By The Quixotic Man, on August 5, 2010, at 8:16 am  Kaplan: Profiting off a broken educational system since 1938. Recently, I’ve realized that if I want to have a real career, I need to go back to school. And that means I get the delightful opportunity to take the GRE. Oh hosanna of hosannas. Now, there’s something I need to make really clear here, right off the bat. I’m good at standardized tests. Back in the day when I was getting ready for the SAT, I started out with a good score on the practice tests and wound up knocking it out of the park. NYS Regents tests, SAT2s, the works, I score well on tests. But that doesn’t make me smart. And it’s no indication of my intelligence. It’s an indication of one thing and one thing only: I know how to prepare for and take standardized tests. And the fact that if I get a good score on one of these tests it may have any bearing on whether I get into school over someone else who may in fact be a better candidate, if only that person had my aptitude for test taking, is a travesty to our educational system. … continue reading this entry.
By Page, on June 11, 2010, at 3:48 pm  Two unrelated articles in separate periodicals got me thinking about gender inequality in our society. First, the NYTimes science section ran an article this week discussing a piece of legislation that has been passed by the House designed to address gender disparities in the sciences. The legislation proposes a series of workshops aimed to discuss:
methods that minimize the effects of gender bias in evaluation of Federal research grants and in the related academic advancement of actual and potential recipients of these grants, including hiring, tenure, promotion, and selection for any honor based in part on the recipient’s research record.
How they are going to address all of this in a workshop, I would love to know. … continue reading this entry.
By Page, on May 7, 2010, at 7:03 am  Join as Saturday at this free event with Beth Fertig who will discuss her experiences as WNYC’s education reporter and her recent book, Why cant you teach me 2 read? Education is a fundamental priority if skeptics desire increased critical thinking skills for our children and our nation’s population in general. But the politics of education frequently seems to get in the way of education itself. Fertig will discuss New York City’s attempt to use data to track student achievement, and to measure school performance through “progress reports” using an A-F grading system. Fertig’s exposure of the city’s “rubber rooms,” where teachers facing disciplinary action are left to languish, have been instrumental in getting the city to reassess the system for processing these teachers and getting them back to work or out the door faster and more efficiently. … continue reading this entry.
By The Quixotic Man, on May 3, 2010, at 7:03 am
 Deepak! Deepak! Camera's over here! Look here! Here! Oh forget it...
A note for the litigiously minded:
This is a work of parody. No one here is saying Deepak Chopra actually was offered Everybody Poops. No one’s saying these would be his words if he got the book (although honestly, I suspect I’m close). I’m not even saying Deepak definitely exists. If any of this is unclear to you as you read this blog, might I humbly suggest you stop being so litigious before you’re able to be literate? And if Mr. Chopra (who may/may not exist) happens upon this post and gets excited about his changes to Everybody Poops, I apologize. It was never my intention to toy with him like that. … continue reading this entry.
By The Quixotic Man, on March 15, 2010, at 7:28 am As I’ve mentioned in the past, I’ve been doing some work lately as a tutor. Some of the tutoring materials they give me are better than others and when I looked at how the book suggested one should write an essay… I was a little appalled. Though I don’t always bring my full ability to essay to this blog, it’s one of those things that I actually understand extremely well. My solution was to put together a standard lesson on how to construct an essay. Now, you may be wondering what exactly this has to do with skepticism, and I’m here to tell you: just about everything. A good essay begins with a strong premise, leading to a thesis statement, and then proceeds to present valid reasons for why the author believes that thesis. Being able to write an essay is being able to construct a valid argument. Being able to read an essay is being able to deconstruct an argument. If you’ve somehow lost either of those vital tools for your skeptical tool-box, consider me your Home Depot. … continue reading this entry.
By Page, on December 29, 2009, at 7:03 am There has been a recent increase in comics and graphic art that cover topics relating to science and logic. If you are looking for a little fun reading while sitting in the airport or metal transportation-box of your choice, here are some spots to check out:
PHD Comics: Piled Higher and Deeper
These charming strips were started by a graduate student several years ago and were a comfort to me during my own struggles. If you are considering higher education, I recommend reading through these comics as a form of essential research. Really, this is what it is like!
A few personal faves:
xkcd comics
Another humorous strip related to academia and science, but mostly about logic. … continue reading this entry.
By The Quixotic Man, on November 6, 2009, at 7:03 am Good news to all the homeless in Arizona. Apparently, poking needles into your ears will in fact help warm you up! WAHOO!!
It seems that the Phoenix Institute of Herbal Medicine and Acupuncture College & Clinic, Phoenix’s only accredited acupuncture school, has decided to help the homeless with a new free clinic designed to help deal with problems ranging from “cold” to addiction. It seems that their treatments help people exposed to really cold conditions, and the real miracle is that in the summer, the PIHMA can help people who are too hot too! … continue reading this entry.
By The Quixotic Man, on October 27, 2009, at 7:03 am  I Want You: To join me in poorly educating my civilians It’s tough sometimes, being an American. Sure, we have a bit more money and a couple more bombs than anyone else in the world, but on some issues, I feel like we’re just that little bit inadequate. Like… evolution. It seems that our little secret has gotten out. Little Johnny America doesn’t understand evolution, and his dad, Big Johnny America, believes that if it’s going to be taught in schools, creationism should be taught too! Which is sort of like believing that if gravity is going to be taught in schools, the hypothesis that the earth is a big flat disc constantly accelerating upwards at 9.8 m/s2 also deserves it’s rightful place in the physics textbooks. So forgive me, my friends across the pond, if I take a little bit of happiness from the fact that it seems that 60% of you are idiots, just like us. … continue reading this entry.
By The Quixotic Man, on October 22, 2009, at 7:03 am This is what was inside of me [/caption]
One of the most annoying questions that can be asked of a middle school math teacher is, “When am I ever going to use this in the real world?” Part of the annoyance is that for most kids, it’s kind of true. I don’t know about you, on a daily basis I find a lot of use for arithmetic, but on the whole I don’t really have to rely on all that much else. Sure, I recently solved a quadratic equation, but I can’t honestly say I needed to. However! The other day, I discovered a great reason for any kid to learn math: winning arguments with annoying people. … continue reading this entry.
By AJ Mell, on October 6, 2009, at 7:03 am  I have no objection, in principle, to celebrities using their bully pulpits to push whatever cause they like. If I were a wealthy, gorgeous, powerful individual with millions of people following my every move, I would do everything I could to bend the teeming masses to my will. What depresses me is how many of said celebrities don’t seem to have two active brain cells to rub together, and use their vast influence to peddle various forms of ineffable twaddle. As a result, we have millions of people accepting medical advice from anti-vaccinationist dingbat Jenny McCarthy, even though her primary contributions to world culture have been displaying her surgically-enhanced charms for Playboy, and pretending (I hope) to eat her own boogers on TV reality shows. Kirk Cameron is the latest entrant in this celebrity clown cotillion. … continue reading this entry.
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