunger

By Ed Rogers

I believe, as we look ahead and see the road much shorter than the one behind us, we have moments where we reflect on where things went wrong. Everybody thinks that the movement in the sixties was about the Vietnam War, but that was only a part of it. There was a war on the poor even back then and many a debate centered around what we could do about the poor. While Nixon was bombing the hell out of Vietnam with operation Rolling Thunder, his "Re-elect the President" campaign was blaming those on welfare for pulling the economy down.

Tuesday Voice: Ne’er so well expressed

Learning from English epigram

By Eric Meub

Words are like leaves; and where they most abound,
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.
                            –Alexander Pope
    Here is a sentiment that many of today’s high school students might heartily commend, at least according to Kyle Garza’s overview of the state of teaching English (see “Tuesday Voice: Our amusing age,” October 1). Our educators are the canaries in our cultural coalmine: we ignore them at our peril. Some of today’s students will go on to lead entertainment and media corporations, or programs for the endowment of the arts, or institutes of higher education. Some will be news anchors or reviewers. A few will become Speaker of the House, or President. Any malaise affecting our youth has potentially drastic ramifications for the culture at large.

When's your birthday time?

"February 29 birthdays" reminded us of the burden suffered by people born on February 29 when it comes to the question of when they may celebrate their birthdays. They have to decide between (1) aging only about one-fourth as fast at the people born the day before or after them and (2) having their own birthday cake seven times every four years.
    Well, the American Cerebral Liberties Union has come forth with a proposal for everyone to share the birthday burden. ACLU representative James Leland, Directrix, wrote me yesterday:

Age measures the number of years that have passed since birth. A year is the time it takes Earth to make one orbit around the Sun. So technically, your age increases by one year every time Earth is at the same point in its orbit around the Sun as it was at the time of your birth. The time this occurs each year would be your birthtime (b.t.) and the day on which your b.t. occurs would be your birthday.
    A year takes (roughly) 365.25 days, or 365 days, 6 hours to orbit the sun. (More precisely, it takes 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes, 9.7632 seconds.) So, for example, if you were born on 1/1/1971, at 9 p.m., your first birthday would have been on 1/2/1972 (b.t. ≈ 3 a.m.). Since 1972 was a leap year (it had 366 days), your second birthday would have been on 1/1/1973 (b.t. ≈ 9 a.m.). Your third birthday would have been on 1/1/1974 (b.t. ≈ 3 p.m.). Your fourth birthday would would have been on 1/1/1975 (b.t. ≈ 9 p.m.), and so on.
    But if you had been born at 3 a.m. on 1/1/1971, your first birthday would have been on 1/1/1972 (b.t. ≈ 3 p.m.), and your second birthday would have occurred the same year, on 12/31/1972 (b.t. ≈ 9 p.m.)!

    Directrix Leland notes that, "if you were born before 6 a.m. on 1/1, not only would there be calendar years in which you have two birthdays, but there would also be calender years in which you have no birthdays."

This is a very exciting proposal. I'm particularly encouraged by the prospect of a compelling new incentive's being injected into American mathematics education by which students would have to study more math in order to be able to calculate when their next birthday will be.
    It could revolutionize American education and help us catch up with the approximately ten countries whose students outscore ours in math. Write to your Congressperson today.
_______________
Sequelae:

1. March 3: Theological fallout from "birthtime"
2. March 15: motomynd: "Quantity of life, or quality?"

Good on you, oh my reader!

Your sincere travail will not go unrewarded. Some recent critical references to “institutional education” on another blog made me realize that I very much cherish my own such education. I learned to form clear letters from dear Mrs. Zelpha Bennett, my nuturing third-grade teacher, learned to cherish ancient learning from Mr. Morris Knudsen, my cosmopolitan high-school Latin teacher, was introduced to “The Great Books” by Mr. Charles Albert King, my visionary high-school history teacher, read Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species and novels by Thomas Hardy and others for Miss Lois Thompson, my devoted high-school English teacher, acquired a love mathematics and proofs from Mr. Loren Court, my passionate math instructor, majored in philosophy at Yale University (which Mr. Court recommended I apply to), where I immersed myself in Plato, St. Thomas Aquinas, Descartes, David Hume, Immanuel Kant, Soren Kierkegaard, Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, and other philosophers, read a smattering of the world's religion texts, and discovered the work of Sigmund Freud, Leon Festinger, and a number of others. I feel richly blessed by my institutional education and its book learning. A friend shared with me today that he and his wife went through a phase with their homeschooled son in which he would do nothing but read for hours on end. His wife told the local principal, “I don't know what to do. He won't do any of his workbooks. He just reads.” “He reads?” said the principal. “Don't do anything!” I also feel richly blessed by my intuitive learning, which often “overcomes me” out in the garden—while I'm raking leaves, mowing grass, digging holes to plant, moving rocks to line paths. Life and learning are glorious, and institutional and life learning can come together in a beautiful, mutually supportive mosaic. At least, I feel that my own learning experiences have done so. Perhaps I am unusually blessed, but I can hardly credit that conceit. Good on you all, to overrunning cup!