NRU, more mish mash

A few pieces from the NYTimes.com sat open on my desktop until I finally got around to finishing reading them.

This is one ... about fear and writing.  I started it thinking about the fear I have to write ...not literally about FEAR.  So, it wasn't what I was expecting, but interesting nonetheless.

If nothing else, the tragedy in Connecticut put violence back on the radar for newspapers beyond the mere reporting that this person was shot or that person was killed.  This is a piece on how Chicago has been working on the issue.

I have endured an awful lot of articles on the *uselessness* of college education.  I read them because it is important part of the discourse on education, in general, and because it illuminates what folks think about how we should educate *those people* -- you know, the ones like me. The purported attacks on university-level education always leave out the notion of personal responsibility (when reporting on loans) and fail to disentangle for-profit from non-profit universities.  If you read them without care, you might be inclined to believe that college is only for training for particular occupations, or that only super brainy, over-thinkers need it.  Frankly, many in the media seem to be pushing the notion that college is just unnecessary for so many lines of work.  So, I read with unique interest a story about a university that has consistently produced Tony winners.  I had, indeed, noted from their IMDB biographies how many actors were graduates of Carnegie Mellon, but I hadn't thought about it in terms of college.  Frequently, one does read the story about the actor who left college to pursue acting, making it seems like college was somehow holding him/her back.  This article, probably unwittingly, demonstrates the power and usefulness of good training ... good, college training.  Makes you want to be more critical of those many other articles decrying the state of the college education, doesn't it?  Perhaps there is value in a liberal arts education. Perhaps there is reason to build up a professoriate in even programs such as those preparing for a life of the stage.

Everyone needs a walk around the new neighborhood ... hope he was able to take in some of the sights before he got carted off to the *hospital*!

I agree with Ruth Bader Ginsburg.  The Supreme Court should have never agreed to hear this case let alone tell the lower courts to take another look.  This young woman is saying that people of color don't need special treatment, but she, as a legacy, is entitled to not only special treatment, but a cut in line.  Someone needs to tell this young woman that even if there were no people of color or from lower socioeconomic status, she would not have gotten in because she could not compete with the other white girls without considering her being a legacy -- at least that is what she intimated with the court case in the first place. To say that I am sick of entitled white girls is a tremendous understatement. 

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I don't really have words that I can live with right now, but I understand the need to reach out in this way as a result of grief.  I struggle with when and how to share here and in other spaces.  But, I cherish the ability to visit my sister and brother's obituary pages because it is as close as I can get.  It is comforting in a way that I cannot explain.  Therefore, I am not surprised that it is not unique to me ... we do all grieve in our own ways, but finding ways to not be alone is apparently something we all want.