The Core Remains

I’ve been reading the Concord Monitor recently. Much of the local news coverage has been about education budget cuts around the state. It’s common knowledge that the arts – art, music, etc. – are often the first classes to be eliminated. But once those are gone, what classes come next? Which teachers, subjects and skills are considered to be the next-most expendable?

I have not hard data, nor do I claim to be an expert. But today I’m reading about foreign language classes being dropped and the blocking of programs for troubled teens. Both of these cuts, however locally limited, trouble me.

It seems that we know now more than ever how to better address learning difficulties. Whether this means specific attention in the form of additional programs or different curriculum in the same classroom, it seems that such a careful approach requires greater resources and more teachers.

Cutting foreign language classes is a slippery slope for a country already of limited international exposure. My impression of aliens is that they are far more likely to be multilingual than a fellow American. Go to France, Mexico, or even China and most likely they’ll say hello before you can say bon jour, buenos dias, or ni hao.

I realize I’m highlighting, not solving, problems here. It’s just disappointing to see the core remains so nakedly exposed as the more expendable classes are dropped left and right. Of course reading, writing, and arithmetic are critical to a well rounded education. And perhaps there are enough artistic stimuli available to students of all ages beyond the walls of their elementary, junior high, or high school. But, I don’t think so.

I just can’t help thinking about how fortunate I was to be afforded the opportunity to learn my numbers and fruits in French from first grade on, to play the recorder in third grade and to mold clay as a ten-year old. Like compound interest that is more beneficial the earlier you start investing, early exposure to the arts, a foreign language or additional help at an early age can significantly realign a student’s life for the better from an early age onward.

Embrace the Internet Already!

Dear Newspapers and Television Networks, the fact that I can’t get everything you offer for free on the internet at the same time, or earlier, than when you print or broadcast it is unfortunate in this day and age.

Newspapers, most of you are starting to get it. But you’ve been slow on the uptake. The pay walls were not smart (Come on WSJ!). I understand you’ve yet to figure out how to make enough money from your websites to cover costs. That, coupled with declining print subscription rates is doubly bad.

My suggestion is this: stop paying reporters to write content for you. Cut that part of your staff. It’s got to be a significant portion. Instead, make the people your media. Tap the collective mind, and hire a smaller herd of editors to refine submissions. I’d be surprised if the contributions were not overwhelming. Exposure would be compensation.

It is here that we can take a page from Twitter’s book. At the rate the world turns today, printed news is old news. In fact, CNN is often old news. During an event nearly anywhere on the globe, search for relevant keywords on Twitter’s search and I assure you that you’ll be more in the know than anyone reading a newspaper or watching cable news.

Broadcasters, you, too, need to accept the web. I can deal with the commercials you splice into your online offerings. I get that your linear brains see that as the obvious way to do things. There were commercials on TV, so there should be commercials on the internet, right? Wrong, but I forgive you for the time being.

There can’t be a delay and the content needs to be high definition. Further, you need to flip your current stance and make the Internet your primary focus and television your secondary focus. New goes online because online is where we find new things now. That’s where it will be shared on Facebook, talked about on Twitter, and recut for YouTube.

Stop showing kids toys they can’t play with. Instead, give them the toys early and let them play and share them. Embrace that the kids may find new uses for the toys you didn’t think of instead of being scared of such an outcome. The worst case scenario is that the toy sucks. Best case scenario – the kids love the toy and do your marketing for you. Do yourself a favor and loosen up a little!

My Information Experiment

A few years ago I heard that the most informed people were those who regularly watch the evening news – local and national. This came as a surprise to me, a guy thoroughly overwhelmed by hundreds of minute-by-minute RSS feed updates. I thought that I was surely the most up-to-date fellow around. But, I’ve never been able to get a solid grasp of “real” world news from online sources. Either I get overwhelmed by the amount of information or I get distracted by geek news and pictures.

So, two years after first learning that despite being highly tech savvy I was among the less-informed, I am going to undertake an experiment and get my news from three different sources each of three months.

March: I will read one local and one national newspapers daily for one month. I will do my best to avoid both online and television news.

April: I will watch the local and national news daily, avoiding newspapers and online news.

May: I will read online news (sources TBD), avoiding tv news and newspapers.

My prediction is that if I can make/find the time to read the newspapers, I’ll be most informed during March. Least informed in May.

I’ll post my thoughts at the end of each month and a conclusion in June.