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Cosmic's Corner of the Space Time Continuum

Tag Archives: politics

Please Don’t Be a Teacher, Son

23 Sunday Jun 2013

Posted by cosmichomicide in News and Politics

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politics

“Teaching is the only major occupation of man for which we have not yet developed tools that make an average person capable of competence and performance. In teaching we rely on the “naturals,” the ones who somehow know how to teach.” ~ Peter F. Drucker

My rising high school senior wants to be a teacher.  He loves teaching, coaching, mentoring, tutoring.  He talks about great teachers he has had and how they have influenced him.  He wants to help kids not make the mistakes he has and to discover how great books are and how much fun rugby can be.  He loved teaching classes as a camp counselor.  He wants to start a rugby team at a school that doesn’t have one.  He has all the right motivations and all the right traits.  The only schools he’s applying to are those with education programs.  He understands he’ll never get rich and he doesn’t mind.  His friends all say he’ll be terrific at it.  I believe he will be.

And I hate it for him.  Many members of my family are either current or retired teachers.  I still remember the teachers who influenced my life and instilled in me a love of learning.  I’ve spent 20 years doing technical training and I know the thrill of seeing students grasp a concept.  But I look at schools and teachers and what this country has done to education and I worry.  A lot.  He’s signing on for a lifetime of being undervalued, underpaid and underappreciated.  Will he love it?  Probably.  But what a shame that one of our most important careers to our society makes a mother wish her son would pick something else.

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$2.50 – You Have To Be Kidding Me!

18 Tuesday Aug 2009

Posted by cosmichomicide in News and Politics

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money, paperless, politics

So I go online to pay my “middle of the month” bills – utilities, internet, phone, etc.  I had a very pleasant surprise earlier in the month when the gas company (love my natural gas) DROPPED my EPP (Equal Payment Plan – same amount every month) by $80.  Sweet – $960 instant and unexpected savings.  Flush with enthusiasm and windfall, I hit the local government site to pay my water, sewer and power – something I’ve been doing online since the first month the City added online billing.  Love it.  Until…. a new $2.50 “convenience fee”.
 
What effing convenience?  The fact that the City conveniently doesn’t need to hire people to stand around and wait for other people to wander in and pay a bill?  That credit cards are instant payment – no “will the check clear” worries.  That people can pay over the weekend, no receipts need printing (good for the planet too), more accurate – nothing but good news in this move.  But wait – since when do I have to *pay extra* for an already cost-cutting measure?  Don’t get me wrong, I expect to be picked apart like a pile of (taxable) guts in the desert, but good grief… a deuce and a half is just petty even for a cash starved government cow.  Not gonna do it – gonna walk down the few blocks to Public Works and pay in person.  I just have to decide if I want to use a check that will take days to clear or loose change…
 
Speaking of cows… the polar caps on Mars are receding.  Melting.  Getting smaller.  Warming even.  (This is nothing new but still one of the reasons we love NASA.)
 
Wonder if that’s the cows or the cars causing that Martian Warming…

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