Roland Allen: Weblog

This is a four-day weekend for the students. The school threw in a long weekend just for fun. The school was closed on Friday. Students are off today, but the faculty is gathering at 7:30 for a day of meetings. It’s been a nice break.

The heat has abated a bit and the house cooled down nicely last night, unlike the night before. I’m up early because I want to bake some vegetables for lunch. It was too hot to do so last night.

I started watching Bergman’s Wild Strawberries last night. Although the movie’s shorts (94 minutes), I didn’t watch it all. I got tired. It’s simple movie that develops a lot of characters in a short time.

I haven’t written a conclusion to last week’s visit to Serra High School. Readers will recall that I was an accreditation visiting committee last week in Gardena. I was at the school from Sunday through Wednesday. I enjoyed being there a great deal, although it is draining work. Being on a visiting committee is volunteer work. Experienced educators are invited to serve on committees. I can’t write about a lot of details, but I can share some things. A lot of things impressed me about Serra, particularly the dedication of faculty/staff, students and parents. Basically, all of the constituents have a stake in the school, which makes it nice to be there.

But, being away for most of last week, and coming back to my school for only one day, meant that I was pretty busy on Thursday. In fact, I had to come in on Friday to catch up on stuff, including scheduling a couple of meetings with students who had urgent things that needed to be dealt with.

I did get to an important track meet on Thursday afternoon and evening. Quite a few students on our team qualified to advance on to league championship competition. And, on Saturday, I spent the middle of the day at a swim meet.

Facebook Chat has arrived. This clever application sets Facebook apart from other social networking/mini-blogging sites. And it will certainly keep users on Facebook.

I wonder what this means for the future of AIM?

I’m not sure if I’ve been in Gardena before. It’s a small city off of the 110 south of Los Angeles. It’s bordered by Hawthorne, Compton and Harbor City. Although the streets that run east to west (Manhattan Beach Boulevard and Redondo Beach Boulevard) suggest that it’s near the beach. It’s not.

I’m in Gardena for most of this week as part of a “visiting committee” that is reviewing Junipero Serra High School. Serra is a Catholic high school that is part of the diocese of Los Angeles education department. The school has transitioned from an all boys school to a coed school with a mostly minority and low-income student population of 600 kids. The school shrank to about half of its current size a few years back, but, a dedicated faculty and administration partnered with parents to bring it back. And the results are impressive. Last year 100% of Serra graduates were admitted to college, and the majority were admitted to four-year colleges and universities.

A couple of cultural notes: This hotel we’re put up in is along a strip of Gardena that is “Fusion” Asian. What I mean is that there are a lot of signs designating Korean businesses and restaurants. And there are a number of Chinese restaurants. The hotel is Japanese. The staff speaks Japanese and there are Japanese businessmen around the entrance smoking. I was given an option of having either an American or Japanese breakfast tomorrow morning. (I will have the Japanese breakfast.)

One of the best videos I’ve seen:

I was the doting uncle this past Saturday afternoon at the UCLA Rafer Johnson/Jackie Joyner Kersee Invitational outdoor track meet.

My nephew is a freshman at Texas A&M. He ran the 400 and was anchor for the 4 X 400 meter relay. The first race (400m) didn’t go well for Bryan. However, there was not another team even close in the 4 X 400 relay, and Bryan’s team came in first.

Texas A&M men’s team rose from number 16 to the top spot in the nation last week. And, they should hold on to that position after a very successful meet at UCLA.

Of course, I have photos from the meet. It was cool to see Jackie Joyner-Kersee on the field cheering on the athletes, along with her children. I heard from some of the athletes that she attended all three days of the meet. That, to me, is a class act for one of the greatest women athletes of our time.

Here’s a photo of Bryan, my nephew, in the home stretch of the relay, that his team won.

It was fortuitous that I got to see a former student of mine, Johnny Quinn, who is a pole vaulter for UCLA. Johnny competed at the same time as my nephew, so I got a two-fer on Saturday and it was nice to sit with his family at the meet.

Here’s a link to my photos of the meet. Saturday was one of the hottest days we’ve had in Southern California so far this year. It was so hot that I had to keep the top up on my car!

The New York Times reported on the stress of professional blogging:

Two weeks ago in North Lauderdale, Fla., funeral services were held for Russell Shaw, a prolific blogger on technology subjects who died at 60 of a heart attack. In December, another tech blogger, Marc Orchant, died at 50 of a massive coronary. A third, Om Malik, 41, survived a heart attack in December.

Other bloggers complain of weight loss or gain, sleep disorders, exhaustion and other maladies born of the nonstop strain of producing for a news and information cycle that is as always-on as the Internet.

To be sure, there is no official diagnosis of death by blogging, and the premature demise of two people obviously does not qualify as an epidemic. There is also no certainty that the stress of the work contributed to their deaths. But friends and family of the deceased, and fellow information workers, say those deaths have them thinking about the dangers of their work style.

Don’t think that I’ll ever get to that point, as a blogger, but the gist of the NYT article is that bloggers who are paid by the click, have to get the story out first, in order to create a buzz and bring in the clicks.

That’s a curious economy, but I suspect that it works.

The London sky is beautiful tonight.

(Click photo for larger image.)

I am aware that this is my first post since leaving for almost a week ago. That should be sign enough that I’m enjoying spring break.

I went met up with Nick, his brother, Michael, and Michael’s lovely wife, Sarah, my first night here. We went to dinner on St. Katharine’s Dock, which is a cool place. So much so that I went there again today!

There was snow in London on Easter morning.  I spent Monday in Windsor and Easton with my friend, Nick.  On Tuesday I flew to Dublin to see Trinity College/University of Dublin. I loved Trinity, although I felt that Dublin was a bit dull. I suspect that the smaller towns and Irish countryside would be more interesting.

I returned to London Wednesday evening and spent today walking along the Thames. I went to Tate Modern, which was very cool. I haven’t mapped out the next two days, but I’m sure that they’ll be fun.

Here are links to my photos:

London

Dublin and Trinity College

Cheers!

One of my work colleagues invited me to go on a hike with him and his dog after work today. I’ve just posted some photos of my hike with James, and his dog, Mae. We went in the hills above San Juan Capistrano. There were a lot of swallows up there who have returned to San Juan Capistrano.

The photos are linked here.

I wanted to point out this photo, in particular, because it shows the amount of area on Saddleback Mountain that was burned in one of the fires this past Fall. The “light” area on the left of the mountain is the burn area, which denuded the mountain.

I’ve been talking to my students about writing a personal belief statement. This is a first exercise that they will incorporate into writing philosophical position statements later in the semester.

We’re using NPR’s This I Believe as a starting point.

I’ve written a belief statement for tomorrow’s class. I’ve also recorded it as a podcast that you can listen to.

Read .pdf document here.

List to MP3 here.

There have been a number of disturbing news reports on dumping the homeless on Los Angeles streets to get them out of hospital beds. A recent news story reported that in the city of Los Angeles there are only 45 beds available in shelters for homeless individuals who are recuperating from illnesses. However, the cost of keeping those same people in a hospital is often in the thousands of dollars per day. There is a movement to add recuperation beds in shelters.

I am somewhat amazed that this issue hasn’t been addressed before now. My thoughts are that the homeless have little to know voice. Sadly, they seem to just be supplicants.