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Oslo, Norway
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TK455': "Hi! We're TK455 and TK479 from the future."
TK455: "Isn't our encounter supposed to create a time paradox, the results of which could cause a chain reaction that would unravel the very fabric of the space time continuum, and destroy the entire universe?"
TK479': "No. It's not the same movie."
TK479: "Why is that guy looking like me?"
Part of the time-travel story arc.
For better comprehension, during the next days, the TK455 and TK479 who are coming from the future will be named TK455' and TK479'.
Stormtroopers 365 > Day 316/365
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What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Frederick Douglass circa 1852
The 1852 pamphlet printing of the speech
"What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" is the title now given to a speech by Frederick Douglass delivered on July 5, 1852, in Corinthian Hall, Rochester, New York, addressing the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society.The speech is perhaps the most widely known of all of Frederick Douglass' writings save his autobiographies. Many copies of one section of it, beginning in para. 32, have been circulated online.[4] Due to this and the variant titles given to it in various places, and the fact that it is called a July Fourth Oration but was actually delivered on July 5, some confusion has arisen about the date and contents of the speech. The speech has since been published under the above title in The Frederick Douglass Papers, Series One, Vol. 2. [5
While referring to the celebrations of the Independence Day in the United States the day before, the speech explores the constitutional and values-based arguments against the continued existence of Slavery in the United States. Douglass orates that positive statements about American values, such as liberty, citizenship, and freedom, were an offense to the enslaved population of the United States because of their lack of freedom, liberty, and citizenship. As well, Douglass referred not only to the captivity of enslaved people, but to the merciless exploitation and the cruelty and torture that slaves were subjected to in the United States.Rhetoricians R.L. Heath and D. Waymer called this topic the "paradox of the positive" because it highlights how something positive and meant to be positive can also exclude individuals.
Qué para el esclavo es el cuatro de julio?
De Wikipedia, la enciclopedia libre
Frederick Douglass circa 1852
La impresión del discurso en 1852.
"¿Qué para el esclavo es el cuatro de julio?" es el título ahora dado a un discurso de Frederick Douglass pronunciado el 5 de julio de 1852, en Corinthian Hall, Rochester, Nueva York, dirigido a la Sociedad Antiesclavista de Damas de Rochester. El discurso es quizás el más conocido de todos los Frederick Douglass 'escritos salvan sus autobiografías. Muchas copias de una sección, comenzando en el párr. 32, se han distribuido en línea. [4] Debido a esto y a los títulos variantes que se le otorgan en varios lugares, y al hecho de que se llama una oración del 4 de julio, pero en realidad se entregó el 5 de julio, ha surgido cierta confusión sobre la fecha y el contenido del discurso. Desde entonces, el discurso ha sido publicado bajo el título anterior en The Frederick Douglass Papers, Series One, vol. 2. [5
Al referirse a las celebraciones del Día de la Independencia en los Estados Unidos el día anterior, el discurso explora los argumentos constitucionales y basados en valores contra la existencia continua de la esclavitud en los Estados Unidos. Douglass dice que las declaraciones positivas sobre los valores estadounidenses, como la libertad, la ciudadanía y la libertad, fueron un delito para la población esclavizada de los Estados Unidos debido a su falta de libertad, libertad y ciudadanía. Además, Douglass se refirió no solo al cautiverio de las personas esclavizadas, sino a la explotación despiadada y la crueldad y tortura a la que fueron sometidos los esclavos en los Estados Unidos. Los retóricos RL Heath y D. Waymer llamaron a este tema la "paradoja de lo positivo "porque resalta cómo algo positivo y destinado a ser positivo también puede excluir a las personas.
[polski opis poniżej]
And again I have to post something that Piotrek posted last year. Fortunately, our framing was different again, so at least it's not a 1:1 copy.
The title sums up the inspiration for a trip to Germany last year. That is, visiting my sister in NRW, at whom we had a set-off base. The two of us visited some German railway pecularities (Piotrek longer by one week), with particular emphasis on diesel locomotives and mechanical signalling.
Well, we actually have these two features in this picture. It's Monday, July 25 in Klanxbüll in Schleswig-Holstein (more precisely - North Frisia), and the InterCity train no. 2311 from Westerland auf Sylt to Stuttgart is passing the entrance semaphore of the local station, or simply passing loop. At the forefront is a duo of locomotives of the 216 class (the first one number #390), which are becoming rare at DB Fernverkehr, diesel engines of the design dating back to the first half of the 1970s.
I do not want to write more on the circumstances of this photo and the area around, because this is a good reason for another story that surely appears soon. So let's focus on the photo and very intreresting (from Polish point of view) feature - an old entry semaphore installed also on the left track.
About a title. Well, literally everyone knows that the Germans introduced a special killer-offer in the period June - August 2022, a ticket for 9 euros, which entitled to an unlimited number of trips in a calendar month, by means of regional public transport. Therefore, we could travel by S-Bahn, RegionalBahn and RegionalExpress trains, regional buses, all public transport in cities, and even several ferries in the country (I haven't tested this one though). It would be a terminal sin not to take the advantage of such an opportunity.
Paradoxally, the train in the picture is not covered by this promotion, because IC and ICE trains were forbidden fruits for 9ET holders, just same like FlixTrains.
And I'm already awaiting a ticket for 49 euros and the next trip to Germany, longer this year. This is almost certain.
Photo by Jarek / Chester
I znów muszę wrzucić coś, co Piotrek wrzucał w ubiegłym roku. Ale na szczęście znów kadrowanie nasze było nieco odmienne, więc nie jest to kopia 1:1.
Tytuł podsumowuje inspirację do wycieczki po Niemczech w ubiegłym roku. To znaczy, odwiedzin siostry, u której była baza wypadowa. We dwójkę zwiedziliśmy nieco niemieckich kolejowych smaczków, ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem lokomotyw spalinowych oraz sygnalizacji kształtowej.
No właśnie, te dwa aspekty mamy na tym obrazku. Jest poniedziałek 25 lipca w miejscowości Klanxbüll w Szlezwiku-Holsztynie (tu nawet bardziej ściśle - Fryzji Północnej), a pociąg InterCity 2311 relacji Westerland auf Sylt - Stuttgart mija właśnie semafor wjazdowy miejscowej stacji, czy po prostu mijanki. Na czele duet coraz rzadszych w DB Fernverkehr lokomotyw serii 216 (pierwsza o numerze 390), starych, bo pochodzących z pierwszej połowy lat 70. diesli.
Nie chciałbym się więcej rozwodzić teraz o okolicznościach powstania fotografii i okolicy tego szlaku, bo to jest temat na inną opowieść, która szybko się pojawi. Skupmy się więc na zdjęciu - zaciekawia bardzo rzadki u nas (w Polsce) widok, czyli semafor kształtowy wjazdowy na torze niewłaściwym (lewym). O ograniczeniu prędkości do 140 km/h na takim niezelektryfikowanym szlaku nie wspomnę, bo u nas takich prędkości się nie osiąga, zresztą nie specjalnie byłoby czym, zważywszy na wieczne niedomaganie SU160...
Ale jeszcze tytuł. Otóż chyba już dosłownie każdy wie, że Niemcy wprowadzili w okresie czerwiec - sierpień specjalną killer-ofertę, bilet za 9 euro, który uprawniał do nieograniczonej liczby podróży w miesiącu kalendarzowym, środkami transportu publicznego komunikacji regionalnej. W związku z tym do dyspozycji mamy pociągi S-Bahn, RegionalBahn i RegionalExpress, autobusy lokalne, komunikację miejską w miastach, a nawet kilka promów. Nie skorzystać z takiej okazji byłoby grzechem najcięższym.
Paradoksalnie, pociąg na obrazku nie łapie się na tę promocję, gdyż IC oraz ICE to owoc zakazany dla posiadaczy 9ET, podobnie jak pociągi Flix.
A ja już ostrzę sobie zęby na bilet za 49 euro i wycieczka do NIemiec, dłuższa w tym roku, jest już prawie pewna.
Photo by Jarek / Chester
“She is a paradox. She is faithful and yet detached. She is committed and yet relaxed. “She loves everyone, and yet no one. She is sociable and also a loner. She is gentle and yet tough, she is passionate but also platonic. In short she is predictable in her own unpredictability.” ~ Unknown Author
Having realised that, as in Zeno's paradox, however fast I walk, map in hand, I cannot catch up with the past, I wander aimlessly around the city, dizzied by the endless pouring, step by step, of memory into a void.
Paradox...the beauty of these trees amidst the seemingly beauty of the rising steam... actually that steam is coming from large stacks in the city..Pulp Mills. I live in a big paper producing area and the loads and loads of trees trucked into these mills daily is phenomenal
View large.
Special NOTE: On Feb. 8, 2012 I attached a comment, readable & easily discoverable on Page 2 of the comments below, that details the vast corporatist scheme, fronted by Jeb Bush, financed in part with hundreds of millions from Rupert Murdoch (FOX nooze), to privatize American public education & reduce it to 'virtual' schools - not to improve anything (as national & international educational research studies clearly show), but rather to become the final recipients of the taxes people pay so that they can skim huge profits off of the top while providing grotesquely inferior services & lots of lying propaganda to keep the public bamboozled. I beg everyone to read the report.
The McGuffey's Ecclectic Spelling Book was published in 1879.
Raymond Cyrus Hoiles (1878-1970) founded Freedom Communications, a newspaper publishing & broadcasting company that has never hesitated to shape the news to fit right wing ideology. When Hoiles was alive & roaring I lived in Orange County, California, home of the equally right wing Walt Disney & Walter Knott, & was frequently compelled to suffer people who agreed with Hoiles' constantly editorialized insistence that public education was a form of theft & communism that must at once be got rid of. Hoiles was motivated by his fundamentalist Christian persuasions, & quite serious. We should restrain our laughter at the abysmal stupidity of his example, because in many ways he & people like him won & are still winning control of public education. - To introduce the article below, I'll say a little about the Christian strategy.
For many years Orange County's teachers worked under a Draconian ruling that forbade the teaching of values. There is no way around the fact, however, that the statement, "Values may not be taught," is itself a value statement belonging to a class of propositions known as Epimenidean Paradoxes. A comparably illustrative sentence would be, "This is not a sentence." Or, a favorite of the best hypnotists, used when addressing a resistant subject, "Do not obey any instruction which I give you."
What, then, was intended by those who created the paradoxical Orange County law? Well, if any teacher dared to say or imply something that would be disagreeable to any person whose beliefs began & ended with church, flag & free-for-all capitalism, then that teacher could be charged with teaching values & be suspended. One family friend, a young man teaching at an elementary school in Anaheim, was charged, hounded, publicly disgraced, threatened with death & discharged from his post, immediately after which he died from a heart attack. The case was depicted in Life Magazine. His only crime was that he was Jewish. His wife, also a teacher, remained bereft & embittered the rest of her long life.
These people became increasingly invisible over time, largely by devising ever more clever ways for gaining control of both education policy & the public dialogue about education.
Ralph Reed, working for Pat Robertson & the Christian Coalition, devised the "stealth agenda" to place fundamentalists in every local school board in America. The plan helped select & fund candidates, who in accord with Reed's instructions never mentioned their religion or religious connections when campaigning for office. In 1983 Reed rigged an election at his university - he got started early, in other words. Recently we learned that Mr. Reed & Jack Abramoff were associate crooks. The revelation forced Reed to abandon his run to become the lieutenant governor of Georgia. Mr. Reed will not disappear, however. He remains a darling of the far Christian right, & owns Century Strategies, a dirty-tricks political consulting & lobbying organization. In 1999 Karl Rove got reed a nice contract with Enron, which was paying Reed $30,000 per month. And guess who recently went to Georgia to try to save poor Reed? Rudy Giuliani, who has the hots to be the next U.S. president & is pandering to the Christians so he can be their new burning Bush.
Stealthiness did not go away when the Christian Coalition folded & Reed went off on his own to rig elections for big bucks. Rather, the stealth moved into policy matters. For instance, all the phony propaganda claiming religious & private education is more successful, creating the excuse to promote vouchers (for which the motives are both religious & racist). Or, most recently, Bush's No Child Left Behind Act, which was sought by the Christians not because they believed all the testing of students would lead to improved education, but rather because they wanted teachers to be made too busy preparing students for endless tests about facts to find time to do the great evil thing, which is the teaching of concepts. Teaching concepts leads to teaching logic, scientific & other academic methodologies which by their nature instill respect for critical - read, skeptical - thinking. Dogmatists, advertisers & con men have equal cause to fear skepticism.
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From: Truthdig.com
Taking Back Our Schools--and Fixing Them
Full text with links: www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060425_taking_back_our_sch...
Posted on Apr. 25, 2006
By Wellford Wilms
The recent news reported in The New York Times that schools are throwing out science, social studies and art to make time for drilling students in remedial math and reading is a sign of things gone terribly wrong. Former New York State Commissioner of Education Thomas Sobol told the Times that narrowing education to just math and reading would be akin to restricting violin students to playing scales day after day. “They’d lose their zest for music.” But most schools that serve poor populations, like those in Cuero, Texas, are squeezed to meet federal math and reading standards. Cuero Superintendent Henry Lind told the paper, “When you have so many hours per day and you’re behind in some area that’s being hammered on, you have to work on that.”
But by the looks of things, hammering students for higher test scores isn’t making much of a difference. Most students have already lost their zest for learning. How do we know? In Los Angeles, upwards of 50% of Latino and African American students never finish high school. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
I’ve been a professor of education at UCLA for more than 25 years and am convinced that despite the fads that come and go, nothing has put a dent in the public schools’ failure to educate inner-city children. In fact, things are getting worse. But I am also convinced that we’ve been looking in the wrong places for solutions. My own research across a wide array of organizations—corporations, trade unions, public schools, colleges, teacher unions and police agencies—suggests another way of looking at the problem and that solutions will come from a new direction.
This essay is a proposition—one that I hope will spark a lively debate among Truthdig readers and inform policy leaders. Future essays will examine Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s campaign to take over the public schools, analyze whether teacher unions can be a force for productive change, and expose promising ways to rebuild public investment in the schools.
Let’s start with Jonathan Kozol’s new book, “The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America.” It is a scathing indictment of American social policy that banned racial segregation in public schools in 1955 and then turned a blind eye to its implementation. Today, Kozol says, schools are more segregated than ever. But he fails to explain why resegregation has occurred. Because Kozol overlooks the root causes of the problem, his solutions—spending more money on dysfunctional schools and wishing for a social mandate to desegregate the schools—miss the point.
To be sure the problems are undeniable. Kozol examines the appalling condition of big-city schools. In school after school we see children who are brimming with potential but who are walled off from the larger society and abandoned by the schools. Most middle-class white Americans simply cannot comprehend the horrid schools that Kozol describes. Ceilings fall in, toilets are filthy, libraries, music and arts have been stripped away. Teachers in these schools, who are paid 40% less than teachers in the suburbs, are forced to teach “scripted” lessons that are written for children who are deemed incapable of learning.
It is all part of the latest reform pushed by the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind initiative, a reform aimed at the singular pursuit of increasing test scores. Learning has been stripped of its intrinsic meaning and reduced to simplistic steps—“Authentic Writing,” “Active Listening,” “Accountable Talk”—that hamper teachers in teaching anything but how to take a test. Behind it all is an attempt to impose control, much as mass production techniques were used a century ago, to standardize instruction to fit new immigrants to the system.
Meanwhile, millions of children are failing. In nearly half of the high schools in America’s 100 largest districts, fewer than 50% of students graduate in four years. Most of these students are from poor Latino and African-American families. And from 1993 to 2000 the number of failing schools has mushroomed by 75%. Mayor Villaraigosa calls Los Angeles’ high dropout rates “numbers that should put a chill down your spine.”
The reasons, Kozol argues, are lack of money and racial discrimination that produce inferior and segregated schools. No doubt this is partly true. We have tried to desegregate the schools for a half-century and failed. Middle-class white parents have voted for individual freedom with their feet, enrolling their children in private schools, leaving the public schools more segregated than ever. The same is true for middle-class black families. Gail Foster, an educator who has studied black independent schools, was quoted in 2004 in The New York Times as saying: “Many of the most empowered parents and families are removing their children. What’s left, in even working-class communities, are schools filled with the least empowered families. Families with the least parent involvement to offer, families with the least help with homework to offer. There’s been a continual outflow for at least 10 years, and it isn’t stopping now.”
More money is not the answer either. Kozol points to wide disparities in educational expenditures ranging from $11,700 per student in New York City to $22,000 in suburban Manhasset. Disturbing as that is, study after study shows that equalizing money does not necessarily equalize learning.
In 1966, sociologist James Coleman conducted the most extensive study ever made of desegregating education and found that what mattered most in students’ learning was the economic status of their peers rather than the racial makeup of the school. He also found that school funding was not closely related to students’ achievement—their families’ economic status was far more predictive. Coleman’s findings were controversial and led to a bitter debate, but they have been replicated many times. Daniel Patrick Moynihan summed it up best when he commented shortly after Coleman’s groundbreaking study, “We should begin to see that the underlying reality is not race but social class.”
Since social class matters because money follows privilege, and since desegregation will take generations to eradicate, what can be done now? Are poor children doomed to attend grossly inadequate schools? Surely not. We must find ways to remove the influences that have crippled the schools. Money must be diverted from bloated bureaucracies that snuff out innovation. Instead it must go directly to schools where principals and teachers can influence what is taught and what children learn, and help bring parents back into the fold. Otherwise, it is going down a rat hole.
Parents have a significant role to play in their children’s education, but their voices have been largely silenced. Over the last 40 years, we have witnessed the decline of civic involvement and the growing dominance of self-interest over the greater good, a social deterioration that sociologist Robert Putnam calls “hollowing out” in his 2000 book “Bowling Alone.” One result, as the old saying goes, is that “the rich get richer” and the poor fall ever further behind in crumbling schools.
Over the last 25 years, education in general has been taken from ordinary citizens and teachers by politicians, administrators, union leaders, publishers, test makers, consultants, university professors, hardware and software developers and the media, each playing its part in keeping alive the illusion of reform. All in all, this $1-trillion industry has replaced the common interest, and no one, it seems, can muster the will to rein it in.
Local control is only a dim memory. Decisions now come from the top—from the federal and state governments, school boards and high-level administrators who have little knowledge of what goes on in the classroom. Teachers are left out of these decisions, carrying on the best they can, safe in the assumption that the newest fad, like those before it, will blow over. Parents are all but forgotten.
While command-and-control management may seem to produce results in the short run, it strips schools of the capacity to develop the stable leadership that is necessary to sustain success. Principals are besieged with demands from district offices and from the educational fads that emanate from publishers and university researchers. Many principals know that they put their careers in peril unless they do what their bosses want. One elementary school principal told me, “District directives undermine our own abilities to think for ourselves, to believe in what we see and know.” When schools discover something that works, it is rarely sustained because they lack authority or stable leadership.
In 1969 when I worked for the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, I monitored the schools in impoverished Ocean Hill-Brownsville in New York City. The local school board hired a charismatic superintendent, who fired incompetent teachers and hired young and idealistic ones. The firings set the local board at odds with the huge teachers’ union, which demanded due process for the fired teachers. The superintendent, Rhody McCoy, was convinced that good teachers had to respect the children they taught. He put it in plain words: “If you’re convinced that this kid is doomed by nature or by something else to lead a shrunken and curtailed life, then you’re basically incompetent to teach that child.” The experiment worked. Observing classrooms left no doubt in my mind that students were learning. Eager first-graders sat attentively on the floor in semicircles shouting out answers to fraction problems and reading aloud. The schools buzzed with excitement as parent helpers streamed in and out of classrooms. But in a bitter power struggle the board seized authority and the experiment ended.
Years later, in 1985, Deborah Meier, a passionate educator who founded Harlem’s Central Park East Secondary School, achieved stunning successes that led the school to be celebrated as a model alternative school in Time magazine. But it could not be sustained beyond Meier’s unique leadership. Today, 10 years after Meier left, a respected children’s advocacy group, Insideschools and Advocates for Children, reports that the Harlem school “…has fallen on hard times in recent years with rapid staff turnover, low staff morale and uneven discipline.”
In risk-averse environments like public schools, few principals will stick out their necks, because they don’t want to buck the bosses downtown. Courageous and visionary principals like Rhody McCoy and Deborah Meier keep coming. But charismatic leadership is no match for heavy-handed district management, which always wins out.
Take Foshay Learning Center in Los Angeles, for example. In 1989, Howard Lappin took over a failing middle school. With the help of teachers and an infusion of money, Lappin wrested control from the district and transformed Foshay. The school expanded into a K-12 “learning center” and became largely autonomous of the district’s bureaucratic requirements. Teachers and administrators decided who would be hired and what would be taught. Foshay succeeded, and in 2000 its high school was selected by Newsweek as one of the 100 best in America. But in 2001 Lappin retired, and his unique leadership was lost. Today Foshay is being threatened with sanctions by the district and the county because gains in students’ test scores have stalled. As the school has fallen under the district’s “one-size-fits all” bureaucratic requirements, the impact has been to undermine the once vibrant teacher leadership that made the school so enviable.
The problem with public education is not with the teachers, or with the children, but the way we organize the schools. Probably the greatest casualties are teachers themselves, who are forced to accept decisions by authorities about teaching that they know to be nonsense. One professor interviewed by Kozol said that forcing an absurdity on teachers teaches something: acquiescence. For example, in study after study, teachers report that relying on test scores as sole marks of student achievement and teaching scripted lessons destroy students’ natural love of learning. And such practices also erode teachers’ professional authority, which is fundamental to student learning.
Why is it so hard to foster the only kind of reform that really works, which is right in the schoolhouse? Because politicians, school board members and administrators are under intense pressure to produce immediate results, i.e., higher and higher test scores—a goal that is pursued through directives from districts with little input of principals, teachers and parents. Superintendents serve at the pleasure of school boards, and most board members are elected or appointed and have limited terms of office. As test scores have become the measure of educational quality, everyone is under immense pressure to show fast results or be turned out.
No wonder that school boards hire superintendents who promise to deliver quick results. But few do. Superintendents last on average only three or four years. Many are thwarted by outmoded bureaucracies that were designed a century ago using top-down control practiced in American industry to mass-produce learning. Within these organizations, power has quietly accumulated, making them all but impervious to outside influence. Sid Thompson, former superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District, told me: “Trying to change the district is like trying to change the direction of a fast-moving freight train. You might knock it off course for a moment, but before you know it it’s rattling right down the tracks again.”
Frustration and suspicion about who might emerge from the shadows to sabotage their plans often lead superintendents to jealously guard their power. In 2002, Day Higuchi, then president of United Teachers Los Angeles, the Los Angeles teacher union, had high hopes for working with the school district’s new “can-do” superintendent, Roy Romer. Higuchi hoped that Romer would endorse a new union initiative called Lesson Study, a plan to help teachers work collectively to improve classroom lessons. At a breakfast meeting that I attended, Higuchi presented Romer with an invitation to work with the union to develop and spread Lesson Study across the district. When Higuchi finished, Romer flipped over his paper placemat and with a red felt pen drew a box with an S in it. “That’s me,” he said. Beneath he drew 11 boxes with smaller s’s in them, representing the 11 local superintendents, and below that, a number of small boxes with roofs, representing schools and teachers. Then, pulling his face near to Higuchi’s, he drew bold red arrows pointing downward from the top. Romer jabbed his pen in the air to accentuate each word: “You cannot usurp my authority to manage this district!” It was a dumbfounding moment, one that revealed the true underside of the use of power. Here was a chance for a new superintendent to forge a small but significant step with the union, but Romer, who recently announced his resignation, explained that he was “in a hurry.” He clearly had little time for ideas that were at odds with his own. In the end his refusal to work with the union undermined the possibility of creating a broader base of power that could transcend self-interest.
Nor are the unions exempt from self-interest. A few years ago I helped establish a national group of union presidents called TURN (Teacher Union Reform Network) who were dedicated to remaking their unions as forces to improve education. One way was to cooperate with administrators and encourage teachers to use their classroom know-how to redesign teaching at the schoolhouse. But hostility and mistrust run deep. The union leaders became nervous, fearing that fellow unionists would attack them for “collaborating” with the enemy and that if the effort to collaborate failed they would share the blame. Don Watley, president of the New Mexico Federation of Educational Employees, commented: “It’s like the Normandy landing. We’ve got the best troops in the world. We’ve got the best officers in the world. And we’ve got the best equipment in the world. But at 0800 when we hit the beach half of us are going to get killed!” Sadly, in the years to come, the ingrained mistrust, and the unpredictable dance of union politics, prevented these unionists from becoming a positive force in educational reform. Instead, they have been reduced to stockpiling power, much as the Soviets and Americans stockpiled nuclear weapons during the Cold War, to oppose any hostile moves the other side might make.
So what can be done to break the standoff between teacher unions and districts? How can teachers’ professional authority be restored? How can parents be awakened and brought back into the fold? Experience shows that it can be done. Schools such as Harlem’s Central Park East Secondary, Los Angeles’ Foshay Learning Center, those in Ocean Hill-Brownsville, and many others attest to the fact that schools can be made into safe places where children learn. Sustaining them is the hard part.
There is little doubt that trying to build good schools with command-and-control management doesn’t work. School boards, superintendents and union officials need to clear the obstacles—unnecessary bureaucratic requirements and outmoded work rules—to make innovation at the schoolhouse possible. These top-level educational leaders also must make resources available to support new ways of teaching. Jonathan Kozol has it right. Teaching is the only reform that counts and it can be done only at the schoolhouse by teachers, principals, parents and students working together.
Turning school districts upside down will also mean turning a century of top-down management on its head. But where is such bold leadership to be found? One promising place is among big-city mayors. But they must resist trying to take over the schools, as they did in New York, Chicago and Boston with mixed results at best. Instead, popular mayors could use their influence and visibility to tell the truth about the condition of education and to build a popular consensus about how change must occur.
In the next essay I am going to examine what mayors can do. Waiting for the schools to be saved by someone else is nonsense. Only concerted local action offers a chance. Doubters should recall Margaret Mead’s observation: “Never doubt that a small group of concerned people can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
A Progressive Journal of News and Opinion. Editor, Robert Scheer. Publisher, Zuade Kaufman.
Copyright © 2006 Truthdig, L.L.C. All rights reserved.
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I had a crazy idea last night and decided to run with it. Here's the result. In case you're wondering I didn't superimpose the photograph into this picture. First I composed the inner photograph and actually printed it out on photopaper and held it there for the big shot. (I then later snapped a picture of the printed photograph to help sharpen some of the inside image.)
I guess my original source of inspiration would have to be ocellnuri's Task Force.
Chris, I'm dedicating this one to you.
Larus dominicanus dominicanus
Paradox: A beautiful seagull and garbage background
Calle-Calle River / Valdivia City / Los Rios Region / Chile
I've been wanting to create this Escher-like paradox for ages; I just had to work out how to hold the camera! Viewing the large size might help you solve the enigma ... or discombobulate you further!
The fight took at least 20 minutes. They were both battling each other, and I was just about to make a stealth attack, when....
Bombs came crashing down. It knocked both sides out. Marc wasn’t there, meaning he teleported out just in time. Cobb was knocked out from the impact, leaving Rory to help. He telekinetically removed the rubble and carried his body away.
Rory: He’s hurt. Bad. I have to perform a quick surgery on him. Mate’s gonna live long enough. But for now, we’re out. Watch over yourself, Noriko. I’ll telepathically establish a link if the comlinks don’t work in our team.
Noriko: Ok Doc.
Trent (over comlink): All right folks. I know what happened. I just had a brief fight with Mech-Prince. He has lead his team, which I believe dropped the bombs around here. The police can’t hold long for this. And where’s Marc?!
*Somewhere unknown:*
My suit was sustained with multiple cuts and bruises, but I’m still up for a fight. My mini-cape has been burnt off and my I don’t really have a lot of ammo there. Last I heard from the comlink before it broke down was Cobb getting knocked out and Trent’s fight with that gosh darn CEO. I just really hate him, you know. My mind has been on too many things. I just wanna know where my best friend is now....
*Dallas, Texas.*
I woke up with a jolt. The dreams kept coming, if the guy, the prophet dude who sorta invaded my mind and he let me saw the future. The Grey Police. Really totalitarian. Darren and Carl were apprehending guys. My team was half dead. My (grandson?) was taking charge over my legacy. So much stuff going on.
Conrad comes in. “Bad dreams again?” He asks. “I know it’s the same thing over and over again. There’s always a way to prevent it. We’re not talking about dystopian futures like in X-Men or Terminator, but it’s rather a different situation, another scenario. Just relax. I’ll get you some tea. Try meditating if you can.” “Thanks,” I reply. I go to the washroom, staring at my torso and muscles. Then I start washing my, face, knowing that I got to dress up and go to battle.
*Back in L.A.:*
Police officers were coming. I recognise a few of them. Some were Adrian’s friends. Trent’s hand appears before me.
Trent: Kid, this isn’t good. The army can’t access here. Conrad just told me that they’re both in Texas. Adrian’s been dreaming again. And that aside, none of the allies can reach us. I told my sister to stay out of this, she’s under the care of Lockhart and Sanford. You should tell your uncle if you have to.
Noriko: He’ll know soon. Oscar just called me. He’s getting reinforcements, and one of his drones managed to sneak through. He’ll find a way. But as for Adrian, I’m worried about his dreams.
Trent(using his tech and footage): Nothing we can do about it. The ESP is coming soon, and they’ll handle this. By the way, check out Darren, Carl, and Megan. I’ve saw them fight with potential. You think they’ll ever make good team members?
Noriko: Impressive fighting skills. Marc’s gonna like this, speaking of which...
Officer (comes running and interrupts): Blazefire, ahem,—sir, enemy fire is returning! They have heavy weapons here!
Trent: Deploy more squads. Here, take some of my tech. This’ll hold them off a bit. With the ESP coming, we could still have a slight chance of victory. You have to hurry.
Officer: Yes sir.
Trent (back to conversation): About Marc, I’m afraid I can’t come. I’m in command partly with the police here. My mentor is gonna show up anytime to assist, as much as I don’t like him. But Noriko I need you to find him. I’m sure you can do this alone.
Noriko: I could be in use of a “emergency” ally.
Trent (checks database) No one is active, except our doctor. Take Rory with you. I’m sure he’s ready as Cobb is resuscitating. He’ll be notified when you’ll come. I’ll keep tabs on Adrian. Now go!
I run as fast as I can, taking out some nearby enemies. Ironrazor had left early, leaving some mercenaries behind with civilians hostage. I take them out with my sais, and some police officers come and free the civilians. I see one running away the other direction, who’s around at 4 o’clock. I chase after him, using my vision, he’s crawling under the tunnel down below.
*Back in Dallas:*
Conrad: Ready to leave?
Adrian: Sure as always.
Conrad: Good. Then get ready. You are needed as your best friend goes missing.
Adrian: Then ready the squad. The contingency plans have to be set into motion.
Conrad: You sure about this? Given their performance that Trent has showed us?
Adrian: They are.
Conrad: I assume one of them is...your ex girlfriend?
Adrian: That’s a thing of the past. My feelings are mutual, just friends.
Conrad: Then let’s keep it that way.
Somewhere, location unknown:
I wake up with my mouth dry. I hate this. Now my suit was starting to fall apart. I find myself in the clutches of that one a**hole. Mech-Prince. And Ironrazor was there too, gleaming happily.
MP: Ah...the assassin.
Marc: What do you want, f***er?
MP: I assume you know the codes. Don’t play games now.
IR( steps in): I regret we didn’t have much of a longer fight, do we?
Marc: See for yourself, I can last longer than that.
IR: Always got an edge there.
MP: Enough! Now is not the time for quarrel. I need the codes! You will tell me where is it. I will find the agent!
Marc: Well...I still don’t know. But I know you’re kinda overreacting.
*Los Angeles:*
Noriko: Is Cobb stable?
Rory: Yes, but he’s healing. I do believe before the lad got knocked out, he managed to pin the last known location of our friend. Must be somewhere close.
Oscar (coming out of nowhere): And I believe we’re being followed. My drones can navigate the sewers quickly. That guy you just chased? He’s a distraction. I “asked” him politely but he’s quite rude.
Rory: All right lads, we’ve got a lead. Follow me now!
*Phoenix, Arizona, en route to L.A, aboard Photonkiller’s jet:*
Conrad: We’ll be there soon. Your ninja friend Noriko is heading out there with a small team, who are the remaining members active now. You have to assist them.
Adrian: I doubt my leadership is not going anywhere. I’m not even sleeping that well. How will they react if this keeps happening recurrently? And what I did in the war...good lord.
Conrad: I feel your worries. But you shouldn’t bring it up at a time like this. I agree that PTSD is a serious issue, but believe me, you’re doing just fine. Remember how I managed to calm my mind? I saved those people in Calcutta when I was 16. I may have lost 20% of my hearing, but still, I never gave up. And so can you, good friend. Now, assemble the team when we get back there ASAP. We are running out of time.
*Meanwhile...back to the fight...*
I’ve been scouting for hours without avail. It’s been almost a day and I can only assume there is battle up there, as Trent keeps on informing us. But then I stumble upon a piece of dirty cloth, which is very tattered.
Rory: Let me analyse it. There’s some blood on...bloody hell! It’s Teleshift’s. Must be his small cape.
Oscar: Did you hear that?
Rory/Noriko: What?
The sounds come again. It seems like I’ve heard correctly, the screams of torture. My run to the nearest spot, and using my vision, the figure looks like...Marc’s.
I lead my team there, with various mercenaries standing by. Poor Marc’s been bruised and beaten. Without second thoughts or hesitation, I shout to my team, “Take them down!” As Rory telekinetically slams men across the walls. Oscar takes down some men with his revolvers and his drones, while I disarm them with my quick speed. Mech-Prince seems to have found out our sudden attack.
MP: Take them down! Barrett, get us out of here. The interrogation is a failure! The enemy is here to save him! We need to run!
IR: Sir, we can still handle the Paradox Force! You should be leaving first!
MP (launches internal jetpack): Then hold them off as much as you can. I’ll be going...
IR: Well, ninja girl, looks like we’re rebound for a match again, eh?
Noriko: I’m game.
He strikes the floor down while my agility makes me dodge him. The attack doesn’t harm me much. I see Rory levitating himself, propelling up to catch with Mech-Prince. Oscar is still really busy with his job. Then Ironrazor proceeds to escape up, and I catch him. I realise we are somewhere in the broken police station. I call Rory to “switch dance partners” with me, where I proceed to sneak up on Mech-Prince, who is launching blasts and rockets at me, while Rory duels Ironrazor. Their fight looks very impressive too.
Noriko: What do you want?
MP: Just a code. The agent. And today, since we’re here, let’s end this. On a police station.
Noriko: What’s so important with the third one?
MP: He will fuel my powers. I plan to use him as my agent that turns against you and your friends. And the code that leads me to dominance over technology and most companies in the world.
Noriko: I bet you’ll never find it before you’re even dead.
MP: Then you leave me no choice. I can blow up this station right now!
Noriko: Isn’t there always a better way?
MP: One that should end in vain and in sacrifice. Goodbye, Spectre Blade.
The evil CEO proceeds to press a button on his suit’s left arm, causing everything to start falling down. But then a shadow appears, and Mech-Prince strikes him with some blasts. He looks hurt from the smoke, but proceeds to shoot him with his guns, when I realise that it’s Marc, using the remainder of his energy to fight. He absorbs the energy, and proceeds to take Mech Prince one on one in CQC. Both wrestle over control over one another. Then I see a piece of rubble falling over Oscar, who just came up from below but pretty much unconscious. Marc quickly runs over, kicking him out of the way. He teleports me, Rory (who is holding Ironrazor, unconscious with darts around his neck) and Oscar away quickly before the explosion continues. His masked eyes imply him smiling, but then I realise...
“NO!” I shout.
It’s too late when the explosions trap him and Mech-Prince away. The last thing I saw was rubble, dirt, mess and Rory’s sad, shocked eyes...