Well, It has been a great, busy summer.  Outside the days are beginning to cool down and for me the classroom is back into my weekly schedule.  Yep.  I started my second Semester this week.  On the agenda this semester is a class on culture and diversity and a class on method and practices.  I would be lying if I said that I was ready to begin this semester, but truthfully, I'm not. 

Well...ready or not...the semester is here and it is time for me to continue on my academic journey.  I'll be letting you know how it goes, if you are interested.

Sorry I haven't posted in a while, I have been really busy.  I just finished my first semester of school and started a new job in the process as well. 

Just recently, I was asked by former students to come and speak at their High School Graduation.  Needless to say, it was an honor to do that. 

I figured what I had to share with them might be useful to all and so here is what I shared with those students on May 24th.

"Hello and Good Evening. Lake Pointe Faculty, Staff, Parents, Grandparents, Distinguished Guests, undistinguished guests (you know who you are), and especially, my friends, the Lake Pointe Academy graduating class of 2012!

Congratulations! You did it! 

It is a great honor and privilege to stand before you tonight and celebrate with you on this great occasion.  A month ago, when I came down to visit, I was approached by one of you and told that I needed to speak at your graduation.  I thought it was a nice gesture, and I even joked that I couldn't make the scene if I didn't have the green.  Realistically I wasn’t sure how it would happen.

Then I was approached by Mr. Lemmon (the school principle).  I immediately said that I would. 

And for good reason.  Like I’m sure it is for you, Lake Pointe Academy holds a special place in my heart.  Although I live exactly 2000 miles from my old classroom, I still feel like I’m a part of this school and this culture.  In fact, I live in the shadow of this great school.  I hate to say it, but ya’ll were the guinea pigs that I was unleashed upon, and I am forever grateful to [ Lake Pointe HR] for hiring this untested weirdo who loved youth and history.  I hope it isn’t conceited of me to say that I must have done alright since you invited me back.  I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

It is a huge responsibility to speak to a graduating class.  When Mr. Lemmon told me “officially” that you wanted me to come down, I began researching what I should say, and do.  I quickly learned that many commencement ceremonies are done by people who have accomplished great success. 

I figured I’d share the story of making my first million….no wait...I don't have a first million.

Well, maybe I could tell you about my book deal...no...no book deal. 

Obviously, I feel a little out of my league.

 I bounced around many ideas.  I turned to the best resources I could find: namely youtube.  I watch great communicators like Ronald Reagan and Larry the cable guy for inspiration.  The last one more so for fun.   I decided that the greatest thing I could share with you tonight- was what I had learned over my journey the last year since you too have been on a journey. 

More specifically, I want to share with you things I have learned that I hope will help you. This last year has been a year of growth for me.  I won’t bore you with details, but between heart searching, job searching, cure searching for my wife’s Fibromyalgia; I unknowingly created a list of things that I wish I’d been told when I graduated high school. 

I think the first thing I want to share with you, comes from the history teacher in me. Do not forget who you are, what you have learned, how you have made it to this point tonight, and at what price you have been bought. That is a lot to unpack, and I don’t want to take to much time teaching or preaching to you tonight, but at this time of the year, graduating classes all over the country are hearing things like: “you are the future” and “you can make a difference” or "all of you are at a major milestone in your life."

These are true, if not a little cliché.

Right now you feel like you can conquer the world.  I know I’ve been there.  Granted it was 15 years ago.  With each new generation the younger generation tries to push the older generation and their values out of the way, but I ask you, as you go out tonight into a future that you either have mapped out or don’t, please do not forget the values that you have learned here. 

Hard work-like the kind that won the trophies in the lobby.  Perseverance the kind you need to make it through Mrs. Smith’s Science classes.  Patience, Charity, Love, Brotherhood, and Determination.  These are just some of the values that you learned and employed that got you to this point tonight.

Also, please do not forget the teachers and the parents that made the journey with you. Do not forget the friends that you sit beside tonight, the community and the relationships that you have with each other.  I recently have gone back to school to get Teacher certification. I am a student again after 10 years.  One of the things that we had to do this year was visit schools and observes the different types out there.  Minnesota was the creator of the charter school.  I have seen many styles, but none with the love and family feeling that LPA has.  If I was to design a school, I would model it after LPA- because the boys and girls sitting next to you are an asset. 

Do not forget or disregard the relationships that you have nourished and maintained here.  If you look back at some of the most effective leaders and most successful people, you will see that they had the ability to maintain and develop friendships.  You have friendships, please maintain them.  Show me your friends, I’ll show you’re your future.  Look around you.  You want to be successful-stick with the person next to you.

Please do not forget that you have been bought with a price, Jesus Christ.  I don’t want to preach- let me just say this.  The workplace and the university can be places of great knowledge and experence, but they can also be places of great trials and temptations. Please remember your calling; To be a light to the world.   

The second thing I want to share with you comes as a Christian.  I want to encourage you not to worry about the present.  The headlines are enough to drive people into hopelessness. Inflation, Rumors of War, A second Term, collapse of European finances.  It’s no wonder suicide rates are up.  It can be bad and it can be scary. 

This year, with all this in the news, struggling for a job, and having a sick wife; I gave up.  There was a time this year when I had a hard time seeing; as my dad always says, God still on the throne.  If you were here the day I visited I shared with you in connections what happened to snap me out of my funk.  I remembered my life's verse.  If you’ve had me in class you know my life’s verse.  Proverbs 6:6 "Go to the ant O sluggard; consider her ways and be wise.  Without having any chief, officer, or ruler, she prepares her bread in summer and gathers her food in the harvest".  

There I was felling sorry for myself and I forgot that God is in control.  Even the ant continues to work.  I can do that. I saw God, enthroned.  Please, do not waste anytime worrying about the present.  Be anxious for nothing, but with Prayer and Supplication make your request known to the Lord.  Worry does no good.  In fact, it paralysises.  Instead request and be active.  Whatever you are doing do it.  Lock on and engage.  

Someone that I have rediscovered this year is George Washington.  Someone who understood the power of God enthroned.

When George Washington was at Valley Forge, the revolution was not going well.  One day, he goes out to pray.  Nearby, a Quaker, Isaac Potts was in the woods and heard Washington praying with such power.  Washington knew that God was in control and that America was going to win.  Potts goes home and tells his wife that although they use to be loyalists, they now would support the cause of liberty, because America was going to win. 

That is how we need to see the world.   I better move on, or the seminary student in me will pop out and I’ll deliver a 3 point sermon before you can say John Calvin. 

Lastly, my friends….as your friend... let me end with two things: First: find what you love and do it. Don't let the expectations of others control your life.  Do what you want and what you love.

 Secondly...one last assignment.  One of the things that I know your teachers and parents have tried to do, is teach you how to learn and to pursue the truth.  Continue that tradition.  Whatever you do, wherever you path takes you.  Seek out the truth.  The truth in politics, the truth in education, the truth in religion. Wheter you go to college, or into the workplace-continue to learn.

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.  Philippians 4:8

Remember how I said I’ve been studying Ronald Reagan and Larry the Cable Guy. 

Well, following their example,

Farewell, God Bless, and Git R Done. 

Thank you.

Moving Forward by Looking Behind

 “When will America make up its mind about what public education should be, and what will American schools and society look like in the next 50 years?  

These are questions that I asked earlier this semester when reflecting on a video that we watched in my "Schools and Society" class.  We recently finished the series and after seeing the whole series I think I can safely speculate that in the near future the American school system will begin looking to the past to move forward, and they will allow more parental choice and control in the education of America’s youth.

The main thing that we will begin to notice with our public education is that the school districts that want to move forward will begin to look to the past for curriculum and guidance.  When the school system began, it was primarily designed and started to teach the three R’s; reading, writing, and arithmetic.  It was focused to raise educated Americans.  There was a focus on patriotism and morality, in addition to the core knowledge areas. 

Then, beginning in the early 1900’s, reformers like John Dewey came out and redesigned the system to be more student oriented and friendly.  The Progressive School was formed to allow learning through social interaction.  Students, in the progressive method, learned best through real-world experience and research.  The classroom moved away from the teacher centered lecture and allowed more hands-on experimentation with the world around us.  Jump ahead to the present and we see a new movement on the rise that I feel incorporates both methods into an interesting and successful program: the "Core Knowledge" method. 

I find the "Core Knowledge" method interesting because it still stresses academic excellence in the cores of reading, writing and math, yet is progressive in its applications and research.  They still stress the basics, but also realize and allow students to own part of their education through hands on research and experimentation.   

Secondly, the schools of the future are going to allow more parental choice and involvement in the education of their child.  Starting in the mid-1980’s after “A Nation at Risk” was issued during the Reagan administration, there was a surge of school choice experiments and legislations.  The goal of school choice at the time was to raise academic excellence by allowing parents to choose schools that best suited the needs of their children.  It also allowed for business to invest in schooling.  They hoped that by bringing business resources and completion into the schools, then the things that makes American business great, would in turn make American education great.  The rise of Magnet schools that specialized in certain fields, vouchers that allowed parents to send their students to a school of choice, and finally the homeschool movement of the 1990’s show that parents are aware,  involved, and invested in the education of their children. 

If the American school systems, and politicians for that matter, wish to remain relevant, and quite frankly employed, they need to begin to reform and redesign the existing public school to meet these expectations.  The story of the American school system is a story of constant change.  We have the advantage of looking back over the course of the last 100 years and can identify the things that have worked, and not worked.  More importantly, we can identify what people want. 

We live in a society where everything is governed by supply and demand.  The American parents in general feel that there is still some improvement that needs to be done in the education of their students.  I think what we will see in the near future are school boards and administrators that will begin to give the people, the parents, what they want and in turn we will see American students unlock their full potential as Americans.

If I were the devil....

I remember as a little kid riding around town with my parents and occasionally we would listen to Paul Harvey and "The Rest of the Story". 
He was such a great storyteller and a great American. 
Recently, I was looking at old American speeches and ran across this broadcast that was astonashing in its predictions. 
I am a Christian.  We are not fighting princes and principalities.  We are all fighting the devil.  He wants America as his own, and unfortunatley, he has been very busy.  Thank you Paul Harvey, May God grant that we listen and learn.

"If I were the devil...

If I were the prince of darkness I’d want to engulf the whole world in darkness, and I’d have a third of its real estate and four fifths of its population. But I wouldn’t be happy until I had seized the ripest apple on the tree: thee.

So I’d set about however necessary, to take over the United States. I’d subvert the churches first. I’d begin with a campaign of whispers. With the wisdom of a serpent I would whisper to you as I whispered to Eve, “Do as you please.” To the young I would whisper that the Bible is a myth. I would convince them that man created God, instead of the other way around. I would confide that what’s bad is good, and what’s good is square. And the old I would teach to pray after me, “our father which art in Washington...”

And then I’d get organized: I’d educate authors in how to make lurid literature exciting so that anything else would appear dull and uninteresting. I’d threaten TV with dirtier movies, and visa versa. I’d peddle narcotics to whom I could. I’d sell alcohol to ladies and gentlemen of distinction. I’d tranquilize the rest with pills.

If I were the devil I’d soon have families at war with themselves; churches at war with themselves; and nations at war with themselves; until each in its turn was consumed. And with promises of higher ratings, I’d have mesmerizing media fanning the flames.

If I were the devil I would encourage schools to refine young intellect, but neglect to discipline emotions; just let those run wild, until before you knew it you’d have to have drug-sniffing dogs and metal detectors at every schoolhouse door.

Within a decade I’d have prisons overflowing; I’d have judges promoting pornography. Soon I could evict God from the courthouse, then from the schoolhouse, and then from the houses of Congress. And in His own churches I would substitute psychology for religion and deify science. I would lure priests and pastors into misusing boys and girls—and church money.

If I were the devil I’d make the symbol of Easter an egg, and the symbol of Christmas a bottle.

If I were the devil I’d take from those who have, and give to those who want it, until I had killed the incentive of the ambitious. And what’ll you bet I couldn’t get whole states to promote gambling as the way to get rich.

I would caution against extremes, and hard work, and patriotism, and moral conduct. I would convince the young that marriage is old fashioned—that swinging is more fun. That what you see on TV is the way to be. And thus I could undress you in public, and I could lure you into bed with diseases for which there is no cure.

In other words, if I were the devil I would just keep on doing what he is doing".

Paul Harvey, March 16, 1993

Mom! Hurry. I'm going to be late for iSchool.

One of the big topics in American society right now is the public school system, or more specifically school choice, school performance, and the failing of American students compared to their competitors in other countries of the world. 

Political parties, unions, and concerned parents alike will clammor, fight, and lobby for what we historically have done since the Great Depression.  Throw government money into the sinkhole that is the public education system.  Granted I am a little biased when it comes to public school, because I am a product of it.  Sadly, I can't hold a candle to my brother and sister who were homeschooled.   

So.  What do we do.  Continue to do the same thing and expect a different result?  I have a better idea.  Instead of turning to the government for help (because they've done such a great job with the post office) why not turn to an institution that generally has lead America to become a world leader in the first place.  Business and capitalism. Lets have schools for profit. 

Sadly, I can't take credit for this, because it has been tried.  In the 1990, the largest of the "For Profit Schools" was Edison Schools.  Now not to get into all the details, they had a rocky beginning and they obviously haven't been very impactful, because many of us haven't heard of them.  Implementation costs to get the schools off and running were high and there were questions about their effectiveness.   

While pondering this last night I got to thinking....what makes America great?  Besides Hot Dogs, mom, and Jeeps.  Everything.  We are exceptional.  Unlike our current President, I believe that American exceptionalism has been a motivator for advancments in technology, morality, and  standards of living.  With that said, imagine what a school run by Apple, Microsoft, or Sony would look like.  I'm thinking the bridge of the Starship Enterprise.  Think of the tech.  Think of the resources that successful businesses can bring to the realm of Public education.  As for questions about their effectiveness, how many businesses hit it out of the park their first year in business, or their first 15 years for that matter?  We shouldn't give up.  Thank goodness Thomas Edison didn't give up after his first attempt with the light bulb. Ronald Reagan once said, "we are too great a nation to limit ourselves to small dreams".  Right now, with "No Child Left Behind" school's effectiveness is decided by test scores.  As a teacher, I know that students testing doesn't always reflect student ability.  Thats a small dream.  Do we really want students that test well, or do we want students that will spend the rest of their life learning?  I for one, want students that will one day be productive citizens in an exceptional society.

How does a business measure effectiveness?  The Bottom Line.  If it isn't profitable, then it is changed or dropped.  Lets pretend that a large successful business starts a school with a specilization in technology and robotics.  Their not in the school business to change society.  They are in the business to transmit society.  To make future businessmen or engineers.  To make a profit, both at the end of the year, and twenty years down the road when these students are in the workforce.  In order to stay profitable, they need parents to bring and keep their students in school.  So, if you were dependent on parents for your livelihood, and not the state or unions, what would you do.  You would hire the best teachers and fire the bad ones.  You would provide the best resources and research.  At the end of the year, your effectiveness would be decided by next years enrollment.  One of the things I've learned over the years is there is no one more invested in the education of a child than the child's parents.  If they don't see improvement with their children, they don't enroll again.  Capitalism at work is a beautiful thing.

I know some may argue that not every parent can be as envolved in their children's education or afford to pay to have their children go to a "For Profit School."  You can also make the point that there have been businesses in the recent past that have been unethical.  That's true.  There will never be a perfect system.  I personlly am a big fan of homeschooling, and it isn't perfect.  I'm not advocating that this become the only school in America.  What I am saying, is that for those who can and who want that "choice", putting the power of the American businessman and entrepreneur behind education is a great option. 

What's so great about the truth?

Great question?  Why does it matter if anyone tells the truth?  In fact, isn't truth in the eye of the beholder? 

I beleve truth to be fundamental and absolute.  There is a right and a wrong. 

I have always prided myself in having no grey area.  In our relationships with co-workers, professors, family, and even ourselves, truth has to be concrete and certain.  Otherwise, you make up the rules as you go along, and soon you no longer see a society of law and order.  Instead you see chaos, and people struggling to figure out what they believe. So...what am I getting at? 

Recently, I have gone back to school to get my teacher certification.  That involves going back to the (cue scary music) the University.  How much untruth will I have to endure before I have that little piece of paper telling the world that I am certified to teach.  Well, lets find out. 

You're invited as I, once again hit the books and debate professors.  Throughout my, or our journey, if you decide to follow, you will hear me share the stuff that I think is interesting, infuriating, and the stuff that I flat out reject because I do not believe it to be true.  Also, for those of you not interested in Piaget's theory of cognitive development, I will be commenting on a little bit of everything.  My favorites include politics, politics, history, and...politics.  I can't promise that you will agree, in fact I have found that most people don't.  In fact, my poor, wonderful wife doesn't always agree.   I will promise however, that I will tell the truth.  I will have facts and examples to back up why I believe what I believe.  Those of you who knew me years ago can thank my wife for tempering my arrogance.  I not here to pick fights.  What's going on in society right now is going to change America for the next 100 years and I don't like it. 

Tonight in class we discussed what our views of school were.  Should a school be a tool for changing society or a tool for transmitting society? I beleive that it should be a tool for transmitting society and reminding use where we have come from.  America has done many good things.  America has done many evil things.  If we lose track of where we have been, and what we have done, good or bad; we won't know where we are going.  That is why I want to be a teacher.  

vincit omnia veritas- truth conquers all things.