Archive for June, 2011
Catching up with Bellevue’s Nate Sikma
June 30th, 2011
In just a few days, Nate Sikma will complete the transition to Division I basketball player. The 6-foot-6, 215-pound forward, who led Bellevue to the Class 3A state-title game, leaves Monday to start the next chapter of his basketball career at the University of Hartford.
“They have a lot of freshmen coming in with me and I thought that was the best option, because I could just make lifelong friends in the process and play in the style I enjoy,” Sikma said. “That’s kind of what sold me.”
Sikma decided to play for the Hawks after taking a trip to visit both Hartford and the University of New Hampshire in the spring. It was a bit of a surprise that most of Sikma’s recruiting attention came from East Coast schools, but it’s not something he spent much time thinking about.
“I would like to have gotten some more, but I can’t control that,” he said. “I just went out there and played as hard as I could in high school and AAU and it just happened to work out where I got East Coast looks, so I’m excited about that. That’s just how it worked out, so you just have to go with it.
“I had a great high-school experience with basketball, just lucky to even have offers. A lot of kids would love to be in this position, so I’m just taking it with a positive attitude. I’m not going to have any regrets or anything. It’s fine with me. I’m just going to work hard and maybe prove myself and show I can play with anyone.”
As a senior, Sikma averaged 19.6 points and 8.8 rebounds. In a title-game loss to Lakes, he finished with 28 points and 13 rebounds.
“We had a great run,” Sikma said. “No one really thought of us as a contender or anything. We just went out and played hard. That’s all you’ve got to do. If you have good chemistry and you’ve got good enough talent you can go far.
“It was tough to not get that last one, but you’ve got to keep it in perspective. It was just an unbelievable accomplishment.”
Once the season ended, Sikma said he continued to work on his conditioning, getting to the gym as often as he could with his father, Jack, the former NBA center, and his brother, Luke, who played at the University of Portland.
“I’m just keeping conditioning up and working on strength, trying to get in the gym and shoot,” he said. “My dad is in town right now, so I try to make the best of our time.”
Now that an impressive high-school run has come to a close, Sikma is ready for his next challenge.
“I’m just ready to work hard, ready to see a whole new level of competition and kind of try to fit in and blend well with my teammates, build some chemistry going into the new season,” he said.
Tags: Nate Sikma, Sikma
Posted in Education Sport Notes | No Comments »
Bloomsday with Marilyn Monore, Barry McCrea, Sylvia Beach, and, of course, James Joyce
June 30th, 2011
Since it is Bloomsday today, we offer two Bloomsday-related posts:
Barry McCreas new book In the Company of Strangers: Family and Narrative in Dickens, Conan Doyle, Joyce, and Proust, examines the evolution of the family plot in Victorian and Modernist literature, including a discussion of the famous family in Ulysses. Read it here.
We are also re-posting Keri Walshs essay on celebrating Bloomsday in Paris.
Finally, for those readers interested in both Marilyn Monroe and James Joyce, the above image is from James Joyce: A Critical Guide, by Lee Spinks.
Tags: Barry Mccrea, Joyce
Posted in University Business | No Comments »
Bangor Township Schools Trustee Tim Allen: Michigan teachers make as much as dog trainers
June 30th, 2011
“I hear how teachers are paid way too much,” Allen said after thanking Bangor Township Schools’ teachers for their sacrifices. “I think it’s not really wise to think that way.
“I did some research,” he continued. “According to the Department of Labor and Statistics, in the state of Michigan a first-year teacher makes $35,000 a year. That’s decent. But do you know how much a dog trainer makes in Michigan? $32,500.
“So for all comparable purposes, a first-year teacher makes as much as a dog trainer,” Allen said. “Someone who teaches our children to read, write and calculate makes as much as someone who teaches a dog to walk on a leash. If that doesn’t bother you, I don’t know what does.”
Allen noted that many teachers throughout Michigan including those at Bangor Township Schools have agreed to pay freezes for the next several years.
“So in two to three years, it’s quite likely that the dog trainer will make more than a first-, second- or even third-year teacher,” he said.
Allen went on to say teachers’ health insurance and retirement are reasonable, repudiating an ongoing narrative that teachers’ benefit packages are too lavish.
“I appreciate all the work everyone does, I just want to state that publicly,” he said.
Tags: Bangor Township, Bangor Township Schools, Teachers, Township Schools
Posted in School Advisory | No Comments »
Wide-ranging education reform bills begin moving in Oregon Legislature
June 30th, 2011
Students mingle on the last day of classes at Parkrose Middle School. SALEM — Oregon legislators broke a session-long logjam over education policy Friday by beginning to move several bills that could eventually have a big impact on students and their schools.
The legislation includes Gov. John Kitzhaber’s proposal to create a new investment board that would coordinate funding for all levels of education, from pre-K to the universities, as well as measures providing a boost for both online and bricks-and-mortar charter schools.
Other measures would spur school districts to offer all-day kindergarten, give students more leeway to transfer to schools in other districts and would abolish an elected superintendent of public instruction and put the state Department of Education under the governor’s control. And one bill would add $25 million to the K-12 schools budget, slightly easing the strain on local schools.
Legislators ended the impasse — which included bitter infighting among the teacher’s union, a wide variety of education groups, school officials and others — by sending a widely disparate package of 14 bills to the House and Senate floors without offering any guarantees they will pass.
House Co-speakers Arnie Roblan, D-Coos Bay, and Bruce Hanna, R-Roseburg, said it was up to the sponsors of each bill to try to muster the needed votes. “We’re trying to move to a conclusion of the session and this is a way to provide people with an opportunity to make their best case,” Roblan said.
Kitzhaber, who had been meeting frequently with legislative leaders in an attempt to get his education package moving, hailed the legislative action.
“Moving forward on improving education takes bold leadership,” Kitzhaber said in a statement. “We need to change Oregon’s public education system to deliver better results for students and more resources for teachers by passing key priorities” such as his bill establishing an education investment board.
Kitzhaber agreed to sign all of the bills if they reach his desk, including the online and charter school bills that have drawn particularly heavy opposition from the Oregon Education Association as well as many public school officials. Several Republican legislators had worked to keep Kitzhaber’s priorities bottled up until they got action on the online and charter bills.
“I think we are close to having the most consequential legislation on education reform in Oregon history,” said Rep. Matt Wingard, R-Wilsonville. He’s also a consultant who works with an online charter school managed by one of the country’s largest for-profit education firms, and who played a lead role in pushing the online and charter school bills.
Wingard said he was “cautiously optimistic” all the bills would pass in the House, which is evenly divided between the two parties. But he refused to address reports that the failure to adopt the bill for online schools could threaten passage of the bills sought by the governor.
In fact, several legislators and the powerful Oregon Education Association are urging legislators not to view the bills as a package, and to pick and choose among them.
“Our understanding is that there is nothing to jeopardize” by voting down some of the bills, said BethAnne Darby, the union’s chief lobbyist. “I’m hopeful that people will not lock up like that, that they can look at each bill individually.”
The union has lobbied particularly hard against the online and charter school measures, saying it takes resources away from the financially pressed public schools that the vast majority of students in Oregon attend.
Rep. Sara Gelser, D-Corvallis, who co-chaired the House Education Committee with Wingard, said she worried the Legislature was poised in a last-minute flurry of deal-making to pass several sweeping bills that hadn’t been properly vetted.
“It would be better if we could take a deep breath, slow down and put some sideboards on these things,” she said. “I’m just worried that in the rush for the door, we’re leaving the public out of the process.”
Most of the 14 bills have been heavily amended in the last few days and were sped out of the Joint Ways and Means Committee and sent to the floors of each house.
One of the measures, House Bill 5055, would take $178.7 million out of a rainy-day fund to shore up budgets both in the current budget cycle and in the upcoming 2011-13 biennium. Included was $25 million to add to the $5.7 billion already appropriated for schools. That addition will help ease some of the layoffs and other budget cuts schools around the state are making but is much less than school advocates had once hoped to gain.
–Jeff Mapes
Tags: Moving Oregon, Oregon
Posted in School Advisory | No Comments »
Sabbeth Week Schooling Schedule
June 30th, 2011
What is Sabbeth Week Scheduling?
Sabbeth Week Scheduling was born from the biblical concept that the seventh day is holy and should be used for rest. In this vain, a student works for six weeks and has the seventh week off. The seventh week can be used for rest, make up work, catching up on household needs, adjusting your homeschool, or whatever need you may have on that week. The method of scheduling is not implying that the seventh week is holy or that this scheduling is a “Christian” method. The use of the word Sabbeth is simply the concept not a religious affiliation.
Many of you may have already heard of this method or use a similar one. If so, please let me know how it is working for you. I would like to know what advantages or disadvantages it may present. I am tossing the idea around and sincerely thinking this may be what works for my family. I have found a blog post on Permanent Things which speaks indepthly on the subject and has a master schedule to get a feel for how you may apply it to your homeschool HERE.
Tags: Sabbeth Week, Week
Posted in School Advisory | No Comments »