newsobserver.com projects - ...than the speaker you don't know - Comments

Dale Swiggett

ryanteaguebeckwith — Tue, 26 May 2009 12:39:45 -0400

Unrelated comment deleted. Dale Swiggett, you're on notice.

— RTB

Re: ...than the speaker you don't know

Isaac136 — Tue, 26 May 2009 09:10:55 -0400

Something tells me Joe S. doesn't actually miss Jim Black.

Re: ...than the speaker you don't know

dawgitall — Sun, 24 May 2009 14:08:24 -0400

The days after the EOG has been administered are indeed difficult ones in the classroom. Students that fail to pass one or more of the tests must retake the tests. The school schedule is totally disrupted as teachers must be pulled from their regular duties to administer tests and classroom instruction is often compromised. Students feel like the school year is over since the EOG's have been completed for them. I personally try to continue quality instruction right up to the last day but it is a battle. My question is how does knocking five, and a year later five more days off the schedule do anything to help? Unless the EOG is administered on the very last days of school and staff are hired to come in after the year is completed to administer the makeups you will continue to have a problem providing quality instruction in the days following the EOG. Also remember that those first days after the students leave are spent closing out the school year. There are tons of things that have to be done and many of us spent time after the work days are over just trying to finish that up since they knocked off some of our workdays a few years ago.

This post is not intended as a complaint, just a few points to bare in mind. Unintended consequences can cause the best of ideas to fall flat.

...than the speaker you don't know

markjohnson — Fri, 22 May 2009 15:34:22 -0400

Joe Sinsheimer, the man whose jimblackmustgo Web site helped topple former House Speaker Jim Black, may be having some regrets.

That's what he wrote on Facebook, anyway.

Legislators are considering shaving a few days off the end of the 2009-2010 school year to save money. Rep. Rick Glazier, a Fayetteville Democrat and education budget writer, said those final days are of limited instructional value.

Sinsheimer wrote: "It is really dangerous when someone as well-respected as Rep. Rick Glazier tells us that the last two weeks of school have limited instructional value. Years from now, when the current budget fiasco has passed, these words will be flung into the face of any who lobby for more funds for our schools. Who would have thought that Joe Hackney et al would be leading this. My God, I am starting to miss Jim Black."