0.62%

I first read this story and thought 62% of H.S. graduates entering our local Gavilan Junior College have college level math skills, a number I thought was low but very workable. Wrong.

It's 0.62%!

LINK
Less than half of the Gilroy High School students entering Gavilan College this semester were prepared for college-level English classes and a paltry 0.62 percent - less than one in 100 students - of those students were ready for college-level math. The majority of these GHS students ended up in remedial classes - classes they should have mastered in high school or even junior high.

The problem with students being unprepared for college is compounded by the fact that more than half of all students doing remedial work at Gavilan cannot pass the classes with a grade of C- or higher, according to the college's own statistics. Further, these students are not English-language learners, who statistically tend to score lower. English is the first language of these students.

Pat Midtgaard, president of Gilroy Unified School District's board of trustees,
gasped when she heard that less than 1 percent of GHS students going to Gavilan were ready for college-level math.

"I didn't think that the math would be that bad, and I'm very surprised at the level of English, too," she said. "I think I'm even more surprised because these students have always spoken, read and heard English. It is alarming."

That's approximately one person out of 160 applicants and 160 is a good estimate for an entering class. That means 0.62% is likely one person.

The entering class for our local Junior College didn't get a HS math education.

The CSU system's policy refuses to offer long term remedial classes and UC actively screens out college motivated non-performers to a Jr. College. Gavilan is obviously getting those who can't get into UC or stick in CSU schools like CSUMB and SJSU. Still, I fear that's too optimistic an explanation.

Jr. College is also a low cost spring board into CSU so there should be a nontrivial fraction of entrants at Gavilan who can perform at college level but don't have the time or money to attend a CSU institution. Think NFL's Jeff Garcia who attended Gavilan to play football before transferring to SJSC. Where are these students?

0.62% is scary low. Maybe this math failure is a matter of screwed up priorities, not disinterest in the local and world events. What is filling their time and lives?

Gavilan College should test pop-culture knowledge.

"Name three American Idol winners?"

I can name three and I hate the show.

If they're learing the wrong things well, it's at least a start but if there are a significant fraction that isn't learning anything... wow.

GUSD gets an F for failing to try.

Fill out the application and try for chris'ake. GUSD should apply every year. Two children have died.





GilroyDispatch.com of Gilroy California

School and city officials opted not to seek coveted federal safety funds this year, despite ongoing concerns about kids' safety in Gilroy crosswalks.

...

This year, SRTS' requests for proposals came out in October. One month after Gilroy Unified School District Superintendent Edwin Diaz mentioned possibly applying for the grant in his winter bulletin, school officials decided to drop the idea, put off by expensive engineering assessments and looming deadlines. This is the first time the school district has considered applying for the funds, said Freedman, who estimated that engineering conducted by outside firms would cost $5,000 per school.

The assessments are not required to receive grant money, but could give Gilroy a leg up on the competition.

"You're competing with every other city in the state, and the funds are scarce," said city traffic engineer Don Dey, who consulted school officials on a possible application. "Last year, they awarded about one grant per county."

But other cities have snagged funding without costly assessments, said Wendi Kallins, program director of the Transportation Authority of Marin, which administers Marin County's SRTS program. Marin County laid the groundwork for the nationwide program, cutting their own school-zone congestion by 13 percent, Kallins said. Among the county's most successful programs are "non-engineering" efforts such as Walk to School days and crosswalk safety education.

It is the first time GUSD considered applying for aid. Gilroy just added a huge shopping complex across town and our Mayor used this development to increase traffic congestion in the City core as part of his downtown business rennovation, "Drop a few bucks".



Shouldn't we have been trying to adapt to the increased traffic before this devleopment was finished?

HW 152-156 fix pending

Jan. 10, 2007
HIGHWAY 152-156 INTERSECTION GETS FEDERAL FUNDING.
By Gary Richards
Mercury News

Motorists who endure 10-mile backups before the Highway 152-156 intersection ... might finally ease.

Plans to upgrade two of the biggest traffic nightmares in the South Bay cleared major hurdles on Wednesday, with federal officials signing off on the 152-156 upgrade east of Gilroy ... .

Moving ahead first will be building a flyover ramp at 152 and 156, with the Federal Highway Administration signing the final paperwork after a five-month delay that frustrated local officials. The Valley Transportation Authority will advertise contracts for the $36 million project on Friday, with construction set to begin in April.

...

If the state gives its go ahead next month, it could come at the expense of widening 101 from Gilroy to the San Benito County line, removing left turn pockets and converting that section to a six-lane freeway. The price tag is $284 million.

But the traffic backups there are minimal, compared with other freeways in the nine Bay Area counties.

``It's pretty tough case to make that this is where all the congestion is,'' Rentschler said of the Gilroy area. ``That is not true. Our view is that there is a lot of congestion across the Bay Area and in Santa Clara County. This just doesn't happen to be one of them.''

It's for the poor

One argument Gilroy city government floated for super Wal-Mart was the need for low cost retail and food for the working poor of Gilroy. Well our lovely city council didn't see fit to approve a shopping complex that could support a bus - they can't make it to the store.

The Dispatch: "Wal-Mart spokeswoman Amy Hill said she was surprised to learn that the new store won’t have bus service.

"“We certainly want our customers to reach our store,"” Hill said. "“We will speak with the developers and other retailers and see if there’s an interest in working out this problem."
....
Well, for now, shoppers and Wal-Mart employees who rely on the 17 bus will have to get off in the Gilroy Crossing Shopping Center, take a long walk and risk crossing eight lanes of busy Pacheco Pass traffic.

“It would be a lot better if it stopped in front of the store,” new Wal-Mart employee Francisca Colon said on her way to work. “You can’t cross that street. By the time you get halfway across, the light changes.”

Did they design this on Wal-Mart's behalf?
Hell no.
They did it for themselves - low wage prices and no rif-raf.

A man in way over his head.

The Dispatch: "Mayor Al Pinheiro, one of five councilmen who approved the project in 2003, is still convinced of the supercenter’s benefits.

“It helps the consumer overall because the day that Wal-Mart opens, the other stores are going to all of a sudden adjust their prices to stay competitive,” he said. “That means they may have to adjust their profit margin and not be so fat. That’s a choice that they have to make, but who says I have to be the protector of what they do in their business.”"

Do grocery stores operate with fat profit margins Mayor Al or will they cut wages?

What does it matter? Who is Al to be a protector of people's livable wages? After all, what business does a City Mayor have in getting involved with supporting a livable wage in his City? He the Mayor for Chris'Sakes!

Hyperdrive: "One game system to rule them all" - Yeah sure kid

This Xbox360 hype is laughable.

Forbes reported that XBOX cost MS 4 billion since it launched. That loss includes offsets by XBOX revenue. XBOX is tied for 2nd with the Nintendo Gamecube.

Now MS is going to market first and claiming a technical edge over the 2006 Sony PS3 so that technical claim means they'll need to push Moore's Law and thus spend more money on cutting edge hardware to ship a system today that will be competitive against the PS3 and Nintendo Revolution when they ship in 2006.

MS is going to market first and will lose hundreds on each system sold.

They will do redesigns. It is reasaonable to refresh the system design in two years - for XMAS 2007 - to boost sales and cut manufacturing costs. And it is reasonable to redesign the system chips within a year to cut costs/heat. It is laughable to think they'll redesign the XBOX to cover the hardware costs within 1 or 2 years on a 6 year product life cycle.

And MS has to recover the hardware design costs of the Xbox360 - they own (paid) for the chips designs.

CNN.com - One game system to rule them all - Sep 19, 2005: "As of June, Microsoft had sold nearly 22 million of its original Xbox consoles -- fewer than one-fourth the number of PlayStation 2 units sold by Sony. Nintendo Co. Ltd.'s GameCube is the third biggest seller in the console market.

Now Microsoft wants to get many more of its next-generation consoles to market faster, buoyed by a wider selection of titles and an improved ability to keep costs in check.

'We will wind up cost-reducing the product every year,' Todd Holmdahl, corporate vice president of the Xbox product group, said in a recent interview.

Microsoft is working to break-even on the Xbox 360 hardware in the the first year or two -- roughly the first third in its expected six to seven-year console cycle."

Golden State signed 7-foot-1-inch center Deji Akindele of Chicago State.

Never heard of him.

ChicagoSports.com - Pargo accepts Bulls deal: "- Golden State signed 7-foot-1-inch center Deji Akindele of Chicago State. Last season as a sophomore he averaged 12.0 points, 8.6 rebounds and 2.5 blocks and was Mid-Continent Conference defensive player of the year."

Gaming | News.blog | CNET News.com

Remember, MS think's Sony's Blu-Ray DVD format has technical problems so they will not support Sony's DVD format.

Sony being a MS XBOX competitor and the XBOX costing MS 4 Billion in losses is irrelevant.

Gaming | News.blog | CNET News.com: "Forbes says that the Xbox division has lost $4 billion since 2001. Four. Billion. Dollars."

Blu-Ray and FUD

Tom's Hardware Guide: Tom's Hard News: "'Our decision is based mainly on where the formats are today,' Ribas said, referring to Microsoft. 'A year and a half ago, both format organizations had very similar goals, and to some extent, the story of Blu-ray was actually very powerful. It had higher capacity, it had what we would consider benefits at the time. But then as time went on, and we'd seen what's the reality of both formats today, and what were promises versus what's proven and what's real, that's when we decided to make the decision.'

Blu-ray failed the Intel/Microsoft test in six critical areas, Ribas told us, referring to a document listing those areas that a Microsoft spokesperson provided to Tom's Hardware Guide: "

Forget the B.S. and F.U.D.

MS and Sony are at war over the next generation game console. Both consoles use PPC chips.

Sony backs Blu-Ray and is pushing a their PPC derived processor as an alternative CPU to Intel's IA64 processors.

The problems MS and Intel have with Blu-ray are political.

Star Wars Follow ons

More of me there is

Lucas will do two Starwars TV series: A Cartoon and Live Action:

The fan-anticipated "Star Wars Celebration III" convention in Indianapolis drew big crowds and a few big scoops in regards to the fate of the popular Lucas sci-fi franchsie. After several minutes of footage from "Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith", Producer Rick McCallum conducted a Q&A and confirmed a few details.

"Revenge of the Sith" final running time of is 131 minutes (though official reports last week listed it at 141 minutes), the film itself had the last touches added to it on Tuesday. Whilst they plan to do Star Wars in 3-D, they have no real timetable due to the lack of technology available.

Lucas got a script for Indiana Jones 4 last week and Spielberg plans to make it the film he does after his next one (likely the Munich Olympics terrorist flick). By that timetable it would put in on track for a Summer 2007 release.

Meanwhile, Lucas himself appeared and talked about the TV plans for the future. There are two TV series in development - a half hour 3-D computer animated series, and a live action series starring some supporting characters featured in the movies.

Production on the live action show would begin in about a year and unlike other shows, all the scripts for every episode will be done first and then shooting will happen in one big block. Lucas himself would handle at least the pilot. Judging by this timetable it would probably start airing sometime 2007.

Thanks to 'Justin'

Putting the "fried" back in Fried Chicken.

"With", you forgot the "With"

I never knew they only used "KFC" so they could stop saying "fried". It didn't work with me - I knew it was fried - crispy batter outside and all - and I and my kind called it Kentucky Fried Chicken.

After 14 years of trying to downplay the image of its food as greasy and unhealthy by calling itself simply KFC, the chain opened a new restaurant in its hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, on Wednesday under its former name and plans 50 more this year.