Why Read the Classics

“Why read the classics rather than concentrate on books that enable us to understand our own times more deeply?” “Where shall we find the time and peace of mind to read the classics, overwhelmed as we are by the avalanche of current events?”  Italian writer Italo Calvino (1923-1985) offers compelling answers to these questions in a marvelous essay entitled “Why Read the Classics?” To answer this If you love books, Read more

Socrates Where Are You Now?

In explaining why our democracy and our institutions of learning need Socrates’ commitment to self-examination in order “to fulfill the promise of democratic citizenship,” University of Chicago professor Martha Nussbaum notes that “Our democracy, like ancient Athens, is prone to hasty and sloppy reasoning, and to the substitution of invective for real deliberation” (Cultivating Humanity, page 10).
Pulitzer-Prize winner Leonard Pitts, Jr., offers an especially clear example of this substitution in Read more

Cultivating Humanity: Educating World Citizens

On this election day, a day in which citizens of my town are burdened with the task of going to the polls to approve another school levy just to keep up with the rising cost of doing business, a reflection on the important role education plays in our democracy:
In the introduction to her learned and thought-provoking treatise, Cultivating Humanity:  A Classical Defense of Reform in Liberal Education, law and philosophy Read more

Auditory Processing Disorder

Talk-show host Rosie O’Donnell has lent some star power to raising awareness of auditory processing disorder.  Check out the NYT article:

“Little-Known Disorder Can Take a Toll on Learning.”

Have a wonderful weekend,

Tim

Unplugging, Take II

Still on my Thoreau kick.  If the taste you got of Thoreau in 10th grade slaked your thirst, stop reading here.
For those of you who can’t get enough of Walden, here’s a little hit from “Where I Lived And What I Lived For,” taken from a very cool web site which allows one to search for favorite passages:
“Let us spend one day as deliberately as Nature, and not be thrown Read more

Unplugging

“Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing it is not fish they are after.”  –Henry David Thoreau
I did something on our spring break vacation which has become all but taboo these days.  Out fishing for an hour one afternoon, I left my cell phone . . . sssh!, don’t tell . . . in the car.  It may seem a small act of personal liberation, but it’s Read more

The Treasured Wealth of the World, or, How I Assembled a Respectable Personal Library for $5 a Bag!

“Books are the treasured wealth of the world and the fit inheritance of generations and nations.”—Henry David Thoreau

“There is more treasure in books than in all the pirate’s loot on Treasure Island. –Walt Disney
From the hundreds of messages1 from adoring fans begging me to get back in the groove, I know that you know I’ve been away for a while.  To be precise, I was actually out of town Read more

Are You Paying Attention?

If the prophets broke in
through the doors of night
and sought an ear like a homeland—
Ear of mankind,
overgrown with nettles,
would you hear?
If the voice of the prophets
blew
on flutes made of murdered children’s bones
and exhaled airs burnt with
martyrs’ cries—
if they build a bridge of old men’s dying
groans—
Ear of mankind
occupied with small sounds,
would you hear?
–Nellie Sachs, Nobel Laureate (1966)
Today is Holocaust Remembrance Day.  I invite you to join me today in redoubling our Read more

What If I Don’t Want to Believe in Climate Change

Here’s one thing that climate change skeptics and I have in common:  Neither they nor I want devastating climate change to be for real.  That’s about where we stop seeing eye-to-eye, however.  I was stunned, for example, to see Jim Tankersley’s recent article, “Global Warming Skepticism Rising in the GOP,” reprinted in my local paper on Sunday, March 14.
The article reports on grassroots efforts—despite scientific data that suggests we’re gas-guzzling Read more

Boost Your SAT Scores on the Beach

According to a recent article on Cincinnati.com, Cincinnati Public Schools this spring will administer the ACT to every one of its roughly 2,060 juniors.
According to the article, Cincinnati school officials are gambling that offering the test to all juniors will put college on the radar of students who have not yet given it much thought.
“By offering the test on campus, we’re saying we believe you can go to college,” Eric Read more