C’EST BON This will never get old. The Recording Academy began handing out a Grammy Award for best Cajun/zydeco record just a few years ago, and, as expected, the category has been dominated by local artists, as it should be. The latest nominees — Chubby Carrier, Feufollet, D.L. Menard, The Pine Leaf Boys and Cedric Watson — represent a mix of old and young, traditional and contemporary, black and white. Establishing the category was long overdue — Louisiana indigenous artists used to compete in the folk category against polka bands and such — but we’re glad to have it and proud that Acadiana talent routinely dominates the category. (New Orleans has a ton of Cajun/zydeco bands and California has its fair share, too.) It just feels right that someone who lives west of the Atchafalaya Basin, east of the Sabine Pass and south of Alexandria walks away with the gold-gilded gramophone. To the nominees: Good luck and Godspeed.
PAS BON The state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education last week voted to establish a grade system for public schools. It’s a worthy effort to help parents gain a better understanding of how their children’s schools are performing since the A-F system, similar to a student report card, is more familiar than the school performance scores used heretofore. But applying that grade system to Lafayette Parish schools, we get a stark reminder of just how far we have to go as a parish to ensure our future prosperity. Only one school in the parish — N.P. Moss Middle, earns an F, but 15 earn a D. That’s 16 of the parish’s 39 public schools, or 41 percent, performing below average. Three of the five high schools in the parish — Acadiana, Carencro and Northside — earn a D; Comeaux High merits and C and Lafayette High a B. On the bright side, six schools scored an A, but as expected, the distribution of our below-average public schools mirrors demographics in the parish, with inner city and rural, north/west schools performing poorer than those on the south and east of the parish.
COUILLON Speaking of BESE, Dale Bayard, the District 7 (southwest Louisiana, including Lafayette) rep on the board, is immune to reason, impervious to science and susceptible to charlatans. Bayard proved his couillon mettle last week when he not once but twice voted against proposed science textbooks for Louisiana public high schools, buying hook, line and sinker Louisiana Family Forum’s spurious argument that the books — mainstream, peer-reviewed, up-to-date, standard curricula — treat Darwin’s theory of natural selection and the science of evolution that springs from it as matter-of-factly true. LFF wants Intelligent Design — the pseudo-science concocted by creationists to do an end run around the Constitution — taught alongside evolution, and Bayard did their bidding; he was the lone naysayer to vote against the books in committee on Tuesday and one of just two on the full board to vote against them on Thursday. Fortunately for our children — and thanks to a vocal cadre of professors, high school biology teachers, students and even pastors — reason prevailed. Give ’em hell, er, heaven, Dale!
... written by i notice , December 15, 2010 - 08:14 am
He is probably the poster child for his church!!
... written by Gman , December 15, 2010 - 12:44 pm
It dont find that proponants of either side of the issue have a monopoly on misinformation or closed mindedness. As is usually the case, there is enough to go around. I have not seen the book and therefore am not qualified to pass judgement on it. I woould venture a guess that not many others have either. I would hope Mr Bayard has looked at it, and it sounds like the auther of this piece has. If I am mistaken in either case, please inform me. But dosent it make sense that only those who have read it would know if the authors present Darwinian theory as scientific fact or not? Which, according to this piece, was the reason Mr. Bayard objected. But then if it does present Darwinian ideas as fact, how credible is it as a science book since Darwin's ideas, and especially evolutionary theory that proceeds from it, cannot be verified using the scientific method? Remember, it is a theory, and therefore should be presented as such.
... written by NORTHSIDIAN SHOTGUN , December 15, 2010 - 04:04 pm
I wonder, if that is brought on somewhat by the fact that the kids with the poor grade point average's are taught by example that one can coast through life and the government will give them a free ride.
... written by Gary McGoffin , December 17, 2010 - 09:55 am
41% of our schools are rated a D or F. 30% of our high school students do not graduate. We're all Couillons if we don't stand up as a community and demand better.
... written by Jason D. Faulk , December 20, 2010 - 04:49 pm
Gary, What are your thoughts on the following: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U
Are we just doing business as usual with our education and still achieving the same bad results, chasing a ghost with No Child Left Behind? Seems to me that standardization is a one-trick pony, when our youth are more diverse. Is there a better system of evaluation that could be put into practice, rather than chasing the test scores, to authentically lead to a change of curriculum and methods that could get these peformance rates up?
... written by PomegranateRed , December 20, 2010 - 06:30 pm
It's disgusting to me that Bayard-or anyone- would try to gets books into our schools that teach intelligent design. In this day and age, really? As far as we've come with science, and THAT is how they want to try and educate our students? Ridiculous.
... written by dimmesdale , December 27, 2010 - 03:31 pm
Hey GMAN,
Your idea of theory: an idea that isn't certain.
A real-life scientist's idea of theory: an explanation of reality that has been thoroughly tested so that most scientists agree on it.
Get a clue.
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