Posted on 11/01/2019 8:25:23 AM PDT by grundle
Helen Moore of Detroit leads a group of protesters outside the federal courthouse in Cincinnati last Thursday.
"Every school in the country would be affected," one expert said. "There could be a lot of litigation."
After two years of struggling to pass any of his community college classes, Jamarria Hall, 19, knows this for certain: His high school did not prepare him.
The four years he spent at Detroit’s Osborn High School were “a big waste of time,” he said, recalling 11th and 12th grade English classes where students were taught from materials labeled for third or fourth graders, and where long-term substitutes showed movies instead of teaching.
What’s less certain, however, is whether Hall's education in Detroit’s long-troubled school district was so awful, so insufficient, that it violated his constitutional rights.
That’s the question now before a federal appeals court that heard arguments last week in one of two cases that experts say could have sweeping implications for schools across the country.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
I purchased a motor scooter recently and arranged for the shop to install crash bars.
The scooter has a seat, hinged at the front so that the seat can raise up to access a storage compartment. there is a latch at the rear end of the seat to hold it closed.
The crash bars mount two-thirds of the way from the hinge to the latch. The bar causes the seat to be four millimeters higher at the mount point.
The problem is that the part of the seat latch that is mounted to the seat gets raised along with the seat.
The mechanic first tried a four millimeter spacer to raise the non-moving part of the latch. When that didn't work, he tried four and a half millimeters.
Each try necessitated disassembling part of the gas tank tubing.
When four and a half didn't work, I grabbed a tape measure and gave the guy a lesson in proportionality of similar triangles; learned from high school geometry.
A quick measurement indicated that six millimeters was the proper amount of adjustment and it worked perfectly the first time tried.
I was gratified that the mechanic showed appreciation for the value of this lesson.
Is high school geometry required to work as a mechanic? Apparently not. Will it make for a more valuable employee who is deserving of recognition and higher pay? Yes.
Wow, I am in the presence of true genius............Why didn't you fix the damn scooter yourself if you're so smart?
I had a part-time job when I was 17, delivering chinese food and doing kitchen prep between deliveries. I worked three nights a week. I let it be known that I would be happy to work six days. As soon as one of the other boys left, I was offered the additional days.
I think your son needs to recognize that employers are not stupid. Have him take two part-time jobs and let both employers know that he would be happy to work full time. Do not play one employer off on the other. Just reward the employer who first offers full time employment.
To deserve this opportunity, your son needs to work HARDER and SMARTER than his competition for that work. How can this plan possibly fail?
Well, it can fail if Obamacare penalizes employers who employ people for more than 29 hours per week. Let your son know that voting for Democrats plays a large part in why he might not get a full time job. That is a lesson he needs to learn well.
Just for context on your work history, how old are you now?
Because I prefer to remain retired after a career as an engineer. I value my time more than my money at age 71. I also very much enjoyed helping this young man learn an important lesson.
Does your comment reflect the opinion that nobody but engineers can profit from an understanding of high school geometry?
71. Retired at 55 and haven't regretted it for a single second.
Dropped out of UC Berkeley in time to enlist in the Army. Trained in electronics in the Army. Worked for over 30 years for a major electronics manufacturer, starting as a technician before I even knew what a technician was. Highest level reached was as an engineering manager.
It sounds like you’ve had a fine life, and I wish you the best in the rest of your retirement.
However, life was different when you were 17 than it is for today’s 17-year-olds.
My 21-year-old son and 19-year-old daughter both applied for summer jobs as Lowe’s Hardware during a job fair at the community college they both attended. He was called the same day, and she never heard from them. The difference was that Lowe’s liability insurer would let a 21-year-old drive a forklift, but not a 19-year-old.
She ended up joining the Marine Corps. Hoo-ah, Lcpl. Elen!
Yep, what does your mechanic know about geometry today? If he can't explain the fundamentals of the Pythagorean theorem then he doesn't know squat about that math and you taught him nothing........Nice try.
I was never fond of being in the military. It's just not my style. However, I think the military does a pretty good job of recognizing and rewarding merit. This is probably more true today than when I faced the prospect of being drafted.
Some 21-year-olds probably shouldn't be allowed near a fork-lift and some 19-year-olds would probably do fine. You only have to be 25 to be a member of Congress. If I thought being older would improve the situation I would support that.
A friend of mine has a son who is a "retired" Marine. He now works as a warehouse manager. Next time I see him I will ask. It wouldn't surprise me if he started driving a fork lift at 17 when he enlisted.
My oldest daughter was in the Coast Guard for almost 10 years, and the second graduated from USMC boot camp at Thanksgiving last year. She learned to drive a Humvee in Australia earlier this year, so I’m sure she could handle a forklift ... but 21 is a magic number for lots of employers. It used to be 18.
I didn't claim to have taught him geometry. The lesson I wanted to teach him was the value of education. He was very explicitly appreciative of not having to go through exactly the same exercise five times and he realized that understanding the geometry of the situation would have allowed him to do the job ONCE.
He realized that he didn't have to simply guess the answer. There was a high-school-level solution that he could have used.
Re-reading your post reveals a very significant problem.
"... he doesn't want to work steadily."
Good interviewers can spot people who feel entitled. Unfortunately, that is a high percentage of youth today. During the interviews I conducted, I would ask a complicated question after having very purposely supplied a pencil and notepaper. An interviewee got plenty of credit for simply picking up the pencil.
You could try this on your son. Cook up some problem that would justify using a pencil and present it to your son, asking for help. Make sure that notepaper and pencil are close at hand. If he fails to pick up the pencil, ... well I'll let you decide what he needs then.
Remove common core and add McGuffey Readers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGuffey_Readers
Examples in pdf here:
https://www.learn-to-read-prince-george.com/McGuffey-readers.html
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