So is we were taught using “new math”, what the hell is this called?

More on the cretins trying to strip the vote away from out-of-state college students across the nation.

Republicans hate teachers, and teachers are somewhat befuddled as to why.

Hell, so are the rest of us. I mean, I know conservatives hate education as much as the next Arab despot, but to hate the educators too?

The origins of “OK” and it’s spread into nearly every language. Interesting stuff.

I was reminded of this post from a few weeks back when thinking about the situation in Wisconsin.

It isn’t just unions Republicans hate. Or common folks having the audacity to believe they have rights – or to even speak up to defend those rights. Nah, they just sic the National Guard on folks like that and act like the dictators we support around the world.

No, it’s learning they hate. People who work to learn things, particularly things they don’t even have to use for a job, scare them. Learning for learning’s sake confuses them. Knowing things that make you a better, more well-rounded person does not conform to the Republican belief of take orders, obey them, and shut up.

Knowledge is power and conservatives only can compute that money equals power. Anything outside that equation confuses them.

So learn something people. Do it just because you are curious. If you better yourself financially, great! But do it for your SELF, not your wallet.

I was actually argued with by a Facebook “friend” for posting the following: “Try to learn something new every day, because the more you know, the smarter you’ll grow.” That was Miss Rosa on the PBS kid’s programming block. I mean, seriously, who hates that kind of mentality? Why the fear and loathing of knowing more tomorrow than you do today?

Fi we want to actually compete with the world, we need to encourage kids that math and science are not only valued and interesting, but also useful. Our ed system, as structured, is to produce workers for our economy.

Right now, it’s only chucking out – in the main – kids who can take tests and run a McDonald’s drive thru window.

Our canary in the coal mine in this instance ar science fairs. Make does a good overview of the issue and provides some good followup articles.

Meanwhile, a week late to the party, NPR covers the reporting on how so many biology teachers are not teaching evolution.

Look, if we can’t hire people to teach our children facts, we’re already screwed.

If you want to know what is wrong with this nation, start looking at this little fact. only 28% of our nations biology teachers think they should teach provable fact in their classroom. The rest either want to not offend religious zealots or are basically lying to their students because they can’t separate faith from fact.

It is a damn shame that we need it, but here is a guide to teaching science for science teachers.

The very last thing we should try to cut back on in this country is our education system. As this post shows, however, conservatives hate public education enough that they’ve put it on the chopping block early and often.

It isn’t equitable to screw kids out of a future folks. YOU take the hit before THEY do.

Granted, this isn’t directly a casualty of our culture than celebrates stupidity, but it might be a side effect. We are a nation that is losing our ability to write legibly and that makes us lose like dullards in some ways.

Yes, it is probably a direct relation to our increased use of technology, but much like homemade food tastes better than drive-thru, shouldn’t we at least try to maintain some illusion of intellectual prowess?