Rant VIII: The Reckoning
- Thread starter Anonymous
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- boat people
A friend of mine died today. He'd been having some troubles with his lungs lately, coughing and such but "nothing serious". Had a lung bleed a few days ago, fell and hit his head. Everything was going to be fine, stayed at the hospital overnight and... Never woke up. The guy wasn't even 30 yet 
Omg. I clicked that and now somehow it's my top book mark.
Every few days, I'll get a recorded call from Michael, saying that it's my last chance to renew my vehicle warranty. I wonder what will happen if Michael ever calls one of those Pakistani scammers who pose as IRS agents.
There is no wrong Kardashian.
Dave
Staff member
I am not good at creating web sites. They either look completely devoid of anything aesthetically pleasing or it looks like the 1990's threw up all over it. I fucking hate that I've been put in this position and there's nothing I can do about it but suck it up and try and make something passable.
Dave
Staff member
I just spent 2 fucking hours trying to get the header to show right and when I did I didn't like it so I scrapped it. Right now the site is WAY too busy and just...terrible.
Does this site have scripted functionality (CMS, shopping cart, blogging platform, ...) or is it a static site that gets manually edited and re-uploaded? If the latter, you could try finding a free Boostrap template and add your content to it. It takes a lot of headaches out of the equation, in my experience, and there's a ton of tutorials that cover all the bases.
For more advanced/customizable static sites, Jekyll or Pelican are good starting points, but that gets into the "you need to know some programming" territory.
That's awful . I'm so sorry.
. I'm so sorry.
Thanks for the hugs and the kind words.
I don't actually have all the details, because my sister and her husband are on the other side of the world, but as far as I know it was completely out of nowhere. They had the baby, they went home, they went to sleep, they woke up and noticed something wrong, they rushed to the emergency room, and that was it. That's all I know so far.
Everyone in our family's rather shaken up. I think I'm actually the one keeping it together best so far, so I'll see if there's anything I can do in the coming days. Fortunately my mother's over there with my sister and my brother-in-law, so they don't have to deal with this by themselves.
But seriously, man... talk about a total gut punch from the blue. Fucking hell.
I don't actually have all the details, because my sister and her husband are on the other side of the world, but as far as I know it was completely out of nowhere. They had the baby, they went home, they went to sleep, they woke up and noticed something wrong, they rushed to the emergency room, and that was it. That's all I know so far.
Everyone in our family's rather shaken up. I think I'm actually the one keeping it together best so far, so I'll see if there's anything I can do in the coming days. Fortunately my mother's over there with my sister and my brother-in-law, so they don't have to deal with this by themselves.
But seriously, man... talk about a total gut punch from the blue. Fucking hell.
I'm so sorry! I can't even begin to imagine what you are all going through.
I am so fed up with public school right now, not with teachers, but with the system in general. I am strongly considering trying online high school with my son and just teaching him my damn self instead of having to drag him out of bed and practically dress him myself just to have him come home and have him stare blankly at homework that he doesn't want to do. I'm concerned about social engagement and IEP services if I go that way, but quite frankly he's not interacting with kids at school NOW, and his services are considered an elective that he gets a fucking grade for (and not even a gimme grade, he got a fucking C last semester). I have to kick and scream to get a para for check in because they can't spare them for Honors/AP classes, but even then my son is a disorganized mess and if things he needs aren't available on Schoology they might as well not exist. He failed a class because I didn't know he was missing his lab work (which never showed up online and his teacher never communicated this with me until 4 0s showed up at zero hour) I wish I could put him in private school, but the best fit for him is 35k or so a year which it's not going to happen no matter how many fights I have with my husband about it. He was doing well for the first part of the year, but ever since Thanksgiving break he's regressed back months, to the point where I can't trust him to do anything on his own initiative anymore and he's punishing himself for not doing things as soon as I ask him to do it. The most frustrating thing is if I try to ask him what's wrong, he says he doesn't know, so I don't know what to do to help. I don't think the classes are too hard for him, and honestly he doesn't get a lot of homework, most of the time it's 90 minutes tops for everything if he just did it. His focus is just completely gone. I know online high school still goes at the same basic pace, but I don't think I could teach him at his level after many years out of school combined with knowledge atrophy.
On top of that I'm seriously starting to wonder if my daughter has high functioning autism, but it's so hard to tell in girls. I see a lot of myself in her, but I could never put a finger on a lot of things I struggled with until I had my son.
I won't even go into the fear I have about the future of the public education system in general in the next four years.
On top of that I'm seriously starting to wonder if my daughter has high functioning autism, but it's so hard to tell in girls. I see a lot of myself in her, but I could never put a finger on a lot of things I struggled with until I had my son.
I won't even go into the fear I have about the future of the public education system in general in the next four years.
I don't know if this would help at all, but a friend of mine home schools her kids in CO, although they are much younger, but she does it through a neighborhood community, so it isn't just her kids. If you don't think you could teach him the way he needs, is there a home schooling group he might fit in with? Maybe the smaller group will help his focus more, or at least get more one-on-one attention.
It's pretty easy to say file suit, but realistically it won't really do anything. Special Ed across the country isn't meeting funding requirements, and spending on education in CO in general is complete crap. You'll find most special ed in schools (not all, but a significant number) will be fine for kids who are able to basically function normally, or kids who aren't really expected to be part of the general ed curriculum. But if you have a kid who likes learning but struggles with executive functioning, your options are put them in classes that are too easy but they'll get extra help, or put them in the class that fits their education level and make them work it out. The reason online school was something I was considering was because flat out, at least if he does online school I'll be there to help him one on one. But it's still not really ideal. I don't really have the temperament for teaching him myself, because while my attention span is better than his, there's really no mystery where a lot of his tendencies came from in his gene pool. I'm mostly just frustrated and venting once again that the best option is prohibitively expensive and my husband is more worried about us being tapped out before our kids get to college while I'm more worried that college will never happen for my son because everything in school is a band aid instead of actual help.
With some children the interface actually matters. My son wouldn't be doing his homework if he couldn't do it on the computer, and work with the teachers to turn some assignments into computer assignments, such as a PowerPoint rather than a report.
So there are some situations where self motivation is different based on the interface.
My son does every bit of school work he has by iPad or computer, unless it's something he HAS to do by hand, such as geometry constructions. At the beginning of the year I seriously had to argue with the Principal and Dean of students about it, but it's such a non issue to all of his teachers because all of the classwork is meant to be done with an iPad, each student even has a district loaned one, and they even use it to take their tests, so it's ludicrous to me how out of touch people can be.
This is a fair point. I never would have succeeded in school if I hadn't been allowed to turn in typed reports instead of hand written ones. Sometimes being able to do stuff like this can be a game changer.
That doesn't undermine my point though: until he's able to motivate himself into doing the work when he needs to, he won't be able to handle going online school only.
And that's kind of my point. Would he be more inclined to do his work if he could do it from home instead of having to get up at 5:30 in the morning to catch the bus at 6:30 to have to sit still in a classroom all day? I don't know the answer. That's why it's only a thought ticking the back of my mind and not my actual plan.