The Nature of High School and Prison

Imagine a building filled with people who are forced to be there, under constant supervision by the authorities, with limited freedom. The building is secured, patrolled by guards, and life is heavily structured and scheduled. People who are forced to be there must adhere to a specific dress code, require permission to do almost anything, […]

Taiwan’s Child Culture

Something that always fascinates me (and also often frustrates me) is something I like to refer to as “Taiwan’s Child Culture.” The most important thing to understand about any culture is the way they raise their children.  Without question, the key to any culture is education.  Education is indoctrination: it’s where we learn what society […]

Moving to Taiwan: Avoiding Disaster

There are always people moving to Taiwan. I talk a lot about it in what I write; I give a lot of advice on this site regarding moving to Taiwan, getting settled in Taiwan, and living in Taiwan. What a challenge a move like this can be. For a start, you have to consider what […]

The Hotness: Class Hot, Work Hot, and Street Hot

There are a lot of different kinds of hotness out there. Some girls want the guy in the suit while others want the stripping firefighter that can treat them sensual touches and make them feel like they’re starring in a https://www.hdsexvideo.xxx/ film…and many want both. But even beyond those kinds of differences, there’s a difference […]

Let’s Talk About School Shootings

I was sixteen years old when Harris and Klebold walked into Columbine High School and went on a killing spree. We were in school when it happened – before the media-driven-fear-fest that was 9/11, there was Columbine. Imagine being a teenager watching a school get destroyed…and discovering it’s being done by other students. It was […]

Israel Is the Bully You Hated

I hear a lot of people saying Israel is justified in what it does.  That they’re standing up for themselves.  Americans love that rhetoric, because so many of us still think we’re Rambo Cowboys fighting for truth and justice.  But here’s the reality. In 2007, for every one Israeli death there were 25 Palestinian deaths. […]

The Battle Against Bullying

I’m 29 years old – that means I was born in 1983.  It was around that time where parents began to go off the deep end.  Prior to that, corporal punishment was the norm, as was letting kids run around outside unsupervised, or riding bikes without helmets.  To this day, there has not been any […]

Selling Children In Taiwan

While I no longer work with educational institutions in Taiwan, I do like to share my experiences with them. I have a unique knowledge in that I have been in both the education side as well as the managerial side; this allows me to have a perspective that is rarely gained and even less-commonly shared. […]

What’s It Like To Be A Sub?

Being a substitute teacher at Pulaski County Special School District boils down to one thing – you are a per-diem employee that can be dismissed at any time for any reason.  However, given that there are so few substitutes available, most schools simply ban bad substitutes – it’s rare that you hear of one get […]

Never Let Schooling Interfere With Your Education

When I was in high school, which was only a decade ago, it was a better time than today. While I wasn’t enrolled in the district I currently teach in, I’ve seen pictures of kids then and I see them now, and today is clearly more oppressive. We thought we had it bad in high […]

How My Students Change The World

When I was in middle school, which was around the time modern high school students were born, there was a new phrasing of an old word that had really taken over the scene.  For a long time the word meant happy and then, later, the word changed to mean homosexual; by the year 2000, the […]

Oh, That Sub?

Substitute teachers have a few different brands.   You were a kid once.  Maybe you still are.  You know the drill.   There’s a reverse bell curve, with “insanely strict substitutes” on one end and “totally aloof substitutes” on the other end.  The minority find themselves in the middle – 90% of subs are super strict […]

Who’s The Sub?

Teaching has its various merits and drawbacks, for me.   First of all, no matter what educational bracket you are in, academia is the lowest income bracket you are looking at. This is why most teachers do lots of extra stuff – anything from coaching sports teams to staying after school to monitor kids getting […]

You’re The Sub?

I’ve come to realize, over the last few months, that I’m in a unique position. Since returning to the USA in December on 2011, I began substitute teaching at Pulaski County Special School District at the end of January.  I have worked the last 45 out of 55 working days, the majority of my work being at […]

Endings and Beginnings – Written April 8, 2003

How will it end? Nonsense. When will it really begin? We love and we loathe our aspirations, our expectations, and our anticipations. They keep us all living without actually allowing us to live; we are constantly waiting for a conclusion so we can begin another story. We learn in high school to get into college […]

Two Educations – Written January 21, 2003

My high school life was unlike most others’. There were so many changes that occurred in my life, it is hard to really differentiate. The first real difficulty I had in high school was not academic, but social. It was not without the social education I received (thanks to these mytefl reviews), however, that I […]