Balance.

I decided to start a blog to remember the last year of my life before I got married. What it was like planning a wedding and making decisions that I probably don't particularly care to make. What I did for fun during the year. Different feelings that have been on my heart. Then I thought how fun would it be if Kevin joined in.... and what do I get? The plain as day realization that boys and girls are completely opposite and yep, we will never write about similar things. Ha. I am a girl. I am emotional and write about things on my heart. He is a boy. A realistic boy who writes about things on his mind. Analytical brain verses my creative, feeler brain. Good thing that for the rest of my life he will be a boy and I will be a girl and we will balance each other out with creative verse analytical thoughts. My highest highs and lowest lows and his always staying even keel in the middle. I'm glad God made boys and girls and I am glad that I have found the one to stand opposite me and balance me out. It's a good thing.

School.

Question: How can we make society more educated and productive?

Answer: Get rid of ...Schools?

Ok, not exactly. But it is unfortunate that greedy investors and lobbyists will spend millions brainwashing kids to think that if they don't go to school/college they will somehow fail out of life. The following are 3 myths that I hope will shed light on our modern definition of this thing we call education.

1. The Department of Education (DoED) is crucial:

October 17, 1979, education in our country drastically changed with the formal establishment of the DoED. Ever since, education has become the most prominent "social policy" in our nation forcing every human to become a cookie-cutter mold of the next. The DoED has done nothing more than to expand America's debt hundreds of billions, all while de-inspiring and de-motivating pliable young minds. The DoED's approach to education has punished the student who was blessed with high energy (thus doesn't have a preference for sitting and learning one subject for hours on end). The DoED also has punished the students who are not good standardized test takers, yet were blessed with a myriad of other talents. All of this has resulted in many kids with diminished confidence and low self-worth.

In the 1980 presidential election President Reagan ran on a Republican ticket that was pushing the dissolution of the DoED. Unfortunately, it never came to pass because of a democratic majority in congress. However, if the passion could revitalize, the presidents and the congress could actually work together for once, and the DoED was abolished it would mean we just found a way to save $71 Billion per year on the national budget and perhaps just a fraction of that money could be given to the states to handle education locally. For goodness sake it is not the distant federal government that lives in our towns, goes to our churches, knows us personally, and attends PT meetings. But THEY know what's best for our kids, not the local agencies, right? Wrong.

2. Only the "A" students are successful.

Every subject, in every college, is way to vast for the most intellectually gifted of students to learn perfectly in the short semesters they study. For a law student to say he has mastered the subject of law after 3 short years of studying centuries of legal theories, evolution and dicta is like saying I counted every rain drop in the thunderstorm this afternoon. It just isn't possible. This is true for medical students, science majors, mathematics or engineering students, et cetera.

A professor years ago addressed my class on the first day of school. He grabbed his chin and asked "Who in here are "A" students?" A few proud nerds had their moment in the sun as they wildly threw up their hands. "Good, good. Now, who in here are "C" students?" Another group of kids, indifferent to the judgements delivered by their classmates sheepishly raised a hand and rolled an eye. The class was stunned, and some offended as the professor sincerely exclaimed "All you "A" students look around at the students that now have their hands up, these are the men and women whom you will be working for in the near future!" The professor understood the value of student abilities beyond the "cramming and regurgitating" trait which is modern education. No exam ever administered, has been able to test the ability of long-term subject retention.

So, even the "A student", without the ability to be a life-long learner, is no further ahead of a "C" student than a newborn is ahead of an infant. Which leads me to the final myth about higher education.

3. School teaches students to be leaders, lifelong learners, and innovators:

This is just all kinds of false. Partly because there are so many disinterested teachers out there. All school does is introduce you to a subject. Even "Entrepreneurial" majors don't teach students to be innovators, critical thinkers and inspiring leaders. That has never been the job of education. It always, and forever will be the job of the family and church. The short of it is this: law school teaches you to be a junior associate at a law firm, not to be a leader and start your own firm. Likewise, a marketing major will teach you the standards of current marketing strategies and advertising forces, it doesn't teach you a method for creating new innovative marketing strategies. That would be better left to the Mark Zuckerberg's (Facebook-college dropout) and Larry Page's (google-college dropout) of the world. To be a life-long learner you must find daily inspiration in life. People can teach about the benefits of life-long learning, but it is up to you to truly be able to learn it (Tip: read the inspired word of God in the Bible)

Proposal: Abolish the DoED and make primary education a function of local and state governments. Prohibit "for-profit" schools of any kind (see previous blog "gainful employment"). Implement more ways in which students can hold apprenticeships in specific trades. An example of apprenticeships is this: I have learned more about the law in a short 3 months of working in a law firm than I have in the previous 2 years of law school. Which only leads me to rationally conclude that I would learn more about practicing law if I could work as an apprentice for 3 years than sitting in a stuffy classroom while I'm force fed nothing but instructions and semi-practical legal theory. Analogy- how do you learn how to play Monopoly? Do you read the instructions? I have, it is the single most complicated piece of literature I have ever seen. Or do you just up and start playing? Exactly.

-KG

FirstSex.

You get to do that when you are married. My parents never taught me anything about it but I learned about it on my own. The kids in middle school told me all about it. But I'm not here to talk about the "how"...or "why"...or "who." Because the obvious answers to those are; the way everyone else does it, because i'm in love, and Amanda, respectively.

Im more interested in discussing the when and where. There is a long outstanding debate, and to keep it clean for the children I'll put it this way, Airport hotel? or Honeymoon destination? There are critical pros and cons to be weighed for either option. Most critically, Airport hotel is sooner. And I believe I have already submitted my due diligence in waiting long enough. Also, "it" could be made to be a part of the whole wedding ceremony and festivities. Unfortunately, those pro's that are in support of the airport hotel are also the cons for the honeymoon destination, and vice versa.

The ultimate advantage for the honeymoon destination is that it is, well, the honeymoon destination. Additionally, this likely means tropical weather with endless privacy, bottles of wine with a delicious feast afterwards. All of which are sure to make for an unforgettable experience! And to be honest, 24 years...what's one more day. Right?

It has been great to post about this! I'm sure I have affirmatively embarrassed Princess Amanda on this blog and will pay for it later. Until then, signing out, and if your married, go have sex.

KG

Gainful Employment / Titans

I recognize that those subject haven't the slightest thing to do with each other. But for the sake of not creating 2 separate blogs I will include them both on this post. Props to my honey for knowing just how to get me to start posting on here (mention football).

It agreement with Amanda it will be a fun football game this sunday. The Titans are forced with an extra challenge of having to prepare for 2 radically different offensive schemes, one led by the fleet-footed Vick and the other by the golden-armed Kolb. The verdict is out on which quarterback will be given the start on sunday.

Flip over the coin and the Philadelphia Fagles, oops, Eagles, will also be challenged not only by the obvious threats of Chris Johnson, but also the apparent resurgence of the Titans receiving core which has torched opposing defenses in recent weeks.

In sum, Titans 31-10. In other football news, Ben Roethlisberger is a closet homo.

Now on to the more important issue of Gainful Employment. If you haven't checked the news lately this hot topic is gaining widespread popularity. While on it's face it may not appear to effect many of you, legislators nationwide are predicting that the passing of the bill (which will be voted on in the coming months) will have a profound effect on our nations educations system.

The brief overview is this: The Department of Education, in response to a swell in the number of grad students NOT GETTING JOBS after graduation, is attempting to regulate for-profit schools (including for-profit professional schools). The regulations will force these schools to deploy more open and honest policies of publishing actual facts such as graduation rate, first-year employment, drop-out rates, etc. The regulations will also be more strict in handing out absurd amounts of federal money to kids who are obviously not going to succeed at the for-profit schools. The for-profit CEO's of these schools are fighting this tooth-n-nail because this means they personally will profit less at the expense of poor johnny who can't even figure out how to zip up his own pants yet he was granted $140K by the Fed after he was accepted to for-profit law school or medical school.

I would urge you all to learn as much as you can about this issue and if you have a chance to vote on this issue, please help continue to rebuild our nations morals and vote in favor of Gainful Employment. To embark on some self-learning you can check out 75 Federal Registry 43616 or click this link

http://www2.ed.gov/legislation/FedRegister/proprule/2010-3/072610a.pdf

Manda-- Sorry for being political. love you!

house dividedddd

Side note before I begin... our save the dates came in the mail and now my friends you can just put us up on your refrigerators and enjoy until MAY 29 2011! YES.

okay next... so when Kevin and I get married we are going to be a house divided. YEP. He loves himself some titans and I LOVE myself some EAGLES. I was born and raised a dire hard Philadelphia sports fan of everything. The eagles, the phillies, the76ers (but I hate basketball) and the flyers. Except sometimes I actually do really like the predators and doing fang fingers at the games. BUT, we will never be cheering for the same team. Sometimes I think we both secretly pretend we are cheering for each other's teams when they are playing, but I think it's only because we want to be sweet to each other, but really we could care less. He told me the other day that our kids would cheer for his teams because he is the man and the kids always side with the man when it comes to sports. I think that is FALSE. My children will be wearing tiny green eagles jerseys and singing

Fly Eagles Fly, On The Road To Victory. Fight Eagles Fight, Score A Touchdown 1-2-3. Hit 'Em Low. Hit 'Em High. And We'll Watch Our Eagles Fly. Just kidding, but maybe.. I will give them a chance to make their own sweet decisions. Just know that mommy buys the presents children. :) Yep.. let the life long different team rivalry begin. I love you Kevin Gavigan. :)

best days are photo days.

I can spend hours upon hours in fields of cotton, on top of barns, petting pigs/horses, and feeding COWS (which are my heart y'all) all for the love of photos with my BFF for LYFE rebecca june. I mean really, we run out in to the middle of streets in DBURG or sit on the edge of the Mississippi River, or drive in snow storms just to capture an image that we hope depicts the lives we live and the fun we have together. Photo days are the BEST days and I am so glad the RJH loves them as much as I do. When we were driving today Kevin and I were talking on the phone and I explained to her how Kevin has said he has no desire to run in a field of wildflowers and take pictures with me... sad for me but I guess it's not so manly after all. Can't wait for the fun we are going to have taking engagement pictures and wedding pictures. It's like pulling teeth, but it will be so worth it in the end. I showed Rebecca, Kallima Photography today and she said it's perfect. I said I know. Been stalking her for 3 years now and I can't wait.