If She Needs Us, Swift Must be Desperate
In fact, that Jane thought to hop aboard the whirlybird rather than log valuable state time sitting on Route 93 tells me she’s a pretty smart cookie. And the governor must agree, or he wouldn’t have named Swift the state’s "education czar." We can only hope she doesn’t end up like many of history’s other czars, which is to say, shot by Bolsheviks.
One of the first things Czar Swift did in her new position was call for volunteer tutors to work with the 30,000 students expected to fail this year’s MCAS exam. As you may have heard, the MCAS exam has been controversial, in that the kids taking it tend not to know many of the answers. Somehow, the state has missed the obvious solution to this problem, which is to make the questions easier.
But barring that plan, the tutor idea is a good one. The only problem is, where will they come from? One suggestion is college students, but it seems to me the reason we need the MCAS in the first place is because so many students were able to get into college without really knowing anything. Asking these college students to now be tutors is sort of like asking for batting tips from the Philadelphia Phillies.
That means it’s up to us normal working people to step up and help. My only concern is that the general population has about as much intuitive ability as the people here in my newsroom, where it takes about eight of us working in tandem, sometimes for hours on end, to figure out how to remove a scrunched-up piece of paper from the copy machine.
Still, I’m willing to do my part. In fact, here are some of my suggestions as to how to approach the exam, using actual questions from the fourth- and eighth-grade tests. I was going to use the 10th- grade test, but I couldn’t figure out how to download it from the Department of Education Web site.
1) What is the cause of most earthquakes?
A. the rotation of the Earth
B. the direction of the wind
C. the pull of earth’s gravity
D. the movement of plates on Earth’s crust
This is a very tricky question, in that, as everybody knows, the cause of most earthquakes is giant monster worms. But since that isn’t a choice, you need to use process of elimination. There are many ways to do this — Regis recommends you "go with your gut" — but the best rule of thumb to follow is: The answer with the most words in it is probably right. So here, I’d go with "D."
2) A dish of sugar water was left on a window sill. One week later, there were only sugar crystals left in the dish. The best explanation for the appearance of sugar crystals is
A. some of the water was absorbed by the dish.
B. the air condensed.
C. the light shining on the window sill produced more sugar.
D. the water evaporated.
Again, very tricky, particularly given that several key pieces of information are missing. For instance, was the dish made of a sponge-like material? Is the window facing a nearby sugar factory? What planet is the window on, and what are the atmospheric conditions on said planet? I’d refuse to answer this one and write a stern letter to the DOE.
3) Melinda looked out her window one night and saw a very bright star just over the top of a tree. Late that night she looked out and the star was gone. Which best explains what happened?
A. Earth turns so the stars seem to move.
B. Some stars only shine for a few hours each night.
C. The star must have burned up.
D. Some stars move faster than others.
For this one, it’s important to have done some research on stars — specifically, on the lyrics to the 1975 Bad Company song "Shooting Star," which go, "Don’t you know, don’t you know, don’t you know that you are a shooting star, don’t you know, woah yeah, don’t you know that you are a shooting star, yeah, and all the world will love you just as long, as long as you are, a shooting star."
Actually, that didn’t help at all, but it did make me want to dig out my old three-quarter-sleeve Foghat jersey.
4) Joelyn has decided to save $12 a week to buy a stereo system costing $125. Which expression shows how much she will still have to save after n weeks?
A. 125 + 12n
B. 125 - 12n
C. (125 + 12)n
D. (125-12)n
Clearly none of these are the correct answer, because as anyone with a first-grade education knows, n is not a number.
Of course, this is just a small sampling of the many questions we here in the general population could help students answer, thus making Swift’s plan a success. Now we just need to figure out how to find time in our busy schedules to do it.
After all, think of all that time we’re stuck sitting in traffic.