My thoughts on “fixing” Education in Florida

One of the hot topics in Florida – specifically Polk County – is the education system.  Many feel that it is a flawed system, and in certain regards it might be.  It certainly isn’t run as efficiently as most successful businesses are, but then again, what government system is?  In my opinion, there’s too much in the way of politics to ever have any public service group run efficiently — at least the way our society works right now.

One thing that Polk County is considering – though has stated publicly would be a last resort – is to furlough 10 days throughout the year, increase employee contribution to health care, and cut salaries by up to 7%.  This being on top of the new Governor’s hopes to switch the current Pension Plan for all state employees from State funded to employee funded.  All of these things seem like sensible things to do, with one caveat:  state employees don’t get paid enough as it is, and those benefits are one of the few perks that make it worth it for teachers to get into the business in the first place.  Don’t get me wrong, I love teaching.  Very few people do it that don’t enjoy it, or do it for very long.  But if all these cuts are made, people are going to have to make a decision whether to continue teaching, or support their families.  You’ll still have teachers who have wealthy spouses, or that really can’t do anything else (and there are some of those out there, unfortunately).  But I have a feeling that a large portion of the rest will bow out.

Most of this stems from the over $3 billion Florida legislators are expecting to be short with regards to their budget.  Always you hear about tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts.  You also hear about wanting to save jobs.  In my mind, you can’t have both.  I think it’s time to actually raise taxes slightly, or, heaven’s forbid, introduce a very mild state income tax.  When you decide to penalize your teachers, firefighters, and police force to give corporate tax breaks, something is seriously wrong with the system.

Another hot topic that has been talked about for several years now is a switch to a Voucher program, where the State gives families a certain amount of money to have their child attend whatever school they want, whether it be public or private.

The general populace seems to have this great notion that the teaching in private schools is far superior to that which goes on in the public system.  To be honest, the level of teacher at each isn’t very different, if the quality differs at all.  The MAIN difference is that parents pay, and students can get kicked out of said private institution much easier.  Yes, that also means that some of the truly bad teachers can be fired much more easily, but there aren’t as many of those teachers as you’d think.  If the state goes to vouchers, I envision a three tiered system: public contains only poverty ridden students with parents that are not invested in their students, a lower end private system that is about the same as public schools today, because it would still be “free” (think vouchers) to the parents, and the upper end schools.  Nothing really changes, except students in poverty getting an even bigger shaft.  So again, nothing changes except a widening divide in the social class structure.

Finally, we have the Pay Per Performance, which I had a nice chat with a co-worker about last week, and somewhat tied to this – doing away with the pension program.  My co-worker had the idea of doing away with the pension program and replacing it with a rotating 5 year contract instead of pension.  This I actually like quite a bit, and think that a 3-5 year contract keeps some sense of job security with teachers, while giving the ability to get rid of teachers who can’t hang with teaching anymore, or have become disenchanted/burnt out, and no longer care, but still need the job.  I also don’t have an issue with the Pay Per Performance, IF done correctly.  I think this cannot be taken on a one year basis, however, nor can it be compared to state averages.  There are so many variables that go into how well a student does on the FCAT, that there is no WAY you can directly attribute the learning gains success to one teacher.  How effective that student’s other teachers are, family issues that are going on, major social events or upheavals, illness on test day – all of these things effect how the student does on this test.  It is also not fair to judge a teacher teaching in a migrant, poverty ridden school where parents work 2 jobs and simply don’t have time to properly assist and monitor the education of their child to that of an average wealthy community.  But if you modify this so that it is on a 3 year average, and matched only with school historical averages combined with similar socio-economic environments (yet slanted more towards those same school averages), you’ve got something I think most teachers would buy into.

What actually happens, we’ll see.  Sadly, most people just don’t understand all of the factors involved, or simply don’t care, and will always vote for someone who simply promises “lower taxes” to “save the economy.”  I’m not sure what the answer is to fix our current economy, but I certainly don’t think penalizing the public servants is the answer.  Teachers, policemen, and fire fighters already don’t get paid enough for all that they do.

Short Update

…or lack thereof – but figured I might as well try and put something up every here and again.  As mentioned earlier, I’m currently in the process of taking some certification classes online for my day job.  Which is going fairly well.  However, between those and some interesting situations regarding Life in general, writing is taking a seat on the back burner for a bit.  Brainstorming as always, still coming up with ideas … just not putting pen to paper or fingers to the keyboard for a few more weeks at least.

School’s out in 2 weeks, the classes are completely finished in 3, and … we’ll see where Life’s little surprises wind up taking me.  If nothing else, I’ll say that good old Lady Luck constantly keeps me on my toes.  For better, or for worse, though, is yet to be determined.  Still targeting getting that first novel finished by the end of August.  After that, I plan on setting up my next novel which I will try to complete during this year’s NaNoWriMo, hopefully fully plotted beforehand.  Those, I suppose, are my 2010 Calendar Year Writing Goals.

Choosing A Different Idea

So, after reading through so many numerous pieces of advice warning that the first written novel is almost certain to be, if not garbage, at least unpublishable, I had decided to write an off-shoot of my Dream Story that I’ve been planning here and there for over 4 years.  This would be a very detailed back story of a key location with possible younger cameos of important though not main characters.

While beginning to seriously plan this out the past month or so, I’ve grown to really like the crime/mystery story that I’ve come up with.  REALLY like it.  So much so, that I don’t want it to be my first novel.  Characters are starting to come alive in my mind.  This is quickly becoming a baby that I don’t want to kill, at least not completely.

So today I decided to start writing something else.  Something I didn’t care quite as much about, without any intention of such extensive planning.  I took the base magic system from my unfinished NaNoWriMo novel, and tried finding a better home for it.  I didn’t want to use a Medieval European type society as my base, because…well, it’s been done too much.  Then I come across some historical research on the Shinobi (Ninja) and the Sengoku period of Japan in particular.  Bingo.  In fact, I’m already starting to REALLY like the potential of this new world.

Am I starting to get to the point where new ideas that are worth writing a story about aren’t that hard to come by?  At any rate, because I refuse to write about anything I don’t care at all about, I suppose I’m about to have to kill my babies.  Even though I think this idea can and will turn into a great novel with more practice.

Magic System Gets An Upgrade

Well, back to another blog entry, my very own writers journal.  Like my writing projects, these entries have been extremely sporadic.  Hopefully this will change, though time will only tell — just as I’m starting to get back into the swing of things with regards to novel planning, I now have to take 3 college courses for certification purposes back to back to back.  Good fun.  But I’m still trying to keep the effort going.

On that note, I came across an upgrade to the magic system for the novel that I’m currently working on.  It is a sacrificial magic system that is based on a sort of yin and yang philosophy of Life vs. Death, the Sacrifice of Oneself vs. the Sacrifice of the External.  While this theme has certainly been done before, I haven’t really seen it done quite this way with real sacrifice.  I’m talking about preemptive sacrifice, not a consequence, where Power is obtained only after prolonged suffering by one party or another.

Overall, I have at least 3 novel ideas with one 2-3 novel epic fantasy set in this universe, and I started coming up with this current idea as a throw away novel, something I kind of liked but am not expecting anything fantastic from — this would be, after all, my first completed novel (if I ever DO finish it!).  And while I’m starting to like the characters and idea more and more as I’m planning everything out, I have had some issues with regards to balance, and what I want out of my main protagonist.

The largest issue is that I want him to be both powerful, yet weak at the same time.  Given the magic system as was, this would be fairly difficult.  However, as I started reading Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn: The Final Empire — which I highly recommend anyone who likes fantasy to go out right now and buy — I thought up two additional, and exceedingly rare, subsets of the magical duology.  Presto!  I now have the ability to have him be at once extremely powerful in some situations, yet also fairly weak in many others; at the same time, he is automatically different than almost everyone around him in more than just his ideologies.

I’m also rewriting the prologue.  I’ve been going back and forth as to whether or not I even want a prologue, and have settled — for now — on the state of mind that I definitely do.  Its focus will not include ANY of the protagonists of the story, but should foreshadow a bit of the rest of the book, introduce some of the land’s more prevailing ideologies, a bit of the magic, and act as a slight punch in the face to draw the Reader’s interest.  At least that is the hope.  I may decide to post that, along with the first couple of mostly edited chapters, on this blog sometime down the road.  We’ll see.

Nook vs. Kindle

My wife has had a Kindle for over a year now, and for the last 6 months or so, I have been “borrowing” it.  However, I figured that it was time to let her have it back, which meant either getting my own electronic device, or completely switching back to printed books.  And while I still like the printed book a touch more than any e-reader I’ve come across, I am running out of places to put my books and I hate giving away or throwing out books.  In that sense I am a hoarder by definition.

So during a field trip to Tampa, we stopped by a Barnes and Noble, where I was able to fiddle around a bit with the Nook.  I’d read a bit about it online, mostly a negative comparison when matched up against the Kindle, however it has that nifty iPhonish touch screen at the bottom for navigation and quite simply looks a bit “sexier” to me.  I was also intrigued at the claim of a more open format acceptance than the Kindle and more books available on the B&N website.

So after messing around with the sample copy they had at their center kiosk, I came to the conclusion that I would rather have the Nook and the Kindle.  There are enough pros and cons when looking at the two that it really is simply a matter of preference.  For a lot of the complaints about the Nook, I just don’t see them.  However, here is what I did and do see:

If you are electronically disinclined, then the Nook probably isn’t for you.  While I absolutely love the extra little features on the Nook, and feel it gives an easy and speed of use that I didn’t get from the Kindle, I can easily see it being confusing for non-tech people, especially those that grew up pre-internet (you know, all you old people).  If you’re used to using an iPhone or iTouch or iWhatever, then the Nook interface will come second hand to you.  Not to say that there aren’t speed issues and glitches with the current software set.  But those can be corrected for the most part, and in my eyes it’s a sight better than that darned mini joystick the Kindle has for a more limited feature set.

The one big drawback of the Nook’s color touch screen, which is small and at the bottom of the eBook, is that it sucks power like a mother.  While with the Kindle I could read for almost 2 weeks without a recharge, we’re realistically talking about 2-4 days of intensive use for the Nook.  I would say a full weekend if you are leaving the wireless on, probably 4 days if you have it off and aren’t screwing around with the touch screen too much.

I also like the Nook’s ability to both have next and previous buttons on BOTH sides of the eBook, and even more do I enjoy the finger swipe to turn the page.  I do have to press the buttons harder than the Kindle, which is a bit of a downer, however I generally just use the finger swipe.  It may take more time than just pressing the button, but to my print book loving self, it just feels more “right”.

Both eBooks crash.  Whoever tells you that the Kindle doesn’t is full of it.  However, I will say that, right now, the Nook crashes a lot more, and is a bit more frustrating to get back up.  However, whereas the Kindle crashed in the middle of reading, the Nook seems to do OK in that area;  it is when you are flipping through navigational screens that it seems to get the vast majority of system failures.  Which, for both products, boils down to software issues that are correctible rather than the hardware itself (at least, for the most part).

The Nook also allows you to adjust the font on top of the font size, which Kindle does not allow.  For elderly people with minor macular degeneration, the Nook is probably going to be easier to read for this reason; it also seems to be a little bit more crisp with its text.  The minor annoyance I have right now with fonts is that it seems that the font size are NOT always the same, and seem to jump around in size from publisher/ebook to publisher/ebook, which is slightly annoying.  Not an issue on the Kindle, since everything is exactly the same (with no pretty font change features).

Finally, we get to provided content.  Embedded DRM’s within all of the ebooks from either Amazon or B&N are there so that you have to use the ebooks with their product.  In fact, you can’t even buy an Amazon ebook without a Kindle, which in my opinion is just stupid.  And I will say that Amazon has a better price point /selection for what I read than B&N does.  The whole issue of B&N having 100,000’s more ebooks is crap – most of those are just the same books in wierd languages, or 27 different versions of The Time Machine.  So I definitely enjoy Amazon’s bookstore better, and can purchase from them since my wife has a Kindle.  And while I won’t provide any information on here as to how it can be done, it is certainly possible to do some software wizardry to purchase a Kindle Book, remove the DRM, and then read it on the Nook.  I will put as an aside that I said “purchase”.  I believe once purchased, you have individual ownership of that said item and can do what you want with it, and have no issues with deDRMing said ebook to use on another eReader device.  That said, as an aspiring writer, I feel much stronger about paying for your product with books than I do even with any other form of media.  I wish they made it easier to cross connect the devices, but for marketing dominance it is what it is.

Avatar

Well, I finally found myself state-side with enough free time to get out and see Avatar in 3D.  I hadn’t been back since its opening weekend, and seeing it at that point in time just wasn’t going to happen.  And while I didn’t get to complete my movie theater trifecta, combined with copious quantities of Burger King, Taco Bell, and some local Chinese food, I DID manage to find time for James Cameron’s mega hit.

I will say straight off that I thought the movie was incredibly enjoyable.  I was expecting a certain amount of spectacle, which the movie certainly delivered, but besides that I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect.  And beyond that, I actually wasn’t thrilled that I could only see it in 3D; I for one have never had much luck with 3D films, as they give me a certain amount of nausea.  To my relief and mild surprise, Avatar would be the first use of big screen 3D that did NOT have any negative effects on my head or stomach.  I think the main reason for that, other than improved technology, is that the use of 3D seemed only intended to add subtle depth.  There was nothing that really popped out at the screen, no objects that were simply used to shout at the audience “Look at me!!!! I’m imitation 3D!!!”  And so it didn’t give me a headache, or upset my stomach, and the period of adjustment was very shot.  Kudos on that.

The movie itself was also enjoyable.  The acting was well done, and it was marketed perfectly, having something for almost every walk of life: men, women, teenagers, romance, action.  You name it.  The CGI helos looked real, the Na’Vi looked fairly real (completely other than a few scenes), and the scenery was breathtaking.

As far as complaints, there weren’t many.  Of course my main two complaints have to do with the source of conflict.  Unobtanium?  Really?  You couldn’t come up with a better name than that?  Sure, it may reference that you can never have enough, but still.  That’s just an awful name.  Also, as it appeared to be related to some naturalistic anti-gravity properties, you’d think it would be located in fairly large quantities in or under the huge floating islands. NOT under the Mother Trees.  But you’ve gotta add conflict somehow.  And while that could have been done better, not too much else could.  I’m now eagerly awaiting the sequels, as Cameron has mentioned a trilogy arc.  I had initially heard this and thought “God, I hope he goes with a 10,000 in Gehenna approach to keep things fresh.”  Unfortunately not, as it looks as though it will still follow the two main characters through all three movies.  In my opinion, that is a mistake.  While I’m sure that Cameron will still pull out a whopping success of a blockbuster, it just won’t be the same.  The ending clearly leaves options for a resurgence by the human militia, which leads me to believe that movies 2 and 3 will either by much more tilted towards action, or it will be a rinse and repeat of the original.  And the original has now been done.  Matrix was an amazing movie when it came out.  The 2nd and 3rd movies of that trilogy…not so much.  Not because they were worse, but because we all knew about the world of Matrix by that point…nothing was NEW.  And as an avid sci-fi reader and wannabe writer, I see the use of the same people in most likely too near of a future, and can’t see the dynamic changing enough to continue the same amount of WOW.

So I’m very interested in how this will be carried out.  Will it be going from Alien to Aliens?  Or will he really change up enough of the story to keep the magic alive?  Time will only tell.

A Bit Premature, Perhaps?

For myself, I rather like Obama.  Are there better ways to go about fixing the nation’s problems, different approaches to attack the root causes of issues like Health Care Reform?  Yeah, there probably are.  I think that Tort Law Reform shouldn’t be one aspect to look at trying to change; it should be the first thing that should change.  But, given the wonderful circumstances that he was left with, I think he’s done a pretty good job.  We’ve got a long haul left to go, and it’s going to be rough.  A lot of people, even those I know and that are my friends, are a bit short sited in this regard, and hammer Obama for a growing national debt, making diplomatic rather than show of force efforts with Iran and North Korea, and a myriad of other things.

I believe that the approach that he’s taking is the right one.  There are short term budget cuts that simply aren’t going to benefit the nation 10 or 20 years down the road.  Education and infrastructure need to be a focus.  A better medical system actually means a stronger middle class and less money spent, not short term, but long term.  And do you really think that simply sending troups in and either threatening or the actual use of force is going to solve long term issues with the Middle East?  I sure don’t.  If you can’t fix the viewpoints of the common people towards the West, then what have you really accomplished?  A new generation of hatred led by a different person?  That’s not to say not to carry a big stick.  Just that that shouldn’t be your primary focus.

So there’s a lot of potential for Obama.  But the Nobel Peace Prize?  Now?  Really?

Now, the cutoff for nominations is in February, so this fell just a few short weeks after Obama was sworn into office.  And sure, the award isn’t necessarily given for things done, but sometimes for the effort and potential of the candidate.  And I think Obama has a chance to really earn that award.  But this year?  Not so much.  I don’t think he should legitimately even have been nominated.  You can play it off as a great boon for the US, or you can look at it more pragmatically as a blow to the credibility of the award itself.

Once the award was release, you had a whole slew of Republicans rightfully questioning the validity of the selection, but also using it as a platform with which to further bash Obama.  And I find it ironic that a lot of the things that Obama is getting slammed on – such as the economy and the budget – are the result of Bush’s term, not Obama’s.  Fact is that once something goes into a downward spiral, it takes awhile for it to turn around.  That means its going to get worse before you can see the light.

Ahhh, REAL sports at last!!!

Not being much of a fan of baseball, though quite the sports enthusiast, summer is somewhat of a drag. Sure, that leaves me with a lot of additional hours of my week to do things like write, windsurf, read, play games, etc – and yet as wonderful as those things are, I still sit from the end of the NCAA Basketball Tournament to the beginning of September waiting for that opening kickoff.

Don’t get me wrong, baseball is a perfectly fine sport to play. But to watch? Not in person, or without any beer? Sorry, but I’d rather watch other people golfing.

So I’ve got my college football pool picks in, my fantasy team drafted, and in just over one hour I can plop down in my reclining chair with a cold beer and a hot pizza. Ahhh, what an American past-time.

Outside of the wondrous start of the sports season, things have been relatively calm. Err, rather, they’ve been really slow. The wind has been outright dead, so I haven’t gotten out windsurfing in a couple of weeks. The house has been a mess (thanks to the wife for cleaning up a big chunk of that), which had overcrowded the writing desk. Which is a crappy excuse for the fact that I just haven’t gotten around to writing in awhile. The start of school has been a little overwhelming with 8 teaching preps, there’s been family birthday parties, illnesses, and a general lackadaisicalness to my mood in the evenings. Things seem to be kicking into more of a routine, and the urge is starting to come back. Hopefully that will transfer into words on the page. Or at least a completed outline, which I’ve almost finished.

Enjoy the weekend, watch a few games. There are certainly some good ones. Myself, I’m looking forward to the Virginia Tech – ‘Bama game. Whichever way it goes, I’m hoping for a close fought, slobber-knocker defensive beat down by both teams. God Bless football.

Back into cardio

Well, finally felt good enough to get out and try my hand at wind surfing again this afternoon. This would be about my 5th time out, and I think the most frequent I’ve ever done it is maybe a week apart. The last time I was out was almost a month ago.

At any rate, apparently the two smaller sails I had used before have since ripped through due to heavy use, laying out in the sun, and not being periodically cleaned and undone. Since I am going to have to buy my setup piece meal, I was originally going to go with a board first, but with the two sails down, I think I’ll try and just pick up a sail that will fit on the existing masts that they have.

The sail I used today was an even larger racing sail. And while I think I did OK, it was a bit intimidating with the decent wind we had. My confidence level for speed is not quite up there yet, along with my lack of confidence in leaning back into the wind (giving me somewhat poor posture). Just need some practice. At least I know how to depower the thing when it really starts picking up so that I don’t get pulled right over the mast.

I stuck to fish and broccoli for dinner and ran 2.34 miles after that. Which I’m glad I did, but there’s also no way I’m writing tonight now…I need to work out a schedule to windsurf and run and lift and whatnot. Unless it is a weekend and I’m spreading it out between morning and afternoon, I think this is the last time I do windsurfing and running on the same day.

Starting to kick the cold

…just in time for work to start up again. Funny how that always seems to work out, isn’t it?

Well, even though I haven’t actually written any part of my fantasy novel manuscript yet, I have been logging 60+ minutes a night for the past 5 nights on planning. I’m a little antsy spending so much time without actually writing any STORY, but I feel pretty good about how the plot is winding up. I’m coming up with a lot of names, which are a combination and bastardization of Persian and Celtic names (with a moderate attempt not to come up with anything unintentionally offensive). I’m coming up with the Big Disastrous Middle to the novel, along with smaller disasters to get to the Big Ones. I’ve got to come up with some bios for the minor characters, but I’m pretty well set on the major ones – though I still need to do some work on a love story arc in the second half of the novel between two of the characters. All in all, I’m pretty happy with Jim Butcher’s method of planning.

I also went into this story confident that I can produce a short story from the first chapter or two, and while I think it might be a longer short story, I am still confident on this point. I’ll definitely be sending it out once complete, so we’ll see.