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Sunday, January 09, 2005
Just A Few Things I Never Knew I Had To Have.
Belatedly, I have discovered the joys of EBay. I am currently bidding on a pair of blue, daisy-print doc martens and an FDR campaign pin. I believe that the world is a very good place.
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Sunday, December 19, 2004
A Christmas Present to Commuters.
The MTA is running a few historical trains on the weekends as part of their 100th anniversary celebrations. (Another part of the celebrations involves running us into debt and raising our fares.) M and I took a break from studying today to go ride the History Train of Celebration and Debt.
Note from M: I particularly like the computer-printed sign that says: "I was born in 1955. Note my seating. Sit on me." (Did they really think we wouldn't sit down?)
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Saturday, December 18, 2004
Ungodly at Any Speed
Volkswagon makes a car called the Phaeton. Why would you name a car after the son of Helios who, when he drove his father's Chariot of the Sun, nearly destroyed the earth until Zeus struck him dead with a bolt of lightening? The message seems to be "drive this recklessly and die!" Fun.
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Now Thats What I Call Music The best part of the New Year is that I get to read all the different Best Albums of 2004 lists out there - not that I use them to make a list of CDs to buy, but rather I get to feel infinitely cooler than all these music editors because MY list is SO much better than theirs.
Spin magazine claims to be the "alternative" to Rollingstone, but they didn't even mention Arcade Fire's Funeral or The Fiery Furnaces Blueberry Boat, AND they put Wilco's A Ghost is Born all the way down at number 38. Rollingstone earned some points by not actually ranking their top fifty and including Funeral, but lost points for describing R.E.M.'s Around the Sun as an "elegant album" and not including The Talking Heads The Name of This Band Is on their list of best re-issues. They didn't include Blueberry Boat either. While I agreed with three or four of each of their Top Ten, and most of my favorites made their Top 50, some of the best were far down the ranks (i.e. A Ghost is Born). The two most over-rated albums of the year have to be Franz Ferdinand and Van Lear Rose. They're both great, but FF is near the bottom of my list, and Lynn only just didn't make fit, and everyone put them right near the top of their lists above much better material.
So after talking a lot of trash, that leaves the question - what's my Best Of List? I don't directly rank them (its impossible to really differentiate between my favorite and second favorite), but I've divided the top ten into the Top Five and the Rest of the Top Ten.
Top Five: Funeral - The Arcade Fire Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes - TV on the Radio A Ghost is Born - Wilco Good News for People Who Love Bad News - Modest Mouse Blueberry Boat - The Fiery Furnaces.
The Rest of the Top Ten: The Grey Album - Danger Mouse i - The Magnetic Fields Antics - Interpol Franz Ferdinandd - Franz Ferdinand Real Gone - Tom Waits
I'm making a Best of 2004 mixed CD - I'll put up the track lists when I'm done. Over all, it was a great year in music. Now if I can just get my hands on a ticket to The Arcade Fire for February . . .
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Friday, December 17, 2004
Our Fifteen Minutes of Infamy
Walton continues to be the current poster child for how bad New York Schools are - WNYC had a segment on our faults (overcrowding, violence, inter-school tension, etc.) this evening. No one ever believes me, but really most days aren't that bad. I don't know if its that things just sound worse when you retell them or if I've become inured to the situation, but most of the time Walton feels normal. Really, it does.
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More Police, but Halls Are Still Jammed at Unruly School By ELISSA GOOTMAN
Published NY Times, December 15, 2004
After Walton High School in the Bronx was placed on the list of the most dangerous city schools last April, it was flooded with extra police officers, safety agents and metal detectors.
But that was not all. The Walton building also got a new small school, its third, while its total population of 3,751, in a building designed for 2,249, decreased by only 62 - worsening, some students, parents and teachers say, some of the very conditions that led to Walton's placement on the list of so-called "impact schools" in the first place. Last Tuesday, two students were arrested and charged with inciting to riot, and three were given summonses, after a fight broke out on the second floor of the three-story building, officials said. Students said that incident was but the most dramatic in several unruly weeks.
"It's just too crowded," said Schezel Musler, 16, a junior at Walton. "It's just a whole bunch of gangs. People think they're better than others. Other schools think they're better than Walton."
Department of Education officials stood by their efforts to crack down on problems at Walton and other impact schools, saying there have been fewer violent incidents this year than last and attributing recent fights to the disorder that often pervades schools in the weeks between the end of the second marking period and Christmas break.
"We're seeing some improvement, but it's got a ways to go still," said John Feinblatt, the city's criminal justice coordinator.
But some parent advocates accused the Department of Education of a lack of foresight and proper planning, saying that the impact schools should have been given a break this year.
"There is a heedlessness about the way this is being implemented," said Leonie Haimson, the head of Class Size Matters, a parent advocacy group. Of Walton she added: "No matter how many police you put in a school and no mater what kind of security procedures you put in place, there is no way to totally defuse the tension that exists in that school because of the huge amount of overcrowding and also the clear disparities between the students in the small schools as opposed to the large."
Michele Cahill, Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein's senior counselor for education policy, said officials thought carefully about enrollment and where to place new small schools but that the challenges were great: 26,698 Bronx students entered the 9th grade this year, up from 24,646 last year. Next year, even more - 27,165 - are predicted.
Assistant Police Chief Gerald Nelson, chief of school safety, said there were 18 violent and other disruptive incidents at Walton from July through November, down from 21 during the same period last year. Chief Nelson said that aside from last Tuesday's fight, he knew of nothing in recent weeks that would give parents cause for concern.
But often, incidents that do not rise to the level of an arrest or summons are disturbing enough to upset students, teachers and parents.
Patricia Britton, president of the Parent Association at the High School for Teaching and the Professions, one of three small schools that share the third floor of the Walton building, which is on Reservoir Avenue in Kingsbridge Heights, said she was concerned about the recent fights in the building.
"As much as they put security up there, they need to keep putting more," she said. "And how much security can you keep putting if the problem keeps getting worse?"
Deputy Mayor Dennis M. Walcott is expected to address concerned parents at a meeting this evening, at the request of Adaline Walker-Higgins, whose daughter is a sophomore at the Celia Cruz High School of Music, a new small school that moved into Walton from DeWitt Clinton this year. Ms. Walker-Higgins had led an unsuccessful effort to keep the music school at Clinton or find it another space.
Alan Ettman, leader of Walton's United Federation of Teachers chapter, said that even if there are slightly fewer students in the building this year, the addition of Celia Cruz and the growth of the two other small schools meant that Walton itself actually lost about a dozen classrooms.
"It doesn't matter how many security personnel are there," Mr. Ettman said. "If you have halls that are impassable, there are going to be fights. There is going to be jostling and fighting, and security can't be at all places at all times."
Several students at the High School for Teaching and the Professions said that tensions had risen recently between students from their school and from Walton.
"They always want to fight our school," said Melissa Foster, 15. "They're jealous of us because we have more hallway space."
Naomi Bruno, 15, said that last week, a few Walton students came to the third floor and started to "hit people in the hallways."
Tatiana Cooper, 15, added, "They figure that we're not going to fight back since we're such a small school."
Melissa Rivera, 16, speculated that some of the problems could have started brewing in the cafeteria, where this year, unlike last, small school and big school students often eat lunch at the same time.
Nathalie Toribio, 15, a Walton sophomore, said Walton students did not like feeling like the building's third floor, now the domain of the small schools, is off limits.
"Four schools?" she asked, before heading off along Jerome Avenue. "It's too much." --------- Note that there is still no mention of a police officer pepper-spraying a crowd of students. I also find the number "18 violent incidents" very humerous, as do all my students. We read the article in class the other day and wrote Letters to the Editor, and I asked them how many violent incidents they thought there had been. Keven put it best - "How many days of school have there been? Multiply that by two or three."
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Thursday, December 09, 2004
Bronx: Fights Disrupt High School From the New York Times Metro Briefing 12/8/04 Two students were arrested and charged with inciting to riot yesterday after a fight broke out inside Walton High School, said John Feinblatt, the city's criminal justice coordinator. There were no injuries, the police said. [ha! - C.] Walton is one of the 16 "impact schools" that were flooded with extra police officers and safety agents last year after officials found them to be particularly unruly. Students said the arrests yesterday stemmed from one of several fights that erupted throughout the day. Several said the discord at Walton, which now shares a building with three small schools, was a result of overcrowding. "One kid bumps another one, which is bound to happen, and they start shoving," said Jack Israel, a teacher.
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Date: December 8, 2004 To: All Staff Subject: safety Protocol - December 8, 2004
The following safety protocol must be consistently enforced until further notice. Please see above the item clock for special instructions.
* No passes to any bathroom or school office should be issued. The student bathrooms will be available to students during their lunch period and physical class period. If a student has an emergency condition, please send the student with the appropriate pass to the nurse's office, B80. When possible, summon a staff member stationed in the hallway to escort the student.
* Staff should not open a bathroom for a student for any reason. Please see above.
* Teachers need to stand in their doorway during the change of period to welcome students and insure that they take their seats promptly.
* All guidance office, student store, senior office, college office, and supermarket will be closed to students.
* All comp. time staff must report to the Dean or SSA on their floor for patrol during the entire period they are assigned to their office.
* All assistant principals must be on hallway patrol during the last 10 minutes of a period and the first 15 minutes of the next period.
Thank you for your cooperation. I am certain our efforts will yield positive results.
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They left out "All prisoners must be in their cells by lights out." But what is really nice is that at the bottom of the memo is printed the inspirational quote that Walton puts on all its memos - "It is the nature of man to rise to greatness if greatness is expected of him" (Steinbeck). So we pepper-spay them and treat them like prisoners and wonder why they aren't turning out right.
I also like how the lock down includes the college office - if students are working hard to get into college, they most likely aren't jumping kids in the hall. And most college essays are due next week, so seniors are frantic about getting to the college office. Which is closed. So the official tally from the chaos on Tuesday - seven large fights, two students arrested for inciting a riot, and two fires started.
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Tuesday, December 07, 2004
Life in the Big House
Today was one of those days at Walton. Sometime around the end of fourth/beginning of fifth period riots broke out - someone stepped on someone shoe, someone swung, someone hit someone because that was their friend that went down, and before you could say "Attica prison uprising" there were dozens of kids kicking and punching each other. Then the cops broke out the mace and hand-cuffs. Two periods later you could still smell the pepper-spray in the air and one of my kids had to go to the nurse because he got some pepper-spay in his eyes. Mr. Prince came on the intercom to announce that no students were to be let out of their rooms for any reason - no bathroom, no water fountain, and the counselors' offices were all closed - and all after school activities were canceled. There were about twenty extra cops patrolling the halls, and by the end of the day nearly a dozen kids were hauled off in handcuffs. Luckily I got the edges of it - I shut my door, tried to quiet my kids down, and kept teaching.
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Monday, December 06, 2004
They Care so Much . . .
This morning C. asked me how my weekend was. I told her that it had been very busy, as I had been grading their projects, and I had also been finishing my project for my college class. "Mister, you're still taking college classes." "Yes." She smiled. "Good for you, Mister. Then you can get a better job than this." I explained that I was taking the classes so I could keep the job I had now. She seemed somewhat disappointed.
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Sunday, December 05, 2004
A la Merrydeath - make a playlist with all your mp3s, randomize it, and share the first fifteen that pop up, regardless of how embarrassing the might be. And its no fair deleting "Mental Jewelry" before you start. (If you are like me, however, you will have stuck your old Live cd's in the very back of your closet and never put them on mp3, so this won't be a problem.)
1. I Found a Reason - The Velvet Underground 2. Punk Love - The Magnetic Fields 3. If I were a Carpenter - Johnny Cash 4. That's not the Issue - Wilco 5. Buried Bones - The Tindersticks 6. Hallelujah - Nick Cave 7. The Drowning Dream - Augie Marsh 8. Get me Away From Here - Belle & Sebastian 9. Tangled up in Blue - Bob Dylan 10. Life During War Time - Talking Heads 11. 40 ft. - Franz Ferdinand 12. Take this Waltz - Leonard Cohen 13. Cut-Out Witch - Guided by Voices 14. Flowers on the Wall - The Statler Brothers 15. Spaniolated - The Fiery Furnaces.
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