The New Math

The Gwinnett County School System, located just outside Atlanta, has made the news several times in the past twelve months for its unorthodox approach to cross-curriculum education. Like many districts, Gwinnett County is attempting to maximize instruction time by integrating lessons from one subject into the homework for another subject in the hopes of reinforcing the retention of both.

In March of 2011, a local third grader brought home a reading comprehension assignment titled “What is an Illegal Alien?” The worksheet chronicles the adventures of Sam and Taylor playing in Sam’s backyard until they are joined by another boy who “jumps the fence” without permission (presumably to monopolize unskilled labor in the area). After completing this tale of unsolicited entry, the students are asked to answer a series of questions to confirm their understanding. Number six was as follows:

 What does the U.S. do with illegal aliens?

A. The U.S. puts them to work in the army.

B. The U.S. shoots them into outer space.

C. The U.S. puts them to death.

D. The U.S. sends them back where they came from.

Original Illustration from Worksheet

I realize that education has evolved since I went through public school, but is immigration policy routinely taught to third graders? What would the correct answer even be? I went to edhelper’s site and found the original worksheet which even featured a faceless silhouette lurking behind a fence. Interestingly enough, the illegal alien lesson is recommended only for grades 7-9.

After several parental complaints, the teacher (herself Hispanic) revealed that she had acquired the worksheet from the educational website edhelpher.com. The Gwinnett School system referenced the teacher’s lack of experience (it was her first year) and a lax curriculum review board as the culprits and vowed to put the incident behind them.

On January 6^th of this year, a local news station was contacted by several concerned parents about another homework assignment given to local third graders. Having learned not to rely on educational websites for politically-correct resources, one of the teachers decided to create a series of word problems herself by combining American history and mathematics. A sampling:

1.      "Each tree had 56 oranges. If eight slaves pick them equally, then how much would each slave pick?"

2.      “Frederick had 6 baskets filled with cotton. If each basket held 5 pounds, how many pounds did he have all together?”

3.      “If Frederick got two beatings per day, how many beatings did he get in one week? Two weeks?”

School system spokesperson Sloan Roach publicly admitted that “these questions were not appropriate” and they are currently looking into the situation. The local NAACP is calling for the teacher’s termination and parents have been urged to simply shred remaining copies of the assignment.

To the system’s credit, they used this incident as a learning experience and guaranteed that if their staff was going to assign offensive homework, it would originate in-house. Laziness could easily account for the “illegal alien” incident since the teacher in question didn’t even put forth the effort to locate racially-charged lessons for the correct age-group, but in this case a teacher actually took time to author the curriculum.

This begs the question, who is in charge of elementary curriculum in that system? It sounds like they have Howard Stern on quality control down there. Sure, something like this might slip through the cracks every once in a while, but this county is on the verge of turning offensive third-grade worksheets into a system-wide tradition.   

I can see the merit in combining history and math, but it is essential that the history is contextualized and age appropriate. Otherwise parents could find themselves discussing Rwandan ethnic-cleansing during a lesson on counting change.  

Given this Georgia school system’s propensity for turning potentially-offensive social issues into worksheets, I would like to offer some suggestions for future word problems:

1.      If two Klansmen place a 10-foot wooden cross into a 2-foot hole in someone’s front yard, how much of the cross remains above ground level?

2.       If Suzie’s pimp takes a 50% cut of her nightly earnings and she made $440 last night, how much did the pimp earn?

3.      If each Columbian coke mule can store ½ Kilo of uncut nose powder in their rectum, how many coke mules do you need to move 5 Kilos through US customs?

4.      If Cousin Roger is entitled to 25% of grandma’s estate upon her passing and she is currently worth $2 Million, how much does he stand to inherit by squeezing off her feeding tube?

5.       If neo-Nazi Dave can firebomb two synagogues per night, how many weeks will it take to burn down all 28 synagogues in town?

As for whether or not the teacher was being deliberately offensive and therefore deserves to be fired, I am reminded of a quote I once heard:

“Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."

The Underwritters

Recently my wife and I began updating our life insurance policies to make certain that any postmortem financial concerns are properly addressed.   When I spoke to our agent, she was extremely helpful and asked how much coverage I wished to have available for my wife and future children were something to happen to me. I informed that I was seeking the happy medium between complete irresponsibility and my wife arriving at my memorial service in a Mercedes.

She suggested $500,000 if I wished to pay off existing debts, keep my spouse comfortable, and ensure my non-existent offspring could afford a Bachelor’s degree from an accredited university. When I inquired about different rate and term options, she informed me that she would need to place me on hold as she spoke with the “underwritters.”

For those who do not know, the “underwritters” are apparently a faceless collective of statisticians who are unwilling or unable to communicate directly with other humans. I say apparently because even after dealing with several different insurance companies concerning a variety of coverage, I am still unable to amass any proof of their existence.

When I was first attempting to acquire auto insurance I spoke with a local agent about rate discounts. After recording all my pertinent information, he informed me that he was unable to immediately generate a quote since the information had to be reviewed by the “underwritters.”  Upon receiving what I felt was an unfair quote; I told the agent that I wished to dispute my risk category. He replied that the risk category was assigned at the discretion of the underwritters and that there was nothing he could do.

Foolishly, I asked to speak directly to the underwritters to plead my case. I doubt the look on his face would have been any different if instead I had requested to have his wife bear my children. Incredulous at my audacity, he chortled that “no one speaks directly to the underwritters.” He went on to explain that he himself doesn’t even communicate directly with the high council, but rather does so through a home office proxy.

Based on my experience (or lack thereof) I have decided that underwritters either do not exist at all or possess the single greatest job in America. The former possibility would place them in the same category as the “sales manager” at a car dealership, a system that allows employees to reject reasonable offers while deflecting the customer’s hostility away from themselves and toward a common enemy.

The latter possibility means that somewhere in America there are gainfully employed men and women with the power to make life altering financial decisions without having to so much as acknowledge their own existence to the customers whose lives they alter. This would be akin to a doctor’s visit where you relay your symptoms to an intern who then leaves the room for ten minutes and returns with a bottle of green pills and strict orders that you are no longer allowed to consume bird meat after Labor Day. If you were to question this course of treatment, the intern would then reply, “I have no idea why you cannot have bird meat, that’s just what my proxy said that the doctor wanted you to do.”

I can think of only one other parallel and it exists in the technology field. If you are having issues with a specific piece of software and you call tech support, you will be strategically routed through a gauntlet of friendly yet under-trained employees designed to convince you that it would be less trouble to work around the issue than insist on a resolution. If, however, you possess the constitution to forge ahead and reach level three tech support; you will be placed in touch with someone who has the privilege of indirect access to “the developers.”

The developers are the Mountain Dew-fueled software programmers whose contract prevents the possibility of direct contact with anyone actually utilizing the code that they authored. Presumably, such interactions would negatively impact their World of Warcraft scheduling and, by extension, their experience points. Like all of us in the technology field, they can easily be identified by their non-existent muscle tone and translucent epidermis. 

Unlike my experiences with the underwritters, I have actually spoken to someone identifying themselves as a developer. While I admit that it is a distinct possibility that I was simply having a conversation with a member of the janitorial staff, they did display enough technical knowledge to fix the issue. In my particular case, the issue was a commercial printer that insisted on displaying its interface in a combination of Dutch and English causing mass confusion. After convincing four other employees that “Dinglish” was a legitimate phenomenon, I was allowed to speak to “Rick” who fixed the issue while microwaving a burrito.

Fitness in the New Year

Every January, throngs of Americans publicly declare their intent to “get healthy.” Depending on your current lifestyle, that could mean anything from simply joining a gym to finally weaning yourself off Chinese laxatives. For those that choose a more traditional route to their fitness goals, many gyms offer group sessions for those that prefer communal calisthenics over solitary routines. It has gotten to the point that a fitness center would be downright embarrassed to admit that all they had to offer was free-weights, treadmills, and adequately-lit parking.

The race to provide a more creative method for this choreographed physical exertion has led to some interesting offerings over the years. America experienced Jazzercise, Spinning, Buns of Steel, Tae-Bo, Zumba, and 8-minute abs; yet somehow the entire nation manages to collectively get fatter every year. So what looms on the horizon for 2012? It appears there will be two contenders for exercise phenomenon of the year.

The first is called Drums Alive, and involves participants beating drum sticks on yoga balls to a rhythmic beat set by the instructor. It was invented by a German woman named Carrie Ekins who decided to start beating on cardboard boxes with sticks after suffering a hip injury and was unable to continue her normal exercise routine. Like any true visionary, she quickly recognized that just because a primate can do something unaided doesn’t mean Americans won’t pay cash for an instructor.

Drums Alive

It is quickly replacing Zumba as the class of choice in many fitness centers due to its lower impact and ability to channel aggression. In fact, many “Drum Alivers” cite anger rather than fitness, as the primary driving force behind their participation and claim they feel relieved after their sessions. The program’s biggest market has been senior centers, a trend instructor Shawn Bannon attributes to familiarity: “For seniors, a lot of this involves dance moves that they already know."

Am I the only one disturbed at how angry these people are? What is going on in their lives that they can only find relief through hour-long sessions of synchronized bludgeoning? My theory is that their aggression stems from the realization they agreed to an iron-clad 12-month contract with a gym whose most appealing classes involve hitting decommissioned exercise equipment while listening to “My Humps” by the Black Eyed Peas.

I am also unsure how to interpret the instructor’s theory on the programs popularity amongst the geriatric demographic. What exactly does “this involves dance moves they already know” mean? What kinds of dance moves involve repeatedly striking an inanimate object on command? And better yet, why would said dance move be more familiar to the elderly? If this catches on I will seriously consider quitting my job in order to lead a fitness class where participants pay $10 apiece to hit a piñata with a pool cue.

The second challenger to the Zumba throne is called “Nia” and is also a certified instructor-led low impact dance workout to music. But don’t let the similarities fool you, because Nia involves a much more impressive quasi-spiritual description:

Nia is a sensory-based movement practice that leads to health, wellness, and fitness. It empowers 

people of all shapes and sizes by connecting the body, mind, emotions, and spirit. Nia draws from disciplines of the martial arts, dance arts, and healing arts. Every class offers a unique combination of 52 moves that correspond with the main areas of the body: the base, the core and the upper extremities. We can become connected to others to shape a consciousness that extends beyond our own. Together we will unearth possibilities never before imagined.

Roughly translated, this means that by combining ambiguous religious terminology with commercially-unmarketable music we have created a more efficient way to sell you a rebranded version of the same fitness product you have been repeatedly purchasing for the past twenty years.

The real beauty of Nia is the breathtaking revenue infrastructure. Instead of simply becoming certified as a trainer, those wishing to become instructors must earn a series of color-coded “belts” with the black belt being the highest. Not only does each belt cost $1,600 dollars, you must take a mandatory “reflection” period of one year between belts ensuring that the creators of Nia will have a steady source of income for the next half-decade or so.

This, combined with the online store selling official Nia music, videos, and pendant necklaces makes this the clear winner in terms of profit margin. There are over twenty official Nia CD’s alone on the site. This means that an exercise movement in its infancy has already generated a larger back catalogue than The Beatles. While a few of the discs feature recognizable artists like Moby, most tracks are nameless instrumentals destined to appear in an upcoming Lexus commercial.   

So which will take the crown? First of all, if my choices as a fitness instructor are between paying $8,000 to acquire a series of refurbished Taekwondo belts or simply possessing the motor skills to move a stick in a repeating vertical pattern you can bet your sweet Aspercreme I will be down at the senior center with a set of 

yoga spheres. So, in terms of market penetration I will give it to Drums Alive.

However, I am not yet convinced both programs have the same target audience. After all, Nia appears to be aimed at middle-upper class women under 60 who feel Zumba is becoming too pedestrian while Drums Alive has found a niche with emotionally-disturbed octogenarians. Either way, I am sure both will be obliterated once Tony Little releases The Gazelle 2.

Fire on the Mountain

It appears that for the first time in the history of the United States, the majority of the public favors the legalization of marijuana. A recent Gallup poll showed that 50% of Americans favored legalization while only 46% opposed it, marking the first time in the polls 40-year history this has occurred. Shockingly, the highest support came from men in the 18-29 demographic while the lowest was senior citizens, which is ironically the group most likely to suffer from cataracts.

This is one of those issues that I was never really sure where I stood. On the one hand, the recreational use of perception-altering substances can often have serious, if unintended, side-effects. On the other hand, Friday was a really funny movie.

From what I understand, the argument against weed is anchored in the idea that it is morally reprehensible and decriminalization is the equivalent of legitimization. It would essentially be the government validating the pot-head lifestyle. Doing so would also become a slippery slope and the umbrella of legalization would soon grow to encompass cocaine, methamphetamines, and Canadian Prilosec until the entire nation was engulfed by a drug-fueled haze.

I can certainly understand these concerns and, unlike Ron Paul, I cannot get onboard with legalized heroin so I wish to avoid the slippery-slope pitfall.  Another argument is how the drug’s effects could compromise the safety of the greater public relating to, say, operating a motor vehicle. From what I have read, the level of impairment resulting from ganga use is on par with, if not slightly less than, alcohol consumption.

There is also the idea that crime rates will skyrocket once half the nation’s able-bodied youth fall under the deviant spell of hash. I could not locate any reliable statistics directly correlating marijuana use with violent crime, but then again you are unlikely to participate in a heated confrontation if you are unwilling to extricate yourself from the couch. In the majority of the cases, it appears that the user simply forfeits whatever ambitions they had in search of empty calories.

Proponents of legalization argue that the regulation and taxation of grass would reduce public safety spending while actually generating revenue through mandatory tariffs. Many point out that the addiction rates and destructive patterns of Mary Jane are no more troubling than alcohol which we regulate and tax to moderate success. Plus, your co-worker at Abercrombie & Fitch can stop pretending that he suffers from seasonal allergy attacks every time the Pink Floyd laser light show hits town.

It seems disingenuous to categorize marijuana with life-shattering substances like heroin or crystal meth. I can envision myself becoming accustomed to the sight of an employee getting baked behind the store with the nicotine addicts, but I am not libertarian enough to be comfortable with my mechanic tying off so that he can get dry while he checks my brakes. We do have a responsibility to prevent undeniably destructive substances from ensnaring the general populace; I am just not convinced that marijuana is any more destructive than vodka.  

While I myself have never partaken of the devil’s lettuce, I feel that the funds utilized to police, prosecute, and house marijuana offenders would be better served fighting much more destructive substances like crystal meth or canned BBQ. Plus, the commercials resulting from the inevitable corporatization of cheeba will be priceless. Can you imagine the TV spot featuring Willie Nelson where he looks gravely into the camera and proclaims, “When it comes time to blaze a fattie, there is only one choice: Willie’s Spanish Angel!”