Tag: politics
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Polar Extremes on NOVA – Behold the Reality of Higher Carbon Dioxide Levels
Thanks to Mike Sharp, one of the members of our Sunday School class this year (“Curiosity and Questions: Jesus and Science”), I learned about the new NOVA PBS Special, “Polar Extremes.” Here’s a 3 minute preview of the full episode I watched tonight, which runs just under 2 hours long. I watched it on AppleTV…
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Understanding the Puerto Rican Blackout: Bank Regulation, Bureaucratic Inefficiency and Leadership
This afternoon I watched the outstanding PBS Frontline documentary, “Blackout in Puerto Rico.” The program unwraps the story of why it took 7 months to restore electrical power to most of the island of Puerto Rico, following the devastation wrought by hurricane Maria in September 2017, and the complicated reasons why the infrastructure of the island had…
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Arab Spring and the 2018 Oklahoma Teacher Walkout
In this post, I’ll summarize a few key ideas I’ve been thinking about over in the past week as we’ve had the start of a populist uprising in our state reminiscent of other eras when activists have taken to the streets to change government, both here in the USA and in other countries. I pray…
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Pre-Reflections on the April 2018 Oklahoma Teacher Walkout
This past Friday evening, my wife Shelly (@sfryer) and I attended the last half of an evening town hall meeting at Wilson Elementary in Oklahoma City Public Schools (@okcps). Speakers included Representative Cyndi Munson (@CyndiMunson85), Senator Kay Floyd (@KayFloydOK), and Representative Jason Dunningham (@jdunnington). In this post, written on March 31, 2018, I’ll share some reflections…
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Bernie Sanders Explains Progressivism in the new Democratic Party
The United States under the leadership of President Donald Trump is politically headed in the wrong direction. Rather than confronting potentially overwhelming and devastating issues like costly health care, climate change, and corruption in federal elections, our nation is poised to make bad situations even worse with misguided policies. I am hopeful the inquiry of…
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Staying On Message in the Classroom After the Election
While Trump supporters celebrate the electoral outcome, many others are looking around and asking, “What just happened and why? What do we do now, and what do we say to our children?” In this post, I’ll explore how educators can “stay on message” in the classroom to both inspire and empower students to be informed,…
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Using 8 Bit Games and Humor to Present Serious Political Messages
The website and political game project “GOP Arcade” (@GOParcade) offers telling insights into not only the issues of the 2016 election in the United States, but also the ways media and gaming can be used to influence voters and communicate serious political messages. The site features 8 bit online games (that means they have very…
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A Transformed Political Culture in Oklahoma #transformOK #OklaEd
In Oklahoma, our elected officials need our support to pass legislation which will change our tax code and provide adequate funding not only for our public schools but also for a variety of important social services. Our legislative session is almost over, and legislators have not taken steps to address the budget shortfall for next year…
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In Oklahoma Education, We Have to Stop Pretending
Scott McLeod (@mcleod) has thrown down the gauntlet: What are five things we need to stop pretending about in education? We have to stop pretending… http://t.co/jhU5rnYkXl cc @gcouros @smartinez @wfryer @coolcatteacher @web20classroom #edchat #edtech #cpchat — Scott McLeod (@mcleod) April 13, 2015 Here’s my list. When it comes to education, we have to stop pretending… We…