The state of Bogalusa schools

There've been a number of articles published recently in The Daily News detailing the trials and tribulations of our supposedly rotten school system. There are discipline problems, attendance problems, and low achievement.

Parents blame the teachers and the school board. Teachers blame the parents.

I've got to side more with the teachers here, folks. I'm old enough to remember the "good ol' days." Thirty years ago, there were not these huge problems in the schools that I went to, which I admit were more upper middle class than the ones in Bogalusa. So that may have skewed things.

One thing that has changed radically in the past few decades is the number of single-parent families. When one person is trying to do too many things, something is gonna suffer. We've seen the news items about how more juvenile thugs come from single-parent homes. We know that intuitively, eh?

Single-parent homes are also more likely to be poorer homes economically. Poor kids don't do as well in school as better-off kids, generally.

A recent article in The Daily News says the school board and city are going to try and place a "resource officer" at Bogalusa Middle - basically, a uniformed cop. Will that help? Does that help? Or does it simply mean quicker arrests?

If there are gangs, as school board member Raymond Mims claims, Know Gangs is one site with info. Gangs or Us is another. And here is a list of links courtesy of Michigan State University.

I suspect what Bogalusa Middle needs - more than a cop stationed at the school - is a couple more full-time counselors and after school programs with room for any child who wishes to participate.

Addendum: From the MSU site, and thanks to the internet archive - Developing a Gang Prevention Program.

Plumbing problem?

A student at Bogalusa Middle told us there was a busted pipe or some such on Monday (1/29) which flooded floors.

R.I.P., Barbaro

Euthanized today.

Latest spam

Introducing the morons who've filled my inbox:

• PaulRubeal - with the busted spacebar.
• Dan Molinaro, who says he's from Bismarck, North Dakota.
• Ethan Wayne
• Saunders Triplett
• Perry Mertens
• ned aleta - of the broken shift key
• Kathrine Haney
• Raymundo Titor
• Vito Peel - sounds like a blender. "Ladies and gentleman, I'm here to demonstrate the amazing Vito Peel. It chops, it dices!"

I also get a bunch of messages from "Free Hoodia," could be a rallying cry. Free Hoodia! "Jose Hoodia is still being held as a political prisoner in this humid tropical dictatorship..."

My favorite subject lines are the ones that promise to help me with my "tonnage." Hey, since when is an extra 15 pounds "tonnage"? Ya catch more flies with honey...

The good ol' days

Seen in the comments at Blackfive:

Take Me Back to the Sixties.

Turn on your speakers and enjoy.

Barbaro has another setback :-(

He's in trouble again:

After Barbaro developed a deep abscess in his right hind foot, surgery was performed Saturday to insert two steel pins in a bone, one that was shattered but now healthy, to eliminate all weight bearing on the ailing foot.

The procedure is a risky one, because it transfers more weight to the leg. If the bone were to break again, chief surgeon Dr. Dean Richardson said: "I think we'll quit."

Hang in there, fella.

PS - The article has good background, if you haven't been reading the Barbaro news.

Slothful Sunday

As you might guess, today's Slothful Sunday wasn't as relaxing as I might wish, heh. There was nothing I could leave undone today.

But I've been getting in a little relaxation by watching movies, yesterday and today.

Darling Daughter and I had a Harry Potter festival. I'd never seen any of the Harry Potter films, and she's got the complete set.

My verdict is: very entertaining. And the set decorators must've had a blast. Wonder if there's someplace I can buy a set of those spine candles?

Justice at last

Good news [emphasis mine]:

A white former sheriff’s deputy who was once thought to be dead was arrested on federal charges Wednesday in one of the last major unsolved crimes of the civil rights era — the 1964 killings of two black men who were beaten and dumped alive into the Mississippi River.

The break in the 43-year-old case was largely the result of the dogged efforts of the older brother of one of the victims, who vowed to bring the killers to justice.

James Ford Seale, a 71-year-old reputed Ku Klux Klansman from the town of Roxie, was charged with kidnapping hitchhikers Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee, both 19. He is expected to be arraigned on Thursday in Jackson.

Maybe there will be more word soon on Oneal Moore's murder, too:

The crime occurred around 10 p.m. in Varnado, a village on the outskirts of Bogalusa. Rogers and his partner, the first two black sheriffs deputies in Washington Parish, noticed they were being trailed by a pickup truck with a Confederate flag emblem on its front bumper. When they crossed some railroad tracks on the way to Moore's home nearby, they were fired upon. Moore was killed instantly, and Rogers lost an eye in the shooting.

One hour later, Mississippi authorities stopped Ernest Ray McElveen in nearby Tylertown. He was driving a truck that matched Rogers' description, and authorities said he was armed with a .45 caliber pistol and a .22 caliber pistol. But two weeks later, the local district attorney released McElveen, and nobody was ever tried in connection with the shooting. Attempts to reach McElveen, who lives in Bogalusa, were unsuccessful by presstime. [...]
In a 1998 interview with Gambit Weekly ("The Last Klan Case," Dec. 15, 1998), Rogers said he hasn't forgotten the night of the attack. "The older I get, the more it gets to me," he said.

There were three original suspects. McElveen has died. If he was guilty, presumably he's down in that hot place. As for the other two, there are a couple of the worst murderers living among us. Could be my neighbors. Or yours.

Turn 'em in, people. Closing ranks around this kinda scum is inexcusable.

Open note to Creed Rogers: Keep after the FBI, sir. I wanna see the perps fry.

School arrests

There may have been students with weapons as I was told by a student on Monday.

The Daily News has the info:

The day of in-school disturbances began Monday at Bogalusa Middle when a fight broke out and school officials called in police.

The early morning incident happened at about 8:30 a.m. and involved three youngsters, all of whom were sent to a regional juvenile detention facility, Darden said, following a written order by Juvenile Court Judge Bobby Black.

At about 11:30 a.m., another fight broke out at the middle school. This fight led to the arrest of seven students.

"Retreat isn't an option"

Liz Cheney gets it:

We are at war. America faces an existential threat. This is not, as Speaker Nancy Pelosi has claimed, a "situation to be solved." It would be nice if we could wake up tomorrow and say, as Sen. Barack Obama suggested at a Jan. 11 hearing, "Enough is enough." Wishing doesn't make it so.

Go ye and read it all, for it is good.