With Good Reason

In the shadow of the US Government’s massive subprime lending bailout, the House of Representatives passed legislation HR 5244, better known as the Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights Act of 2008. Designed to curb the growing torrent of credit card consolidation and bankruptcy filings, the bill bans or limits several lending practices, including:

• Increasing the annual percentage interest rate (APR) on the outstanding balance without the customer acting delinquently on the account in question.
  Example: John’s FICO credit score drops by 70 points over several months. Although he has never missed a payment on his credit card, the lender sees him as a default risk and raises his APR from 19% to 34%
• Using APR increases as penalties without a 45-day written notice
  Example: Suzy has missed several payments over the past year. On September 3, the bank decides to raise the APR on her card. The increase effects all purchases starting September 10. Suzy does not become aware of these changes until she receives her bill later in the month
• Double Cycle Billing – using the previous month’s balance to calculate interest due on an outstanding balance
  Example: Jim owes $1000, payable by September 30. He pays $550, ensuring he is not delinquent but leaving $450 due. Most lenders calculate interest due based on the average daily balance and interest for the billing cycle (e.g. $1000* 19.5% * 25 / 365 = $13.36 interest) , but lenders who use double cycle billing take the average of the current month’s balance and the previous month’s balance. Thus, if Jim spent $2000 the previous month, the interest would be calculated on $1500 rather than $1000 (interest = $20.03).

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Filed under: Society by Cynapse
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If parents and educators want to stress more of “the basics” in public schools, something is going to have to give because the school day and the school curriculum are just too crowded. It’s odd, really, how people will complain that the education system does not respond to public input and pressure when, in actual fact, it has responded to the point of its detriment.

For example, in September of 1972 when I started teaching elementary school, I had a homeroom Grade 6 and taught visual art to Grades 6 to 8. My morning consisted of two main blocks of time. From 9am until 10:30 it was language arts (reading, writing and spelling) and from 10:45 until noon it was math. That was it. Then, in the afternoon, there was phys. ed/health, music or art (on alternating days) from 1 until 2:00 and social studies or science from 2:15 until 3:30pm.

In many ways it was like “the balanced school day” now with the large blocks of time — but with fewer subjects. Clearly the emphasis was on what many call “the basics” — reading, writing and arithmetic, social studies and science.

Then, along came (in no particular order) daily classes of “sustained silent reading (SSR),” phys ed, health and French. Then, we were asked to include dental education and sex education in health. Now, I understand there are also curriculum units on diversity and equity (including gender equality), family education and drug education.

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Filed under: Education, Society by Sandy
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Thanks to the Internet, waiting for the latest news is a thing of the past. Most credible web news sites provide RSS feeds and are updated 24 hours per day, allowing important stories to propagate across the entire web in mere minutes. The resulting consumer desire for immediacy and the wide availability of internet connections has presented a challenge for traditional media like newspapers (which are forever condemned to slow periodic releases) and television (which precludes fast searches for specific content). Many major news services in Canada have attempted to bridge the gap between old and new media via podcasting, releasing creating just-in-time audio and/or video broadcasts of news content for download onto IPods and alternative MP3 Players. Apple’s Itunes contains one of the largest collections of free audio and video news content – perfect for making that daily trip to work just a little more pleasant.

CBC leads the way for Toronto and Canada with a comprehensive selection of weekly, daily and even hourly news podcasts. Provincial, national and international programs are available for download as well as specialty programs like Quirks & Quarks and The Hour (the latter provided in video format) Music fans will be happy to hear that several Classical, Jazz and Pop music programs from Radio 2 and Radio 3 are also available for download, though some require a modest fee (most likely to keep CIRA quiet).

CanWest Global provides a worthy alternative to CBC for more conservative listeners. Its Global TV news station provides a daily video podcast of the 6:00 news. The catch is that the news segments are posted the morning after the TV broadcast, so avid watchers may not gain from this content. For editorial content, CanWest’s National Post newspaper offers two podcasts - Full Comment and Posted Toronto. Full comment topics are usually political and patterned around editorials on the Full Comment section of the NP website. Posted Toronto deals strictly with GTA matters and uses an informal talk radio format. Both NP podcasts are approximately weekly.
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Filed under: Media by Cynapse
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There can be power in labels, both positive or negative because labels can predetermine beliefs and expectations about people, a phenomenon that is often referred to as the “pygmalion principle.” While this article is primarily about learning disabilities in a school context (no matter what th learning level), it can also relate to an employment situation and the point that people are much more than a label.

Unfortunately, most children and adults, no matter what type of educational program they are in, if they need accommodations they need to be formally assessed. And, being formally evaluated puts a label on that individual — often for life. Is that fair? Is that the only way we can get help for people? And, why does it matter? What those children and adults and their families are trying to avoid is the ”pygmalion principle” — how the expectations of others can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

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Filed under: Education, Society by Sandy
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I received an e-mail from a regular reader yesterday who explained that her daughter had just graduated from high school and was about to start university in September – without the English grammar and spelling abilities one might expect — and wondered how she would survive university without those skills.

It was also explained to me that she, the mother, had asked her daughter’s high school teachers over the years about why her daughter wasn’t being taught distinct grammar and spelling.  In response she was always told they, high school teachers, didn’t have to do that. That whatever spelling and grammar she learned as a distinct subject would have been done, or at least should have been done, at the elementary level. Since that didn’t seem to have happened, the mother asked for my recommendations.

First of all, you can’t start from scratch. You can’t go back to the junior grades once your son or daughter is eighteen.  So, once your children graduate from high school with the required marks and credits to get accepted into a Canadian university, it is best to deal with where they are at right now.

As such, my first recommendation was that her daughter make sure she take part in her university’s orientation “essay” writing and related courses because some grammar and spelling would be included, if only in a contextual way.

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Filed under: Education, Technology by Sandy
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Given that far too many of Ontario’s school boards’ elected trustees cannot be trusted to manage the public interest regarding board budgets and what goes on in Ontario’s schools, that model should be completely abolished in favour of the New Brunswick model of “School Districts.”

Yesterday, for example, Ontario’s Education Minister Kathleen Wynn, had to take over the Toronto Catholic Board’s financial affairs by appointing school finance expert Norbert Hartmann, because she no longer had confidence in the ability of its trustees to do what needed to be done. (I wrote on this last month here.) 

No doubt many other Ontario boards have also been found to be negligent in their public responsibilities. And, just try to imagine how much all these trustees are costing — money that could be going to school resources — such as membership fees in their associations, their stipends, attendance at conferences and retreats and mileage.

Back in 1995, when I was working for an Ontario PC MPP, the Mike Harris government had to take away Board of Education taxing powers because of a similar “trustee” entitlement culture. At that time it was called the “Who Does What” process but, being on the inside, I can say that much of the downloading was done so as to take away the ability of boards to continually raise education property taxes.

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Filed under: Education, Politics by Sandy
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While there are definitely some Toronto parents and public school supporters who agree with the notion of an Africentric program from Junior Kindergarten to Grade 12, the speed at which Toronto District School Board (TDSB) trustees and members of its “advisory panel” are putting forward and approving proposals is clearly political. 

For example, today’s Toronto Star editorial comment states:

“Bureaucrats at the Toronto public school board have barely begun the effort of launching an Africentric elementary school this coming fall. But now some trustees are calling for an Africentric high school to open just one year later.”

So, however well intentioned, some TDSB trustees are making recommendations for an Africentric high school without adequate “action research” and feedback on the pilot elementary program slated for Sheppard Public School in September of this year.  As such, in their unseemly haste, the needs of the students seem to have been forgotten or minimized.

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Filed under: Education, Politics, Society by Sandy
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According to this urban legend/recipe, if you can boil water, you can make an omelet. All you need is a couple eggs, the chopped-up ingredients you want in your omelet, and a quart size Ziploc baggie (same size they want to see your toiletries in when you fly).

The recipe has apparently been circulating on the interweb for some time:

Crack 2 eggs (large or extra-large) into the quart size Ziploc bag (not more than 2) and shake to combine them. Put in a variety of ingredients such as: cheeses, ham, onion, green pepper, tomato, hash browns, salsa, etc.

Make sure to get the air out of the bag and zip it up. Place the bag(s) into rolling, boiling water for exactly 13 minutes. You can usually cook 6-8 omelets in a large pot.

Open the bags and the omelet will roll out easily.

Because I’ve never successfully made an omelet–it turns into scrambled eggs every.single.time–I knew I had to try this. “But is it safe?” was my nagging, second thought. After googling around, I’m pretty sure the short answer is no, not really. That’s why you don’t do it every day. Just like you don’t microwave your leftovers in Tupperware and don’t drink from plastic water bottles every day…. right?

So anyway, I didn’t take pictures of the process, but I tried this with olives, tomatoes and mushrooms inside and came out with the fluffiest, most cohesive omelet I have ever made! tah-dah! (more…)

Filed under: Food by Jeela
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Congratulations to the staff and students at Britannia Elementary School on Vancouver’s east side!  From a previous school ranking by the Fraser Institute of 2.8 a number of years ago, this year they made in on the honour roll with a 7.5 out of ten. Well done!

What an inspiring example of what can happen when everyone involved in a school makes a commitment to improve.  And, when they do, everyone benefits — clear across Canada because we are now telling their story. And that story is that school rankings, whether they be from the Fraser or C.D. Howe Institutes, can be used as the impetus for change. 

They are not, as I wrote yesterday, a “flawed picture” as suggested by the Ontario Public School Board Association (OPSBA). As Doretta Wilson, Executive Director of the Society for Quality Education pointed out today in an e-mail, there are jurisdictions in this country that are using the school rankings to make a difference and she included the link to the Vancouver Sun article as proof.  

And, make a difference they have. According to Janet Steffenhagen of the Vancouver Sun, Britannia is an inner city school. Half the children are ESL, more than half are aboriginal and the parents’ education is generally below average.  So, how did the staff take the school from a 2.8 ranking to a 7.5? One teacher was inspired to use a controversial “direct-instruction” literacy program called “Reading Mastery.” And, when students started making huge gains, the whole staff decided to use it school-wide spending up to 2 hours every single day on the program.

Memo to OPSBA and the Ontario teachers’ unions. Britannia Elementary School in Vancouver has used the school rankings to improve.  Don’t tell the government, the general public and parents, that it can’t be done. It not only can be done, it has been done.

[...] 

Note: Read Steffenhagen’s column in full. It is truly inspiring. And, let’s get the news out. Send the link to this post to everyone you know. C/P at Crux-of-the-Matter.

Filed under: Education, Society, Uncategorized by Sandy
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So, the latest census figures released by Statistics Canada tell what many of us have been saying for years, that whether you complete a trades certificate (to become an electrician, a carpenter, a plumber or a brick layer), a college diploma (for a career as a police officer or fire fighter), or a bachelor’s degree “staying in school pays off.”

While some individuals know exactly what they want to do with their lives, others may need to do an indepth old fashioned job search before they decide where to go to school and what to study.  Here are some ideas to think about.

• SEARCH! Go to every conceivable employment search site and look at what jobs are in demand. Even look in the local and national newspapers. Get a picture of what jobs and careers are growing and where in Canada that is happening. Make up a scrap book of the jobs according to their similar characteristics.

• DETERMINE! To the best of your ability, decide which jobs represent the new economy and those which will always be in demand — such as accounting. Separate out those that you think are highly competitive and likely not to remain in demand in the future.

• ABILITIES! Think carefully which of the demand areas suits your interests and abilities. There is nothing wrong with doing something you are interested in or even love to do. And, keep in mind that the career you are choosing now will not likely be for life. Most of us experience different jobs along the way or different types of jobs within a single company. And, you know what, at the end of your working journey, when you look back at what you have done, there will be a very interesting pattern. You will take something from every job you ever had. In other words, there is no such thing as wasting your time.

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Filed under: Education, Society by Sandy
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