Baby girl (aka Little One) has arrived! What started with a routine appointment led us to rush to the hospital for me to be induced and eventually deliver, but she’s here and is perfect. My friends and family were asked to send prayers for her, I’d love that from you too.

We have this, but kids cancer research was deemed wasteful spending.

We’re not talking enough about the catastrophe that looms when the students who have never been asked to read a book grow up and become the adults who run our country.

For an hour today we didn’t know where one of our cats was. I was way more scared than when I saw 2 rattlesnakes with my toddler yesterday. For context, when I saw the snakes we were at a nature center that was well staffed, and the snakes were moving in the opposite direction.

I love that someone said that. Everyone hates Boomers (understandably) but it is genuinely a problem that the “Great Transfer of Wealth” is not going to be to the children and grandchildren of Boomers. Your parents/grandparents assets will be given to these healthcare companies

“I will do it tomorrow.” said Toad. “Today, I will take life easy.”

My daughter has been in toddler soccer (they mostly run around the field and chase butterflies). It’s 99 degrees outside, but that was still considered “okay to play”. I think not, Soccer Shots.

Teachers are expected to hold a degree. Manage thirty kids at a time. Differentiate for a dozen learning needs. Handle mental health crises. Navigate federal law. Communicate with parents. Write lesson plans. Grade papers. Cover duties. Sponsor clubs. Chaperone events. Buy their own supplies. And be personally responsible for every child's academic outcome. For every dollar a similarly educated professional earns in another field, a teacher earns 73 cents (weekly wages, per EPI — this accounts for the shorter contract year). Even including stronger benefits/pensions, teachers still face a total compensation gap of ~17%. epi.org/publication/the-teac…

“Exposure to respiratory viruses before a baby’s first birthday — when immune systems are immature and before most childhood vaccinations — consistently predicted reduced earnings, education and health decades later.”

More Teachers Name Classroom Management as a Job Stress Than Low Pay edweek.org/teaching-learning…

Honestly, i don't understand this economy when nursing homes are so expensive they bankrupt our grandparents but nursing home aides need to use food banks. daycare is so expensive it eats up one parent's entire paycheck and yet daycare providers only make $10/hr and need second jobs. college costs hundreds of thousands of dollars and puts students into debt for life and yet we have thousands of professors living in their cars. everything we need is astronomically expensive and yet almost none of the money we pay is going towards the people actually doing the work and providing the services.

This is one of the many reasons you don’t see much of me here anymore. I just… care more about other things.

I would love to return to the work force if there was remote work that paid well enough to make it worthwhile, and if people were actually hiring. Problem is, those roles don’t exist in education or entry level policy work. If you know of any send it my way.

This should concern everyone. What we’re doing isn’t working.

Due to a series of unfortunate events (bee sting Zyrtec hangover other factors) I am not feeling well, but still have a toddler to watch. The Mr sat her down and said, “Mommy’s not feeling well, I need you to be nice to Mommy.” Why do I have a bad feeling about this?

Back when I served in the Peace Corps, I had a blog. One of my readers sent me a care package of M&M’s in a jar; they withstood the heat of the Sahel. I think of how good those M&M’s tasted now as I sneak M&M’s out of my daughter’s potty training reward jar.

We need to return to the basics. Teach students to read and write for pleasure. Forget response questions, forget the five-paragraph essay structure, forget constant check-ins and assessments. Let kids read what they want and enjoy the act of reading. Then, from there, you can trickle in some of the classics.

I’ve asked teachers before to do this and I’ll ask again - teachers if you go back to school next year and only work contract hours, working conditions will change by the end of the year. Even if just tenured teachers did this. Our refusal to challenge free labor and just complain about it online, keeps us right where our employers like it.

I’m so thankful I saw the earlier post about Mr Rogers’ Neighborhood being on YouTube, because I hurt my foot (making the bed 🙄) and now we spent part of the afternoon watching the infamous episode on how crayons are made.

WATCH: “We made an enormous mistake allowing the ed tech industry to come in and give every kid a computer, a tablet, an iPad, a Chromebook… and the results are devastating and we need to stop.” @JonHaidt via @andersoncooper @AC360