Just to go really off tangent, met a lady on the plane back from Europe, we got along really well. So I went to visit her in crown point Indiana I think it was. She was a teacher and planning to go to Ireland to help foster children from the IRA problems. I was out loading some stuff into my car and we were going to take her Gremlin to FL for a mini vaca before she left. Gal dang a police car pulled up in the drive and asked for ID and why I was there as they kept really close tabs on teachers for possibly immoral conduct. I said I am her cousin, she is leaving at the end of the semester and just helping her move stuff out. She got fired the next Monday. She did not mind, but I guess the cousin thing does not work. We had a great trip!
Got relatives in Crown Point and been to a couple weddings there. I thought it was my imagination that I felt I was being watched the whole time. Big brother lives.
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I was on a search committee for my department at the university where I taught. One candidate lived 55 miles away and said she was going to commute. As far as I was concerned, that was her business until she announced that she wouldnât be able to teach a class before 10:00 a.m. and couldnât teach a class after 2:00 p.m. She didnât get hired.
I was asked to show another candidate around the community and show her different neighborhoods. She asked me where I lived and since we were close to where I lived, I took her past my residence. When I pointed it out , she exclaimed âMy thatâs a chintzy houseâ. This candidate also told us what courses she would and would not teach. We dismissed her as a candidate.
Some folks are destined to never realize why they didnât get the job. I was interviewing for an analyst position and the lady brought the book âHow to Pass an Interviewâ or something like that. She never ever tried to hide the title. When you want someone who can think on their feet you donât want someone just reading answers out of a book.
Thatâs weirdâŠI have at least 10 relatives who are teachers in NY (from Rochester to Syracuse and up to Watertown)âŠOnly ONE I know of lives in the district they teach in. I live on a Boarder town in NH, and many of the teachers here live in MA.
You have to compare teachers salaries to industry if you want the best teachers. Most teachers in Math and Science are way way way behind industry. Thatâs why itâs very tough to find qualified teachers in those fields. I applaud NY for having decent wages for teachers. Here in NH if you graduate from college to become a teacher you either have to have a spouse that works (duel income), or you live at home with your parents for a few years to finally start making enough money to live on your own. Education is always way down on the list of priorities in our local and federal governments. What a damn shame.
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Public education being a huge government proposition means that politics is involved with every aspect. A state jr college system seemed interested in hiring me some years ago as an instructor and department manager and as I looked into the situation the generous salary and benefits and setting aside my lack of any training as an educator was totally trashed by the multi level political rings that required kissing on both sides of the aisle. Itâs just crazy how the actual objective of adequately educating those who want to be educated is lost in a murky pool of butt kissing politicians.
Sorry to throw a wrench in the discussion, but can we bring this back to cars? Thanks.
One of my relatives is School SuperintendentâŠand one of the nice perks is he gets a new car leased for him every 3-5 years. Itâs a rural school district that encompasses several towns spread out over a few hundred square miles. Heâs spends a lot of his time visiting each of the schools in the district. The last 2 leases have been full-size 4wd SUV. The district is in one of the worse snow county in the country.
The job offer was in the automotive vo-tech department Miss Carolyn so I thought it was a good post.
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To bring it back to cars, some years ago our superintendent was a woman. She went down to the local GM dealer looking for a new car. The salesman finally told her to come back with her husband. Knowing her I laughed myself sick. At any rate that kid got an earful and she made it clear that she was the one buying the car and not her husband.
Yeah, you still see that today, except itâs in pricing and needless or overpriced repairs. They try it on me, too⊠I guess I look clueless.
Iâm always astonished at how obtuse some car salespeople can be. The last time my wife was looking for a car, she was considering Ford (against my advice). The salesman asked what sheâd driven so far. âA Civic and an Elantra.â
âOh, those Japanese cars. Just like the people. Canât tell 'em apart.â
Yeah, first, Hyundai is Korean, moron, second, thatâs racist, and third if youâd been paying attention when you saw us roll up in an Acura you might have thought twice about making racist Japanese car jokes.
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I dunno but I think Iâd wipe that term from my vocabulary. It is so over-used it has become a meaningless term. Yes we must guard against stereotypes but the truth is they are developed by general observations but certainly not attributed to everyone. Things like they are smart, short, industrious, quiet, sexy, tall, frugal, spry for his age, and on and on are all stereotypes for certain groups both positive and negative. Of course whites are all bad today-thatâs a joke son. Donât take it so seriously.
Car salespeople are a particular breed. Iâm not sure where they fit but somewhere below lawyers, journalists, politicians, and maybe above ticket takers. They are not car experts, or human relations experts. Of course thatâs a stereotype and I have run across some very good ones and others that didnât know what kind of fluid electric steering uses. At a Buick dealer once, I overheard a daily sales meeting while waiting for my car. It was truly disgusting the way they talked about their customers. I was really surprised because the owner was one of the nicest most honest people and saw him in church every Sunday. So I just donât worry about them and expect they arenât people Iâd socialize with mostly.
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There are several different kinds of Stereotyping. One is RACIST/OffensiveâŠthe other isnât.
Those are observations about individuals. Itâs when you apply those observations to a specific group/race of people is the problem. Itâs called PRE-JUDGING (or prejudice) based on your observation. Even if you lived in an extremely gang ridden community and were mugged by every person of color you metâŠby saying that ALL people of color are muggers - IS STILL RACIST. Youâre pre-judging a whole group of people based only the people youâve met/know. This world would be better off if we treated people as individuals instead of groups.
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Yeah I agree, but then there is this thing called statistical sampling.
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What does statistically sampling have to do with how people are treated? As someone who actually taught statistics in college while receiving my MS in applied Mathematics is curious.
Doesnât have anything to do with how people are treated. It has to do with random sampling of products or people to make judgments about the general population.
But my original statement was about How we treated people.
This world would be better off if we treated people as individuals instead of groups.
You then replied with
Yeah I agree, but then there is this thing called statistical sampling.
You only select parts of what you said. And you arenât saying that all gang members are muggers are you? So if you got mugged by everyone you met, that would be a pretty good statistical sample of âthose in your communityâ but not everyone. Being a statistics expert, you should know that would be a pretty good sample. But a quality control sample of products from one plant would really have nothing to do with the quality of the products in another plant, yes? So going from a sample in one community to âallâ people is silly for someone with a statistics background to say. What happens in Baltimore is unrelated to what happens in Omaha. But my whole point way back is that the charge of âracistâ has been so over-used for everything someone doesnât like or agree with that it has become a meaningless term.
Back to the original statement of all Asians and Asian cars looking alike, I donât agree that all Asians look alike, but I do agree that a lot of the cars look alike. In fact like I said before it looks like some of the body panels would be inter-changeable. Itâs hard to tell the difference except for the small ID plates. But go ahead and take it to whatever level you want, but go out to the parking lot and do a statistical random sample of the Asian cars out there and see how many look alike.
And that is why youâd fail my class. The sample rate is no where NEAR large enough to make any valid conclusions. Not even close.
I donât think itâs used enough or ignored completely. We have a whole political party thatâs ignoring blatant racism from their leaders.
Saying that cars from a certain region look alike is one thingâŠ
If you canât see the statement made by the salesman âOh, those Japanese cars. Just like the people. Canât tell 'em apart.â - isnât racistâŠthen thatâs a problem.
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