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Comment Re:A simple rant. (Score 2, Interesting) 423

by mrthejud (#20397901) Attached to: New UK Initiative - Make Science Easier
Sometimes it is out of the teachers hands. I am a second year teacher and because of this in my province my students need to take the provincial exam. I personally gave a girl a 30% in the class, the test was worth 40% of her final mark. I found out just the other day that she ended up with a 51%. While talking to the principal about the whole thing he mentioned that every kid should try the class because then they at least have a shot at it and just may get it "whether the mark is legit or not". And that is where the frustration is for me because as a teacher its damn near impossible to fail a child now. The rumour on the street (well the teaching street) is that marks as low as 42% are now being rounded up to a 50%. A friend of mine once said, "When a child is born we should hand them their birth certificate and their high school diploma because thats what education is turning into."
Media

Submission + - Internet Radio to be killed by the RIAA

Submitted by
Anonymous Coward
Anonymous Coward writes: "Just got this in the mail from Tim Westergren, Pandora's CEO: "I'm writing today to ask for your help. We've had a disastrous turn of events recently for internet radio: Following an intensive lobbying effort on the part of the RIAA, an arbitration committee in Washington DC has just dramatically increased the fees internet radio sites must pay to the record labels — tripling fees and adding enormous retroactive payments! Left unchanged by Congress, this will kill all internet radio sites, including Pandora. Tomorrow afternoon there is an important U.S. Senate hearing on the future of internet radio."

This issue has started to get blog coverage: http://gigaom.com/2007/03/05/webcaster-royalty-rat es-go-up/ and http://www.rossdawsonblog.com/weblog/archives/2007 /03/the_vast_potent.html

If you live in the US, please contact your local Congressman now!

Please note that I have no Pandora affiliation except as a very happy user."
Enlightenment

Submission + - Work unhappy or move on?

Submitted by
dunnowhat2type
dunnowhat2type writes: "I grew up around a big city (suburbs of NY) and went to college in a relatively different area (upstate NY.) After graduating last May, I took a job in the area where I went to college. I started in July and was given a relocation package contingent on me staying for a year. Since August I haven't been happy with the area I have been living in and have actively been pursuing employment back in the city. In January, the program I was working on got cancelled and my manager didn't want to commit me to something long-term with the knowledge that I didn't plan on staying more than six months. He made me a time-based offer (probably expiring soon) that he'd take every effort to get the relocation payback waived if I were to resign, find an internal transfer, or another job. I had a couple of interviews a month ago, but nothing else has happened, and this uncertainty, with the pressure of having to make this decision has made the last two weeks really hellish. I wanted to make this decision within the next couple of days and have spoken to friends, but I wanted to pose the question here. What am I better off doing, being miserable around here, but at least having money, work experience, and health insurance, or going home and being happy, but being unemployed?"
Education

Submission + - Kansas Adopts New Science Standards

Submitted by porcupine8
porcupine8 writes: The Kansas State Board of Education has changed the state science standards once again, this time to take out language questioning evolution. This turnaround comes fast on the heels of the ouster given this past election to the ultra-conservative Board members who originally introduced the language. "Science" has also been re-redefined as "a human activity of systematically seeking natural explanations" (the word "natural" had been previously stricken from the definition).

If you'd like to see the new standards, a version showing all additions and deletions is available from the KS DOE's website (PDF).
Censorship

Submission + - Ethics of proxy servers

Submitted by
Mav
Mav writes: "I was recently asked to host a website for free in return for a lot of advertising. After querying them about how they knew the site would produce traffic they stated the site was going to be running PHPProxy (an open source web proxy). The traffic was a result of him and his contacts (nearly one thousand of them) using the site to bypass his school's firewall in order to view their MySpace pages and get access to their MSN messengers. Given all the attention social networking sites have recently received and the various laws attempting to block or control access to them I feel guilty and unsure making this available. Are there legal implications that I need to worry about? Could I be held liable if one of the students got in trouble? Most importantly, what's the moral thing to do?"
User Journal

Journal Journal: Not So Global Warming

Journal by OverlordQ

A new report on climate over the world's southernmost continent shows that temperatures during the late 20th century did not climb as had been predicted by many global climate models. This comes soon after the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that strongly supports the conclusion that the Earth's climate as a whole is warming, largely due to human acti
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft blasts IBM in open letter

Submitted by carlmenezes
carlmenezes writes: Arstechnica has an article on Microsoft's open letter to IBM that adds fresh ammunition to the battle of words between those who support Microsoft's Open XML and OpenOffice.org's OpenDocument file formats. Microsoft has strong words for IBM, which it accuses of deliberately trying to sabotage Microsoft's attempt to get Open XML certified as a standard by the ECMA. In the letter, general managers Tom Robertson and Jean Paol write: "When ODF was under consideration, Microsoft made no effort to slow down the process because we recognized customers' interest in the standardization of document formats." In contrast, the authors charge that IBM "led a global campaign" urging that governments and other organizations demand that International Standards Organization (ISO) reject Open XML outright.
Could MS actually be getting a taste of their own medicine?
Biotech

Stem Cell Research Paper Recalled 112

Posted by CowboyNeal from the making-the-grade dept.
MattSparkes writes "One of the best-known stem cell papers describes adult cells that seemed to hold the same promise as embryonic stem cells. Now some of the data contained within the paper is being questioned, after staff at a consumer science magazine noticed errors. It shows how even peer-reviewed papers can sometimes 'slip through the net' and get to publication with inaccurate data."
Mozilla

Submission + - Over 27% of Firefox patches come from volunteers

Submitted by
dolphinling
dolphinling writes: "Everyone knows the Mozilla Corporation makes a lot of money and employs a lot of people now. Google has full-time employees working on Firefox too, as do a number of other places. Yet despite that, in the six months up to Firefox 2 "27% of the patches to Firefox and Gecko and other key projects were submitted by key volunteers, [and] those patches represent 24% of changes made to the source code". What's more, those numbers only counted contributers with 50 patches or more, so the actual numbers are probably quite a bit higher. It's good to see that even as Mozilla does so well in the business world, it can still keep its ties to the community so strong."
User Journal

Journal SPAM: Neo-Nazi rally was organized by FBI informant 12

Journal by Jeremiah Cornelius

A paid FBI informant was the man behind a neo-Nazi march through the streets of Parramore that stirred up anxiety in Orlando's black community and fears of racial unrest that triggered a major police mobilization.
User Journal

Journal SPAM: '...something I have never witnessed before on this scale' 14

Journal by Jeremiah Cornelius

Carl Bernstein:

"Nixon's relationship to the press was consistent with his relationship to many institutions and people. He saw himself as a victim. We now understand the psyche of Richard Nixon, that his was a self-destructive act and presidency.
Networking

How Would You Deal With A Global Bandwidth Crisis? 478

Posted by Zonk from the read-a-book dept.
lopy writes "First Google claimed the internet infrastructure won't scale to provide an acceptable user experience for online video. Then some networking experts predict that a flu pandemic would bring the internet to it's knees and lead to internet rationing. We used to think that bandwidth would always increase as needed, but what would happen if that isn't the case? How would you deal with a global bandwidth shortage? Would you be willing to voluntarily limit your internet usage if necessary? Could you live in a world without cheap and plentiful broadband internet access?"
User Journal

Journal SPAM: The Road Map to Despotism 28

Journal by Jeremiah Cornelius

Despite spending an estimated $80 million, the government was unable to prove that Dr. Sami Al-Arian was a terrorist, yet he remains in prison and his sentence will likely be extended. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges warns that the abusive imprisonment of this nonviolent Palestinian dissenter does not bode well for the rest of us.
Space

Hayabusa To Begin Long Journey Back to Earth 92

Posted by Zonk from the any-mission-you-can-walk-away-from-right dept.
Sparky writes "Japan is planning to set the Hayabusa spacecraft on a trajectory back to Earth next month after a delay of more than a year, but it's far from certain that it will get back safely. It was supposed to retrieve asteroid debris, but it's thought that a computer error prevented that from happening. A fuel leak means that its chemical thrusters are out of action, and the craft is relying on its weaker ion engines. The journey back will take 3 years, and the capsule will be on Earth in June 2010 — even if it is empty."

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