Seeing Red

I just have to answer this Daily News article. Since I know they would never print my response, I will just post it here. My comments are in red because that is what I saw when I read this article. The black is from the News.

With the new school year nearly here, with principals bracing for budget cuts, almost 2,000 teachers are getting ready to pass their days at full salary - doing nothing.

DO NOTHING!!!!!! The author of this article has not seen an ATR at work or he would never write this. One of the ATRs in my school taught 5 classes (some not even in her license area) one term and the other term she taught 4 classes and mentored two new teachers. Yes, the teacher that is deemed too unfit to be in a classroom was asked to help two young newbies. She was also asked to run staff development. Another ATR worked in the college office and spent almost every period counseling students, helping them fill out college applications and all the other stuff that goes with applying for the universities. Still another one worked as a daily sub (not her choice.) She got to know some of the most difficult students in the school and was able to help them. They are more than earning their salaries and if there are schools where they aren't, the administration is to blame, not the teacher.

They have no place to go because the city's more than 1,100 principals have not offered positions. Which is a biting commentary on how well-suited many seem to be for the classroom.

HOW WELL SUITED!!! The problem is not the ATR, it is the fair funding policy and the fact that principals want the young, moldable teachers. The mentor program no longer exists so quite a few ATRs are former mentors. Klein told them they were the cream of the crop. Now they are undesirable. Take a 30 something principal who is lucky he can wipe his own bottom and take his word on suitability. Give me a break!

The roster is now a couple thousand long, at a cost of $200 million a year. The Education Department has offered résumé-writing help and other job-hunting aid. And Chancellor Joel Klein has assured principals their budgets will not take a hit if they hire pricier, more experienced teachers rather than younger peers.

All the help mentioned is true however most of these people don't need the help. They are experienced, qualified people who know how to present themselves. And, schools will take hits in the long run. Principals don't want teachers who might ask why instead of answering "Yes sir, may I have another."

The longer teachers stay idle, the smaller their chances of finding work. Long timers are more likely to have unsatisfactory performance ratings than colleagues outside the pool. More than 325 have sat for over a year.

Isn't it interesting that only older teachers are undesirable and have unsatisfactory ratings. I smell a rat here. The three ATRs I know all have satisfactory rating for their entire careers and they still cannot get teaching positions.

The waste is unconscionable.

IT SURE IS. Klein ought to force principals to hire these wonderful teachers.

I know I am rambling on a problem that is not mine. But, it could be. Besides, I grew up in an era where people stood up for others, we weren't afraid of consequences. We stood up for what is right.

This is only a little blog but when I look at the counter in the sidebar, I know it is well read. I would be just as guilty as Klein, Bloomberg, the principals out there who won't hire ATRs, and the writer of this article if I kept silent. My message has to be heard and it has to be repeated over and over again. We can't let ATRs lose their job because of the negative propaganda being spread.

You might be safe in your job today, but you never know what tomorrow will hold. Your "A" school today might be an F school next year and Klein will decide to shut it down. You will then be an ATR. The principal that loves you now might be replaced by a teenie bobber leadership academy one next year. You might then become an ATR. You might be young now but trust me, if you are fortunate, you too will be old and the system will want to put you out to pasture as well.

A Heart Of Gold

I miss my newspaper while on vacation and make it a practice to skim through all the ones I missed while away. Please forgive this rant that is old news to most people, but new to me.

Saturday's Newsday had a headline that grabbed my attention:

Bloomberg says drug CEOs aren't paid much

I couldn't believe my eyes. In fact, Bloomberg is quoted as saying:

"Last time I checked, pharmaceutical companies don't make a lot of money, their executives don't make a lot of money."

The article also listed a chart showing the pay packages at these companies in 2007. They ranged from a high of $33.3 million to a low of $9 million. I guess the guy at the bottom is the one Bloomberg is feeling sorry for.

Everyone, lets open our wallets and checkbooks to donate to these poor individuals. me. Bloomberg claims to care about the common man and here he is doing just that. All you Bloomberg groupies, be glad you found a man who supports you well.

I couldn't find the link to the article I read, so I googled Bloomberg and drug CEO's. You can check the results here.

Let's all remember to vote for this man with a heart of gold who realizes that one cannot live on $9 million dollars a year and that $33 million is not all that much.

So Much For Standardized Testing

Error on test spotted by Kan. student 1 year later

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) - A high school student's keen eye has caught a state test error that managed to slip past teachers, test coordinators and other students for almost a year. Geoffrey Stanford, 17, discovered during a Kansas writing test last week that an essay question concerning greenhouse gases incorrectly used the word "omission" for the word "emission," prompting the Wichita East High School junior to point out the error.

"I thought, 'Surely they're not talking about leaving out carbon dioxide altogether.' It just didn't make sense," Stanford said. "It had to be a mistake."

The state Department of Education has e-mailed a corrected version of the essay question to test coordinators around the state, but the incident already has caused a lot of red faces at the department, which used a committee of more than 30 state teachers to develop the test almost two years ago. The questions had been tested in 50 high schools last spring.

"You hate that sort of thing to happen, but it happens," said Karla Denny, an Education Department spokeswoman and former English teacher. "We're human."

No one before Stanford had reported the error, Denny said. Stanford said he is careful with his written work and called himself a "stickler for grammar and vocabulary and the correct use of words." "It annoys me when I see mistakes," he said.

Stanford's discovery has caught national attention, even earning him an appearance Sunday on the Fox News Channel's "Fox and Friends" morning show. "It's been hilarious, because I just never thought it would get to this point," he said. "Some people are saying, 'Good job,' and some are giving me a little grief about it."

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

In Boynton, Florida, Michael Harrison and Kevin Carter were arrested and charged with armed robbery and murder in their attempt to raise money to attend the police academy.

Bizarre News

Who Says Math Is Not Relevant To Real Life?

You even need it to read the comics.

Baby Blues 12/31/08
Rhymes With Orange 12/13/08

Hard To Believe This Is Going On In The 21st Century

ATLANTA (Dec. 17) - A Muslim woman arrested for refusing to take off her head scarf at a courthouse security checkpoint said Wednesday that she felt her human and civil rights were violated.

A judge ordered Lisa Valentine, 40, to serve 10 days in jail for contempt of court, said police in Douglasville, a city of about 20,000 people on Atlanta's west suburban outskirts.

Valentine violated a court policy that prohibits people from wearing any headgear in court, police said after they arrested her Tuesday.

Kelley Jackson, a spokeswoman for Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker, said state law doesn't permit or prohibit head scarfs.

"It's at the discretion of the judge and the sheriffs and is up to the security officers in the court house to enforce their decision," she said.

Valentine, who recently moved to Georgia from New Haven, Conn., said the incident reminded her of stories she'd heard of the civil rights-era South.

"I just felt stripped of my civil, my human rights," she said Wednesday from her home. She said she was unexpectedly released after the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations urged federal authorities to investigate the incident as well as others in Georgia.
The group cited a report that the same judge removed a woman and her 14-year-old daughter from the courtroom last week because they were wearing Muslim head scarves.

Jail officials declined to say why she was freed and municipal Court Judge Keith Rollins said that "it would not be appropriate" for him to comment on the case.

Last year, a judge in Valdosta in southern Georgia barred a Muslim woman from entering a courtroom because she would not remove her head scarf. There have been similar cases in other states, including Michigan, where a Muslim woman in Detroit filed a federal lawsuit in February 2007 after a judge dismissed her small-claims court case when she refused to remove a head and face veil.

Valentine's husband, Omar Hall, said his wife was accompanying her nephew to a traffic citation hearing when officials stopped her at the metal detector and told her she would not be allowed in the courtroom with the head scarf, known as a hijab.

Hall said Valentine, an insurance underwriter, told the bailiff that she had been in courtrooms before with the scarf on and that removing it would be a religious violation. When she turned to leave and uttered an expletive, Hall said a bailiff handcuffed her and took her before the judge.

Math Error--NCLB Screws Up Again

Our surreal nation: School district math snafu forces layoffs of math teachers
Geoff Williams
Oct 17th 2008 at 5:40PM

CNN is reporting today on its web site that due to a miscalculation in the school district budget for Dallas, Texas, officials were forced to lay off 375 teachers and 40 counselors and assistant principals yesterday. Another 460 teachers were transferred to other schools within the district.

At least one girl was crying, in the article, as she said good-bye to her music teacher. "Why do you have to leave?" she was quoted as wailing.

The irony would be funny if it weren't so sad and serious: that a math error is hurting Dallas' school children. A math error? A math error has led to the dismissal of math teachers, and numerous other instructors, and it's going to make at least the Dallas area's educational system even weaker, and as I noted in a post just yesterday, when we have a weak educational system, our entire country suffers.

While the nationwide school program No Child Left Behind program is often maligned for its bureaucracy, it's incidents like this that make me see why it was created. When children are left behind, some of them grow up and get jobs. Like in the government, not to mention Wall Street, and even the occasional corporation like Enron. Suddenly, I'm starting to see that a lot of people, kids and grownups, would be better off if at least some adults in prominent financial positions were forced to retake some of their high school and college math courses.

Geoff Williams is a freelance journalist and the author of C.C. Pyle's Amazing Foot Race: The True Story of the 1928 Coast-to-Coast Run Across America (Rodale).

Vice In Go-Go Boots?

Vice in Go-Go Boots?
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/31/opinion/31dowd.html
By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: August 31, 2008

The guilty pleasure I miss most when I’m out slogging on the campaign trail is the chance to sprawl on the chaise and watch a vacuously spunky and generically sassy chick flick.

So imagine my delight, my absolute astonishment, when the hokey chick flick came out on the trail, a Cinderella story so preposterous it’s hard to believe it’s not premiering on Lifetime. Instead of going home and watching “Miss Congeniality” with Sandra Bullock, I get to stay here and watch “Miss Congeniality” with Sarah Palin.

Sheer heaven.

It’s easy to see where this movie is going. It begins, of course, with a cute, cool unknown from Alaska who has never even been on “Meet the Press” triumphing over a cute, cool unknowable from Hawaii who has been on “Meet the Press” a lot.

Americans, suspicious that the Obamas have benefited from affirmative action without being properly grateful, and skeptical that Michelle really likes “The Brady Bunch” and “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” reject the 47-year-old black contender as too uppity and untested.

Instead, they embrace 72-year-old John McCain and 44-year-old Sarah Palin, whose average age is 58, a mere two years older than the average age of the Obama-Biden ticket. Enthusiastic Republicans don’t see the choice of Palin as affirmative action, despite her thin résumé and gaping absence of foreign policy knowledge, because they expect Republicans to put an underqualified “babe,” as Rush Limbaugh calls her, on the ticket. They have a tradition of nominating fun, bantamweight cheerleaders from the West, like the previous Miss Congeniality types Dan Quayle and W., and then letting them learn on the job. So they crash into the globe a few times while they’re learning to drive, what’s the big deal?

Obama may have been president of The Harvard Law Review, but Palin graduated from the University of Idaho with a minor in poli-sci and worked briefly as a TV sports reporter. And she was tougher on the basketball court than the ethereal Obama, earning the nickname “Sarah Barracuda.”

The legacy of Geraldine Ferraro was supposed to be that no one would ever go on a blind date with history again. But that crazy maverick and gambler McCain does it, and conservatives and evangelicals rally around him in admiration of his refreshingly cynical choice of Sarah, an evangelical Protestant and anti-abortion crusader who became a hero when she decided to have her baby, who has Down syndrome, and when she urged schools to debate creationism as well as that stuffy old evolution thing.

Palinistas, as they are called, love Sarah’s spunky, relentlessly quirky “Northern Exposure” story from being a Miss Alaska runner-up, and winning Miss Congeniality, to being mayor and hockey mom in Wasilla, a rural Alaskan town of 6,715, to being governor for two years to being the first woman ever to run on a national Republican ticket. (Why do men only pick women as running mates when they need a Hail Mary pass? It’s a little insulting.)

Sarah is a zealot, but she’s a fun zealot. She has a beehive and sexy shoes, and the day she’s named she goes shopping with McCain in Ohio for a cheerleader outfit for her daughter.

As she once told Vogue, she’s learned the hard way to deal with press comments about her looks. “I wish they’d stick with the issues instead of discussing my black go-go boots,” she said. “A reporter once asked me about it during the campaign, and I assured him I was trying to be as frumpy as I could by wearing my hair on top of my head and these schoolmarm glasses.”

This chick flick, naturally, features a wild stroke of fate, when the two-year governor of an oversized igloo becomes commander in chief after the president-elect chokes on a pretzel on day one.

The movie ends with the former beauty queen shaking out her pinned-up hair, taking off her glasses, slipping on ruby red peep-toe platform heels that reveal a pink French-style pedicure, and facing down Vladimir Putin in an island in the Bering Strait. Putting away her breast pump, she points her rifle and informs him frostily that she has some expertise in Russia because it’s close to Alaska. “Back off, Commie dude,” she says. “I’m a much better shot than Cheney.”

Then she takes off in her seaplane and lands on the White House lawn, near the new ice fishing hole and hockey rink. The “First Dude,” as she calls the hunky Eskimo in the East Wing, waits on his snowmobile with the kids — Track (named after high school track meets), Bristol (after Bristol Bay where they did commercial fishing), Willow (after a community in Alaska), Piper (just a cool name) and Trig (Norse for “strength.”)

“The P.T.A. is great preparation for dealing with the K.G.B.,” President Palin murmurs to Todd, as they kiss in the final scene while she changes Trig’s diaper. “Now that Georgia’s safe, how ’bout I cook you up some caribou hot dogs and moose stew for dinner, babe?”

Some Incentive To Buy

U.S. Auto Dealership Offers Gun With Purchase
By AP
BUTLER, Missouri (AP) - Salesmen at a Missouri car dealership are not just kicking in a free CD player or air conditioner: They are offering a free handgun with every purchase.Through the end of the month, car buyers at Max Motors in Butler will have a choice - $250 (159) toward either a gun purchase or gasoline.General manager Walter Moore said that so far, most buyers have chosen the gun, adding that he suggests they opt for a semiautomatic model "because it holds more rounds."(In the fine print, the ad on the Web site explains, "Check written toward purchase price" and also mentions, "Approved Background Check REQUIRED!!")Moore said he suspects his "Free Handgun" ad will draw protests in some places. But not in Butler, about 65 miles (105 kilometers) south of Kansas City.

Student Urinates in Lunch Box in Class

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - A teacher was put on paid leave Tuesday while officials investigate why a student urinated in a lunch box during her class.

The Meadowbrook Middle School student urinated in a lunch box while hiding behind a classroom bookcase, Orange County school officials said Tuesday.

According to statements by other students in the class, school officials think that when the boy asked to go the restroom on Thursday, teacher Jameeka Chambers told him to hold it or use her lunch box.
The boy took the lunch box, hid behind a bookcase, urinated in it and returned it to her, Frank Kruppenbacher, attorney for the Orange County School Board, told the Orlando Sentinel.

"I think we clearly know she didn't tell him, 'Go pee in this box,' in the sense of going to go do that," Kruppenbacher said. "That's beyond our comprehension."

Chambers is to be interviewed on Monday.

The next morning the boy's mother complained to the principal and told a local TV station that Chambers would not allow him to use the restroom.

The boy was not regularly in Chambers' class, but was in her room to complete makeup work on a computer, Kruppenbacher said.
This is a first-year teaching job for Chambers, who teaches sixth-grade language arts.

A telephone number listed under the name of a Jameeka Chambers in Orlando was busy.

How many times have we all been told by administrators not to let the kids use the pass to go to the bathroom? How many times have we had kids who just want us to let them walk the halls? Is this another way to send teachers to the rubber room for no reason?

Not Exactly Why Schools Have Cable....

School District Investigates Porn Bill

Apr 7, 10:49 PM (ET)

UNION CITY, N.J. (AP) - School district officials are trying to identify who watched $250 worth of pay-per-view pornographic movies using a school cable television box, officials said.

Someone after business hours used one of the five cable boxes in the Board of Education building to order the films, priced between $4.95 and $9.95.

The cable provider, Cablevision, has refunded the school district the money, and is helping to investigate the purchases.

School officials have since gotten rid of three of the cable boxes. A board official said the building had cable in case there was an emergency.

Not A Great Form of Discipline

She might lose her job?????

April 5, 2007

A Toronto school principal faces a serious board of education review after admitting to throwing feces at a young boy who was not in her care.

Maria Pantalone, 49, pleaded guilty to assault against a child Monday out of "total frustration" but was given an absolute discharge to keep her from having a criminal record stemming from the incident last June - but she now faces peer sentencing for her actions.

Since the charge, she has been suspended indefinitely from her job as principal at Keele Street Junior Public School and Mountainview Alternative.

The in-house counsel for the Toronto District School Board, Grant Bowers, told the Toronto Star that the board will be conducting its own review into the incident.

Mr. Bowers said that the review could result in punishment, transfer or dismissal of Bowers.

In his ruling, the judge said Pantalone was "publicly embarrassed, if not humiliated. She has suffered more than most." She might get her job back.

Test Rules May Loosen for Disabled Kids

So, does he really care about helping these kids or is he just looking to find a way to make the NCLB policies look more successful?

Test Rules May Loosen for Disabled Kids

By NANCY ZUCKERBROD
AP Education Writer

April 4, 2007, 9:23 PM EDT

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration is letting more children with disabilities take simplified tests under the No Child Left Behind education law. The change, outlined in final regulations Wednesday, would triple the number of children who can take tests that are easier than those given to most students under the 2002 law.

Roughly 10 percent of special education students -- those with the most serious cognitive disabilities -- currently can take simplified, alternative tests and have the results count toward a school's annual progress goals.

Under the new rules, about an additional 20 percent of children with disabilities could take alternative tests and have those count toward a school's progress goals.

The new tests are for children who are not severely disabled but who have been unable to work on grade level at the same pace as their peers because of disabilities, such as some forms of dyslexia.

The new tests will not be as easy as those given to the children already exempted from the regular tests. But the tests will not be as hard as those given to typical students. Federal officials said the new tests would provide educators with a more meaningful way to measure what some students with disabilities know and can do.

"It's an option for those children whose needs are not being met under the current system," the deputy education secretary, Raymond Simon, said Wednesday.

The change means 3 percent of all children -- or roughly 30 percent of all children with disabilities -- will be allowed to be tested on standards geared for them.

The No Child Left Behind law is up for renewal in Congress this year and lawmakers, educators and the public have pushed for changes.

Simon said the administration would like to see the new special education rules written into law when No Child Left Behind is updated.

Some lawmakers gave the new rules high marks.

"It's essential to fully include children with disabilities in No Child Left Behind's guarantee that every student counts. Today's regulation is an important step forward in helping to address that challenge by ensuring better assessments for children with disabilities that recognize their progress and ability to achieve at high standards," said Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., who heads the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

The administration is responding to pleas from states for more flexibility in how they test special education students.

The 2002 law requires that all students be tested in reading and math in grades three through eight and once in high school. When enough students miss annual progress goals, their schools can face consequences such as having to overhaul their staff.

Schools can face penalties even when just one group of children, such as those with disabilities, fails to meet the benchmarks.

That has focused more attention on the progress of children with disabilities, says Doug Fuchs, a professor of special education at Vanderbilt University.

"It includes them in the same accountability framework as kids without disabilities," Fuchs said. "Educators feel as compelled to work with kids with disabilities as they are compelled to work with kids without disabilities."

Several advocacy groups for children with disabilities worry that the changes could weaken the promise to leave no child behind.

"Most of these kids surprise us in what they can do," said Katy Neas, a lobbyist for Easter Seals. "When we set the bar higher, more kids do better than we ever thought they could."

Neas said she hoped the government would provide states and districts much help in coming up with high-quality tests and putting the new policy in place to ensure the right students are given the correct tests.

The department said $21 million would be available to help states come up with the new tests.

In addition to calling for changes in how special education students are tested under No Child Left Behind, lawmakers are debating changing the testing requirements for students learning English.

Lawmakers also are considering giving states more flexibility in how they measure student progress. Schools that fail to meet progress goals by just a little are treated the same as schools that miss those goals by a wide margin, something lawmakers say is unfair.

___

On the Net:

Education Department's Office of Special Education:
Copyright 2007 Newsday Inc.

It's The Real Thing

Pair Accused of Trying to Poison Teacher

Apr 2, 10:24 PM (ET)

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) - Two students were arrested on felony charges that they tried to poison their science teacher by pouring a fabric freshener into her soda, authorities said Monday.

The teacher, 51-year-old Jacqueline Hutchins, was not hurt, the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office said. She noticed an odd taste when she sipped her Pepsi on Friday.

Other students told deputies the boy and girl, both 15, huddled around the teacher's soda and talked about putting the Febreeze fabric freshener in her soda, authorities said.

The boy and girl, both 15, were charged with poisoning, a first-degree felony, authorities said. They were taken to a juvenile detention center, and their status was not available Monday.

Dangerous Conditions? Not According to DOE

According to an article in this week's Queens Tribune, the DOE has two suspension trailers that sit several feet behind PS 173, located at 174-10 67th Ave. These trailers are the site that students in grades six through eight who have committed dangerous and violent infractions are attending classes and receiving "counseling". Parents, community leaders and elected officials are up in arms about he inappropriateness of such a site so near to an elementary school. DOE officials claim parents have no need to worry. These students are in totally different facilities with their own security guards, faculty and learning center and the dismissal times are different. To me and the parents in the community, this is just an incident waiting to happen.

The NY Sun

We just started receiving the NY Sun. We got an offer for a free year and hating to pass up a bargain started our subscription immediately. Truthfully, I just thought it would give my husband another crossword puzzle to do and I might even come up with a new restaurant to visit, but I was not expecting anything more.

I always skim over the paper when I get home from work and have found this newspaper to be ...hope you are sitting....PRO TEACHER. Today there is an article by Sara Berman asking why private schools employ mediocre teachers. (She heartily defends most teachers in the article) and ends with "I don't know how the teachers do it."

The front page had an article on Klein's school spending and while he has promised to cut beaucracy since his appointment in 2003 but has in actuality done the opposite. Even his planned budget cut of $73 million will only save money he was spending on the new bureacrats he hired. He reminds me of the shopaholic who saves $200 by spending $300 on things that they don't need to begin with.

Let's hope The Sun keeps on standing up for what is right. If it does, I will continue my subscription even when I have to pay for it.

Are Teachers The Only Ones Held Accountable?

Students' test rulers don't measure up
Mismarked tools supplied by state create what teachers say is even more stress during assessments

BY JOHN HILDEBRAND
john.hildebrand@newsday.com
March 13, 2007

Teachers now administering the state's annual math tests complain that, this year, Albany has come up a little short.

Literally.

The problem: 1.1 million plastic protractors mailed out by the state last month with test packets are missing 1/16th of an inch from the four-inch ruler along the bottom of the angle-measuring tools.

Moreover, 1.6 million plastic rulers also sent out by the state are irregularly marked, with quarter-inch hash marks that are shorter than three-quarter-inch marks. Those lines are equal on standard rulers.

The State Education Department says it purchased the Chinese-made devices for $324,000 through a state-approved vendor, United Supply Corp. of Brooklyn, which did not return calls for comment yesterday.

Department officials first became aware of the flaws Feb. 28, through a call from a regional BOCES agency serving schools in the Syracuse area. In response, Steven Katz, the department's assessment director, wrote that the protractors and rulers were "the best plastic measurement tools that the Department was able to procure in the large volume required at a reasonable cost."

Eileen Welch, coordinator of math and science for the Brentwood school district, Long Island's largest, said the situation "just adds to the frustration and stress."

Like many colleagues, Welch fears the faulty devices could add to pressures on the more than 200,000 Long Island students already harried by hours of testing. Statewide tests for students in grades 3-8 began last week and continue through this week.

Scores won't be compiled until the end of this month. But education department officials who had hoped the measuring equipment would ensure uniformity in testing say they don't expect flaws to affect students' marks. These officials add that the protractors are used only for measuring angles, not lengths.

Mary Sennett, a math specialist who initially alerted BOCES to the problem says she's never seen rulers marked this way before.

Sennett, who works at a school serving Native American students 10 miles south of Syracuse, thinks it's ironic that state testing officials should suggest that flawed equipment is good enough.

"They are holding us to a very high standard within our district - we are expected to have most of the kids passing," Sennett said. "So now I think these people should be doing the best they can."

PROTRACTED PROBLEM

1.1M

Number of plastic protractors that had 1/16 inch missing from the ruler across the bottom

$324,000

Amount State Education Department says it spent on the state-approved devices, which were made in China.

1.6M

Number of state-issued plastic rulers that had quarter-inch hash marks that were shorter than the three-quarter inch marks. On standard rulers, those lines are of equal length.
Copyright 2007 Newsday Inc.

Houston Teachers Asked to Return Bonuses

HOUSTON (March 9) - Almost 100 Houston teachers were asked this week to return parts of bonuses they received in January because of an error made by the school district that runs the nation's largest merit pay program.

A computer program mistakenly calculated their bonuses as if they were full-time employees, instead of part-time personnel, according to the Houston Independent School District. The error led to almost $75,000 in overpayments, with amounts ranging from $62.50 to $2,790.

The district said less than 1 percent of teachers were affected by the gaffe, but critics have said this is one more indication of what is wrong with a system that was unanimously approved by the school board last year over opposition from the teachers' union.

"It's just another example of how poorly thought out and planned the whole program was, so it's not surprising these kinds of mistakes are being made," said middle school teacher Steve Antley, who did not receive a bonus.

Even before the program was implemented, critics said it was flawed and divisive. Then, shortly after the district doled out $14 million to almost 8,000 teachers two months ago, officials realized they overlooked several hundred teachers, so they distributed $1 million more.

The district is to give the 99 teachers and other instructional staff affected by the latest error the choice whether to have the money deducted from a single paycheck or spread over 10.
But the local teachers' union president advised members not to give the money back at all.

"If it's the district's error, then the district should bear the loss," said Gayle Fallon of the Houston Federation of Teachers.

The district won't be able to take back the money unless teachers sign a form authorizing it to do so, Fallon said. "And if they direct them to sign it, we'll see them in court," she said.

Bloomberg Cares

The Mayor is spending $80 million on a massive computer to track kids progress. He is saying our kids are worth it.

My kids don't even have a classroom with a door that closes. Last week it was possible to yank the door shut, now it doesn't fit squarely in the frame anymore so we are permanently open. At least if the room gets too hot, we can enjoy the natural air conditioning. It's great having that fresh air on a morning with temperatures near zero degrees.

Be Nude to your School

Teaching just doesn't pay enough. Here is what one young history teacher decided to do when she had enough school.

This past May, Erica Chevillar, a history teacher at West Boca Raton High School, got tongues and fingers wagging when photos of her posing for the USA National Bikini Team Web site surfaced. Buoyed by the publicity, the 25-year-old Delray Beach resident has quit teaching in pursuit of an equally noble profession: Playboy Playmate. Chevillar appears in all her educated glory in the magazine's March issue, now on newsstands. She spoke to City Link last week.

Are you nervous about your former students' seeing you in Playboy?

No, I'm really not worried about it. You have to be 18 years old to purchase the magazine. [But] I'm sure they will find a way to get ahold of it.

Do you get recognized on the street now?

Yes. People know me as the "bikini teacher," and I was a finalist on WWE's 2006 Diva Search for a couple of months. It's been funny. People have asked for autographs and if they could take a photo with me.

How has your family reacted to the Playboy spread?

My parents are from a small town in Pennsylvania. I was worried about their reaction, but they've seen the pictures and they think everything was done beautifully.

What's your next career move?

I want to be a Playmate eventually and continue modeling, and maybe get into TV hosting. I was just selected to be the spokesmodel for [social-networking site] Yourhangout.com.