Pearblossom Education

"In July of 2023, Washington D.C. passed a bill to cut nearly $64 billion from educational funding." With lower attendance projections and not enough money, “the bill reduces U.S. Department of Education funding to its lowest levels since 2006. These cuts affect both K-12 education and higher education funding, making cuts to federally funded education programs across the board, and certain programs would be totally eliminated as a result” (TexasAft). And here we are, nearly a year later- reaping the consequences. As our school year comes to an end, as do many people’s jobs as districts prepare for enormous budget cuts. Dave Miller from Think Out Loud states that “difficulties mainly stem from inadequate state funding for K-12 public school districts, especially considering inflation and state requirements. Other factors include fewer enrolled students due, in part, to lower birth rates, pensions that need to be paid without allocated funds, higher student needs, and the end ...

Update 6/18: I have been observing and here are some revelations: Artificial Intelligence will never be able to achieve the emotional semantics that a real human has- at least not for now. The words are so scripted, lifeless, data-analytical, which is great for some types of research, but for the meat and potatoes of life- human words bring so much more to the table... And not to mention- plagiarism- on the AI's behalf! This topic was evaluated in a recent news story, when a professor noticed that there were no citations or reference logs in regards to information that the AI was pulling up and displaying. Well, in that case, send me a royalty check if your AI Chatbot happens to pull from my writings...!   "Will AI Replace Human Intelligence?" - 10th Grader So, I had to do some experimentation for myself. The intricate details of how software is established provides pertinent details about the succession of where AI will eventually go. For me, as a native English speaker,...

"We teach because we care." As things get "back to normal," relatively speaking, as does the perspectives that our youth have had during this past school year. This year I was lucky to work at an elementary school in a Kindergarten classroom. Most of my students were not able to attend preschool due to protocols- as many of the preschools had stopped taking incoming students. I could see the positive impact that either preschool or the attentive parent serves for children 3-5 years old. They have seemed to have grasped the concept of writing and numbers much more easily if they had worked with it prior. Though there are always obstacles to overcome in learning, overcoming challenges are actually an integral piece to education. While there were positives about staying home with our families and learning for the past couple of years, there were also downsides. I was lucky to speak to a few students about the impact this has had on their lives, and what they are doing ...