No, not our current president, rather George Washington, president #1. I am reading a biography of his life at the moment and it is quite interesting.

One tidbit relates to his feeling that the success of the "American Experiment" would be dependent on the strength of the central government. At a time when other founding fathers were over cautious about any appearance of a strong central figure reminiscent of the English monarchy, Washington felt that without sufficient authority and power the union could not be held together. Of course this may have been based on his experience as General during the revolution and the challenges of obtaining resources, both people and supplies, to support the war in an effective manner.

to what I am unsure, but hopefully something big. As a triathlete and part-time bike commuter I'm in pretty good shape, but not great. Three years ago I completed an ironman and while it was not particularly fast, I was in the best shape of my life. Since then, i have been in steady decline.

My training partner from that ironman and I started back today towards some big goals today - we ran all of 3 miles, and pretty slow at that. I'll say more later, but we are headed towards a marathon, an ironman and finally a cross-country journey.

I ride to work tomorrow. I'll post my workout graph image so everyone can see my heart rate, altitude and speed ;-)

My state is either next to last or last in education and to add insult to injury we always seem to be at the center of the intelligent design\evolution contraversy. What is up with the religious zealots that can't accept that Evolution is scientific theory and intelligent design is based on faith.

Most religious people that I know can accept evolution as a theory without compromising their faith. The minority that cannot need to get on their bike and ride. If they don't want their children to learn about evolution then they need to get their kids out of public school and into a religious institution rather than forcing their faith on everyone else's children.

Ride on!

With 3 kids all under the age of 10, education is a Hot Topic for my wife and I. We have chosen public schools and we chose our current home in suburban Atlanta partially based on the quality of the public schools for our district. To date, both my wife and I have taken a very active role in our childrens' education by helping with homework and being involved in school activities and organizations. At this point we are very pleased with where our children are in their curriculum, their teachers and the school as a whole.

This morning, however, brought home to me once again the ever accelerating issue of people leaving our public school by either moving to another school district or choosing a private school. It seems that once this gets started that people begin to panic and the next thing you know the school in no way reflects the socio-economic status of the community that it serves.

This is a shame as I believe it helps everyone in the school if the entire community supports the public school. I cannot explain why people leave, but I have my thoughts - some I can sort of understand, some not at all:

• want a religious education - I respect the desire to provide a religious education, but I send my kids to school for math, literature, social studies, etc. which have little to do with religion. This could be provided at home and at the church of your choosing. I went to a Catholic school and was taught by nuns for 6 years. We didn't talk about God during math class, but we had chapel services frequently. Today, I am agnostic, but I know my multiplication tables just fine.
• poor education due to too many ESOL students - I understand how language problems could slow the class down, however, I believe there are two factors that make this point mute: 1) the mandated curriculum requirements for say the 2nd grade are the same for public schools as private schools (i.e. private schools don't require reading War and Peace by the end of first grade while public school kids are still working on the alphabet) and 2) the resources that public schools have available allow for separate assistance for kids with all sorts of needs. Yes, even public schools allow for smart kids to excel. I believe that this is a canard to avoid saying that they are uncomfortable with the "color" and socio-economic status of the students.
• better chance at getting into the best college - I don't even know where to begin on this one, but suffice to say that 1) there are a lot of great colleges out there and I'm not thinking Harvard quite yet and 2) getting into college is a function of grades, SAT scores and extra-curriculars all of which are just as possible at a public school and depend more on the childs' abilities and commitment than the funding source for the school.
• cultural issues - I can sort of understand how you would want your child surrounded by other kids of the same moral standing, but to assume that wealthy, white families offer that is funny to me. For high school, I attended a boarding school as a day student. I can tell you first hand that my class mates could afford and did spend much more on Robitussin cough medicine (no, they didn't have bronchitis), pot and cocaine than the public school across town. I'm not thrilled with the "hip hop" culture of baggy pants with underwear showing and foul language, but I'm not going to tell you one set of slackers is superior to another.
• safety - This one, if truly an issue, is one that makes the most sense to me. This is not an issue at our elementary school.
• smaller class sizes - this is a rare criticism mostly because it is not the case in our district.
• better teachers - this is also rare as I don't think it is the case in our district. There are good and not so good teachers at every school, public and private.

All I'm saying is if you really care about your child's education, first gain an understand of what the school (public or private) really has to offer and then get and stay involved with your student, with your teachers, with your community. The school will not fix your child for you. And last, there are problems with the public school system that desperately should be addressed, but that's for another post.

I missed U.S. History (must have been sleeping) in high school and had the luxury of avoiding it in college only to feel like a complete idiot when discussing politics and not being able to relate to an historical reference or analogy. So, as I try to catch up, I may as well share some tidbits along the way...

Did you know that New York was New Amsterdam prior to the English coming along and basically taking it over in a bloodless coup in the 1600s? The Dutch, maritime powers that they were in the 17th century (who knew?) were first to settle and colonize Manhattan. They staked claim to it after they had commissioned an english explorer, Hudson, to explore the region. Apparently, the Dutch settlers were so fed up with their leaders that they basically accepted the British seizure.