Friday, October 30, 2009

Jobs really saved or created?

The New York Times just posted an article entitled "White House Chalks Up 650,000 Jobs to Stimulus". Click the title of this post to see the full article.

This article states that because of stimulus money, 650,000 jobs have been saved or created claiming that this is right on track with the goals of the stimulus money. But how can we really determine how many jobs were saved because of stimulus money? The article even gives the example of schools in New York City where before the stimulus the schools were going to be faced with huge layoffs. The writer of the article then goes on to say that Mayor Bloomberg likely would not have allowed that many layoffs because of how it would hurt his re-election. So can we really count those as jobs saved?

Secondly, how many of these jobs created (or saved) by stimulus money are long-term jobs? And what will happen once money from the stimulus runs out and these people are out of jobs once again?

Additionally, what about all the jobs that are being lost each day? Where does that number fit into this picture? Unemployment continues to rise and daily large numbers of people are running out of their unemployment benefits.

So I really have a hard time believing Vice President Biden's comments that, "There is strong and mounting evidence that the recovery act is putting people back to work." And I strongly feel that this article really is missing the whole picture and just trying to make the politicians who passed the stimulus packages look good.

One final note: If the stimulus packages were really working, wouldn't we all see it for ourselves and not need to be told that they are working?


Monday, October 26, 2009

LSAT score

Recently I received my LSAT score from the September test. I didn't post right away because I was a little disappointed in it. It was on the low end of all my practice tests. But nevertheless it is still a good score. With a 163 LSAT score and a 3.68 GPA, I should be able to get into Wisconsin Law or Marquette. At this point I don't plan to apply this year. With the economy as it is and the record number of law school applicants, I think that waiting a year or two will put me in a better position for finding a job after law school. Additionally, it will give us more time to save money so that I can take out the least amount of loans and be free to choose a career path based on my interests and not on whether it will allow me to pay off my loans.

In the meantime, I am substitute teaching and looking for a office support position in a law firm to get some experience and make some connections.

Technology doesn't always make things better

Many school districts have adapted the software AESOP for scheduling subs. This software eliminates the need for the district to hire someone to call subs and match them with sub jobs. Instead teachers enter their absences into a website and substitutes log into this website (or log in by phone) to see potential sub jobs and accept or reject them. This sounds like a great thing but there is a huge downfall to this system. Subs aren't necessarily matched to classes that they are best qualified to teach so students are left with subs who really struggle to execute the lesson plans (because of lack of content knowledge, experience with that age group, or other skills necessary).

I taught a bilingual second grade class last week. The students are used to learning reading, writing, math, social studies, and science all in Spanish. The only English that is used in the classroom is for their ESL class as well as specials (Music, Art, and Gym). When the aid for the classroom arrived and heard that I was conversing with and working with students in Spanish, she was beyond excited. She then explained to me that they don't usually get Spanish speaking subs and that the day before an English only speaking sub was in and things didn't go so well. Later on when the Principal walked around, the aid shared her excitement with her that I spoke Spanish and I was told to check in with the office before I left to see if the teacher would be returning the next day or not. She did return the next day so I didn't get any more days at that school but the Principal told me to keep my eye out for jobs at Blair because they have quite a few staff members in bilingual positions.

AESOP software is just like a job board that is first come first serve. So the teacher who sees a job first and grabs it first, gets it. Just recently, I have found a way to auto-refresh the page every 15 seconds and so have actually seen a few more jobs. On average jobs last 15-30 seconds before they are taken by someone which leaves very little opportunity to grab jobs unless you stare at the screen all day.

Before software like this, school districts had a live human being matching subs with jobs. Teachers would call the "sub caller" when they had absences and even then had the opportunity to request certain subs or certain qualifications. Then the "sub caller" would go down their lists of subs, hopefully trying to match sub jobs with substitutes who were qualified in that area. Making a perfect match was not always possible especially with certain subject areas but an attempt was often made and thus it was far more likely that students would have a substitute that could successful carry on plans as usual ensuring the least amount of lost time due to absences.

I don't know if we need to completely throw the software away. But it is not working as it is written now. As a Spanish speaking sub, I (and all the other Spanish speaking subs) should be the first ones to see those types of jobs just like subs certified in math should be the first ones to see math jobs. I wish districts would see how important it is for student learning that a better match is made.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Be wary of technology without understanding the principles behind it

So a while back my Dad got a GPS unit for hiking and he has started using it a little for driving as well. The other day I asked him if he thought that people had become so dependent on GPS to get them where they are going that they were losing their direction skills and ability to read a map. His response was that even if they are, it isn't a big deal. And he compared it to the dependence on calculators which I disagreed with touting several examples of when I have needed to be able to do math in my head or understand the principles behind what my calculator was doing to realize that my calculator had not given me an answer that made sense with what I was trying to do.

Yesterday, I traveled with my in-laws who had recently purchased a GPS unit and had been just raving over it. To prepare for our trip, my father-in-law just wrote down the addresses of the places we were going. So we head off after typing in the first address and I listen as they try and figure out the route the GPS might take us, a route, I would not have chosen as it spent little time on freeways and significant time on roads littered with stop lights every half mile. Then as we continue to another place, the address is typed in, and the address could not be found (or maybe it was not typed in accurately) so we had to choose an address it suggested for us hoping it was something close. It then sent us on back roads, making turn after turn. And all the time not sure of where it was sending us. Add to that all the fumbling with the GPS unit as the driver is driving made worse by the fact that no one was all that familiar with the unit yet.

So then I wake up this morning and there are two blog posts in my Google Reader and after reading them both, I couldn't help but laugh at how appropriately timed they were.

The first post was by Prof. James Edward Maule in his blog "MauledAgain". He primarily writes about tax law. Today's post was entitled "Why the Nation Needs Tax Education." First he discusses several posts with citizens highly debating whether Obama would have to pay federal income tax on his Nobel Peace Prize award and how the answer was so clear in federal tax code yet people had no understanding of it even when made available to them. However, then in the 10th paragraph he mentions my whole point of dependence on technology when he blames the lack of understanding of the federal tax system on tax preparation software and tax preparers (who usually use tax preparation software as well). US citizens have become so accustomed to TurboTax and the like that just asks us questions and does our taxes for us to the point where so many would not be able to figure their taxes out by hand even with all the resources necessary.

The second post was by Tom Kuntz in his New York Times blog "Idea of the Day". His post today was titled "Can GPS Help Your Brain Get Lost?" and discussed how GPS may eventually contribute to dementia as the dependence on it eliminates the use of the skill that gives us direction and allows us to understand abstract concepts spatially. Which makes perfect sense to me as I watched the GPS tell us to make turn after turn without any need to understand where locations were located.

So my advice to everyone is to be wary of technology that replaces your need to think as it may affect you greatly in the future.

Friday, October 2, 2009

I am remembered....

I just got an e-mail from a former colleague with questions from a student in my Spanish I class last year. She was looking for the name of the video series we watched last year (Sam - Extra Series) and the name of a song she really liked (Me Voy - by Julieta Venegas). It's exciting to see a student that actually remembers something from last year and has an interest in finding out more.

My colleague also mentioned in the e-mail that the student misses me. This was a class that was hard to leave. If I had classes like this more often along with more support from administrators and parents, I wouldn't be leaving the profession. But this class really was that rare gem. A small class with some really strong positive leaders and other students who fed off the excitement of the class. This will be a class I always remember.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Anglo-centric view

So recently I read a blog post about an Aztec exhibit in England that represented the Aztecs in a very bloody manner. To me, this blog, was the perfect example of our Anglo-centric view. We, as a culture of the West, are always trying to judge other cultures that are very different from us without ever stepping out from our Western point of view. And by doing so we miss the boat completely. Click the title to see the blog.

Well, comment number 12 on this blog post shared a satirical "Conquistador's Song" which so clearly fits. So I thought I would share it with you here:

Conquistador’s Song

On the way to go killing a whole bunch of people,
I learned THEY were murderers, TOO,
which only can make me look better
than murderers often do.
But if there’s a difference between us
it’s simple enough to trace:
they killed for god and power and TRIBE;
while we kill for God, greed, and RACE!