It is hard to think of anyone bringing more positive change to public education than Chris Rufo. His latest proposal is pure brilliance; how can anyone object to transparency? At a minimum, parents should be able to know what’s being taught to their children in the classroom. Transparency is a virtue for all of our public institutions, but especially for those with power over children. To that...
Woke Joke Part II: NCSU responds to lawsuit
The university has responded to my lawsuit with a motion to dismiss. You can find their response here.
If Black lives really mattered, you would fund the police and hire a lot of cops
From a forthcoming paper in the American Economic Review: Insights. A team of criminologists has found that every 10 to 17 new cops added by a city police department can be expected to save one black person from being murdered. “There are some people who say, ‘We can invest less in police. They’re not doing much to control crime,’” Chalfin said in a November 23 news release published by Penn...
Greece 2021: Olympia
If you drive the back roads you’re liable to run into this:
Tent protecting the Temple of Apollo Epicurius, a fantastic site on a mountaintop near Olympia. It was low season and we were the only visitors at the site.
Ruins at Olympia
Starting point for runners at the Olympic stadium, with grooves for the left and right feet.
Breakfast view at the Bachhus Taverna
Democrats lost in Virginia because of school closures, CRT not so much
From Byron York’s Daily Memo: So now, Democratic pollsters are doing some basic research. Why did voters reject McAuliffe? What, specifically, did he do wrong? Recently, a Democratic firm, ALG Research, which served as the top pollster for President Joe Biden's campaign, asked those questions in focus groups in the Northern Virginia suburbs and in Richmond. Some of the answers they found...
Greece 2021: Kardamyli
The roadsides are filled with these little chapels. They are either a memorial to someone who died in an accident, or they announce a nearby church or monastery. Along the back roads you will also see memorials to Nazi atrocities in Greece. Kardamyli harbor Video of the backyard of our rental. The owner’s son said the olive trees in the terraced backyard had been in the family for several...
I helped a guy in Germany find his unknown father via genetic genealogy
I’ve done genealogy since I was a kid, and several years ago I uploaded my DNA to MyHeritage; one feature of the website provides me with a list of genetic matches and our relationship. Most of them are quite distant, such as 3rd-5th cousin, but occasionally some close matches appear (e.g., my mother’s first cousin, whom I met years ago, showed up one day in my list of matches). Several weeks...
Greece 2021: Nafplio
Ancient Theatre of the Asklepieion at Epidaurus Ruins of Mycenae Hotel Grande Bretagne in Nafplio View of Nafplio from our hotel balcony; one of the biggest mega-yachts in the world (the Maltese Falcon) was anchored just in front. We managed to get a tour and tasting at the Karonis Distillery; this is the 5th generation owner standing by the tank they use to make ouzo. Each distillery has a...
Yale has almost as many administrators as undergrads!
According to the article, 5,907 undergrads versus 5,000 administrators: In 2003, when 5,307 undergraduate students studied on campus, the University employed 3,500 administrators and managers. In 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic’s effects on student enrollment, only 600 more students were living and studying at Yale, yet the number of administrators had risen by more than 1,500 — a nearly 45...
New analysis demonstrates that NSF grants are increasingly politicized
Almost a third of grants are now woke! The frequency of documents containing highly politicized terms has been increasing consistently over the last three decades. As of 2020, 30.4% of all grants had one of the following politicized terms: “equity,” “diversity,” “inclusion,” “gender,” “marginalize,” “underrepresented,” or “disparity.” This is up from 2.9% in 1990. The most politicized field is...