* Where it all started three and a half months ago.

To enlarge text: Hold down the Ctrl button and press the + sign as many times as you wish text to enlarge .

*Please help: create your own PK poster, bumper sticker, and campaign buttons

HELP requested please!  

I tried making one bumper sticker of      VTPK   in Power Point but it wouldn't open in blogger and I couldn't convert it to a jpeg on Word2003.

 Can my tech savvy friends do this ?  Then it could be printed out on paper and scotch-taped to a rear/side window in cars, all FREE (zero cost) as promised in my UN-campaign !

:>)

PK
                      
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* Why Wasn't I Outside the Polls Today Gladhanding Voters ?

This is the ONLY way I can possibly get elected (word of mouth) since I am not creating posters, spending money, accepting donations, kissing babies, twisting arms, or saying what I think voters want to hear.

* LOL----but vote !

* A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose: NOT !

Letters to the Editor

The Valley News

Word count: 350

Dear Editor:

     Years ago I coined this phrase: “Every mother knows you cannot rush a rose.” All parents know that their children grow at different rates. I was always called a “late bloomer”  because I did poorly on tests and was socially awkward,

but somehow I managed to  graduate from four colleges: Ithaca, Kent State, Yale and Middlebury.

     After teaching in Vermont public schools for 25 years I have come to this conclusion: we are harming  “late bloomer” children by subjecting them to standardized tests. Not every Ninth Grade student is ready to be tested on what the pompous Princeton Educational Testing Service and its money-hungry clones have decided are “Ninth Grade  Benchmarks”.  You cannot rush a rose.

     Subjecting all students to standardized testing and then reporting the results on their official  school record and/or  analyzing where they stack up against all other students of the same grade level in America is, at best,  a form of unkindness, and at worst, a form of  cruelty, i.e.  a form of child abuse.

   Why have parents, without a peep,  surrendered to this kind of cruelty?  Because they  have been told by their school boards to do so.  And why have the school boards surrendered?  Because they have been lured by the big bucks of the federal government which says if you want our millions, you must report your students’ “achievements” on standardized tests.

    I advocate a grass-roots parent revolution since the school boards  and the states are too cowardly to stand up to the federal government.  Parents, especially those of late bloomers, should create an organization called BOOOST (Better Opt Out Of Standardized Testing), insisting that their child or children have the right to refuse to take any standardized test.

    Cruelty is cruelty. I still remember how depressed I felt when I got a combined score of 989 on the SAT’s in high school. (1000 was the minimum needed if you didn’t have a foreign language and I had flunked Latin). My fate seemed sealed when my high school guidance counselor told me “You are not college material.”

   Thank goodness my mother raised roses.

Paul D. Keane

Independent Candidate for the Vermont House

* Mr B: Mr. Hockey

Hartford High School Hockey Team, with another "Mr. B," their coach, Todd Bebeau, himself an alumnus of Hartford's hockey program.

* Not lifting a finger-----Word of mouth !

This is the finger I am NOT lifting to get elected.

This is the ONLY way I can possibly get elected (word of mouth) since I am not creating posters, spending money, accepting donations, kissing babies, twisting arms, or saying what I think voters want to hear.

* PKvermonter Hilarious Snippet Contest: "What the heck, what the heck, what the heck!"

GRAND PRIZE:
PKvermonter
Hazardous-Waste-Suit
Worth
 $11.75
Deadline for YouTube submissions: 
October 1st
Winner announced one week later.

CONTEST

Cut a "funny" snippet (3 minutes or less) from the four part interview with Alan Haehnel and PK (next post, below) and edit and turn it into a new  lol YouTube video.  I can see someone taking my "What the heck" comment and juxtaposing it with another random comment of mine and  making it really funny!  Or just repeating it over and over in an idiotic chant !

Post the new snippet YouTube link  in the Comment Section  of the original interview on Paul Keane, Independent's  facebook page so we can view it.

The  # 1 lol snippet will win  

as a 

Grand Prize 

the hazardous-waste-suit 

used in Pkvermonter 2  

Vermont Yankee-Fukushima video, 

worth 

$11.75 !

* Alan Haehnel interviews PKvermonter

PART ONE


PART TWO



PART THREE


PART FOUR

* Selling our Souls to False God of Relentless Efficiency

Letters to the Editor

The Valley News

Word count: 349

Editor:

A recent New Yorker article entitled “Big Med” (think “Big Brother”) describes the coming-world of McDonalds-like hospital chains, and reports a current experiment in which regional off-site control centers, staffed by doctors and nurses, monitor Intensive Care Units in  dozens of hospitals at a time by video camera and computer analysis, often catching errors like an incorrectly inserted breathing tube, or heart medicine whose level of potassium will fatally damage the lungs of  a patient with emphysema.

Virtual surveillance might also work well in schools.

An off-campus control center staffed by teachers and administrators could monitor dozens of schools at a time, alerting on-site administrators to possible drug-deals in hallways, sexual harassment at lockers, bullying in gym, etc.

Think of the benefits if a TV monitor in the wall  alerts the teacher that “Johnny  is text-messaging ; “Sarah threw a spit-ball ” and “the entire class is making faces when teacher turns his/her back to fiddle with the smart-board.”

Imagine what such a universal, unblinking, virtual set-of-eyes will do for the development of our children! They will surrender entirely by first grade any shred of privacy which might have managed to survive the facebook/twitter tsunami, and enter a world in which they expect to be watched every second. We'll call it Don't Fail, Surveil, (DFS).

This is certainly the wholesome life we want for American children as their characters are molded in what used to be called schools, but will soon be called “Information Delivery Systems.”

And it is certainly the hyper-efficient workplace we seek for our doctors and nurses, who  will surrender their  autonomy to the distant digital double-checking of control  centers, and come to think of themselves not as professionals whose judgment is often crucial to life and death, but as understaffed medical practitioners whose number can be trimmed even further as wall-mounted cameras and computers scan hospital crisis centers for every possible mistake.

Let’s call it Skype and Scalpel (S&S), like Bed and Breakfast, or Fish and Chips.

It is certainly worth sacrificing the dignity of professionalism, the privacy of individual freedom, and the joy of childhood to achieve such wonderful efficiency, don’tcha think?  

Paul D. Keane

* Future Attraction

Mr. Haehnel with his grandaughter, Rhea,
and my YouTube dog,
Nemo.

COMING SOON to CATV  

Channels 8 and 10 (Public Access Channels)  

Mr. Haehnel interviews PKvermonter 

(Paul Keane, Independent)

check link for tv guide-schedule
(link)

www.catv8.org

Stay Tuned !

* Judge for Youself

Did a Hartford Meeting I Arranged Scuttle Statewide Teacher Contracts?


"Without that meeting you set up with Dick McCormack,  there would have been a statewide teachers' contract passed in the legislature."
(A retired member of the Hartford High School English Department, 2012)

In the mid 1990's, Governor Howard Dean tried to institute a statewide teachers' contract in Vermont public schools. It looked like he might succeed, and I decided to go into action.

Vermont Governor
Howard Dean

I had been a teacher at Whitcomb High School in Bethel, Vermont and Hartford High School in White River Junction since 1987, and I valued the Vermont tradition of local control of education through school boards negotiating contracts with teachers.

It seemed to me that a statewide contract was too cityfied an idea for the local traditions of Vermont.

One of my students in 9th grade English at Whitcomb High in 1987 had been the son of state senator Dick McCormack.

State Senator
 Dick McCormack

I decided on the basis  of that experience to call Dick and ask him if he would be willing to speak to a meeting of concerned members of the Hartford  community if I arranged to hold such a meeting about the proposed statewide contract. 

McCormack was on the legislature's Education Committee. He readily agreed to meet with us and a date was set.

The meeting took place at night in the Hartford High School Library. The Superintendent of Schools, Carl Mock, attended, as did the Principal of Hartford High and some members of the Board of Education.  Many teachers and community members also attended along with students.

Folks spoke passionately about preserving the tradition of local control, including our Superintendent, Carl Mock.

After the meeting, I walked Dick to the door and asked him to consider the sincerity of the speakers who wanted to preserve Vermont's tradition of local control. He promised he would give it serious consideration.

A few weeks later, when the Education Committee voted on the matter, Dick McCormack's vote was the tie-breaker.

Statewide teacher contracts were voted down and local control would continue to be a hallmark of Vermont's public education system.

One of my colleagues in the English Department at Hartford High (now retired) claims that without that meeting of Senator McCormack with concerned members of the Hartford community, teachers in Vermont would today be employees of the state, not the local government.

You can judge for yourselves.

Respectfully submitted,

Paul Keane




*Cost/Benefit Analysis of a Statewide Teacher Contract
Submitted by the Department of Administration
Pursuant to Chapter 376 of the Public Laws of 2003 - Article 9, Section 10
Report Submitted to the General Assembly
May 12, 2004

* "You can do that job !"

Representative Chuck Bohi addresses listeners.

                                Service



I'm not running AGAINST any one. 

I'm running to fill a vacancy. 

I'm not debating anyone. 

I'm offering to serve my community in the closing years of my life.

When our faithful servant, Chuck Bohi,  announced at Hartford Town Meeting that "my doctor and  I have decided that I should not run for " another term as Hartford's representative to the Vermont legislature, a bolt of lightning shot through my brain with these words:

                           "You can do that job!"

I have just ended my professional career after 25 years as a Vermont school teacher and 17 years obtaining four college degrees. 

I will be 68-years-old when the new legislature meets in January. 

If the voters of Hartford want me to use some of my remaining time on this planet to work for them in the legislature, I will gladly do so. 

But I will not spend any money, twist any arms, kiss any babies, or criticize any other candidate to earn this office.

I simply put my name in the ring and use free social media to make myself known to the voters.

By the way, I have been  writing letters to the Valley News for 27 years* and have taught 3000 kids at Hartford High over the last 25 years---two pretty intense ways of  making myself known, and of getting to know the families of Hartford.

So, that's my campaign.  It is not to "oppose" anyone.  

It is simply to offer myself in service.


PK

*http://pkvermonter.blogspot.com/2012/05/letters-to-editor.html

  http://bashiungschools.blogspot.com/

* THE SKINFLINT REPORT

$18.05 

TOTAL EXPENSES

   for 

the campaign 

of 

Paul Keane, Independent 

as of August 11, 2012

$6.35

 to send my petitions to the Vermont Secretary of State with Return Receipt Requested postage.

$11.70
for my hazardous waste suit for the Vermont Yankee Fukushima video at
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nqydX3zXuI

*My name will NOT be on the August PRIMARY ballot. It WILL be on the November ELECTION ballot.

I just received an email wishing me good luck in the August primary.

GUESS WHAT:  Independent candidates do NOT engage in a primary race.  They are simply put on the ballot in November.

So if you are going to the polls for the August primary contest expecting to see my name, it won"t be there.

NOT TO WORRY !

Vermont takes care of Independents !

My name will be on the ballot in November:

Paul Keane,
Independent

PK

* NO DOLLAR LEFT BEHIND