Oh, Matt Damon

[thenammagazine]

I disagree with what the dude is saying and even how he is saying it, but your remark makes you sound like an .

Doesn't change the fact that it's 100% truth.

 

[Blackthornone]

So basically you are a middle aged man that washes and polishes cars for a living? Boy, you really stuck it to the man. All that lack of hard work in school sure paid off.

It isn't my goal to stick it to the man. Furthermore, how I earn money has nothing to do with how the public school system is designed to be. However, what difference would it have made if I worked harder in school? Either I have a job that makes me happy or I don't. No amount of money can make up for a miserable job. There isn't a single job I can think of that doing better in school would have helped me to get, that was one I actually wanted. That was the bottom line. I knew I never wanted to work for a corporation, or be a doctor or a lawyer or have any job that necessitated that I have a degree. I have a friend who wanted to be a doctor, and so he applied himself in school, and that made sense to me, and I respected that, because he was doing what he wanted. He became an OBGYN. I have another friend who wanted to be a lawyer, and he applied himself in school, and he became a lawyer. He is also one of the few lawyers who can practice in front of the Supreme Court. I respect that, because he is doing what he wanted. He is a man of integrity and has helped people with his career. I never wanted those jobs, so it wasn't important that I get high grades. If I DID want a job that required a degree, of COURSE I would have gotten high grades in school, because it would have been required.

 

[jonny88]

So basically you are a middle aged man that washes and polishes cars for a living? Boy, you really stuck it to the man. All that lack of hard work in school sure paid off.

don't bash that profession. l was actually thinking of starting my own company doing that. there is lots of money in that, don't kid yourself. when my dad had his shop a few years ago there was this guy next door who had his own car detailing company. he was 25. his company grew really fast and he was driving a new Lexus. he scored a contract detailing cars for dealerships. year and a half later he opened up another shop. he was actually on his way to being wealthy, but lost his contracts because he didn't show up for a couple meetings with the dealers. he started doing drugs, go figure.

point is charing $200-$400 + for a couple hours worth of work detailing really adds up.

 

[ShadowX81]

So what job did you want?

I garuntee you that no matter what it was, school would have helped you get there.

 

[jonny88]

So what job did you want?

I garuntee you that no matter what it was, school would have helped you get there.

sure it would, but don't hint that if a guy details cars he is a failure.

 

[The Mike]

This thread is um.....

I tried to catch up on it but there was so many bull____ posts and strange rationales that I just skimmed it and gave up.

Here is my point on what was absorbed.

1. Confiscations. Here is the deal. I'm paid to teach, not to be the end all monitor of all things I feel are inappropriate. The school has policies enacted mainly for two reasons. 1: They become a distraction within the classroom, mainly not to the kid who has whatever they aren't supposed to but the kid in the back of the room who doesn't want to learn in the first place and is looking for a catalyst to misbehave. 2: The school does not want to take responsibility for said items because in our society things run differently in a school than they do in real life. If a kid goes to the mall and loses or has their phone stolen they are SOL. If a kid goes to school and loses or has their phone stolen suddenly the school is responsible for replacing it. It's a rationale that only occurs in the K-12 system because in college they don't give a ____. So the school doesn't allow them even on campus so they cut the problem before it begins.

So...my job has a policy "X" isn't allowed on campus from iPods to Hats to "I love ****ies" bracelets for those reasons above. So I have to follow policy. Just like any other job even in the private sector, a policy is to be followed. If the school says take it and I ask for it. If the kid has "X", I simply ask for it. I have a policy in my class. If I ask for it and you give it to me then you get it from me at the end of class, if you forget to get it then I immediately send it to the office (it's their policy). If you make a stink then you go straight to the office (it's their policy) but also with a referral for defiance because you wanted to be an ass and rebel. Done and done. The interactions take approximately 2 minutes in my class and that is 2 minutes too long since 29 other kids' educations are being put on hold to deal with one knucklehead. We have Campus Resource Aids (security) and if a kid won't leave, one call and they come and take the kid and my lesson continues.

2. The Pink defense. For every one rapper, singer, actor, athlete who skipped school and became famous and rich there are hundreds who are having the worst life because they struggle day in and day out. If everyone was talented and gifted then none of us would be. Their roads to success are littered with the hopes and dreams of those who just didn't cut it and now had no out. I tell my students that repeatedly. I also tell them that if they become famous now they are a double threat by being smart and talented. Scholar Athletes or Scholar Musicians if you will and I tell them to remember me in their speeches for their awards.

One thing I find interesting is that all the banter and the seemingly offtopic discussion actually shows how complex this issue is from thoughts of the public consciousness, even internationally, to the fact that people have different "solutions" even though some aren't even part of the educational structure to the point that what people feel is an acceptable action by a teacher differs greatly.

If people can't agree in one thread about what a teacher should be responsible for or even public school systems multiply the 15 posters by 4 and you have one school, multiply again by an average of 10 schools (if not many more) and you have a district and that isn't even adding the thoughts and feelings of parents.

The system needs a severe overhaul but the reason why it hasn't occurred is because those in power are products of the status quo who are successful so they don't believe a full reboot is needed. Those who do have no power and everyone else falls in between. There are too many cooks in the educational kitchen with no one wanting to simply state this is what is going to happen and some of the wild postings in here about the school system just further proves that everyone thinks they know what they are talking about, no one really does (teachers included) because we only see the ground floor of the issue and many of us do not see the amazing amount of self-imposed layers on a school district and system and there is virtually no guidance from the government who quickly criticizes but doesn't assist in the matter.

I am one teacher who can tell you what I've seen, what I think but I'm 1 in a school of 50 teachers. In a district of 2000. No matter how much I think change is needed not for me but for our children going through this system and how loud I scream at any possible chance there needs to be a full on movement. Numbers of districts, numbers of teachers who say "What is best for our kids?" not what is best for me. I am a public school teacher, I am there to serve one clientele: The Kids. I don't give a ____ what other teachers, parents, administrators or even the general public wants or needs. I care about what my kids need. If teachers would just be that way, we'd have a step in the right direction.


(Holy ____ that was long)

 

[ShadowX81]

The point is that he is saying that school does not create an environment that helps you achieve your dreams in life and for that reason he deliberatly shunned putting in any kind of effort.
Not only does he list several examples of friends who could not have achieved thier goals without school, but he has a job that is very much engrained in the "system" he has spent the thread protesting against.

Maybe hes not a failute by other people's standards, but by his own he is. His meathod of "living outside the system" did not give him the freedom to blaze his own trail, it did just the opposite. Boxing him into a job in which it is impossible for him to have any real influence on the world. And his lack of academic success makes it even more impossible for him to have the options to control his life, and possibly break out of his role.

Case in point: Like it or not we are all in the system. The only way you can escape it is by getting to the top.

 

[Blackthornone]

So what job did you want?

I garuntee you that no matter what it was, school would have helped you get there.

I was thinking about art. I was quite prolific in art class. Art class was pure learning and pure teaching delivered by the teacher. No political propaganda, no pro establishment rhetoric, just teaching a skill. That was my second favorite class. My favorite class was weight lifting. My third was metal shop. Public school performance had nothing to do with any success I might have as an artist.

Frankly, I was almost entirely self taught as an artist. However, I learned shading and perspective in Junior High, and that was one thing that school did teach me for which I am quite grateful, and learning it as young as I did was a big help to me. I also enjoyed vocabulary quite a bit in k-12, and developed my skills at articulate conversation in intellectual banter with my fellow 7th graders.

I never said I didn't learn anything in school or that all teachers were bad. I said that I generally didn't like them because they worked for a system that didn't treat people as individuals, and to me, to not treat a person as an individual is not to care about a person. It is to treat them as just a number, and that is something I find to be very dehumanizing, and is why I don't like the public School system as an institution.

There were some teachers who treated people as individuals and obviously care about helping them, but most didn't, and again, the SYSTEM doesn't. As I said my main problem is with the system and not the teachers, and I tend to dislike people who become such integral parts of a system that I hate. It's nothing personal against them until I meet them. Then if they are rigid slave drivers, I hate them, and if they obviously care about their students, like one teacher I met, who I really liked, I like them. He was a new teacher, though, and obviously an intelligent man, but perhaps he was so likable because he was so new. Perhaps he will become more jaded as time goes on and he will be less likable then, but I think he will always be likable.

 

[Blackthornone]

This thread is um.....

I tried to catch up on it but there was so many bull____ posts and strange rationales that I just skimmed it and gave up.

Here is my point on what was absorbed.

1. Confiscations. Here is the deal. I'm paid to teach, not to be the end all monitor of all things I feel are inappropriate. The school has policies enacted mainly for two reasons. 1: They become a distraction within the classroom, mainly not to the kid who has whatever they aren't supposed to but the kid in the back of the room who doesn't want to learn in the first place and is looking for a catalyst to misbehave. 2: The school does not want to take responsibility for said items because in our society things run differently in a school than they do in real life. If a kid goes to the mall and loses or has their phone stolen they are SOL. If a kid goes to school and loses or has their phone stolen suddenly the school is responsible for replacing it. It's a rationale that only occurs in the K-12 system because in college they don't give a ____. So the school doesn't allow them even on campus so they cut the problem before it begins.

So...my job has a policy "X" isn't allowed on campus from iPods to Hats to "I love ****ies" bracelets for those reasons above. So I have to follow policy. Just like any other job even in the private sector, a policy is to be followed. If the school says take it and I ask for it. If the kid has "X", I simply ask for it. I have a policy in my class. If I ask for it and you give it to me then you get it from me at the end of class, if you forget to get it then I immediately send it to the office (it's their policy). If you make a stink then you go straight to the office (it's their policy) but also with a referral for defiance because you wanted to be an ass and rebel. Done and done. The interactions take approximately 2 minutes in my class and that is 2 minutes too long since 29 other kids' educations are being put on hold to deal with one knucklehead. We have Campus Resource Aids (security) and if a kid won't leave, one call and they come and take the kid and my lesson continues.

2. The Pink defense. For every one rapper, singer, actor, athlete who skipped school and became famous and rich there are hundreds who are having the worst life because they struggle day in and day out. If everyone was talented and gifted then none of us would be. Their roads to success are littered with the hopes and dreams of those who just didn't cut it and now had no out. I tell my students that repeatedly. I also tell them that if they become famous now they are a double threat by being smart and talented. Scholar Athletes or Scholar Musicians if you will and I tell them to remember me in their speeches for their awards.

One thing I find interesting is that all the banter and the seemingly offtopic discussion actually shows how complex this issue is from thoughts of the public consciousness, even internationally, to the fact that people have different "solutions" even though some aren't even part of the educational structure to the point that what people feel is an acceptable action by a teacher differs greatly.

If people can't agree in one thread about what a teacher should be responsible for or even public school systems multiply the 15 posters by 4 and you have one school, multiply again by an average of 10 schools (if not many more) and you have a district and that isn't even adding the thoughts and feelings of parents.

The system needs a severe overhaul but the reason why it hasn't occurred is because those in power are products of the status quo who are successful so they don't believe a full reboot is needed. Those who do have no power and everyone else falls in between. There are too many cooks in the educational kitchen with no one wanting to simply state this is what is going to happen and some of the wild postings in here about the school system just further proves that everyone thinks they know what they are talking about, no one really does (teachers included) because we only see the ground floor of the issue and many of us do not see the amazing amount of self-imposed layers on a school district and system and there is virtually no guidance from the government who quickly criticizes but doesn't assist in the matter.

I am one teacher who can tell you what I've seen, what I think but I'm 1 in a school of 50 teachers. In a district of 2000. No matter how much I think change is needed not for me but for our children going through this system and how loud I scream at any possible chance there needs to be a full on movement. Numbers of districts, numbers of teachers who say "What is best for our kids?" not what is best for me. I am a public school teacher, I am there to serve one clientele: The Kids. I don't give a ____ what other teachers, parents, administrators or even the general public wants or needs. I care about what my kids need. If teachers would just be that way, we'd have a step in the right direction.


(Holy ____ that was long)

Indeed. I agree with that.

 

[thenammagazine]

Indeed. I agree with that.

But Mike would've taken away your discman.

 

[Blackthornone]

The point is that he is saying that school does not create an environment that helps you achieve your dreams in life and for that reason he deliberatly shunned putting in any kind of effort.
Not only does he list several examples of friends who could not have achieved thier goals without school, but he has a job that is very much engrained in the "system" he has spent the thread protesting against.

Maybe hes not a failute by other people's standards, but by his own he is. His meathod of "living outside the system" did not give him the freedom to blaze his own trail, it did just the opposite. Boxing him into a job in which it is impossible for him to have any real influence on the world. And his lack of academic success makes it even more impossible for him to have the options to control his life, and possibly break out of his role.

Case in point: Like it or not we are all in the system. The only way you can escape it is by getting to the top.

I do not believe that I have a job that is "ingrained" in the system.

As far as my school performance was concerned, I payed attention to those things that I knew would be useful to me in my life, and paid none to the rest. I resented the school system forcing me to remember things that weren't useful to me even over the sort term. I say short term because a lot of people don't even remember the stuff they allegedly "learned" in school over the long term.

Because I was only concerned with getting real benefit from school, I didn't care about irrelevant info, or about grades, because grades are for other people. Grades are for what other people think about your education. I don't care what they think, and I don't care about any job that requires high grades.

It is my life to live, and I should have the right to determine what I want to pay attention to without undue hassle from the school system. Everyone should have that right. My life is none of their business. My life is my life, and not theirs, and I know myself better than they ever will. I am the one who will benefit or suffer according to my performance in school, and so it should be my prerogative as to whether to participate or not. If I want to draw pictures when others are doing math, let me. If I needed math later on and missed out because I drew pictures, shame on me. If I am not disrupting the class, I should be able to do what I want because it is my life. The school system presumes to own children's lives and I object to that. Make a safe environment for children to be in, and offer teaching, and help, but don't force compliance with the "lessons". If I am late to school, I shouldn't have to go to detention. It's my life.


You don't escape the system by getting to the top. You are always beholden to someone. Taxes at least.

 

[Blackthornone]

But Mike would've taken away your discman.

No, because I wouldn't have worn it in his class. He never would have seen it, and I never would have listened to it. It would have been hidden the whole time, so unless he is going to frisk me, he would never know I had it.

 

[jonny88]

l have a headache now.

 

[ShadowX81]

I do not believe that I have a job that is "ingrained" in the system.

As far as my school performance was concerned, I payed attention to those things that I knew would be useful to me in my life, and paid none to the rest. I resented the school system forcing me to remember things that weren't useful to me even over the sort term. I say short term because a lot of people don't even remember the stuff they allegedly "learned" in school over the long term.

Because I was only concerned with getting real benefit from school, I didn't care about irrelevant info, or about grades, because grades are for other people. Grades are for what other people think about your education. I don't care what they think, and I don't care about any job that requires high grades.

It is my life to live, and I should have the right to determine what I want to pay attention to without undue hassle from the school system. Everyone should have that right. My life is none of their business. My life is my life, and not theirs, and I know myself better than they ever will. I am the one who will benefit or suffer according to my performance in school, and so it should be my prerogative as to whether to participate or not. If I want to draw pictures when others are doing math, let me. If I needed math later on and missed out because I drew pictures, shame on me. If I am not disrupting the class, I should be able to do what I want because it is my life. The school system presumes to own children's lives and I object to that. Make a safe environment for children to be in, and offer teaching, and help, but don't force compliance with the "lessons". If I am late to school, I shouldn't have to go to detention. It's my life.


You don't escape the system by getting to the top. You are always beholden to someone. Taxes at least.

Exactly. You are beholden to someone. And grades are for other people. But you know what? So is everything else.

What jobs you get, promotions or raises you attain, the praise an awards you recieve for what you do are all determinant on other people deciding weather or not you are worthy of them. And they make those decisions based on the quality of your work. Every single thing you attain in life is based apon you proving to someone else that you deserve it.


You can't tell me that it wouldn't have been easier for you to succeed as an artist if you hadn't gone to a prestigious art college such as the Rhode Island School of Design. Or to succeed in life all, if not only to simply bring home more money every week. All of it would be easier the better of a college you go to. Is it a bias and unfair system? Definatly. But it is also reality. And part of getting there is putting up with some pointless crap along the way. You need to do well in math because it determines if you get into a good college. Also reality.

 

[hoodonit00]

Blackthornones entire post quoted.

Yea but see part of the problem with people who think that way is they fail out of school and do not become productive members of society. I'm not talking about you, at least you have a job. Far to many people who spend their young lives slacking then get to live off the system. Want to know part of the reason the U.S is Trillions in debt? Because of social programs to aid some of the people who have the same attitude as you. You want to screw off in school and be a bum when you get out (again, not talking about you)? Great knock yourself out. But when I have to pay higher taxes because some slacker decided he was going to be anti-establishment, well I have a big problem with that!

 

[jonny88]

if he said that. the reaason the US is in debt isn't because of people who dropped out of school.. it's because of the crooks and criminals who run the country who can do what ever they want. they fire people so they can give millions in bonuses to a hand full of other people. just because you pass high school doesnt mean you are smart. people who run the country are all college graduates and they are the biggest idiots on the planet.

 

[thenammagazine]

if he said that. the reson the US is in dept isn't because of people who dropped out of school.. it's because of the crooks and criminals who run the country who can do what ever they want. they fire people so they can give millions in bonuses to a hand full of other people. just because you pass high school doesnt mean you are smart. people who run the country are all collage graduates and they are the biggest idiots on the planet.

Post is oxymoronic. You can't belittle people and call them the "biggest idiots on the planet" and not have a basic understanding of proper capitalization, spelling and grammar.

 

[hoodonit00]

Post is oxymoronic. You can't belittle people and call them the "biggest idiots on the planet" and not have a basic understanding of proper capitalization, spelling and grammar.

I also suggest he looks up "part of the reason" so he doesn't get confused on what I wrote.

 

[pixletwin]

Post is oxymoronic. You can't belittle people and call them the "biggest idiots on the planet" and not have a basic understanding of proper capitalization, spelling and grammar.

Kind of off topic, but I don't think I can stand to hear one more person pronounce "debt" as "debit" and "debtor" as "debitor".

 

[jonny88]

Post is oxymoronic. You can't belittle people and call them the "biggest idiots on the planet" and not have a basic understanding of proper capitalization, spelling and grammar.

Show your immaturity some more. Big deal l didn't cap my letters. I never do when i'm typing here. Go look through this thread and see all the other mistakes from members and start a fight with them while you are in the mood. By the way did l use caps properly this time.

how many times do l have to say it. l don't have spell check. l also don't have the red line under the word that is spelled wrong since l got a new computer. all you guys act like perfect spellers. in reality most of you probably make many mistakes and use spell check to do the work for you. l think l am actually a good speller considering l don't have anything to help me. and yeah l make a mistake here or there, big deal, l see many members make mistakes also.