Standardized testing in schools

My daughter took the STAAR (State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness) test this week at school and while most of the year I totally don't worry about her education because she goes to a pretty good school, the week of these standardized test always make me cringe. I hate standardized testing. I realize that it's a good way to see what level students and schools are performing at but I hate what they represent in the day and age of the No Child Left Behind act. These tests have been put forth by our government in order to see where funding should go and when schools are under performing for multiple years parents have the choice to switch the school that their children go to. The government mandated the amount of funds that schools should get but then refused to pass the amounts in the budget so many schools haven't even gotten monies promised upon the passing of that particular bit of legislation. I completely disagree with these tests, mostly because teachers will teach the test material and leave out important teaching material that children really should learn. Schools that under perform rarely get the funding or resources that they need to get up to the level that the state requires. My daughter goes to a "magnet school" which means that school accepts only gifted students. They are required to keep so many seats for neighborhood children but most of the classes are made up of the gifted students. These kids already test well or they wouldn't be accepted to the school in the first place. When the district holds them back by teaching mostly test material they aren't learning everything they need to know. The biggest textbook that she brings home is the study guide for the standardized tests. There is already certain "controversial" material that is left out of Texas textbooks, but that's a whole other blog! With the NCLB act my kids are rarely given individual opportunities to excel. They are allowed to turn in papers late and receive no less than a 70. They are allowed to bring home failing grade papers and redo them for a 70. What happened to letting children fail so that they learn something from that and try harder next time? I was the type of kid that would only do the minimum that I knew I could get away with. If I knew that no matter what I did I would still get a passing grade then that would be it for me. Children are being held back by these rules and there is nothing that I, as a parent, can do. I am deeply involved in the my kids schools and I do talk to teachers about these issues. They all tend to agree that the tests are a horrible way to gauge anything really. There are ways to help our kids excel in school and forcing these standardized test on kids is not the way. I could go on and on about the ways to help our kids be better students. One way would be to place less emphasis on these tests and more on the way that our kids are taught and helping schools that are falling behind by bumping up funding rather than taking away funding based on test scores. Our children deserve access to a good education. Parents can only do so much at home and some parents work so much to make ends meet that they can't do much at all to teach their children things they need to know. We have to get someone in office who is serious about education. I already spoke about student loans and issues facing college students but now we are making it difficult for a person of any age to get a good, quality education. Anytime education is allowed to fall by the wayside is a time when our country is in trouble!

Carissa

Student Loans in America

I was talking to my sister tonight and we were discussing debt and whatnot. I don't know how we got on topic but it got me thinking about student debt. My husband and I are currently drowning in student debt. I don't know how we stay afloat exactly but we are managing so far. I remember reading an article on Yahoo! not too long ago that followed several people who had student debt. It asked them how much their debt was, whether they were working in the industry that they studied in and how much money they currently made in their jobs. I remember reading that while my own husband was in school racking up $20,000 a year in student loan debt. I also remember thinking then about how in the hell we were going to manage to pay off his loans while saving for our own children to go to college. There is no way we will be able to pay off his loans before my children go to college, barring winning the lottery of course. I want to try to pay for my children's education because I don't want them to be trying to start a family with an unfathomable amount of debt the way I am. I want them to get out of college and start thinking about what house they want and where they want to live, even if they want to travel the world for 10 years before they come back and settle in. I want them to be carefree! Isn't that the way it should be? Anyway, back to the Yahoo! article. Those people who got out of college with Masters degrees and Bachelor's degrees were not doing well. Not one single person. They were all trying to pay back between $30,000 and $120,000 in student debt while making very little money as entry level employees with an entry level salary or not even being able to work in their chosen fields. Of course the economic disaster that our country is in hasn't helped one bit, starting salaries are at all time lows, including ours. Why have tuition rates skyrocketed past normal inflation levels? We all know the value of an education, but is it really worth it to be this stressed out and wondering if we will ever be able to provide our children with the same education that we have? I can't answer that question for everyone but I do know that my husband is happy knowing that he has a Bachelor's, no matter what he had to do to get it. He worked his butt off and I worked hard too, making ends meet while he attended 15-20+ credit hour semesters to get his schooling done as quickly as possible. I am not writing this blog to gripe about our situation. I hope it doesn't seem that way. We are not the exception these days though. Something needs to be done about the cost of education. PELL grants have been cut back and companies are not giving scholarships as freely as they once were, tuition reimbursement is a thing of the past. To add to this private loan companies that offer student loans can charge whatever interest rates they want. While the federally guaranteed loans have regulated interest rates. Our own interest rates go from a very good 6% all the way to 15%. We didn't choose the loan with the 15% interest rate. The school chose it for us. This is happening to students all over our country. Some students have no idea what they are getting themselves into. They couldn't understand it because of the mounds of paperwork they have to sign tells them very little about the types of loans the school can apply for without your consent. They get one initial consent and the rest they can do without any further consultation with you. What can be done about it? We are putting young people at a disadvantage before they even leave the ground. If our country is ever going to pull itself out of this economic situation we have to do something about this. People just want to provide for their families. The 1% say, "Get a real job." and yet college cost are so out of control right now that nobody can afford to get a real job. You have to have a Bachelor's degree just to get anywhere and the average cost of getting one is around $60,000 for a 4 year program. It's almost as much as buying a home. Combine that with interest and it could cripple a young couple trying to buy a home and start a family. Something real has to be done about the cost of college and the interest rates on student loans and soon or only the rich will be able to       afford college and wealth inequality will only get worse.

Carissa :)

Barefoot and Pregnant 2

I have been reading more and more about this whole Planned Parenthood issue. Of course, in this political climate and in an election year, we hear about it every day. I can't understand the math that people are using. Having three children myself I understand that my birth control costs are around $10 a month and that the cost of raising just one child costs on average $600 to $700 a month. I feel as if that could be a conservative estimate. There are a lot of factors that would change that number but it's probably pretty close. Now, I want to understand why we don't want to pay for birth control but we do want to pay out for child care, clothing, housing, food, etc. Trust me, if a woman can't afford her birth control, she sure as hell can't afford to take care of that kid. Why do we want to give her a lifetime of welfare but not help her with her birth control? I talked in my last blog post about using birth control for preventing pregnancy but let's talk about some other uses. I know many women who use birth control to help control heavy flow issues, menstrual cramps, fibroid cysts and tumors, among other things. I have used progesterone in the past to shrink fibroid tumors myself. My insurance should pay for that. They should pay for any necessary medications that my doctor prescribes. If I didn't have insurance where would I go to get this medicine? I would go to Planned Parenthood. I would expect that the state of Texas, where I live, and pay taxes to help me with the costs of such medicine. Currently Texas is attempting to cut all funding to any clinics that provide abortion services, which include Planned Parenthood. Where would I go then? I don't qualify for Medicaid and I make a little too much money to qualify for other services but Planned Parenthood would welcome me with open arms to help me with whatever my issues might be. I used PP in the past for my birth control, yearly exams and such when I didn't have insurance and needed those services. Some women only have their PP nurse or doctor to offer advice for any number of issues they may have. PP is their only source of medical care. What will those women do when they have no clinic to go to? Women may not get their yearly exams and then when they have untreated cancers, cysts, endometriosis, etc they would go to an ER and cost the American taxpayers twice as much as if we had just left PP alone to provide their services. What math equation makes closing PP a good decision? Last time I checked abortion was still legal. Why are we making every effort to defund it so that it essentially becomes unobtainable, legal or not? There are only 682 clinics that offer abortion services in American as opposed to 4,000+ pregnancy resource clinics. Defunding PP and closing abortion clinics will not stop abortions from happening. It will cost us a lot more money to treat women in the ER and it will cost us many lives for women receiving back alley abortions. I understand the moral question involved. We look the other way on so many issues involving morals but we hone in on this. I just can't understand it. Attacking women is not the way to go about this. Please, if you agree and you can help, donate money to PP so that the women out there who need our help can get it. They deserve to get the care they need whether we agree with their decisions or not. I'll say it again, women are important no matter what our healthcare needs are and those needs should be met.

Carissa

Radiohead

Radiohead is political, right? I went and saw Radiohead on Monday so I am kinda brain dead today. I cannot think what to blog about! I do have to say this though. I had the best time EVER! It was truly awesome and I even got a t-shirt! This is my favorite band and it was my first time seeing them. Some of their songs have even helped shape my political views. Thom Yorke is somewhat of an activist and I do enjoy his point of view on some things. He writes amazing music too. Ok, well that's enough gushing. I just exposed myself as a true dork.   To be honest, I am kinda burned out right now. I am just saddened when I read articles about some of the things happening to our people and our Earth right now. Lately, I am having a hard time making myself dig through that every day. I am enjoying the quiet joys of life and family. Like a concert that pretty much made my whole year! My beautiful baby who can sit up, kinda, on his own and has the most gorgeous smile in the world. Life goes by too fast. We have to enjoy the small, quiet moments while trying to stay involved mostly in the pursuit to make it better for us and the generations to come. We should probably start by caring for and about each other. Unfortunately, that has not been our way for some time. I can only hope that we can begin to change our way. I have been finding myself on the verge of tears frequently when I read or watch the news. So I am taking a short break. I am going to try to start attending the Occupy movement general assemblies in Dallas and hear what they are doing. I hope to be able to blog about that a little bit. I am also about to start an organic garden. I am only going to plant a few things but I hope for it to be successful. It's good for the earth and it's probably really good for your grocery budget! I know we eat a lot of fruits and veggies here and boy are they expensive! Hope everyone has a great week! Hope to bring you more great blog material soon.

Carissa :)

Barefoot and Pregnant

I have been thinking long and hard about this blog post. I want to talk about birth control or better yet why all women should have access to it for very cheap or even free. I have been a user of birth control for many years. I know lots of women who use birth control! I am currently using birth control in order to prevent myself from having any more children. I have three at this time and to have any more would put undue hardship on my family. We would love to be able to have an unlimited amount of kids. My husband and I adore children and not just ours. We volunteer in every one of our childrens sports and school activities and we even volunteer when our own children are not involved. We love kids. The number of children we would have if we had no restrictions is probably different between my husband and I but we would definitely have more.
There are all kinds of good reasons not to have children. My reason is simple and yet profound. I cannot knowingly bring another child into the world that I cannot give everything they want/need and then pay for college too. I want my kids to be happy kids and I want them to be involved in all sorts of things. I want them all to have a good education that I provide so that they are not in debt up to their ears like I am because we had to provide our own education. Our parents were, for various reasons, unable to help us with our collge costs. As it is, I will have a difficult time providing a good college education to my three children, but i will do everything I can to make it happen.
If I choose not to have any more children then that should be my choice. Why do some politicians want to limit my access to birth control? Like I said, there are lots of reasons not to have children. Women all over would feel the effects of birth control being limited. Right now politicians are just trying to limit our access to birth control by not making insurance companies pay for it. I'm sure insurance giants would love to have to pay for prenatal care and delivery. They would however make more money in the long term by being able to insure more people. I think that's why they aren't making a peep during all this. I think that eventually politicians will try to ban access to birth control. It was like that prior to the 1930's. Do we really want to move backwards 80 years? Last year in Mississippi there was a bill introduced Mississippi Amendment 26. I have copied and pasted off the website below:
Amendment 26 - The Mississippi Personhood Amendment-- is a citizens initiative to amend the Mississippi Constitution to define personhood as beginning at fertilization or "the functional equivalent thereof." Its purpose is to protect all life, regardless of age, health, function, physical or mental dependency, or method of reproduction.
It basically says that all hormonal forms of birth control, IUD's and the morning after pill would be murder. The IUD for instance, my own personal favorite form of birth control because it's cheap and lasts for 10 years with little maintenance, would be causing murder because it causes fertilized eggs not to be able to implant into the uterus. Our bodies frequently perform this action by itself, say when women are breastfeeding or the body knows it's not healthy enough to support a pregnancy. This amendment would make that illegal. It would also make in-vitro fertilization illegal. People can't be grown in test tubes after all. There were 60,000+ babies born via in-vitro in 2009. That, my friend, is a lot of happy mommies!! The amendment did not pass. As a matter of fact people were quite taken aback by it. I hope that says something. I know people want to stop abortions but is limiting our access to birth control really going to help that situation? Women are going to need birth control of you want to stop abortions from happening. I don't think anything we do will stop them altogether but the best way to combat it would be to offer anyone seeking it free birth control. Women have to be able to take control of their bodies and do what is right for them and their families. I am rambling a little bit here and I have a hard time with this subject because I am so emotionally involved with it. Planned Parenthood was founded in 1942 and they have helped countless women to stop pregnancies from happening that would hurt them for whatever reason. I cannot think of a good reason for all women to be "barefoot and pregnant" as they say. We have come a long way with women's rights and we need to continue to move in the right direction. I read an article today that says that in 40% of American households women are the breadwinners. I am the breadwinner in my house and I am proud of it. If I were to have another child there would be no way I could work and bring home the money my family so desperately needs to survive. Oh sure, I could go on welfare and let the system support me and my countless children but I'd really prefer to take care of myself as most people would. Don't take away the one thing that women need to keep ourselves propelling forward. We are proud of ourselves and we want to keep it that way! Trust me! We are good for more than just having babies and keeping house!

Death and Taxes

A friend of mine once told me how much she paid in taxes and she let me know that she'd be willing to pay more. I am not sure how much money this friend makes but I can hazard a guess that she makes roughly what my family brings in. The reason that she'd be willing to pay more taxes, she tells me, is that she has a police force to protect her, roads to drive on, firefighters to put out her house should it catch on fire, schools for her child to learn in, and so on and so forth. I too would be more than willing to share a bit more of my income to the government to obtain all the great services that I take advantage of on a daily basis. Why then do two middle class people feel that way when people who makes millions, or billions of dollars are not willing to share one more penny? Some would say that that's how they got rich in the first place, by holding on to every penny they made. They call it wealth redistribution, or class warfare. I call bullshit on the whole issue. When times are tough we help each other out more by putting a little more money in the big pot we call government so that we can hold on to the way of living that we have established. It would hurt my family a little to pay more taxes. I may have to cut back on a few things. I would have to cook at home more nights a week, or forgo a date night with my husband. Nobody would go hungry mind you but we would have to make some small sacrifices. What I am having trouble understanding is that if you have, say a billion dollars in the bank and the goverment asks for $100,000 more dollars from you a year, what would you have to give up? Can your children still eat? Can you still buy your wife a new Bentley for Christmas? I would guess the answer to be yes. It may hurt you in some way that I do not understand, but I'd like to know why so many of my middle class friends don't gripe when our taxes go up but you, upper class, do. Taxes are a way of life. There is not any place that you can go where there is any type of government and not have to pay taxes. Like they say, "The only thing certain in life is death and taxes.". As the cost of things rise our taxes must go up. Our wages should go up as well but that's a whole other post altogether. The rich can call it whatever they like, but I call it fairness. We should be willing to help our fellow man. There are a lot of people in our country that are down right now. They need our help and the tax revenue we raise to get through this hard time. A hard time that has been brought on by the greed of the wealthy. When will we see the error of our ways? I can only hope that it's soon becuase if it's not we will die as a country. Other places are already wondering if we are losing our place as a "world superpower" and I think that we are certainly headed that way if we don't fix this, and soon.

Yertle the Turtle? Who knew?

I've been turning the thought of starting a political blog over in my mind for many months. I don't know if I have enough knowledge to share with the masses. I know that I have a hell of a lot of opinions which, I personally, think are great! There are two reasons I have decided to jump in head first to this thing. Well, there are a lot of reasons but the two main reasons are, 1. My daughter, the genius, upon hearing that there were lots of jobs created in the past few years jumped up and down and screamed at me, "I have a future!" and 2. I was reading Yertle the Turtle to my son tonight and I thought it sounded like a damn good thing to blog about. I'll get around to that in a minute! So my daughter is typically the driving force in my life. She is the reason for everything. I know, sounds dramatic but it's so true. I want her to have a future. Will blogging help her to have a future? Short answer is no, but I believe that if I can change even a few minds about some political views she may have a slightly better future then she would have if I did nothing. I will send her to this blog and hope that she knows that I love her and that I have strong opinions and that it's okay for her to have strong opinions too. She is so much smarter than I was at that age so maybe she will change the world if I teach her that it's okay to. Now for my second reason. Dr. Suess, you are one smart bastard!
Here are a few passages that really struck a cord with me:
On the far-away Island of Sala-ma-Sond,
Yertle the Turtle was king of the pond.
A nice little pond. It was clean. It was neat.
The water was warm. There was plenty to eat.
The turtles had everything turtles might need.
And they were all happy. Quite happy indeed.
There were....until Yertle, the king of them all,
Decided the kingdom he ruled was too small.

It goes on to say that Yertle stacked all the turtles of the pond up on top of each other until he could see everything for miles. He was happy until the moon came up and then he wanted to be higher than the moon. A little turtle named Mack was at the bottom of the stack and he was very obviously not happy. The king was upset at the little turtle and tells him:
"You hush up your mouth!" You've no right to talk to the world's highest turtle. I rule the clouds! Over land! Over sea! There's nothing, no NOTHING, that's higher than me!"

The turtle king tries to stack more turtles, but alas, Mack the plain little turtle at the bottom of the stack burps and sends the king flying to the bottom of the pond. Dr. Suess finishes the story with this:
And today the great Yertle, that Marvelous he,
Is King of the Mud. That is all he can see.
And the turtles, of course...all the turtles are free
As turtles and, maybe, all creatures should be.

You may be asking yourself right now why in the hell you are reading a political blog that quotes Dr. Suess! I am here to tell you, this story signifies, to me, the 1% (Yertle) and the 99% (Mack and all the other little turtles). You see, the 1% is up there telling us to shut up and sit down. Do your work and we won't crush you and we are going about like little ants trying to make it even under great hardship. We can fight back, the smallest of us. It only takes a small thing to upset the whole system. We all do deserve to be free! Dr. Suess says it better than anyone I have heard talk about this subject in a long time. Please fight back. We have to do more than burp but not much more. Go and vote. Join the Occupy movement or any other movement out there that will get the word out about what we need to do to free ourselves of this plutarchy that we currently live under. If you don't know what plutarchy is, please, Google it! You will very plainly see that is what we have in America, not a democracy as we were supposed to have. I can't say that the fix is an easy one or one that will happen quickly but I can say that anyone reading this can make a difference. Even just by spreading the word. There is a lot of false information out there and I hope to be able to address some of that in my coming blog posts! I hope you enjoy this blog! Thank you for reading!