School Calendar Controversy

The new Superintendent of Schools has decided that the only way the kids here will learn enough to pass the minimum grade levels tests is to go to school for more days out the year. He wants to take away most of the summer vacation days and make them go to school earlier in the year.

I already think it is ludicrous for the kids to start back the first week of August. That is awfully early to be going to school when most of the rest of the country does not start until after Labor Day. As far as I am concerned, they need to bring in extra teachers and extra tutors to help the kids who are struggling. The kids who are average and better are being punished for being in the same classes as the dumb ones.

Attacking the Dropout Rate

Our new mayor is getting serious about his campaign promise to attack the dropout rate in the county. But he might be a little too late. Evidently, the state has taken over the county schools and has their own plan of attack in mind. They fired most of the school principals and moved people around all over the county, giving some promotions and others just re-assigned to where they can do less damage.

I would love to see the schools get serious about making the school campus a safe and pleasant place for our children to spend the better part of their days. If you’ve not been inside a public school lately and seen the awful conditions, listened to the demeaning and humiliating way that the teachers and school staff talk to the students, and actually looked inside their current textbooks to see what they are supposed to be learning – you can’t begin to understand the ginormous problems we are facing in trying to improve or revamp our public education system here.

A Marketing Career

Years ago I wanted to get into “Sales and Marketing” primarily because I felt that the opportunities to earn what you truly deserve are more prevalent in sales positions than in traditional corporate management positions. Plus, sales is very optimistic, upbeat, forward thinking and you when you make a sale it is reason to celebrate your accomplishment. In corporate management, it is a lot of negativity, screwing people over and self serving. The only real reason a CEO has to celebrate is receipt of a fat bonus check earned off the sweat and sacrifice of all the worker bees.

In the early days when i was exploring the sales and marketing route, I asked a lot of my contemporaries, including other successful sale people and vendors, “What is the difference between “sales” and “marketing”? None of them gave me a good answer. It was only on my own exploration of the sales process and corporate structures that I discovered and embraced marketing. Over the years I’ve mastered quite a bit of the marketing principles and techniques in a variety of corporate settings. Now I am ready to step into the new millenium and learn more about internet marketing and search engine optimization.

Obviously I will make use of the internet for a lot of this effort. I have found some good articles about search engine optimization and internet marketing. One interesting aspect of the new marketing is that most of the traditional marketing logic does not apply. You have to shift mental gears into “geek think” instead of what works in the real world, because often they are very different and mistakes on your website can prove very costly and difficult to correct or overcome.

Channel Surfing

Can’t sleep. The past couple of days have been really hard on everyone in the family. I got back to the hotel tonight around 10:00, took a shower and just fell across the bed with the TV’s remote. Watched as much of the local channel news and reruns of sci-fi that I could stand and then I started flipping through the other cable channels. The hotel doesn’t have all that many channels, but there must be something on TV at 2:00 am besides infomercials with Susan Lucci’s skin care and the next great kitchen gadget.

As I was sufing the channels I came across a headshot of someone that I recognized immediately – Steve Cropper. Now I have been a big fan of Steve Cropper for many many years and I was intrigued – what is this show about? Turns out I struck gold and had come upon a special documentary show about Staxx records in Memphis back in the 1960′s. It had info on Booker T and the MGs, Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, Sam & Dave, and all the greats of the Memphis sound, narrated by Samuel Jackson.

Great show – what a lucky break that I found it this morning.

College Bound and Down

My step daughter had decided to become a professional student. She goes to school for a bit, then quits. Then a few months later she regrets having quit and signs up again. Then she find a reason to not go. Then she hears about a scholarship program or student loans and she goes again. I think she will be 30 before she ever actually finishes school.

My son is much more serious about getting a college education and we are in the process of evaluating the different colleges and universities to see where he would like to go. Of course, I would prefer an in state school to help save on tuition and take advantage of the scholarships available to residents through the lottery funded programs. But if he gets his heart set on an out of state school then I’m down with it and will find a way to get the money for him.

There’s a cool website that helps kids with their college applications. Here are their top tips:

  1. Proofread your applications for spelling and grammar
  2. Read the instructions carefully and all the way through before beginning
  3. Type the applications and write legibly
  4. Apply to several schools
  5. Don’t use a silly nickname in your email address – get a free email account using your first and last name to appear more serious and professional