Tests & School

[USANick7]

Originally Posted by Sigaba

An educational psychologist at USC's School of Education has offered a competing definition of education. He defined an education as a set of tools and skills that empower a student to reach goals that the student sets for himself. To me, this definition establishes a distinct difference between education and indoctrination.

My own experiences have led me to conclude that the educational system is tilted too far towards indoctrination. Educators, especially in the humanities and social sciences, already have an incredible opportunity to privilege their views over those of their students through the selection of course materials. Educators should (dare I say 'must'?) do a better job at letting students make up their own minds. While I do think a certain degree of indoctrination is needed to establish ground rules and expectations given the limited length of an academic term, it is simply not an educator's prerogative to attempt to rewrite the values of his or her students.

My own preference would be for young people to be taught the critical thinking skills and communication skills they need to evaluate rigorously the utility all information they encounter in regards how that information helps them meet their goals. I have less of a problem with a person who has read widely and thought deeply and disagrees with me than an indoctrinated person who may appear to share the same core beliefs.

Any information that has lasting merit will survive intense scrutiny; information that does not have merit will not. Faith in God endures because the faithful scrutinize and wrestle with their beliefs on a daily basis, not because they're indoctrinated. I am confident that such an approach will result in a citizenry that won't agree on every issue but, at least, would be able to give Senator Obama what he's thus far avoided: a thorough vetting.

This is very insightful...

I would like to discuss this a little bit more if your game, but I want to properly define what I understand as "indoctrination" first, so I know we are on the same sheet.

I look at "indoctrination" like I do "prescription" or "prescriptivism". Essentially telling someone what to believe. Or prescribing one system or belief over another.

Would you agree with that definition, or would you say that indoctrination is more malicious, in that it accepts the willful misleading, or manipulation of facts in order to attain its goals?

Thanks...

By the way, the reason I ask, is because I do see a place for prescriptivism in education along with critical thinking.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Sigaba

An educational psychologist at USC's School of Education has offered a competing definition of education. He defined an education as a set of tools and skills that empower a student to reach goals that the student sets for himself. To me, this definition establishes a distinct difference between education and indoctrination.

My own experiences have led me to conclude that the educational system is tilted too far towards indoctrination. Educators, especially in the humanities and social sciences, already have an incredible opportunity to privilege their views over those of their students through the selection of course materials. Educators should (dare I say 'must'?) do a better job at letting students make up their own minds. While I do think a certain degree of indoctrination is needed to establish ground rules and expectations given the limited length of an academic term, it is simply not an educator's prerogative to attempt to rewrite the values of his or her students.

My own preference would be for young people to be taught the critical thinking skills and communication skills they need to evaluate rigorously the utility all information they encounter in regards how that information helps them meet their goals. I have less of a problem with a person who has read widely and thought deeply and disagrees with me than an indoctrinated person who may appear to share the same core beliefs.

Any information that has lasting merit will survive intense scrutiny; information that does not have merit will not. Faith in God endures because the faithful scrutinize and wrestle with their beliefs on a daily basis, not because they're indoctrinated. I am confident that such an approach will result in a citizenry that won't agree on every issue but, at least, would be able to give Senator Obama what he's thus far avoided: a thorough vetting.

You've hit upon a number of points which would make a good thread unto itself and, maybe, should be so. As a high school principal for some 13 years, let me hit just a couple of points which could be expanded under a dedicated thread to this topic.

• There are as many types of schools in this country as there are shoes...and parents should find the type of school that "fits" their family/child.
  
• Any major urban area will have a broad offering of public, private, and parochial schools. This is also becoming a trend in smaller communities, and remember, there is always the 'home school' option...which many do here in Texas. For the most rural areas, there are also 'distance learning' options where a student can attend high school in an interactive virtual classroom on-line through a university; Texas Tech and the University of Texas offer such programs here in Texas, as does the University of Nebraska.
  
• "Core Curriculum" programs--which are mostly found in so-called 'inner city' environments--offer more of the type program defined by your professor.
  
• Public and most traditional parochial (e.g., Catholic) schools offer very broad curriculums designed for a wide range of student needs and abilities.
  
• Large numbers of private and more non-traditional parochial schools offer a more selective and challenging curriculum; such schools also usually require selective admission testing and application.
  
• Any 'good' school today, high schools especially, do offer a challenging variety of choices in meeting curriculum objectives...much like good colleges...and do seek to teach their students 'how' to think as opposed to 'what' to think.
  
• IMO, the national push to 'quantify' one's education through 'standardized' testing (as pushed by NCLB) is an educational disaster and is contrary to what scientific brain research has shown over the last two decades. In Texas, for example, students in kindergarten must take and pass a standardized skills test to enter 1st grade...which is wholly developmentally inappropriate practice. Texas has the TAKS (Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills) at specified grade levels, and public schools spend a lot of time teaching students to specifically take that one test vice just teaching them to think and process.
• A good book on this subject and college is titled "The Big Lie," the history of the SAT, which tested what was being taught in East Coast prep schools to keep 'westerners' out of the Ivy League and the resultant ACT to counter it. However, neither has proven to be a true indicator of how a student will perform in college.
  
• Another problem with schools today is the national obsession with 'ranking' our schools. One of the worst offenders is the US News national ranking of high schools--which most private college-prep schools refuse to participate in. And how do they determine the ranking? They take the total number of AP classes being taken by the school's entire student body and divide that by the number of seniors in the school. Yep...and the stats are provided by the schools themselves...and have nothing to do with how well the students perform on their AP exams, how many students begin AP classes and then drop them, etc. Can you see a problem here?
  
• The 'business' of educational assistive resources--as well as lobbying--has become HUGE and perpetuates the false idea that all it takes is $$$ vice 'teaching' to 'fix' our educational system...which, based on my experiences and in my opinion, is not nearly as broken as the MSM seeks to make us believe.

I could go on...and probably will if we get this thread started. Bottom line--this is America and America, as it always has, offers choice and opportunity, not guarantees.

FWIW, I, my wife, and my 3 sons are all products of a public school education because we believe in it and always sought to live where there were very good public schools...something we took seriously as being a part of our parental responsibility towards our childern.

Richard's $.025

[Pete]

When I went to school each student was required to pass each course at each grade level to be promoted.

I think somewhere in the 80's "some" schools shifted to social promotions and dumbing down the passing grades to move others along. It then became the norm in some areas. The result was grads who could not fill out a job application, make change etc.

The "standardized test" was put in place to insure that everybody was at least at a certain level before being passed to the next grade. Now we have teachers carping that they have no time to teach because they are "teaching to the test".

If the tests do not relect what the tearchers are teaching there is a big problem. Is it the teachers or the test? As the one who saw first hand for the last four years the interaction of students, teachers and higher staff in a high school my vote is on 80% of the teachers.

I think all public schools should have a video system where parents could click in and see what the teacher is up to in your kids classroom. I've stood in the hallway a number of times and listened to teachers in the classroom. My youngest is now in private school.

[nmap]

Originally Posted by Richard

I could go on...and probably will if we get this thread started.

Sir, I hope the thread does get created.

I was unaware that homeschool students had a virtual classroom option - since online education is of particular interest to me, I have a particularly strong interest.

On Edit: I see the thread was created. Thank you!

[nmap]

Thank you, Sir, for starting this thread!

I have no personal experience with NCLB or the present high-stakes testing system; such things did not exist back when I was going to school, and I have no children. I always did well on standardized tests.

My understanding of the problem is that there are a great many students who do poorly on the tests and hence do not graduate. For example, students with limited English proficiency (LEP) students have significantly worse performance on the tests than do native English speakers. The schools receive poor marks if the LEP students perform badly, so the schools focus on bringing all students up to minimum score levels. Hence, teaching to the test.

On the other hand, there is the issue of teaching style. Again, according to my understanding, the current model is "student centered", which means the teacher tries to guide students as opposed to direct instruction. Traditional "teacher centered" methods - the one's we're used to, with the teacher at the front telling the students what to do - can work much better in preparing students for the tests. (I don't have the citation at hand, but I will try to find it if anyone cares). So, that might be an issue too.

I hope Richard adds his thoughts. Since he is in the trenches, I'm sure he will have some great insights.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Pete

When I went to school each student was required to pass each course at each grade level to be promoted.

I think somewhere in the 80's "some" schools shifted to social promotions and dumbing down the passing grades to move others along. It then became the norm in some areas. The result was grads who could not fill out a job application, make change etc.

This will probably become a very 'active' thread and I will, for my part, try to keep my own thoughts succinct by addressing only one issue at a time.

It has been my experience--and upon a great deal of study and reflection--that we all tend to view education through the lens of our own perception of that experience. For example, if we go back to the schools we attended, I think we will find that the idea that each student was required to pass each course at each grade level to be promoted does not hold true and that a great many 'exceptions' were in place; we just didn't need to know about them so weren't aware of them...and probably wouldn't have cared much about them anyway. Teens are like that.

This was certainly true at my school, a large and very high performing public high school (still is) which offered a wide variety of educatiional opportunities based on 'tracking'...of which I was not aware at that time (I graduated in 1968) but understand today.

For example, I discovered later in life that I was placed in a 'college prep' track, and my classes and the majority of my friends were arranged for me to fulfill that 'track.' The school also offered tracks in general education, industrial and business arts, and AG arts. Students in those programs did not have to meet the same 'core' math, science, English, social studies requirements as the 'college prep' track--nor, IMO, should they.

If you go to a state education agency web-site, you can access information on the various 'tracks' they offer--generally a minimum, a recommended, an honors, an AP/IB track--and the requirements for each to obtain a high school diploma. Independent School Districts also determine the criteria for these program's curriculums themselves--and it varies quite a bit throughout the state.

For example, in Texas, the minimum math requirement for a HS diploma is 3 credits--Alg1, Geometry, and 1 additional math credit (usually a Consumer Math, General Math, or Math Models course). Remember, not everyone really 'gets' math or the more theoretical aspects of higher level math.

The recommended HS program requires 4 credits--Alg1, Geometry, Alg2, and Trig/PreCalc.

The other programs require more of the higher levels of math and generally begin with Alg 1 in 7th grade, Geometry in 8th grade, Alg2 in 9th grade, Trig/Pre-Calc or Pre-AP Calc in 10th grade, Calc1 in 11th grade, and Calc2 in 12th grade or they will take a Calc course at a local college/junior college for college credit.

A few little known facts about AP coursework to consider:

• A student does not have to take a course to challenge an AP exam. Like a CLEP exam, they can apply for the exam through their school, pay the fee, take the test, and--if the scores are high enough--may be eligible for being awarded college credit.
  
• Whether or not a college awards credit for an AP test is wholly dependent upon the college, and many do not allow credit for them.
  
• Many states use AP offerings and enrollment as part of their criteria for rating their high schools, the perception being that they are offering a more challenging preparatory curriculum. However, this is not always the case and many honors programs actually offer the most challenging curriculum.

Private and parochial schools do not have to follow the state's guidelines, although they generally do, with some programs being stricter and some being more lenient.

Colleges are aware of all these programs and take that into consideration when screening applicants. FYI--every HS program in the US has a school code which is used by the The College Board to collect data on that school in regards to college admissions, guidance, assessment, financial aid, enrollment, and teaching and learning.

As for the 'everyone passing every subject for promotion,' the issues of testing, grading and alternative courses to meet those requirements come into play--a topic we can address when we have the time.

Richard's $.02

[Peregrino]

Added (copied) the original posts to provide background.

[Pete]

Rich;

I agree with what you posted. My kids were in the top ten of the class, took the AP tests and were in the honors programs. The AP tests allowed them to knock out 2 years worth of the basic classes at college.

One will take a summer class here at the local Community College next summer so she can get a double major in 4 years.

My comments are based on the interaction with the teachers and other staff and how that impacted the other students. Parents who were not involved have no idea of the crap that went on.

It got so bad the last year my wife started writing MFRs after each run-in with school staff. Had them in a folder she carried in the car. The principle moved her office out of sight from the front desk and it had a side door. Call? Not in. If you went there to talk with the principle she would slip out the side door and the front desk would say "not in, sorry". Had to go up with two people, one at the desk and the other in the hallway.

Problem with a teacher? You could not get the teacher and the principle in a room together to talk about the issue. One wacked out AP teacher who couldn't cut it as a fast food manager took over an AP English Class and within 6 weeks had half the APs failing. Two almost dropped out - April of the senior year???? D2 said the nut case was a good intro to her college Prof's.

One wacked out principle and a couple of looney teachers can raise all kinds of heck with a class.

Seat time? Towards the end of the year D2 was in class and her teacher told her she had to make up seat time because she was absent. She asked what day she had missed and the teacher said the office had her down as missing "TODAY". You would think somebody could understand that it's hard to be absent when you're sitting in your chair but no - two hours of seat time after school.

Good thing my kids went to one of the better schools around here. Most parents have no idea whats going on at their local school.

[Jack Moroney (RIP)]

Originally Posted by Richard

You've hit upon a number of points which would make a good thread unto itself and, maybe, should be so. As a high school principal for some 13 years, let me hit just a couple of points which could be expanded under a dedicated thread to this topic.
[LIST][*]There are as many types of schools in this country as there are shoes...and parents should find the type of school that "fits" their family/child.

You have made many excellent points, however the first one needs to be modified to read "try to find" in the case of many folks who have military school age dependents. I know in my particular case my kids were bused to the schools that the post decided on and not what I decided was best. While my kids did great, they were discriminated against academically because of their ethnicity to the point where my son, who was number one in his class, was recognized as not number one but two because we received orders for OCONUS and he would not be returning. The student awarded the recognition for number one was of the ethnic majority as an example for that ethnic group.

OCONUS military kids, for the most part, have no other choice but the DOD system.

[ZonieDiver]

Richard stated:
You've hit upon a number of points which would make a good thread unto itself and, maybe, should be so. As a high school principal for some 13 years, let me hit just a couple of points which could be expanded under a dedicated thread to this topic.
There are as many types of schools in this country as there are shoes...and parents should find the type of school that "fits" their family/child.

Any major urban area will have a broad offering of public, private, and parochial schools. This is also becoming a trend in smaller communities, and remember, there is always the 'home school' option...which many do here in Texas.

For the most rural areas, there are also 'distance learning' options where a student can attend high school in an interactive virtual classroom on-line

Very good points! Another option we have in Arizona, and some other states, is "charter schools" which are public schools offering a particular curriculum. Years ago, most here were "bone-head" schools - for kids who couldn't make it in regular public schools. Now, most are "college-prep" or offer vocational type prep programs. If you have them in your area, look into them. Some can offer all the benefits of a private school - but it is taxpayer funded so there is no tuition.

My district (a large, urban HS district) has a "Cyber-High School" for kids who want that option. There are several charter HS here that offer the same thing. I will be teaching an online class through one next semester. A friend I taught with at another school teaches full-time for one. He meets "face to face" with students (who need the contact) on Friday - otherwise it is all online.

Where do I begin to state what is wrong - and right - with public education in the USA (or at least Arizona, Colorado, and Missouri - where I have first-hand experience)? Like Richard, I'll try to keep it brief.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Pete

My comments are based on the interaction with the teachers and other staff and how that impacted the other students. One wacked out principle and a couple of looney teachers can raise all kinds of heck with a class.

Leadership and personal responsibility. This is one of the major problems within education today--just as it is with business, the government, etc. I offer no excuses or remedies, but realize that it is an issue as individually and as collectively complex as building an ODA. Here is how my faculty and I view such an onerous task--as a Team.

Richard's $.02

The Upper School Philosophy

I have witnessed a whole succession of technological revolutions,
but none of them has done away with the need for character or the ability to think

.

Bernard Baruch

The Upper School has a distinctive mission—to expand the hearts and minds of students and to nurture excellence through academic, creative and physical achievement. This mission carries within it two important ideas. The first is that students should engage in the expected facets of a college preparatory program, namely a rich academic, artistic, and athletic environment. The second is that the program to deliver this mission needs to be developmental in its approach. That is, the school believes that the students are not completed people and learners yet; that they are still growing into these roles. Therefore, our program takes this fact into account. The faculty has high expectations of the students but also the understanding that students enter with varying levels of ability to handle these expectations.

The development of the program is shaped by the following core values:

• Committing to improvement and a desire for excellence,
• Cultivating a sense of personal responsibility,
• Developing a sense of service and pride within the school community and the greater community surrounding it,
• Fostering creativity as a fundamental life skill,
• Practicing mutual respect, support, honesty, and trust.

These core values led to the development of the key features of the program-- our advisory/mentoring system and our approach to classes.

Advisory/Mentoring

The mission statement of the school and its core values all imply a global, instead of piece-meal, approach to education. Therefore, built within the school is a system to track the global view of each student—the advisory system which is at the heart of our developmental approach to education. Through personalized attention, students are better able to develop their academic and social skills to successfully navigate the challenges of high school. It is within this system that they can discuss their capabilities, learn who they are and how they learn, and create a desire to push themselves academically. Also within this system, students can learn to problem-solve and work through difficult academic or social issues in a safe and trusting environment.

The primary goal of the advisor/mentor relationship is to aid each student in assuming responsibility for his or her own learning and life. Advisor relationships make time for assessment, inquiry and reflection, help students learn to make use of what they know, and allows advisors to help develop personalized learning strategies, support and reinforce a student's individual identity, and respond to each student as a whole person.

The advisor system is the network within which teachers share information about individual students and within which most student situations are resolved. The advisory relationship also assists in scheduling, problem-solving, counseling, and school - home communication. As a general rule, parents begin with the advisor to seek advice, have questions answered, and raise issues concerning their student.

Approach to Classes

The Upper School offers a full college preparatory educational program that adheres to the recommended guidelines of the Texas Education Agency. Additionally, students are encouraged to further challenge themselves while finishing their high school graduation requirements by availing themselves of the wide range of dual-credit college-level classes offered by local colleges.

What makes the Upper School's college prep program distinct is the manner in which the instruction is delivered. The classes explicitly build student academic skills, deliver factual content, and push students to grapple with the meaning of the subjects. The faculty has a solid understanding of this approach and develops its classes in response. To reflect this common understanding, the faculty follows a set of commonly applied curricular goals that reflects the approach to classes of the Upper School.

• Goal 1: Every class builds students' academic skills. This means that every class explicitly deals with academic skills such as note taking, collecting, organizing, analyzing, and presenting information, and participating in class. This goal is based on the core values of personal responsibility, as students must take care of most of these things on their own, and a personal commitment to seeking excellence, as these skills lay the foundation for strong academic work.
  
• Goal 2: Every class builds students' life skills. Each class deals with personal traits that lead to success in class, such as perseverance, dependability, and the ability to work with others. This goal is based on the core values of mutual trust, support, and respect, since developing these traits form the basis on which a person can be trusted, and personal responsibility, since each person has to develop these skills.
  
• Goal 3: Every class is clear about the fundamental knowledge that students must learn, and then pushes each student to reach an explanatory level in the class. Every class makes clear to the students what the base-line assumptions are for the factual knowledge that must be learned. This information is used as a base to build explanations of the knowledge and understanding of how it integrates with other elements from the subjects and, further, how it relates to other subjects. This goal is based on the core value of a commitment to seeking excellence. Excellence in academic subjects is reached when a student is able to effectively handle the factual, process-oriented elements of a subject while also being able to explain its meaning and purpose. Additionally, this goal reflects both the core values of diversity and creativity. Diversity is reflected in the idea that many paths to true explanation exist; sometimes the explanations are verbal, sometimes written, sometimes logical, and sometimes more philosophical or emotive. Creativity is reflected in the many modes of explanation that exist and the ways in which students can combine them to reach an original or deeper understanding of subject material.
  
• Goal 4: Every class holds students accountable for their learning and pushes them to become active participants in their education. Naturally, students are graded in every class as a means of accountability. Beyond this, however, students are often asked by their teachers and mentors to evaluate their own progress and to account for themselves for their learning. This goal is based on the core value of personal responsibility and students are pushed to continually work towards taking an ever larger role in their own education.
  
• Goal 5: Every class personalizes the education and differentiates for the skills of students. This goal is met through means such as individualizing assignments and assessments, peer tutoring, ability grouping, and one-on-one instruction when necessary or requested. It is based on the core value of diversity, by recognizing that students come to us with a range of abilities and skill sets, and our need to attempt to meet student’s differing cognitive levels.
  
• Goal 6: Every class uses a range of different instructional approaches to accommodate a variety of learning styles. The instructional approaches range from one-on-one instruction to lectures, group work, peer tutoring, independent projects, and guided discovery. This goal is based, in some measure, on all of the school's core values. In particular, it represents creativity by exemplifying the on-going search for new and better instructional methods. It also represents service when the instruction turns to peer tutoring and working groups and students aid one another through the learning process.
  
• Goal 7: The information in each class is presented through multiple perspectives. Teachers push students to understand various subjects in multiple ways. For instance, in English classes, this involves reading texts that include a range of different authors and expressing understanding of the texts verbally and in written analysis. In mathematics classes, students deal with mathematical ideas in symbolic, graphical, structural, and written forms. This goal is designed to foster both a sense of diversity and creativity of thought: diversity by the very nature of the different ways of approaching subjects and creativity by being able to apply more than one approach to their problem solving.

Reading the set of curricular goals as a whole reveals a belief in our developmental approach to education. Goals 1, 2, 5, 6, and 7 all stem from an understanding that the students do not come to us as whole, complete learners at the start of ninth grade. While focus on content mastery is clearly stated in goals 3 and 4, we recognize that students will grow in their academic ability over the course of high school and that one of our primary missions is to actively help them realize and achieve this growth in an increasingly technologically challenging world.

[USANick7]

Washington also has a program where you can send your kids to only those classes you wish, and home school them on the rest.

Your kids will also be permitted to participate in sports, drama, or any other school functions.

Personally I am very interested in the home school co-op.

Bottom line...

I WANT my kids to grow up with a particular world view. I don't want them taught morale or cultural relativism. And more and more that seems to be the trend in public education.

Now I am in favor of public financing of education to a degree, but not public administration of education.

Milton Friedman put it pretty well when he pointed out that...

"Unlike education, when the government wanted to help hungry people they distributed food vouchers; they didn't open up 20,000 grocery stores."


As long as a private school is not advocating the harming of innocent people or the violent over throw of the United States government, i think it should be eligible for an education voucher.

Past those 2 stipulations, let the parents hash it out.

[stickey]

I mentioned this in the other thread...but I don't care how many classes i took on education in college and how to get students motivated, but the mere 6 weeks i have been teaching social studies to 11th and 12th graders, the biggest disappointment are the students that do not want to learn. I have been receiving excellent advice from faculty and have come to realize, as they suggest, that you cannot make a student learn or do well as long as they do not want to learn. I explain my concerns with the teachers, they reassure my methods and attempts are noble and productive, then laugh and chuckle and say "welcome to teaching".


The old horse to the water analogy applies here. I have tried to spoon feed these kids the quiz and test material, throwing blatant hints as to what is going to be on them and what the answers are, and still, because they don't care, they still fail. What my fellow teachers are saying makes sense, the students that show effort are the students that have decent parents that support the idea of a good education. The other students come from families that don't care, therefore, they do not care.

[nmap]

Stickey, your experience reminds me of one of my own.

The scene...a summer course in beginning computer programming at a state university.

The students...a mix of college students, some interested in majoring in computer science and some gifted/talented senior HS students, along with some in a special scholarship program for disadvantaged students.

You know where this is going....

So, I teach the course. I put stuff on the board, work problems, create examples, and explain. The department makes tutoring available, free of charge, six days per week.

I give various assignments, complete with opportunities to work on the material in class. I plead for questions. The good students (who are doing well) ask. The others do not.

I give the first test. One simple problem, open book, open note, two hours of time...all for a test that should require less than an hour. Some students finished in 15 minutes, turned in their tests, and got perfect scores. Some went an hour or so and got bad scores. A couple went the whole two hours and demonstrated profound cluelessness.

I gave the biggest curve I ever gave in my life. One cannot flunk two-thirds of the class, even though they earned it.

Matters proceed.

I provide a sample test prior to test two. It is a precise duplicate in every detail except I changed the name of the variables. The results are essentially the same.

And so on to the final, which produces the same outcome.

Sure, I curved the grades. Yes, most passed. But the great majority knew absolutely nothing.

Oh well.

The scary part is the trend. The test I gave was similar to one I have given in the past. It really should take much less than an hour, as judged by student performance. We are producing students with degress who are not educated. This is not good.

[pheepster]

nmap: I'm currently in a similar situation at the moment with a Composition course I'm teaching. I've had apathetic students in the past, but this one section of a lower level course I'm teaching this semester is something special. I've decided not to teach next semester, so for once I'm going to fail everyone who deserves it. My department will be rather upset, but I'm sure it will be better for everyone in the end. (I hope.)

stickey: Just out of curiosity, what subject are you teaching?


There's a picture on the other thread, so I thought I'd add one to this thread... an oldie but a goodie.