Here’s a new twist on that old cliché “Those who can’t do, teach.” “Last night, former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich returned to his alma mater, Northwestern University, and to a crowd as skeptical as it was curious to hear how he would defend his legacy in a panel discussion dedicated to ethics in politics,” David Vognar reported on The Huffington Post. “The result for both Blagojevich and the audience was more talk, talk, talk.”
Faculty Lounge
An Inconvenient Koala
Gregory Kane writes for The Examiner Thursday that “America is a much less racist country than it was 50 years ago, 40 years ago and even 10 years ago.” Yet problems with race conflict—and how to properly address this—still plague higher ed.
Twilight For Seniors
A Utah Republican legislator has proposed scrapping senior year of high school to save state funds.
Practice makes…?
Ooops. “What was supposed to be a school wide assembly featuring a motivational pep talk turned into an impromptu and explicit discussion on sex acts at Crosby Middle School in Texas,” the National Abstinence Education Association reports.
Still Stuck on Stupid
With literacy on all levels (i.e., without adjectives or with—scientific, historical, civic, etc.) on the wane, public officials everywhere scratch their heads over what to do about it while concocting schemes such as the one devised by the school board in the city Tony Bennett sings about.
Inside Temples of Tolerance
While academics lecture the rest of us about diversity, all is not well in their own temples of tolerance.
No Stimulus Left Behind
The Bush Administration’s education reforms doubled education spending but not test scores or graduation rates. The Obama Administration’s proposals might make No Child Left Behind look like school choice.
Old Deal New Scam
Every now and then we can get some much needed clarity from academia. “Nowadays, the unemployment rate equals the number of unemployed persons divided by the total civilian labor force, which itself adds the number of people who are employed to the number of unemployed,” William F. Shughart II writes in the Spring issue of The Independent.
Find The Endangered Species
Farms and ranches in California might be going out of business due to environmental zeal in protecting so-called endangered species, many of which are easier to find than factories. That doesn’t stop one school from partnering with the federal government to promote the Endangered Species Act.
No Laptop Left Behind
Educators and their benefactors might ponder what good computers are when students can’t read what’s on the screen.