Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 11/25/2010 - 13:41.
No unbearable lightness of being here - pure disgust.
When I was at US we couldn't wear jeans or shorts and we needed to wear a collared shirt - sportcoat and tie for morning announcements and lunch. I've visited in the last few years and it seems the same today.
While most kids end up looking about the same, we were free to dress ourselves. I wore the same linen jacket (from my dad's college days) every day senior year... a filthy crumpled mess... and the headmaster gave me a few pink slips for that (and for hair being too long, being late, etc... I had the school record) but I was able to graduate and still be an individual.
I'll send my kids where uniforms are not required, thank you. There's a school on Highway 1 that overlooks the Pacific and kids seem very happy and free to learn the right lessons in life.
There is no video of them dancing for the Charter School movement, because public education there seems to still work.
Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 11/25/2010 - 14:21.
Students at US in the 1970s were given great personal freedom and space, with responsibility and consequences for pushing the rules - expulsion for going over certain lines, like cheating and lying. By Junior and Senor year we left campus for lunch and to take classes at other schools, etc - we were encouraged to push the learning envelop.
When you pushed a rule too far, you received pink slips. I had the most pink slips (given by Cosmo DiBiasio, a former WWII Navy officer) for minor infractions ever, I was told at the time, which meant I vacuumed and cleaned chalk boards pretty much every Friday afternoon junior and senior year, and got to know the small cleaning and maintenance crew and other pink slip boys (about half of us were regulars) pretty well. There were usually about a dozen of us and we cleaned the school. Took us about an hour for our assignment and we got exercise. I planned my week around that.
More serious offenses came up, and were handled pretty fairly. After a weekend retreat the school organized Junior year, a kid who smoked pot on the retreat (everyone smoked pot then, and now) got pinned into confessing by his parents and he narc'ed on most of the class - everyone he had seen smoke pot. The school conducted an internal investigation and a few kids who were narc'ed out as supplying were expelled (they shouldn't have been) - kids who were narc'ed as having just smoked were suspended for the rest of the year. We were expected to follow our coursework from home, turn in homework, and take our tests at school Saturdays - and work around the school after we took our tests on Saturdays as well. I learned how to glaze windows and do other useful things those Saturdays. The only times we went to school were for our AP tests and a few special events. Worked out great, and I had time to paint my parents' house and get in shape.
The kid who sold diet pills as speed... the kid who blew up the science lab to try and burn up the gradebooks (guess he was failing, which is not a good thing at US)... they definitely got expelled.
A very fair and resonable approach to keeping order and house. We had lots of freedom because our families believe in freedom, even for their kids. Our rules were based more on responsibility to learn right - NO CHEATING OR YOU WERE OUT - but if you were late or even when a group of kids were caught smoking pot, if we weren't in the business of selling drugs or skipping school entirely we were punished but reasonably - as the parents want to be treated themselves.
And we dressed like reasonable adults going to work each day - professionally for our aspirations.
Submitted by Norm Roulet on Fri, 11/26/2010 - 01:58.
The kids are certainly alright and the video has some great highlights - Poland Invasion seems cool and the song is catchy. Overall great effort.
I don't want to denigrate this authentic production and all these sincere artistic expressions - I give them a 10.
But I've been around too many of the Charter people over the years and seen too much about the CMSD processes to feel good about education in Cleveland or even the region.
We should celebrate high points in education here - some Charters doing well and some schools in the public system excelling - but as a parent looking at the situation - and as a citizen paying for the outcomes - I don't want to see happen with education what is happening with public health and community development... a series of placed PR mainstream articles, slick documentaries and videos puffing successes out of proportion, and hyping a new way, to hide larger systemic problems beneath... as the problems never seem to be documented or acknowledged - the Michener Chateau Hough ReImagining Cleveland Pop-Up Prize Package Process that gives a few foundation leaders a few minutes of fame within their small circles of fans as the balance of costs and benefits harm the masses.
I'm not sold on where education in Cleveland is going, and can't sell that package to the world. We'll see what kind of leaders this all creates here over the next few decades... only time will really tell.
Submitted by Norm Roulet on Fri, 11/26/2010 - 14:55.
And E-Prep is in Lead Poisoning Death Zone #1 - highest lead poisoning rates in the region (America) right there... ground zero... Saint Claire Superior... over 35% of children tested there have lead levels over 5 - this is exacerbated by the fumes from Burke Lakefront Airport, where all those prop planes still burn leaded fuel and spew lead upon the Tyler Building and China Town.
What.... never read that in the PD - didn't get the warning from Mayor Jackson and his Sustainable Cleveland 2019 crew... no notices for protest from GCBL... EHW... EPA was just seeking public comment on this issue... Nothing from Cleveland?!?!?
Bad adults mess up good kids. Sadly, the bad adults were once kids, so we have to focus on what's important. Fortunately, resilience is built-in. Sometimes, adversity brings out strength that a young person would not recognize in themselves. Sometimes, having the "good life" makes kids bored and complacent.
Personally, I'll take the comic book kids, who think in technicolor, anyday.
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Thankful for the kids who make me LAUGH
Happy Thanksgiving NEO :)
I'm thankful I ws a kid in NEO when I was a kid in NEO
I'm thankful I was a kid in NEO when I was a kid in NEO, and not now.
I hope they paid those kids to dance in this latest propaganda for the machine
Cute uniforms... glad my kids will never be subjected to that fascism
Disrupt IT
University School
University School students wear uniforms...lighten up :) I am going for a walk now. The zoo is free today and Riverside Cemetery is always FREE :)
When I was at US
No unbearable lightness of being here - pure disgust.
When I was at US we couldn't wear jeans or shorts and we needed to wear a collared shirt - sportcoat and tie for morning announcements and lunch. I've visited in the last few years and it seems the same today.
While most kids end up looking about the same, we were free to dress ourselves. I wore the same linen jacket (from my dad's college days) every day senior year... a filthy crumpled mess... and the headmaster gave me a few pink slips for that (and for hair being too long, being late, etc... I had the school record) but I was able to graduate and still be an individual.
I'll send my kids where uniforms are not required, thank you. There's a school on Highway 1 that overlooks the Pacific and kids seem very happy and free to learn the right lessons in life.
There is no video of them dancing for the Charter School movement, because public education there seems to still work.
Another reason to be leaving Cleveland.
Disrupt IT
Keeping order and keeping house at US
Students at US in the 1970s were given great personal freedom and space, with responsibility and consequences for pushing the rules - expulsion for going over certain lines, like cheating and lying. By Junior and Senor year we left campus for lunch and to take classes at other schools, etc - we were encouraged to push the learning envelop.
When you pushed a rule too far, you received pink slips. I had the most pink slips (given by Cosmo DiBiasio, a former WWII Navy officer) for minor infractions ever, I was told at the time, which meant I vacuumed and cleaned chalk boards pretty much every Friday afternoon junior and senior year, and got to know the small cleaning and maintenance crew and other pink slip boys (about half of us were regulars) pretty well. There were usually about a dozen of us and we cleaned the school. Took us about an hour for our assignment and we got exercise. I planned my week around that.
More serious offenses came up, and were handled pretty fairly. After a weekend retreat the school organized Junior year, a kid who smoked pot on the retreat (everyone smoked pot then, and now) got pinned into confessing by his parents and he narc'ed on most of the class - everyone he had seen smoke pot. The school conducted an internal investigation and a few kids who were narc'ed out as supplying were expelled (they shouldn't have been) - kids who were narc'ed as having just smoked were suspended for the rest of the year. We were expected to follow our coursework from home, turn in homework, and take our tests at school Saturdays - and work around the school after we took our tests on Saturdays as well. I learned how to glaze windows and do other useful things those Saturdays. The only times we went to school were for our AP tests and a few special events. Worked out great, and I had time to paint my parents' house and get in shape.
The kid who sold diet pills as speed... the kid who blew up the science lab to try and burn up the gradebooks (guess he was failing, which is not a good thing at US)... they definitely got expelled.
A very fair and resonable approach to keeping order and house. We had lots of freedom because our families believe in freedom, even for their kids. Our rules were based more on responsibility to learn right - NO CHEATING OR YOU WERE OUT - but if you were late or even when a group of kids were caught smoking pot, if we weren't in the business of selling drugs or skipping school entirely we were punished but reasonably - as the parents want to be treated themselves.
And we dressed like reasonable adults going to work each day - professionally for our aspirations.
I guess I always wanted to be a punk rocker.
Disrupt IT
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The kids are certainly alright - I give them a 10.
The kids are certainly alright and the video has some great highlights - Poland Invasion seems cool and the song is catchy. Overall great effort.
I don't want to denigrate this authentic production and all these sincere artistic expressions - I give them a 10.
But I've been around too many of the Charter people over the years and seen too much about the CMSD processes to feel good about education in Cleveland or even the region.
We should celebrate high points in education here - some Charters doing well and some schools in the public system excelling - but as a parent looking at the situation - and as a citizen paying for the outcomes - I don't want to see happen with education what is happening with public health and community development... a series of placed PR mainstream articles, slick documentaries and videos puffing successes out of proportion, and hyping a new way, to hide larger systemic problems beneath... as the problems never seem to be documented or acknowledged - the Michener Chateau Hough ReImagining Cleveland Pop-Up Prize Package Process that gives a few foundation leaders a few minutes of fame within their small circles of fans as the balance of costs and benefits harm the masses.
I'm not sold on where education in Cleveland is going, and can't sell that package to the world. We'll see what kind of leaders this all creates here over the next few decades... only time will really tell.
Disrupt IT
i think we need to all stop pretending
and stop being hypocrits.
tHAt would make us better adults.
No pretending here
No pretending here - live in Cleveland die about 16 years younger than necessary, of a horrible pollution related condition not found in nature.
Get those kids out.
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And E-Prep is in Lead Poisoning Death Zone #1
And E-Prep is in Lead Poisoning Death Zone #1 - highest lead poisoning rates in the region (America) right there... ground zero... Saint Claire Superior... over 35% of children tested there have lead levels over 5 - this is exacerbated by the fumes from Burke Lakefront Airport, where all those prop planes still burn leaded fuel and spew lead upon the Tyler Building and China Town.
What.... never read that in the PD - didn't get the warning from Mayor Jackson and his Sustainable Cleveland 2019 crew... no notices for protest from GCBL... EHW... EPA was just seeking public comment on this issue... Nothing from Cleveland?!?!?
No Pretending Here - get the kids out.
Disrupt IT
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Kids are ALRIGHT!
Bad adults mess up good kids. Sadly, the bad adults were once kids, so we have to focus on what's important. Fortunately, resilience is built-in. Sometimes, adversity brings out strength that a young person would not recognize in themselves. Sometimes, having the "good life" makes kids bored and complacent.
Personally, I'll take the comic book kids, who think in technicolor, anyday.