Quote

A hundred times a day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give the same measure as I have received--Albert Einstein

Beware of Parking

Apparently there's a new racket to (legally) scam people out of money these days in Dallas. A friend of mine has been a victim of this scam twice in the past week alone and 3 times total in the past year. Apparently apartment complexes contract with tow companies to remove cars from their properties that are not in compliance with their policies. In the past, this usually meant cars that were abandoned, broken down, parked in fire zones, or otherwise detrimental to the value of the property. I can perhaps understand towing someone who is in a fire zone or parked in a spot that is clearly marked "reserved." However, the new trend seems to find the most nit-picky parking errors and tow the car without warning. Just a week ago, my friend squeezed into a small spot in his apartment complex and because the car beside him had not parked correctly, he was over the line. The next morning he walked out to go to work and found no car....towed because of "double space parking." That was a $163 mistake that also made him over an hour late to work. Last night, the same friend was visiting his brother in another apartment complex. His brother just moved in about a week ago and doesn't have a car, so he wasn't even aware of the policies regarding parking. Now, this complex had more than ample parking. There were literally hundreds of vacant parking places. There were no signs posted regarding prohibitions of parking nor were any of the parking spaces marked with any kind of labels indicating "visitor" or "resident." A couple of hours later, my friend walks outside to find his car missing...again. A call to the police led to the discovery that again his car had been towed. This time for "unauthorized" parking. Another $171 down the drain. It is infuriating because he had no idea he could potentially be parking in the wrong spot. There was no warning, no explanation. It's not like when you park in a fire zone or a handicap spot without authorization...you are at least aware of the risk. In both these cases, he had no idea you could even be towed for something as minor and petty as this. Apparently this complex requires a "resident sticker" and if you don't have a sticker, you have to park in "visitor" parking. The only problem was it wasn't clearly marked which spots were visitor or resident. After he was informed of this policy at the tow facility, he later drove around the complex and finally found a section of "visitor" parking that was nowhere near his brother's apartment...it wouldn't have been safe or convenient to park so far away from where he could keep an eye on the vehicle....especially when there were MORE than enough so-called resident spots near the apartment. I might could even understand if they were having an overcrowding problem, but this was not the case. This was clearly just a money-grab...very irritating. A few months ago, his car was towed for an expired inspection sticker, though it had only been out for a day or two. Legally they are supposed to provide a warning and give the resident time to correct the problem in instances like that, so since they did not provide a warning, he ended up getting his money back on that case, but not without a lengthy hassle. When he was picking up his car from the tow facility, there was another girl there who had just been towed from a parking garage after only 15 minutes in a "Future Resident Only" spot....mind you, it was 11pm on a Sunday night...the complex office wasn't even open to accept future residents at that time of night, so what was it hurting for her to park there? What was it hurting for my friend to park in an otherwise empty parking lot just because it didn't say visitor? Was that really worth punishing them with an almost $200 fine?

I think this is ludicrous that these complexes can create these arbitrary parking rules and not even inform visitors and residents about the policies and then tow you without warning. Legally they are allowed to do this, but I think it is very shady business. Fortunately for my friend, he was able to somewhat afford the unexpected expense, but what about people who are barely getting by financially? This could be a major blow to the budget....just to line someone else's pockets. If they aren't able to come up with the money, their car can be sold in an auction, which could further complicate their situation for getting to work and staying above water. I think it is a very unfair practice that needs to be addressed.

Makes Me Want to Scream!!

Last night was my first class of the semester as I continue to wrap up this second M.Ed. degree in Reading. Although I've lost almost all motivation and interest in this degree, I plod forward, mainly just to finish what has been started. Unenthusiastically, I arrived for class with a professor that I have had 3 times before and who I can honestly say I haven't learned one solitary thing from in any of those experiences. So needless to say I'm less than thrilled about enduring another semester of this particular teacher repeating the same trite spiels and cliches and hearing the same un-enlightening lectures and completing the same mundane assignments as I have in the previous three courses. It doesn't seem to matter what the course is supposed to be about...we do the same thing and talk about the same thing in every class. So essentially I will have taken the same course 4 times and learned nothing. Sigh. Since last night was the first night, we discussed the syllabus (which I have memorized by this point) for basically 2 hours. My mind was so uninterested, so unengaged, so under-stimulated that I felt I was going to scream before the class was finally and mercifully released. It was literally torture and it is torture that I will have to endure every Wednesday night for the next three months. On my way home, I found myself driving like a crazy woman on the freeway with all the pent-up frustration and boredom of the previous two and a half hours seeking some sort of release. I began to think about our students and realized that more than likely this is how they feel after school each day. I know that there are teachers and schools out there that make learning interactive, interesting, meaningful, and engaging for students....but unfortunately in many environments--especially low-income, urban environments-- the focus is on drill and kill test prep which literally sucks any joy and life out of the learning process. Texas is transitioning from the TAKS test to a new high-stakes assessment called the STAAR this year. It is only the second week of school and I'm already STARR'd out. I'm already tired of talking about it, analyzing it, gearing our entire lives around it, and we are still 9 months away from test-time!

Let me give you an example of how this test is already taking over our school. The district decided to give some of the students some kind of beginning of the year assessment this week. (Teachers are telling me that the test basically covers concepts that the students haven't even been introduced to in previous grades so I'm not sure what the purpose of the assessment is other than to document that students don't know those concepts, which I don't think we needed a test to determine). I'm not sure how other schools are handling this assessment, but our administrator has decided that we need to go into full test-mode this week to model the environment of the STAAR which will be given in late April. The STAAR is going to be a timed test, unlike the TAKS. So our leader has decided that we need to start preparing students for that. Therefore, on the second week of school, we are in full test-mode all day every day this week. The students are not following their regular schedule, but are instead taking two tests per day. One in the morning and one after lunch. Most students are finishing the test within the first hour of being in the testing room and then are spending the rest of the allotted time in forced silence, bored and unoccupied. We have given up an entire week of instruction for the purpose of "practicing" for a test that is 9 months away. Furthermore, we will be doing this every six weeks for each common assessment (Do the math. That's over six entire weeks that will be dedicated to testing or practicing testing, and that's not including the end of semester exams or once a semester Benchmark exams). As if our students haven't been tested to death since they first walked into a school six, seven, or eight years ago. As if they don't know what to do when a test booklet and scantron are placed in front of them. In all reality, they don't know what to do when anything ELSE is placed in front of them.

Just as I wanted to scream last night as the professor said the same exact pet phrase for the one millionth time, I want to scream when I walk around this school. I don't see kids engaged in learning or excited about learning. I don't see creative instruction going on that will set the tone for another year of exciting exploration and discovery. What do I see? Kids testing. Is it common sense to anyone but me that if you test the kids to death, they will get burned out and apathetic before we ever reach April? Sadly, I know this isn't the case in all schools, but for those here in this district, there seems to be an unhealthy obsession with these statewide tests that in my opinion is severely limiting the quality of the education our students are receiving. Yes, on paper, our students are performing at acceptable levels, but I just know there is so much they're not getting that a test score is not going to reflect. And unfortunately this frustration I feel can't be relieved with a few minutes of road rage on the interstate.

And so the torture continues....