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Showing results for tags 'school'.
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My town has recently been through some major turmoil (actually, things aren't completely fixed yet) within its school district and higher government, and it inspired me to write up a quick blog entry about one key word that is integral (at least in my opinion) for a democracy to function correctly. Communication. Almost all of the problems in my town's current crisis relate directly to a lack of communication or else a misunderstanding of what was stated. Back in 2001, our school district formulated a new assessment plan combining the operational and capital budgets which, they thought, was in accordance to all higher laws. Our superintendent was even in contact with a DoE representative to make sure that our agreement was valid. The final version was a ten-year agreement, supposedly lasting until FY2011. But here's the catch - we never received official approval because of an unofficial letter from (funny enough) a DoE official giving approval. Now, six years later, our government has decided to "clarify" some laws that have been misconceived. Apparently, my town's ten year agreement is invalid because, among other problems, we aren't allowed to make a ten year agreement concerning a non-statutory assessment plan. This wasn't a problem in 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, or 2006 because, quite frankly, my town's district's agreement worked. It was practical, so the government ignored the fact that according to its interpretation of the law the agreement was invalid. But now, in 2007, one of the district's towns decided it wanted to back out of the ten year agreement. Without voicing its opinion until after the school released the budget for town approval in March, this renegade town decided to change the warrant and vote the way it wanted to. This, because of the government's "clarification," meant that we couldn't use our method of payment. However, the school committee was bound by our agreement to use our method of payment to assess the towns' payments. Essentially, the school now has no budget for FY2008. The other towns argued that under our agreement, only four out of five towns had to vote yes each year to approve the budget (which happened). That, however, was declared invalid by the government, even though we were never told this back in 2001. We should, by law, be stuck with the government's default assessment system, but it's not that easy. Oh, no. Since under the government method the nay-voting town would pay less and every other town more, the other four towns, when voting for our alternative method, didn't vote for all of the school's budget as would be paid by them under the default method. Meanwhile, the school committee was sabotaged because of a violation of open meeting laws and a power-hungry selectman, and two of the may-voting town's school committee members, including the committee's chair, have been ousted for not supporting that town's wish to undermine the regional ten-year agreement. Caught in a legal suit, the school committee is stuck and cannot release a new proposal. July 1st is coming quick, and if the towns don't start to communicate instead of making severaled decisions, we won't have a school budget next year and will be given a dreaded 1/12th budget by the government. However, all of this could have been diverted years ago if the government had communicated clearly to our towns in the first place instead of neglecting us. And even then, had the one town voiced its concerns of not being able to pay enough instead of undermining the budget by exploiting the legal loophole, everything would have run much more smoothly. Communication is key. The icing on the cake is that nobody's bothered to ask the students how they feel about all of the program cuts that will result from the 1/12th budget.
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Tomorrow is my History final, which should be cake compared to the rock that was the AP test last month. But still, our class has been studying for it. Over the weekend, we were given a set of 50 multiple choice questions to go over as if it were part of the actual exam. On Monday, we went over them as our class, reading each question and shouting out answers. Derek, who sits at the opposite end of the lengthy rectangle table which we sit around, didn't do the problem set, nor did he bring the questions into class. There he was, sitting at the far end of the table (I sit down by our teacher), a blank table in front of him, seemingly clueless. However, as we began going over the homework, he shouted out seemingly random numbers (we had a 1,2,3,4 system instead of A,B,C,D)... right numbers. Indeed, he was guessing each and every one correct, not missing a beat. How did he do it? Students around him became uncomfortable. Some shouted at him. This was ridiculous. We reached question 20, and everyone else shouted out a different answer than Derek. They thought he had finally guessed one wrong. But then, lo and behold, our teacher agreed with Derek; the answer was 3. All eyes were searching around the room, frantically looking for an answers - all, that is, but eight - four pairs Our teacher was one, not caring how Derek knew (or guessed) each one correctly. Derek was the other, his eyes roving calmly and without direction, as usual. Molly was a third, who was simply laughing historically. The fourth was the key. As we continued, some people began to go ballistic. This couldn't be possible. And yet it was. Then, one by one, a few focused in on something. There was the answer! Another girl joined Molly in giggling; a second shook her head in realization. Then, an explosion hit as Rose discovered the truth after twenty minutes of frantic wonderment. My name was shouted multiple times, Derek was assaulted for being a cheater. We were both slandered, and vicious language was flung in our opposite directions. The entire time, I had been sitting with my left cheek resting on my left hand, my left elbow on the table. My right hand had been resting by my left elbow, also resting on the table. The fingers of my right hand clung around my arm. However, after each answer was confirmed by our teacher, the number of fingers across my arm changed - changed to the answer of the next question. The entire time, I had been feeding Derek the answers in a subtle, silent manner. Our trick uncovered, Derek launched from his seat, made a rounds of the table, and gave me a smacking high-five. We laughed profusely, and the class scowled.
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Well, I'm off to my French exam in 10 minutes. I really hope that I don't fail miserably. *ulp*
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Goodbye moderation! Woohoo!
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Well, it's that magical time once more, when the ground becomes all nice and moist, and the trees grow tall and green..... Also, the scorching heat that can incubate an average high-school like an oven. Yes, Summer (strictly speaking, it's still Spring.... But who cares?). And what would that mystical season be like without Air-Conditioning? Heck. Yessiree. That is why I have begun a petition to install new AC's in my school. Foolish? Yes. Stupid? Yes. Going to work? No. But wait! What can persuade principles more than anything? You bet! Screen-names of people they've never met on a website they've never heard of! So, c'mon! And remember: Posting is the equivelant of signing your name. Really. Do the math.
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My answer was right! Somewhere between the making of the Math book and the answer book the length of the side of the square was changed from 10, to the square root of 72. That's why my answer was proportional to the one the answer book had. Yeah math. I'm happy for "Ask Harold R. Jacobs", the author
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Today is the day where my life sucks again. Yup. School. Vacation has ended, and, in fifteen minutes, I will be carted off to the prison of which there is no escape.... Unless you call in sick. But I can't call in sick, for I can't really miss any more school (I've called in sick quite a few times), so for now I'm trapped.... In fiteen minutes. My dad read somewhere that it's going to snow tomorrow. Well, that sucks, 'cause it's April. But it's also good news, as any amount of snow could mean a possible SNOW DAY! So I'll just keep my fingers crossed, and hope for the best..... ...In fifteen minutes.....
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Well, I was watching a Volcano documentary in Geography today, and they said a rather interesting word. "Volcanology". Then it hit me. You can add the suffix 'ology' to almost any word! I call it: "Ologyology". Waterology. Stapleology. Doctor Whoology. Palindromeology. Potatology. Comicology. UFOology. BZPology. Norikology.
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4th Period Gym. Click at your own risk. Seriously, it would be cool if that had happened.
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No explanation needed.
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Well, today was the day that I needed to reorganize my locker. I gathered everything within, and, in the process of one hour, I loaded it into my bag. I really, really hurt. Grah, now I need to spend even more time organizing it..... HELP!
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Well, this was supposed to be posted yesterday, but the server crashed..... It still applies, though. HOMEWORK IN EVERY SUBJECT! AUUUGH! Help... me..... *gack*
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For once in my life, I can do things other people can't do! I... I feel so.... so..... Special...... First period French. Sorry to everyone who loves the language, but I HATE IT. HATE HATE HATE. ... Well, we're currently working in groups to finish a book report. It's a very odd book. In French. And, wouldn't you know it, I get the largest chapter of all. 29 pages. Darn. Anyway, today we started working on cover pages. It was 'fun'.... See, you can't really have 'fun' in French. It goes against some law, or something. I dunno. Anyway, my project partner turns to me and says: "Hey, do it on that awesome FireWorks Program." So I say: "I could do that at home." "I can't." Then I felt very good about myself, for my friend couldn't use FireWorks. Ha! It turned out pretty good, I think, so I'll put it up here. For everyone who can't read French, it reads: "The Battle". Ha!
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So, I was in Physics class in the other day, which means I was sitting on a stool at a lab table pondering what to do next because I had finished the chapter's problem set but most of my classmates were only on problem 40. (I like Physics, but my school's student body as a whole seems to detest it.) Anyway, I was talking with Sam about some of the more quirky characters in our school (she is the only other person who seems to finish the problems as quick as me - but yes, she still hates Physics). And I suddenly had an idea: "Wouldn't it be funny if entire school - you know, every student grade seven through twelve - just got plopped somewhere random and had to build a society. Kinda like the plane-crashing-on-a-desert-island complex, but without any notion of anything modern. You know, building a society - like the Dark Ages. IT could be a recently established village in Prussia (or, well, what will become Prussia, anyway) around 700 AD... You know, when Germanic Tribes are settling down." She thought it was a rather interesting idea, and we started to ponder, "Who would take charge? Who would be the "soldiers," farmers, artisans, etc.? Who would be the town scapegoat who got blamed for everything?" We ended up with answers for all of those question - and more. After picking out a few characters, I decided that we should write things down. After a few days, we had a slot for almost everyone in this 300-person-strong village, everyone grades 7-12. There was some help from other people... my sister had some opinions on who would be married and such (I mean, if people don't get married and have babies, the village won't last very long). After a few other Physics students were done with the problems, they had suggestions, too. People were really starting to get excited about this imaginary idea... On a field trip up to a local artist's museum, I began writing from the point of view of Mitch, the cat breeder. (Yeah, that is one of the more odd choices, but it makes sense if you know Mitch and our school.) I read it allowed to Mitch and a few others, and they were cracking up over it. I read it to my sister, and she immediately wrote her own little account of waking up one morning. The person assigned to "Apothecary" did so as well. My sister started drawing pictures of some of the village members... I made a typed copy of the character list. This is becoming a school-wide phenomenon (which is actually possible, considering that 10% of the school is only 30 people, and way more than that are already enthralled in the Prussian Village.) I'll keep this updated, because it is a very fun little project.
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To start things off, we've got an all new MotD! Yay! Say hello to the guy almost everyone knows: Beliwa: Toa of Demons! Now, let's talk about the day itself. Let me think.... My mom got up at 5:30 AM today to take the dog out or something. Ungh. She came back at eight. School was... odd. It was first period Gym, and me and my friend; Brownstien (that is his screen-name), were sitting on a bench off to the side of the court. I turn to Brownstein and say: "What if you had a gun that turns people into skeletons?" "Skeletons?" he said, "stuff like that always ends badly. I'll pass." "No, no! Living, breathing, walking, talking skeletons!" "Still, something always goes wrong." "Okaaaaaaay... What about a gun that turns things into whatever you want?" "Well, I suppose that's less dangerous... But is it really safe?" "Sure! Let's see, if I'm thinking of eating a chicken, and I point the gun at you..... Bingo!" "A guy eating a chicken?" "No! You = chicken. Me = guy eating chicken. Me + chicken = Yum." "That's just even worse than the skeleton thingie!" "Alright..... What if you had a Dalek Death-Ray?" "A whaty what-ray?" "Dalek!" "Da-what?" "Okay. Picture a box. Now picture a box with two little bulbs on top. Now picture a box with a plunger. Now give it a big blue eye. Now give it a gun. Now give it some bumpy thingies on its body. That is a Dalek." "Wel, now Mr. Dalek is robbing a bank! I gave him legs." "Daleks don't have legs." "This one does." "They don't have legs. They hover, though." "Then he hovers over to the bank, and --" "Kills everyone?" "Well, then he robs the bank. Then he goes on a killing spree." "Oh." "But what's inside?" "A mutant squid." "But... Ewwwwwwww." "Yeah." "But I wanted a fishy!" "No, it's a squid." "But I wanna fishy!" "So turn the squid into a fish." "But what if it's not smart enough?" "You'll make it smart enough." "But what if I'M not smart enough?" "Then turn yourself into the fish and get inside the Dalek." "But I'm not smart enough..." "I guess..... He'll just get mad and kill everyone, then." "Yeah. But, wait- What if the Dalek starts killing people I don't want him to kill?" "Then you die." "No, no. I'll just tell him to compute pi. Daleks are like robots... Right?" "Not those robots." "But robots help people!" "No, not Daleks. They'll be all: 'Cannot compute pi! EXTERMINATE!' Then you're dead." "Oh." "Yeah." "So..... I'd take the turn-into-anything gun and turn the Dalek into a hockey stick!" "Then he'd kill Saku Koivu." "Yeah... The NHL would be a lot smaller...." "So...?" "So... I'd make him a Wii." "And?" "He probably wouldn't let me play..." "So?" "I'll turn him into a PC!" "Okay... That'll work, sort... ish....." "You're right. I'd wanna go to the Windows Vista homepage, and he'd be all: 'No! MSN!' I'nd I'd say no, and then-" "Then you'd be dead." "Yeah." "Yeah." "What do I do?" "Just sorta turn yourself into a Dalek Emperor." "Okay..... So, I point the zappy gun at me and WHAMMO!" "Yup." "So.... I tell it to give me a super gun!" "You already have a gun-" "I WANNA A SUPER GUN!" "Okay... okay....." "So then I blow it up!" "Congratula--" "Augh! It's unending! I still end up with a Dalek Death-Ray!" And that's what happened.
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Yup. Very boring. I just had a language test, didn't do so bad (I think). Now it's lunch. Yay, lunch. Lunchy-lunch Mclunch. Then, of course, I have history. Then Geography. We're studying Earthquakes . Boooo. Well, at least it's a short day today, and we get out and 12:30.
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I have come home from a terrible day at school. 1. Didn't leave the house until past 8. 2. Didn't know what the heck anyone was talking about 1st period. 3. 2nd period. It's math. What're you gonna do? 4. Lunch. My maccaroni got stuck in the thermos, so it took my 15 minutes just to get it out. The rest of Lunch was okay, I guess. I had time to write a blog entry.... 5. Gym. Got in trouble for not having my uniform, then got my pinkey finger crushed in a door. It still hurts, I can barely type. 6. Oh boy. Language class. We had to put on a play, which was terrible. My fellow classmates were all sychophants and hypocrytes. Then, out of the blue, we all had to say what our allowance was. WHAT THE HECK? 7. Forgot that my mom was coming late, so I was out in the cold for a while. Dropped my bag on the way out. I didn't care, though. Reached the car, remembered my bag, ran back, picked it up, and slowly walked to the car. That's the story of today. It kills to be me. *siiiiiigh*
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I am at school. Right now. In the computer lab. During lunch. It's not much fun, school. I just came from Math, boring ol' Math. Same old angles, same old equations.... *Sigh*. Next up is English. Working on Public Speaking..... Yeah..... I really don't like school.... Most of it, anyway.
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Grah They're dragging me to school! I don't know if I can even finish this blog--
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There was a quick little incident today in school that I found hilarious. We had to tell our AP US History teacher that he would only be having over half of his class tomorrow because of a field trip. The class tried to convince him that, being half empty, he would have to go a little lighter on the workload so they wouldn't fall behind. So, why is this ingrained in my memory like a firebrand on a cowhide? Well, my 6'3" teacher, having stating that "the train doesn't stop moving for anybody in the feel-good room," proceeded to launch himself onto the table and yell like a union protestor, "The class won't be half empty! It will be half full! Half full! Half full! Half full!" This chant continues on for about half a minute, (full or empty, it's your choice) and some of the class joins in (mostly those of us who won't be absent tomorrow). The clock turns to 1:52, so class is over, but that doesn't stop our vivacious history teacher from lacking out into a hall littered with petrified freshman and sophomores, "Half full! Half full!" The poor children had no clue what he was yelling about, and I'm afraid he may have frightened some of them. So, what moral can you take from this incident? If you miss class for a field trip, the class won't be the thing that's half empty - your knowledge of the material is what will be lacking. Or at least, that's what I think he was saying in an implicit philosophical sense... Either that or he's just a bit crazy.
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I'm currently taking an online geography course that's been focusing on global warming and how we're going to combat the resulting problems. It's only one semester, so my final project is due on the 18th of December. Like a good child, I decided to do the project. (It seemed like the natural thing to do since it's worth about 20% of my grade.) I whipped out my maps of Europe, my world atlas, some ArcGIS data, and Google Earth and started working. Apparently, after a 5 meter rise in sea level (which could result from the melting of just one of the many ice features in Antarctica), not only are places like Venice and the Netherlands going to have a little excess drinking water, but cities like Odesa, Ukraine will also find themselves oddly underwater. My job is to come up with an action plan to deal with a theoretical (and highly exaggerated) 50 meter rise in 50 years. Where 5 meters floods the lower city, 50 meters floods out the whole thing, and this is a city built along the slopes of a hill (which, funny enough, is almost exactly 50 meters at its peak). So, I start looking for information on the internet about Odesa (or Odessa, if you prefer), and I find that Odesa, England and Odessa, USA are much more popular. In fact, the only websites besides the encyclopedias that seem to care about Odesa, Ukraine are travel websites advertising hotels. That's great, but I really don't care about hotels. I want to know about the industries (Odesa has an institute for eye-diseases, a jute mill, and an oil refinery, among other things) and where they are. If the factory is 40 meters above sea level, then it wouldn't make sense to try to transplant the industry when the institute will flood after only six years. And of course, with my current streak of luck, there's a naval base at Odesa, so the government is a little touchy with some information, which makes it even more difficult to find any information. If I had the money, I think I'd just go to Odesa myself and find out where everything is. I even know where the best hotels are now. Sadly, that can't happen. The other sad thing is that I can't just say, "Let her sink!" (well... I could, but then I'd fail.) And overall, this project was rather depressing... After a 50 meter rise, the entire eastern seaboard of North America, from the Yucatan, along the Gulf Coast, all of Florida, through up into Canada until about Labrador. My house would be save, which is a nice thought, but looking at Europe isn't a fun time either. Humans have some sort of tendency to build on water (as if they needed it to live or something). They're attracted to it like flies to a dead carcass. So, my advice to everyone who reads this: Move to Tibet! So, five hours later, I decide that I've had enough, and I starting reading Lord of the Rings. That makes me happy. I still can't get over the fact that the Black Gate of Mordor is actually three doors.
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I was reading Daniel Webster's Seventh of March Speech today, and I decided that I needed a blog. It wasn't because of the speech so much as I was cold. Anyway, I decided that I had prolonged the inevitable long enough. Time to dive in. This will look pretty ugly until I decide that I'm seriously going to keep it up (which may be a few hours or a few weeks). So, this morning I wake up and the temperature is about 10 and the wind is howling. The hot water heater broke again, so I can't take a warm shower. I get out of the shower blue and shivering and put on a T-shirt, among other things. I then remember that it isn't 50 degrees out like the day before. My winter coat is still at my cousin's house (because I left it there... why else?), and that makes me unhappy, but I still have to prepare for the worst. I put on my under armor and check the temperature again before I leave: now it's three degrees colder. I walk outside in the wind (the wind chill was about -10... I've had as bad as -50 over here, but it was about 50 last week, so this was a major shock). I wipe the snow off my car and try to open the door. The handle is frozen and won't budge. I end yanking open the back and crawling through to the front of the car. I turn it on (it took about four revs of the engine to get going) and blast the heating fans. I break through the ice hold the driver's door shut, but the handle is still frozen. I go back inside to let the car warm up. I go back out and it's even windier. I scrape the windshield and windows of ice, crawl back in the car, and drive to school at 7:30 to get there early for the Morning Show (our school's daily news show that broadcasts across the school and county). At 7:47, 20 minutes before school starts, the fire alarms go off. That wasn't fun. After my name was checked off, I dashed back to my car, crawled back in it, waited for my comrades to enter, locked the doors, and listened to music with a few of my friends until the alarms went off and they let us back in. Apparently, the intense cold and winds had knocked on something in the alarm system and the entire thing went off. I hate irony. I am still wearing the under armor, and I am still shivering, but at least there won't be any school fire alarms tomorrow.
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Aperntly, we have to back to school on August 16th! And we got off on June 6th! It's a rip off. -P. Jr.
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Today is the last day of school in about 8 1/2 hours we'll be free! The tiranay is over! Until September. -P. Jr.
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I'm a happy person. Schools ending! In six school days, school is over! If you're counting all of the days, there are nine days. WEE! Happy summer time! -P. Jr.
