NationStates

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:38 pm**

Cill Airne wrote:
Saruhan wrote:Hopefully he'll have fully kicked it this time

I think so. He said he was going to come back to NationStates, but he can't. Doesn't remember the password and there isn't an email linked to the account.

He could just make a new nation

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:39 pm**

Coffee Cakes wrote:
Bralia wrote:Kinkiness is awesome. But it occasionally needs to take a rest.

I'll drink to that.

*raises glass of lemonade*

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:39 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Bralia wrote:Except I'm straight. I don't want you to be drilling ~~for anything~~ me.

I realized that sounded homophobic. . You can drill anything but me, CC.

I didn't think it sounded homophobic. :hug:

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:40 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Coffee Cakes wrote:
I'll drink to that.

*raises glass of lemonade*

Cheers!

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:43 pm**

Individuality-ness wrote:
Bralia wrote:What do you do on Wikipedia? And you're a Pandoran? Awesome. I've been a loyal Pandoran for countless years now. I dedicate my entire 4300+ song library to Pandora. What stations do you listen to most?

Look up random articles on Wikipedia, and I don't have that many stations on Pandora, I can list the number of stations I have off my hand (maybe two hands). Haven't been using it for a while due to connection issues.

I don't have many Pandora stations either. The probably goes to show just how powerful they've been, considering my library. I've only been listening to one of the stations for a year or two now. That station started out as a 10 Years station, then I added Rise Against, just mix things up, then Story of the Year and finally, and most recently, Sevendust as primary seeds.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:44 pm**

Coffee Cakes wrote:
Bralia wrote:I realized that sounded homophobic. . You can drill anything but me, CC.

I didn't think it sounded homophobic.

I implied that you should keep it in your pants at all times. :unsure:

. That wasn't what I had intended. :lol:

Coffee Cakes wrote:
Bralia wrote:*raises glass of lemonade*

Cheers!

Cheers!

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:45 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Individuality-ness wrote:Look up random articles on Wikipedia, and I don't have that many stations on Pandora, I can list the number of stations I have off my hand (maybe two hands). Haven't been using it for a while due to connection issues.

I don't have many Pandora stations either. The probably goes to show just how powerful they've been, considering my library. I've only been listening to one of the stations for a year or two now. That station started out as a 10 Years station, then I added Rise Against, just mix things up, then Story of the Year and finally, and most recently, Sevendust as primary seeds.

I have a classical music station, a Broadway music station (RENT, Avenue Q, Wicked, Chicago, Book of Mormon are the seeds), Florence + the Machine, Lady Gaga, and a Stop and Stare (for the song) radio station. Recently added Ellie Goulding and Anais Mitchell, I tend to put them all on shuffle.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:46 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Coffee Cakes wrote:
I didn't think it sounded homophobic.

I implied that you should keep it in your pants at all times. . That wasn't what I had intended.

Coffee Cakes wrote:
Cheers!

Cheers!

Oh?

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:48 pm**

Individuality-ness wrote:
Bralia wrote:I don't have many Pandora stations either. The probably goes to show just how powerful they've been, considering my library. I've only been listening to one of the stations for a year or two now. That station started out as a 10 Years station, then I added Rise Against, just mix things up, then Story of the Year and finally, and most recently, Sevendust as primary seeds.

I have a classical music station, a Broadway music station (RENT, Avenue Q, Wicked, Chicago, Book of Mormon are the seeds), Florence + the Machine, Lady Gaga, and a Stop and Stare (for the song) radio station. Recently added Ellie Goulding and Anais Mitchell, I tend to put them all on shuffle.

You mix all of your stations together? Nice. I'm not sure I could stand my Trance stations being mixed with my modern rock, though. :blink:

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:51 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Individuality-ness wrote:I have a classical music station, a Broadway music station (RENT, Avenue Q, Wicked, Chicago, Book of Mormon are the seeds), Florence + the Machine, Lady Gaga, and a Stop and Stare (for the song) radio station. Recently added Ellie Goulding and Anais Mitchell, I tend to put them all on shuffle.

You mix all of your stations together? Nice. I'm not sure I could stand my Trance stations being mixed with my modern rock, though.

I like a little randomization, is all. ^_^ Might start using Pandora again tomorrow if the Internet stays stable, plus then my listening hours will be reset (I've been known to go on for hours...).

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:51 pm**

Hello.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:52 pm**

Dalvikur wrote:Hello.

Welcome to TET and NS, your biolink has been installed and will be activated shortly.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:54 pm**

Individuality-ness wrote:
Dalvikur wrote:Hello.

Welcome to TET and NS, your biolink has been installed and will be activated shortly.

Okay. If I have to

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:54 pm**

Individuality-ness wrote:
Bralia wrote:You mix all of your stations together? Nice. I'm not sure I could stand my Trance stations being mixed with my modern rock, though.

I like a little randomization, is all. ^_^ Might start using Pandora again tomorrow if the Internet stays stable, plus then my listening hours will be reset (I've been known to go on for hours...).

I listen to my own music for hours on end, too. Heck, if I'm at my computer, there's a 99% chance that I'm listening to my music.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:54 pm**

Would you say that the spoilered post would fall prey to "Tl;Dr"?

Forsher wrote:I'll start with listing my previous threads on the topic at hand. There was Educationz, Die School and Eduaction: Solution in February. They've been my only dedicated education threads although an argument can be made for Forgotten? but it was really too forgotten. Should Bibles be in State Schools? focussed on a particular aspect of education and A Smoking Good Education is linked here purely because I like those pictures. The reason why I am doing this is to provide the broadest possible picture for anyone who replies. (And also to show off my credentials, as it were.)

I'm interested in education but I am in a country where unless I stay in education in some capacity for the rest of my life there will come a point where I will be out of date and my opinions will reflect this. Between primary and secondary this is seen. In fact between the damn subjects and year levels this is seen. No-one has a real idea of what things are like. That said, except when it comes to knowing what is happening in schools this is all anecdotal. I may have just been blessed to have decreasing amounts of homework as I got older (until this year). I've often viewed this as a bad thing, but need it be so? Schools are pretty free in NZ regardless of whether they are private or not and the system is allowed to potter on as it wants. When one compares this to the US and its endless court cases one finds the secret agency approach to be much better. That said, it's not intentional... the unawareness, that is.

I think that overhauling the model of education in the United States would be a very good idea. What one must remember is that I have had secondary experience of education in the United States and I have talked about its system before in my threads but also threads that other posters have made (which aren't linked). The standard complaint with education in the US, and pretty much anywhere else, is that the education that students are getting isn't good enough. The usual response to this has been to review the curriculum but I think the US needs to be more basic. (Yes, I know that what I propose is unlikely to work.)

I have read remarks here by people who favour the end of the Board of Education which is a national (federal) body as far as I know. I disagree with this view. It is important to have a clear top down approach with a system that I have previously termed rotten. Basically, I think that the states need to say bye-bye to the control of education in their state, for now at least. There is precedent for this but it has required a military presence to work (look I just solved what to do with the army as well, aren't I clever?) so a firm hand would be needed. The BoE would create a curriculum, maybe even a qualification (importing one is an option... IGCSE for example), that would be rolled out across the US. They'd also institute a new funding model whereby schools that are in poorer areas would receive more funding per student than those in wealthier areas. It would also be important to ensure that areas have enough schools.

Here in New Zealand we have a thing called Tomorrow's Schools which is well liked, unlike No Child Left Behind (they're quite different), and one thing that came from that is a Board of Trustees, who are elected from the parent body for the most part, for each and every school. They do not, however, manage the curriculum and instead deal more with allocation of funds and extreme disciplinary actions (going before the Board is worse than meeting the Principal). This would be necessary, I feel. Hopefully the states would eventually be able to assume control once more but it would be only to ensure easier administration: they'd still take the lead from the BoE.

However, I feel that education is too undervalued around the world for stuff like this to actually happen. Sure there was controversy when we were told we'd be getting charter schools but that's faded out of the nation's conscience to the extent that I've forgotten what the name we'll have is. Valuing education to a proper extent is key and sadly I don't think education is the answer here. The change will have to start at the top. In a way the US has an advantage here with the strong political split. If someone made it an issue then change, or at least, talk of change would happen.

What do you think?

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:55 pm**

So guys, I'm just saying that Atlas Shrugged is a capitalistic Fifty Shades of Grey.

No, wait. That's insulting to E.L. James.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:55 pm**

Dalvikur wrote:
Individuality-ness wrote:Welcome to TET and NS, your biolink has been installed and will be activated shortly.

Okay. If I have to

Please allow me to seize your dignity. It will not be returned.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:56 pm**

Oh, I should say. I'm Sauðárkrókur

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:56 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Individuality-ness wrote:I like a little randomization, is all. ^_^ Might start using Pandora again tomorrow if the Internet stays stable, plus then my listening hours will be reset (I've been known to go on for hours...).

I listen to my own music for hours on end, too. Heck, if I'm at my computer, there's a 99% chance that I'm listening to my music.

Same here. Damn it, I want my iPod back. >.>

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:56 pm**

Caninope wrote:So guys, I'm just saying that Atlas Shrugged is a capitalistic Fifty Shades of Grey.

No, wait. That's insulting to E.L. James.

I saw a little bit of an Ayn Rand interview (which may or may not have been playing on the Colbert Report; shut up).

"So, the weak, they do not get love?"

"They certainly do not deserve it."

And that's when I imagined myself punching a frail, PTSD-suffering woman in the face and thought myself a good person.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:57 pm**

Individuality-ness wrote:
Bralia wrote:I listen to my own music for hours on end, too. Heck, if I'm at my computer, there's a 99% chance that I'm listening to my music.

Same here. Damn it, I want my iPod back. >.>

Your iPod is not in your possession? I get violent if forcibly removed from my iTouch . . . :unsure:

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:58 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Individuality-ness wrote:Same here. Damn it, I want my iPod back. >.>

Your iPod is not in your possession? I get violent if forcibly removed from my iTouch . . .

Mine got smashed one rainy day due to a car door... >.>;

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:58 pm**

Forsher wrote:Would you say that the spoilered post would fall prey to "Tl;Dr"?

Forsher wrote:I'll start with listing my previous threads on the topic at hand. There was Educationz, Die School and Eduaction: Solution in February. They've been my only dedicated education threads although an argument can be made for Forgotten? but it was really too forgotten. Should Bibles be in State Schools? focussed on a particular aspect of education and A Smoking Good Education is linked here purely because I like those pictures. The reason why I am doing this is to provide the broadest possible picture for anyone who replies. (And also to show off my credentials, as it were.)

I'm interested in education but I am in a country where unless I stay in education in some capacity for the rest of my life there will come a point where I will be out of date and my opinions will reflect this. Between primary and secondary this is seen. In fact between the damn subjects and year levels this is seen. No-one has a real idea of what things are like. That said, except when it comes to knowing what is happening in schools this is all anecdotal. I may have just been blessed to have decreasing amounts of homework as I got older (until this year). I've often viewed this as a bad thing, but need it be so? Schools are pretty free in NZ regardless of whether they are private or not and the system is allowed to potter on as it wants. When one compares this to the US and its endless court cases one finds the secret agency approach to be much better. That said, it's not intentional... the unawareness, that is.

I think that overhauling the model of education in the United States would be a very good idea. What one must remember is that I have had secondary experience of education in the United States and I have talked about its system before in my threads but also threads that other posters have made (which aren't linked). The standard complaint with education in the US, and pretty much anywhere else, is that the education that students are getting isn't good enough. The usual response to this has been to review the curriculum but I think the US needs to be more basic. (Yes, I know that what I propose is unlikely to work.)

I have read remarks here by people who favour the end of the Board of Education which is a national (federal) body as far as I know. I disagree with this view. It is important to have a clear top down approach with a system that I have previously termed rotten. Basically, I think that the states need to say bye-bye to the control of education in their state, for now at least. There is precedent for this but it has required a military presence to work (look I just solved what to do with the army as well, aren't I clever?) so a firm hand would be needed. The BoE would create a curriculum, maybe even a qualification (importing one is an option... IGCSE for example), that would be rolled out across the US. They'd also institute a new funding model whereby schools that are in poorer areas would receive more funding per student than those in wealthier areas. It would also be important to ensure that areas have enough schools.

Here in New Zealand we have a thing called Tomorrow's Schools which is well liked, unlike No Child Left Behind (they're quite different), and one thing that came from that is a Board of Trustees, who are elected from the parent body for the most part, for each and every school. They do not, however, manage the curriculum and instead deal more with allocation of funds and extreme disciplinary actions (going before the Board is worse than meeting the Principal). This would be necessary, I feel. Hopefully the states would eventually be able to assume control once more but it would be only to ensure easier administration: they'd still take the lead from the BoE.

However, I feel that education is too undervalued around the world for stuff like this to actually happen. Sure there was controversy when we were told we'd be getting charter schools but that's faded out of the nation's conscience to the extent that I've forgotten what the name we'll have is. Valuing education to a proper extent is key and sadly I don't think education is the answer here. The change will have to start at the top. In a way the US has an advantage here with the strong political split. If someone made it an issue then change, or at least, talk of change would happen.

What do you think?

Theocracy coming near you: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/educati ... ses-doubts

Plans for a school to teach creationism as well as evolution have raised doubts over how the Ministry of Education will ensure children are properly educated under the Government's charter schools framework.

The Manukau Charitable Christian Trust is one of a number of faith-based groups planning to be, as the Government now calls them, a partnership school.

It plans to team up with Manukau Christian School and teach the In God's World philosophy, marked against the Cambridge curriculum.

The philosophy, used at other Christian schools, encourages every subject to be taught so students discover how God made the world, and upholds and governs it.

Science and culture modules are taught to equip students to recognise what the In God's World document calls the wonder of God's creation, and that God is the God of history.

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:58 pm**

Nationstatelandsville wrote:
Caninope wrote:So guys, I'm just saying that Atlas Shrugged is a capitalistic Fifty Shades of Grey.

No, wait. That's insulting to E.L. James.

I saw a little bit of an Ayn Rand interview (which may or may not have been playing on the Colbert Report; shut up).

"So, the weak, they do not get love?"

"They certainly do not deserve it."

And that's when I imagined myself punching a frail, PTSD-suffering woman in the face and thought myself a good person.

That was a great Colbert episode . . .

Posted: **Fri Aug 31, 2012 6:58 pm**

Bralia wrote:
Dalvikur wrote:Okay. If I have to

Please allow me to seize your dignity. It will not be returned.

I don't have any, anyways.

NationStates

The Eternal Thread - Why me?