This opinion piece in the Australian today finally says out loud something so politically incorrect that even the Federal Libs wouldn't say it (yet). Namely, that you really have to question whether remote aboriginal communities are viable.
As Rosemay Neill says:
"A notion of cultural autonomy that discounts the importance of real jobs and formal education simply divorces indigenous communities from mainstream power structures, even as they are flooded with the worst aspects of Western culture, from junk food to drugs."
What a pleasure to read such common sense.
Just last week, Phillip Adams up at Garma was interviewing someone who said that it was obvious from the festival that an active aboriginal culture can save lives (pointing out all the young ones who had evident musical talent at the festival.)
My suspicion is that active culture is still only successful if it results in that particular community being better integrated with the actual economy.
No one would expect success from a new community of (say) a few hundred white folk who had the idea of going to live in a remote and infertile part of Australia so that they could be successful musicians who connect with Gaia (or some such equivalent to aboriginal "connection to the land".) Not unless the said group also had a proper plan as to how they were going to deal with growing food, getting a source of clean water, building and maintaining adequate housing, etc. I suspect that all "hippy" communes (which is the nearest real life example of my theoretical case) which are successful are in fertile areas, grow a substantial part of their own food, and are not hundreds of klicks from the nearest town or hospital.
So why do liberals think that for aborigines culture alone is enough to live on?
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Ann Coulter on Maureen Dowd
Ann Coulter, who I don't read regularly but probably should, takes her own swipe at Cindy Sheehan, as well as the Maureen Dowd column which had the much ridiculed line that (quoting Ann, quoting Maureen) : 'it's "inhumane" for Bush not "to understand that the moral authority of parents who bury children killed in Iraq is absolute." '
As Ann says:
"The logical, intellectual and ethical shortcomings of such a statement are staggering. If one dead son means no one can win an argument with you, how about two dead sons? What if the person arguing with you is a mother who also lost a son in Iraq and she's pro-war? Do we decide the winner with a coin toss? Or do we see if there's a woman out there who lost two children in Iraq and see what she thinks about the war? "
But the line I liked most in the column is this:
'Dowd's "absolute" moral authority column demonstrates, once again, what can happen when liberals start tossing around terms they don't understand like "absolute" and "moral."'
I have been meaning to write something at length about my belief that a major problem with current day liberals is their apparent lack of knowledge of some pretty basic moral philosophical concepts. But it will probably have to wait for another day...
As Ann says:
"The logical, intellectual and ethical shortcomings of such a statement are staggering. If one dead son means no one can win an argument with you, how about two dead sons? What if the person arguing with you is a mother who also lost a son in Iraq and she's pro-war? Do we decide the winner with a coin toss? Or do we see if there's a woman out there who lost two children in Iraq and see what she thinks about the war? "
But the line I liked most in the column is this:
'Dowd's "absolute" moral authority column demonstrates, once again, what can happen when liberals start tossing around terms they don't understand like "absolute" and "moral."'
I have been meaning to write something at length about my belief that a major problem with current day liberals is their apparent lack of knowledge of some pretty basic moral philosophical concepts. But it will probably have to wait for another day...
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Good reading on North Korea
The New Yorker: The Critics: Books
The link is to an excellent book review/essay in the New Yorker on the history and current status of North Korea, with particular reference to the dictatorial Kim family. Highly recommended.
The link is to an excellent book review/essay in the New Yorker on the history and current status of North Korea, with particular reference to the dictatorial Kim family. Highly recommended.
Media Watch on Red Cross canapes
Credit where it is due. The Media Watch story this week on the alleged Red Cross plan to use donations to fund a "series of catered parties for wealthy donors" was well done. The Sydney Morning Herald should be deeply ashamed of this example of tabloid quality journalism, especially because of the problems it could mean for Red Cross fund raising in future.
Hitchens on Cindy Sheehan
Cindy Sheehan's Sinister Piffle - What's wrong with her Crawford protest. By Christopher Hitchens
See the link to Hitchen's take on Cindy Sheehan's grandstanding. It is what you would expect (pretty scathing).
See the link to Hitchen's take on Cindy Sheehan's grandstanding. It is what you would expect (pretty scathing).
In the papers today
In The Age today, some straight talk against late term abortions from a woman who would appear to be of feminist inclination (yay).
In the Sydney Morning Herald, Mem Fox takes on the phonics/whole language debate and seems to side strongly with whole language. I am not sure she makes a well argued case. For example:
"Parents often make the understandable mistake of believing that phonically sounding out words is reading. But we do most of our reading in silence: the meaning is on the page, not in the sound.... Is it necessary to have a grasp of phonics in order to be able to read? Broadly speaking, the astonishing and contentious answer is no, otherwise we wouldn't be able to read silently;"
This is a bit of a reach, isn't it? I thought the point of phonics was the assistance it gives to children (or adults) learning to pronounce a new word. The fact that you may not rely on it much as an experienced reader is neither here nor there to debate on education in primary schools.
She does make one valid point, in that she points out that languages based on pictographs don't use phonics at all. However, although Japan, for example, claims a very high literacy rate, I believe it does have the downside that it takes many years of school before they can read newspapers or similar "adult" material with full comprehension, because of the rate it takes to learn the couple of thousand pictographs that are necessary.
Her main argument seems to be against going back to a phonics only system of teaching. But is that really the likely outcome of the current federal government inquiry into literacy teaching? If the report simply wants all teachers to be able to effectively teach phonics to those student who benefit from that approach, it may not necessarily mean whole language is completely out the window. The current problem may be that some teachers may be too wedded to whole language.
And even it if did recommend going back to phonics only, if the empirical evidence is that literacy levels overall were better under that system, what is the point of insisting on whole language or a combined system being best?
To further confuse the argument, Mem then ends up with this:
"Phonics comes into its own as soon as children begin to learn to write. Josie is now courageously struggling to write. She has to match the sounds of language to the letters she scrawls across a page. During the complex battle between her brain and her hand she's now coming to grips with phonics and spelling. Those people who argue for an exclusively phonics approach in reading misunderstand what phonics is and forget how absolutely fundamental it is in learning to write."
Huh? Suddenly sounds like a bit of an argument for phonics to get more emphasis. I don't see her point here.
That Josie, by the way, is an acquaintance of hers who at age 3 can "read anything from atlases to adult books on dream interpretation."
Just what we need, more 3 year olds with a deep understanding of dream interpretation!
Mem obviously has a fair bit of sympathy for whole language, and I guess it may work well for some. The debate is more about those it doesn't work well for. Mem fails to approach the issue in this article with any empirical stuff at all.
She also had a few meetings with Mark Latham and seems to have liked him quite a lot. Maybe that says a lot about her judgment too.
In the Sydney Morning Herald, Mem Fox takes on the phonics/whole language debate and seems to side strongly with whole language. I am not sure she makes a well argued case. For example:
"Parents often make the understandable mistake of believing that phonically sounding out words is reading. But we do most of our reading in silence: the meaning is on the page, not in the sound.... Is it necessary to have a grasp of phonics in order to be able to read? Broadly speaking, the astonishing and contentious answer is no, otherwise we wouldn't be able to read silently;"
This is a bit of a reach, isn't it? I thought the point of phonics was the assistance it gives to children (or adults) learning to pronounce a new word. The fact that you may not rely on it much as an experienced reader is neither here nor there to debate on education in primary schools.
She does make one valid point, in that she points out that languages based on pictographs don't use phonics at all. However, although Japan, for example, claims a very high literacy rate, I believe it does have the downside that it takes many years of school before they can read newspapers or similar "adult" material with full comprehension, because of the rate it takes to learn the couple of thousand pictographs that are necessary.
Her main argument seems to be against going back to a phonics only system of teaching. But is that really the likely outcome of the current federal government inquiry into literacy teaching? If the report simply wants all teachers to be able to effectively teach phonics to those student who benefit from that approach, it may not necessarily mean whole language is completely out the window. The current problem may be that some teachers may be too wedded to whole language.
And even it if did recommend going back to phonics only, if the empirical evidence is that literacy levels overall were better under that system, what is the point of insisting on whole language or a combined system being best?
To further confuse the argument, Mem then ends up with this:
"Phonics comes into its own as soon as children begin to learn to write. Josie is now courageously struggling to write. She has to match the sounds of language to the letters she scrawls across a page. During the complex battle between her brain and her hand she's now coming to grips with phonics and spelling. Those people who argue for an exclusively phonics approach in reading misunderstand what phonics is and forget how absolutely fundamental it is in learning to write."
Huh? Suddenly sounds like a bit of an argument for phonics to get more emphasis. I don't see her point here.
That Josie, by the way, is an acquaintance of hers who at age 3 can "read anything from atlases to adult books on dream interpretation."
Just what we need, more 3 year olds with a deep understanding of dream interpretation!
Mem obviously has a fair bit of sympathy for whole language, and I guess it may work well for some. The debate is more about those it doesn't work well for. Mem fails to approach the issue in this article with any empirical stuff at all.
She also had a few meetings with Mark Latham and seems to have liked him quite a lot. Maybe that says a lot about her judgment too.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Able Danger rollercoaster
The Able Danger story in the States, which is also relevant to Mark Steyn's defence against last week's Media Watch story, seems to have more twists to it than your average corkscrew rollercoaster.
What impresses me a lot, though, is the rapid willingness of LGF and the other right wing sites to admit that it is looking like the allegation against the 9-11 commission may be a lot less than it first seemed.
Even if the allegation proves unreliable, Mark Steyn's point in this article (that it is still entirely possible for Atta to have been in the States prior to June 2000) seems solid. However, Mark seems to be much less emphatic about the veracity of the Florida story than before, saying that Atta "might [my italics] have been in Florida, attempting to get a U.S. Farm Service Agency loan for the world's biggest cropduster, as reported by USDA official Johnell Bryant."
He's a great read anyway, even if the Florida stories were to be debunked.
What impresses me a lot, though, is the rapid willingness of LGF and the other right wing sites to admit that it is looking like the allegation against the 9-11 commission may be a lot less than it first seemed.
Even if the allegation proves unreliable, Mark Steyn's point in this article (that it is still entirely possible for Atta to have been in the States prior to June 2000) seems solid. However, Mark seems to be much less emphatic about the veracity of the Florida story than before, saying that Atta "might [my italics] have been in Florida, attempting to get a U.S. Farm Service Agency loan for the world's biggest cropduster, as reported by USDA official Johnell Bryant."
He's a great read anyway, even if the Florida stories were to be debunked.
Peculiar plane crash
Guess you don't need me to tell you, but the plane crash in Greece earlier today is mighty peculiar. Obviously, a problem with the air is at the core of the disaster, but reports are that people were moving in the cockpit long after the problem started, and the passengers had their emergency oxygen masks on.
Surely then there were some flight attendants still able to work out what to do with the (presumably) incapacitated pilots. I mean, even if the cockpit crew all passed out due to an undetected or sudden air leak (which is rather puzzling in itself), obviously someone in the aircraft activated the emergency oxygen in time to keep some people alive. (Or is it automatic at a certain level of depressurisation?) If an attendant was alive, why couldn't they revive the pilots (or at least, taken the controls for a time and stopped a descent into a mountain?) I wonder if flight attendants all know how to use the radio in an emergency. Surely they would have to be taught?
Maybe flight attendants and the cockpit crew all passed out and it was only passengers moving around wondering what to do. Again, you would think shoving some of oxygen on an attendant would have revived one, and couldn't a passenger fly the plane at a steady, low altitude until someone could make radio contact?
If it all happened in a short space of time, it would be more understandable. But it seems to have taken place over a considerable time.
Oh well, guess we will know eventually.
Surely then there were some flight attendants still able to work out what to do with the (presumably) incapacitated pilots. I mean, even if the cockpit crew all passed out due to an undetected or sudden air leak (which is rather puzzling in itself), obviously someone in the aircraft activated the emergency oxygen in time to keep some people alive. (Or is it automatic at a certain level of depressurisation?) If an attendant was alive, why couldn't they revive the pilots (or at least, taken the controls for a time and stopped a descent into a mountain?) I wonder if flight attendants all know how to use the radio in an emergency. Surely they would have to be taught?
Maybe flight attendants and the cockpit crew all passed out and it was only passengers moving around wondering what to do. Again, you would think shoving some of oxygen on an attendant would have revived one, and couldn't a passenger fly the plane at a steady, low altitude until someone could make radio contact?
If it all happened in a short space of time, it would be more understandable. But it seems to have taken place over a considerable time.
Oh well, guess we will know eventually.
A Test Post about fonts
I have used firefox ever since I started this blog, and found that using the "normal" size font for posts looked really big, so I got into the habit of making all of them "small".
For the first time today, I looked at my blog with IE, and found the font was really uncomfortably small.
Other sites don't seem to have much difference between IE and Firefox, but then most people use additional software that I haven't investigated yet.
Oh well, sorry to any IE user who has had a problem with my font.
For the first time today, I looked at my blog with IE, and found the font was really uncomfortably small.
Other sites don't seem to have much difference between IE and Firefox, but then most people use additional software that I haven't investigated yet.
Oh well, sorry to any IE user who has had a problem with my font.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Hold, whip and return
Just as Australia starts taking a softer approach to its detention centres, a news story from the Jakarta Post says that Malaysia has this year taken to flogging illegal immigrants, and has no plans on changing this policy any time soon:
"KUALA LUMPUR (AP): Despite increasingly congested detention centers, Malaysia will not deport illegal immigrants immediately, but will stick with its policy of sending them to trial and sentencing them to the lash, the home minister was quoted as saying on Sunday.
"If they are charged and then punished with whipping, they would think many times before running the risk of re-entering the country," Home Minister Azmi Khalid was quoted as saying by the national news agency Bernama.
More than 9,000 illegals, mostly Indonesians, are being held at the centers throughout the country as they await their trials to start or be completed, according to Azmi.
"This is due to delays in the legal process," Azmi was quoted as saying by the Berita Minggu newspaper. "The cases drag on (sometimes for more than a year) due to many postponements, whereas illegal immigrants are caught almost every day."
Azmi said congestion in detention centers will worsen as the government steps up the operation to round up illegals by empowering civilian volunteers - besides police and immigration officers - to detain them.
Whipping was introduced as a punishment for illegal immigrants as part of a crackdown launched in March 2005."
I had not heard of this in the Australian media, but maybe I missed it.Puts our treatment of such people in some sort of perspective, doesn't it.
Friday, August 12, 2005
Aboriginal woes
A detailed bad news story here about chronic aboriginal problems (petrol sniffing, sexual assault, lawlessness, etc) in the community near Uluru, despite a steady stream of income from the tourists. Part of the problem (I guess) is that the money comes without much (or any?) effort from most in the community.
I had never heard this before:
I had never heard this before:
"Some community members bought cars "like tennis shoes", dumping them in what he called a "World Heritage Car Dump" within sight of Uluru when they broke down.
"I counted about 1000 cars there – that's about $4 million ... of money that has potentially been wasted," he said."
Meanwhile, this week's Phillip Adams' Late Night Live radio show has been up in Arnhem Land doing tedious reports on the Garma festival, an annual event which has previously escaped my attention. If I can believe Phil, it would seem that the communities up there are much healthier than the ones further south. Maybe it has something to do with being nearer to a big city, and having some decent natural resources to live off. Anyway Phil, rather than rubbing shoulders with the relatively successful, and their white groupies, why not do a week from the Uluru community and help them workshop ideas to get out of their appalling mess?
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Euthanasia in practice
This item didn't seem to get much attention in the Australian media, but is interesting nonetheless.
It's about a recent study that indicates there were well over a thousand cases of euthanasia actually administered in a year in the Netherlands. (Country population: about 16.5 million; still seems a lot to me.)
A few points of interest:
"Project leader Bregje Onwuteaka-Philipsen said she was surprised that "the most important reasons for doing the request are not strictly medical." The survey asked physicians the reasons that patients sought help in ending their own lives, with the most frequent being pointless suffering, loss of dignity and weakness.
In cases in which doctors denied the requests, the most common reasons were not wanting to be a burden on their family, tired of living and depression.
Well, Australia's scientist/ aboriginal adviser/death-loving creepy doctor Philip Nitschke wouldn't have any such doubts and must think it is a stupid law then, if he can't help people who are just old from topping themselves.
"Under a law that took effect in 2002, euthanasia is restricted to terminal patients suffering unbearable pain with no hope of improvement, and who request to die when they are of sound mind. Each case is reviewed by a panel of medical experts."
The study also reportst that 13 % of those who requested euthanasia changed their minds.
The report continues:
"But in a critical accompanying editorial, University of Minnesota law professor Susan Wolf said the important question is whether mercy killings are taking place that do not follow the strict guidelines the Dutch have put in place.
If I can't trust my hospital doctor to wash his or her hands, I am not sure I should trust them with this either.
It's about a recent study that indicates there were well over a thousand cases of euthanasia actually administered in a year in the Netherlands. (Country population: about 16.5 million; still seems a lot to me.)
A few points of interest:
"Project leader Bregje Onwuteaka-Philipsen said she was surprised that "the most important reasons for doing the request are not strictly medical." The survey asked physicians the reasons that patients sought help in ending their own lives, with the most frequent being pointless suffering, loss of dignity and weakness.
In cases in which doctors denied the requests, the most common reasons were not wanting to be a burden on their family, tired of living and depression.
Well, Australia's scientist/ aboriginal adviser/death-loving creepy doctor Philip Nitschke wouldn't have any such doubts and must think it is a stupid law then, if he can't help people who are just old from topping themselves.
"Under a law that took effect in 2002, euthanasia is restricted to terminal patients suffering unbearable pain with no hope of improvement, and who request to die when they are of sound mind. Each case is reviewed by a panel of medical experts."
The study also reportst that 13 % of those who requested euthanasia changed their minds.
The report continues:
"But in a critical accompanying editorial, University of Minnesota law professor Susan Wolf said the important question is whether mercy killings are taking place that do not follow the strict guidelines the Dutch have put in place.
The study could not determine that, she said, because doctors self-reported on whether their efforts complied with Dutch rules, among other reasons.
"The ultimate question remains — if you permit physicians to take life deliberately by assisting suicide or performing euthanasia, can you control the practice? Can you keep it within agreed boundaries? ... We do not yet know the answers," "If I can't trust my hospital doctor to wash his or her hands, I am not sure I should trust them with this either.
Moon tourism and other space stuff
Interesting news about possible commercial trips around the moon, coming soon to you for $100,000,000. That's a lot of money for a holiday that offers the potential danger of death from solar flare.
But then again, maybe if the spacecraft is thickened up a bit from the average density of the old Apollo craft, maybe death is avoidable. This interesting article (from NASA, so maybe it is more optimistic than it should be) indicates that the Apollo command module would have given a fair degree of shielding. Maybe the real concern during Apollo was for the astronauts if they were caught on the moon during a flare. I am sure the Lunar Module would have offered pretty pitiful shielding, as there was not much to it.
I also found this nice little site about the possible replacements for the Shuttle. The little rocket based on the shuttle solid rocket booster looks very neat, and I don't think even I would have much worry about riding a solid rocket. From what I gather, they are pretty damn simple devices, and don't tend to blow up. Unfortunately, looks like you still need a liquid fueled second stage too. D'oh...
But then again, maybe if the spacecraft is thickened up a bit from the average density of the old Apollo craft, maybe death is avoidable. This interesting article (from NASA, so maybe it is more optimistic than it should be) indicates that the Apollo command module would have given a fair degree of shielding. Maybe the real concern during Apollo was for the astronauts if they were caught on the moon during a flare. I am sure the Lunar Module would have offered pretty pitiful shielding, as there was not much to it.
I also found this nice little site about the possible replacements for the Shuttle. The little rocket based on the shuttle solid rocket booster looks very neat, and I don't think even I would have much worry about riding a solid rocket. From what I gather, they are pretty damn simple devices, and don't tend to blow up. Unfortunately, looks like you still need a liquid fueled second stage too. D'oh...
On education..
Seems to have been a pretty quiet week in the world of blogging. At least in the bit of it I check regularly.
However, an opinion piece in The Age caught my attention. The writer, one Neil Hooley from the academia of education, talks about how being teachers forced by the terrible Federal government to use a simple scale to rank children's achievements is "letting the kids down".
"Apparently, parents are confused by other terminology that might use words such as "established", "consolidated", "developed" and the like. A grade of B, for example, is very explicit and everyone knows what it means."
Well, yeah. But in the world of education, nothing can be allowed to be so clear:
"We have a distinct choice here. Either it is appropriate to draw up an absolute scale that measures achievement, or we look at progress that has been made over time. In the former case, the context is really unimportant - all that matters is product at the time. Contrast this with the latter case, where the conditions are crucial and really shape what is achieved."
Here we go:
"The allocation of absolute grades to the learning of children fits into a particular logic of knowledge. This says that schools are involved in the passing on of predetermined information or subject content that can be known, taught, assessed and rated accurately at each age or year level. Under this arrangement, the logic is internally consistent and defensible. There trouble is, there is another logic.
An alternative view indicates that children learn by building their own knowledge and that learning is always a work in progress."
Fair enough. The problem comes with the next sentence in that paragraph:
"Under these conditions, it is highly problematic whether predetermined content can be known, taught, assessed and rated accurately. With this logic, a graded system of assessment is therefore entirely inconsistent and indefensible."
Why? Every sensible person agrees that it is good for an education system to encourage students to "build their own knowledge" and realise that you can go through life continually learning, if you want to. But why should that preclude being able to give a simple assessment of where the student is in their level of objective knowledge of a subject at any particular time?
Surely he is getting at something more subtle, and it would seem to be the lingering postmodernist idea that, at heart, there is no objective truth about anything. No point in testing kids for how much they remember or understand it then. Go on, admit it Hooley!
His ending is particularly silly:
"An imposed system of A to E labels assumes one logic. It assumes that schools are only about the passing on of knowledge from elsewhere, that both teachers and children are disconnected from their knowledge and that imposed external judgments are accurate and necessary.
Parents will make up their own minds, but children may have little option to do so, locked in the iron cage of A to E determinism."
Look, if teachers want to comment on a student's "progress over time" or general aptitude etc, can't they still do it in the way they always have (at least in primary school)? That is, little Johnny gets a C in maths, but teacher writes at the end of the report card that "Johnny could do better with increased effort" or "Johnny has improved considerably, but further effort should see better results." Damn simple, it you ask me. At high school level, you can test in other ways about general aptitude and combine it with the other testing of stuff learnt to get a general idea of a kid's potential.
And it is absolute rubbish to suggest students are going to be "trapped" by their school grades anyway. Surely everyone knows of fellow high school students who didn't do well there, but after a few years maturing have gone back to study properly and ended up with tertiary qualifications and well paying careers.
Oh,and he also starts by criticising the government not (he believes) allowing the aboriginal flag to be used at schools instead of the Australian flag. Yes indeed, I am sure the lack of that flag must account for so much of the educational difficulties in aboriginal society.
However, an opinion piece in The Age caught my attention. The writer, one Neil Hooley from the academia of education, talks about how being teachers forced by the terrible Federal government to use a simple scale to rank children's achievements is "letting the kids down".
"Apparently, parents are confused by other terminology that might use words such as "established", "consolidated", "developed" and the like. A grade of B, for example, is very explicit and everyone knows what it means."
Well, yeah. But in the world of education, nothing can be allowed to be so clear:
"We have a distinct choice here. Either it is appropriate to draw up an absolute scale that measures achievement, or we look at progress that has been made over time. In the former case, the context is really unimportant - all that matters is product at the time. Contrast this with the latter case, where the conditions are crucial and really shape what is achieved."
Here we go:
"The allocation of absolute grades to the learning of children fits into a particular logic of knowledge. This says that schools are involved in the passing on of predetermined information or subject content that can be known, taught, assessed and rated accurately at each age or year level. Under this arrangement, the logic is internally consistent and defensible. There trouble is, there is another logic.
An alternative view indicates that children learn by building their own knowledge and that learning is always a work in progress."
Fair enough. The problem comes with the next sentence in that paragraph:
"Under these conditions, it is highly problematic whether predetermined content can be known, taught, assessed and rated accurately. With this logic, a graded system of assessment is therefore entirely inconsistent and indefensible."
Why? Every sensible person agrees that it is good for an education system to encourage students to "build their own knowledge" and realise that you can go through life continually learning, if you want to. But why should that preclude being able to give a simple assessment of where the student is in their level of objective knowledge of a subject at any particular time?
Surely he is getting at something more subtle, and it would seem to be the lingering postmodernist idea that, at heart, there is no objective truth about anything. No point in testing kids for how much they remember or understand it then. Go on, admit it Hooley!
His ending is particularly silly:
"An imposed system of A to E labels assumes one logic. It assumes that schools are only about the passing on of knowledge from elsewhere, that both teachers and children are disconnected from their knowledge and that imposed external judgments are accurate and necessary.
Parents will make up their own minds, but children may have little option to do so, locked in the iron cage of A to E determinism."
Look, if teachers want to comment on a student's "progress over time" or general aptitude etc, can't they still do it in the way they always have (at least in primary school)? That is, little Johnny gets a C in maths, but teacher writes at the end of the report card that "Johnny could do better with increased effort" or "Johnny has improved considerably, but further effort should see better results." Damn simple, it you ask me. At high school level, you can test in other ways about general aptitude and combine it with the other testing of stuff learnt to get a general idea of a kid's potential.
And it is absolute rubbish to suggest students are going to be "trapped" by their school grades anyway. Surely everyone knows of fellow high school students who didn't do well there, but after a few years maturing have gone back to study properly and ended up with tertiary qualifications and well paying careers.
Oh,and he also starts by criticising the government not (he believes) allowing the aboriginal flag to be used at schools instead of the Australian flag. Yes indeed, I am sure the lack of that flag must account for so much of the educational difficulties in aboriginal society.
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Relativistic Poverty
Peter Saunders makes a lot of sense in his continuing attack on the welfare lobby (and Left generally) insisting on defining "poverty" in a relative sense.
Funnily enough, one of the comments posted after the article says this:
"The thing that Saunders does not understand is that in wealthy societies where there is no starvation or dying from exposure, poverty is about being unable to participate in the society with respect and esteem.
A relativistic definition of poverty is not adopted by ‘the left’ just so they can advocate redistribution of income. It is favoured because it is the only real way of understanding what it means to be poor. If parents cannot afford Nike trainers for their child, the child ‘feels’ poor. The lack of money for trendy shoes ‘means’ poverty in our society."
What to make of this post? Surely she can't be saying that it reflects good, sensible values to say that children have a right to have the "coolest" brand names rather than simply a reasonable quality shoe? If she saying that, it plays exactly into Saunder's criticism of why a relative treatment of poverty is pretty stupid and unhelpful.
Picking brand fetishism as a way of illustrating being "unable to participate" is pretty startling, so much so that I wonder if she is having us on. But I don't think she is.
Funnily enough, one of the comments posted after the article says this:
"The thing that Saunders does not understand is that in wealthy societies where there is no starvation or dying from exposure, poverty is about being unable to participate in the society with respect and esteem.
A relativistic definition of poverty is not adopted by ‘the left’ just so they can advocate redistribution of income. It is favoured because it is the only real way of understanding what it means to be poor. If parents cannot afford Nike trainers for their child, the child ‘feels’ poor. The lack of money for trendy shoes ‘means’ poverty in our society."
What to make of this post? Surely she can't be saying that it reflects good, sensible values to say that children have a right to have the "coolest" brand names rather than simply a reasonable quality shoe? If she saying that, it plays exactly into Saunder's criticism of why a relative treatment of poverty is pretty stupid and unhelpful.
Picking brand fetishism as a way of illustrating being "unable to participate" is pretty startling, so much so that I wonder if she is having us on. But I don't think she is.
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