Not much according to Bob Hebert. A provocative new book, “Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses,” makes a strong case that for a large portion of the nation’s seemingly successful undergraduates the years in college barely improve their skills in critical thinking, complex reasoning and writing. Intellectual effort and academic rigor, in the minds [...]
education
Rewired for the digital age (and that’s not necessarily a good thing)
From the New York Times Sam Crocker, Vishal’s closest friend, who has straight A’s but lower SAT scores than he would like, blames the Internet’s distractions for his inability to finish either of his two summer reading books. “I know I can read a book, but then I’m up and checking Facebook,” he says, adding: [...]
What Will Future Generations Condemn Us For?
From the Washington Post …a look at the past suggests three signs that a particular practice is destined for future condemnation. First, people have already heard the arguments against the practice. The case against slavery didn’t emerge in a blinding moment of moral clarity, for instance; it had been around for centuries. Second, defenders of [...]
Make Inner City Schools More Like Law Firms
From Good This past weekend, The Daily Beast held its Innovators Summit in New Orleans, which gathered 300 leading thinkers to discuss big ideas for changing the world. One of the most interesting innovations, according to senior reporter Jacob Bernstein, came from a former lawyer named Rafiq Kalam Id-Din, who has a radical idea for [...]
Maybe we are in the top 500
The bad news is that the University of Saskatchewan is not listed in the top 400 universities from around the world. Here are the Canadian universities that are well respected. #18 McGill University #29 University of Toronto #44 University of British Columbia (UBC) #78 University of Alberta #131 Queen’s University #136 Université de Montréal #145 [...]
10 Revolutions in How We Read (other than the E-book reader)
From The Atlantic The industrial revolution. Gigantic presses powered by steam (and later, electric power) could crank out books and newspapers and advertisements that strained the always-fickle paper supply. Eventually, papermakers were able to invent a variety of mechanical and chemical techniques engineer decent-quality paper out of pulped wood, a supply that (unlike cloth rags) [...]
From Mayfair to Caswell
As Wendy wrote, Mark has been transferred from Mayfair School to Caswell School. The experience has been a really good one for Mark so far which kind of frustrates me. There are more computers, a better paint job, more extra curricular activities, and resources for kids at Caswell despite the schools only being five blocks [...]
Surge in Homeless Pupils Strains Schools
From the New York Times While current national data are not available, the number of schoolchildren in homeless families appears to have risen by 75 percent to 100 percent in many districts over the last two years, according to Barbara Duffield, policy director of the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth, [...]
What to do…
Wendy and I chronicled some of the struggles that Mark has had at Mayfair School. The school faces declining enrollment and he has had split classes since grade 2. As he enters into grade 4, he has another split class. Apparently there are enough grade four kids for a class but not enough grade 3 [...]
Tall Skinny Bailout
Andrew Jones is blogging on the debt dependent church. Here are some of the gems from the post I have seen a number of Seminary graduates come overseas to hang with us and to potentially find work in the "emerging church". After a short time, they have gone back to USA disappointed that there are [...]
