Which nation is the most corrupt?

Folks are claiming that Afghanistan is the most corrupt place on the planet-- I vote for the good ole USA. Here in the land of the quick buck and glad hand, politicians are routinely bought (75 million for a president, 10 million for a senator, 3 million for a house member), statistics massaged and gamed (NYS standardized school testing results), defective products sold (Wall Street sells junk mortgages as AAA rated securities might be the biggest and most costly scam ever)

And, as HL Mencken correctly observed: no one even went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.

There's nothing standard about standarized scores--or why you can't trust the scores schools report

Seeing Geoffrey Canada featured in the pro-charter schools documentary, “Waiting for Superman”, and then reading about his richly-endowed, superbly staffed, 11 month a year operation, Harlem Children’s zone schools so-so educational achievements, (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/13/education/13harlem.html New York Times, Oct 1s) left this ex-Harlem public school teacher wondering what was wrong with his approach and what more needs to be done to improve our schools.

We can all agree that we have some serious school problems, particularly when it comes to Black, Hispanic and immigrant students: 50% dropout rates in urban high schools and standardized scores in reading and math 50% below that of white and Asian students. While many can agree that there is a problem, there is no agreement as to what the solution may be. Better teachers? More charters? Less unions? Or what?

What makes schools successful? Good teachers are a necessary but not sufficient part, despite all the trashing teacher unions get, there is some evidence that unions seem to be important (southern public schools generally do not have unionized teachers and score lower compared to northern schools that do have unionized teachers. Moreover, Finland, the country everyone raves about as having the number one educational system has both teacher unions and tenure.) Charters -in general, 4 out of 5 charters do not outperform public schools and here in Boston, the 4 charter high schools have dropout rates of 50%.

Harlem Children’s Zones poor to average standardized test results raises questions about standardized tests and their reliability. Previous to the 2010 New York State test, (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/11/education/11scores.html New York Times, Oct. 10^th) the zone did fabulously well-researchers claimed that the Zone’s Harlem students even outperformed the tony students in Scarsdale, NY. In 2010 the state changed the test—raised the number of correct answers to pass the test and, more dramatically, no longer distributed the test questions, which remained basically the same year after year. The implication is that teachers had the test questions and simply taught them to the students and that’s why the students did so well. Moreover, there is a long history of educational research that suggests that high-stakes testing leads to massive massage of the data. In other words, cheating. If your job is on the line or bonus might be coming your way as a result of a test, there is all the reason to change test results in your favor.

How about affordable housing and stable jobs for parents? It's no small thing that there is a high correlation between SAT scores and family income, heck, there is high correlation between zip codes and SAT scores. The richer the parents, and hence the better neighborhood they live in, the better the score. Many a college admissions officer has followed this simple rubric.

For the most part, our so-called "failing schools" occur in impoverished minority/immigrant parts of the urban landscape. That should tell you something; poverty can have a debilitating impact on educational achievement ! Students of poverty move often, have poor job prospects and, as a result, often drop out. High school drop-out rates in urban high schools in often 50%.

Give parents jobs, provide affordable housing, provide a career path for impoverished students and you have the means of solving the problem. Who will pay for it? Many well to do philanthropists are now pouring money into “failing schools.” So far, they have not come up with the right solution to the problem. A jobs and housing program might be just such a solution.

Elena Kagan, Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court

What, no Protestants on the court? Only Catholics and Jews? Chief Justice Marshall must be turning in his grave--serves him right for allowing the court to deem laws unconstitutional. Perhaps this is the time to go back to democracy! No monarch (Obama, Bush, et. al.), no House of Lords (Schumer, McCain, et. al.), just a House of Representatives expanded to 1 member for every 30,000 population--as it was in the beginning. (Actually, the only people who don't want democracy are the truly rich--the Blankfein's, the Gates’s, et. al. ) However, the rich have so royally screwed up this country, that it's time to let Jefferson's rabble rule!

Oil rig in gulf explodes and causes environmental and economic devatation

Oil coming out all over the Gulf? New Orleans vulnerable--sounds like old times. And heck, the oil companies couldn't care less what happens to New Orleans, the oysters, the whales, the birds or the rest of us.

This is the problem with oligarchy--AKA, rich rule. BP don't care a hoot about anything except making their money. Hopefully they'll lose a pile in the gulf and capitalism's "creative destruction" will kick in --oil companies like BP and Haliburton (Take Dick Cheney with you) will go down.I'm not getting my hopes up too high as I know that these firms and Wall Street run the show in D. C. But anything that takes the wind out of the oligarch's sails is good with me.

Our economy and its discontents...

Can the SEC protect us from the scandalous behavior of Goldman-Sachs? Sure, they can fine the firm but Goldman-Sachs's misdeeds are inherent in the way business is done in our economy and will not go away.

Read on---There seem to be two seemingly intractable problems involved in solving our economic woes:

First. Making money the derivatives/gambling casino way is easy money--much easier than the Henry Ford way of large plants, massive work force, harnessing of natural resources --iron, coal, rubber. Currently, nearly half of corporate profits are made in the financial sector. The money men of today sit at computers and make millions betting on the price of oil futures, the housing market and even how long your mother-in-law might live. They are not going to be later day Henry Fords.

Secondly, Wall Street owns the government. If need be, banking billionaires run circles around a $400,000 a year president and the millionaire senators.

So, our bankers are addicted to easy money and they run the show. Now what? Like other addicted to easy money former financial powers --the Dutch, Spain and England--we're heading for tier two status. Which might not be so bad. It will give us a chance to become a kinder, gentler nation, one that takes care of its own, rather than trying to stamp out "evil" in the world.

Charter schools its discontents

Charters don't work--it's that simple!

Charters and its discontents.

News item:

Rhode Island H.S dismisses all teachers and staff in an effort to turn-around a failing school.

The school in question, Central Falls H.S in Rhode Island, situated in a poor minority community with high student transfer rates, has a disappointing 48% rate of graduation.

In this regard it is no different from the rates of most urban high schools and even the rates of the four charter high schools in Boston. Remarkably, even though the Boston Charters get to select their own teachers and students, they do not best the public schools. Diane Ravitch, the leading scholar of the school reform movement and long a critic who argued for choice, charters, merit pay and accountability , no longer feels that way. “Charter schools, she concluded, were proving to be no better on average than regular schools, but in many cities were bleeding resources from the public system. Testing had become not just a way to measure student learning, but an end in itself. New York Times, (Scholar’s School Reform U-Turn Shakes Up Debate By Sam Dillon, Published: March 2, 2010). http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/03/education/03ravitch.html?scp=2&sq=diane%20ravitch&st=cse... See More

If charters, etc. don’t work their magic on impoverished communities, what might? There has long been a correlation between parents income and student achievement (See SAT scores). In this regard, A good jobs program, when everything else fails, might well prove to be the royal road to educational excellence.

“Disadvantaged children have been cemented into an underclass by third-rate schools” argues the New York Times' Nicholas Kristof in a recent op-ed entitled, “Democrats and Schools.” Teacher Unions and the impossible-to-get-rid-of-bad teachers are the villains and charter schools are the good guys. But let’s wait a minute before we clean out the Augean stables.

In a recent Boston Globe story, it was reported that half of Boston’s Charter school high school students fail to graduate, and, according the Kathleen McCartney, Dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education , this is same as the public school rate for urban high schools . Moreover, we have the recent Stanford University study reporting that charter schools do not outperform public schools. This part is really odd, given that the charters cherry-pick their students and teachers. It seems that the "whiz kids" who teach in the charters are no better at their task than the "unionized dinosaurs" in the public schools.

Yet, charters have their fans as well as many parent advocates. Since it is not about academics, it must be about atmospherics. As parent-involvement is a must at the charters, a well-behaved student body will be evident (as any unruly are sent back to the public schools). With the charter movement, we seem to be on the road to a two-track public school system—raucous, underfunded publics and the well-mannered charters. And this just might be the beginning of the dismantling and privatizing of the public schools. And we will still be left with disadvantaged youths.

Schools--what is to be done?

What's up with the schools and no child left behind?

International education expert says US "Schools are inheriting an over entertained, distracted student." hmmn

A Senate panel learned that more students in more countries graduate from high school and college and score higher on achievement tests than students in the United States.

So that's it. US student's minds are not in the classroom (their minds are on hand-held devices) and are too damn twitchy. Just as I thought.

So what's the answer? One answer is to keep the politicians away from the schools. The other answer is to ask: "Do we need smart"? Probably not. Rich can always buy smart from anywhere in the world. Also, since we've left manufacturing behind, how smart do you have to be to sell sub-prime mortgages or credit default swaps? It's not a lack of smarties that are leading us to 2nd tierdom; it is the rich-ies who can't stop gorging themselves on the financial sector that is leading us there.

But what about charter schools, another gleam in the eye of the "we'd rather fiddle than watch Rome burn" crowd? Charters are no better on average than the public schools, report scholars at Stanford U. and Diane Ravitch.

So we're left with the public schools: love them or leave them. I say leave them alone--they're doing the best they can with what they've got to work with.

New from the old Bronx

A friend sent me news of the old neighborhood:

Bernie N. was taking out the garbage at his father's slum-lord house when the kindergarten pictures were being taken.

Pookie Beck now owns a candy store in the middle of Broadway

Freddie the cop's gun went off when he tripped over Muck when he fell off his 3 wheeler and a bullet hit Nora bad breath and chipped her tooth.

Sam Senzar was seen just last week still standing on the corner, or on the coroner.

Off the shoulder is now walking Lenny the Dog Walker.

Raymond Berr's mother is still looking for a nice girl for her son.

Donniel Zing has never been found. Still lost in the basement in the coops as it's believed that we are still playing cops and robbers.