West Virginia schools offer modified junk food to students

In an effort to entice students to eat food that is good for them, or at least better for them than what they had been eating, West Virginia officials are offering such modified junk foods as "protein-packed donuts, low sodium hot dogs on wheat buns, low-fat pancakes and baked French fries." according to an ABC News article:

"They have to be able to still enjoy their favorite foods, but let's let them enjoy them at a lower risk to their health," said Kennan chef Harold Kuhn.

But critics say the faux junk food can steer children in the wrong direction.

"I'm worried that they go away from those meals with the message that wherever they eat those foods they might be perfectly healthy," said pediatrician Dr. Stephen Daniels.

The schools insist they educate students about what they're eating.

Texas may require mandatory steroid testing for all student athletes

The state of Texas has passed a bill that would require all high school student-athletes to undergo mandatory steroid testing. Once the governor signs the bill, and according to an Associated Press article, he has not expressed any opposition to it, it will become law:

Don Hooton of the Taylor Hooton Foundation – established to fight steroid abuse – is among those who testified before Texas state lawmakers in support of the legislation.

Hooton's foundation bears the name of the 17-year-old high school athlete son he lost in 2003 to a suicide believed caused by abuse of anabolic steroids.

In an interview with CBS News correspondent Hari Sreenivasan, Hooton says testing is the only deterrent that will work.

"They're not doing it to get high," says Hooton. "I am convinced that this intelligent group of kids, if they think there's a reasonable chance of getting caught, won't make the decision to use the steroids in the first place."

Steroid testing has been a major component of Republican Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst's campaign to protect children. Athletes who test positive, or refuse to be tested, could be suspended from play. Athletes in all sports, from football to wrestling to tennis, could be tested.

"I made steroid testing of high school athletes a priority this session because I believe it will deter young people from putting that poison in their bodies and save lives all across Texas," Dewhurst said.

The House of Representatives voted 140-4 to send the bill to Perry.

More graduations being webcast

A new fad, the live streaming of graduation ceremonies, is becoming more and more popular, according to an article in the Houston Chronicle:

Gradcasts," as some techies call them, allow viewers to watch live streaming video of the ceremonies without the nightmares of parking, uncomfortable stadium seats and long restroom lines. The Web-based technology is catching on among some school districts who say it costs next to nothing to offer the extra service to students' families. Some districts have even started webcasting sporting events and pre-kindergarten graduations. School plays and open houses aren't far behind.

"We haven't even tapped into the possibilities of the Internet yet," said Mimi Morrison, director of technology for the Huffman school district, which will stream its graduation ceremonies online for the first time this weekend. "This video on demand is definitely the wave of the future. It's here, and it's exciting."

Concentration on core classes has not prepared students for college

A study sponsored by those who publish the ACT says students need more than just the core classes in order to be able to succeed at the college level.
According to an article in today's Washington Post:

Using research on the college success of students who took the ACT college entrance test, and comparing their test scores to their high school records, ACT researchers found that many core courses were not carefully constructed or monitored and that students often received good grades in the core courses even if they didn't learn much.

The study also suggests that students need to take upper-level classes in the core subjects.

Neosho school district adopts stronger dress code

Today's Joplin Globe features an article about the revised, much stricter, dress code adopted last week by the Neosho R-5 Board of Education:

Clothing and other accessories that will be prohibited under the new dress code include:

- Torn, cut or tattered clothing.

- Clothes that advertise or display alcohol, drugs, tobacco, nudity or double-meaning slogans.

- Trench coats or long jackets.

- Unnatural hair coloring, such as fuchsia, green or blue.

The revised dress code also mandates that all shirts, tops and dresses have sleeves, defined as passing the shoulder, and that all shorts, pants, dresses and skirts be no shorter than three inches above the knee. Skirts and dresses with slits higher than three inches above the knee are not allowed.

Check out the comments at the bottom of the story, including this one:

Of course the school board based this on evidence that these changes will somehow reduce some undesirable behavior other than old people not liking unnatural hair color. I hope the 50 something teachers who color their hair to an UNNATURAL color (if it's grey, that's nature baby!) will be held to the same standard. And for the male teachers... the toupee has to go too! They should model appropriate behaviors for the kids. Here come the socialists!

How do you feel?

Teachers stage gun attack on sixth graders

In the category of "What in the heck were they thinking?" CNN reports teachers at a Tennessee school staged a fake gun attack on sixth graders without even telling them it was fake:

The mock attack Thursday night was intended as a learning experience and lasted five minutes during the weeklong trip to a state park, said Scales Elementary School Assistant Principal Don Bartch, who led the trip.

"We got together and discussed what we would have done in a real situation," he said.

But parents of the sixth-grade students were outraged. "The children were in that room in the dark, begging for their lives, because they thought there was someone with a gun after them," said Brandy Cole, whose son went on the trip.

Some parents said they were upset by the staff's poor judgment in light of the April 16 shootings at Virginia Tech that left 33 students and professors dead, including the gunman.

During the last night of the trip, staff members convinced the 69 students that there was a gunman on the loose. They were told to lie on the floor or hide underneath tables and stay quiet. A teacher, disguised in a hooded sweat shirt, even pulled on a locked door.

After the lights went out, about 20 kids started to cry, 11-year-old Shay Naylor said.

"I was like, 'Oh My God,' " she said. "At first I thought I was going to die. We flipped out."

Principal Catherine Stephens declined to say whether the staff members involved would face disciplinary action, but said the situation "involved poor judgment."

Poor judgment? That's putting it mildly.

Teen alcoholic tells her story

Today's Columbia Tribune features the story of a 19-year-old alcoholic, and it is an unsettling one, to say the least:

By the time she went outside to smoke that early November morning in 2001, Katie had already downed about five or six shots of mixed liquor.
"I fell on my face, and that’s the last thing I remember. They said after that, I kept drinking and that I drank a half a bottle of vodka. My friend and I drank the bottle of vodka between us."

The 15-year-old Columbia junior high student was 5 feet, 8 inches tall and 105 pounds. Her blood alcohol limit soared to 0.2 percent - two-and-a-half times the legal limit.

She’d been drinking every weekend for more than a year. Had it not been for a trip to the emergency room, the night would have been just like any other Friday night for Katie and her friends.

Katie's problem started early, according to the story:

Katie’s substance abuse problem started at 13, when a friend pressured her to smoke marijuana. Aching from her parents’ divorce, the promise of a good time outweighed the fear of drugs that Katie's elementary school D.A.R.E. class had instilled in her.

"At first I didn't really feel anything. Then I tried again," she recalled. "And one time, it hit me. There was no real reality. It was a completely different world where I didn’t have to worry about anything."

Then an eighth-grader at Oakland Junior High School, Katie continued to get high on weekends and added alcohol to the mix shortly thereafter.

Thomas Jefferson High School students receive laptops

Students at Thomas Jefferson High School have received laptops they can use at school and home as the independent school continues to improve its technological offerings.
But is this a good thing for education?

A New York Times article indicates there is no evidence that laptops improve grades or education and in fact, are used more often for music, games, and downloading porn:

Matoaca High School just outside Richmond, Va., began eliminating its five-year-old laptop program last fall after concluding that students had failed to show any academic gains compared with those in schools without laptops. Continuing the program would have cost an additional $1.5 million for the first year alone, and a survey of district teachers and parents found that one-fifth of Matoaca students rarely or never used their laptops for learning. “You have to put your money where you think it’s going to give you the best achievement results,” said Tim Bullis, a district spokesman.

May 19 signing scheduled for Devil's Messenger

A second signing for South Middle School eighth grade communication arts teacher Randy Turner's novel, Devil's Messenger, will be held 3 to 9 p.m. Saturday, May 19, at Hastings Books, Music and Video in Joplin.

Free Jolly Ranchers will be given out, and drawings will be held for Natural Disaster CDS, copies of Devil's Messenger and copies of Mr. Turner's first book, Small Town News.

For more information, e-mail Mr. Turner at rturner229@hotmail.com.

Campuses seeking better, quicker notification system

In the wake of this week's massacre at Virginia Tech, authorities are examining better ways to let students know when something has happened on campus:

"When you're in the middle of something, two hours is not very long. But when you're looking in, it does seem like a long time," says Mitchell Celaya, the assistant chief of campus police at the University of California, Berkeley.

At UC Berkeley, Celaya says an extreme emergency would warrant, among other things, a siren on an outdoor public address system, followed by an announcement with instructions.

Teens limiting personal information online

An article in the April 18 issue of USA Today, teens are limiting the information they reveal about themselves online:

Dashiell Feiler, a 16-year-old high school junior, said he keeps his profiles open, but uses at most his first name and last initial. He said people who find him tend to be friends anyway, but he left off his full name as a precaution.

"I just thought I didn't want anybody to figure out where I live," he said.

According to Pew, 45% of online teens do not have profiles at all, a figure that contradicts widespread perceptions that the nation's youths are continually on MySpace. Lenhart said younger teens, in particular, tend to stay away, some because they fail to meet a site's minimum age requirements.

Post-prom parties designed to promote safety

The latest fad is post-prom parties, a parent-generated concept to prevent tragedies from occurring to students left on their own after the annual proms.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Mandy St. Amand examines the trend:

Marketing experts get rich coming up with catch-phrases and slogans to get across a message. Culp, of the state police, said kids don't need a catchy slogan to understand that they shouldn't drink, and they certainly shouldn't drink and drive. As Culp put it: "They just need an adult to say, 'I love you and want you alive to live longer than me.'"

We can do that, can't we?

Judge violates student's right to post opinions on MySpace

A higher court has ruled that a judge was out of line when he placed a teenager on probation for writing obscene postings about the principal on MySpace:

The three-judge panel on Monday ordered the Putnam Circuit Court to set aside its penalty against the girl, referred to only as A.B. in court records.

"While we have little regard for A.B.'s use of vulgar epithets, we conclude that her overall message constitutes political speech," Judge Patricia Riley wrote in the 10-page opinion.

In February 2006, Greencastle Middle School Principal Shawn Gobert discovered a Web page on MySpace purportedly created by him. A.B., who did not create the page, made derogatory postings on it concerning the school's policy on body piercings.

The state filed a delinquency petition in March alleging that A.B.'s acts would have been harassment, identity deception and identity theft if committed by an adult. The juvenile court dropped most of the charges but in June found A.B. to be a delinquent child and placed her on nine months of probation. The judge ruled the comments were obscene.

Are year-round schools the answer?

"Do year-round schools enhance student learning, or are they a costly, hectic, and largely ineffective cure for the nation's educational ills?"
That's how an article in the latest edition of Education World begins. A reporter for the magazine talked with superintendents, teachers, principals, and others to get their views.
Check out the article, then post your own feelings about the subject.

Landmark free speech case set for Supreme Court

Students in my communication arts classes at South Middle School have discussed the famous Tinker vs. Board of Education case in which the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that students do not leave their free speech rights at the schoolhouse door.

That concept will be revisited by the high court (no pun intended) this summer when it hears the case of an Alaska student who was punished after displaying a pro-drug message at a school event, which was held off of the school campus:

Bong Hits for Jesus

That is the slogan that a defiant high school student named Joseph Frederick fashioned with a 14-foot piece of paper and a $3 roll of duct tape. His goal was partly to get on TV as the Olympic torch passed through his town of Juneau, Alaska, and mostly to get under the skin of his disciplinarian principal, Deborah Morse, with whom he had a running feud.

It worked, at least the irritating-the-principal part. Morse crossed Glacier Avenue to Frederick's position across from the school and confiscated the banner. She later suspended him for 10 days. Frederick, a high school rebel who at the time was fond of quoting Thoreau and Voltaire, said Morse tacked on the last five days when he paraphrased Thomas Jefferson's admonition that "speech limited is speech lost."

The American Civil Liberties Union is backing Frederick, while former Special Prosecutor Kenneth Starr is among those backing the school district.

No grand jury indictment in Emmett Till case

Each year during third quarter, the students in my eighth grade communication arts classes do a major research project on some aspect of the civil rights movement. Some of them elect to research the Emmett Till case, in which a 14-year-old African American was brutally murdered after whistling at a white woman.

The two men who committed the murder were found not guilty at their trial, but admitted they did it a year later in an interview with Look magazine. For the past half-century, many have believed that the woman Till whistled at, Carolyn Bryant, pointed him out to the killers and was responsible for the death.

During the past three years, it has appeared Ms. Bryant might finally be brought to justice, but a decision issued Tuesday by a grand jury in Mississippi indicates that may never happen:

"This was our last hope — and it was dashed today," said Simeon Wright, 64, Till's cousin, who was with him at the grocery store and heard him whistle at Donham (Ms. Bryant remarried.). "The Emmett Till case started with one person, and that person is still alive. She played a role in identifying Emmett, she participated in his kidnapping, and now she is getting away with murder."

Some members of Emmett Till's family would prefer not to send Ms. Bryant to prison, but simply get her to tell the truth once and for all:

With the trail in the Till case as cold as ever, some of his family members say they would prefer truth more than payback. Marvel Parker, 60, of Summit, Ill., is the wife of Wheeler Parker, a cousin of Till's who was with him at the Mississippi store. He is now hospitalized after a stroke. His wife said they would prefer to see Carolyn Bryant Donham receive immunity in exchange for telling her story. "Mrs. Bryant is still alive, and her husband admitted that he did it," Marvel Parker said. "We don't want her to go to jail…. But you don't have to be a Rhodes scholar to know that she knows something."

Devil's Messenger on sale at Hastings in Joplin

As of approximately 5 p.m. today, my second novel Devil's Messenger is on sale at Hastings in Joplin. Five copies were put on the shelves at that time and more will arrive later as the time grows closer for the 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, April 21, signing.

The book is on sale at three locations in Joplin- Hastings, the Changing Hands Book Shop and Always Buying Books. It is also available at Pat's Books in Carthage, and at the Lamar Democrat office in Lamar. More sites will be added in the near future, and more signings will be scheduled in late spring and during the summer.

The book also can be purchased directly from me. Send me an e-mail at rturner229@hotmail.com for more information. It is available from several internet outlets, including Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, BooksAMillion.com, and the publisher I-Universe.

The novel is a combination horror story/murder mystery about a teenage girl who communicates with her murdered father through Instant Messenger.

Congressman pushes to award Anne Frank honorary U. S. citizenship

Students throughout the world are aware of the story of Anne Frank, whose diary of her experiences hiding from the Nazis during the Holocaust has been a worldwide best seller for half a century.
A United States Congressman is attempting to make Miss Frank the seventh honorary citizen in the history of the United States, according to an article in today's New York Times.
Rep. Steve Israel notes that Otto Frank, Miss Frank's father, was trying desperately to get his family to the United States:

"The best way we can honor Anne Frank in death is to give her what her father sought for her in life," the congressman said. Seventeen House members from both parties have signed on as co-sponsors. It would make Anne Frank only the seventh person to be granted honorary citizenship in the history of the country. The others are Winston S. Churchill; the Marquis de Lafayette; Mother Teresa; the Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg, who worked to save Jews in World War II; William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania; and his wife Hannah Callowhill Penn.

Politicians looking at longer school days

American students may be in for longer school days sometime in the near future.
An Associated Press article indicates that some schools are considering 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. schedules or going more days during the year to catch up with other nations.

The article includes information that Congress, as it works on renewing the No Child Left Behind law, is seriously considering extending the school day and adding more days to help increase test scores.

School lockers are not big enough

With all of the backpacks, larger-than-life textbooks, and the other necessities of teen living, lockers are no longer big enough to serve today's students.
That issue is addressed in an article in today's Washington Post:

Lockers aren't getting smaller. Lockers are one of the few things that haven't changed much in the daily rounds of students. But bulky textbooks have spawned bulky backpacks, some of which, in turn, have taken the next evolutionary step and grown wheels.