Categories
News and events

Names from the past

The neurosurgeon attacked at Footscray Hospital was Dr Michael Wong, aged 43. I went to school with a Michael Wong; presumably he’d be 43. Digging around, I haven’t found any other detail to confirm or deny it’s the same bloke (there are tons of Michael Wongs, even just in Melbourne, and my usual method of  ... [More]

Categories
Friends and loved ones Retrospectives

VCE exams – good luck everybody

I was 25 when I first had kids. One outcome of this is that my eldest son’s education is running 25 years after mine. The dates don’t match up completely — the main event, the English exam, for me was on 7th November 1988. For this year’s VCE, it’s today. Good luck Isaac, and all  ... [More]

Categories
Retrospectives

25 years on – school reunion

The weather on Friday night wasn’t favourable, but I think we all had a good time at the 25th school reunion in any case. Amusingly, it clashed with the year 9+10 social in the main building. When I first arrived (wearing a black suit) I was asked if I was with Security. It was a  ... [More]

Categories
Retrospectives

Before Facebook and Twitter, we did analogue social networking with paper and pen

Tonight I’m going to a school reunion. Almost unbelievably, it’s 25 years since year 12 in 1988. To mark this occasion I’ve dug out something even older than that. Once upon a time, before Facebook and Twitter, we couldn’t write on each others’ Walls or send a Tweet. On occasion in class, we’d pass a  ... [More]

Categories
Retrospectives

First school day

With most kids going back to school this week, Andrew was blogging about the first day of school. I don’t remember much about my first day either, though I do have a photo that I believe was snapped that morning: Long-haired hippy. It was the 70s though. And I was obviously in a good mood…  ... [More]

Categories
Geek

Laptop vs USB stick for school

Was chatting a while back to a colleague about his kids in high school. One of them ends up carrying an enormous amount of stuff to and from school, including books and sports equipment, but also a notebook (laptop) computer costing a couple of thousand dollars. Giving students laptops makes no sense to me. Compared  ... [More]

Categories
books

The mathematics of school textbooks

It’s all easy in primary school. You send the money in, you get a box of goodies. There’s few textbooks, and almost all are kept at and owned by the school. It gets more complicated and expensive in secondary school. So here’s the scenario: Two kids, two years apart. The school has a secondhand book  ... [More]