Change is good... all the time

If you watch nothing else in your life with a mission for change, watch this 20 minute clip with a direction of where our wisdom may work for us. in my personal experience, this is how i feel. this “game” that i am forced to play in order to do what is right some days knocks the wind out of my sails. i operate on the idea that we need a huge change in not how we live, love, and work, but in WHY we do it. last night during our family meeting, we touched on grandma Melernea’s gold kaiser card. Barry Schwartz talks about the janitors who have the wisdom to do their jobs well with the intent of offering caring service to others. when i think of my grandmother and the fact that she did housekeeping for as many years as she had when others ask if she is a doctor, the answer should be “no” with a reply of “better”. like the janitor who cleaned the floor in the room of the comatose man TWICE because the father who had been sitting vigil for 3 months didn’t see it done and was upset; like the housekeeper who did not vacuum because another family who had spent a great deal of time in a waiting room were asleep; and for the janitor who stopped mopping the floor so that a patient who was trying to regain strength could walk the halls. we have to remember that so much of what makes this world a fantastic place comes from those who society looks at as the bottom of the pickings pile. we should never give up hope that doctors, lawyers, politicians, and yes even businessmen on Wall Street can reach for greatness by being more like janitors and housekeepers and persons who work with the public and do their jobs well and with wisdom simply… because… it … is … right Goddess
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Goddess Rambles about Charter Schools

i do see some successes in the charter schools in my area. there are populations that have been painfully under-served. in my case, Black students... yes i know there are many other students who fall into this niche, but i will only talk about what i know. the goal in the school was to give everyone a chance at a quality college-prep educational opportunity. the downside is the proposal was fought like it was the plague. we had a school, the school was empty. we were not shuffling kids about, we just wanted a place for OUR kids... and we take everyone but hear me out. We had to go grassroots to lift enrollment. we pushed in our churches and through our families and we now have to turn children away. our schools are some of the highest in the state of CA at least if not in the nation for charter schools. now that the schools are doing well, other want to sign up. i was on the waiting list for at least 3 years before my son was admitted. if we could open another school, we would be able to increase enrollment. our high and middle school are on a campus that has the ability to house roughly 2000 students, we have half that. it is almost as if we are being set up to fail because we are successful. there are other schools that have closed down. why not take them over? some points that frighten people. 1. non-union teachers 2. unconventional methods used to educate (sure they don't fit the norm, but they work for certain students and we have studies to back that up) 3. makes other schools in the district look bad (my solution to that is for the regular public schools to step up and make the changes necessary for success for ALL of their students) because a great deal of this is from the perspective of a parent of a gifted child in a public school where there was no GATE program, no instinct from teachers so overwhelmed with extremely high student numbers and lack of funding to manage their classrooms effectively (i rarely fault the educators and i don't fault them in this case either) , I felt i had no choice but to step out of the neighborhood school to help my child succeed. His teacher suggested in the 4th grade that i pull him and try to get him in charter. it is a tough call for administrators, educators, parents, and in many cases even the students. i truly believe that charter schools can be the catalyst for change in the educational system of America.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Technical snag but i still support my union.

WOW! I have to try not to be pissed when I sit here unable to sign on to the union meeting that is being held online. grrrrrr

something tells me that I am just going to have to wait and watch a recorded version of the biggest union meeting in the history of the CWA union.

I registered, I waited for the instructions and I went to the site and logged on around the designated time and I am still hour glassing after 45 minutes.

hmmmmm. Did they do a test run? nah.

Today at work must have been the last straw for the management staff. They are on call and ready for anything and the company starts to refer to them as lesser employees by trying to get the union members to get their drift by telling us that what they are asking from us is far better than the shitty plan they stuck their managers with. Usually, you see comments on the company sites about union bargaining littered with messages from managers saying good things about the company. After they dogged out the managers two days in a row by mentioning that the health plan they have sucks rocks, they finally lashed out.

I was waiting for Big Brother to swoop down and wipe out the messages, but not today...I think the company computer guy must have gone on a vacation... or has stopped following the company rule of wipe-it-out-if-it's-not-towing-the-company-line.

Some of the comments really got me thinking about how management gets screwed and how we cannot be mean to them because part of their job requirement is to follow company policy and work during strike.

Does it make you anti-company if you don't subscribe to all of the company's policies?

Maybe it is time for the managers to consider walking out with us. Now that would stick it to the corporation. From what I understand, managers have a 2500 deductible which means that they have to see the doctor a total of 65 visits per year in order to have the company pick up the tab at that point. Some of the comments from the managers stated that the only cost savings they had from their medical plan was the small discount they got on each doctor visit price.
If there were to be any type of catastrophic illness a family would be wiped out by having to pay medical bills up front before the company would take over and pay their share.

I am very disappointed by ATT for the way they have put down their management staff as well as the core wire line persons who keep this business running even if we aren't making as much money for them as we used to.
What the union and the company need to do is come to an agreement that is fair for ALL employees.

Why not have the employees, managers and executives share the medical cost. I think that if they worked it out, it would balance out quite well.


Shame on ATT

what would I give up to have a contract RIGHT NOW!

what would i give up RIGHT NOW for a contract.

I would give up that paid FLMAwithout a doubt. They do need to back down on some stuff because some of them are still thinking like it is 1980. You can't always get what you want. The worst part is that they are ripping us off on the health care. There is no way to get them to hear what we are thinking. That is the problem.
If we speak out against the union, they point us out to be union crashers. So be it I say. I have no shame in telling them that they are asking for to much and fighting a fight that I don't think we can win on the backs of the employees.
The employees are stuck in the middle between the union and the corporation and the only folks who will suffer will be us.
I would love to get the jobs back to CA and the people who got screwed out of jobs a good deal too. We can handle not having more money. We just need to be able to take care of our health without having to file for bankruptcy.

Sometimes I feel like the union did not take enough time to hear how we felt and what we really wanted to fight about.
We got a survey out that gave us an opportunity to vote on what we were willing to strike for but we never got a return on that survey when it came time to authorize a strike. I would have felt more comfortable making a decision on something that might send me into bankruptcy court.

Was my decision to vote "no" appropriate? yes. Did it make a difference? Not to the union or the members who voted yes but doing the best and voting your conscience is the best that you can do.

I have enjoyed a wonderful Easter and hope that we don't have to go through the whole crucifiction thing again during negotiations.

g

Bring on the procession of single men!

Sometimes I just get these thoughts in my head and I toss them around and then throw them away. Some of the thoughts stay and boy has Arranged Marriage stuck with me!

Who better to pick someone who would be great for you than someone else?
The people doing the choosing are also relatives of yours? Aren't there some Thanksgiving dinners where you just want to throw a roll at your Uncle Tony or hide the liquor from Auntie CeeCee?
Yeah. I bet you feel me on this one.
They want what is best for you as well as your family even if they are drunks and criminals.

Someone please tell me how an adaptation of Arranged Marriages can work in America. I am Sooooooo open to this idea it is scary.

first comes compatibility then comes love.
Somehow it makes more sense to me.

Help a sistah out

TV can be your savior or Satan incarnate...

More parenting videos on JuiceBoxJungle

As a parent to an extremely intelligent (yes I'm biased) 7 year old, I have learned to pick my battles carefully. I have less and less control over some things as he gets older and I become more exhausted from keeping him occupied while I try to sit down and breathe for a moment, so tv has become a few and far between friend.

In the beginning, (bible study anyone?) there was Teletubbies and Baby Einstein. My son was stimulated into a coma while I ran the house single handed due to a now former husband who wanted to be a rock star more than a father.

Television gave me just enough time to get some very important things done and then the child was pulled away (sometimes kicking and screaming) to use his human power. I would order him to go play in the fresh air and find some rocks to kick around.

I remember the television of my childhood, and it usually happened on Saturdays and not for too long. By noon, my mom was swinging a broom at us yelling "go play outside!" and we obediently filed toward the door.

Well, maybe it was because of the broom...

There was no audible lock, as my mother had an "in or out" rule. If you chose to come in and out of her house too many times bringing in dirt, flies and extra neighborhood kids, you got the all expense paid trip to 'momma's world'. Playing outside was fun. besides, who the hell wants to hang out with your mom and fold sheets all day?
"Not I!" , squeaked the fly (that was the one that sneaked in the house with the annoying neighborhood kids and the dirt.)

More kids should do it.
More parents should demand it.

For my mom, there was no convenience of 24 hour television programming for children. If there was nothing on the boob tube, we were up under her feet and life was bad for everyone.

As a mother now, I prescribe to my mother's saving grace. That is to "get out, stay out and don't come back until I call for dinner or until the street lights come on!" Mind you, this was all said in love, and i think the statute of limitations has run out on a call to CPS.

At an early age, my son was taught to go outside and play.

This upholds the idea that there is a difference between school clothes and play clothes.

I would send him to the backyard at age 3 or 4 and let him have at it. He could play in the hose and make mud puddles and chase the dogs around and get into all sorts of safe trouble. I could peek out the windows and know he was okay and could feel no worse for wear at having to hose him down before bringing him into the house.

I purposely did not subscribe to cable because I wanted to be in control of what my son watched when he did sit down for his coma sessions.

We watch public television. There is so much there for his brain to be inundated with and it is good stuff too.
After he graduated from Sesame Street and Teletubbies (Boobah was all wrong for my house), he moved on to Cyberchase, where got to use his thinking skills and Dragonfly TV where he got ideas for experiments he could do at home.

Regardless what your children watch, Adult Supervision should be required for ALL programming. Your child should feel comfortable asking questions and you should be there even if the question that comes up is "why does Tinky Winky carry a bag?"

At the same time time, children should be jazzed to go ride their bikes and build forts and get dirty.
Our only requirements as parents now is to not only demand that they use; instead of sedate their brains but dig in with them as well.

Ramblingly yours,

The Goddess