Free Republic

Can't resist it - I was raised on American culture and am all the happier for it. It formed me culturally and made me what I am. Since I come into contact with Americans professionally on a frequent basis, it's always a great pleasure to have 'common ground', so to speak. Today I started reading 'Moby-Dick' for the fifth time. And believe me, I do have an exceptional memory. But this book is so rich that you can spend a lifetime with it and still miss out on some things. The pretty pragmatic, relativistic Ishmael embarks on a boat trip...

HAWIJAH — In the month which marked the birth of the United States of America and the liberation of other nations, July 5, will be remembered in Hawijah, Iraq, as the day its country’s deputy minister of education Nehad Al-Juburi and the prime minister’s education advisor Zaid Chaid paid a historic visit to bring national attention to a pilot literacy program underway here. Five-hundred SoI members in four of the sub-districts of Hawijah, Iraq - Zaab, Abassi, Riyadh and Hawijah city - are currently participating in this program, which teaches students up to a 3rd to 4th grade reading...

this site is personal to me it seems no strings attached, their sponsors take care of it all. just click and you will help many worthwhile causes, like hunger, breast cancer, literacy and pets. really, i run firefox with adblock plus and this site has given me no malware or issues/popups. it seems legit, if i can donate a can of food a day and more, i'm sure someone here can help spread the word. i appreciate it. and i'm in no way affiliated with them or paid, this isn't spam. i'm just a news junkie with this place and...

TALLAHASSEE, FL - A report issued today by the Department of Education reveals that the expected illiteracy rate among high school graduates will decline significantly this year. This marks the first time in several decades that this benchmark has fallen in two consecutive years. The expected illiteracy rate of 32% is down from 33% last year ...

Remember shortly before Election Day 2006 when Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) suggested that if you don't get a good education, "you get stuck in Iraq" (video available here)? Well, last month, famed horror author Stephen King was speaking in front of a group of high school students at the Library of Congress, and he virtually made the exact same statement. For those that can bear it, what follows is another in a long line of liberal media members bashing the military (embedded right, h/t Terry Ann): I don't want to sound like an ad, a public service ad on TV,...

In my ignorance, I once held hopes of gaining entrance into a club more exclusive than any country club or nightclub. Having been educated in public schools and therefore exposed to only one form of thought, I thought this club represented intellectualism. My first exposure to intellectual thought was a shelf filled with dime store Golden Books. One of the American “ladies� had heard about the cleaning abilities of a Slovenian immigrant woman who was laid off from her job in a factory. So this lady picked my mother and me up and drove us out to her big house...

Or maybe not Because the 2002 No Child Left Behind Act imposed standards and accountability on the public schools, many conservatives were willing to support the law even though it was also a massive expansion of the federal government's role in education. It might be time for them to reconsider. On Thursday, the Department of Education announced that a key component of the measure -- the $6 billion Reading First program -- has been an utter failure.

OK everyone, it's time for my quarterly "What Are You Reading Now" post. I like to get a feel for what Freepers are reading these days. It can be anything...a best seller, a literary classic, a trashy pulp novel, a scientific journal, etc. Do not demean this thread with posts like "I'm reading this Thread right now". It became un-funny a long time ago. I'll start. I've just started "One Square Mile Of Hell: The Battle For Tarawa" by John Wukovitz. Rather than a minute by minute account of the battle, it takes a more personalized view of the battle...

FORT HUACHUCA — There is one thing Command Sgt. Maj. Gerry Wykoff is thankful for, and that is Dr. Seuss never wrote an Army Field Manual. As it is, his children’s books are full of tongue twisters, as the senior noncommissioned officer for the Intelligence Center and Fort Huachuca found out Monday when he read Seuss’ “The Sleep Book,” to fourth-grade students of Janet Josa’s class at General Myer Elementary School. For many young school students, the Dr. Seuss books are today’s “See Spot Run” that older generations remember from their days in the lower grades of elementary education. Nationwide,...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) - The state Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case of a functionally illiterate man who says the Kanawha County school system failed to provide him a proper education. An attorney for Thomas Sturm says that although Sturm was allowed to graduate from Sissonville High School in 2004, the 21-year-old man can read only on a third-grade level. The attorney, Mike Clifford, says the school board failed to abide by state and federal laws meant to monitor and protect the rights of students with disabilities. Sturm allegedly suffers from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Kanawha County Judge...

<p>Woops, an errant email advisory sent to House Democratic members by Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office had some unique suggested talking points for the upcoming "Read Across America" day. Basically, it said, just tell the kids and their teachers: blah, blah, blah.</p> <p>"Blah, blah, blah, blah Blah, blah, blah."</p>

What will happen to reading and writing in our time? Could the doomsayers be right? Computers, they maintain, are destroying literacy. The signs -- students' declining reading scores, the drop in leisure reading to just minutes a week, the fact that half the adult population reads no books in a year -- are all pointing to the day when a literate American culture becomes a distant memory. By contract, optimists foresee the Internet ushering in a new, vibrant participatory culture of words. Will they carry the day? Maybe neither. Let me suggest a third possibility: Literacy -- or an ensemble...

OCEANSIDE, Calif. -- John Corcoran graduated from college and taught high school for 17 years without being able to read, write or spell.Corcoran's life of secrecy started at a young age. He said his teachers moved him up from grade to grade. Often placed in what he calls the "dumb row," the images of his tribulations in the classroom are still vividly clear. "I can remember when I was 8 years old saying my prayers at night saying please god tomorrow when it's my turn to read please let me read. You just pretend that you are invisible and when...

"As a school librarian, I wind up reading all sorts of damning reports on students' lack of reading skills. The latest dire news came from the National Endowment for the Arts' recent "To Read or Not to Read" study, which warned that "less than one-third of 13-year-olds are daily readers, a 14 percent decline from 20 years earlier." High school students are faring even worse: Among 17-year-olds, the percentage of "non-readers" has doubled over a 20-year period, from 9 percent in 1984 to 19 percent in 2004. This multitasking generation, we're led to believe, can't focus on any item for...

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Like a top-heavy tower of books, Seattle tumbled from its ranking as "America's Most Literate City" this year. The new winner: Minneapolis, ending Seattle's two-year reign on top. The Emerald City only slipped to second place, but some of the local literati took it hard. "I don't believe it," said Tracy Taylor, general manager for Elliott Bay Book Co. in Pioneer Square, which was bursting with post-Christmas customers Thursday. "And we're not even having a sale," Taylor noted. But the statistics don't lie — even though they also don't capture all the nuances of what makes one city more literate...

When Congress decided to appropriate $2 million in fall 2001 to help D.C. kindergartners and first-graders learn to read, city school officials were told that the money could be spent only on the Voyager Expanded Learning literacy program, a new product with virtually no track record. They had just picked a different reading curriculum, and "we didn't want to be guinea pigs," recalled Mary Gill, then the system's chief academic officer. School leaders did not know that the $2 million was an earmark that had been guided into law by Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) just after she had received more...

A computer instructor (left) teaches boys ages 11 to early teens how to use a computer during a computer literacy course at the community center in Assiriyah. Photo by 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division Public Affairs. ASSIRIYAH — Thanks to recent improvements in security, local leaders with a little help from Soldiers in Troop D, 1st Battalion, 82nd Field Artillery Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, are bringing civic improvement projects to residents throughout this village of more than 2,600 people. The Troop D Soldiers leant a hand in one such project by donating computers for...

REPORT BY AMERICAN INSTITUTES FOR RESEARCH FINDS AT LEAST 20 PERCENT OF COLLEGE GRADS UNABLE TO DO FUNDAMENTAL COMPUTATIONS WASHINGTON, D.C. – Twenty percent of U.S. college students completing 4-year degrees – and 30 percent of students earning 2-year degrees – have only basic quantitative literacy skills, meaning they are unable to estimate if their car has enough gasoline to get to the next gas station or calculate the total cost of ordering office supplies, according to a new national survey by the American Institutes for Research (AIR). The study was funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts. The AIR study...

WASHINGTON - U.S. fourth-graders have lost ground in reading ability compared with kids around the world, according to results of a global reading test. Test results released Wednesday showed U.S. students, who took the test last year, scored about the same as they did in 2001, the last time the test was given — despite an increased emphasis on reading under the No Child Left Behind law. Still, the U.S. average score on the Progress in International Reading Literacy test remained above the international average. Ten countries or jurisdictions, including Hong Kong and three Canadian provinces, were ahead of the...

The 2007 Human Development Report says Iceland now leads annual United Nations Index. Iceland has narrowly passed Norway to take the top spot on the Human Development Index (HDI), according to the 2007/2008 Human Development Report (HDR) released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) today. Norway had held the number one ranking for the previous six years. This change in ranking is a result of new estimates of life expectancy and updated GDP per capita figures, stress the Report authors. Introduced with the first HDR in 1990, the HDI assesses the state of human development through life expectancy, adult...

The Constitution of the United States established what form of government? Which wall was President Reagan referring to when he said, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall"? These questions were part of a 60-question test of civic literacy administered to college freshmen and seniors at 50 American colleges and universities. The test (available at www.isi.org) covered American history, government, international relations and economics. The results were disheartening. Freshman overall scored an average 50.4 percent, while seniors improved only to 54.2 percent. Eight of the 50 colleges were left to explain how four years at their institution could actually diminish students'...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 24, 2007 – More than 12,000 children of servicemembers each year are getting a foundation for lifelong literacy from their doctors through an effort called “Reach Out and Read.” “Reach Out and Read” co-founder and chief executive officer Dr. Barry Zuckerman reads with a young patient. The group’s literacy program is part of early childhood check-ups at seven U.S. military medical facilities. Photo courtesy of the Reach Out and Read National Center  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. “Reach Out and Read presents a unique opportunity to support and strengthen military families with young children,” said Carolyn...

America’s Founders were convinced American freedom could survive only if each generation understood its founding principles and the sacrifices made to maintain it. Failing Our Students, Failing America: Holding Colleges Accountable for Teaching America’s History and Institutions asks: Is American higher education doing its duty to prepare the next generation to maintain our legacy of liberty? In fall 2005, researchers at the University of Connecticut’s Department of Public Policy (UConnDPP), commissioned by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s (ISI) National Civic Literacy Board, conducted a survey of some 14,000 freshmen and seniors at 50 colleges and universities. Students were asked 60 multiple-choice...

High Tech Illiteracyby: Malcolm A. Kline, September 12, 2007 At the same time that American students are becoming more and more technologically adept, they are increasingly less and less likely to possess rudimentary capabilities, data from the National School Boards Association (NSBA) indicates. “Think of the way we do research—look up a topic, follow a link to another link to another link—linear,” Pennsylvania school board member Kathy Pettiss explained to the American School Board Journal (ASBJ). “Our kids go 40 different directions at once, just like a spider’s web.” “They shop sites that have no store—there’s no inventory until someone...

CALGARY (ALBERTA): The reading skills of young male students may improve more when boys are tutored by women, a Canadian study shows, contradicting some school policies to hire male teachers to improve boys’ literacy. Herb Katz, an education professor at the University of Alberta, took 175 boys in the third and fourth grades, identified as struggling readers, and paired them with a research assistant who worked on their reading skills for 30 minutes a week over 10 weeks. On average, the boys paired with female tutors felt better about their reading skills after the 10 weeks than those who were...

WASHINGTON -- There it sits on your nightstand, that book you've meant to read for who knows how long but haven't yet cracked open. Tonight, as you feel its stare from beneath that teetering pile of magazines, know one thing -- you are not alone. An Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Tuesday reveals a nation whose book readers, on the whole, can hardly be called ravenous. The typical person claimed to have read four books in the last year -- half read more and half read fewer. Excluding those who hadn't read any, the usual number read was seven. "I just...

PORT HUDSON, La. - A literacy test used to screen Georgia-Pacific Corp. applicants discriminated against blacks because blacks were far more likely than whites to fail the test, the federal Labor Department said. Utility workers at a paper mill don't need to read well, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. Georgia Pacific disagrees, but has stopped using the nationally standardized Test of Adult Basic Education's literacy exam and will pay $749,076 in back pay and interest to 399 black people who applied over the past two years, spokeswoman Patty Prats-Swanson said Wednesday. "We may not agree but we have...

Pop quiz. Which has been most important in reducing poverty over time: a) taxes, b) economic growth, c) international trade, or d) government regulation? We know what our readers would say. But lest you think American young people are slouching toward serfdom, you'll be pleased to know that 53% of U.S. high school seniors also answered "b." The latest version of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) asked this question, among others on economics, and the results will not please members of the Socialist International, or for that matter the Senate Finance Committee. Since its founding in 1969, the...

Science Daily — An analysis of Milwaukee County pharmacies shows that about half don't provide prescription labels and instructions in languages other than English, and almost two-thirds are unable to communicate to patients who don't speak English. The study, included in the upcoming edition of Pediatrics, is unusual in that its lead author is a Medical College of Wisconsin 4th-year medical student. Michael Bradshaw worked with statistician Sandra Tomany-Korman under the direction of Glenn Flores, M. D., professor of pediatrics. "Language barriers can have major adverse consequences in health care, but little is known about whether pharmacies provide adequate care...

Source: Northwestern University Date: July 26, 2007 Low Literacy Equals Early Death Sentence Science Daily — Not being able to read doesn't just make it harder to navigate each day. Low literacy impairs people's ability to obtain critical information about their health and can dramatically shorten their lives. A new study from Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine shows that older people with inadequate health literacy had a 50 percent higher mortality rate over five years than people with adequate reading skills. Inadequate or low health literacy is defined as the inability to read and comprehend basic health-related materials such...

Richmond, Virginia In a classroom at Ginter Park Elementary School, a century-old brick schoolhouse on a dreary, zoned-commercial truck route that bisects a largely African-American neighborhood in Richmond, a third-grade teacher, Laverne Johnson, is doing something that flies in the face of more than three decades of the most advanced pedagogical principles taught at America's top-rated education schools. Seated on a chair in a corner of her classroom surrounded by a dozen youngsters sitting cross-legged on the floor at her feet, Johnson is teaching reading--as just plain reading. Two and a half hours every morning, systematically going over such basics...

06 July 2007 From Rags to Riches, Or How Undergarments Improved Medieval Literacy Thought the invention of the printing press led to an upsurge in literacy rates in the later Middle Ages? Wrong, according to some historians of communication, who believe that paper was more important than printing. “The development of literacy was certainly helped by the introduction of paper, which was made from rags,” says Dr Marco Mostert, a historian at the Centre for Medieval Studies, Utrecht University and one of the organisers of this year’s International Medieval Congress at the University of Leeds. “These rags came from discarded...

Share this with All your Friends... And SHOW this to your children and grandchildren !!!! THE YEAR 1907 This will boggle your mind, I know it did mine! The year is 1907. One hundred years ago. What a difference a century makes! Here are some of the U.S. Statistics for the Year 1907: ************************************ The average life expectancy in the U.S. Was 47 years old. Only 14 percent of the homes in the U.S. Had a bathtub . Only 8 percent of the homes had a telephone. A three-minute call from Denver to New York City Cost eleven dollars. There...

The use of a building foundation as a metaphor has been used just about to death, but that's probably because it's both relatively simple and completely appropriate. Let's face the facts: The foundation is integral to the entire structure built above it, and it had better be strong and well made so that subsequent levels don't falter and topple. Many of us who are politically active would encourage others to do the same. The single most important thing that we can do to make that happen is to do our best to see that they're informed about our particular cause...

Most parents are pleased to hear, “…plays nicely with others,” when their children are assessed in preschool or kindergarten. Getting along is a skill that will transfer throughout our lives. On the flip side, it’s hard to be around people with nothing positive to say. Beware the other -all too common- colloquialism, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” Nowadays, in order to get along, people are told what they must believe, who they must accept, and what they cannot say. Society is losing the option of going against the politically correct grain. Daring to disagree...

Muslim mums told to speak English at home Julie Henry, Education Correspondent, Sunday Telegraph Last Updated: 12:30am GMT 14/01/2007 Muslim mothers who do not speak English at home are stunting their children's literacy levels, one of the Government's most influential education advisers said last night. Sir Cyril Taylor, the chairman of the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust, said that the failure of parents to speak English at home was a key reason why some schools were at the bottom of newly-published-league tables. The problem, described by Sir Cyril as a "major issue", should be addressed by a national campaign to...

My mother never had the opportunity to attend college. Yet, on her nightstand, next to her bed, could always be found books by the likes of a Evelyn Waugh, C.S. Lewis, or Robert Louis Stevenson. The product of parochial schools and an America that still treasured high-quality literature, my mother breathed the healthy air of culture not yet polluted by the corrosive effects of the radicalism of the 1960s, rampant egalitarianism, consumerism, or postmodernism. My mother's literary tastes, an inheritance, really, of the society into which she was born and raised, came to mind as I read of the purging...

College administrators are scratching their heads trying to figure our how the straight-A students they accepted tanked on the SATs. “The University of California system, for instance, reported a 15-point drop in applicants’ scores but no corresponding dips in other measures of their quality, such as class rank and grade-point average,” Eric Hoover reports in the September 8th issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education. “At La Salle University in Philadelphia, SAT scores fell an average of 15 points for applicants and about 10 points for admitted students even though officials had not altered their admissions strategies.” “Robert G. Voss,...

Sunday morning vanity for a buddy. One of his new careproviders is fufilling his interest in reading books out loud to him. He does not care for books on tape as he enjoys the interaction of reading with someone. He is a quadroplegic 27yrs now and very active in all aspects of life, case you are wondering. So our little town started a community reading circle and he can check books out of the Library but would rather buy the book and keep it. So word is getting out. But he needs Titles/Authors as people want to give him books....

As news organizations update their obituaries of ailing Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, it’s worth recalling how many liberal journalists have fallen under Castro’s spell over the years, sounding like paid Cuban government propagandists as they touted the "great success stories" of Castro’s decades of communist rule. For some in the media, it was love at first sight. Back on January 18, 1959, New York Times reporter Herbert L. Matthews exulted in Castro’s seizure of Cuba: "Everybody here seems agreed that Dr. Castro is one of the most extraordinary figures ever to appear on the Latin-American scene. He is by any...

Studies have long shown that boys in the United States and around the world do not read or write as well as girls. There are several reasons, according to the common wisdom: Girls mature more quickly. Boys are more likely to suffer dyslexia and other reading disorders. Race and poverty play a role. But a new study finds that the problem cuts across socioeconomic lines and pins part of the blame squarely on schools, whose techniques cater to the strengths of girls and leave boys utterly disinterested.Can't read a newspaper The research, by psychology professor Judith Kleinfeld at the University...

Thousands of schools across the nation are responding to the reading and math testing requirements laid out in No Child Left Behind, President Bush's signature education law, by reducing class time spent on other subjects and, for some low-proficiency students, eliminating it. Schools from Vermont to California are increasing — in some cases tripling — the class time that low-proficiency students spend on reading and math, mainly because the federal law, signed in 2002, requires annual exams only in those subjects and punishes schools that fall short of rising benchmarks. The changes appear to principally affect schools and students who...

NYC Kindergarteners To Be Taught About AIDS Image Kerri Lyon Reporting Save It Email this Article Email It Print this Article Print It (CBS) GLENDALE HIV and AIDS have been taught in New York City classrooms since 1987 with the lessons mandated by the state. But this year, the city has revamped the curriculum, and parents said that it was without their input. Parents have now seen what their kids will be learning, and they have a lot of questions about whether its appropriate in the classroom. Susan Petschauer's third grade son Andrew is getting his first lesson in the...

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The last Global Geographic Literacy Survey, assessing the geographic knowledge of 18-24-year-olds in nine different countries -- Canada, France, Mexico, Great Britain, Japan, Italy, Sweden, Germany and the United States -- was, at best, a disappointment. It found, for example, that only 17 percent of young Americans could locate Afghanistan on a map; 29 percent could not correctly identify the Pacific Ocean; and 11 percent were unable to find the continental United States. If high-school geography classrooms around the United States are anything like that run by "teacher" Jay Bennish, at Overland High School in Aurora, Colorado,...

"Party in your library with the accordion-playing Clown Prince of Mock 'n Roll—"Weird Al"

WASHINGTON (AP) -- One major factor separates high school graduates who are ready for college from those who aren't, a new study shows: how well students handle complex reading. Trouble is, most states don't even have reading standards for high school grades, and not a single state defines the kind of complexity that high school reading should have. "If you're not asking for it, you're not going to get it," said Cynthia Schmeiser, senior vice president for research and development at ACT, the nonprofit company that did the study. In a complex text, organization may be elaborate, messages may be...

When Mark and Jenny Sanford moved from Charleston to Columbia, S.C., they had a big concern: Where would their kids go to school? They wanted to send their kids to public school, but the middle school near their new home was not particularly good. But it turned out that this wouldn't have been a problem for the Sanfords because the reason they had moved to Columbia was Mark had just been elected governor. While students are normally assigned to schools based on where their house is located, Gov. Sanford's family was offered special options: People from better school districts invited...

More than half of college students nearing graduation lack the capacity to perform complex but common tasks, such as computing the cost per ounce of food, grasping the arguments of newspaper editorials, summarizing results of surveys and understanding credit-card offers. "It is kind of disturbing that a lot of folks are graduating with a degree and they're not going to be able to do those things," said Stephane Baldi, who directed a study for the American Institutes for Research. Kind of disturbing? That millions of soon-to-be graduates lack the capacity to perform basic real-world functions is the product of a...

WASHINGTON: More than half of students at four-year colleges in the United States - and at least 75 percent at two-year colleges - lack the literacy to handle complex, real-life tasks such as understanding credit card offers, a study found. The literacy study funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts, the first to target the skills of graduating students, finds that students fail to lock in key skills - no matter their field of study. The results cut across three types of literacy: analyzing news stories and other prose, understanding documents and having math skills needed for checkbooks or restaurant tips....