At Change.org, there is an honest look into "The Myth of Public Education" by Megan Greenwell:

"But that notion of public universities increasingly belies a less-attractive truth: many public colleges are too expensive for even middle-class students, and they're not providing enough financial aid. A study out this month from advocacy group The Education Trust underscores the growing problem: rising tuition and changing priorities for financial aid have priced many poor students out of their states' flagship public universities. As Kati Haycock, president of The Education Trust, wrote in the report, 'No longer widely accessible, their treasure is bestowed disproportionately on the children of America's economic and political elites.'"

 At the same site, there is also an article about America's drop-out epidemic. Marian Wright Edelman says:

"One-size-fits-all school zero tolerance disciplinary policies are responsible for the growth in the number of school-based arrests of poor and minority children, funneling them into the juvenile and criminal justice systems at younger and younger ages. So many are suspended, expelled, even arrested, for nonviolent infractions such as being 'disruptive' or 'disrespectful.' In the past, many of these problems would have been resolved in the principal's office or referred to a pastor or social worker or by calling the parent (who may no longer be in the house). Too many children today end up with an arrest record and are labeled a troublemaker, increasing the likelihood of dropping out of school."

No surprise that some professors and scientists routinely say that kids in India and China will take over America in the next decade. Next week we will look into Indian and Chinese education systems and why so many foreign students want to attend U.S. universities.

Bhumika Ghimire

Bhumika Ghimire

When I was 13 years old, I'd decided that if Pat Benatar was right and love really was a battlefield, then I'd be proud to fight for the grandeur of romance, show off all of my scars, and maybe lose a few emotional appendages, too.

By the time I was 16 years old and my father revealed that he'd had two children out of wedlock, and that he and my mom were considering divorce, the idealism of happily ever afters had sunken in so deeply that it wouldn't bleed out of me, no matter how many times my heart broke.

And so it's been, despite  the unhealthy dysfunction of my parents' rollercoaster marriage, and my own many strange and twisted experiments with sex, love, and fidelity: I have always held on to the ideas that love is one of the most beautiful things anyone can know, and that the hope of an enduring, loving, and fully supportive marriage is an ideal worth fighting for.

Even though my American peers and I all know about single-parent households, divorce, remarriage, and blended families, there is a legitimacy behind it all, a logic telling us that what matters is not how a family is made, but the definite love and respect between a family's members. We carry this knowledge like a badge of superiority, an assured and assumably accurate claiming of life experience and maturity. Sure, bad things happen; sure, marriages end and parents divorce; sure, many teenagers navigate the quicksands of dating and relationships at the same time that their parents re-enter those same assailing conditions, but that's life. We act out, we drink too much and do drugs, we go to therapy, we become promiscuous, we cry on our friends' shoulders, and then, eventually, we trudge on with the business of growing up and getting over it all. Throughout these battles, our reverence for love and marriage remain intact.

Apparently, it's a different love story in the Philippines.

There is no divorce in the Philippines, no empathy for unwed mothers or their bastard children, no faith in the loyalty of men, and no hope in happily ever afters. A hard crust of distrust coats the layers of bitterness which enshroud the Filipino's romantic experience, and try as they might to shake off the negativity, "common sense" and experience have taught their lessons well: the only happily ever afters are the ones that exist after you've contorted your romantic ideals into an unrecognizable blob of compromise and resignation.

Women are expected to fulfill their supportive and nurturing role of "girlfriend" or "wife" regardless of their partner's loyalty or lack thereof; cheating and adultery among men is not only accepted, but expected. When a woman cheats, she's a slut or a whore or a lunatic. But when power-wielding men do it, when down-and-out men do it, when young men do it, and when old men do it, the common reaction is "But of course!" Either they do it to show off their power, or to show that they still have some kind of power, or because they have the power of youth, or because they're losing the power of youth. One thing is clear: love in the Philippines is an epic power struggle, and women are not the only ones losing.

Children grow out of these relationships feeling awkward and uncertain about their worthiness of love and their claim on a legitimately successful life. They question the value of romantic relationships and doubt their own ability at finding everlasting love. They half-believe what the culture dictates: that they are somehow less desirable as human beings because their parents do not have a storybook romance and marriage. It is in this climate of hostility that far-fetched notions of acceptable loves are brewed and the significance of the institution of marriage is devalued.

Because there is no divorce in the Philippines, and also because women who have children out of wedlock sentence themselves and their offspring to eternal criticism and condemnation, there is a pervading sense that the solution to the mistakes of romance is not to learn from it all, grow, and move on, but to get married and stay married. And even though some teenagers are lucky to have a teacher deplore this ill-advised measure, the idea of marriage as panacea has sunken deeply into the core of Filipino culture. Shame on you for having sex before marriage. Shame on you for having children before being wed. Shame on you for being born out of wedlock. Shame on you for separating with your spouse and shacking up with someone else. In a country whose culture dictates that everyone know everything about each other and that they all wield the power of judgment, shame is powerful. For these reasons, marriage becomes a last-chance or last-ditch-effort at keeping one's life together and not a lasting tribute to love.

Maria Elizabeth Rubio

It is not all about money, folks. When it comes to international disaster relief, yes, money is the big thing, but it is not the only thing. If you cannot send money, then please spread the word around among your friends, family, and co-workers; maybe someone will be able to. Right now aid agencies are saying that they are not looking for money more than relief materials from the public.

I have decided to donate my one-week online earnings to Save the Children for their work in Haiti. You know during times like this, it is the children, women, and people with disabilities who suffer the most. As a mother, I was drawn toward children.

Here is a list of organizations now accepting online financial donations:

Save the Children

 Yéle Haiti

SMS text “HAITI” to 90999 to donate $10 to Red Cross relief efforts 

You can also visit Google's Haiti crises page for more. And here is part of a  press release I received from Tampa, Florida, just to show that every bit helps:

Spinelli, president of the Association to Conserve Tampa Water, and Aquafree Toothbrush will be joined with Kalos International and the Haitian Association Foundation of Tampa in a major press conference today with emergency officials announcing local efforts by Tampa residents to assist in the earthquake that caused a major disaster in Haiti. The press conference will take place today, Thursday, January 14th at 12:00 p.m., Hillsborough County-John F. Germany Library, 900 North Ashley Drive  in Tampa. The city of Tampa recently went through a water shortage, which is happening in Haiti right now. Over 100,000 water-less Aquafree toothbrushes invented by a local resident will be handed out to children and families in Haiti.

Bhumika Ghimire

Yesterday marked the "Ninth Annual No Pants Subway Ride," wherein thousands of exhibitionist New Yorkers got down to their skivvies and boarded the subway. For what, you ask? Well to get a date, silly.

"It's a place to meet people that's not your traditional bar scene," said Brady Kirchberg, 26, who was taking part in his third no-pants ride. At least we singletons now have another option beyond eight-minute dating and online dating. It sorta eliminates a lot of awkward moments later on, no? Though I should note that the temperature hovered at about 20 degrees yesterday, so you'd have to take that into account.

As you'd expect, most New Yorkers were fairly blasé about the whole thing. Gintas Norvila said, "It's the first time I've seen it. It looks very interesting," and went back to reading Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground.

Here's a clip from last year's No Pants Ride.

Jacquelin Cangro

According to Reporters Without Borders

"Arrested in December 2008, Liu spent nearly a year in prison before being formally charged with subversion on 12 December. His trial on 23 December was accompanied by a high degree of police surveillance. Dozens of foreign journalists, foreign diplomats and Liu supporters were kept away from the courthouse. Liu’s wife, who had wanted to attend, was prevented from leaving her home.

This is not the first time that the Christmas period has proved to be particularly dangerous for Chinese human rights activists."

 

Jonathan Fryer, a freelance writer who writes for the BBC and The Guardian, has also commented about Xiaobo's sentence in his blog. He calls the whole episode shameful.

"Shameless governments have a habit of doing nasty things over Christmas, when they hope most of the world’s journalists aren’t looking — or are on holiday. Think the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Israel’s Operation Cast Lead and now China’s disgraceful sentencing of the dissident writer Liu Xiaobo to 11 years in prison for his political and human rights activities. Perhaps best known abroad as the founder of Charter 08, the Chinese group calling for constitutional reform, Mr Liu has been a sturdy champion of fundamental rights since he took part in the quashed 1989 pro-democracy movement. His jailing, for an unusually long time, is a moral outrage which should be protested most strongly by all decent politicians and NGOs around the world."

Here is Xiaobo, speaking to the PEN American Center about free press and freedom of speech. This video is at YouTube.

With all China has achieved in last decade, it is really shameful that they chose to end it by sentencing for eleven years a man whose only mistake was advocating for freedom. China has successfully integrated capitalism into its communist structure; how long will take for the country to embrace and integrate democratic values too?

Bhumika Ghimire

Lara Gabrielle Blanco Heintz

New Yorkers have very specific fears that don’t necessarily translate to other parts of the country. But for some people, the paranoia gets the better of them. Just a few days ago, a man who’d had it with roaches decided to exact his revenge by spraying the hell out of them with extra-strength Raid. In fact, he sprayed so much of the stuff in his tiny apartment that one lit match ignited it, blowing out the front windows and charring more than 80 percent of his place. At least the roaches are gone.

But New Yorkers’ fears aren’t limited to the vermin/rodent category. Here are some other things that freak us out (in no particular order): getting run over by a bike messenger; a transit strike; a black-out during a heat wave; George Steinbrenner; falling debris from high-rise construction work; the mysterious steam that comes out of those orange cylinders in the middle of the street; and, oh yeah, Al Qaeda.

A very pregnant friend tells me that she hyperventilates at the thought of going into labor on the subway. She has reason to be worried. She knows the story of Francine and baby Soleil. Francine, pregnant with her first child, starts feeling a little uncomfortable, so the doctor tells her to come to the hospital to be examined. Without enough money for car service, presumably, or thinking she has all the time in the world, she hops on the F train with her husband, Max.

By the time they get to the East Broadway stop, Francine is feeling much worse. Max tells the conductor who radios ahead for an ambulance. He ushers Francine, who is by now having serious contractions, onto the platform, and the train leaves the station. Then New Yorkers, who love to be in the middle of everything, spring into action. They lay Francine on the platform (blech!) – a man offers his briefcase as a pillow, a woman holds her hand, several people give their clothing to the cause, another man runs to the street level to guide the EMTs and, as luck would have it, a nurse steps off an arriving train and lends a hand. In fact, Wendy Brown, a woman from the Bronx who offered moral support, noted at least four trains came into the station and some people from every one stopped to help. When baby Soleil makes her appearance, all the passersby applaud and jump on the next arriving train.

What a welcome to the world! 

Jacquelin Cangro