Washington State

Interesting article when you consider what children will have to face in the next generation as opposed to what young adult have to face now and what we as older adults had to face in our youth. Education is the union card. Interest in education is the gasoline. That gasoline is pumped early - at three. America's education program and policy of stirring the interest soup will not be able to keep up until we realize that education is about learning. It's not about control; it's not about getting a 96 percent on a test that could stand correcting; it's not about who can blow back the hot air delivered poorly in classrooms all over the country. It's about who knows what and how they can use that information.

Two nights ago I got a note from my grandson who at 14 and 15 is writing his first novel. It's splendid. It reads well; it's interesting; it's full of knowledge both gained and created, and he innocently gave it to a teacher who tossed it off as amateurish. Is this what public education is all about? How can I trash your dreams and make you feel as crummy as I do?

When did we stop looking for the gold and treat everyone like a bag of sawdust?

Two teachers told me that in a day care in EVV that is considered to be the top ranking childcare institution in the city the director told them that it is not appropriate to teach a child who is three, four or five. It's not age appropriate. Readers can take the story from there.

The picture is the Monastery at Norcia where St. Benedict and St. Scholastica were born. I posted this picture because these twins are in many ways a tribute to education. The monastery still is under the direction of Prior Cassian.

Monday, April 24, 2006
Chrononline.com

Comment:

Gregoire’s Warnings on China, Education Need to be Heeded

In her address last week at a meeting of the Chehalis Rotary Club, Gov. Chris Gregoire had some words of warning about education we should heed. Gregoire is big on improving education in this state, from preschool to post-graduate. In discussing early childhood education, for which she is an ardent advocate, Gregoire told a story.

When she was a child, she said, her mother used to tell her to clean up her plate because children in China were starving (for some of us, it was starving Armenians or others). The lesson was that we shouldn’t be wasting when others were starving and by us not wasting there would be more for them. But now the focus has changed, Gregoire said. “The story today is, ‘If you don’t do your homework, that child in China will get your job,’ ” Gregoire may well be right.

China, which remains the most populous country in the world, is coming on strong as an economic competitor, its economy growing by leaps and bounds. Leveling the trading playing field with China will help create new markets for our goods there, as Gregoire was striving to achieve for this state in a recent trade mission to that country. Further opening of the Chinese market will in turn create more jobs in the United States.

But with education levels and skilled work forces increasing in China and Asia, more jobs and potential jobs in this country will flow there if we don’t bolster education in this country so that we can compete. That’s why efforts to raise education standards, including this state’s Assessment of Student Learning testing that Gregoire also strongly supports, is so important.

On another subject, the governor indicated she is well aware of the magnitude of the methamphetamine drug problem in our area and the state. She noted meth is particularly insidious and dangerous because “unlike any other drug, we do not have the ability to get people off” it.

In connection with that, she mentioned a disturbing trend in meth that many may not be aware of — an increased tendency of women to use the drug as a dietary aid. That is insanity. Once they are hooked on this highly addictive drug, the number of people who can get off it permanently is abysmally low.

SATSOP PLAN: Also when she was here last week, Gregoire embraced a plan to convert the abandoned Satsop nuclear power plant project near Elma to a job training facility that could be operated by Centralia College. Gregoire toured the college’s Center of Excellence for Energy Technology. In a presentation to the governor, Barbara Hins-Turner, executive director of the center, said the energy industry will need thousands of replacement workers as baby boomers start to retire in the next five to eight years.

Hins-Turner has been working with both industry leaders and labor representatives in the region on a plan to convert the 1,800-acre Satsop site into a training facility for future employees in the power generation field. That would be fitting.Gregoire said the plan “sounds like it has a lot of promise. ... The whole region will benefit” from Satsop as a job training site.

The energy industry has been aware of the declining work force for years and “The cold, hard truth is that we’re going to suffer a tremendous brain drain,” said Steve Milistefr, a representative of the Bonneville Power Administration who was at the college with Gregoire. He also lauded the college for its efforts to provide more trained workers to fill the gap.

“Centralia College is starting to put some action behind this, and things are starting to happen.” Jim Walton, president of the college, said he hopes to have a Satsop job training facility operational in two years, including on-site dormitories. He commended Gregoire for her interest, noting that support at her level of government adds impetus to the Satsop plans.

In the end, then, it appears something positive will come out of the costly boondoggle of trying to build nuclear power plants at Satsop. Who knows, some day employees might be trained there for jobs at nuclear power plants, which this country will likely need more of at some point to become more energy independent.