.

Textbooks are like hotdogs -- If you knew what went into it, you wouldn't want to eat one.

Dude, you posted that same joke 5 posts back. Hears to hoping your "babe" doesn't thread stalk you....:praying:

Hee hee! Oh for chrissakes, did I?? Must have been a long time ago because I don't remember that at all!

Thanks for pointing that out, ya goof. Now no one will miss it.

My pleasure.

An yah, it was July, so it really doesn't count. :byebye:

ONTARIO: Catholic Group Campaigns Against Anti-Bullying Bill

The Ontario Assembly is considering Bill 13, which mandates that schools must organize programs to thwart anti-gay bullying. This has made one Catholic group extremely angry because ordering an anti-bullying campaign is bullying itself.

From the petition campaign launched by Parents As First Educators:
- Bill 13 privileges one group of students (LGBT) over others.
- An anti-bullying bill should treat all students equally.
- We do not believe that equity education should be part of an anti-bullying bill.
- We don't believe equity education has been proven to affect bullying rates.
- We don't support gay-straight alliances (GSAs) in Catholic schools. The imposition of GSAs on Catholic schools IS bullying.
- Bill 13 does not give enough local control to school boards over bullying policies.
- It is unnecessary. Bullying problems will be best solved by mediation between the bully and the the victims, with their families, at the school level. We don't need a new law for that

--from Joemygod

Here's their F'd up organization: http://www.p-first.com/

Missouri--*Don't Say Gay Bill*
 

HB 2051
Prohibits the discussion of sexual orientation in public school instruction, material, or extracurricular activity except in scientific instruction on human reproduction

http://www.house.mo.gov/billsummary....ar=2012&code=R

-------------------------

For the last several years - PROMO, Missouri's statewide LGBT advocacy organization and its allies have worked to advance pro-lgbt legislation, and have seen steady, continuing success.

"Filing this bill is a desperate tactic by frightened, bigoted, cynical individuals who are terrified at the advancement the LGBT community has made in breaking down the barriers to full and equal treatment under the law," said PROMO Executive Director, A.J. Bockelman. "Why else would they file a bill so clearly out of step with the growing trend for fairness in this state when similar legislation filed in Tennessee last year led that state’s legislature to become the object of national ridicule?"

"It’s clear that this proposed bill does absolutely nothing to protect students," continued Bockelman. "In some ways, however, these enemies of Freedom of Speech have done us a favor. By attempting to coerce teachers and students into making this core reality of our lives literally unspeakable, they have only proved why LGBT students need greater, better, and stronger protection in our schools."

Missouri is not the first state to push the so-called "don't say gay" bill. Tennessee advanced similar legislation through multiple votes last year, drawing national ridicule, as well as opposition from their Republican governor, Bill Haslam. Despite that legislation's failure - Tennessee lawmakers introduced a nearly identical bill this session, which was approved by the state House earlier this week.

http://www.thevitalvoice.com/news/50...s/625-breaking

CTA- positions Bills
 

You have to wonder who edited this summary of a Abolition of Child Commerce, Exploitation and Sexual Slavery Act of 2011 . Below is a quote directly from the summary.....

Teachers believe that children should be protected by predators and exploitation in every way possible

....shaking my head.....I do believe the 'by' should be 'from'

I know!! Who knows what editing devices used! Weird, huh?

Here is some info concerning testing recently - as a means to evaluate teachers in NY. Many states are following this and trying to implement similar policies.

>>>Last week, the New York State Education Department and the teachers’ unions reached an agreement to allow the state to use student test scores to evaluate teachers.>>>

http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog...ruary+21+2012&


Adding- Huff Post OpEd- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-...b_1034926.html

Linking Teacher Evaluation to Student Test Scores: Wrong 25% of the Time

NEA Tags: budgets, community college, Department of Public Instruction, educational excellence, Florida, higher education, Illinoi
 

AtLast.........the link does not work

Here is the article- link might not work without membership sign-in i guess--

Florida – Dismal state budget shortchanges public schools
FEA President Andy Ford issued this statement on the state budget signed Tuesday, April 17 by Gov. Rick Scott and its implication for public education:

The state budget passed by the Florida Legislature and signed by Gov. Rick Scott is a dismal failure to provide for the students who rely on the state to attain a high-quality education. Despite the governor’s claims that the increases in funding for education represent his commitment to our schools, he has failed to point out that this budget restores less than a third of what was cut from last year’s education budget and that our schools are still miles behind the funding levels in our state five years ago.

Total school funding will not change much next year, as local school districts will have to use the added state money to make up for the loss of federal funding, an increase in enrollment and a drop in local property taxes. Officials at school districts throughout the state say they’re considering layoffs of teachers and other school employees, and curtailing arts programs and athletics for students.

At the same time the governor and lawmakers doled out more tax giveaways for corporations, more money for unaccountable voucher schools and more support and autonomy to for-profit charter schools, our public schools are given a budget nowhere close to adequate and light years away from a true investment in our children.

Click here to find out more at FEAWeb.org, or sign the petition to help save educator jobs at the University of Florida.

Illinois – 2012 MAP grant rally
Community college students from around Illinois lobbied legislators, asking them to please increase money for MAP grants. MAP grants are given to college students around the state to help defray the cost of going to college.



Visit IEANEA.org for more information and to find out how you can get involved.

Wisconsin – Wisconsin schools cut 2,312 positions this year, student-teacher ratio highest in nine years
Under Governor Scott Walker, 73 percent of Wisconsin school districts have lost teachers, the Department of Public Instruction reports. According to the new report [ed note: pdf link], the number of teachers and other staff working in Wisconsin schools dropped 2.3 percent this school year.

The report, an annual tracking of staffing levels and other details about Wisconsin public schools, shows the true impact that $1.6 billion in reduced state education funding has had on local schools. According to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, which uses these figures for federal reporting purposes, this year’s annual school staff report shows that school districts cut 2,312 positions for the 2011-12 school year, a 50 percent increase in staff losses from the previous school year. That is the steepest decline in the nine years that the DPI has been consistently tracking staffing levels. Teaching positions accounted for more than 60 percent of the cuts.

The report said the student-teacher ratio increased from 14.33 to 14.66, the highest level in nine years.

“The numbers released by the state Department of Public Instruction underline the damage Governor Walker has inflicted on students and schools in all areas of Wisconsin. The facts are undeniable and show that – despite what the governor tries to hide – public education in Wisconsin has indeed suffered under Governor Walker,” said WEAC President Mary Bell.

Get the whole story at WEAC.org.

Utah – Educational Excellence Task Force members selected
Each year dozens of policy changes affect Utah’s public schools, yet these changes do not always result in the best outcomes for students. Educators are uniquely positioned to identify critical academic priorities and propose important solutions to strengthen teaching effectiveness and improve student outcomes. Therefore, the UEA has organized the Educational Excellence Task Force to study and prioritize critical education issues and create a vision of teaching excellence that is designed and led by educators.

The Task Force will be chaired by Park City teacher and instructional coach Anna Williams. “I’m honored to serve with such an outstanding group of educators who excel in their field,” said Williams. “It’s important that we as educators take the lead in identifying changes that will promote educational excellence for our students and enhance our profession.”

“The educators participating on our Educational Excellence Task Force represent a breadth and depth of experience in many areas,” said UEA Director of Educational Excellence and Community Outreach Sara Jones. “The end goal of the Task Force will be to impact decision-making and priorities at UEA as well as broader state policy.”

The Task Force will meet regularly with the charge to analyze relevant research in order to identify priorities for the Utah Education Association and public education in Utah; develop a comprehensive set of policy recommendations regarding teaching quality and effectiveness; and engage the association, policymakers and the public in the important dialogue of change.

---

There are so many major education political/public employee battles around the nation- "Snot" Walker is just but one Gov. that took aim at collective bargaining and teacher rights in the US after the 2010 mid-terms.

Church blindsided by Ontario government over gay-straight alliances: Catholic sources

The Ontario provincial government has ignored months of behind-the-scenes negotiations by announcing Friday that all schools, religious or otherwise, will be required to host gay-straight alliances, Church sources say.

Ontario Passes Anti-Bullying Bill

Over the screams of the Catholic Church, today the Ontario provincial legislature passed Bill 13, the anti-bullying ordinance that orders all schools to allow gay-straight clubs. Bill 13 was launched after the suicide of a 14 year-old gay boy, whose own father opposed the bill.

Catholic schools and parents will soon come to accept the provisions of the government's anti-bullying legislation, according to Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty. Ontario's anti-bullying bill, also known as Bill 13 or the Accepting Schools Act, passed through the legislature just before noon today by a margin of 65-36. Only the Progressive Conservatives voted against the legislation. Catholic educators and church leaders oppose the bill because it requires schools to allow students to call anti-homophobia clubs gay-straight alliances if they wish. McGuinty said the issue of protecting kids from bullying transcends all faiths and partisan politics. He added Catholics would understand the true significance of the bill is to build a stronger, more cohesive society.

Conservatives claim the bill is actually meant to cause Ontario to defund non-compliant Catholic schools.

Sullivan, Indiana
 

UPDATE: Local Students Want Separate Prom That Bans Gays[/URL]


/snip


Diana Medley is a special education teacher in town. She doesn't believe anyone is born gay.

"I believe that it was life circumstances and they chose to be that way; God created everyone equal," said Medley.

"Homosexual students come to me with their problems, and I don't agree with them, but I care about them. It's the same thing with my special needs kids, I think God puts everyone in our lives for a reason," said Madley.

"'So the same goes for gays? Do you think they have a purpose in life?' No I honestly don't. Sorry, but I don't. I don't understand it. A gay person isn't going to come up and make some change unless it's to realize that it was a choice and they're choosing God," said Medley.

I don't have FB, but please comment on their page if you feel the need:
 

Petition to Discipline Diane Medley
 

Diana Medley @ The NORTHEAST SCHOOL CORPORATION of Sullivan County: Appropriate disciplinary action to Mrs. Medley, including termination.

Diana Medley is a Special Educaiton teacher in the Northeast School Corporation of Sullivan County and spoke ON CAMERA to WTWO-TV saying that "Being Gay Is A Choice..." Then went on to tell a television reporter that gay people don't have a purpose in life? This is woman teaching our children -- including openly gay students. Gay Teenagers have the HIGHEST rate of suicide in our country, surely Mrs. Medley's lack of concern for their emotional and mental well-being, as well as her mis-understanding of their purpose in life makes her a threat to not only students in her classroom, but, in her community!

To:
Diana Medley @ The NORTHEAST SCHOOL CORPORATION of Sullivan County
Appropriate disciplinary action to Mrs. Medley, including termination.
Sincerely,
[Your name]

Thanks for posting this, Soon.

Would you place your post here, as well? http://www.butchfemmeplanet.com/foru...?t=2839&page=6

Windsor, ON: Bullied (by a teacher/school) Catholic student speaks out
 

http://www.xtra.ca/public/National/B...4bRVS34M.email


*note Ontario Schools are publicly funded and are required to abide by all equality laws and anti-bullying legislation that includes sexual orientation and gender identity.

wow! I hope they lose their funding.

Agreed.

However, it will take more incidents (that are publicized--this crap's been going on forever) than this I think, but the tide is turning. There is no reason, in our pluralistic and secular Canadian society, for one religion to be publicly funded at this point (it began due to a Constitutional bargain way back in the day).

I want the two boards amalgamated which all but two Provinces have done (Alberta and Ontario).


The whole story makes me sick, and I hope it gains local and national attention. Bring it on.

What happened when I started a feminist society at school

I am 17 years old and I am a feminist. I believe in gender equality, and am under no illusion about how far we are from achieving it. Identifying as a feminist has become particularly important to me since a school trip I took to Cambridge last year.

A group of men in a car started wolf-whistling and shouting sexual remarks at my friends and me. I asked the men if they thought it was appropriate for them to be abusing a group of 17-year-old girls. The response was furious. The men started swearing at me, called me a bitch and threw a cup coffee over me.

For those men we were just legs, breasts and pretty faces. Speaking up shattered their fantasy, and they responded violently to my voice.

Shockingly, the boys in my peer group have responded in exactly the same way to my feminism.

After returning from this school trip I started to notice how much the girls at my school suffer because of the pressures associated with our gender. Many of the girls have eating disorders, some have had peers heavily pressure them into sexual acts, others suffer in emotionally abusive relationships where they are constantly told they are worthless.

I decided to set up a feminist society at my school, which has previously been named one of "the best schools in the country", to try to tackle these issues. However, this was more difficult than I imagined as my all-girls school was hesitant to allow the society. After a year-long struggle, the feminist society was finally ratified.

What I hadn't anticipated on setting up the feminist society was a massive backlash from the boys in my wider peer circle. They took to Twitter and started a campaign of abuse against me. I was called a "feminist bitch", accused of "feeding [girls] bullshit", and in a particularly racist comment was told "all this feminism bull won't stop uncle Sanjit from marrying you when you leave school".

Our feminist society was derided with retorts such as, "FemSoc, is that for real? #DPMO" [don't piss me off] and every attempt we made to start a serious debate was met with responses such as "feminism and rape are both ridiculously tiring".

The more girls started to voice their opinions about gender issues, the more vitriolic the boys' abuse became. One boy declared that "bitches should keep their bitchiness to their bitch-selves #BITCH" and another smugly quipped, "feminism doesn't mean they don't like the D, they just haven't found one to satisfy them yet." Any attempt we made to stick up for each other was aggressively shot down with "get in your lane before I par [ridicule] you too", or belittled with remarks like "cute, they got offended".

I fear that many boys of my age fundamentally don't respect women. They want us around for parties, banter and most of all sex. But they don't think of us as intellectual equals, highlighted by accusations of being hysterical and over sensitive when we attempted to discuss serious issues facing women.

The situation recently reached a crescendo when our feminist society decided to take part in a national project called Who Needs Feminism. We took photos of girls standing with a whiteboard on which they completed the sentence "I need feminism because...", often delving into painful personal experiences to articulate why feminism was important to them.

When we posted these pictures online we were subject to a torrent of degrading and explicitly sexual comments.

We were told that our "militant vaginas" were "as dry as the Sahara desert", girls who complained of sexual objectification in their photos were given ratings out of 10, details of the sex lives of some of the girls were posted beside their photos, and others were sent threatening messages warning them that things would soon "get personal".

We, a group of 16-, 17- and 18-year-old girls, have made ourselves vulnerable by talking about our experiences of sexual and gender oppression only to elicit the wrath of our male peer group. Instead of our school taking action against such intimidating behaviour, it insisted that we remove the pictures. Without the support from our school, girls who had participated in the campaign were isolated, facing a great deal of verbal abuse with the full knowledge that there would be no repercussions for the perpetrators.

It's been over a century since the birth of the suffragette movement and boys are still not being brought up to believe that women are their equals. Instead we have a whole new battleground opening up online where boys can attack, humiliate, belittle us and do everything in their power to destroy our confidence before we even leave high school.

It is appalling that an institution responsible for preparing young women for adult life has actively opposed our feminist work. I feel like the school is not supporting its girls in a crucial part of their evolution into being strong, assertive, confident women. If that's the case for a well-established girls' school, what hope does this generation of women have in challenging the misogyny that still pervades our society?

If you thought the fight for female equality was over, I'm sorry to tell you that a whole new round is only just beginning.

• Altrincham Grammar made the following comment about the feminist society:

"Altrincham Grammar School for Girls has supported Jinan in setting up the society, providing administrative assistance, guidance and proactively suggesting opportunities to help members to explore this issue which they feel passionately about.

"We are committed to protecting the safety and welfare of our students, which extends to their safety online. We consider very carefully any societies that the school gives its name and support to.

"As such, we will take steps to recommend students remove words or images that they place online that could compromise their safety or that of other students at the school."

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/...inists-008.jpg

Transgender schoolgirl wins equal access to girls bathrooms at school
 

http://www.transgenderlegal.org/head...how.php?id=415

I hope I posted the link right.

This is a pretty significant ruling and is a first in the nation for equal access.

I was just thrilled to see this!

St. Petersburg, FL
 

Parents Of Boy Chastised For Wearing Make Up To School Call For Tolerance

The parents of a 14-year-old Florida boy are campaigning for tolerance after their son was chastised for wearing makeup at school.

Chris, an eighth grader who doesn't label his sexual orientation, wore black eyeliner, eyeshadow and lipstick along with a shirt featuring an anarchy symbol to the last day of classes on Wednesday, June 5.

Officials at Meadowlawn Middle School in St. Petersburg told him his makeup was in violation of the school's dress code, according to the Tampa Bay Times. However, his mothers, who admit the shirt was inappropriate, don't think his modest maquillage was any different from what girls wear every day.

Chris' mom Katelynn Martin took to MoveOn.org and started a petition in the name of change. She argues that the school's principal, Claud Effiom, "expressed his own belief that boys wearing makeup is ridiculous, unnecessary, and distracting." She is calling for tolerance training, gay-straight alliance (GSA) clubs and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ)-inclusive curriculum at the school.

The petition has since received more than 1,300 signatures.

Martin expressed dismay over the school's response to her son's decision to wear makeup in an email correspondence with The Huffington Post on Tuesday.

"Honestly, when Chris asked me to apply his makeup that morning, it never occurred to me that it would cause a problem," she said. "More than anything, I was happy to see him so confident in expressing himself. When he called a little later from the school to tell me that he got in trouble for the makeup and that the administration wanted him to wash it off, I was sad and then angry to hear in his voice that he had lost that self-confidence."

"While speaking with the principal, it became clear that his issue was based upon my son's gender nonconformity and not the dress code. In my opinion, the principal was not passing judgement upon my son's appearance, but rather his person."

Martin hopes her voice will be heard and change will be enacted so all children can feel safe and accepted at school. A 2011 LGBT student survey conducted by the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network (GLSEN) revealed that more than 60 percent of respondents felt unsafe at school because of their sexual orientation. A considerable number of respondents also reported discriminatory policies or practices against LGBT people by their school or school personnel.

"I want people to know that this is clearly a systemic issue that affects kids every day," Martin told HuffPost. "My son Chris is only one of many, and we as a society can and should do more to show them that they are welcome and valued. The things that we are asking for in our petition may seems small, but can make an enormous impact in their lives."

A communication representative for Meadowlawn Middle School was not immediately available for comment. However, district spokeswoman Melanie Marquez Parra told the Tampa Bay Times "there is more to the story" than the Martin family is telling, but she isn't at liberty to discuss it since it is considered confidential student information.

What’s Lost as Handwriting Fades
 

Does handwriting matter?

Not very much, according to many educators. The Common Core standards, which have been adopted in most states, call for teaching legible writing, but only in kindergarten and first grade. After that, the emphasis quickly shifts to proficiency on the keyboard.

But psychologists and neuroscientists say it is far too soon to declare handwriting a relic of the past. New evidence suggests that the links between handwriting and broader educational development run deep.

Children not only learn to read more quickly when they first learn to write by hand, but they also remain better able to generate ideas and retain information. In other words, it’s not just what we write that matters — but how.

“When we write, a unique neural circuit is automatically activated,” said Stanislas Dehaene, a psychologist at the Collège de France in Paris. “There is a core recognition of the gesture in the written word, a sort of recognition by mental simulation in your brain.

“And it seems that this circuit is contributing in unique ways we didn’t realize,” he continued. “Learning is made easier.”

Handwriting is being dropped in public schools — that could be bad for young minds. Google’s new hands-free computer is finding its way into operating rooms. Breast cancer survivors find the start of their new lives in a tattoo artist’s work.

A 2012 study led by Karin James, a psychologist at Indiana University, lent support to that view. Children who had not yet learned to read and write were presented with a letter or a shape on an index card and asked to reproduce it in one of three ways: trace the image on a page with a dotted outline, draw it on a blank white sheet, or type it on a computer. They were then placed in a brain scanner and shown the image again.

The researchers found that the initial duplication process mattered a great deal. When children had drawn a letter freehand, they exhibited increased activity in three areas of the brain that are activated in adults when they read and write: the left fusiform gyrus, the inferior frontal gyrus and the posterior parietal cortex.

By contrast, children who typed or traced the letter or shape showed no such effect. The activation was significantly weaker.

Dr. James attributes the differences to the messiness inherent in free-form handwriting: Not only must we first plan and execute the action in a way that is not required when we have a traceable outline, but we are also likely to produce a result that is highly variable.

That variability may itself be a learning tool. “When a kid produces a messy letter,” Dr. James said, “that might help him learn it.”

Karin James, a psychologist at Indiana University, used a scanner to see how handwriting affected activity in children’s brains. Credit A. J. Mast for The New York Times

Our brain must understand that each possible iteration of, say, an “a” is the same, no matter how we see it written. Being able to decipher the messiness of each “a” may be more helpful in establishing that eventual representation than seeing the same result repeatedly.

“This is one of the first demonstrations of the brain being changed because of that practice,” Dr. James said.

In another study, Dr. James is comparing children who physically form letters with those who only watch others doing it. Her observations suggest that it is only the actual effort that engages the brain’s motor pathways and delivers the learning benefits of handwriting.

The effect goes well beyond letter recognition. In a study that followed children in grades two through five, Virginia Berninger, a psychologist at the University of Washington, demonstrated that printing, cursive writing, and typing on a keyboard are all associated with distinct and separate brain patterns — and each results in a distinct end product. When the children composed text by hand, they not only consistently produced more words more quickly than they did on a keyboard, but expressed more ideas. And brain imaging in the oldest subjects suggested that the connection between writing and idea generation went even further. When these children were asked to come up with ideas for a composition, the ones with better handwriting exhibited greater neural activation in areas associated with working memory — and increased overall activation in the reading and writing networks.

It now appears that there may even be a difference between printing and cursive writing — a distinction of particular importance as the teaching of cursive disappears in curriculum after curriculum. In dysgraphia, a condition where the ability to write is impaired, sometimes after brain injury, the deficit can take on a curious form: In some people, cursive writing remains relatively unimpaired, while in others, printing does.

In alexia, or impaired reading ability, some individuals who are unable to process print can still read cursive, and vice versa — suggesting that the two writing modes activate separate brain networks and engage more cognitive resources than would be the case with a single approach.

Dr. Berninger goes so far as to suggest that cursive writing may train self-control ability in a way that other modes of writing do not, and some researchers argue that it may even be a path to treating dyslexia. A 2012 review suggests that cursive may be particularly effective for individuals with developmental dysgraphia — motor-control difficulties in forming letters — and that it may aid in preventing the reversal and inversion of letters.

Cursive or not, the benefits of writing by hand extend beyond childhood. For adults, typing may be a fast and efficient alternative to longhand, but that very efficiency may diminish our ability to process new information. Not only do we learn letters better when we commit them to memory through writing, memory and learning ability in general may benefit.

Two psychologists, Pam A. Mueller of Princeton and Daniel M. Oppenheimer of the University of California, Los Angeles, have reported that in both laboratory settings and real-world classrooms, students learn better when they take notes by hand than when they type on a keyboard. Contrary to earlier studies attributing the difference to the distracting effects of computers, the new research suggests that writing by hand allows the student to process a lecture’s contents and reframe it — a process of reflection and manipulation that can lead to better understanding and memory encoding.

Not every expert is persuaded that the long-term benefits of handwriting are as significant as all that. Still, one such skeptic, the Yale psychologist Paul Bloom, says the new research is, at the very least, thought-provoking.

“With handwriting, the very act of putting it down forces you to focus on what’s important,” he said. He added, after pausing to consider, “Maybe it helps you think better.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/03/sc...dayspaper&_r=0