Imagine a situation where young kids who aspire to be cartoonists or guitar players are placed in classes where they are regularly graded and ranked on their prowess. If students scored near the bottom consistently, how more likely would it be that they give up or develop an inferiority complex? Hell, I know confident, well-adjusted … Continue reading »
Increasing the Role of Federal Funding in Public Education
Among the reasons for the regional disparities in educational quality in the public system has to do with the source of funding. Currently, public schools are primarily funded by state and local taxes. Federal funding accounts for less than 10% of the total. Since states, towns, and districts differ greatly in economic status and therefore … Continue reading »
A Few Points on Why the Gold Standard is a Bad Idea
I recently listened to the latest Intelligence Squared debate where the two sides essentially argued for and against returning to the gold standard (debate link). While the side arguing against returning to the gold standard did a decent job of attacking some of the historical inferences used as evidence by the opposition, they neglected attacking … Continue reading »
Teacher Evaluations
Most schools have simple, ineffective systems of teacher evaluation that do not provide much useful information for teachers seeking to improve their skills or administrators needing to make crucial judgments about their personnel. A better system of evaluation would include the assessment of student achievement and the involvement of faculty and parents. Assessment tests in … Continue reading »
What Happened to the Management of the Largest Banks After the Financial Crisis
I found some info when I was trying to decide on which bank to move my account into & I thought I would share. These are the 13 banks which received the largest bailouts, the time put in by the active CEOs in September 2008 when the subprime mortgage bubble burst, and the fates of … Continue reading »
Why We Shouldn’t Answer Poll Questions About Politicians
By answering political popularity polls we enable politicians to dissect and categorize us. We become part of the black vote, young vote, social conservative vote, women vote, and so on. Message adjustments and decisions on whether to address or neglect particular groups are made based on what can be gathered about the political landscape. That … Continue reading »
The Information We Should Expect Politicians to Divulge
There are a few basic things that we should expect from political candidates. Too often we let them dictate the terms by which they engage us. For starters, they should be involved in more open-ended debates. That means that the audiences and the questions are not screened. It also means that that the questions are … Continue reading »
Campaign Contributions Applied Democratically or Not at All
The idea that we must treat corporations as legal people is absolutely ludicrous. We find a way to categorize anything and everything we can conceive, yet lawmakers act stumped as to how to create a different set of standards for companies. With respect to campaign contributions, this feigned impotence is particularly pernicious. We allow a … Continue reading »
Executive Council as Opposed to a President
No other branch of government hinges on the efficacy and judgment of a single person as does the executive branch. There are other options as is evidenced by the Swiss Federal Council and a couple of other executive governments. I propose that we use the single transferable vote system to elect executive councils. To keep … Continue reading »
Teacher Dismissals and Transfers
Being able to dismiss poor teachers or those that do not fit in with a school’s culture and philosophy is an important aspect of education reform. To do so, I think it is pivotal to do away with the current system of tenure. However, there should be measures to protect teachers. If a useful evaluation … Continue reading »
