Author Nirvana

Most of the time it is pretty tough. You work by yourself in a vacuum usually over a garage or in a basement or holed up in some back bedroom. You get few attaboys and you work for years on something that might or might not work out for you. You burn out from your own company and fantasize about a real job where people interact and talk and it is not just you and that screen day after day saying...so what are you going to write today?

But occasionally it all pays off. Sometimes it is a great review or somebody buys your book and lets you know or you get a rights sale or just something good comes out of all that effort. But the real payoff is when you see your readers and you see how the book affects them and for a moment it is all worth it. This happens for me when I go to schools to speak and suddenly I see all these young faces and they are holding my book.

And the presentation goes along and they are shy and don't ask too many questions. Sometimes they don't ask you a thing and you have to fill with your writing experiences. But then at the end after you are done signing the books and have talked to the teachers and you are about to go...a lone student walks up and they are holding the book and they look at you and turn red and say "I loved your book....it was the best book I have ever read."

And it took a lot of guts for them to do that. An Adult. An author. And you smile and shake their hand and say thank you very much. And then they leave and you walk away and you really wish you had said more as you cruise down the hallway. Because for a  moment...it all made sense.

www.williamhazelgrove.com
The Pitcher...Sometimes a dream is all you have
 

Waiting For Superman

Go see this movie. Go see it for your children, go see it for your school, go see  it for your country. Because if we believe American is in decline then we should at least know why the last great chapter of this country is closing down on us in the beginning of the twenty first century. You cannot escape that feeling anymore. And you wonder where it all began. Why do our towns look like burned out rust belt towns with no commerce except for some river boat pulled in for a last gasp of economic resuscitation? Why is our culture bankrupt and vapid?Why are we trailing the world now ? It had to start with our kids.

This documentary should not be political. Waiting for Superman should not make teachers coil up and dig in and say no way. The union should not say this is the Antichrist of all film making because it suggests that tenure is not a good thing for our children and that charter schools are not anomalies. Wisconsin is unfortunate because it casts a political light on the question of what is wrong with our schools? Why will we have only 53 million skilled workers for 130 million high tech jobs in 2020? Why do our tech companies go halfway around the world right now to find the engineers they need. Why are we almost last in math and science in the Industrialized nations?

Our schools are in decline because they are incapable of change. As a parent I get this. I have seen this. I have seen good and bad teachers, but the thought they are on equal footing is unacceptable. It is not a matter of economics anymore. It would be nice if we could assume this only exists in parts of the country, but our entire country did not test up to the proficiency standards in math and science for eight graders. Now why is that? Could it be, as the film so eloquently points out, it has become all about the adults and not the kids.

The film ends with a challenge. Do something. Do something to make our schools better. I hope I can do more, but the best I can do right now is to tell you to watch this movie and pass it on. Maybe then we can figure out what to do next.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will be out in April

Our Sputnik Children

You can feel the desperation in American Education now. Tenure is under attack by the states. Pensions are getting busted. Nobody has the money to fund them and all those people skating along under the education umbrella are in danger of getting rained on with the rest of us. The teachers figured they would never fear the pain of the recession and now the clouds are gathering. You think of this as you talk to teachers about your kid and realize how little teaching goes on and how the ability to get a grade now passes for education. Robotic kids able to follow specific directions flourish while children who take time to think drown in the sorrow of failure. And America is behind the rest of the world.

Ramp up math and science. Then we will beat the Chinese. Forget about the ability to speak or think, lets be more linear. Engineers will certainly save American Education. Much the same for the Sputnick generation as that tin cat slingshots around the earth beep beeping way. We will bury you. We will bury you. We will bury you. The Chinese surround us with their low level hum, we own you we own we own you. Teachers put into overdrive to catch up. The kids must meet a higher standard. Download more lessons. Fill more time with more work with more computer time with more Blackboard.

But America never won the day by following rules. How did we win? As Steven Ambrose pointed out in Citizen Solider we won because the individual soldier, the grunt was given permission, nay, he was taught at a very early age to think for himself. To improvise, to create on the spot. So when he came up against his German counter part on the beaches of Normandy the soldier, the citizen solider figured out a way to get himself and his platoon off the beach. And that was good because the Germans waited for orders. They waited for someone who was hell on wheels in science and math to give them exact coordinates while a GI snuck up with a a flamethrower and incinerated their pillbox.

So out Sputnik children are on the line once again. At a booster event for the baseball team I brought up the movie Race to the Bottom to a man whose kids are on military footing in school and athletics. Outstanding achievers. Race to the Bottom is a  documentary that catalogs the stress kids are under now to achieve and how suicide and depression is on the rise among high school students. The man waved the movie away and scoffed. They don't like it then they should drop out he muttered. Wimps.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man wil blast off in March

The Downloadable Classroom

If you have kids in school now then you are in the down loadable classroom. Now we are all teachers. If little Johnny or Suzy has a problem the teacher simply downloads it to the parent. The download comes in the form of emails, websites, twitters, webinars. You name it, teachers discovered the cyber world has a built in time saver--you download all your problems to the parents and you have done your job. Also, you can vent in a lovely one way vehicle called the email bomb and dress down little Suzie or Johnny's deficiencies and again the problem has been taken off the teachers desk.

Used to be a teacher had to teach. If a student really didn't get it then they had to get in there and teach...you know, convey a concept to the student who is having a hard time grasping the concept. Now. They simply let the parent know the student is having problems and would they please work with Suzy or Johnny on their science, math, social studies, reading, geography, and by the way little Suzy and Johnny talked in class, forgot their pencil, forgot to put the lock on their locker, took too long going to the bathroom, chewed gum, texted on their phone, burped, looked out the window, yawned, looked bored, laughed, scribbled on their desk and would you the parent please take care of that also?

Ok. I get it. Maybe everyone doesn't get these emails. But education has become a web based commodity and the teachers are gatekeepers. If there was not an internet then homework could not be near as elaborate and certainly any kind of disciplinary problems would be taken care of in the classroom. What the open laptop does for teachers is it allows them to vent at that moment when a kid makes them mad. They vent directly to the parent. What a luxury. How would you like to vent every time your boss made you mad or you had a problem at work. But the teachers have found a perfect get it off my desk device. Clearly the problem student is now at the mercy of Blackboard.com.

But if you are pulled into the classroom for a conference then you will be introduced to another little time saver for the teacher--the TEAM. No longer will you face off with your kids teacher--you will face off with seven teachers who back each other up. Again, think about work. You have a grievance against your boss. You meet him with seven people who back you up. I don't think so. In the TEAM world it is your word against the seven teachers. Watch out for anyone who speaks of the THE TEAM. There is no responsibility in that kind of plurality. No one is at fault except for little Suzy or Johnny and by proxy you the parent. Like the faceless void of the Internet--there is no responsibility for teaching your child.

So the only thing I can think of is to block the emails. Maybe then a teacher might pick up the phone or actually solve the problem in class. Or they might....um, five letter word, starts with a t and ends with an h....ah, I know, teach!

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/