I think this FoxNews story speaks for itself:

Woman Shoots Herself While Trying to Kill Mice
Tuesday, July 08, 2008

POTTER VALLEY, Calif. — A Mendocino County woman who was trying to kill mice in her trailer with a gun ended up shooting herself and another person.

The 43-year-old woman pulled out her .44-caliber Magnum revolver after she saw the mice scurrying across the floor of her trailer on Highway 20 in Potter Valley, sheriff's officials said.

But she accidentally dropped the gun, which went off as it struck the floor. The bullet went through the woman's kneecap, bounced off the keys sitting on the belt loop of a 42-year-old man in the trailer and grazed the man's groin before ending up in his coin pocket.

Authorities did not release the shooting victims' names.

The mice escaped the shooting unharmed.

OK, maybe it does deserve some commentary. This could well be a good argument for gun control. Geesh! I thought it was kind of funny that they mentioned more than once that this couple lives in a trailer. Talk about your bad luck, she gets hit in the knee, which will probably be a life-affecting injury and her boyfriend/husband gets it in a place that could well end the physical side of their relationship.

This happened just a few miles from where I live. It is a sad statement on some of the residents of our county. We're not all like that, I promise. When I shoot mice with my .44, I hit them the first time.

7/10 Update:
According to this Press Democrat article the woman's name was Debra Due. The gentleman involved is apparently her tenant and not her boyfriend. The District Attorney's office is considering whether to file charges against Debra.

The Sheriff’s Office has submitted the case to the District Attorney’s Office, suggesting that Due be charged with negligent discharge of a firearm, Smallcomb said.

Smallcomb said there may be a lesson to be learned from the accident.

“I guess you don’t drink and shoot mice at the same time,” he said.

Good lesson Captain.

My sense of humor is such that I really enjoy good irony. This story from Fox News is probably the most ironic tale I've heard today.

Daniel Winsky of Salem was arraigned on a drunken driving charge today in district court.

Court documents say the 52-year-old had a blood alcohol level of .233 after he was stopped by police in December. That's nearly three times the legal limit.

Witnesses called police while Winsky was instructing a student because he allegedly appeared drunk. Winsky wasn't driving the car, but instructors have a brake on the passenger side.

His lawyer says police used a portable breathalyzer that isn't admissible in court and failed to arrest Winsky and take him to a police station where they could have used equipment that meets court standards.

Court documents say students in the car said he didn't appear to be intoxicated, but was sipping a bottle of cough medicine.

I'm sure that Mr. Winsky is really innocent. I'm certain that the "cough medicine" he was drinking just caused a false positive. Yeah, sure.

I thought this Fox News story was pretty funny. Apparently, a woman saw a job listing that sounded very similar to her job, with her boss' phone number listed. She assumed she was going to be fired, so she took action and deleted important company documents.

When Marie Lupe Cooley, 41, of Jacksonville, Fla., saw a help-wanted ad in the newspaper for a position that looked suspiciously like her current job "and with her boss's phone number listed" she assumed she was about to be fired.

I was really disappointed by this Los Angeles Times editorial. I've frequently praised the paper for education stories, but I think with this editorial, they're headed in the wrong direction.

The No Child Left Behind Act has made an admitted mishmash of public education. Yet, like nothing before, the law also has schools and the public paying serious attention to how little is learned by so many students, and how inferior conditions fester in schools that enroll large numbers of black, Latino and impoverished children. They are left to struggle, barely mastering elementary reading skills, passed from one grade to the next like scholastic hot potatoes.

Still, how can one like a law so badly framed and rigidly constructed that it erects unfair and unreachable standards, encourages schools to ignore the children most in need of help, labels many a fine school as failing, and has the perverse effect of shrinking history, science and arts education and badly cutting into programs for gifted kids?

While NCLB isn't perfect, they seem to be throwing it under the bus. They appear to be repeating the anti-NCLB rhetoric that the act is a failure and nearly beyond redemption. I just don't believe that. The editorial then goes on to address some of the changes being considered in NCLB, particularly those proposed by Representative George Miller (D-CA).

One proposed fix is long overdue and widely applauded. Miller would get rid of the arbitrary and useless rule that schools be measured by how many students test as "proficient" each year in reading and math. Proficiency is a meaningless term because each state sets its own standard, and those standards are quite literally all over the map. But the proficiency requirement has had a more insidious effect: Schools tend to ignore students who are truly struggling and concentrate only on those who are just below proficient, who might be boosted over the bar within an academic year. And because they get no credit for pushing students from proficient to advanced, schools are neglecting the top academic performers, and gifted programs have been shrinking or dying nationwide. Miller now wants schools measured by each student's year-to-year progress, which always made a lot more sense.

While I agree that a value added model where the student's progress from year to year is measured is probably better than a status model, the reality is that many states are not equipped with data systems capable of making that analysis. California for example, is still at least a couple years away from any sort of longitudinal data system. The CALPADS system isn't supposed to be running until 2010. Even then, it won't have been designed to do this analysis, so additional work will be needed to make that happen.

I don't think that proficiency is "arbitrary", as the editorial suggests. In many states, including California, proficiency is being at grade-level on the state standards. If a student scores proficient on the California Standards Test (CST), they are determined to have mastered the skills for their grade level. That doesn't sound very arbitrary to me. Isn't our goal to get students to grade level? When we have 60% of the students in the state below grade level, we have a serious problem that just switching to a value-added model isn't going to fix.

Yes, some schools are focusing on those kids just below proficiency, but that isn't a model that is scalable. You only see short-term gains, since as you move the "bubble" kids up into proficiency, the students with lower levels of achievement aren't being similarly pushed upward, so in a matter of a few years, you don't have any more bubble kids to focus upon. That's not the fault of the model. That's the fault of the educators who are looking for a quick bump in test scores regardless of the effect on their students.

As a kid who went through the GATE (gifted) program during my school career, I understand the concern for those students, but the reality is that those students are primarily self-motivated and have parents who will make certain they receive additional educational opportunities. We have limited education dollars that we need to focus on where we can have the most impact. That simply isn't those high achieving kids. We have children without basic skills in language arts or math who are being advanced year after year without urgently needed remediation and intervention. That's where we need to focus our energies.

Miller also has written provisions that encourage states to raise standards and put better teachers in high-poverty schools. The law would no longer hit schools that come close to their growth targets with harsh punitive measures. He includes a modest bonus program that would pay teachers for good performance, including raising test scores. Its reach is limited, but Miller deserves praise for introducing on a formal level the idea that better teachers deserve better pay.

I agree with efforts to improve teacher quality, particularly in high-poverty schools and rewarding superior teachers financially. Research has shown that teacher quality is among the biggest impacts on whether students are gaining ground academically. Teachers who have the most impact on student achievement should be receiving additional compensation to reward their efforts and conversely those who are having the least impact on achievement need intervention and retraining.

Eliminating "harsh punitive measures" on schools that come close to targets is a bunch of crap. First, if you don't designate schools getting near to the goals as needing improvement, then you've simply lowered the standards. It would be like saying that we're going to give every student who get a "B" on the test, credit for an "A", since they were close. Life just doesn't work that way. Second, at least in California, there are no "harsh punitive measures" beyond simply being designated as a "program improvement (PI) school." The reality is that these schools get increased funding, so they have no incentive to ever get out of this designation. The "harsh" measures that are supposed to happen in year 5 of PI almost never happen because no one is responsible for making them happen outside of the local school district. CDE isn't required to approve these PI plans, so many school districts simply go through the motions without making any real reforms or taking the more drastic steps called for under NCLB.

His approach to standardized testing is clumsier. Yes, a single standardized test measuring two subjects -- reading and math -- is an inadequate measure of a school's mettle. Yes, teachers tend to "teach to the test." But at least mastering the subject matter for these tests is more than many students were doing before. Given more wiggle room, schools invariably devise ways to make their students look good while selling them short. That's a major shortcoming of Miller's plan for a pilot program that would allow local districts to come up with their own assessments. Local assessments were what we had before the accountability movement, and they failed. The way the bill is written, a majority of students nationwide could be covered by what's supposed to be an experimental program.

I actually agree mostly with this part. Locally developed assessments won't cut it. Just look at the grade inflation that we've seen as proof of that. We need a standardized test as an impartial measure of the student's academic success. By the way, while NCLB only focuses accountability on language arts and math, the states individually assess other things. For example, in California, we assess science and history/social science as well. Those assessments inform students, parents and educators on whether the student is at grade-level in those subjects, even if they aren't part of NCLB. I think until we start to see much higher proficiency rates in basic language arts and math, we need to focus our energies there. Once we're getting most kids to proficiency in those subjects, then let's look at adding other subjects to the NCLB mix.

Miller also has written in an extensive list of other objective measures schools could use, in addition to their reading and math tests, to bolster their standing. The list is so broad, though, and can be manipulated in such different ways from school to school that it greatly complicates an already complicated law and could be used to cover up failure. Say a school does great on Advanced Placement tests -- that tells us nothing about its work with low achievers.

Again, I agree with some of this. Adding "multiple measures" beyond objective assessments is similarly crap. These other measures are typically evaluated by teachers at the school. For the most part, they're not objective or impartial and all we'll end up with are high-scoring students who don't have mastery of basic skills.

There's one other essential flaw in the act that Miller does not address: It still aims to bring all students up to proficiency by 2014. Let's face it. The nation will never make all of its students academically proficient, as long as proficiency is a reasonably high standard. That's like saying all Americans will be above average. Continued growth is realistic; so is narrowing the shameful gap in achievement between white and minority students. Academic stardom for all is not. The public will not trust this law until it at least is honest.

It isn't like saying all Americans will be above average. It is saying that all students will be at their grade-level. I don't believe it is unreasonable to expect all students to reach grade-level. That's why we have these standards in the first place. If these standards aren't reachable by all students, then perhaps the standards are too tough. As I've said before, people in other professions don't get to set low standards of performance. Firemen attempt to put out 100% of fires. Police try to solve 100% of crimes. Attorneys try to win 100% of the time. None of these other professions get to strive to a low standard. Why do we think educators should be able to ignore some of their students?

Do I think that 100% of students in America are going to be proficient in 2014. No, I don't. Most educators aren't willing to try. Most parents aren't willing to hold their local schools accountable. The 100% proficiency goal isn't what most people dislike about NCLB. They've just been told by "those who should know" (teachers and administrators) that the law is unreasonable. Yet not one of those parents believe their child is one of those that shouldn't be at grade-level. They think it is the other children who won't be at grade-level . They expect their child to be at grade-level. If that isn't a great example of Garrison's "every child is above average", I don't know what is.

There will be some schools that will reach that 100% proficient level. Lowering the bar however isn't the answer. One-hundred percent of our students deserve the opportunity to receive a high-quality education. One-hundred percent of our students deserve an opportunity to prepare them for higher education and the world of work. Any other goal condemns some of our children to lives filled with poverty and unfulfilled desires. That's not a goal that I'm willing to accept.

Unfortunately, this Los Angeles Times story isn't very surprising. The Los Angeles Unified School District is considering robbing the Measure Y Bond funding approved in 2005 for modernization to cover a huge shortfall in their new school construction budget.

Los Angeles school district officials want to close most of a staggering deficit in the school-construction program by using more than $1 billion in bond money that was meant for other purposes. The Los Angeles Board of Education is scheduled to vote on the shift today.

The proposal, expected to pass, would use for new schools money that would have repaired and modernized existing schools, improved Internet access and other technology on campuses, and built and repaired preschool centers. Instead, the funds will backfill the plan to build 145 schools in an effort to provide all students with a neighborhood campus that operates on a traditional two-semester schedule.

The $20-billion construction and modernization program is the nation's largest and frequently touted as a seminal accomplishment. But the effort has run up against spiraling increases in property values and construction costs.

"Our hope here is that this is just a borrowing, if you will, of those funds" and the original programs "will be finished sometime in the future with other funds, whether they be from future bond measures or from other sources," said Edwin Van Ginkel, senior development manager for the Los Angeles Unified School District.

The bond already provided $1.6B for new schools, but they need more and they're just going to take it.

When voters passed Measure Y in 2005, they authorized nearly $4 billion in school bonds. The breakdown included $1.6 billion for new schools, $1.48 billion for existing schools, $325 million for technology and $100 million for early education.

The resolution before the school board would take $790 million from repair of existing schools, $200 million from technology and $60 million from early education. Each cut is greater than half of the bond money allocated.

Despite declining enrollment and billions of dollars, LAUSD still has significant construction and modernization needs that still haven't been met. After years of ignoring the issues, now in the last few years, they're trying to catch up by spending billions of taxpayer dollars. They're already talking about the next bond issue.

Folsom foresees another difficult juncture approaching: "We are going to need to go to the voters at some point in the future -- not that far away -- to ask for more money."

If this resolution passes, it will be an in-the-face move against the will of the voters. It is unfortunate that many government enterprises just plan for cost overruns and know going in that their budgeted amount will never be enough to finish the project. They plan to go back and ask for additional money to cover these overruns. Let's get our agencies to start doing better planning for the project in the beginning and include appropriate contingencies to handle the stuff that comes up as the project is implemented. That way we'll know better what something is going to cost when we approve it.

Is it just me, or is this the stupidest idea ever? According to this Los Angeles Daily News story, the district has announced a new program to reduce dropouts.

The new program - "My Future, My Decision" - is a broad effort that includes spots on KPWR-FM (105.9), a text-messaging campaign and interaction through popular social networking Web sites MySpace and Facebook.

This San Francisco Chronicle story kind of scares me. It shares the results of a Fordham Institute study which found that California, South Carolina and Massachusetts have the toughest standards tests among the 50 states. With the move in other states to reduce the definition of proficiency in order to meet No Child Left Behind (NCLB) requirements, I can easily see California doing the same. One of the few good things to come out of Sacramento in recent years has been our world class standards and the state's consistency in maintaining them. I fear more stories like this one could encourage efforts to lower our standards in order to give the illusion that students are improving.

While our standards are high, I don't believe they are not unreasonably so. There is evidence to support this position. For example:

• The bulk of California High School graduates attending the California State University (which are supposed to be the top third of graduates) as freshman require remediation before they're ready for college level work. These are students who have passed the California High School Exit Exam, which is also based on our standards for 8th/9th grade.
• As the article points out, California's students are generally improving on the California Standards Test (CST) but not showing the same progress on the National Assessment of Educational Process (NAEP). If California's test is so difficult, why aren't we seeing more progress on the NAEP?
• There are schools across the state who are getting high percentages of students to proficiency (above 80%), including ethnic minority and/or low-income students. Since these schools are able to get nearly all their students to proficiency, they're proving that all students can reach these standards with the right kind of classroom instruction and academic support.

The article goes on to describe the recommendation in the report that national standards be created, along with an assessment of those standards so that individual states can no longer lower their standards in order to artificially inflate proficiency rates. Unfortunately, that's going to be a difficult sell. NCLB opponents want to diminish the act's influence on state standards. I'd love to see an effort among the states to settle on common standards rather than have national standards forced on them by NCLB. I just don't see that happening. Until it does, states are going to continue to game the system to their benefit and the detriment of their students.

Fortunately, this is one area where California has held strong. I sincerely hope our education leaders continue to do so. We have much work to do in our state. We need to build on these world class standards and reform the rest of our system of public education to match.

I thought this Santa Rosa Press Democrat story was funny. Apparently, two girls offered a guy $10 to buy booze. He grabbed the $10 and exited out a different door without buying them any booze.

Two teenage decoys in an undercover alcohol sting operation suddenly had the tables turned on them Thursday in Sebastopol, stung by a suspect a bit too clever for his own good.

As police watched surreptitiously, the two girls approached a Sebastopol man outside a Safeway store and asked him to buy them booze. He kindly took the $10 they offered -- and took off, police said.

Steven Lionel Buchanan, 54, was $10 richer only for the time it took him to get a block away, however.

Unfortunately for Steven, the cops grabbed him and found out he had a $5,000 warrant for being drunk in public. He's now spending more than $10 worth of time in jail.

I didn't realize that the California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE) was under attack again. According to this Sacramento Bee article, AB 1379 "would lay the groundwork for using other measures of academic proficiency instead of just the exit exam. Those could include academic transcripts, completion of projects and alternative tests, for example. The bill was approved by the Assembly, 47-31, and is pending in the Senate."

Do you remember the term "multiple measures"? This bill is the same attempt to water down accountability. The reason we have the CAHSEE in the first place is that students were graduating without basic reading or writing skills despite having completed all of the graduation requirements. The CAHSEE's level of accountability is pretty low, with tenth grade language arts and 8th or 9th grade mathematics. The percentage required to pass isn't even that high; only 55% for math and 60% for language arts.

By allowing other measures including "include academic transcripts, completion of projects, coursework portfolios, and alternative tests that are aligned to state content standards", I believe we're going to end up exactly we were before the CAHSEE. Students will graduate using these other measures and they'll graduate without these very basic skills.

Fortunately, the Governor vetoed a similar bill in 2005. It seems likely that he'd veto this one as well if it manages to make it to his desk. Despite all the other hard things I've had to say about Superintendent O'Connell, he is a strong supporter of the CAHSEE.

Requiring passage of the exit exam creates an objective benchmark for measuring students, comparing districts, holding schools accountable and ensuring that all teenagers have basic skills to work in a global economy, supporters say.

Hilary McLean, O'Connell's spokeswoman, said the exit exam was developed because subjective ways of measuring proficiency, such as grades, were resulting in teenagers receiving diplomas even if they couldn't read or do basic math.

The exit exam is "our best tool for ensuring that students have mastered critical skills," McLean said.

Schwarzenegger, in vetoing 2005 legislation, said it "sends the wrong message" to allow alternative assessments.

"We have a responsibility to each of our students to believe in them, and not to have low expectations," his veto message said.

The CAHSEE has really made a difference. Schools are paying more attention to students who aren't prepared for graduation. Students who previously would have graduated without these basic skills are now getting extra attention from their schools. The students themselves are paying more attention to their school work. Their parents are aware of whether their student is ready to graduate. The CAHSEE added an "in your face" aspect of accountability that is too difficult to ignore.

I sincerely hope that this legislation doesn't make it and the Governor, State Superintendent and the legislature stay strong on this one aspect of accountability.

A friend sent me this item earlier today: