Many teachers and union representatives became upset when I would first advise giving up tenure. It was necessary to explain or suffer a fate worse than death. Remember, my wife is a retired teacher.

Their understanding of what tenure used to be, and should continue to be, was incomplete. It was necessary to give them a bit of a history lesson.

Tenure was a medieval concept. No, that doesn’t mean it’s bad or too old. It addressed a serious concern that came about  with the founding of the first universities.

The idea of the university was somewhat revolutionary. The Middle Ages were a time of social, political and intellectual ferment. New ideas were coming hard and fast. That didn’t please everyone. Neither did the ideas themselves.

Given the authoritarian nature of society at that time, it would not be surprising to see many, perhaps most, new ideas squashed. The authorities had some famous successes in delaying the spread of knowledge. Had they not been subject to some limitations, we would not have had the various renaissances or Tox, quihe Reformation.

Just think; if you get upset on the way to work, behind someone making you late, how would you feel stuck looking at the rump of an ox all day? Had those authorities not been subject to some limitations, the odds are I would not be writing this, even with a quill, and you would not be reading it. Illiteracy was the norm.

Tenure was created to protect the positions of professors so that they could acquaint their students with the torrent of new ideas without fearing the loss of those positions. Once a professor had proven his competency in the subjects he taught, he needed protection from the powers that be.

Secondary and elementary school teachers rarely get in trouble for teaching unpopular ideas. Our system is set up to have the teachers cover an approved curriculum, using approved textbooks and materials. While it is obvious that teachers need protection from the dodos in charge and those parents with their own limitations and a few axes to grind, tenure is not the way.

Tenure, being even less understood by those politicians and parents, is seen primarily as a sledgehammer, a weapon with which the teachers can be knocked about. Hanging on to the word tenure, sans its real meaning, merely means that the teachers and their unions are providing their nemeses a gift-wrapped weapon.

In the past, my alternative was for teachers to accept what all other government employees have: civil service protections. It offers similar protections to their present application of tenure.

Government workers, in general, need to be sheltered from the whims and relatives of politicians and their friends. Seeing the shenanigans (From the Gaelic sionnachuighim “I play the fox.” My concession to St. Patrick’s Day) of the governors of Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Florida and others, I fear for the future of any protections for any workers.

Competition

Competition is another concept that is misapplied, if not misconstrued.

Our years of school almost always turn on competition. That’s the sole reason for grades, both numerical and alphabetical. The object should be to determine whether a student has mastered the subject matter, not whether one qualifies for an honor society and a bumper sticker on mommy’s SUV.

Sports merely add additional layers of competition. We can’t even seem to have team sports without ‘stars.’ Throughout our years of education, the emphasis is basically on competition.

Once you go out into the real world, you are usually expected to cooperate with your peers so that the firm can compete. But, your day is primarily supposed to revolve around cooperation, not competition. The problem is that you haven’t been taught to cooperate; nor have you been given the opportunity to practice it.

In a larger sense we should be cooperating on a national level in order to be competitive internationally. We compete to our own detriment. The Japanese, Chinese, Koreans and others have realized the value of cooperation and coordination. The Chinese have now passed us in manufacturing. Isn’t that nice?

One idea for correcting this might be dividing classes into teams. Mix the fast learners with the slower ones. Let the faster ones help the others. Trying to explain something to someone else makes ones own learning sink in more and quicker. The students on which teacher now need to focus, the fast and the slow, would both benefit, while taking some of the burden off of teachers, allowing them to concentrate more on the average students.

Such a plan would also give the faster students a sense of connection to others, a sense of commitment to others and an opportunity to develop leadership skills. A measure of competition could be maintained between the class teams. This would provide more balance and be of greater benefit to both individuals and the society as a whole.

An Example Of What Our Educational System Faces

Perhaps you heard about the 11-year old girl in Cleveland, Texas that was gang-raped by 18 teenage boys. Apparently, she reported it.

Cleveland had 7,605 residents in the 2,000 census. It seems that most of those people are really concerned. They are concerned for how it will affect the lives of those 18 boys. If convicted, they will be treated as sex offenders for the rest of their lives. Oh, horrors. It will ruin the lives of the rapists.

They have an excuse. She was, they say, dressed as a 21-year old prostitute. I never realized it was okay for 18 boys to gang-rape a 21-year old prostitute. Then again, I’m just an old fogey.

The New York Times received some justly deserved criticism for covering the story with a piece that seemed to mirror the community’s concern for the malefactors, rather than the victim.

To the rescue – enter Kathleen Passidomo. Ms. Passidomo is a Florida State Representative. She immediately focused on the crux of the problem. She has the solution. She wants a law providing for schools to determine acceptable fashions for 11-year old girls.

I was just thinking how well covering women from head to toe worked out in Afghanistan under the Taliban. We shouldn’t judge the Taliban harshly just because their policy lowered the position of females in their society and made them subject to rape, murder and other insults more frequently. It’s the moral (not religious) standards of the males that needs to be corrected but I’m putting my money into Burqa futures.

Whatever the problem, turn it over to the teachers. We don’t want them teaching anyway. It’s possible they may teach science or some other sacrilegious subjects. School bus duty, cafeteria duty, formal lesson planning, discipline, sponsoring clubs, coaching sports and now being fashionistas cannot be shorted for anything as superfluous and unnecessary as teaching.

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I am going on a little trip. This coming Saturday I will be off on the first leg – to North Carolina. I depart from New York on Sunday.

It has been some time since I last visited Scotland; 1971, in fact. I lucked out and left the States the day after Nixon allowed the Dollar to float. No one had any idea how much it was worth relative to any other currency. It was a time ripe for ripoffs.

I exchanged some pocket money at Kennedy Airport prior to departure – a ripoff. Luckily, the Royal Bank of Scotland had a branch in the airport at Prestwick. It turned out to be about the best rate available anywhere. Later, we learned that the biggest gougers were the American hotels in London.

With both Crawford and Harris being Scottish names, it should be no surprise that my genealogy points in that direction. Other family names include Fraser (from around Loch Ness), McJunkin (Scot-Irish) and Morgan (Welsh, but also Gaelic).

The most success in tracing our genealogy has come with the Frasers. In that part of our family was a U.S. Representative, his father, a Governor and Senator. Further back, Simon Fraser, chief adjutant to William Wallace, he of Braveheart fame was found to be in our family.

I will be visiting Sterling, site of the famous Wallace victory of Sterling Bridge. Braveheart was a wonderful movie but atrocious history. Its Battle of Sterling Bridge was filmed in Ireland, with no bridges anywhere in the vicinity. I will also visit Culloden Battlefield, site of a horrific defeat for the forces of the Jacobite Rising of 1745. It was the last battle fought on British soil.

It is also where we got the phrase ‘beyond the pale.’ Pale means white or light-colored. It came to be used as referring to a paling fence. Then such a fence became a pale, meaning a safe enclosed area. Being ‘beyond the pale’ was to be in a bad situation. There was a pale at Culloden.

Our Harris family is a sept, or sub-clan, under the Clan McLeod. There is an Isle of Harris. You may have heard of Harris Tweed, sometimes called iron cloth. The name is protected by the British Crown.

The lead picture is of the rear of the Castle Dunvegan, home of the head of the clan. It has been the home of that family for over 800 years. That makes it the residence continuously occupied for the longest period of any in the world. Immediately above is a picture of its entrance.

While the interiors for the recent movie, Maid of Honor, were filmed at Dunvegan, the exteriors were of a nearby castle, Eilean Donan. It is the most photographed castle in Scotland.

Much of the staff of the Castle Dunvegan was used as extras in the movie.

I will be taking a netbook, a laptop, a video camera and a still camera. If I have a few down moments, I may try to post a few pictures and a minimal travelogue. Don’t count on it though. I hope to spend my time enjoying what likely will be my last visit there.

My hope is that it won’t be the last. While there I will be contacting literary agents and booking agents. It would be great if I am able to put together a book tour. That might pay for a return and a 2-3 month tour of Europe. Wouldn’t that be nice?

My wife refuses to fly. But, she says, she is concerned that I might enjoy myself so much that I would decide to remain over there. No, it wouldn’t be for the universal healthcare. After all, I am on Medicare.

More likely it would be due to the beauty of the country, the sense of history, and the chance to get away from the birthers, the deathers and the teabaggers.

Don’t begin celebrating prematurely. I’ll be back.

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