Outraged parents are filing lawsuits in the college admissions scandal . . . One parent, Jennifer Kay Toy of Oakland, believes her son Joshua was not admitted to some colleges because wealthy parents thought it was “ok to lie, cheat, steal [steal?] and bribe their children’s way into a good college.” She has therefore filed a $500 billion lawsuit (sounds reasonable) accusing 45 defendants of defrauding and inflicting emotional distress on everyone whose “rights to a fair chance at entrance to college” were stolen through their alleged conspiracy. Not reported: where (or if) Joshua is actually attending college, or which colleges Ms. Toy thinks he would have been admitted to if not for the aforementioned skulduggery. There are also students filing suits, alleging among other things that their degrees have been devalued by skepticism over the validity of the admission process. I think these lawsuits founder on at least a… Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Kids
Why is Sexual Harassment the Only Workplace Malfunction That Merits National Attention?
Many workers in Silicon Valley have said tech companies aren’t doing enough to promote women and minorities, or to stamp out misogyny and harassment. — wsj.com “Not doing enough” . . . I remember last year a female engineer at Uber wrote in a blog post that she was being harassed and mistreated and Uber actually hired the former attorney general of the United States to launch an investigation. One woman! The assertion that Uber in particular and Silicon Valley in general are cesspools of misogyny is based on confirmation bias and small sample sizes. Uber has more than 16,000 employees in 600 cities and 65 countries. If you’re inclined to believe that women are more virtuous and vulnerable than men, then the reported experience of one person out of 16,000 may be enough to confirm you in your view of the world. A man (or woman) hears what he… Read more →
How Our Careers Affect Our Children
Mothers spending time on themselves — on relaxation and self-care — and not so much on housework, was associated with positive outcomes for children. It’s not just a matter of mothers being at home versus at work, it’s what they do when they’re at home with their non-work time. If mothers were not with their children so they could take care of themselves, there was no ill effect on their children. But to the extent that mothers were engaged in housework, children were more likely to be beset by behavior problems. — “How Our Careers Affect Our Children”, Harvard Business Review We’re studying the effects of working mothers, mothers spending time on themselves, mothers engaged in housework . . . I wonder what is the effect of mothers actually spending time with their children? Read more →
Student Loan Debt Sets Record
U.S. Student Loan Debt Sets Record, Doubling Since Recession — Bloomberg What happened to parents saving up to pay for college? Is that not a thing anymore? I don’t find it morally defensible to encourage a kid to incorporate academics into his or her life from an early age, to emphasize the importance of education, then when the kid is admitted to college to say “Congratulations, here’s your student loan application. Have fun paying that off till you’re 60.” Read more →
The Time for Song and Frivolity is Over!
A colleague went to see his son’s Christmas pageant, a day care thing where the kids try to sing “Jingle Bells.” He says once his older daughter got to kindergarten, the school didn’t do singing Christmas shows anymore . . . THIS IS KINDERGARTEN! THE TIME FOR SONG AND FRIVOLITY IS OVER! DO YOU HEAR YOUR PARENTS GOING AROUND SINGING ALL THE TIME? THAT’S WHAT GROWING UP IS ALL ABOUT! ALL JOYOUS ACTIVITIES ARE SURRENDERED OR STRIPPED AWAY FROM YOU! Read more →
Competitive Programming: POJ 2318 – TOYS
Description Calculate the number of toys that land in each bin of a partitioned toy box. Mom and dad have a problem – their child John never puts his toys away when he is finished playing with them. They gave John a rectangular box to put his toys in, but John is rebellious and obeys his parents by simply throwing his toys into the box. All the toys get mixed up, and it is impossible for John to find his favorite toys. John’s parents came up with the following idea. They put cardboard partitions into the box. Even if John keeps throwing his toys into the box, at least toys that get thrown into different bins stay separated. The following diagram shows a top view of an example toy box. For this problem, you are asked to determine how many toys fall into each partition as John throws them into… Read more →
Doesn’t Tell Me What I Need to Know
A co-worker is telling another co-worker that you have to make sure day care providers are insured and bonded. Actually, being insured and bonded is no guarantee that I want you taking care of my child . . . “Mr. So-and-so, your son wouldn’t stop crying so we taped his mouth shut. The bad news is: he died. The good news is we’re insured and bonded!” Read more →
Thomas Jefferson Explains Family Separations
My fellow Americans — The reason families are separated at the border is that the United States, like many countries, has laws governing border crossings by non-residents. When an adult is apprehended crossing our border illegally, they go into the criminal justice system and are placed in a detention center. Keep in mind that an American citizen apprehended in the commission of a crime is not processed any differently. If you are placed in a detention center, I assure you that your children will not be in there with you. A note on rhetoric: A strong line of argument should not require violent metaphors and manufactured hysteria — families “ripped apart,” children “torn from their mother’s arms” — to be persuasive. Read the Declaration of Independence, for example. Read more →
Separation of Families Considered Harmful?
Here’s a photo showing two girls in a “cage” watching a World Cup match, amongst dozens of other kids who are for some reason wrapped in foil. I’ve seen this photo and others widely circulated online recently as evidence of the Trumpenfuhrer’s crimes against humanity. But guess what? The photos were taken in 2014, when some other guy was president. Many people have a single standard for evaluating political activity: Is it being carried out by Team Red or Team Blue. Nothing is good or bad on its own merits. I don’t remember anyone on Team Blue being outraged about kids in “cages” in 2014, but in 2018 it’s a humanitarian crisis that has to be denounced mercilessly, even if the evidence has to be faked. I haven’t heard anyone propose a viable alternative to separating parents and children at the border. I’m not sure Team Blue wants to find… Read more →
Philip Roth, 1933-2018
The final question assigned to the class was “What is life?” Merry’s answer was something her father and mother chuckled over together that night. According to Merry, while the other students labored busily away with their phony deep thoughts, she — after an hour of thinking at her desk — wrote a single, unplatitudinous declarative sentence: “Life is just a short period of time in which you are alive.” “You know,” said the Swede, “it’s smarter then it sounds. She’s a kid — how has she figured out that life is short? She is somethin’, our precocious daughter. This girl is going to Harvard.” But once again the teacher didn’t agree, and she wrote beside Merry’s answer, “Is that all?” Yes, the Swede thought now, that is all. Thank God, that is all; even that is unendurable. — American Pastoral RIP Philip Roth Read more →
Alfie Evans, 2016-2018
Thank god this could never happen here in the US . . . at least until Bernie Sanders is inaugurated. RIP Alfie Evans We're heartbroken, say the parents of 23-month-old Alfie Evans, as they announce that the toddler died overnight https://t.co/HuaJV9UFIE — BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) April 28, 2018 Read more →
If You Act Like an Idiot, I’ll Kill You
When my son was growing up, I found a lot of opportunities to point to someone else’s kid and say, “You see what he just did? Don’t do that.” When I saw a kid acting like an idiot, I assumed the parents were idiots . . . the kid either learned it from the parents or the parents allowed it to happen. So if my kid were to act like an idiot, I assume other people would think I’m an idiot. A friend of mine recently shared some advice he got from his dad growing up. I’ve paraphrased it as the title of this post. Of course killing your own children is going too far, but in a figurative sense, I believe this is good advice and I endorse it . . . Read more →
Empowerment and Accountability for 5-Year-Olds
This is a real thing I just read: I tasked my 5-year-old with cleaning up the blocks from the floor, after he was done playing. A few times, he did not do it, and I ended up doing it for him. Later on, I realized that when I did it for him I was not empowering him to do the task and be accountable for it. This situation can be easily improved by exhibiting Empowerment and Accountability. For a 5-year-old? You’re overthinking it. Even with adults, “empowerment” and “accountability” are overused: I’m empowering you to complete this task. I’m not giving any of the resources you need but I’m empowering you. And as with the 5-year-old, when he doesn’t pick up the blocks despite being “empowered,” you’ll soon realize there’s no “accountability” without consent. Read more →
Some Links on Effective Communication
Busting myths on gender differences in the brain (Article) Nora Caplan-Bricker, “The Idea of a ‘Male Brain’ and a ‘Female Brain’ Is Likely a Myth,” Slate, November 2, 2015. Challenges and strategies for creating safe communication spaces at work (Article) James R. Detert and Ethan R. Burris, “Can Your Employees Really Speak Freely?,” Harvard Business Review, vol. 94, no. 1 (January/February 2016): p. 80-87. Communication comes in all shapes and sizes (Video) Nancy Lublin, “Texting That Saves Lives,” TEDvideo, 5:24, February 2012. Do men and women communicate differently? (Article) Deborah Cameron, “What Language Barrier?,” The Guardian, October 1, 2007. Find out the meaning behind emojis (Website) “Emojipedia.” Game-changing communication developments (Article) Amber Leigh Turner, “5 Trends Disrupting Communication,” TNW News. How the medium of communications can change what we say (Article) “Tweets From Mobile Devices Are More Likely to Be Egocentric,” International Communications Association press release, October 1, 2015. Leaders can change their power… Read more →
Theological Question
I hear people say that bad things happen to kids in schools because God isn’t allowed in schools. Why do bad things happen to kids in churches? Read more →
To the Daughter I Never Had
Take control of your own impulses, conflicts and disappointments. Don’t forfeit your freedom and independence in exchange for intrusion into and adjudication of your private life and penalizing of men who did something you didn’t like. Also: Dress appropriately. Maintain some mystique and intrigue. Don’t feel like you have to link up with another person until you’ve got some idea about what you want from life. Love, Dad Read more →
Those They Leave Behind
My son’s moving this weekend from an overpriced San Francisco apartment to a different overpriced San Francisco apartment. His roommates in the current apartment are a friend he’s known since high school and a young woman who answered an ad to replace the original roommate, a college friend who moved out six months ago. The new roommates are the same high school friend plus two college classmates. My wife was talking to the boy last night on speaker phone . . . she was dismayed that the current female roommate wasn’t included in the move. “We gave her a lot of notice so she’s already found another spot,” the boy said. “She’s hard to live with. She’s kind of a slob. In six months, she didn’t take the trash out one time.” I said to my wife, but loud enough for him to hear, “He never took the trash out… Read more →
Making it Through High School Alive
Baltimore schools spend a staggering $16,000 per student – the fourth-highest rate in the nation – and still an investigation by Fox45’s Project Baltimore revealed that at six city schools, not one student scored proficient on the statewide tests for English and math. At West Baltimore’s Frederick Douglass High, one of five high schools and one middle school where not one student scored a four or a five on the state test, only one out of 185 students who took the test last year scored a three, while 165 students scored a one, the lowest possible score. — Zero Hedge The schools are: Booker T. Washington Middle School Frederick Douglass High School Achievement Academy at Harbor City New Era Academy Excel Academy at Francis M. Wood High New Hope Academy It looks like if you live in Baltimore, you want to avoid sending your child to a school whose name… Read more →
We’re Dreamers Too
There are lots of people who went to school, worked hard, provided for our families, raised our kids, tried to do the right things . . . no one lionizes us but we’re dreamers too . . . Read more →
Some Things You Never Get Used To
Our whole family has been seeing the same doctor for about 15 years. I had an appointment with her today and she was a nervous wreck. She told me she’s flying to Houston tonight with her son, who’s starting college at Rice University. I’ve already had a child move away for college so she asked, “How did you handle this? I feel like I have a rock on my chest.” “Well, it’s a challenge when you love someone so much and they leave. Maybe prescribe yourself some Xanax.” “What do you do at the end? How do the parents leave? Does everyone just hug and say goodbye?” “You probably have to follow your heart on that. My goal was not to cry in front of the boy and I did accomplish that. I hugged him, I said ‘I love you, I’m proud of you,’ he walked into the dorm and… Read more →