Out Of Touch…The End Is Near

The students took their standardized test.  Everyone waited to see if they had learned anything over the last quarter of school.

Notable results:

When asked why a student’s performance decreased tremendously, the student replied hopefully, “Does that mean I’m out of your class?”

When told that she scored higher than her end-of-year growth goal on this the second assessment, the student says smiling sheepishly, “Oh.  That’s because I didn’t really try on the first one.”

Weirder still is that if an observer wasn’t told the students were the lowest performing in the entire country, the observer would never have guessed it.  Most students had no clue what the test scores were “out of”, yet they proceeded to celebrate and congratulate each other in precisely the same manner as the highest performing students do upon receiving grades.

What really takes the cake, however, was the “lead” teacher’s reaction to the generally positive test results.  In an email to the principal she asked:

“Do we have money we could spend as rewards for the students who are proficient or who have growth on the assessment?  How about $5 in “school cash” toward a school colors shirt/hoodie?”

Yep.  Kids who hate the–admittedly ridiculous and difficult to enforce–dress code (only really concerned with preventing the kids from wearing gang colors) that leads them to choose to just wear school t-shirts and hoodies; kids whose parents have failed to create in them any appreciable amount of dignity or self-respect from which they could base an internal motivation to succeed at anything academic; these kids are going to be happy to have earned a ratty t-shirt.

One day and a wake up left.  Pray for me.

The principal responded “yes” by the way.

How To Start An Argument

(If you’re short on time, skip to the bottom for numbered instructions).

“Are you kidding me?  That’s not at all what I said,” he said, resigning himself.

“That is what you said.  That is exactly what you said,” she replied, her voice betraying her emotion.

“No.  I said that your family does things different from how I’m used to.  I never said they are weird.  I never said they are wrong,” he argued, trying one last time to be clear.

“Well, I think if we Googled ‘synonyms for different’, ‘weird’ would make the list,” she said, calming ever so slightly.

“It might.  But the difference is that ‘weird’ carries a value, whereas ‘different’ is value-neutral,” he said trying not to get excited too early.

“Why does my family have to be the ‘different’ one?  Why can’t your family be the ‘different’ one?” she stammered, signifying she was beginning to understand.

“Because I was the one who said it.  My family can’t be ‘different’ to me.   My family is what I am used to.  Therefore, if your family is not like what I am used to…they are different.  You could say the same thing if you thought so,” he said, hoping to be done with the whole thing.

“Fine.  My family is different to you, your family is different to me,” she said, unable to recall why this ever even came up.

“Good.”

“Good.”

“Your brother, on the other hand, is weird,” he said, laughing heartily as he ran.

Instructions for How To Start An Argument

Step 1 – Fail to communicate yourself fully and accurately on the first try.

Step 2 – Believe the other person is incapable of making the same error.

The Easiest Call To Answer

Breakfast at 7:00 am with his woman, a quick shower at 7:45, and they’d be out the door by 8:30 on their way to the home store.  After picking up a few essentials it would be time to head to the hardware store.  He desperately needed a new tool for weeding, and also a bit of potting soil.  Oh, and winter fertilizer.  If things went perfect, they’d be driving away from the hardware store at 11:00 on their way to meet friends for lunch at 11:30.

It wasn’t quite a sit-down restaurant, but the couples hadn’t seen each other in what seemed like forever, so he budgeted an hour and a half for the lunch.  Farewell handshakes and hugs would conclude at 1:00 pm, so he figured they could be pulling out of the parking lot at 1:05, which would leave plenty of time to drive to the ‘burbs for their nephews game.  The kid was only 6, so it wasn’t exactly organized.  From his perspective it was more like a bunch of adults forming a fleshy boundary which attempted to keep sacred childhood.  Either way, he was excited to see his sister and brother-in-law.

From there, the plan was to split-up for an hour or so to clean up.  Then everyone would meet back up at 6:00 for some Colorado-style pizza.  He figured they’d be out of the restaurant by 8:00–8:30 at the latest.  Afterwards everyone would return to their respective homes, and have a nice quiet night on couches.

Yep, he was pretty proud of himself for having such a thought out plan, but now it was time for bed.

Pulling the covers up–awkwardly as usual–to warm the back of his neck, he shut his eyes, smiling.

He awoke.  Widening his eyes as if that helped him regain consciousness faster, he reached for his phone.  Seeing the time before noting who was calling, he read “5:30” with some confusion.  “Who would be calling so early on a Saturday?” he wondered to himself.  The screen informed him who it was, and he couldn’t help but smile.

“Honey,” he said.  “Honey, wake up, wake up,” he said shaking her.

“What time is it?” she mumbled.

“Huh?  Why?  That doesn’t matter.  We’ve got to cancel our plans for the day.  The mountains called.  They’re open!”

The “Prep” Period

The bell rang.  “Alright everyone, we’ll pick up here on Monday.  Be safe this weekend.”

“Finally,” he exhaled, “I have a moment to prepare for the rest of the day.”

After one last glance making sure the hallway was clear, he closed the classroom door.  Inside, he sat alone.  He cleared his throat.

“Do your work,” he said.  But he wasn’t pleased.  He tried again.

“Do your work.”  He still thought something wasn’t right.

“Do your work.”  Eek!  Too much Batman.  He chuckled to himself before continuing.

“Do your work.”  Getting better, but still not perfect.

“Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.  Do your work.”  It was subtle, but he heard improvement.  Looking up at the clock, he saw his prep period was almost over.

“One last time,” he said to himself.

“Do your work.”  He smiled.  “Perfect!  And just in time.”

The bell rang.  Getting up to go stand outside his classroom door, relieved, he said to himself, “Okay, I’m ready for the students.”

She’s A Djeeen-yus!

“Trees,” she said in response to the prompt he gave.

After hearing “I see…” and seeing his finger point to the cars on the page, she responded, “Cars.”

He turned the page.  The next page had two scenes.  In the first, the main character painted a wall blue.  In the second, the main character’s friend colored the wall red with a crayon.  He continued the challenge-response game.

“I see…” he queried, pointing to the blue.

“Paint,” she finished.

Smiling ear-to-ear, he chuckled.  “Ha.  Good.  I would have also accepted ‘Blue’.”

Did Jesus of Nazareth Pass Notes?

“If you open your bulletin, you’ll find a communication card.  If you’re new to the church or have questions or would like to sign up for a class, just fill out the card and drop it in the offering plate when it’s passed around later in the service.”

He cringed.  He wanted to get more involved, he really did.  He wanted to be a part of the group.  He would love to spread the message that he knew to be valuable, yet he couldn’t complete this simple step.  He had been burned so many times in in his life.  He wondered, “Does the preacher actually think there is anyone in the congregation who hasn’t been bombarded-to-death with contact after they signaled interest to Gold’s Gym, or Subway, or a Time-share, or a Credit Card?”  The list goes on and on.  Yet, here he was in a place that offered…well, it offered hope; and he was being asked to formally display interest yet again.  How could he not feel once bitten, twice shy?  He knew he couldn’t be that different than others.

The contents of the offering plate seemed to prove he wasn’t.

The challenge then:  Jesus of Nazareth was different.  He was surely recruiting, but he was not starting a business.  And he was surely not starting an organization.  The picture painted by historical critical scholarship is that the man was intimate.  He didn’t pull punches.  He didn’t waste time.

“Being the more difficult course of action,” he thought, “this intimacy requirement only adds to the strength of his, Jesus’, argument.”

Standing in front of a crowd and asking them to perform the same ritual they’re asked to perform countless times throughout each day should be shameful.  He wondered, “Would Jesus of Nazareth have ever passed notes?”

The Last Time He

The last time he unquestionably believed something because of the proponent’s position in society he was a child.  This is not because he thought position, rank and/or authority were easily gained, but because he wanted to keep ever sharp his ability to think for himself.

And because there is that point, increasingly difficult to identify over time, when trust becomes foolishness–itself only a few steps away from danger.

Walk of Shame

Her elbow as the hinge, her hand lowered the phone to the bed after she finished her morning dose of Dieter.  She pushed the sheets off her body, bumping him, and climbed out of the bed.

Pulling her underwear followed by her pants over her hips, she remembered feeling the electricity of his fingers as he took them off only hours ago.

Fully dressed, she closed the door to his house and began her walk.  Thinking about the night, she recalled her surprise at his home’s level of  décor.  At the bar, he was nicely dressed, but so were most of her other conquests.  She discovered early on that not many men had the stamina to match the presentation of their home to the presentation of their body.  But he did.  She liked that.

She recalled that the wine he served her was remarkably smooth.  “Then again at 2:00 am, (or was it 3?) what wine wasn’t?” she laughed to herself.  They drank it in his wine cellar before he led her upstairs.  She remembered thinking that she didn’t need the comfort of a bed.  Loving how he was so in control, she willingly followed.

Already 9:00 am on a Sunday, she was sure everyone driving by could guess how she spent her night.  After all, her hair was disheveled, she was in heels, and her clothing was not exactly the type women wear for a coffee run.  Let them wonder, she thought.  They would never guess everything.  They would never know her feelings for him.  They would never suspect that afterwards she turned his head–always heavier than expected–so the draining blood wouldn’t soil her half of the thousand count sheets as she slept it off.

Rage Against Home School Teachers

“It is simply a matter of time.  Quantity over quality,” he told his boss, the principal, as he resigned.  He had never been so torn in his entire life.

How does one give up on a child?

****

He felt like crying.

The first step in solving any problem, he knew, was identifying it.  The school district wanted high performance on standardized tests.  The start of his resignation began when, as an outsider looking in, he surmised that the powers that be thought there was a direct correlation between the amount of paper on classroom walls and high performance on standardized tests.  Finding himself in vehement disagreement, he wouldn’t support this doctrine.  Remembering, or rather, not remembering there being much paper, certainly not much memorable paper on the walls of his childhood classrooms–save an attempt to show Pi’s irrational nature and a few motivational quotes–he couldn’t help but laugh at the sick joke.

In dealing with 13 year old’s who didn’t know their times table (and didn’t care to learn it), he recollected something he learned in college.  He recalled learning that the notion of a juvenile, that is a 13-18 year old human, is man made.  The theory goes something like, “until relatively recently puberty marked the coming-of-age of a human.”  Puberty marked the entrance to manhood.  It marked the entrance to womanhood.  In at least Western civilization, however, we have something in between childhood and adulthood.  We have the juvenile.  For the deserving, this truly is a privilege.  The deserving, those 13-18 year old’s who possess an ability to appreciate this extended grace period, should reap a benefit from past generations diligence.  But the undeserving?  What should happen to them?  No matter whose fault it was, the undeserving should be placed where they’ll be placed in a few years anyhow–the adult world.  “Don’t want to learn?  Work.  Find the simple joy of labor.  Or, regret with a vengeance the stupid decision to not want to know how to think for yourself.”  Either way, they’d be better for it.

Alas, frustratingly, even if he identified the problem as a misunderstanding of human biology, he only opened the door to another problem.  What could have been done to teach 13 year old’s to value a readily available, free, and rigorous education?   The answer?  A home  where education is valued.  A better home school.

In his short tenure at the school he refused to call any of his student’s parents–for their protection.  He wasn’t trying to protect the students, but the parents.  He knew once the conversation began he wouldn’t be able to stop.  “How could you raise your children with such carelessness?  How could you not read to your children?  How could you not ask about school and homework?  How could you not demand the highest standards of behavior and performance?  How could you reward their poor behavior with enabling feigned as ignorance?”

His own achievements convinced him of the simple truth that no expectation was too high.  His own achievements began with the fear of earning a mother’s scorn.  No way would she, or his father, have let his school advance him to 4th grade without doing his best in 3rd grade–and having the grades to show for it.  His student’s parents though?  Ha.  They weren’t human beings.  They were jokes.

****

How does one give up on a child?  Most adults avoid situations which might result in needing to answer that question.  He finally saw why.  The answer was simultaneously unthinkable and the right thing to do.  He cried.

Part 5 (Conclusion) – I’m Moving to Mars in 2022

Next, I turned my attention to probably the greatest source I stumbled upon during my relatively light research for this paper.  I discovered an article entitled, “Revised Scenario for Human Missions to Mars” written by Jean Marc Salotti.  As mentioned in this paper, Mars Direct advocates the idea of sending the recovery vehicle to Mars first, and then everything else.  Salotti addresses this notion in depth, and also provides what he (and his team) think is a better scenario.  The specifics are rather boring and not easily summarized here, but suffice it to say that his team believes they have a better plan, which also minimizes risks by providing redundancies every step of the way (286).  What was so moving about this paper is that it was written with a tone that doesn’t hide that he fully expects a successful manned journey to Mars—and soon.

The journey nearing an end, I found an article which seemed a fitting punctuation mark with which to conclude the paper, “Can Humans Live on Mars?” by Ken Kremer.  The short answer is “Yes”.  Kremer focuses his question and subsequent answer specifically on radiation levels.  For the lay reader, the article reveals that astronauts today already operate within preset radiation exposure limits (Kremer).   He goes on to conclude that all the data argues that Mars’ thin atmosphere actually reduces the radiation exposure an astronaut would encounter when compared to current trips to the International Space Station (Kremer).  This is encouraging news.  There are, of course, still many uncertainties, but the overall point is that settling Planet Mars, as Mars One intends on doing, seems to be more than a joke.  While the details are being fine-tuned, it is clear that prominent members of the larger space exploration community argue that humanity possesses the ability to fly to and land on Mars.  Furthermore it seems that humans should be able to live for at least a short time without ill effect.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.  This goal to inhabit Mars in 2023 is achievable and realistic.  More than the research this paper reviews, I know this to be true because I am a member of the human race.  I know this to be true because I possess the innately human quality intuition.  I know this to be true because when backed by the history of human experience and achievement, intuition proves itself accurate.  The human race is a super-organism that does not give-up.  When we direct our attention towards manifesting an idea, the rest is history.

****

Kremer, Ken. “Can Humans Live on Mars?” Universe Today RSS. N.p., 19 Nov. 2012. Web. 17 Sept. 2013. <http://www.universetoday.com/98509/can-humans-live-on-mars/&gt;.

Salotti, Jean Marc. “Revised Scenario For Human Missions To Mars.” Acta Astronautica 81.1 (2012): 273-287. Academic Search Premier. Web. 5 Sept. 2013.