Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education

Dear Mr. Duncan,

I read the piece today in U.S. News and World Report in which you presented your views on the changes needed in the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation.  While some, including this blogger, have expressed concern with President Obama’s selection of yet another Sec of Ed who has never been taught in a classroom, I am still interested in what you have to say about NCLB.

It is reassuring to read your acknowledgment of the problems with NCLB.  I sincerely hope that you follow through on your promise to solicit the opinions and advice of teachers and parents before crafting another counter-productive national edict.

I was most intrigued to read that you have not yet chosen a name for the new legislation.  I would like offer my help, since my colleagues often call upon me when they are in need of a catchy acronym.  I have considered your needs, and I have included some suggestions below.  To keep with the habit of needing an easy way to say every acronym (see the title), I have supplied guidance regarding the appropriate way to say each one:

DODNTINT: “Do, or do not.  There is no try.”  Inspired by the sage advice of Yoda in “The Empire Strikes Back”, and driven by the fact that it doesn’t matter how hard you try only whether you reach the arbitrary goal set for you.  Pronounced “do-don’t-tint”.

DASED: Different Abilities + Same Expectations = Devastating.  Pronounced “dazed”.

FTGWC: Fill the Gap with Children.  Use the increasing number of failing children to fill that achievement gap.  Pronounced “fit-go-wik”.

DMWL: Do More With Less.  A traditional educational war cry.  Pronounced “dim-will”.

DUMB: Duncan’s Underfunded Mandates Bonanza.  Pronounced “dum”.

All of these are hereby protected by the Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 license, but I would be happy to discuss further acronym-writing opportunities with you.

Best wishes,

Mr. Science Teach

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Courtesy of NotRocketScience

Deep-sea biology has always interested me, mainly because of the sheer enormity of what we don’t yet know about the creatures that live in this unique habitat.

Nothing beats the conclusions of a recent genetic study by David Johnson at The Smithsonian confirming the work of a Japanese group.  Breaking it all down is Ed Yong of Not Exactly Rocket Science in a recent post.  In a nutshell, there are three very different organisms that turn out to be the larva, male, and female of the same species.  Imagine what doors this opens up for re-investigating what we already “know”.

I was cleaning out a toy box at home this week, and discovered a card from my 5-year-old’s deck of sight word flash cards.  The pairing of words on the front and back seems ill-advised, unless they were designed for Baby Mixalot.

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Happy New Year!  May all of your decisions this year be either smart of funny.

This one doesn’t even need an explanation. Just read and enjoy the simple fact that I get one of these every month as part of the “All-Electronic Program”.

As the name suggests, this new enterprise is oxymoronic at its core. I will be using my “free time” to post and comment on things of interest to me–Apple products, atheism, dumb people, and education, to name a few–in a unpredictable, yet well-planned, style. I welcome your comments, and I look forward to engaging in some interesting conversations.

Photo courtesy of k4cay at Flickr.com