“Give me liberty or give me death” was a battle cry that many people will remember hearing, but few will recall the statesman who said it. Even fewer will know what it meant. These seven words concluded a speech given by Patrick Henry on March 23, 1775; a speech that...
Our neighbours to the south celebrate a national holiday on Monday, January 20. It is a day to remember and honour Martin Luther King Jr., the United States’ most famous civil-rights leader, and, arguably, the world’s most influential social activist. For those who...
Free speech is under siege on many university campuses, including right here in Canada. Professors, administrators, and students are “deplatforming” invited guests or disrupting and disparaging their fellow academics who fail to toe the politically correct party...
Spring has finally arrived on campus, and graduation exercises are in full swing. It is a wonderful time with students dressed in black caps and gowns and their parents dressed in formal attire. Everyone is smiling as the graduates mount the stage to receive their...
It’s a well-known pattern in public policy – profligate politicians damaging their economies with out-of-control spending, massive borrowing and higher taxes – inevitably leading to fiscal crisis, sharp declines in growth and ultimately rapidly falling currency value...
Mass hysteria is the spontaneous manifestation of a particular behaviour by many people. There are numerous historical examples: Middle Age nuns at a convent in France spontaneously began to meow like cats; at another convent, nuns began biting one another. In...
Better to reform its use than abolish it.
During spring break, the last thing many students and their parents probably want to think about is homework. However, it is a relevant topic because there is an ongoing debate in educational circles about the value of homework.
Even though homework opponents have claimed that homework is a poor use of students’ time and should be abolished, the reality is that there are solid reasons for making it a key part of the learning process.
The primary goals of teachers’ unions are different from, and often incompatible with, those of effective schools.
Most children who went to residential school learned to read, write and calculate. Many children also learned other modern skills — the principles of democracy and common law, for example — which would help them participate more fully in both aboriginal and Canadian society. Given this context, were aboriginal residential schools the unmitigated disasters that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission will, without a doubt, hear them described as? Probably not.
Recent reports written by Arthur Levine, the former president of Teachers College Columbia University in New York City, called into question the quality of most graduate programs for school teachers and administrators in the United States. While the situation does not appear to be as bleak in Manitoba, there are signs that the University of Manitoba is making some of the same mistakes outlined in the Levine report.
PowerPoint from Breakfast on the Frontier with University of Manitoba Professor Rodney Clifton, September 12, 2007.
The presidents of Manitoba’s colleges and universities want more money. But how wisely are they spending what they already have?
CJOB Radio