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Two years ago, The New York Times reported that China is pouring $250 billion a year into higher education, with a goal of producing 195 million college graduates by 2020. Judging by the numbers, China’s efforts are succeeding. Chinese colleges are on the rise, and the number of students that graduated in 2014 reached an all-time high of 7.27 million, up from 6.99 million the previous year. But Chinese graduates aren’t too happy with the situation. Traditionally, China’s education system has excelled at teaching rote memorization, assimilation and theory. But the rapidly shifting economy has driven new market demands that...

In August 2013, the district announced — to the great dismay of the teachers union — a dress code that would require teachers to wear underwear. Every single day. Female teachers would have to wear bras, too. And the very worst of all: No spandex. (RELATED: Little Rock School District Will Now Make Teachers Wear Underwear) Now, a mere 18 months later, the Arkansas Department of Education has voted to assume control over management of the school district, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.

GUSTINE, Texas — A group of students at an elementary school in Texas were apparently asked to lower their pants for a poop inspection on Monday. School educators told two dozen students they were regularly finding feces on the gym floor. The students were then separated into groups of boys and girls and ordered to “pull down their pants” so administrators could “check if they could find anything.” Maria Medina, whose 11-year-old daughter was searched, said her daughter’s privacy was violated. She told WFAA the teachers involved should be fired.

EDMOND, Okla. – A local biology teacher’s multiple choice question about abortion is upsetting students’ parents. Edmond Santa Fe High School officials confirmed Tuesday several biology teachers at the school gave their students a “non graded exercise” – a discussion starter – on human genetic disorders. “You’ve found out that the child you (or your wife) carries has the gene for dwarfism. A new therapy exists that may repair this gene before the child is born. What do you do?” the first question on the exercise asks. A. Allow the child to be born with the gene, and we will...

North Dakota United is a group formed by the state’s two largest unions: The teachers and the public workers. The group claims to represent over 11,000 people, and describes itself on its website as a “professional organization.” You’d think, from the way they describe themselves, that they mostly concern themselves with professional development and advocacy on issues of importance to government employees. Which is all well and good. That’s exactly what you would expect from an organization like that. What you might not expect is the group meeting in “solidarity” with advocacy groups pushing positions far outside the scope of...

Thea Aschkenase Auschwitz survivor, Worcester State College graduate, Commonwealth Corps volunteer "After five days, the train stopped and it said Auschwitz. There was a sign in Auschwitz “Work makes Free,” “Arbeit Macht Frei,” by which one assumes it’s a working camp. But it wasn’t. When we were marched into Auschwitz, there was this infamous Dr. Mengele, maybe you have heard of him, he did the experiments on people and he selected the people that entered Auschwitz and who would live and who would die. So we entered, my father, my brother, my mother and I, with no idea what was...

A small, but elite group of Americans demonstrate signs of anti-Christian hostility, sociologists David Williamson and George Yancey claim in their new book, So Many Christians, So Few Lions: Is There Christianophobia in the United States? In an email interview with The Christian Post, Yancey, professor of sociology at the University of North Texas, explained that Christians are fortunate in one sense, because those with anti-Christian hostility are small in number; but in another sense, they should be concerned, because those with "Christianophobia" tend to be powerful elites with influence in certain important areas, such as higher education. The data for...

Maybe the smoking gun isn’t in a bathroom at Gillette Stadium. Maybe it’s in the laptop of a civil engineer in Washington, D.C. One of the strangest twists in the already strange saga of deflate-gate is the sudden star turn of a man who runs a gambling website when he’s not doing his day job. Warren Sharp is a 36-year-old dad who loves numbers and algorithms, and decided to apply some statistics to the Patriots when he heard about the football deflation investigation. What he found sent ripples through the sports world and got a few other statisticians pretty upset....

Carl Krawitt has watched his son, Rhett, now 6, fight leukemia for the past 4 1/2 years. For more than three of those years, Rhett has undergone round after round of chemotherapy. Last year he finished chemotherapy, and doctors say he is in remission. Now, there's a new threat, one that the family should not have to worry about: measles. Rhett cannot be vaccinated, because his immune system is still rebuilding. It may be months more before his body is healthy enough to get all his immunizations. Until then, he depends on everyone around him for protection — what's known...

After a spate of student misbehavior that has tarnished the reputation of Dartmouth College, its president on Thursday announced a ban on hard liquor on campus, and threatened to do away with fraternities or other groups that fail “to elevate and not denigrate the Dartmouth experience.” In a speech on the Dartmouth campus in Hanover, N.H., to students, staff and alumni, Philip J. Hanlon, the president, said the college would create new spaces for social activity as alternatives to Greek houses, give faculty members more of a role in residential life and provide students more extensive training on preventing sexual...

The History channel’s new miniseries, Sons of Liberty, will anger the purists and the prudes. But it will delight the swashbuckler in the rest of us. It is a big, bodacious screening with superb production values that covers the lead-up years to the American Revolution, 1765-1775. Yes, certain liberties are taken with some of the facts and events.

Prominent Atheist Professor says Intelligent Design is Plausible By Donald Sensing Prominent Atheist Professor of Law and Philosophy Thomas Nagel Calls Intelligent Design Scientific and Constitutional to "Mention" in Science Classes Prof. Thomas Nagel has published an important essay entitled, "Public Education and Intelligent Design", in the Wiley InterScience Journal Philosophy & Public Affairs, Vol. 36, issue 2, on-line at < http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118493933/home>  His paper is a significant because it encourages all intelligent, educated, informed individuals to consider that intelligent design may be a valid scientific approach to understanding how DNA and the complex chemical systems of life came to attain...

Executive SummaryEarly Learning and Student Success Immediate Steps Create early learning collaboratives in every county in the state Adopt a state-wide public engagement initiative (annual summit) Long Range Steps Provide opportunity for all 0-5 to participate in full year educational experiences Adopt pre-k - 3 non-graded education model for children ages 4-8 Teaching and Learning Immediate Steps Develop challenging curricula (common core state standards may be basis for robust curricula). Culture, Climate, and Organizational Efficacy Long Range Steps Establish each school as the center or hub of the community it serves Financial Resources Immediate Steps Initiate process for evaluating local...

Lawrence Krauss, Eric Metaxas, and Aquinas' Fifth Way Michael Egnor January 27, 2015 8:31 PM | Permalink As Daniel Bakken noted here earlier, atheist physicist Lawrence Krauss has responded in The New Yorker to Eric Metaxas's recent Wall Street Journal essay "Science Increasingly Makes the Case for God." Krauss denies that astrobiology and cosmology point to God's existence. I disagree with every keystroke of Krauss's rebuttal, except, oddly, the title: "No, Astrobiology Has Not Made the Case for God." It pains me to agree with Krauss's assertion, in the following limited sense. I agree not because I doubt God's existence,...

Once Again Going After Eric Metaxas, Now in The New Yorker, Lawrence Krauss Opts for Misdirection Daniel Bakken January 27, 2015 2:21 PM | Permalink Now a month after the fact, cosmologist and "skeptic" Lawrence Krauss has made another attempt at damage control in the wake of that wildly popular Christmas Day article by Eric Metaxas in the Wall Street Journal. The Metaxas essay, which went viral, argued that science increasingly makes the case for God. The first try by Dr. Krauss was obviously rushed, and wasn't published by the WSJ, though the Richard Dawkins Foundation did post it on...

David Suzuki’s Anti-Human "Blue Dot" Campaign Wesley J. Smith January 28, 2015 4:01 AM | Permalink Canadian environmental radical David Suzuki is at it again. Not content with denigrating humans as "maggots" that go around defecating on the environment, he now wants to add a "right" in the Canadian Charter to "a clean environment." Such a "right" would be anti-human in that it would destroy Canada's prosperity and subvert individual liberty.The "Blue Dot" campaign, like most radical thrusts, is long on warm fuzzies and short on specifics to hide its ruinous intent. It uses propaganda -- pretty pictures of nature and ugly ones...

Some day college football players will learn not everything needs to be shared to the public. Ohio State quarterback Cardale Jones found that out, as you may have heard by now, but things turned out OK for him. Maybe Penn State sophomore safety Bryant Harper will learn a lesson after being publicly scorned by his head coach on Twitter. On Monday, Harper took to Twitter to boast about a B he received on a recent anatomy exam. "B on my first anatomy exam and I didn't study I'll take it" Penn State head coach James Franklin, known to be fluent...

A northern California high school where sex ed was taught by members of Planned Parenthood apparently had at least two instructors with interesting sidelines. Parents of children who attend Acalanes Union High School in Lafayette, Calif., along with local area groups, had been demanding for months the district tell them exactly who was teaching the sex education program. Some of the answers they received did not make them happy. At least two of the instructors had questionable day jobs, with one conducting sex toy workshops at a local porn shop. Another, who dubbed herself a “pleasure activist,” had attended pornography...

Mathew 18 1 AT that hour the disciples came to Jesus, saying: Who thinkest thou is the greater in the kingdom of heaven? 2 And Jesus calling unto him a little child, set him in the midst of them, 3 And said: Amen I say to you, unless you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. 4 Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, he is the greater in the kingdom of heaven. 5 And he that shall receive one such little child in my name, receiveth me. 6...

Sen. Joe Donnelly, Democrat Indiana, described what his position is as a senator"I am the hired help, and my top priority continues to be addressing the issues most important to Hoosiers: working to strengthen the economy for working- and middle-class families, ensuring our servicemembers and veterans have access to the care and resources they deserve, and providing excellent constituent services to every Hoosier.

11 Unexpected Facts Proven by Science That Can Make Your Life Happier and Exciting Spend time with friends and family. Be sure to exercise. Get enough sleep.Scientists have long known that these and other familiar strategies really can boost your mood. But recent research has revealed several not-so-obvious links to happiness, including everything from the ambient temperature to your political views.Some are causal links, others just interesting associations. But keep reading for some surprising facts that may have you rethinking your pursuit of happiness. 1. Make sure the temperature is right. Research has shown a clear link between warm weather...

Aristotle on the Immateriality of Intellect and Will Michael Egnor January 26, 2015 3:27 PM | Permalink At Why Evolution Is True, Jerry Coyne has responded to my post about the immateriality of the intellect and will and the reality of free will. He admits that he doesn't grasp the argument completely, so I'll expand upon it a bit. First, a note on the provenance of the argument. The argument is not mine. It was originally proposed by Aristotle (De Anima, Book III). For two millennia, it was the common wisdom of educated men, and was widely considered decisive. Thomas...

A mother and daughter upset that their teenage relative was disciplined at a South Side elementary school are charged with allegedly beating and stabbing two Chicago Public Schools employees and a teen boy at the school.

Lucky Us: Turning the Copernican Principle on Its Head Daniel Bakken January 26, 2015 11:27 AM | Permalink Editor's note: As a series at ENV, we have been pleased to present " Exoplanets." Daniel Bakken is an engineer who teaches astronomy at the college level, and an entrepreneur in compound semiconductor crystal growth. In a series of articles he has critically examined recent claims about exoplanets beyond our solar system, asking whether our own planet Earth is a rarity, or common, in the cosmos.As we have seen in this series, which concludes today, at present the idea that the Earth...

The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) reveals American schools as world leaders in spending per pupil but underachievers in student academic achievement. American academic performance has improved over time, but only at a rate close to the international average, leaving our relative position stagnant. The national average, however, conceals a great deal of variation between American states and jurisdictions—some of which have raced ahead while others have trailed behind. Using data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which tests a representative sample of students in Reading and Mathematics in all 50 states, it becomes clear that while...

Should you go to law school? The average debt of a 2012 law-school graduate who took out at least one loan was $84,600 for public school and $122,158 for private school. To determine whether law school is a good investment for you, figure out where you'll end up after graduation. The data offers a clear picture based on which school you attend, and how you rank among your peers. CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO EXPLANATION...

(STMW) — A mother and daughter upset that their teenage relative was disciplined at a South Side elementary school are charged with allegedly beating and stabbing two Chicago Public Schools employees and a teen boy at the school. Authorities say the attack took place on Tuesday at 4 p.m. at Bond Elementary School in the 7000 block of South May Street, the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting.

PATERSON, N.J. (PIX11) — A ninth grader at John F. Kennedy High School in Paterson, N.J. was arrested Friday after police say he attacked his teacher and slammed him to the floor in the classroom. All because of a cell phone. The attack, captured on video, shows the teen slamming the 62-year-old teacher to the floor in front of other students in an effort to get his cell phone back on Thursday. David Cozart, principal of operations at JFK, said the incident began when the teacher confiscated the phone from the student. The 23-second video shows the 16-year-old with his...

If you like, you can text 33733 and include the word CONSTITUTION in the body. This will register you with Ted Cruz and his campaign for our America. This works nation-wide.

SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) — As the U.S. wrestles with how to respond to a series of volatile racial incidents, the University of Notre Dame is offering a class this semester on white privilege that it says aims to help students become more aware of injustices. The course description says the one-credit elective, offered in preparation for a conference, is designed to educate students about the definitions of white privilege and its causes and effects. Though the school offered a similar workshop last year that was not for credit, the class has drawn some objections this time around. Notre Dame’s...

Texas’ new Agricultural Commissioner, Sid Miller, granted amnesty to cupcakes as his first act of office. “I’m announcing that I am giving full amnesty to the cupcakes in Texas. I’m also granting full pardon to pies and cookies and brownies and cakes and homemade candies,” Miller said in his announcement. In Texas, the Department of Agriculture administers the school lunch program responsible for restrictive dietary guidelines. Guidelines were put in place to combat childhood obesity, but as Miller points out, the figures haven’t changed in the ten years stringent dietary restrictions have been in place. “We’re getting out of the...

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Apple's VP of education on how ingenuity, online services and deformed frogs helped his son win his science fair and why that matters for our schools. "Steve Jobs saw technology as an amplifier for our intellect" recalls John Couch, who first met Jobs in the early days of Apple. Apple's vice-president of education remembers the then 20-year-old Apple co-founder comparing computing to a bicycle, referencing its power to augment humans' natural abilities. As someone who exposed his children to computers from an early age, Couch claims to have witnessed this multiplier effect firsthand. Jobs gave an Apple II to Couch's...

How was it that 48 governors entered Race-to-the-Top without knowing outcomes? It was one of the many “crises” exploited by the Obama administration. While the public was focused on a series of radical moves coming in rapid-fire succession, like the health care bill and proposed trials and imprisonment of 9/11 terrorists on domestic soil, governors, worried about keeping school doors open, signed on. Many politicians and pundits praised Obama on this singular issue, repeating the official rhetoric about raising standards. It stands to reason, though, that education policies would be consistent with Obama’s agenda. After all, one of his most...

Former Gov. Jeb Bush, considering a run for president in 2016, looks to be returning to his political roots -- and a place of political influence -- by helping to host an education conference next month in Tallahassee. The conference is to focus on education policies he pushed while in the Governor's mansion. Gov. Rick Scott, Florida Senate President Andy Gardiner and Florida House Speaker Steve Crisfulli will take part, too, one of Bush's education foundations announced today. That suggests that conference aims to impact legislation that will be debated in the upcoming session of the Florida Legislature. Bush's Foundation...

(Dec 5, 2013) In an article published on Monday that advocates for Common Core standards, the Associated Press presents what amounts to the typical talking points for supporters when faced with criticism that Common Core is a federal takeover of education. The standards were created by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers to improve academic achievement and increase accountability. President Barack Obama and his administration embraced them. Actually, Barack Obama did not simply “embrace” a concept that others developed; instead, the very roots of Common Core are in the early ideas generated by him...

All youth football games would be required to have a doctor present to monitor possible concussions as part of legislation considered Friday by the New York City Council. The hearing focused on the safety of young players who are even more vulnerable to brain injuries than their counterparts in high school, college and professional leagues. “It’s too common that kids are taught that getting your bell rung is OK and you need to play through it,” said Councilman Corey Johnson, a Democrat from Manhattan. “Repeated concussions can cause lifelong health injuries especially when the brain does not have time to...

LOS ANGELES, Jan 22 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's proposal this week to roll back tax benefits for so-called 529 plans exposes a fundamental disagreement about who is benefiting from these state-sponsored college savings plans. 529 plans are sponsored by states and run by investment management companies. Withdrawals from the accounts can be used tax-free to pay for qualified education expenses at any college or university in the country, such as tuition, fees and books. Supporters of Obama's proposal point to a 2012 government report showing the plans being used by less than 3 percent of all U.S. families and...

Biologic Institute's Groundbreaking Peer-Reviewed Science Has Now Demonstrated the Implausibility of Evolving New Proteins Casey Luskin January 22, 2015 10:51 AM | Permalink Ann Gauger already provided an excellent series of articles discussing her recent paper co-authored in BIO-Complexity. She explains why it is important for demonstrating intelligent design (see here, here, here, here, and here). However, I wanted to give a slightly different framing of the new data. My purpose here and in a follow-up post will be to explain how this latest ID research (as well as prior work in the field) addresses fundamental questions in the debate...

Free today! (From Amazon) On Guard: Defending Your Faith with Reason and Precision [Kindle Edition] This concise guide is filled with illustrations, sidebars, and memorizable steps to help Christians stand their ground and defend their faith with reason and precision. In his engaging style, Dr. Craig offers four arguments for God’s existence, defends the historicity of Jesus’ personal claims and resurrection, addresses the problem of suffering, and shows why religious relativism doesn’t work. Along the way, he shares his story of following God’s call in his own life. This one-stop, how-to-defend-your-faith manual will equip Christians to advance faith conversations deliberately,...

Primary-aged pupils at a leading Christian school faced questions about homosexual practice as they became the latest target of controversial ‘British values’ rules. The principal of the school, Chris Gray, has written a formal complaint to Ofsted accusing their inspection team of adopting a “hostile” stance against the school’s Christian ethos. Children aged six to eighteen at Grindon Hall Christian School in Sunderland faced intrusive questioning by Ofsted inspectors about transsexualism, homosexuality and religious festivals. … Parents objected to questions their children were asked, including if they knew what lesbians “did” and if their friends felt trapped in the “wrong...

It Takes Great Faith to Be an Astrobiologist Evolution News & Views January 22, 2015 4:28 AM | Permalink NASA's Astrobiology Magazine, funded with taxpayer dollars, illustrates the mystical view -- what else to call it? -- of nature in the astrobiologist community. In Elizabeth Howell's article, "How the Code of Life Passed Through Primitive Kinds of Cells," we see Harold Fellerman of the University of Denmark showing his mystical streak: "I'm very interested in the creative potential of nature," he said. "Nature in general seems to be fertile with creativity that outperforms any human imagination. We find solutions to...

The Virtue of Scientific Thinking Steven Shapin January 20, 2015 Fronstispiece from New Almagest (1651), by the Italian astronomer and Jesuit priest Giovanni Battista Riccioli. Source: History of Science Collections, the University of Oklahoma Libraries Can science make you good?Of course it can’t, some will be quick to say—no more than repairing cars or editing literary journals can. Why should we think that science has any special capacity for moral uplift, or that scientists—by virtue of the particular job they do, or what they know, or the way in which they know it—are morally superior to other sorts of...

The federal mandate to test U.S. school kids annually was at the center of a Senate panel’s work on Wednesday to fix the long outdated No Child Left Behind education law. […] Many educators and parents have complained that the law led to teaching to the test and too much test preparation, but supporters of the mandate such as civil rights and business groups said it’s a critical way to ensure that historically underserved groups of students are learning before it’s too late to help them. […] Sen. Lamar Alexander, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee,...

Veteran actor Brian Blessed collapsed on stage with an apparent heart problem while playing King Lear. The 78-year-old had just started delivering his lines at the start of the Shakespearean tragedy when he fainted, toppled off a raised platform and fell heavily, his crown rolling to a halt at the front of the stage. Fellow actor Noel White, playing the Earl of Kent, announced quietly: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, this is not part of the play. Is there a doctor in the house?’ Indeed there was. A barely conscious Mr Blessed, flat on his back and surrounded by worried cast members...

On a recent Saturday afternoon, a 10-year old Maryland boy named Rafi and his 6-year old sister, Dvora, walked home by themselves from a playground about a mile away from their suburban house. They made it about halfway home when the police picked them up. You’ve heard these stories before, about what happens when kids in paranoid, hyperprotective America go to and from playgrounds alone. I bet you can guess the sequence of events preceding and after: Someone saw the kids walking without an adult and called the police. The police tracked down the kids and drove them home. The...

Does anyone recall an accord that states that every nation importing oil from opec, the bulk of which comes from the middle east, must allow a certain number of muslim immigrants into their nation. I first read of this maybe 8 to 10 years ago. I do not know if it was true. That is why I am seeking it now, to verify.

Signal amplification is ubiquitous to all electronic and optoelectronic systems for communications, imaging and computing - its characteristics directly impact device performance. A new signal amplification process discovered by a team of University of California, San Diego researchers is now poised to fuel new generations of electrical and photonic devices - transforming the fields of communications, imaging and computing. In the journal Applied Physics Letters, from AIP Publishing, the team describes their work behind this discovery. "For many years, the semiconductor industry has relied on photodetectors for optoelectrical conversion, followed by low-noise electronic amplifiers to convert optical signals into electronic...

NASA's Kepler Space Telescope, despite being hobbled by the loss of critical guidance systems, has discovered a star with three planets only slightly larger than Earth. The outermost planet orbits in the "Goldilocks" zone, a region where surface temperatures could be moderate enough for liquid water and perhaps life, to exist. The star, EPIC 201367065, is a cool red M-dwarf about half the size and mass of our own sun. At a distance of 150 light years, the star ranks among the top 10 nearest stars known to have transiting planets. The star's proximity means it's bright enough for astronomers...

Hoping to dominate the narrative on a holiday weekend and on the eve of the annual “State of the Union” speech, the Obama White House late Saturday night leaked some of the new tax ideas in their upcoming budget. One tax hike in particular was very odd, since it’s aimed almost exclusively at middle class families with kids–the exact demographic the goodies in the tax plan is targeting. The levy in question would increase taxes on college savings accounts known as “529 plans” (after their section in the Internal Revenue Code). By definition, these accounts are really only used by...