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“Even today in the modern, developed world, surveys show that parents still prefer to have a boy rather than a girl…Yet it is time for parents to think again. Girls may now be a better investment.

“Girls get better grades at school than boys, and in most developed countries more women than men go to university. Women will thus be better equipped for the new jobs of the 21st century, in which brains count a lot more than brawn. In Britain far more women than men are now training to become doctors. And women are more likely to provide sound advice on investing their parents’ nest egg: surveys show that women consistently achieve higher financial returns than men do.

“Furthermore, the increase in female employment in the rich world has been the main driving force of growth in the past couple of decades…Add the value of housework and child-rearing, and women probably account for just over half of world output. It is still true that women still get paid less and few make it to the top of companies, but, as prejudice fades over the coming years, women will have great scope to boost their productivity – and incomes.

“Governments, too, should embrace the potential of women. Women complain (rightly) of centuries of exploitation. Yet, to an economist, women are not exploited enough: they are the world’s most under-utilised resource; getting more of them into work is part of the solution to many economic woes, including shrinking populations and poverty…

“Likewise, in developing countries where girls are less likely to go to school than boys, investing in education would deliver huge economic and social returns. Not only will educated women be more productive, but they will also bring up better educated and healthier children. More women in government could also boost economic growth: studies show that women are more likely to spend money on improving health, education, infrastructure and poverty and less likely to waste it on tanks and bombs.”

To read the complete article, click on http://www.economist.com/opinion/PrinterFriendly.cfm?story_id=6800723

“THE AGONY OF AMERICAN EDUCATION
How per-student funding can revolutionize public schools
By Lisa Snell, Director of Education Policy, Reason Foundation”

Our title and quotes below are from text posted on REASON’s Internet site in April 2006:

“Imagine a city with authentic public school choice – a place where the location of your home doesn’t determine your child’s school. The first place that comes to mind probably is not San Francisco. But that city boasts one of the most robust school choice systems in the nation…

“San Francisco is one of a handful of public school districts across the nation that mimic an education market. In these districts, the money follows the children, parents have the right to choose their children’s public schools and leave underperforming schools, and school principals and communities have the right to spend their school budgets in ways that make their schools more desirable to parents. As a result, the number of schools parents view as ‘acceptable’ has increased greatly in the last several years..

“Give credit to Arlene Ackerman, San Francisco’s superintendent of schools since 2000. Ackerman introduced the weighted student formula, pioneered in Edmonton, Alberta, in 1976, which allows money to follow students to the schools they choose while guaranteeing that schools with harder-to-educate kids (low-income students, language learners, low achievers) get more funds. Ackerman also introduced site-based budgeting, so that school communities, not the central office, determine how to spend their money. Finally, she worked to create a true open-enrollment student assignment system that gives parents the right to choose their children’s schools…

“The more students a school attracts, the bigger the school’s budget. So public schools in San Francisco now have an incentive to differentiate themselves from one another. Every parent can look through an online catalog of niche schools that include Chinese, Spanish, and Tagalog language immersion schools, college preparatory schools, performing arts schools that collaborate with an urban ballet and symphony, schools specializing in math and technology, traditional neighborhood schools, and a year-round school based on multiple-intelligence theory. Each San Francisco school is unique. The number of students, the school hours, the teaching style, and the program choices vary from site to site…

“San Francisco’s system produced significant academic success for the children in the district. Miraloma Elementary, the school Caroline Grannan [parent and public-school advocate] would not consider for her children in 1996, has seen test scores for second-graders in English language improve from 10 percent proficient in 2003 to 47 percent proficient in 2005. ‘Now’s the time to get in on the ground floor of one of the most up-and-coming schools in San Francisco,’ one Miraloma parent recently wrote in an anonymous review for greatschools.net. ‘Student achievement is rising, parent involvement is soaring and the entire community is working well together to improve the quality of every aspect of the school…Parents are moving their kids from private schools to Miraloma because they like what they see…

“Every grade level in San Francisco has seen increases in student achievement in math and language arts, and the district is scoring above state averages. (Fifty percent of San Francisco seventh-graders were proficient in language arts in 2005, compared to 37 percent proficiency statewide.) Even high schools, the most intractable of all schools, appear to be improving. Mission made Newsweek’s 2005 list of the nation’s top 1,000 high schools…

“As a result of these changes, parents are returning to public schools. In Seattle, the public school district has won back 8 percent of all students from the private schools since implementing the new system. In Edmonton, where it all began, the public schools are so popular that there are no private schools left. Three of the largest private schools voluntarily became public schools and joined the Edmonton district…”

To read the entire five-page article, click on http://www.reason.com/0604/fe.ls.the.shtml

“WHY DO RAINBOWS FORM INSTEAD OF JUST STRAIGHT BANDS OF COLORS? AND WHY DO THEY APPEAR TO TOUCH THE GROUND?”

“Jeff Waldstreicher, a meteorologist with NOAA’s National Weather Service, provides the answer on the SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN web site:

“…In the case of a rainbow, when sunlight hits a raindrop it does not move as fast as it does through the water as it does through the atmosphere, so it turns a little. The light then turns again as it moves out of the raindrop and back into the air at its original speed. When light hits the rain at just the right angle, it is refracted through a raindrop and into our eyes, causing us to see a rainbow…

“A typical raindrop is also spherical and therefore its effect on sunlight is symmetrical about an imagined axis connecting the center of the drop with the sun. Because of this symmetry, so long as the raindrop is viewed along a line of sight that makes a 40- to 42-degree angle with the direction of the sun, the various colors of light will be visible. Thus, the rainbow is actually a circle centered on the point directly opposite the sun from the observer – the so-called antisolar point – with an angular radius of 42 degrees.

“We don’t actually see the full circle because the earth gets in the way. The closer the sun is to the horizon, the more of the circle we see. Right at sunset, we would see a full semicircle of the rainbow with the top of the arch 42 degrees above the horizon. The higher the sun is in the sky, the less the rainbow is visible above the horizon.”

To read the complete article, click on http://www.sciam.com/, then on “ASK THE EXPERTS”, and then on our title.

“ANYONE FOR TENNIS, AT THE AGE OF 150?”
from Ronald Bailey, REASON’S SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT

“…By the middle of this century humanity may see 20 to 40-year leaps in average life spans; human bodies and minds enhanced by advanced drugs and other biotherapies; the conquest of most infectious and degenerative diseases; and genetic science that allows parent to ensure that their children will have stronger immune systems, more athletic bodies and cleverer brains. Even the possibility of human immortality beckons.

“Researchers are making progress on figuring out why our bodies age and are discovering pathways to prevent it. Companies such as Elixir, based in Boston, are hot on the trail of compounds called sirtuins that retard ageing in simple organisms and which they believe will work for people, too. Other researchers are pursuing techniques to renew and replace the tiny cellular powerplants called mitochondria that most gerontologists think are the cause of the damage that leads to ageing.

“Stem-cell researchers are getting ever closer to working out how to create perfect transplants to replace damaged tissues and organs. The Geron Corporation, for example, plans later this year to begin experiments using human embryonic stem cells to repair broken spinal cords…”

To read the complete article, click on http://www.reason.com/rb/rb041106.shtml

USED BOOK SALES

We offer for sale all used books listed at http://www.vardaman.com/booksale.php.

OUR SYSTEM FOR BUYING OR SELLING LAND OR TIMBER

For details, click on http://www.vardaman.com and then on the red horizontal bar “Buy/Sell Land/Timber.” You can offer to buy or sell timber or land. You must post the general area of your interest; be sure to include the state. You must also post your E-MAIL ADDRESS and the URL of your Internet site. Our tracking report will not report the number of visitors UNLESS you enter your URL. If you are selling, you should post the name of the tract. When you have entered all details, click on “Submit,” and what you just entered will appear on our Internet site at the bottom of the page under the red horizontal bar “Buy/Sell Land/Timber.” Be sure to check for and correct errors.

For each tract posted and whose owner posted his URL, we charge $0.50 for each visit his ad receives. On each Friday at 0900 Central Time, we will e-mail him a bill for $0.50 for each visit his ad received during the week just ended. You can pay us by e-mailing the money to “Vardaman Virtual Forestry Company” at PayPal or mailing it to P.O. Box 12293, Jackson, MS 39236. We will delete your ad when your payments cease.

SELL LAND

For tract in AL, send e-mail to landsale@larsonmcgowin.com

BUY LAND

For tracts in SC, send e-mail to loblolly@surfbvi.com
For tracts in SC, send e-mail to rich@CHRISTOPHERRADKO.COM
For tracts in MA, send e-mail to leonelmtz65@hotmail.com
For tracts in OR, send e-mail to 7200moore@charter.net
For tracts in OR, send e-mail to ptodd@orclinic.com
For tracts in FL, send e-mail to hot63vdub@hotmail.com
For tracts in TX, send e-mail to reedkimbley@hotmail.com
For tracts in TX, send e-mail to gilmerboy2@yahoo.com
For tracts in GA, send e-mail to RNP1003@aol.com
For tracts in AL, send e-mail to jbeale@sterlingmanagement.com
For tracts in TN, send e-mail to robmccarthy@redstoneproperties.com
For tracts in SC, send e-mail to south607@acun.com
For tracts in AR, send e-mail to biglikebuda@yahoo.com
For tracts in SC, send e-mail to aaron.langston@cssemnf-wiraq.usmc.mil

BUY TIMBER

For tracts in AR, send e-mail to dyork@digitalpassage.com
For tracts in IL, send e-mail to psftimber@hotmail.com
For tracts in MT, send e-mail to crawlings@mtcdc.org

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