Funny Fact

I was visiting a historic fort yesterday. As I was climbing up to the top of one of the walls, I noticed a placard with something about "French" and "retreat." Upon examining it more closely, I learned that the word retreat was first used/invented by the French! I laughed. How appropriate is that?

Battle of the Sexes: Are Women Smarter than Men?

Warning: Statistical analysis involved in this post. Reader be warned!

Before you blurt out an answer to this post's title, based on some predetermined bias of yours, hear me out. Actually, I'm not sure it's possible to make a blanket answer, though I'm sure some men who want to please their wife, or have had a wife, might say "women" because they know they wouldn't be able to get along without her, and feel that she's infinitely superior and all that. (That doesn't prove intelligence, merely competence!) And some smug women might also cry out "women" just because they think they are naturally superior, or maybe their husband has told them they are and they believe it, or because they've felt downtrodden by men throughout history, and are all liberated now and feel free to dismiss those of the opposite sex as intellectual inferiors. (Come on ladies, don't the majority of you secretly think that your gender in general is smarter than those men folk?) Well, I have some empirical evidence to throw into the debate. Before you simply use it to support your preconceived bias, maybe it can be used to direct you to other ideas which you might not have considered.

I taught the same subject (U.S. History) to four different sections this past school year. With such a large sample of students you can use grades by gender to test the intelligence theory with a greater degree of accuracy than some studies involving smaller pools. For those who don't understand, picture this: a classroom of six students, four of them girls.
Say 2 girls get A's, one gets a B, and one gets a C+. One guy gets a B+, the other gets an F. Can you conclude from this that girls are smarter than guys? Not really. The small sample could be an anomaly, something out of the ordinary. Maybe one guy's grandmother died the night before the final, so he didn't study for it. Maybe one girl's mother is a history teacher, and was able to better prepare her for the final by reviewing with her. These anomalies tend to get made insignificant with larger samples. They balance each other out more. Thus, you get more valuable information with larger groups of information.

Enough on that. For my sample, I used marks of 55 women and 44 men. I threw out a couple of grades from this sample due to extraneous circumstances. The first fact, that more women than men were in an upper level history class, might indicate something about intelligence, or at least academic motivation. There is a significant difference.

Out of 99 students, 14 of them earned A's for the second semester. Eleven of those A's were earned by women. Here is the entire breakdown:
A=3 men, 11 women
B+=8 men, 15 women
B=16 men, 8 women
C+=3 men, 7 women
C=8 men, 3 women
D=1 man, 4 women
F=6 men, 6 women

These figures look like women far outperform men until you take the percentage of men and women that scored in each category. In other words, it makes sense that more women earned an A if there were more of them in the first place. Looking at the percentages gives a more accurate assessment:
A=3/44 men=7%, 11/55 women=20%
B+=18% men, 27% women
B= 36% men, 15% women
C+=7% men, 13% women
C=18% men, 5% women
D=2% men, 7% women
F=14% men, 11% women

Conclusions: women outperformed men at the highest level (an A grade) by almost a 3 to 1 margin. That margin shrinks but is still significant if you include the next highest grade, at almost 2 to 1. In other words, almost twice as many women earned a B+ or higher than men, AFTER taking into account the disproportionate number of women taking the class. However, when you include a B grade, men catch up significantly. Sixty-one percent of men and 62% of women earned a B or higher. Men jump ahead only once you factor in the C's. 85 percent of men earned a C or higher, compared to about 81% of women.

Are there any explanations for this difference in performance, other than natural intelligence? Unfortunately for those of you predisposed toward the ladies camp, there are. Here are some:
1. Women may respond better to the natural wit and charm of a male teacher, which leads to better academic achievement! :-)
2. Women at high school age tend to be more mature than their male counterparts. This leads to higher motivation and better concentration in accomplishing tasks necessary to earn a higher grade (e.g., completing homework assignments, following directions, etc.) Thus, while girls go the extra mile to earn the highest level grades, guys simply put in the basic work necessary to earn a passing, and decent grade, such as a B.
3. Due to less maturity, guys may tend to seek popularity in other ways besides academic success. They don't perceive being smart as being "cool."
4. I could be biased, and tend to grade women more favorably than men.

I won't offer any definitive opinion on which gender is "smarter." I think too many factors are in play to make a decision based on this data. However, these figures tend to back up my predisposition to teaching girls who want to learn over smart aleck guys who like to make wisecracks in class and thereby supposedly prove their manliness. Only a few students act this way, though far more guys than girls. And more guys do tend to be lazy, and not follow directions or do basic homework.

Maybe I should switch to an all girls school? Nah, guys also need positive male role models. I hope I'm at least that, even if I don't get them to achieve like those girls.

Life as an RA and General Life Lesson

What exactly does life as an RA (or RPA) entail? I'll tell you. Basically it involves a lot of eating, sitting around, sleeping, and feeling like you're not getting anything done, because often there are a lot of administrative things to do.

Basic schedule. Get students up in the morning, making sure they are out half an hour before they go on their field trip, so they can get some breakfast. Then you go to breakfast yourself. If you desire to or are asked to go because they need a driver, you might go on a fieldtrip with the students. If not, you return to the dorm and do whatever you want until they get back for lunch. This includes reading, then feeling sleepy because you are in an airconditioned room and it's rather quiet. You might pop out to the rec center to get a little exercise in. You might also read email, surf online, etc.

Lunch comes, and you take turn with other RAs going to eat, so there's always someone in the dorm. Then you come back, and if on duty that afternoon you hang around and repeat the morning's activities. There are likely to be more students in and out in the afternoon, so you might supervise them. Then comes dinner, and once again you coordinate with other RAs. Then the evening, when all are on duty and you do whatever.

Doing whatever is punctuated by a number of administrative things, including checking the other floors to see that other RAs are there on duty and ensuring that girls aren't burning down the dorm, or engaging in some such reckless activity. Sometimes there's an evening program to attend. Sometimes there are activities to coordinate. Late at night you make sure the students follow curfew, and herd them into their rooms by 11 P.M., after which time you can settle down yourself for the night.

It's pretty basic work. What makes it interesting is the students. One male student, who was also here last year, cracks me up almost every time he opens his mouth. I'll call him Tony. At the start of the program we had a floor meeting with all of the guys, and played this icebreaker, get to know you kind of game. Each guy had to take some toilet paper from a bunch that was passed around, then say one interesting fact about themself for each square of toilet paper they had taken. Tony, I should preface this by saying, never pronounces his "r's." All of his "r's" usually come out as "ah," or something like it. This is not because he's from Boston. It really only resembles a Bostonian's accent. I think it is a speech impediment that causes his accent, not because he's from any given region. Sometimes it takes real concentration to process what he is saying, but other than that you can understand him fine.

Tony gives his facts: he went to an all boys boarding school for his four years of highschool. He has a sister (or some such fact, I don't remember). Then he informs us he is having invasive nasal surgery immediately after this program. I thought that was hilarious. What kind of kid picks that as an interesting fact to share among his high school peers? It's my kind of dry humor, and I love it.

Tony is going to Stanford. THE Stanford. He got waitlisted at Harvard, and he told me he was glad this happened. His mom really wanted him to go there, and he didn't, so he's happy that he didn't get accepted and then feel like he had to go there. At the same time he's glad for ego reasons that he didn't get turned down outright. At Stanford, he's getting a full tuition scholarship, plus a quarter of his room and board. Not a bad scholarship for a school that costs about 45 grand a year.

Tony is also one of the few guys so far to not be shy about going upstairs and hanging out in the lounge areas and talking with girls. I was up there the other night when he introduced himself to a girl he hadn't met, and it was hilarious listening to his conversation, complete with dry humor. It went something like this:
T: "I'm Tony. And you are?"
C: "Cindy."
T: "Hi Cindy, nice to meet you. Where are you from?"
C: "Pennsylvania."
T: (with totally straight face, no hint of joking): "Ah, have you recovered from the jetlag yet?"
C: (a little flustered, not sure what to say) "Um, yeah..."
T: "I'm from South Carolina. You know how bad the education is there? We're fifty-first in the nation, behind Puerto Rico. They don't even speak English in Puerto Rico. I don't know how we can be fifty-first when they don't even speak English in Puerto Rico, but we are. It's pretty bad."

Given that I knew Tony had gone to boarding school in Tennessee for his entire high school career, and that he is heading to Stanford in the fall, I thought it pretty hilarious that he was categorizing himself as coming from a poor educational background. But he didn't seem to care, and the girl seemed to have no clue that SC's education system had no influence on his recent education.

In other random news, I am amazed by the number of students here who go to private, single sex high schools. I've had some conversations with some of them about the pros and cons of such a school. Most of the students seem to love it. One pro that has emerged as a theme is the fact that they can get up five minutes or less before going out the door to school, and not have to worry about grooming, what they are wearing, etc. I think there's something to be said about that. One girl talked about the fact that high school boys tend to be immature, and you don't have to worry about their presence in the classroom. I concur with that. The immaturity in the classroom usually comes from the boys. I'm considering writing a book about the need for reform in the educational system. Perhaps single sex is the way to go? And uniforms, of course.

On another note, let me inform any who cares to know about the dangers of a certain kind of worm out there. This is not a worm that you can see, or that bites into fruit of some sort. It's a computer worm. It comes to you through instant messenger, from someone on your buddy list, with a message like "click on this link to see the video I made." If you ever get such a message, even if it's from one of your friends, DO NOT EVER CLICK ON IT! I got such a message recently, and was stupid enough to click on it. At this point some of you might be saying "How stupid of you, how could you ever do that?" I consider myself fairly savvy to the dangers of viruses and worms, etc., but this one caught me unawares, as the message came from a source I trusted. It was a computer worm that infected my computer and automatically sent similar messages to a number of friends on my buddy list. This happened despite the fact that I had good antivirus software up and running! I took my computer to the tech guys here, and they told me that the only way to get rid of this worm is to rebuild my operating system (i.e., reinstall it), which means that I will end up losing everything that is currently on my hard drive. Yes, everything! And until I get it fixed I cannot connect to the internet, as the worm does nasty stuff, trying to infect others, when it is connected. (I'm using a borrowed computer now.) So that's kind of a bummer. The good news is that the computer has not crashed, so I should be able to back up all critical files before I restore everything. And I don't have many critical files, if any, that haven't been backed up already. But I guess several years worth of emails will be erased. I am unaware of any way to back those up. So reader, learn from my errors if you are not already aware of these nasty worms.

Traveling South and Life as an RA

Rambling, pedantic account ahead of my trip south. Reader beware!

I'm back in VA, having returned for a third summer to work as a residential assistant in a pre-collegiate history program for high school students. I first got a job in this program as a grad student, when I worked as a normal RA. Actually, it's much more intensive than the duties of a college RA, as these are high school students and they need more intense supervision. Last year I returned as the Head RA, which meant I had a little more responsibility and got 33 percent more money. Couldn't complain at that. This year I am back as the Head RA. In addition to serving as an RA, I coordinate and supervise all the other RA's, and liasion with the program director.

The trip down was a nightmare. I left my place at about 5:15. I cruised down to the Dunkin Donuts around the corner, and did something I've never done: ordered a turbo coffee. Yup, I've gone over to the dark side. While at the counter I resorted to brother-like, rather timid behavior. (Said brother will go unnamed, but he likes to blog.) I ordered an extra large turbo coffee and two breakfast sandwiches. I had a coupon for a dollar off any breakfast sandwich, and it said right on it "limit 2 per customer." So obviously the coupon meant you could get a dollar off each, right? Well, the lady rang it up and only gave me a dollar off of one! But rather than complaining about it, I just went on my merry way. Such brother-like behavior is unusual, but perhaps on the increase. These little acts of not complaining when I have a right to get my dollar back will probably add up to my failing to achieve millionaire status by age 30. Sigh. Such is life.

The coffee tasted more bitter than usual. If this is a consequence of the turbo shot (and I assume it is), then turbo is not worth the extra dough. Not unless you are really desperate for an extra high. But I didn't notice much of an extra kick either, in my alertness or whatever. So I think, for now, that turbo coffee is a big come on and a waste of money. Save yourselves the money, friends who have not experimented. It's not worth it. (Don't I sound like an ex user warning people from the dangers of drugs? Well, in case you're wondering, they're not worth it either...)

As I traveled, I plotted my trip to miss a major city during rush hour. I did, then got stuck in major traffic north of another major city. Then when I got to NYC, around ten (after rush hour--what gives?) I got stuck in more major traffic. What a pain! It took me three hours to go sixty miles, after going 200 in the first three. And my brother wasn't there to yell "everybody go home!" as he is wont to do when amidst lots of traffic. I was frustrated, especially since I had friends to meet at the other end by a certain time. As I rode, I educated myself a bit by listening to 1776 on CD. It's a recent history book by David McCullough on that famous year (yeah, it's nerdy, but call it professional development on the go!)

I finally got through NYC and into NJ. There I got off the highway to try and take back my EZ Pass tags to the customer service center in Newark. Big mistake. The directions I had from online were confusing, and before I knew it I was meandering down a road in the city that probably has seen its share of drug deals. But I was not mugged. Still, I failed to find the center, and after fruitless searching got back on the highway. Sigh.

South of the NJ turnpike I stop to get gas. 43.50 to fill up. Ouch. Then, as I head onto the highway, I open my 24 ounce bottle of Diet Pepsi, to fortify my caffeine levels and give me something to drink at the same time. As I opened the bottle in one hand while merging into traffic, this bottle fizzled up like a volcano, and proceeded to pour out into my lap a la Mt. Vesuvius. What's a guy to do in such a situation? I tried desperately to roll down the window and hold it outside to fizzle over, but that was hard to do with only two hands, while driving. So I got a good part, maybe 6 or 8 ounces worth of Pepsi spilled into my lap and onto the seat. I didn't think I needed to be cooled down, but it happened anyway. And it left a rather unpleasant stain after it dried, probably hours down the road.

I get to around Washington, and more traffic. Sigh. I finally get to my destination, meet up with friends, and have a nice rest of the evening. All told, my trip took around 14 hours. It could have been done in about 11 if there hadn't been traffic. Nevertheless, I was safe and sound, more educated than I might have been, and at my destination. Can't complain too much.

More on life as an RA in a later post. I've gotten distracted, and it's getting late.

Summer is Good

Ever heard of James Joyce and "stream of consciousness"? Prepare for a taste of it here. Or at least in modified, sanitized form.

I have decided that I like the summertime. Not that I hate teaching or anything. In fact, sad to say, I already miss SOME of my students, and am already looking forward to reconnecting with old students and getting acquainted with new ones.

Why do I anticipate a new group of students? Simply put, I relish striking fear into young people's hearts, making them sweat bullets before each test because it's so hard, giving them nightmares over the grade they will receive on a paper, sending them home in tears after I rip them to shreds for their stupidity in front of their peers; it's all part of the game, and I love it.

Ok, if you are an administrator looking over my shoulder as I inch closer to the goal line known as tenure, please read this: I'M JUST KIDDING!!! If you know me very well, you know this already. But why is it that I look forward to a new year? And so soon after finishing the old one? I suspect maybe I'm crazy. But for some reason, thinking about being able to use all the old jokes and surprises with my new classes brings a smile to my face! Literally. What's wrong with a broken record if your audience is always new? There has to be something besides having fresh ears to hear old jokes/tricks that keeps me going. You wanna know what one of my favorite tricks is? The deadpan. I'm good at this, I think, although some family members think they know the trick (something to do with nose twitching). Yup, there's nothing like a good deadpan to get students worked up into a frenzy.

Example number one: A student nervously asks a question along these lines: "Mr. [my name], I heard we have to do a big research paper for this class. How long does it have to be?"

"You've heard about that, huh? Well, you don't really have to worry about it now. It's not until next semester. And it only has to be fifty pages long." [said with completely straight face, and utter nonchalance.]

Another good one, best used at the beginning of the year when students are not yet accustomed to the format of my tests. A student who really cares about getting a good grade--they seem to be few and far between, but believe it or not they do exist--asks "What exactly do we have to know for the test?" My reply: "Well, everything we've covered in class, all the outside of class homework readings. And look over the textbook chapter too. You should be ok if you memorize it." What's really fun is if you can get some of the gullible students to fall for this. After all, I tell my U.S. History juniors that this class will challenge them like none they have had to this point in high school. Junior year is the time to pick it up academically, and this course will help prepare them for college, etc. So I can get on occasion someone to start freaking out at my response.

These games are fun, but I don't think it's really why I want to return. Why is it? Simply put, I think maybe it is a gift from above. I've been given a passion for working with these kids. It's a field in which there is a lot of opportunity to have a positive influence on young minds. I think it's quite likely that I want my students to do better than about 95 percent of them want to themselves. The last five percent is really driven, and want at least as much I want them to do well.

This is kind of bizarre, isn't it. Is there a job like it? How many patients visit the doctor and don't want to be treated by him/her? How many customers take their car to a garage and don't want it repaired? How many consumers in general visit a place of business and don't want the help of the business, through goods or services. In my line of work, the service is often not wanted by the consumer, whether such service be good or not. What's the solution to this? I think it is to provide an opportunity for those who don't want the goods to leave the store. Permanently. You don't want to learn here? Go home. And don't come back. That would improve schools dramatically overnight, although it might create a lot of hassle for police officers on the streets, who would then have to deal with hooligans in broad daylight during school hours, and not just at night. Call us highly paid baby sitters if you want. That's what we are with those who don't want to learn.

But I digress. Why do I like summer? There are so many things to fill it up with! And I love my house. Did you know that? It's so nice to be able to hang out in a place I can call my own, toodling away at my various projects. What are those projects, you may ask? Here is an updated list of some ways I have spent my time so far, and hope to spend more time doing this summer:

1. Reading! I don't get enough time to do this during the year. Currently in the pot. From Beirut to Jerusalem. A highly entertaining book so far. Laugh out loud funny in spots, the antics of some of the characters in these allegedly true to life stories are so ridiculous. Radicalism of the American Revolution is another book I started. It won a Pulitzer prize for history, so it is supposed to be good. Basically the thesis is that the Revolution radically changed the way Americans thought and behaved. Gordon Wood wrote it. He's good, if you ever want to read some history a little less basic than David McCullough or Stephen Ambrose. History of the Middle East. Finished the other day. Good thing too. I thought I was going to use it for teaching my Middle East class, but it's way too complicated for some of my students. It would have been a waste of money to put my students through this, but it was helpful background reading for my own knowledge base, which is why I am reading all of the other books as well (some guy on leadership a group of us learned about extolled the virtues of expanding your knowledge in your field by reading more. I'm attempting, believe me!) O Jerusalem! I read it long ago in the days of B.S., but it needs to be read again as background for my class. And I'll probably have all my students read it. Truman by David McCullough. But that's on the backburner, I doubt I'll have time this summer. I'll also be needing to take a close look at a World History textbook or two, and take detailed notes on much of it in preparation for teaching the honors class next year. You wanna know how much I know about Chinese dynasties in the 3rd century B.C.? Next to nothing. Thus I read!

2. Playing video games! I almost forgot how fun this can be! Especially now that I have a new computer, I can now play games that are currently sold in the store, rather than looking at them wistfully only to put them back on the shelf after seeing that the requirements are more than my ancient machine could handle. But no more. I've enjoyed Civilization IV, which is also World History oriented, so can be justified playing! And I've been engrossed in Rome:Total War, also history oriented and loads of fun. Nothing quite like ordering around hundreds of Romans to smash the Gauls!

3. Transcribing the diary. I have a lot of work to do on this, as I head toward the goal of eventual publication, if the right doors open up. But it's a work of love, as one of my fellow teachers reminded me when I talked about the work I had to do with it. I have now printed off the 280 plus pages from the microfilm, and have begun to actually transcribe it word for word. I'm up to about page 5. And as I transcribe I have plenty of editorial decisions to make, with the help of a couple of books on the subject of editing historical documents. For example, what do you do with an 18th century manuscript that doesn't use standard spelling? Or what if you can't tell if a word is capitalized or not? And what if there is little to no punctuation? Or you can't read a word? Or it has been crossed out, should you put that in a footnote or indicate this in the text? There are certain rules and standards that fortunately have been set for me, but it's a process to pick which one I want to go with and then attempt to scrupulously follow it.

4. Reading/ordering/distributing scripts for my theater organization. I realized about ten days ago that I really need to get things going this summer as far as having my theater board read scripts and start thinking about what shows to do next year, as we need to make decisions quickly once the year starts. So I ordered several scripts, have read some, and am in the process of distributing them to various students. It helps to be so close to school so I can do this.

5. Attend events in which my school's students are involved. I have attended two plays this past week, both of which had students of mine in them. I like to do this to bless them, to get a taste of various shows and artistic ideas for future products I will direct, etc., as well as to scout out talent that is at my school, so I can direct my recruiting efforts if necessary. Of course, some people are basically out of reach. One student at my school has been in numerous professional productions already, and will probably be famous someday. Besides plays, I also went to a baseball game this week, in which one of my students pitched five innings in relief, gave up only one run, and earned a win. Pretty sweet.

6. Plot and plan for my upcoming trip South to work once again in the history program I've been involved with for two summers now.

7. Watch Red Sox baseball on occasion, though time is pressing.

Guess that's it. I won't bother to go back again and correct mistakes, so forgive the rambling nature of this post. But I have a video game that beckons, and there are only twenty four hours in the day. Summer is good, if too short. But on the other hand, I will enjoy immensely getting back into the classroom. So it's all good.

If You Want a Good Laugh

If you want a good laugh, google my first and last name in quotation marks. You'll find I have made it onto the "ratemyteacher" website. I must claim this is a rare feat. Of the hundred and fifty or so teachers at my school, I think only about twenty of them have any ratings. And another of my students has posted a caricature of me online, complete with one of my favorite phrases. The website is on the second page of the google results. I was amused...