Another encampment in the trenches

Thursday I went to the University at Buffalo to cover President Barack Obama’s speech about the rising cost of college education and his plan to fix it.

I have no intention of discussing the policy initiative as presented. You can hear all about it elsewhere and come to your own conclusion.

Instead what I’m going to do is give you my take of Thursday’s event and provide some details you may not hear elsewhere.

My day started at 6:45 a.m. — at least two hours earlier than I usually roll out of bed — hoping to get to the University at Buffalo well ahead of the 9 a.m. media check in time. I nuked a cup of coffee and sent a message to Heather letting her know I successfully landed my feet on the floor. I turned the water on in the shower and set the temperature at the right level. And I stared at the mechanism of my shower. “How do I get the water to come out of the shower head,” I thought to myself. It took me awhile but I figured it out. I’m so not a morning person. Keep in mind that I get out of work between 1 and 2 a.m.

Heather picked me up around 8:15 and we headed to Amherst — via Tim Horton’s, of course. We got to UB just shortly before 9 and found the media check in. Without asking for our ID’s, they handed us our official White House Pool press passes and sent us to the security checkpoint. Equipment to the left, pocket items to the right, and bodies through the scanner. They checked over Heather’s camera gear to make sure it was really camera gear. They checked over my cell phone to make sure it was really a cell phone. I had placed my extra large triple triple on the table. They didn’t check to make sure it was coffee. It didn’t occur to me until later how odd that was. Security is tighter at Buffalo-Niagara International Airport than at a speech by the standing president (or former president, if you check my column from Oct. 23.)

Inside there was much wandering. And kabitzing. The media is a funny bunch. We all want to be first. We all want to be best. And we all want the other outlets to fail miserably. But when we’re together we’re like dysfunctional cousins at a family reunion.

At my end of the media riser, we watched each other take selfies. We talked shop. We mocked whoever wasn’t in earshot. A reporter from the Olean Times Herald photobombed a selfie Channel 2’s Mary Alice Demler was taking. This lead to much discussion and group photos. It was a party atmosphere.

At the other end of the media riser it was all work and no play, Heather tells me. That’s where all the camera people were. Camera people apparently don’t kabitz. Or take selfies. Although I know better.

So we’re waiting. And waiting. And UB President Satish K. Tripathi speaks. Followed by Education Secretary Arne Duncan. Then UB student Silvana C. D’Ettorre. And finally — although only a few minutes later than originally projected — President Obama.

The crowd went wild. It was my third time seeing President Obama so I was all cool and professional. But really, it’s cool to see the sitting president. If you get the chance, go do it. It’s like the difference between watching a Sabres game on TV or at HSBC. There’s just something about the experience.

In three words, the president inadvertently dissed Congressman Brian Higgins and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown. Those three words were “Mayor Brian Higgins.” Oops. After some jeering from the crowd, he fixed his error and make a joke at his own expense.

About two-thirds of the way through his speech, some idiot stood up in the back and yelled “Traitor!” followed by something unintelligible and then a second “Traitor!” He was hauled off.

I’d say it’s hard to believe that someone could be so openly uncivilised. But again, I know better. I have Facebook.

Following the speech, the president wandered out into the crowd, much to the chagrin of about a dozen Secret Service agents who all “whooshed” to POTUS’ side — apparently out of thin air. He shook hands. He held a baby. He posed for photos. He swaggered. And he left.

The media said our goodbyes to one another until the next big event, went on our merry way and reverted our trains of thought to being first and best.

Scott Leffler has seen every sitting president in person since Ronald Reagan. He’s always respectful. And he thinks you should be, too. Follow him on Twitter @scottleffler.

Hey board of education members! Read This!

I found a great story on Slate.com (link below) detailing the nation's problems with math and science education thanks to a friend and former co-worker of mine, Tasha Kates.

The story explains that technology is destroying the standard teaching method for math and science by making it easy (and fun) for students and teachers alike, while dumbing it down and using incorrect examples and analogies.

It says that many things worth learning in life aren't exactly fun and even uses a sports example:

“Some of the best basketball players on Earth will stand at that foul line and shoot foul shots for hours and be bored out of their minds,” says Williams. Math students, too, need to practice foul shots: adding fractions, factoring polynomials. And whether or not the students are bright, “once they buy into the idea that hard work leads to cool results,” Williams says, you can work with them.

The same analogy could have been made with musical instruments. I was bored as hell learning and practicing scales over and over again. But it drilled the fundamentals of music into my head. And because of that, 20 years after leaving high school, I can still pick up a trumpet and play it, as well as read music.

On the education level, the same analogy could be made with foreign language. Sure, teachers make it fun. I thoroughly enjoyed Bruce Stassburg's Latin class in high school. But there was no cheating. He drilled conjugations into our heads starting on day one ... and continuing for four years. If today's math teachers taught Latin, we would have used an electronic Speak & Spell, no doubt.

One of the things the story mentions is that the graphing calculators used in most schools today are completely unnecessary, something I've said for a long time. Amazing considering the nearly $100 every parent has to shell out for these unnecessary calculators.

Personally, I've always though the calculators were unneeded because after students leave the classes which use them, they almost never go on to talk about sine, cosines, etc. In fact, to be quite frank, I have no idea what those terms mean. I just remember that they go along with those calculators.

One telling point in the story is the fact that 89 percent of high school math teachers believe their students are ready for college math at graduation and only 26 percent of college math teachers believe their students are ready when they get there. That's a huge disparity. (63 percent for those of you without calculators)

I'm not saying that American math teachers are bad. And I'm not saying they're lazy. One teacher oft-quoted in the story had to rebel against his school board to be allowed to keep a chalk board in his class instead of going with one of the new "interactive whiteboards" that seem so popular today.

I think we get seduced by technology. I know I do. If it has electricity running through it, I like it. If it also has an Amoled screen, I like it even more. I'm hardly a technophobe. I read books and play games on my Android phone. I have a work laptop (Mac) as well as a personal one (Windows). I have the internet on my TV (GoogleTV) and I've been coveting a Kindle. But I still know how to use a typewriter, a pad of paper, and read a real honest-to-goodness book. Just because something is shiny and noisy and makes us go "ooh and ahh," doesn't mean it's a useful tool for education.

And it's not just math and science where technology is taking over. The Niagara Falls School District several years ago started giving laptops to all students. Tool or distraction? I don't honestly know. In the Lockport City School District, many students are using iPads on a regular basis. Are they learning with them? Again, I don't know, but my daughter told me she loves playing MineCraft.

The story even takes potshots at standardized tests, showing statistics that they don't actually help kids to learn anything and actually hurt in terms of teaching kids how to learn.

I can't really speak to "how things are" in high school now. It's been 20 years since I exited those hallowed halls. But I remember that when I was in high school, I didn't really feel like I learned much (aside from Latin conjugation). What it felt like to me was that I was in a holding pattern until I got to college and my maturity caught up with my brain. I felt like I was learning how to learn. So if we aren't teaching kids how to learn, but instead are making it "fun" and "easy," then what the hell is the point of education system?

Seriously, check out this story on Slate.com ...

(note: This column originally appeared as a blog post)

Springtime - when education turns to ...

I love this time of year. The weather gets warmer. Women start to wear more revealing clothes. And there's music all over Western New York.

But there is certainly one part of springtime that bothers me ... as a parent.

I send my kids to school every day under the misguided belief that they'll come home better educated than when they left.

For the most part, from September until late May, the education system lives up to their end of this unwritten deal. But come June ... once the weather turns ...

On Monday, I went to a spelling bee that my eight-year-old daughter was taking part in. Today my 11-year-old has talent show practice. Tomorrow, too. And then Thursday, there's something else ... non-education related. A field trip, maybe?

Strange that the number of field trips increases exponentially as the school year starts to come to a close.

And not just field trips. There's movies ... and TV. My youngest told me today they were watching National Geographic at school today.

Now, granted, National Geographic, spelling bees, and even certain field trips could have an educational component to them. But do you really think this is anything other than simply extending the school year a couple extra weeks for the sake of state aid?

I seriously get the impression that my children - and likely all children in Western New York - were finished "learning" about a week ago or so ... and now they're in coast mode. Just "getting their time in" so the state pony's up with the right amount of coin.

But hey, at least this week they're full days. Next week, too. But the week after that - the last week of school - it's all half days. Half days filled with Disney movies and picnics.

As if it's not annoying enough knowing that my tax dollars are going towards my kids watching movies that we probably already have at home, the half-day-marathon at the end of the year is a real pain as far as transportation goes.

I mean - if there's a full day of school, that cool. I take them to school. I go to work. I pick them up after work. If there's no school, I line up child care for the day and go about my business. But on a half day? Either my wife or I has to figure out a way to leave work at 11:15 to pick the kids up at 11:30. Usually, my wife has to request those days off ... and if not, I have to go pick them up and then bring them back to work with me. This is even further complicated by the fact that I'm supposed to be live on the radio during that 11 a.m. hour.

I was midly amused today during the spelling bee. Because the teacher reading the sentences to accompany the spelling bee references this half-day-marathon twice. As I sat in the audience and fumed about it.

I swear to God, she was mocking me.

I spoke with my sister in Florida last week. She told me the kids down there have been out of school for weeks. Made me wonder ... why are ours still in school. And sadly, the only answer I could think of ... is that it's all about state aid.

But, hey. As long as they have their priorities straight.