Scott Bradford: Off on a Tangent

Real Education Reform, Please

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There have been several efforts over the last twenty years to reform the American education system. Each has failed. There have been a few pinpoints of light in particular places, like Michelle Rhee’s four-year chancellorship of the District of Columbia public school system, but they have been sporadic and short-lived. Rhee’s reforms in DC were incredibly effective, but they proved so unpopular with the voters that they threw Mayor Adrian Fenty (D-DC)—and Rhee—out of office after one term. The system has since, predictably, deteriorated.

The broad state- or nation-wide ‘reforms’ have been oriented mostly toward standardized testing and incentive-based funding of schools based on the aggregate outcomes of those tests. In Virginia, we implemented the Standards of Learning (SOL) system back in 1995 to gauge students’ academic performance, and we based the accreditation of our schools on their students’ performance. The system was poorly designed and poorly implemented at the outset, and it resulted in a pervasive ‘teach to the test’ mentality in Virginia’s schools. Most of my teacher friends condemn the SOL’s, and with good reason. I didn’t like them much myself, and I still have many criticisms of the system. Indeed, Governor Jim Gilmore’s (R-VA) poor handling of the SOL’s back in the ’90s is part of why I did not support his failed 2008 run for U.S. Senator.

The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act, a federal law that was crafted by the bipartisan team of then-President George W. Bush (R) and the late Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA), expanded SOL-like programs across the country and tied funding to schools’ academic performance as measured by standardized tests. It passed in 2001 and soon did to the whole country what the SOL’s did to Virginia.

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Leave the Innocent Alone

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When I attended Liberty High School (LHS) in Bedford, Virginia, I used to eat my lunch with several of my friends and acquaintances. When the weather was nice, we preferred to gather outside. The LHS cafeteria had two large indoor eating spaces, and out front there was a patio that ran the width of the building with a number of white-painted concrete tables and benches. We would gather near the north-eastern side, overlooking the Math and Science building, to eat stale chicken nuggets and talk about our classes, our relationships, our faiths, our political opinions, and whatever else came up.

During one sunny lunch period when I was in my sophomore (tenth grade) year, we heard a commotion at the other end of the patio. Off at the opposite side, the south-western part that overlooked one of the two main academic buildings, two kids had gotten into an argument. I have no idea what they were arguing about. Even if I had been able to hear them, I doubt I would have known (or cared) what had gotten them so mad at one another. They were big, athletic guys who had few interests in common with me (or anybody I ate lunch with, for that matter). Their argument escalated into a food fight. One threw his chicken nuggets at the other. There was a retaliation. Soon, countless high-quality American school lunches had been hurled across the patio and ten or fifteen big, athletic jocks were covered in ketchup, milk, and little bits of cardboard pizza and moldy cole-slaw.

Teachers and assistant principals and other officials were there in moments, ordering the jocks to the office and summoning the cleaning staff to come sweep up the detritus that was left behind. Those of us who were watching from the sidelines went back to eating our lunches and discussing what girls we were going to ask to Homecoming and whether President Bill Clinton’s military intervention in Kosovo was justified. Life went on. In a sane world, that would have been the end of it for us. But it was not to be.

The next morning, I sat in my first-period English class and watched our school’s closed-circuit television program: Minuteman News. I would co-host the program myself the following year, but at this point I was just a member of the audience—one of the few who actually watched it attentively. Nestled-in among announcements for club meetings and pep-rallies was a bombshell: students were now prohibited from eating on the cafeteria patio. Because two jocks had gotten into a food fight, and some of their friends had joined in, everybody who preferred to eat outside now had to move indoors—even those of us who were nowhere near the fight, had no idea what it was about, and hadn’t been involved.

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Subaru Stereo Update

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You’ll have to forgive me for multiple car-related posts (and there are more of them yet-to-come). . . . I’m trying to get a whole bunch of things fixed and upgraded on the Subaru before a big, long-distance road trip next month. In the last post, I mentioned that I would soon be upgrading the stereo. Well, today was the day.

I removed stock head-unit (and the iPod kit that I installed back in ’08, which was technically meant for an Impreza but was easily hacked into my Outback), and replaced it with a new JVC KW-R800BT double-DIN unit. It comes with hands-free Bluetooth phone support and a USB port for playing music from memory sticks and iPods. One feature that appealed to me was the ability to customize the display and button colors—the last time I installed an aftermarket head-unit, the mis-matched colors of the unit against the rest of the dash really annoyed me.

Like last time, the unit came from Crutchfield and included the dash panel and wire harnesses I needed for a smooth install. I had to make a Home Depot run to get some twist-on wire connectors and electrical tape. I also got hung-up trying to disconnect the Subaru’s climate control temperature cable, per the Crutchfield instructions. After I lost a good hour or so working on it I finally found an alternative method: bending the mounting brackets with brute-force to get the climate control knobs disconnected from the panel. That did the trick.

Anyway, it took longer than I had hoped, but the install was a success and everything works as expected. For my next project, I’ll be replacing a worn-out hood latch, installing new horns, and blacking-out some of the chrome on the grille. Stay tuned.

Sticking With the Subaru

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Back in 2008, Melissa and I bought a Subaru Outback 2.5i wagon to serve as our rugged ‘family hauler.’ We had a tentative plan to keep it for our usual five- or six-year automotive cycle, which is quickly coming to an end now, before upgrading to something new. As of today, the Outback has been through about five years and 74,000 miles of wind and rain, snow and ice, work commutes and distant journeys, Ikea trips and art-show runs, moves and vacations. It has needed nothing more than a couple of minor repairs and its regular, scheduled maintenance. It’s still, pretty much, as good as new.

After thinking about it and weighing our options, we’ve decided that there is no real need to upgrade it now or any time soon (even though it is always tempting to get something new and shiny). Instead, we’re going to make a number of investments and improvements to keep it up-to-date and working for the indefinite future. Last week, I had its aging tires replaced with new Goodyear TripleTreds, and then spent some time on my own installing a new high-quality permanent (washable) engine air filter, upgrading the headlight and fog-light bulbs with new, brighter ones, and partially de-badging the tailgate (photos below).

I’ve also purchased a Haynes repair manual (which hasn’t arrived yet), and soon I’ll be replacing the stock stereo with an aftermarket head unit that supports Bluetooth calling and USB devices. I’m also entertaining suggestions for reasonably-priced ways to increase performance or add new, useful features to get my Subaru (and me) through the next 74,000 miles. So, dear gear-heads, let me know if you have any recommendations!

Surviving the Septoplasty

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Back in January, I mentioned that Melissa and I both had deviated septums. Our Ear-Nose-Throat (ENT) doctor recommended a surgical procedure called a ‘septoplasty’ to straighten everything out. In my case, he said that the procedure would likely eliminate my chronic congestion and improve my nasal airflow (which seemed constrained, especially during physical activity and when I was asleep). In Melissa’s case, which is complicated by allergies, he was less optimistic about huge improvements, but still expects a reduction in congestion and sinus infections.

So we both went in on Friday morning to have our nasal cavities all straightened out at the Reston Surgery Center. I went back first, around 9:00 a.m. I had never been ‘put under’ on general anesthetic before, so it was a very unusual experience. I remember telling them that I felt a little nauseous while they were rolling me to the operating room, and I remember seeing the ceiling of the OR itself, and then a blink of an eye later I was in the post-op recovery room groggily chatting with my mom. Everything went well; there were no complications or difficulties.

Melissa was in surgery while I was in post-op, and by the time she got back to the post-op room I was pretty conscious (albeit still drugged-up on pain killers). Her surgery also went as-expected with no complications.

We left with antibiotics and Percocet, and my mom graciously drove us home and took care of us through the first night. Without going into too much detail, there’s a bit of bleeding over the first day or so so we need to keep gauze over our noses . . . but that has pretty much cleared up at this point. We tried downgrading from the Percocet to regular Tylenol, but decided to ramp back up to the Percocet again and we’ll try downgrading again tomorrow. There was still a bit of pain and discomfort when we went off the heavy-duty stuff.

The worst of it should be over once forty-eight hours have elapsed from the surgeries—so, roughly, noon on Sunday. We’ll ease back into normal activity over the next week and should be good-as-new pretty soon (with happier noses and clearer breathing). In the mean time, please forgive me for any incoherent, drug-induced posts here or on Facebook ;-).

Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.