Up until recently, Running Start (RS hereafter) was a pretty good idea for homeschooled students who wanted to knock off two years of college at state expense. Now, new restrictions that let the local high school decide eligibility have pretty much trashed the program, and I'm going to advise you homeschoolers in WA to think carefully about your participation.
I teach at a local community college.
I've always had some cautions about RS. Sixteen-year-olds in an adult environment is something you parents need to think carefully about. Assignments can get tossed their way and presentations in class might be something you would wish could wait to have your teen exposed to. And you don't get to ask the instructor how your student is doing, because Federal privacy laws prevent instructors from communicating with anyone but the student about grades. Community college instructors are generally of a liberal bent, and are pretty careless about family and spiritual values. There's a college-wide embrace of rabid environmentalism and Darwinism. Be prepared. In some cases, it's like tossing your kids to the lions. Daniel was about 80 when he got tossed to the lions, and VERY few 16-year-olds (well, let's say I've never met ANY) have the spiritual foundation that Daniel had spent a lifetime accumulating. Don't do it just because Christians should be 'in the world but not of the world'. Your teen will likely get devoured.
But some thrive. They find the good instructors and take more courses from them. They show up in my classes, looking and acting like they are 22 years old. They are focused, wonderful students, and a joy to have in class.
Some don't thrive. I took a phone call recently from a parent of a student who needed RS credits to graduate from a local high school. The student didn't care much about the college classes (not ones I teach) and trashed his GPA. Now the student is stuck with a college transcript that doesn't look too good.
For these reasons, I've advised homeschoolers to wait until the student is at least 17, and even 18 or 19, because RS quarters could be paid for by the state until the student was 21.
That's the rule that's changed.
The local high school, which must sign off on the homeschooler going to RS, determines eligibility. If the parent has registered the 14-year-old with the school district as a freshman, then that child at 16 years old is a junior. Since RS quarters must be taken by the senior year, you must start at 16 if you want the state to pay for those first two years.
Before I make a recommendation, let's look at a statistic.
At the community college where I teach, there are over 800 students enrolled in RS. Half of them should be receiving an Associate's degree this spring term, but the total number of graduates this quarter is 33. That's less than 5% of students who are participating in RS. Generously presuming that there will be RS students graduating each term, and the maximum number is 15%. Not that many students in RS are actually finishing an AA degree in two years. This doesn't surprise me. Despite opinions I've heard, community colleges are NOT glorified high schools. It's harder here. Some high schoolers drown. Some just need from 1 to 3 quarters to finish, but suddenly someone has to pay for those credits, and it won't be the state.
So here's my recommendation.
1. Your focus on using RS should be to get the best education possible for your child. It is one of several educational options you have available, and your focus should be the quality of the education that is appropriate for your child, not the possible cost savings of college, which I will tell you is very expensive these days. Preparing your child to do well in academia is a much more important goal than knocking off two years of college by age 18. A well-prepared student will have doors and scholarships and grants open to them that a student with a lousy track record does not. Do not, DO NOT saddle your student with a bad college track record because their maturity was not up to the work required. Even if you have a gifted student, be cautious and selective about the courses you choose at the community college. Find out who teaches the best classes and take those classes because that's the best education you can find for your student.
2. Do not, DO NOT consider RS as a way to pay for college. As stated above, that less-than-stellar track record accumulated during RS can actually COST you money in the long haul. Those students will have to pay for re-taking classes before they can move on, even if that's years down the road. It would be better to have NO record than a bad record, or even just a moderate record. The university to which the student applies cares nothing for the age of the student at the time s/he earned a C in college chemistry.
3. Four year colleges often have integrated courses of study for freshmen and sophomores designed to help them get to know themselves. At private religious colleges this will include some solid coursework in Biblical studies. If your student comes in as a sophomore or junior, s/he will miss some or all of this very valuable foundation. This is perhaps less important for older students who have a focus on a degree from their experience from work or having traveled or served in the military, but I don't recommend bypassing this for students under age 20. Plan to go to a 4-year college, especially a private college, as a freshman. Spend four years there.
4. Avoid the possibility of that bad college record and use the local public and private high schools more. Again, if you're homeschooling, stay in charge of your child's education, but find the best instructors and get your child in front of them. These folks can inspire students dramatically, and end up setting a life's course for them. You remember who they were from your own education. Even if it's just a single course, get your student in front of that teacher. These can be just as demanding as college courses, but your student won't be stuck with a college transcript if they give a less than stellar performance. They could instead end up gaining the maturity they need to perform in those college classes.
Running Start? Please don't be enchanted by possible dollars saved with this program. Study the possibilities, evaluate your child, and choose wisely.
Friday, June 4, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
College: Unless you have it paid for, DON'T GO!
So, the new healthcare reconciliation part of the health care bill includes a *gasp of surprise* large increase in the amount of money made available for students loans. "We're going to make college more affordable," says one congressman.
He's lying.
More money for student loans does NOT make college more affordable. It allows colleges to raise their tuition and fees. More money is available for loans, so colleges can also charge more. Supply and demand. Nothing about this will make college more affordable.
Tuition fees for 2009 and 2010 are rising 14% each year, way out of line for the cost of living. Why? Because more student loan money is available.
Do not think it's a cheap loan. I know veterinarians and other professionals whose education requires 8 years of college who have a student loan payment equal to their mortgage. And both will be paid off in 30 years. This is for folks who graduated several years ago. It's much worse for those who are in college now or considering college soon.
How do we fight this?
If college isn't free, or if you can't pay for it while you're attending, then DON'T GO! If colleges can't get the students they will lower their fees. And be sure to tell them you're turning down their offer of admission because it's just too expensive.
Shelling out 2/3rd of your income to rent and student loan payments means that you'll work, that you'll pay someone else to take care of your family if you decide you can have kids at all, that your job will be providing more tax money to this current legislative climate in which the winds are blowing to spend before there is money to pay for it, and certain disaster for you, the economy, and the country.
Don't do it.
He's lying.
More money for student loans does NOT make college more affordable. It allows colleges to raise their tuition and fees. More money is available for loans, so colleges can also charge more. Supply and demand. Nothing about this will make college more affordable.
Tuition fees for 2009 and 2010 are rising 14% each year, way out of line for the cost of living. Why? Because more student loan money is available.
Do not think it's a cheap loan. I know veterinarians and other professionals whose education requires 8 years of college who have a student loan payment equal to their mortgage. And both will be paid off in 30 years. This is for folks who graduated several years ago. It's much worse for those who are in college now or considering college soon.
How do we fight this?
If college isn't free, or if you can't pay for it while you're attending, then DON'T GO! If colleges can't get the students they will lower their fees. And be sure to tell them you're turning down their offer of admission because it's just too expensive.
Shelling out 2/3rd of your income to rent and student loan payments means that you'll work, that you'll pay someone else to take care of your family if you decide you can have kids at all, that your job will be providing more tax money to this current legislative climate in which the winds are blowing to spend before there is money to pay for it, and certain disaster for you, the economy, and the country.
Don't do it.
Friday, January 1, 2010
No, it isn't going to change, Part 2
In my last entry I said that the reason that education isn't going to change in this country is because the primary reason for schools is not education, but babysitting.
Here's another reason: The secondary purpose for schools is social indoctrination.
Ok, schools indoctrinate, and you should send your kids to the school where they get the social indoctrination you want them to have. But putting the purpose of schools as social indoctrination ahead of education? Well, here's the link:
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=120622
Yup. You can't be a teacher in our public schools unless you are willing to indoctrinate your students towards certain ideals.
It's one of the reasons I can't teach K-12 anymore. It's perhaps even more pervasive in the colleges and universities, but at least you get to CHOOSE which indoctrination you want to have when you pick one of those.
This is a huge argument for school choice, and explanation for why there isn't much. The educationists want YOU to become one of their disciples for the kind of social change they want to have happen. They will battle for mandatory public schools.
And they don't care about your education.
Here's another reason: The secondary purpose for schools is social indoctrination.
Ok, schools indoctrinate, and you should send your kids to the school where they get the social indoctrination you want them to have. But putting the purpose of schools as social indoctrination ahead of education? Well, here's the link:
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=120622
Yup. You can't be a teacher in our public schools unless you are willing to indoctrinate your students towards certain ideals.
It's one of the reasons I can't teach K-12 anymore. It's perhaps even more pervasive in the colleges and universities, but at least you get to CHOOSE which indoctrination you want to have when you pick one of those.
This is a huge argument for school choice, and explanation for why there isn't much. The educationists want YOU to become one of their disciples for the kind of social change they want to have happen. They will battle for mandatory public schools.
And they don't care about your education.
Monday, December 28, 2009
No, it isn't going to change
Had a conversation over Christmas with one of those family members who doesn't share my viewpoint on much of what I've written here. (See my disclaimer under 'About Me'.) This person is a veteran educator for whom I have great respect. But having been a member of the educational establishment for a few decades, it became evident to me that the paradigm wasn't going to shift for this person, that educational reform isn't going to happen because of the great numbers of teachers, parents, and community members who believe the following:
A school's first and most important job is to provide daycare for parents. It's the school's job to keep the kids occupied while their parents are at work.
Is there anything in this job description about education? No. But this job description will protect unions without requiring teachers to teach.
It is most definitely about bureaucracy, because it weaves a web of social services around the school that involves family, work for parents and teens, law enforcement, child protective services, health care for kids and their families, and welfare for kids and their families. NONE OF THESE HAVE MUCH TO DO WITH EDUCATION!
It is a job description that will continue to contribute to the breaking apart of kids from their parents, and will give parents less reason to stay committed to each other for the sake of the kids. After all, someone else is looking after the kids and their education.
This person and I have a nephew in common, who is now in his mid-twenties and earning his high school diploma through a community college program. He more or less dropped out of high school in his teens, worked for a local business, then spent three years in Japan on his own, working a few part-time jobs. He has wonderful insights into the workings of that culture.
High school didn't interest him enough to finish while in his teens, but the schools did accomplish their primary purpose of day care. He is skilled at many things, is marvelously articulate and philosophical, and was never angry about his educational experience. His current GPA is perfect, but his interests are still too broad to focus on a particular career, and he is still uncertain about what to choose next. He asks amazing rhetorical questions, can generate them at lightning speed, and yet can allow himself and folks around him the time to come to some conclusions. He would make a tremendous lecturer on almost any topic of his choosing.
I would hold him up as a poster child for my one educational reform: We'll give you twelve years, take it when you're ready. But the current paradigm of education says he's not ready for the world, that he should remain in their care until they can put their stamp of approval upon him.
A school's first and most important job is to provide daycare for parents. It's the school's job to keep the kids occupied while their parents are at work.
Is there anything in this job description about education? No. But this job description will protect unions without requiring teachers to teach.
It is most definitely about bureaucracy, because it weaves a web of social services around the school that involves family, work for parents and teens, law enforcement, child protective services, health care for kids and their families, and welfare for kids and their families. NONE OF THESE HAVE MUCH TO DO WITH EDUCATION!
It is a job description that will continue to contribute to the breaking apart of kids from their parents, and will give parents less reason to stay committed to each other for the sake of the kids. After all, someone else is looking after the kids and their education.
This person and I have a nephew in common, who is now in his mid-twenties and earning his high school diploma through a community college program. He more or less dropped out of high school in his teens, worked for a local business, then spent three years in Japan on his own, working a few part-time jobs. He has wonderful insights into the workings of that culture.
High school didn't interest him enough to finish while in his teens, but the schools did accomplish their primary purpose of day care. He is skilled at many things, is marvelously articulate and philosophical, and was never angry about his educational experience. His current GPA is perfect, but his interests are still too broad to focus on a particular career, and he is still uncertain about what to choose next. He asks amazing rhetorical questions, can generate them at lightning speed, and yet can allow himself and folks around him the time to come to some conclusions. He would make a tremendous lecturer on almost any topic of his choosing.
I would hold him up as a poster child for my one educational reform: We'll give you twelve years, take it when you're ready. But the current paradigm of education says he's not ready for the world, that he should remain in their care until they can put their stamp of approval upon him.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Cure for the expense of college textbooks
College textbooks are ridiculously expensive. They are heavy to carry. They are old technology. They use up a lot of trees to print and a lot of energy to transport from printer to student. In the age of Kindle, why can't we have e-versions of them to download, or carry on a CD or flash drive? Why can't we make notes on them electronically?
It's the last part that frightens publishers. A flash drive or CD that contains a textbook could be passed from student to student, and illegal copying would be rampant, especially among college students who are usually starving and wouldn't think twice about passing up the expense of a textbook.
I was complaining to another instructor, Chuck Devange, about the subject of my last blog, and he offered a simple and elegant solution.
Once a textbook has been adopted, the college would charge a fee to every student in the class, and then the student would be allowed to download the text and put it on a CD or flash drive, or just keep it on his/her laptop.
The fee ought to be in the $1 to $35 range. After all, there are no more printing or shipping costs, or buy-back costs. There is no used book market to undercut sales of new texts.
Think of what texts could now contain:
History texts could contain actual news casts from early broadcasting years, or full sized samples of newspapers from whenever they were published. Math texts could contain animated graphs that change based on various parameters that the reader could adjust. Biology texts could contain video that would help identify things under the microscope. Geography texts could contain 360° panoramas of real places. Foreign language texts would, of course, have video dialog by native speakers instead of CD's or DVD's for an extra purchase.
Instructors would have the ability to make their own notes on the text and share them with their students. Texts would be searchable with a 'Find' command. No index would be necessary. Any word in any text could be connected to a dictionary.
Our college operates on quarters, rather than semesters, and we typically use half of a math text in a term. Electronic texts could easily be adjusted in size.
It is time for textbooks and publishers to come into the present. Bound paper is a thing of the past.
It's the last part that frightens publishers. A flash drive or CD that contains a textbook could be passed from student to student, and illegal copying would be rampant, especially among college students who are usually starving and wouldn't think twice about passing up the expense of a textbook.
I was complaining to another instructor, Chuck Devange, about the subject of my last blog, and he offered a simple and elegant solution.
Once a textbook has been adopted, the college would charge a fee to every student in the class, and then the student would be allowed to download the text and put it on a CD or flash drive, or just keep it on his/her laptop.
The fee ought to be in the $1 to $35 range. After all, there are no more printing or shipping costs, or buy-back costs. There is no used book market to undercut sales of new texts.
Think of what texts could now contain:
History texts could contain actual news casts from early broadcasting years, or full sized samples of newspapers from whenever they were published. Math texts could contain animated graphs that change based on various parameters that the reader could adjust. Biology texts could contain video that would help identify things under the microscope. Geography texts could contain 360° panoramas of real places. Foreign language texts would, of course, have video dialog by native speakers instead of CD's or DVD's for an extra purchase.
Instructors would have the ability to make their own notes on the text and share them with their students. Texts would be searchable with a 'Find' command. No index would be necessary. Any word in any text could be connected to a dictionary.
Our college operates on quarters, rather than semesters, and we typically use half of a math text in a term. Electronic texts could easily be adjusted in size.
It is time for textbooks and publishers to come into the present. Bound paper is a thing of the past.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
The college text book scam
Textbooks for college are ridiculously expensive.
Textbooks for the math courses I teach cost about $120, new. There can be add-on charges, such as a CD which shows many problems worked out, or access to online help from the company that published the text.
Why so breathtakingly expensive? It has to do with the used book market. If there are plenty of used books available then the publisher doesn't make much money selling new books. So, part of the price of your new text includes funds for the publisher to buy your used book back at the end of the term. A certain number of those used books will be recycled as paper. Some will find their way back to the college bookstore shelf, if the publisher doesn't have enough new copies to sell.
Every three years, a new edition of the text appears. Changes may be superficial, such as moving the review section from the front of the book to the back of the book, changing the order of some of the homework problems, changing the order of a few topics, or changing the size of the page, all causing enough changes so that us instructors must write a new assignment list based on the new text. The original author(s) may or may not have much to do with the new edition. They will likely participate in the first revision, especially if there are substantial changes, but with subsequent editions you'll see more and more names added to the list of authors, and in the end, the work was BASED on the original authors but may not look much like their material at all. Since the publisher will only supply a new text, or in some cases a text one edition previous, colleges have opportunities to re-adopt the new text, or move to other authors.
At the college level, we REALLY DISLIKE this process. Because we teach several levels of math, that adoption process happens nearly every year, generating work for us both with the examination of new texts and in developing new homework assignments. I've stopped including page numbers in my homework assignment lists, which I pass out at the beginning of the term. I only list section numbers anymore. But I still have to sit down with the old text and the new, to see if the problems are the same. Ninety-nine percent are identical, but they may be numbered differently.
If you use the college bookstore's buy-back program then you are contributing to the problem. Buy your books online at sites dedicated to re-selling books. Ebay's division, half.com, allows folks to park a book online until it sells. This is different from their regular auctions in which items appear for about a week. Be careful, some of the books listed as 'New' list for MORE than the publisher/bookstore price. Buy used, and allow for 3-6 weeks delivery.
The textbook scam has another level.
A few years ago I bought several copies of a college-level math text for my homeschooled pre-calculus students. The book covered topics from 2nd year algebra through trigonometry. I bought copies from a few editions back, and because these could no longer be sold at college bookstores because of the situation described above, I got these copies from $0.75 (yes, that's 75 cents) to $5 each. That text is now a decade old, and we still use those copies. I loan them to students for the year. I have all of the supplemental materials, such as test banks and solutions manuals. The word problems are the only part that's really changed or needs updating. We don't talk much about the manufacture of VCR players any more, and the kind of vehicles manufactured has changed some. We get by!
That text was enormously better than the text we were using at the college for second-year algebra. I campaigned vigorously for its adoption, especially since students in that class (Math 99) could also use the text for Math 141 and 142, the pre-calculus sequence at our school. But what prevented its use had to do with a labeling problem associated with the college accreditation process. At our college, Math 99 is not considered college-level math. But other institutions DO label it 'college level', and it's usually called Math 100 or 110. For accreditation purposes, coursework that is UNDER the college level must use a book labeled 'Intermediate Algebra'. Coursework AT college level should use a book labeled 'College Algebra'.
For awhile, the pages in those books with different labels were IDENTICAL if they were from the same author/publisher. To our dismay, at some point in the last decade, the books labeled 'Intermediate Algebra' got dumbed down. The reading level diminished, using simpler words. While that may not be a bad thing, please understand that terminology among authors of math books is already not very standard. This made it worse. In addition, explanations (mathematicians call these 'proofs') were simply left out, leaving the student to take for granted what the instructor was telling them.
So, not only is the textbook of lesser quality, you have to buy more of them.
There ARE publishers out there that use mostly the same material from year to year, but they publish the book in a softcover format for about 40% of new price from other publishers. After a term or two of use, the book is falling apart, so there simply is not much used book market for it. Makes sense to me.
Textbooks are heavy. Are they ever going to go to CD or flash drive, where you just pop it in your laptop or Kindle and read it? Publishers don't like this, because the book can too easily be shared or put online for anyone to download. That would cut into their profits dramatically. For the sake of the student, making electronic notes on your text would be an excellent educational advantage. The ONLY reason why colleges don't demand this from textbook companies is because most instructors aren't tech-savvy enough to make the notes to share with students, and so don't know to ask for (demand!) this capability.
All that having been said, allow me to endorse a high school math text that is likely the ONLY high school text book still in publication since 1979. Harold Jacob's "Elementary Algebra" is still the best-written book on the market for first-year algebra, and it's still in its first edition. There have been a few corrections, but very, very few. The book is carefully and meticulously thought out and presented. There are some cultural references that are pretty old, older than the cultural repertoire of most of the math instructors out there today. The order and presentation of the material was different than most high school texts at the time. Mr. Jacobs led the way to a better path through first-year algebra, and since then most college textbooks have come around to his way of thinking. The homework is just math, and guess what? Math hasn't changed! I have suggestions for a new edition, but it evidently isn't forthcoming. So I supplement in a few places. This book will never be used on the college level because it isn't labeled for college use. Too bad! It's made me a much better math instructor. Mr. Jacobs has wisely kept control of the material so that subsequent editions aren't ruined, and I know that the publisher is still selling many new copies of this text and is making money on it. If they weren't, they would not be printing new copies.
(I'm not getting anything for this endorsement. The book was first brought to my attention by a student who wished to be tutored from it. I began using it with my privately taught math classes after that, and purchased all the copies I own, or they were donated to me by parents whose students were finished with algebra.)
So there you have it, why textbooks are so expensive, why you have to buy so many of them, and why you have to haul them around. I think textbooks publishers should invest in authors like Harold Jacobs, and in delivery methods that don't inflict printing and shipping charges, which HAS to be a huge chunk of the textbook cost. Subsequent editions ought to be available for a download price, like updated software. Paradigms must shift, if we are to have better texts.
Textbooks for the math courses I teach cost about $120, new. There can be add-on charges, such as a CD which shows many problems worked out, or access to online help from the company that published the text.
Why so breathtakingly expensive? It has to do with the used book market. If there are plenty of used books available then the publisher doesn't make much money selling new books. So, part of the price of your new text includes funds for the publisher to buy your used book back at the end of the term. A certain number of those used books will be recycled as paper. Some will find their way back to the college bookstore shelf, if the publisher doesn't have enough new copies to sell.
Every three years, a new edition of the text appears. Changes may be superficial, such as moving the review section from the front of the book to the back of the book, changing the order of some of the homework problems, changing the order of a few topics, or changing the size of the page, all causing enough changes so that us instructors must write a new assignment list based on the new text. The original author(s) may or may not have much to do with the new edition. They will likely participate in the first revision, especially if there are substantial changes, but with subsequent editions you'll see more and more names added to the list of authors, and in the end, the work was BASED on the original authors but may not look much like their material at all. Since the publisher will only supply a new text, or in some cases a text one edition previous, colleges have opportunities to re-adopt the new text, or move to other authors.
At the college level, we REALLY DISLIKE this process. Because we teach several levels of math, that adoption process happens nearly every year, generating work for us both with the examination of new texts and in developing new homework assignments. I've stopped including page numbers in my homework assignment lists, which I pass out at the beginning of the term. I only list section numbers anymore. But I still have to sit down with the old text and the new, to see if the problems are the same. Ninety-nine percent are identical, but they may be numbered differently.
If you use the college bookstore's buy-back program then you are contributing to the problem. Buy your books online at sites dedicated to re-selling books. Ebay's division, half.com, allows folks to park a book online until it sells. This is different from their regular auctions in which items appear for about a week. Be careful, some of the books listed as 'New' list for MORE than the publisher/bookstore price. Buy used, and allow for 3-6 weeks delivery.
The textbook scam has another level.
A few years ago I bought several copies of a college-level math text for my homeschooled pre-calculus students. The book covered topics from 2nd year algebra through trigonometry. I bought copies from a few editions back, and because these could no longer be sold at college bookstores because of the situation described above, I got these copies from $0.75 (yes, that's 75 cents) to $5 each. That text is now a decade old, and we still use those copies. I loan them to students for the year. I have all of the supplemental materials, such as test banks and solutions manuals. The word problems are the only part that's really changed or needs updating. We don't talk much about the manufacture of VCR players any more, and the kind of vehicles manufactured has changed some. We get by!
That text was enormously better than the text we were using at the college for second-year algebra. I campaigned vigorously for its adoption, especially since students in that class (Math 99) could also use the text for Math 141 and 142, the pre-calculus sequence at our school. But what prevented its use had to do with a labeling problem associated with the college accreditation process. At our college, Math 99 is not considered college-level math. But other institutions DO label it 'college level', and it's usually called Math 100 or 110. For accreditation purposes, coursework that is UNDER the college level must use a book labeled 'Intermediate Algebra'. Coursework AT college level should use a book labeled 'College Algebra'.
For awhile, the pages in those books with different labels were IDENTICAL if they were from the same author/publisher. To our dismay, at some point in the last decade, the books labeled 'Intermediate Algebra' got dumbed down. The reading level diminished, using simpler words. While that may not be a bad thing, please understand that terminology among authors of math books is already not very standard. This made it worse. In addition, explanations (mathematicians call these 'proofs') were simply left out, leaving the student to take for granted what the instructor was telling them.
So, not only is the textbook of lesser quality, you have to buy more of them.
There ARE publishers out there that use mostly the same material from year to year, but they publish the book in a softcover format for about 40% of new price from other publishers. After a term or two of use, the book is falling apart, so there simply is not much used book market for it. Makes sense to me.
Textbooks are heavy. Are they ever going to go to CD or flash drive, where you just pop it in your laptop or Kindle and read it? Publishers don't like this, because the book can too easily be shared or put online for anyone to download. That would cut into their profits dramatically. For the sake of the student, making electronic notes on your text would be an excellent educational advantage. The ONLY reason why colleges don't demand this from textbook companies is because most instructors aren't tech-savvy enough to make the notes to share with students, and so don't know to ask for (demand!) this capability.
All that having been said, allow me to endorse a high school math text that is likely the ONLY high school text book still in publication since 1979. Harold Jacob's "Elementary Algebra" is still the best-written book on the market for first-year algebra, and it's still in its first edition. There have been a few corrections, but very, very few. The book is carefully and meticulously thought out and presented. There are some cultural references that are pretty old, older than the cultural repertoire of most of the math instructors out there today. The order and presentation of the material was different than most high school texts at the time. Mr. Jacobs led the way to a better path through first-year algebra, and since then most college textbooks have come around to his way of thinking. The homework is just math, and guess what? Math hasn't changed! I have suggestions for a new edition, but it evidently isn't forthcoming. So I supplement in a few places. This book will never be used on the college level because it isn't labeled for college use. Too bad! It's made me a much better math instructor. Mr. Jacobs has wisely kept control of the material so that subsequent editions aren't ruined, and I know that the publisher is still selling many new copies of this text and is making money on it. If they weren't, they would not be printing new copies.
(I'm not getting anything for this endorsement. The book was first brought to my attention by a student who wished to be tutored from it. I began using it with my privately taught math classes after that, and purchased all the copies I own, or they were donated to me by parents whose students were finished with algebra.)
So there you have it, why textbooks are so expensive, why you have to buy so many of them, and why you have to haul them around. I think textbooks publishers should invest in authors like Harold Jacobs, and in delivery methods that don't inflict printing and shipping charges, which HAS to be a huge chunk of the textbook cost. Subsequent editions ought to be available for a download price, like updated software. Paradigms must shift, if we are to have better texts.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
The long arm of the state
This afternoon I had a conversation about paperwork with an official at a Whatcom County Parent Partnership Program (PPP). It doesn't matter which one, because this applies to all of you who use them.
Some of you homeschoolers are using classes from ZLO as part of your 25 weekly hours required to complete the Student Learning Plan (SLP) required by your participation in the PPP. The gist of the phone call was to ask if ZLO would sign paperwork showing that background checks are run on our instructors, because that was necessary for students whose ZLO work is included in the SLP. Each and every instructor used by a PPP student showing on the SLP must have the background check performed by the Washington State Patrol (WSP), and if any instructor on their SLP list is a one-on-one instructor, such as a piano teacher, then that person must be fingerprinted.
I made it very clear that ZLO instructors who choose to tutor anyone one-on-one do so outside of their ZLO work. ZLO does not require fingerprinting for instructors. We do perform the WSP criminal record check. We also make a lot of phone calls to check references and we require our new instructors to teach a lesson to our board of directors.
Let me suggest where this is going.
I KNOW that in writing that SLP that homeschool families dig to make up their 25 hours of educational time. For most students, homeschooling requires much less than 25 hours per week to complete while keeping a child at grade level. I have heard of families recording time spent washing dishes, mowing lawns, cleaning garages, etc. as educational time in order to complete the required time for the SLP. That data is recorded and kept somewhere. What your family does, perhaps how often you wash dishes, is in the hands of state officials somewhere. Could that ever be used against you?
It sounds like a silly question, but the person I spoke to is already referring to the 'risk management team', and that means attorneys at the state level who want no part of being accused of allowing child molestation when all a piano teacher did was sit next to a student playing duets. I'm quite certain the piano teacher is thinking about that when permitting him- or herself to be fingerprinted, and you should also be thinking about it when you fill out that SLP.
The administrator I spoke with endorsed the mound of paperwork for these background checks, claiming that if it protects even one student from abuse then it was worth it. I find it interesting that abuse and molestation in the public schools is on the rise by both male and female instructors, who were fingerprinted prior to beginning teaching. Sounds to me like you had better go and hang out in your child's classroom. You can take any class your child is in for free at ZLO.
Could they come back some day and accuse you of putting your child at risk mowing the lawn? Are you a qualified landscape engineer with a state contractor's license that you could guide your child to properly use power equipment like that? If you were a landscape engineer, would you allow a child under 18 to operate such equipment while in your employ? Could you also be accused under child labor laws of requiring a child to do such labor? Could a rebellious and angry child or a wayward spouse or a nosy neighbor accuse you of any of this at some point in the future and use that paperwork to prove it?
How many of you parents might NOT "pass" a background or fingerprinting check? Would that disqualify you to be homeschoolers? Could the state then come by and require you to enroll your child in a public school classroom?
I'm not interested in "Officials we've spoken to in Olympia say..." because that's their opinion this week. Next week, with a different person seated in that position, it could work out altogether differently. How many of you have had such conversations with folks in a city or county planning department concerning a structure you wanted to build?
SLP's and PPP's might not have been created with the intent of corralling parents into becoming an arm of the state, and extension of the public classroom, but that is becoming the end effect of them.
You do NOT need to fill out an SLP if you are homeschooling. That is not required of you when you fill out homeschooling paperwork at your local school district. You do NOT need to fill out an SLP if you are using classes from ZLO. You hire us like you hire the piano teacher. You're in control. And it should be that way.
As administrator for ZLO, deeply committed to protecting our right to teach from a Christian, Biblically-based viewpoint and our right to teach the best way we know how, I will not sign any paperwork for PPP's, not about what we teach or how we investigate our instructors. What we do is on our website. Click on Our Instructors, and then click on the link at the bottom of that page about knowing more about becoming a ZLO instructor.
I've already been asked by a PPP administrator if a math class isn't just a math class, and couldn't PPP funds be used to pay for that? In my geometry class we talk about how we have 360 degrees in a circle. The story starts with the Babylonians, continues with Daniel in that court and ends with the wise men at the birth of Jesus. If there's a problem with state funds being used while I tell that story then I guess it's not just a math class, is it? All of education should be about opening and soaking our souls in the wonder of our Creator. I will not be muzzled!
Educationists have long sought to disqualify the parent. I remember well the day in one of my university classes on education when they told us that we were the experts, that we knew better than the parents. While I do not believe that the administrators of the PPP's intend destruction any more than does any educator, I do believe that if they choose to not cooperate with the state that control will be ripped out of their hands, and what they thought they built for good will be used to dismantle the families they sought to enrich and support.
I will not be a part of this. I will not fill out or sign any paperwork from PPP's describing or guaranteeing what we teach or who we hire. I will not give them any control, or any leverage that could be used against us in the future. I know that I will be cutting off some of you who maneuver PPP funds to help pay for ZLO classes. They claim they're trying to protect your child from molestation. I'm trying to protect your family from the state.
Respectfully,
Molly Crocker
Administrator, ZLO
Some of you homeschoolers are using classes from ZLO as part of your 25 weekly hours required to complete the Student Learning Plan (SLP) required by your participation in the PPP. The gist of the phone call was to ask if ZLO would sign paperwork showing that background checks are run on our instructors, because that was necessary for students whose ZLO work is included in the SLP. Each and every instructor used by a PPP student showing on the SLP must have the background check performed by the Washington State Patrol (WSP), and if any instructor on their SLP list is a one-on-one instructor, such as a piano teacher, then that person must be fingerprinted.
I made it very clear that ZLO instructors who choose to tutor anyone one-on-one do so outside of their ZLO work. ZLO does not require fingerprinting for instructors. We do perform the WSP criminal record check. We also make a lot of phone calls to check references and we require our new instructors to teach a lesson to our board of directors.
Let me suggest where this is going.
I KNOW that in writing that SLP that homeschool families dig to make up their 25 hours of educational time. For most students, homeschooling requires much less than 25 hours per week to complete while keeping a child at grade level. I have heard of families recording time spent washing dishes, mowing lawns, cleaning garages, etc. as educational time in order to complete the required time for the SLP. That data is recorded and kept somewhere. What your family does, perhaps how often you wash dishes, is in the hands of state officials somewhere. Could that ever be used against you?
It sounds like a silly question, but the person I spoke to is already referring to the 'risk management team', and that means attorneys at the state level who want no part of being accused of allowing child molestation when all a piano teacher did was sit next to a student playing duets. I'm quite certain the piano teacher is thinking about that when permitting him- or herself to be fingerprinted, and you should also be thinking about it when you fill out that SLP.
The administrator I spoke with endorsed the mound of paperwork for these background checks, claiming that if it protects even one student from abuse then it was worth it. I find it interesting that abuse and molestation in the public schools is on the rise by both male and female instructors, who were fingerprinted prior to beginning teaching. Sounds to me like you had better go and hang out in your child's classroom. You can take any class your child is in for free at ZLO.
Could they come back some day and accuse you of putting your child at risk mowing the lawn? Are you a qualified landscape engineer with a state contractor's license that you could guide your child to properly use power equipment like that? If you were a landscape engineer, would you allow a child under 18 to operate such equipment while in your employ? Could you also be accused under child labor laws of requiring a child to do such labor? Could a rebellious and angry child or a wayward spouse or a nosy neighbor accuse you of any of this at some point in the future and use that paperwork to prove it?
How many of you parents might NOT "pass" a background or fingerprinting check? Would that disqualify you to be homeschoolers? Could the state then come by and require you to enroll your child in a public school classroom?
I'm not interested in "Officials we've spoken to in Olympia say..." because that's their opinion this week. Next week, with a different person seated in that position, it could work out altogether differently. How many of you have had such conversations with folks in a city or county planning department concerning a structure you wanted to build?
SLP's and PPP's might not have been created with the intent of corralling parents into becoming an arm of the state, and extension of the public classroom, but that is becoming the end effect of them.
You do NOT need to fill out an SLP if you are homeschooling. That is not required of you when you fill out homeschooling paperwork at your local school district. You do NOT need to fill out an SLP if you are using classes from ZLO. You hire us like you hire the piano teacher. You're in control. And it should be that way.
As administrator for ZLO, deeply committed to protecting our right to teach from a Christian, Biblically-based viewpoint and our right to teach the best way we know how, I will not sign any paperwork for PPP's, not about what we teach or how we investigate our instructors. What we do is on our website. Click on Our Instructors, and then click on the link at the bottom of that page about knowing more about becoming a ZLO instructor.
I've already been asked by a PPP administrator if a math class isn't just a math class, and couldn't PPP funds be used to pay for that? In my geometry class we talk about how we have 360 degrees in a circle. The story starts with the Babylonians, continues with Daniel in that court and ends with the wise men at the birth of Jesus. If there's a problem with state funds being used while I tell that story then I guess it's not just a math class, is it? All of education should be about opening and soaking our souls in the wonder of our Creator. I will not be muzzled!
Educationists have long sought to disqualify the parent. I remember well the day in one of my university classes on education when they told us that we were the experts, that we knew better than the parents. While I do not believe that the administrators of the PPP's intend destruction any more than does any educator, I do believe that if they choose to not cooperate with the state that control will be ripped out of their hands, and what they thought they built for good will be used to dismantle the families they sought to enrich and support.
I will not be a part of this. I will not fill out or sign any paperwork from PPP's describing or guaranteeing what we teach or who we hire. I will not give them any control, or any leverage that could be used against us in the future. I know that I will be cutting off some of you who maneuver PPP funds to help pay for ZLO classes. They claim they're trying to protect your child from molestation. I'm trying to protect your family from the state.
Respectfully,
Molly Crocker
Administrator, ZLO
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