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Petition fun
Thursday, May 13th, 2010 10:58 amI regularly check our government's official e-petition page. It's a political barometer as good as any to find out what are the burning issues on my compatriots' minds, and naturally these days, there are petitions on our laws concerning sexual crimes and sexual predators, petitions against financial bail-outs in the Euro-zone, but there is also this:
"Stop funding the expensive and unpredictable LHC experiments at CERN and work to include clear objectives for the conservation our landscapes, biodiversity, health and human dignity into the application guidelines!" - For those of you who speak German, do click on that link and read his explanation of why we need to support his petition and find out why LHC experiments are esoteric.
There's also a petition which has 2k supporters right now, 2k too many in my eyes - a petition to decriminalise homeschooling in Germany, which I am really not a fan of. I like our compulsory school attendance and having children educated by professionals trained and paid to do so rather than their parents - unless these parents are trained to do so.
His main arguments are the lack of ethical and moral values students are taught public schools, mobbing, violence, negative socialisation, lack of motivation, falling standards, lack of support according to the student's individual aptitude and talents.
While I'm aware that especially for gifted students with gifted and didactically savvy parents this model might be ideal, especially if the child was subject to mobbing and endemic boredom, I doubt that it's a model that ought to be encouraged on a larger scale in Germany right now. It's not a model that's likely to be successful for families without a lot of cultural capital.
Also, I don't know about countries which do allow homeschooling, but I'd like to believe that enough trust in our educational system is warranted to make changes in the system and our institutions a solution even for those who are currently so unhappy with it that they'd like to take their children out of school.
«Einstellung der Förderung des LHC-Experiments an der Großforschungseinrichtung CERN»
Der Deutsche Bundestag möge beschließen, die Förderung des aufwändigen und unabsehbaren physikalischen LHC-Experiments an der Großforschungseinrichtung CERN ab sofort einzustellen und die Richtlinien zur Förderung der Naturwissenschaften um klare Ziele zur Erhaltung von Landschaft, Artenvielfalt, Gesundheit und Menschenwürde zu ergänzen.
"Stop funding the expensive and unpredictable LHC experiments at CERN and work to include clear objectives for the conservation our landscapes, biodiversity, health and human dignity into the application guidelines!" - For those of you who speak German, do click on that link and read his explanation of why we need to support his petition and find out why LHC experiments are esoteric.
There's also a petition which has 2k supporters right now, 2k too many in my eyes - a petition to decriminalise homeschooling in Germany, which I am really not a fan of. I like our compulsory school attendance and having children educated by professionals trained and paid to do so rather than their parents - unless these parents are trained to do so.
«Hausunterricht straffrei stellen»
Hausunterricht oder Homeschooling wird in allen EU Ländern und englisch sprachigen Ländern bereits schon länger mit großem Erfolg praktiziert und erweist sich immer mehr als der Bildungsweg der Zukunft. In Deutschland ist es eine noch weitgehend unbekannte und mit zahlreichen Vorurteilen behaftete Form des Lernens. Die unzureichende Vermittlung von ethischen und moralischen Grundwerten an öffentlichen Schulen, Gewalt und Mobbing, negative Sozialisation der Kinder, fehlende Lernfreude, sinkendes Bildungsniveau, die Unfähigkeit vieler Schulen Kinder individuell zu fördern und ihrem persönlichen Begabungsprofil zu bilden, haben dazu geführt, dass immer mehr Eltern sich Alternativen im bestehenden Bildungssystem wünschen. Bis dato existiert die Schulpflicht in Deutschland statt einer sinnvolleren Lernpflicht. Schule wird somit in Deutschland direktiv verordnet. Eltern, die ihre Kinder selbst unterrichten wollen, müssen mit staatlichen Strafmaßnahmen wie Bußgeldern rechnen und werden somit unnötig kriminalisiert. Es sollte mündigen Bürgern frei gestellt sein wo sie ihren Kindern Bildung zukommen lassen. Alle staatlichen Sanktionsmaßnahmen gegen Eltern, die ihre Kinder selbst unterrichten, sollten aufgehoben werden.
While I'm aware that especially for gifted students with gifted and didactically savvy parents this model might be ideal, especially if the child was subject to mobbing and endemic boredom, I doubt that it's a model that ought to be encouraged on a larger scale in Germany right now. It's not a model that's likely to be successful for families without a lot of cultural capital.
Also, I don't know about countries which do allow homeschooling, but I'd like to believe that enough trust in our educational system is warranted to make changes in the system and our institutions a solution even for those who are currently so unhappy with it that they'd like to take their children out of school.
