Category: Education

If you’ve spent any length of time in an urban community in the U.S., I’m sure you’ve seen the ads on public transportation or heard the television commercials from schools where you can train to be a medical assistant or a computer technician. But before you or someone you know signs up for a “promising career” at one of those for-profit colleges, take heed!

For-profit colleges have been around for years. The University of Phoenix, …

SAN DIEGO San Diego Unified’s results on 2010 state tests show across the board gains for the fourth straight year, with more students than ever ranking “advanced” in their subject knowledge.

The results of the annual California Standards Test released today show the district has five straight years of overall gains in English language arts and science scores, while math continues a four-year climb. This good news is tempered by recognition that scores still show an “achievement gap” among ethnic groups. Data relating to the achievement gap – test scores among ethnic groups – is still being analyzed, but early results show the gap is narrowing in some areas, albeit slowly.

One of the great stories from Ocean Beach in the Seventies was the creation and development of what we used to call “people’s institutions” – or “alternatives” to mainstream institutions. OB activists started, for example, the OB Rag as an alternative to the mainstream press. Other alternatives included People’s Food Co-op as an alternative to Safeway and the lack of organic food. The OB People’s Free School was begun as an alternative to the at-times dullifying public schools. And then there was the Ocean Beach Childcare Project.

The OB Childcare Project was begun by activists and local parents and teachers who saw the great need then for day care or child care for working parents or single moms. At the time, there wasn’t any inexpensive day care around. Finally, locals negotiated with the School District which allowed them to take over the building on the same block as the OB Elementary School, clean it up, and initiate a child care center.

Nearly every chair was filled last night at the OB Town Council monthly general meeting. Many of the some thirty folks in the audience had come to hear Scott Himelstein speak about his group’s “reform” plans for City schools.

Himelstein had invited himself to deliver another spiel about “San Diegans 4 Great Schools” and was the night’s guest speaker. The group is going around town in an effort to get their message out to community groups. OB was the second stop on Himelstein’s rounds. Last week he had been in Tierrasanta.

The same guy who will be speaking about “education reform” at the next OB Town Council meeting on July 28th, spoke at a Tierrasanta community meeting Wednesday night (7/21/10). He wasn’t received all that well by local residents there.

Scott Himelstein, the leader of the newly named “San Diegans 4 Great Schools”, told the residents gathered at the Tierrasanta meeting that his group was disappointed with test scores in San Diego Unified schools and that “governance” was the problem. “Governance” is a cloaked term for “how the school board works”.

by John M. Williams / June 30, 2010
Section 1: Last re Working Here

I have achieved some goals and failed to achieve others during my six months in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as an English teacher.

The most significant failure is in not being retained at the school where I taught for most of this past six months. It was my goal upon arrival to do well, and to work through a year at this one school. It even seemed possible to me that I might advance to a supervisory or administrative position as the year progressed.

As it is, I have become toxic, radioactive, a leper; not only removed from class overnight, but denied any contact at with students, to the extent that I was not even allowed to grade final exam writing papers.

Recently, while channel surfing on TV, I happened on a little repartee on the war in Afghanistan and I couldn’t help but notice in all the wit and pontification that Pakistan was barely mentioned since we’re there, too, chasing down al-Qaeda and the Taliban. With robots: Predator Drones.

This bothers me deeply because, with me, it’s all about the children …

Editor: Frank Gormlie recently posted his third in a series about “Left versus Right” and asked for feedback from OB Rag bloggers and friends. Nate responded with the following – and in doing so reminded us of some of our weak points in describing politics. Politics CAN be fun. OB political activists have enjoyed a lot of fun over the decades in being political. So, we asked Nate to tweak his response a bit and post it. So, please bear in mind, that we can benefit from this type of discourse with our fellow citizen journalists and wish to improve our communication skills.
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Let me preface this by saying that I once got a ‘D’ in a political science class. Yes, that’s right. I showed up to class, took notes, wrote entire papers, went to the final, and still got a D.

I’m gifted.

You see, I’m extremely talented when it comes to “filtering-out” things I find boring. Been doing it my whole life! When I was a kid, it was zoning-out during the commercials that interrupted my Saturday morning cartoons. Today it’s skimming past ads in the margins of a website. Call it ADD if you want. But I believe it’s just how I deal with the daily bombardment of information.

Originally posted May 15, 2008
More that we can’t forget

Shattered windows at Alexander Hall, Jackson State, May 14-15, 1970The shootings at Mississippi’s Jackson State University still linger in the shadow of Kent State. Less than two weeks after Kent, two black students were killed and 12 others wounded by state troopers on May 15, 1970.

The incident started after student demonstrators, protesting the Vietnam War and seeking more rights at the historically black college, responded to an order to disperse by throwing stones and bottles. It ended as police opened fire outside a women’s dormitory.

Phillip Gibbs, 21, a junior preparing for law school, who had a child and a pregnant wife, and James Earl Green, 17, a high school track star on his way home from his job at a grocery store, were killed.

– ALL LINKS AND STORIES INSIDE –
* Young at Art Beautify Corner at Cable and Newport
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* Deadline for OB Historical Society Annual Photo Exhibit and Contest Extended to May 19th (was May 13th)
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* Fire Rings Saved But Watch What You Burn
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* OB’s Sacred Heart Parish School Family Festival- May 15
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* Rummage Sale to Pay for OB Elementary’s 4th Grade Sea Camp
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* OB Planning Board to Discuss Sunset Cliffs Traffic at Project Review Meeting on May 19th
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* Planning Board Fills Vacant Seat in District 3
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* Peace Movement to Hold “Die-In” Against the Drones Made by General Atomics May 19th
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* City opens bidding for OB Pier Café concession
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* OB Beach Ball – CANCELED until 2011
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* School Board Candidate Forum at Liberty Station – May 20th
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* Coffee Party to Stage Tour of San Diego’s Mega-Banks – May 21st
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* OB Friends of Library Book Sale – June 19th

Three problems in the US today that have to be solved.

1. New economy must be created as the prior economy of borrow and no production has failed. Must create an economy based on production.

2. Cheap energy bubble has popped …

by Carl Manaster / Special to the OB Rag / May 12, 2010

Van Jones spoke to a nearly full house last night at UCSD’s Price Center. The crowd was diverse – old and young, multiracial, male and female, and most notably right and left.

Supporters – from the left – made up the bulk of the crowd, but probably five percent were from the other side, holding signs that accuse Jones of having an “evil” agenda, calling him a “radical communist”, and calling his green jobs “snake oil”.