Alberta high-school students can take a very valuable lesson from Lynden Dorval's suspension by the Edmonton school board. After refusing to heed repeated warnings and deadlines to complete a certain task - giving the consequence-free mark of "not complete" to assignments not handed in, instead of zeros - he received meaningful disciplinary action. Setting aside whether this suspension and the policy behind it are just or practical, this is the real world and employees get in trouble when they don't follow the rules. He is being punished for holding his students to the same standard of behavior that he is being held to by his superiors, under the umbrella justification of doing what's best for the students. The lesson here, as students who passed their English classes by actually handing things in already know, has to do with irony. Of course being a students is not the same as being an employee, and nor are high schools me...
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Day 58
I do fear, sometimes, that the act of pondering aloud has become a cathartic experience and nothing more . It is hard in this town to find a diversity of thought, because we've all been raised in very similar ways with the same norms, experiences, and conventions. I find that the mightiest opinions of some of the the twentysomethings I know are so damningly narrow that they cannot possibly stand to the slightest breeze of doubt. Often the biggest theory is the thinnest. Our shadows grow long and starved moments before they disappear under the sunset. The natural world has cursed us with its indifference, its vaccuum of conscience in which deeds neither good nor evil subsist. I find the urge to view our species of conscious and conscientious beings as alien. It is as though the world we inhabit was never intended for us to inhabit it. In short, this town is a box. This country, political system, individualistic ideology, humanist dogma, faux rebellion against imagined authority; it ...
So I'm researching both law schools and music schools. It's infuriating that I still, after a whole degree, have no idea what to do. On the one hand I love playing piano, and I'm easily good enough now to get into a music school of my choice. Hell, I was only about 5 wait list spots from music school 5 years ago when my piano level was considerably lower than it is now. On the other hand, I love arguing, debating, philosophy, ethics, and all things of that sort. The LSAT, I believe, will be a breeze. But then there are drawbacks to all choices. If I aim for law school, it can only be one of a few schools, Victoria not included (in all likelihood), because my B+ GPA just isn't very high. I'd probably end up in Edmonton or Manitoba or maybe Dalhausie on the east coast. Boy did I ever work hard every semester, for a few weeks during all the exam and essay due dates. But the rest of the time I just didn't hold much of an interest in regular studying and reading. ...
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