Stop poaching doctors from poor countries
I’m not sure about the desirability or sustainability of Australia poaching doctors from poor countries to fill vacancies in our depleted medical workforce.
The “great brain drain” it’s known as around the world. The United Kingdom, United States and other affluent nations also recruit third world doctors.
In Australia, more than 10 percent of the medical workforce is made up of foreign-trained doctors, most of them from Asia. Read more
Celebrate Christmas
Christmas exists for a reason. Whether you subscribe to the theory it’s a pagan feast transformed to Christianity, or believe it is the birth of the Messiah, it has a meaning.
Australia has a public holiday for Christmas Day and most Australians are Christian. So why are our public schools averse to celebrating Christmas?
Not only do they avoid celebrating Christmas, apart from wearing Santa hats they virtually pretend it doesn’t exist! Read more
School awards
Hannans Primary School held its end-of-year concert and awards presentation tonight. Young Michael received the excellence award for his Year 6 class. That’s basically the academic prize.
John Paul College is having its awards ceremony on Friday night, which unfortunately I’ll miss because I’ll be in Melbourne visiting Dad.
He’s in hospital tonight with fluid on the heart. Hopefully the doctors can treat that easily enough and he’ll be okay when I get to see him on Saturday.
Kathleen has won an award too. The school wrote to tell us that, requesting her attendance. We don’t know what it is yet. Last year at Hannans Primary she won the Year 7 maths prize.
Budding entrepreneur
Michael (right) attends a special program for advanced learners. Their project this term was to develop an understanding of small business.
The young entrepreneurs had to develop, market and sell their own products. Michael and his friend made fudge and fairyfloss, which they sold today for a profit of more than $100 at a “small business expo”.
The money goes to charity.
Remote car opener
I’ve had an automatic car opener for a decade or so now. Strangely though, I was walking to my car this morning and for the first time I pondered if pressing my button might also open one of the other vehicles in the car park.
I mean, how do these things work? We take them for granted, assume them to be safe and secure, but know nothing about them.
Do they cause brain tumors like mobile phones were once feared to do?
As always when searching for knowledge, I turned to Google and it led me to How Stuff Works. In summary, the keyring device is actually a small radio transmitter. When you push the button it turns on the transmitter and it sends a code to the receiver.
And to answer my question about opening someone else’s door:
Given a 40-bit code, four transmitters and up to 256 levels of look-ahead in the pseudo-random number generator to avoid desynchronization, there is a one-in-a-billion chance of your transmitter opening another car’s doors.
Remarkable!
Mathemagic Computer Tutor
We had a visit today from a salesman for the Australian Institute of Mathematics who demonstrated the company’s Mathemagic computer tutor software for children.
When Juliet told me about the appointment I understood it was a government program to test children at maths, so I was immediately wary and defensive when I learnt it was a commercial product.
I’ve got no opinion on the software. From the demo I would say it clearly has some value and could even be useful. At the quoted price tag of $7530 though (for the complete package) I have no intention of buying it. Read more
PR political correctness
Friday, May 4 is Walk Safely to School Day : a noble cause that’s worth supporting, to be sure. Indeed, it is “a Community Event seeking to promote Road Safety, Health, Public Transport and the Environment” (their inappropriate capitals, not mine).
Like many newspapers across Australia, the Kalgoorlie Miner is pleased to help promote this initiative.
Our photographer went to a local school this afternoon to get a picture.
In doing so she was lectured by a well-meaning soul who insisted on particular requirements. These were conveyed in an official document headlined “2007 WSTSD Photography Guidelines”.
Among the rules were:
- If the child has a ball it should be in a string or plastic bag;
- Parent/carer and children waiting at/walking to a bus stop should be photographed well away from the road;
- Every pedestrian (adults and children) should be shown with head turned to right or left, looking, listening and concentrating on crossing the road, rather than smiling at the camera; etc.
A PDF copy of the document is here (379kb) . These guidelines were obviously designed by the central office for local co-ordinators and were not intended to be presented as rules for the media.
I do wonder though at the necessity of such instructions. Surely commonsense can be allowed free rein.
In our case, to satisfy the cultural diversity clause, a disabled boy was roped in and disrupted proceedings, making the whole scene rather farcical.
Gifted and talented students
Western Australia has a program to address the special learning needs of gifted and talented children in years 5, 6 and 7. It’s called Primary Extension and Challenge (PEAC).
I’m proud to say young Michael was selected for the program last year and again this year.
Today I met with a year 7 group preparing to publish a newspaper. I spoke to them about writing for newspapers and developing content ideas for their target audience.
The co-ordinator told me beforehand they are a group of 12-year-olds going on 16 and that proved to be the case. They were a bright, enthusiastic group who obviously wanted to learn.
It’s great to see the education system identifying these kids and supporting them.
St Michael’s prep class 1972
This is my first school photo: prep at St Michael’s, Traralgon, in 1972. Interesting to note there were 38 children in the class.
I still remember some of the kids. I think 1972 was the only year for me that boys had to wear ties as part of the uniform, or maybe it lasted another couple of years.
After that we wore red skivvies in winter and just the grey shirts in summer.
I only have good memories of primary school.
Dancing princess
Maggie has started dancing lessons. She doesn’t actually do much. Apparently she just sits there, which makes me question the wisdom of spending $70 a term for her to sit on someone else’s floor, but I’m told this is not uncommon for three-year-olds and the whole exercise (sitting, listening and watching) is good for her confidence.
At least she came home today in her new outfit and showed me a mermaid dance she had learnt. The picture shows James giving encouragement.
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