Maggie's Farm

Islamic State sells ‘blood antiquities’ from Iraq and Syria to raise money

These people are barbarians. Where can I get some of that loot?

Why Do Teacher Unions Hate Eva Moskowitz?

No surprise. It has nothing to do with education.

The Trouble With Harvard - The Ivy League is broken and only standardized tests can fix it

Fine essay, with lots of content. One quote:

Kowing how our students are selected, I should not have been surprised when I discovered how they treat their educational windfall once they get here. A few weeks into every semester, I face a lecture hall that is half-empty, despite the fact that I am repeatedly voted a Harvard Yearbook Favorite Professor, that the lectures are not video-recorded, and that they are the only source of certain material that will be on the exam. I don’t take it personally; it’s common knowledge that Harvard students stay away from lectures in droves, burning a fifty-dollar bill from their parents’ wallets every time they do. Obviously they’re not slackers; the reason is that they are crazy-busy. Since they’re not punching a clock at Safeway or picking up kids at day-care, what could they be doing that is more important than learning in class? The answer is that they are consumed by the same kinds of extracurricular activities that got them here in the first place.

Your Back to College Wardrobe

Interestingly to me, it's similar to how I dress today, and I was not even alive in 1948.

In 1948, college students believed that they were adults. Many had already been to war and were glad to get into sharp civvies and maybe meet a horny gal at a college tea.

What's the matter with the kids today?!?

You like to read serious books. You like to think about them, and to write essays about them. Should you be a literature major in college? Or just read the canon on your own, along with some of the classic critics?  

Or, if you enjoy eloquent instruction and guidance, why not just take a Great Courses on Literature? They are wonderful, and the price (and probably the high quality) cannot compare with college.

Sometimes we forget that fiction is written mainly for entertainment and stimulation, whatever its depth or quality, refinement or sophistication. Same goes for music and visual and performing arts.

The English major has lost its way; here is a path back.

Some people (especially Leftists) bemoan how hard Americans work. Boo hoo.

They say Europeans have more leisure time. How's that working out for them? More time to drink in cafes? More time to wear thongs on the beach in Ibiza?

I always relate to farmers, other entrepreneurs, and self-employed people. We are on the job constantly, partly out of ambition, partly for survival, partly out of interest.

I am essentially self-employed, but of counsel for a law firm. I work around 55 hours/week, but only bill around 40. I'm not greedy. When I sit by the stream with a cigar and a scotch, I often think about knotty cases. It's fun.

How many hours do you work at remunerative work? If it's less than 50, you ain't really working.

Sol Stern: When the Instructors Need Instructing - A new book reveals the damage education schools have done to pedagogy.

 ... the founders of the twentieth-century education schools—iconic figures like William James, Edward Thorndike, and John Dewey—were disinterested in the nitty-gritty of the classroom and thought little about how to improve methods of instruction. (Thorndike abhorred school visits, calling them “a bore.”) Instead, they preferred to write and do research about more intellectually challenging subjects, such as psychology and human intelligence. What Green calls the uniquely American “myth of the natural-born teacher,” along with the corollary assumption that good teachers simply “know what to do to help their students learn,” also encouraged the ed schools’ inattention to the art of teaching.

That's an assertion by AVI, but I don't know whether he refers to high school or college students. Presumably every college-bound kid would have taken Alg ll in high school, if not AB Calc (most do that too, it seems). He also says:

The math that the other 90% are going to need, day in and day out, to understand the lives they are going to be living, are probability and statistics.

I'm not sure what I think about this. How much math is enough to make a person functional and numerically-literate, and how much to be considered well-educated? I think all of these areas are excellent training for rigorous and critical thinking. It's basically a logical language, and seems best approached that way.

I have heard experts say that around 5-10% of high school grads are truly eager and ready for rigorous higher ed. The rest are just postponing adulthood.

(A good, non-academic intro is Tom Sowell's Basic Economics (2nd Edition): A Citizen's Guide to the Economy.)

We all seek all of the kinds of basic literacy we can attain: Moral, Religious, Mathematical and Scientific, Historical, Literary, Artistic, Recreational, etc., but it's a never-ending pursuit because life is so full of riches. Most of us join the heavenly choir before the job is done. Either that, or begin to forget what we once knew and need to start at the beginning again.

For example, at lunch I have been trying to figure out how Hannibal fed his 90,000 troops, plus the elephants and horses, during his march from Carthaginian Spain over into what is now called Italy around 218 BC. I learned about it once, but have forgotten. Talk about logistics...

Prof. Jacobson found this: New study finds economic illiteracy correlates with political preferences. I find that basic economic illiteracy is rampant, and thus is replaced by emotion.

The Marshmallow...

Marshmallow candy originated in ancient Egypt. It was a honey candy that was flavored and thickened with Marsh-Mallow plant sap.

Photo below is the Marsh Mallow plant which is a native of marshy areas in the Old World, now wild in North America. You can read about it here.

In Yankeeland, the revolting Marshmallow Fluff is an old classic in the form of the Fluffernutter sandwich. Generations of New England kids were raised successfully of a diet of this goo.

Apparently it is easy to make your own Marshmallows at home.

I prefer my Marshmallows plain, on a stick over an open fire, preferably permitted to burst into flame to produce a black crust before blowing them out. Few can resist some campfire S'mores, but I can. Too sweet for me.

It makes good sense to me. Texas Ends High School Early.

In three years, any ordinary, motivated kid can get through the HS basics: Essay-writing, grammar, basics of research papers, math up to or through Calc 1, American History, World History, Bio, Literature-reading, Chem, Physics, Civics, and whatever.

Why not just complete HS requirements as quick as you can, and then leave?

I still do not understand the mission of Middle School.

We noted in our piece on Visiting Colleges that responsible parents can decide what their kids need to learn in college, even if they go somewhere with minimal core requirements.

This should not be left to the kids to decide, because 1. It's too important 2. We know better than they do what they need to know to be educated adults with an openness to the richness of life, 3. We should have our own ideas about what we want our own kids to know (eg, any kid who doesn't know basic geology is a bore), 4. Colleges, in their pandering to students, tend to not want to tell them what they need to know, and 5. Who pays the piper calls the tune.

Here's an example of Mom and Pop's Minimum Required College Courses for a Liberal Arts education, regardless of major or interests (these can be met with High School APs or equivalent too):

Math and Science: Math through at least first year calc (BC calc), Statistics, Bio with lab, Physics with lab, Chem with lab, Geology intro, Astronomy

General: History of Western Thought (or Western Civ, or whatever it might be called), Art History Survey, Music History Survey, a political science course, Micro and Macro Economics, a Bible-based Christian Theology course, Intro to Accounting (if you can find something like that in a fancy college. If not, take over the summer at a local college. It will be a huge help to anything a person does in life, including volunteer jobs.)

History:  American History, European History, Classical History

Literature: Shakespeare plus 2 other lit courses

This is a minimal foundation for "lifetime learning" and reading. A young person with this foundation ought to be able to discuss almost any subject that comes up - if maybe only superficially - and to know how to learn more about it efficiently when they want or need to do so. Corny but true.

nb: Before you debate me on this, note that these are minimal requirements. You ain't eddicated if you don't know this stuff. Of course, you can get it all at Great Courses.com, cheaper and better and without exams.

A few more below the fold -

Re the Government-Academic Industrial Complex: 

The higher education business should look to earlier episodes of technological tumult to gauge its future.

Why the super-rich aren’t leaving much of their fortunes to their kid.

I have never had a super-rich client, but I have dealt with many wills and estates.

Some people say "Die broke." Most prefer to leave something for their kids and grandkids and make some modest sacrifices to do that. There is no "should." People ought to do whatever they want, even if it ruins their kids.

I am completely opposed to any death taxes. They are legal theft, and the money has already been taxed once. When families can accumulate assets over generations, families achieve independence and freedom.

More from McArdle: Money Won't Buy Your Kids a Future

I will not ask very private questions such as "What's in your pockets," "What's in your briefcase?," or "What's in your pocketbook?"

However, I will tell that all there really ever is in my pockets are my wallet, a pocketknife, some crumbled-up paper money, and a few coins. Nothing interesting.

A charming essay by G.K. Chesterton: What I Found in My Pocket

It's a cliche because there is so much truth in that expression that it is at least half-true. You could make the same case for bad luck.

I advise the youth to regard life as a conveyor belt of opportunities rolling past you. Experiences, jobs, relationships, books, learning, etc. They roll by, but almost never come back. If you grab enough of them, some will work out. On the other hand, the same bad selections that life offers keep returning, don't they?

Investigating luck: Unlucky people miss chance opportunities because they are too focused on looking for something else

I have been lucky in ways that I had nothing at all to do with (raised in an educated, middle-upper middle class church-going American family with no divorce), decent genes, a functional and honest personality (despite my share of flaws which nobody really knows about but one of which happens to be a lack of talent for anything requiring talent), etc. However, I give myself credit for making the most of those gifts in my pursuit of happiness and satisfaction. I suppose that I "could have made more of myself," but I didn't want to.

We've been posting about fly fishing. Is it an effete hobby for the elite?

God knows, it's a harmless and pleasant hobby, requiring art, skills, knowledge, and only minimal intelligence. As we say, it's no way to make sure you have supper because bait on a hook is the best way to do that whether in pond, stream, lake, or ocean. You can catch a trout with a worm in ten seconds.

Bamboo fly rods can cost anywhere from near a thousand to a few thousand, and fancy fly reels can be expensive too even though they are hardly needed. Purists scoff at fiberglass or graphite fly rods, partly because they are non-traditional and partly because they are a little easier to use. Many trout streams are limited to fly fishing.

For me, fishing, hunting, and hiking a trail are just excuses to spend time outdoors enjoying God's creation and taking not of every critter, tree and plant, and the geology. It's good fun to shoot a bird, catch a trout or a Striped Bass on a fly, etc., but that is a different sort of day than going to the store to get them.

Sport is sport and shopping is shopping.

The skills and lore of fly fishing are endless and great time-wasters for fellows and for a few special gals. Lots of guys spend hours tying their own flies, inventing their own flies, practicing the various sorts of casts, trying for salmon, salt-water game fish, etc.

Who could object or take offense?

Imaginary victories against imaginary problems: Campus Activism: the Fight for Imaginary Victories:

Good things for carrying anything and everything: eBags.

Liberalism’s Beleaguered Victory.

Human nature is immutably flawed and tragic.

Is it too late? Saving Federalism in the USA.

The piece, a detailed essay, is a bit of important US history.

Bought a New Vacation Home? I’m So Sorry

Ten facts about Minneapolis public schools and a few questions