Isorhythm

Under the proposal approved by the Revenue Laws Study Committee, a group of House and Senate lawmakers, the maximum weekly benefit for someone out of work would drop from $535 to $350. Also, the state would replace its 26 weeks of benefits with a cap of 12 to 20 weeks, based on the health of North Carolina's economy.  -- " Proposed cuts to jobless benefits heading to general assembly ," Laura Leslie for WRAL.com 01/08/2013   Gov. Pat McCrory said Tuesday he's determined to get North Carolina's public university system to focus on teaching what's useful in terms of getting a job and criticized an "educational elite" for offering courses in subjects such as gender studies that don't lead students onto clear career paths. "That's a subsidized course. And frankly if you want to take gender studies that's fine, go to a private school and take it," said McCrory, who graduated from private Catawba College. "But I ...

Mark Binker interviewed each of the three NC governor candidates for WRAL. Among the typical questions regarding funding, private school caps, and teacher pay, Binker posed this question: If you could choose any course to go back and study, what would you want to learn more about? The three candidates -- a Republican, a Democrat, and a Libertarian -- responded as follows. Can you guess their political leanings? "Modern civilization, because you learn a lot from history. . . . We're into a new technical age (like) we have never faced before. But that's true of all history. Every generation, every decade, every century has faced new challenges. How was that handled? ... I continue to learn from that today." "I think we need to teach economics and accounting to more of our kids. . . . I've had to go through more of a self-taught process. I wish I would have had more of that in high school and college."  "I might have taken something along the l...

UNC Chancellor named among top 100 most influencial business leaders I am glad the university is being noticed and that those involved in its management are being recognized for their work, but identifying them as "business leaders" rubs me the wrong way. The danger of associating education with business is that it allows efficiency and profit to overshadow growth and intellectual stimulation. Students become numbers, classrooms become conveyor belts, and educators become cogs in an endlessly churning machine managed increasingly by administators. The CEOs of UNC Health Care and REX Hospital, the chancellor of NC Central University, and the CEO of the NC Museum of Art appear on this list as well. My fears apply to them also.