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Former Supreme Court Justice Switches to Video Games
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Thu Jun 05, 2008 12:53 PM
from the awkward-segues dept.
from the awkward-segues dept.
TechDirt is reporting that former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has moved into the one industry that I don't think anyone might have expected, video games. Not only did she speak at a recent gaming conference, she is also working on creating a video game about the courts. "There have been many similar 'civic education' video games out there, like the UN video game to teach kids about world hunger and, my personal favorite, a video game to teach kids how to gerrymander voting districts to get political support. It's not clear how successful any of these sorts of games really are, but it's nice to see a former Supreme Court Justice taking an interest in these sorts of things. Though, some might point out that this could be seen as something of a gimmick, and students might just be better served by adding a decent civics curriculum back into school (it's apparently gone thanks to No Child Left Behind)."
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No Child Left Behind (Score:2, Insightful)
Thank you.
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He is cutting the severely underfunded Man to mars mission, not the entire budget.
Well, by 'fix it' he is effectively getting rid of it.
To be frank, I was being a little flip. If they fix the problems with it, that would be good. It would also be the same in name only.
McCain's view is the same as Bush's. Vouchers, Privitazation, etc...
Re:Interesting idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Interesting idea (Score:4, Insightful)
Describe in a thousand words or less how you accomplish that without facism. [wikipedia.org]
1. Remove all government fiscal incentives (direct and indirect) for having children.
2. Thorough and compulsory sex education.
3. Free contraceptives.
Parent
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That won't happen in a million years. Americans are split evenly on abortion, but, nearly unanimously would prefer that the morons that get themselves pregnant take care of their own problems.
I fail to see how "taking care of their own problems" excludes abortion.
Regardless, the GP didn't ask for a solution that would be politically acceptable in the United States of Jesusland, he asked for a way to do it without resorting to fascism (which I assumed was being used in the colloquial "oppressive governmen
Re:No Child Left Behind (Score:4, Interesting)
I think it is possible to teach crucial curriculum and still find time for other classes. The problem is that teachers have little to no control over children in an overly litigious society of hyper-sensitive parents.
And more often than not, you either have both parents working, or a single parent household, where the parent may not connect with their child enough. So when a teacher attempts to tell a parent of their child's failing, they don't want to believe it.
We have developed this society where teachers are terrified of instilling discipline (I'm not talking about hitting kids, but rather just instilling order) so that children don't feel the need to take education seriously.
Our countries in the world manage to pull off superior public education programs, not necessarily because of funding, but I believe because of cultural differences in which education is taken far more seriously.
Universally blaiming "No Child Left Behind" isn't actually addressing the issues of what's seriously wrong. Conversely, I think the the concept of NCLB is a very good one. We spend more money on education. We attempt to raise the bar of public education, and hold states accountable for poor results.
There is a great disparity between what a child in rural Alabama, a child inner-city New York, and another say here in Omaha (my town) receives in education. Individual states and school districts should have freedom and flexibility in determining their curriculum, but having a bare-minimum standard of education all American children should be given is a GOOD THING.
If you want to see what's really wrong with public education, don't blame a politician for spending more money on education. Read some Jonathon Kozol.
http://books.google.com/books?as_auth=Jonathan+Kozol&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title&cad=author-navigational&hl=en [google.com]
Parent
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My wife works in special-ed which has an even higher tendency to be litigious than general-ed courses do.
It is amazing how many parents immediately place blame on teachers for their child not doing well in a class. In many cases it may well be a case of a student and teacher not connecting at some level but jumping directly into "it's the teachers fault" versus trying to find a solution doesn't help and just puts teachers and parents more at odds.
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Re:No student allowed to thrive (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't see the evidence that the litigious
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I could suggest that democracy in action has yielded a good deal amount of power, even if it wasn't implicitly stated, so that the federal government do more.
Does the government have the right? Arguably no. Should they howev
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Perhaps it doesn't work. Fine. What would you have the government do?
I'll start: abolish the Dept. of Education and get the Feds out of the schools. Period.
Don't like that? What's your idea? Don't have one? Then STFU.
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The current administration tends to demand things, but not provide funding. Then when it fails, they start talking about privatization.
Don't get me wrong, education for all children are critical to the health of the long term existence of any country.
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Here, we have a jr. high that has roof leaks because one wall of an entire wing was built over a sink-hole:
the foundation sinks>the wall tries to fall over to the outside (crack in attached wall goes from 1/2" at floor to 14-22" at roof/decking depending on time of year)>when it rains, water runs in a sheet down the wall>stresses roofing>multiple leaks form at every roof ju
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Re:No Child Left Behind (Score:4, Interesting)
Rather than focus on the dumb people (say because they represent the majority of voters), we should be mandating some basic IQ and/or knowledge testing before we even allow a child to progress to the next grade. And I'm not talking about weeding out only those who are both mentally retarded AND lazy. We should be weeding out something like the bottom 30% of the curve entirely from intellectual pursuits. What's the point? They will never be succesful at it anyway. If they suddenly "get smart" at some later point they can always test themselves back onto one of the intellectual tracks. We should make staying in school something that is challenging and requires lots of work for the average person. The square peg in round hole kiddies should be derailed onto less intellectually challenging pursuits like the building trades or sewing or cooking. We should be making an effort to train people at something they might actually be useful at rather than just assuming every kid is some kind of budding genius. What we are doing now is our own kind of square peg to round hole fitting. It's not going to work no matter how much we wish it would.
Parent
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On the other side of the spectrum are the ones born who really are borderline retarded (and I'm serious in
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The GP was suggesting that people with no/little aptitude for thinking aren't steered into professions that require a lot of it. I certainly thin
Re:No Child Left Behind (Score:4, Informative)
Having been home schooled until second grade, we finally decided to quit school and begin homeschooling again after 7th grade. This is when I was 12. At 13, we found that IUPUI (Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis) offered a program called SPAN [iupui.edu], which basically allows you to take any college course for both college credit and equivalent high school credit. And since college work is much harder than high school work, they're sometimes worth more credits, too. In other words, I was able to completely replace all of my public middle school and high school, and all of my home schooling with full-time college. Doing so, I entered college at the age of 13.
IUPUI isn't the only college doing this, though. America has many of the best colleges and universities in the world, and its public school system is among the worst (down near the likes of Mexico last I saw a report on it, and that was years ago when schools were better). The universities here are increasingly growing weary of having to teach freshman what they used to learn in high school. Universities now love home schoolers because they have a much better education, and they are usually more disciplined and ready for college than their public school counter-parts.
The American school system is steadily moving towards a point where if you want your child to attend college, you can't enroll them in a public school.
Parent
Re:No Child Left Behind (Score:4, Informative)
Before NCLB the federal government has some requirements to give money. NCLB changed those requirements, without allocating more money. School districts are allowed to tell the DoE to take their money, take their standards, and stuff them both into the same shredder.
We, as voters for each school district, have decided not to do so. We want our federal education subsidies.
Parent
Re:No Child Left Behind (Score:4, Informative)
Sure, it was part of GWB's 2000 election platform, but after taking office, he decided to extend an olive branch to the other party and let Kennedy focus on one of his pet issues in an attempt to ease the partisan fighting in DC. But we'll leave the Senior Senator from Massachussets out of it as we rewrite history to prove yet again that only Republicans are evil.
Parent
I thought I'd never see the day (Score:4, Funny)
Jack Thompson, save us from this calamity!
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Re:I thought I'd never see the day (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
The Havok physics engine (Score:4, Funny)
Phoenix Wright: Ace Former Supreme Court Judge (Score:5, Funny)
Final Boss Ideas (Score:2)
Jack McCoy (now we're talking)
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I just ask the Mod community (Score:5, Funny)
The mod would have to be called.... (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
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Just think... (Score:2, Interesting)
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A game that teaches about courts (Score:2)
Gerrymandering (Score:5, Funny)
Nice Idea... (Score:2)
Good news everyone! (Score:2)
Funny... (Score:2)
You could have stats like "knowledge" which would allow you to more accurately cite precedent to derail your opponent, and "oratory" to baffle with BS...
As you continue through your career you'
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http://www.somethingpositive.net/sp05282008.shtml [somethingpositive.net]
USC's Redistricting Game was actually fun... (Score:5, Insightful)
Try it out.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You are given a map (n by m grid). Each square has a number of democratic, republican and udecided voters. The total number of voters and their distribution across parties varies from square to square. The map is divided into four connected regions.
Mission 1: change the division such that each region contains between 640K and 650K voters. Fairly easy.
Mission 2: change the division, such that the above constraint is satisfied, and suc
There's room in the Geek Pantheon (Score:2)
Unlockable bloodless coup content? (Score:2, Flamebait)
And if you choose the conservative career... (Score:2)
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I wonder how many stories of Republican political crimes I could drag up, if I were to reach back a half century, before practically everyone on Slashdot, or their parents even, were even born.
Um, Clinton? There you go. You don't have to go back a half century. Hell, I thought it was vogue to dig up the Clintons' dirty laundry now that it supports the golden boy, even though it's the same damned laundry the Dems spent 10 years discounting when they were in office.
Hey, Lincoln was a Republican, and he