In a message dated 98-05-12 21:34:17 EDT, you write:

<<
 DREITEK <DREITEK@AOL.COM> wrote:
 > OOHHHH!  OK now my dander is up (and you know how painful that can be!)
 > 99% of all teachers are underpaid and grossly overworked!  Teaching is the

 Reminds me of someone's proposal to reduce the cost of education:

 Let's just pay teachers the same as babysitters:

 30 students x 6 hours/day x 200 days/year x $5.00/hour = $180,000/year.

 Many parents treat school as simply a free babysitting service, and don't
 worry about the quality of the education.  But if it were billed the same
 as babysitting service, there wouldn't be any problem getting plenty
 of well-trained teachers.  Instead of a shortage of teachers, there would
 be a lot of competition for the jobs.  We could even reduce the number of
 students per teacher.

 (Note that I am not impugning the quality of the teachers we have now.)

 Heck, maybe they could even teach kids to program PICs.  :-)

 Eric
  >>
Hi Eric

Thanks for your intelligent insight!!!!

(Hey Andy  thats at least two for my side  :)  )

Point in fact:  My kids just did a unit on technology.  They got to play with
limit switches, proximity sensors and even some simple form of
microcontroller. (I don't know what it was exactly because it was simplified
and sealed in a box.)  This is at the sixth grade level.  I thought it was a
great experiance.  My daughter now wants to build a robot.
Cool huh?

Dave