Berkner's rated #17 in the Texas overall Academic Decathlon standings this year, and we're so excited at the chance we have to take another swing at big shiny things to hang around our necks. The competition's later on in February, on the 24th and 25th, so we've got little more than a month to cram for ten big tests. My team is great this year and we're ready for any challenge!
Man, rough day yesterday. We found we were in 9th place in our region overall with our objective tests, behind some very tough schools. We wondered if we would qualify for state.
Then we saw the final score reports after the awards ceremonies, and flipped out! Our speech, interview, and essay scores put us ahead of three other schools, and landed us in a very hard-fought-for sixth place overall. Moreover, our current score would place us at #14 in the state rankings last year, ahead of our #16 overall showing in that year. We definitely improved, but the competition is just as fierce.
We're hopeful we can move ahead to state, and we'll get the final confirmation of where we're bound on Monday. We're very, very hopeful about it!
Regardless of who believes what or lives where, we're all humans and we're all part of the same family. One of my students has a relative in Mecca right now and I hadn't heard if she was all right or not. It's a very close touch of a distant tragedy, and my prayers are with her and her family and those of the other pilgrims. We may have differences, but we all believe in God. We believe God is great and god is merciful. Allahu Akbar, al-Rahman.
May we all remember to take time to cherish our families and friends. They are more precious than any collection of worldly riches.
http://www.lastbestchance.org/
Dude! Get the DVD!
Fred Thompson is at his gruffest greatness in this one and the tension is handled well throughout the script. The video is 45 minutes long and is followed by a 15 minute discussion between Tom Brokaw and Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar. Lugar comes off as still campainging to me, but there's still enough sense in what he says to pay attention.
Overall, they really did their homework for this one except in dealing with the potential firestorm from a nuclear blast - that could significantly exacerbate casualties and damage. But they did an excellent job of discussing the hair-trigger nuclear stances the USA and Russia continue to adopt, with a very real chance of a breakdown on the Russian side leading to a false indication of attack.
No Words portraits and romantic illustrations.
What's there to say?
I got words and pictures.
I got a message board.
Like I said, what's there to say?
