Great job by Miles Grant on this. I also strongly recommend The Oil Drum for superb, albeit technical, discussion of the Deepwater oil disaster. Often, over the past couple months, I’ve learned about things at The Oil Drum that didn’t appear in the “mainstream” press until weeks later, if ever. Check it out.

Earlier today on ABC’s “This Week,” after blasting BP and its apologists in the Republican Party (“That is a philosophy. That is an approach to what they see. They see the aggrieved party here as BP, not the fishermen.”), White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel (alias, “Rahm-bo”) had this to say about a comprehensive climate and clean energy bill:

“[Senators meeting at the White House this Wednesday] know the president’s perspective…[Obama’s] goal now, now that the House passed a bill, is to get the Senate to pass a comprehensive energy bill that reduces our dependence on foreign oil, makes key investments in the areas of alternative energy so America leads in that space, and deals fundamentally with the environmental degradation that happens from carbon pollution.”

Sounds good to me, just make it happen Rahm-bo!  

In related news, Joe Lieberman weighs in as well, claiming “there are 50 senators that want to put a price on emitting carbon, 30 against it and 20 members who are undecided.” Assuming Lieberman is right, and I must say I’m skeptical, it’s time to call those 20 swing Senators and tell them we need climate action now!

During the 2008 general election, we had our very own “David” and Goliath” contest.  Unlike the more biblical meeting of the duo, when Goliath, the Philistine giant, lost to a much smaller David, the 2008 match-up went badly for David.  Just this week, though, our 21st Century “David” verbally took on “Goliath,” SW Virginia’s very own Philistine, again.  And this time, it was a smack-down of a different sort, with a different winner and loser.

In his letter to the editor to the Roanoke Times here, Carter Turner called out Morgan the Carpetbagger for his hypocrisy on the subject of residence:

Speaking to a Roanoke Times reporter last fall, Griffith stated that I was less qualified to represent the people of Salem and Roanoke County because I had only recently moved to the district. Despite the fact that I grew up in the district and had lived there for the previous two years, Griffith claimed I lacked knowledge of the particular needs of the people I’d be representing – knowledge gained only by living and working within the district for many years.  “Being a product of the district,” Griffith told the Times “… helps me understand where constituents will be on an issue. I’ve operated a business here on Main Street for 25 years [and] that gives me a feel for the community.” So last fall, Griffith tried to convince voters he was more qualified because he had lived in the 8th House of Delegates District longer than I. Eight months later, he is trying to convince voters that his failure to live even a day in the 9th Congressional District is completely irrelevant.

Ouch!  

Now we are to believe that Morgan Griffith, who not only doesn’t live here, but who has never done a thing for the 9th District, should represent us?

Say after me, Morgan Griffith is a:

• Carpetbagger;

• Hypocrite;

• Obstructionist; and

• Cuccinelli-supporting  extremist.

There is much more to say about how bad a choice Morgan Griffith would be for the 9th.  This is only the beginning. Stay tuned…

crossposted from the Great Orange Satan at the request of KathyinBlacksburg

Our last day with students was Wednesday, for teachers Thursday.  Our report back day is August 16, which happens to be one of the days for which we are furloughed to save the district money – which also means many teachers may refuse to report because they are not being paid.  I will cross that bridge later.

Today I will travel to Westtown school in Pennsylvania to honor David Mallery, an extraordinary educator well-known in independent school circles who got me to participate in his amazing Westtown seminar, which empowered me to rethink my own approach to teaching.  

Before I travel North from Virginia, allow me to ruminate online.  As I do, you can imagine the music from Ennio Morricone in the background.  In fact, I promise to share it with you at the beginning of the jump, just to set the tone!.  

I invite you to continue reading.

There is much that was good this school year.  Yes, I was honored for my teaching with an award, but that is of lesser importance.

Only 7 out of the almost 180 students who finished the year did not pass the course they took with me.  One was on suspension pending expulsion, and 5 of the remaining 6 simply made no effort.  The last (whom I will call “L”) did it to himself.  He merely needed to pass the final quarter.  He refused to do his final project and made almost no effort on his final exam, dropping his mark for the quarter to a 57.  Still, he learned enough that he may have passed the state exam, and he should easily pass the course when he retakes it, perhaps this summer.  He had been put up for expulsion for bringing a knife to school, so when he was allowed to return he had missed a lot of work.  For one marking period he made a real effort.   His refusal to follow through might more properly belong in the category of the Ugly, but I will not allow it to diminish the overall accomplishment of my students.

The final projects this year including some truly amazing ones, not always from the students who did the best on more conventional indicators of learning.  That is why I love empowering them to demonstrate knowledge in a form other than essays or in the multiple choice tests they must experience to do well on the state and AP exams.  Knowing that, I plan this summer to step back and rethink my courses, including AP, to allow more of this during the school year.

The bad –  there are still too many I am not reaching in time.  They may receiving a passing grade and thus get credit for the course.  But they are not getting from the course what they could, and here it is less a question of the grade earned than of connecting with the material they study.  I need to be more proactive in trying to make those connections.  I need to remember that having received my teaching award and been told in evaluation how “distinguished” my teaching is, I can afford to take risks in order to try to connect with the students.  It is hard with up to 38 in a class, and next year our average class sizes will increase because of financial pressures.  That is not the fault of the kids, and I must do whatever I can to ensure it does not interfere with their opportunity to have a positive learning experience.

Le’s return to Morricone, in this case with the composer conducting:  

The ugly –  the really ugly is seeing the kids we lose to suspensions and expulsions.  On a smaller scale, it is when I have to have a child removed from class even for one period – it is an admission that I am not reaching that student, but sometimes I can no longer take the time and need to address the needs of the other 30+ young people in the room.  It is one thing that continues to agonize.  

As does when I realize I am too irritable, and thus too impatient with one or more students.  That is my failing.  Sometimes I let what happens in one class affect how I act in another class in a negative way.  That is unfair to both classes.  

What is bad and ugly is the structure of the school day.  We have 8 period running from 8:25 until 3:05  (with an additional “zero” period from 7:15 – 8:00).  First is 50 minutes to allow for announcements.  Each subsequent period is 45 minutes, with only 5 minutes between periods.  That leaves little time to unwind, especially if one has to rush to get from one end of our sprawling building to another.  We also have more than 20 “temporary” classrooms outside.  Somehow I wish we could restructure the school day for some down time for the kids, beyond the one lunch period, which for some is the 3rd and others the 7th period of the day.  This year I had my three regular level classes immediately followed by an AP class to start the day, and in the first half of the year I immediately had 15 minutes of hall duty.  5 minutes between classes is not enough time for me to reflect and readjust, especially when I am transitioning from one preparation (regular government) to the other (AP).  There is no perfect schedule, so I have to adjust to what I am given, and try to make it a more comfortable learning setting for the students.

I can look back.  I also have to look ahead.  And I have to recognize that I am now in my mid 60s.  I do not have the energy I did even two years ago, and must pace myself.  That means that I have to take on less outside of my teaching responsibilities if I want to remain effective in the classroom.  Unfortunately that is not always as possible as I might wish.  I really need to serve as a mentor to other teachers, especially those undergoing the process of obtaining National Board certification.  I have been asked to take on more on behalf of the profession of teaching because I am viewed as an effective advocate:  this includes advising people involved in the governance of our school system as well as those things I do to try to influence educational policy at state and national levels.  In order to have the time for these I will again not be coaching or advising any student activities, which I sorely miss.  I will not have enough time to watch athletic, musical and dramatic performances, important as a means of affirming to my students that I see them as whole persons, not just as an occupant of a seat in my room for 45 minutes a day.

One thing I know I will do more often is to write individual notes to students.  I did it over one long break this year.  I think I need to do it en masse at least 3-4 times a year, and on occasion to specific students.  And I want to be sure to be proactive in contacting parents when a student shows improvement or does something good.  Too often we teachers get so crushed for time that we only initiate contact with parents when there is a problem, and that is not fair.  I will again begin my school year by calling all my families to try to establish a cooperative relationship on behalf of the students.

on behalf of the students – that is the key.  That is the entire raison d’etre for the the work that I do.  In the National Board process we present our portfolios with a reflection on each piece offered:  how does this benefit the students?

And that should also be the question we are asking as we make educational policy, and too often we do not.  Perhaps that is something I can remember during my own participation in advocating about education, in how I write about schools and students and learning and teaching.

David Mallery taught generations of educators, primarily in independent schools, how to think more broadly, to get outside of rigid models, to consider alternative ways of thinking about what we do.  It is appropriate that I offer this reflection on a day when many of us who experienced him will gather to honor his legacy.

The best way to honor that legacy is to embody it in our own teaching.

Which is perhaps why using the title of a Leone spaghetti western is actually strangely appropriate: it requires me to take a different point of view as I look back.  Looking back to see where I have traveled is a necessary precondition to understanding where I am.  And only when I understand where I am and how I got here can I look forward to see where I next can go.

Which for me reminds me of Eliot, in “Little Gidding” (which remains my favorite poem). Somehow it seems appropriate to apply my favorite words to this process of reflection and planning.

I will end with those, after offering one more selection from Morricone.  Just remember, life is always a great deal more than a fistful of dollars:

And now to the Eliot.  I do find the words apropos of the teaching process, even if Eliot’s intent in writing them was quite different.  That is part of the learning process, which makes it part of the teaching process, to find value and meaning in ways that might not have been planned?

In advance, let me wish you peace.

We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started

And know the place for the first time.

Through the unknown, unremembered gate

When the last of earth left to discover

Is that which was the beginning;

At the source of the longest river

The voice of the hidden waterfall

And the children in the apple-tree

Not known, because not looked for

But heard, half-heard, in the stillness

Between two waves of the sea.

Quick now, here, now, always-

A condition of complete simplicity

(Costing not less than everything)

And all shall be well and

All manner of thing shall be well

When the tongues of flame are in-folded

Into the crowned knot of fire

And the fire and the rose are one.

(This is a follow-up on lowkell’s earlier post about Robert Hurt’s ridiculous debate change of heart. I just want to rub it in.)

According to the Charlottesville Daily Progress Robert Hurt, the Republican challenger to Rep. Tom Perriello (D-5th), has changed his mind and refuses to participate in any candidate debate in which tea partier and independent 5th district candidate Jeffrey Clark participates. (Hurt was willing to debate Clark during their primary fight, however.)

In a written statement, Hurt said, “We cannot allow the important debate in this election to be sidetracked by a candidate who is not serious about his campaign or his ability to win.” Unfortunately for Hurt, it was just last Saturday that he told the Daily Progress that he was “absolutely” willing to appear at three-candidate debates that featured himself, Rep. Tom Perriello, and Clark. Before his mighty flip flop, Hurt said,

“We need to work out all of the details, but debates are a very, very important part of elections and obviously we want to make ourselves available to all of the citizens who will be judging us and we’re committed to doing that but obviously we have the details to work out. We haven’t talked with the Perriello campaign – I don’t think – about what they’re interested in.”

Now, he’s saying the opposite, a position that has allowed both Tom Perriello and Clark to attack him at will. I love it!  

It didn’t take long for Tom Perriello’s campaign manager Lise Clavel to say, “Sen. Hurt could not get the majority support of his own party and now wants to silence independent voices that reflect many in this district, including many views of the Tea Party. Tom Perriello faced hundreds of Tea Party constituents during his 21 town hall meetings last summer. If Sen. Hurt wants this job so badly, why is he afraid to face just one?”

Jeffrey Clark also went on the attack. “Sen. Hurt will try to marginalize us every step of the way. If we’re allowed in the debate, it makes the whole dynamic a whole lot murkier for him.”

You bet Hurt will try to “marginalize” Clark. This is the same Jeffrey Clark who said during the Republican primary that he would rather see Tom Perriello get another term than to help elect Robert Hurt, whom Clark called a false conservative.

Clark has the potential to peel off anywhere from 2-10% of the vote in the 5th district. That puts Hurt in an impossible position. If he attacks Clark and refuses to debate him, he will alienate the wacko-wing that the Republican Party manipulated last summer in their fight against health care reform. Yet, if he allows Clark a debate venue for airing his far right views, Hurt also stands to lose votes because of the free advertising such a debate gives Clark.

Meanwhile, Tom Perriello gets to release statesman-like pronouncements like the one that cited Robert Hurt’s first debate position – before Hurt started flipping and flopping:

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned from my first 18 months in Congress, it’s that there are a whole lot of opinions across our district. Some of these viewpoints are represented by Sen. Hurt and some by Mr. Clark, and I look forward to a substantive, honest campaign that brings these discussions more clearly into the public arena. I strongly agree with Sen. Hurt that Mr. Clark should be included in public debates and I look forward to a spirited discussion with both of them.”

Robert Hurt may as well get used to flip flops. His career in the state senate has been one of fairly typical (i.e. not extreme) conservatism. However, in the district’s recent Republican primary, he was forced to portray himself as just as far to the right as the others vying for the nomination. Now, looking to the election, he faces voters who are not extreme or fringe, so he is trapped into moderating some of the positions that he took then.

And…Clark will be right there in the fight, reminding those in the district who long once more for good ole Virgil Goode that “Hurt ain’t Virgil.”

I hope that same dilemma plays out all over the nation in November. The Republicans prayed for something to rescue them after the November 2008 election. They got the tea partiers and the undercover racists and then crawled into bed with them.

There’s an old saying, “Beware of what you pray for because you just might get it.”