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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes Advocate, 1984-08-01, Page 4Page 4 Times -Advocate, August 1, 1984 imes Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881 Amalgamated 1924 IORNE EEE) Publisher d vocate Serving South Huron, North Middlesex & North Lambton Since 1873 Published by I.W. Eedy Publications Limited Y Bill BATTEN ROSS HAUGH Editor Assistant Editor JIM BECKETT Adrertisinl; Manager HARRY DEVRIES Composition Manager •.4 .1._ �JJL,.,JS DICK JONGKIND Business Manager Published Each Wednesday Morning at Exeter, Ontario Second Class Mail Registration Number 0386. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada: $22.00 Per year; U.S.A. $60.00 C.W.N.A., O.C.N.A. CLASS 'A' and 'ABC' Good...but don't test it The work of personnel from the Exeter and area fire department and Hoffman's Ambulance received high praise from OPP Sgt. Ray Glover last week. His comments were related to two accidents when seriously injured motorists had to be freed from the wrecks. In one case, the victim had a severe back injury, and as Sgt. Glover noted, any improper handling could have resulted in even more harm to the victim. The situation required proper appraisal of the problem and the steps to be taken to free the victim without further injury; both complicated by the need to work as quick- ly as possible to get the victim to hospital. It should be noted that Sgt. Glover's comments were not made as a secondary note to information he was supplying about the collisions. He called this newspaper specifically to detail the fine work carried out by those who assisted at the scene. Highway collisions are frightening things and often the trauma experienced by victims is increased by not knowing the quality of help they are receiving from those emergency teams dispatched to the scene. In this area the quality is obviously excellent, but is still a service that motorists should attempt not to put'to the test. Not getting caught It's little wonder Canadians are concerned about interest rates, which are rising again. Homeowners have already been through the period when 20 percent plus interest rates were the norm, and many are still paying the price because they signed 5 -year mortgage deals at those exorbitant rates. Others simply lost their homes because they couldn't afford the rates. The same situation faced the country's smaller companies. Many lost money, so the firms were forc- ed to cut staff, forget about expansion and try to hold on until interest rates dropped. The impact was ex- treme. In fact, Canada's bankruptcy rate reached near -record levels. For big business, those 20 percent rates were also extreme, but some of the companies were bailed out by governments, and the bakers allowed others to postpone interest payments until they were better able to pay. The fallout among consumers was also extreme. People stopped borrowing to purchase major items. Instead of buying new cars and houses, debts were repaid. Flea markets and discount shopping centres became more popular. Indeed, those high, high rates, together with the sharp increase in unemployment, changed people's buying habits. Canadians became a nation of bargain hunters as they hoarded their cash for a rainy day. • Now, it seems, every upward blip in interest rates causes people to worry that rates may again reach sky- high levels. The economists and heavy thinkers tell us we won't . have 20 percent interest rates this time,. al asst not in the near future. Yet, we've become a nation of disbelievers, and who can blame us? If the experts were wrong once, who's to say they won't be wrong again? The politicians may be correct when they say we have no choice but to follow America's lead in interest rates, but one thing is clear: consumers, home buyers and smaller firms may not understand the intricacies of the economy, but those 20 percent interest rates taught Canadians some hard lessons, and many are not going to get caught in such a trap again. Some coincidence Item: "The Liberal MP for Manicouagan, Andre Maltais, says it's a coincidence a federal park develop- ment grant of $6.5 million has been announced for his riding during the election campaign..." The item is from a Canadian Press story appear- ing in the papers this week. Manicouagan happens to be the riding in which Conservative Leader Brian Mulroney has chosen to run. Mr. Maltais, who won the riding in 1980 by 16,655 votes, says the grant could make the north shore of the St. Lawrence River, which is part of the riding, a pro- fitable tourist attraction drawing 30,000 visitors a year. Some attraction. Some grant. Some coincidence. St. Marys Joural-Argus. An embarrassing welcome Readers were taken to task last week through a letter to the editor regarding the disappointingly small crowd that greeted the appearance of the Ontario Youth Concert Band in Exeter. 1. S. Mannell estimated that about 40 area residents attended and this observer would agree with the figure. as well as en- dorsing the suggestion that it is sad that such a fine group of young musicians would meet with such a dismal turnout. For some unexplained reason, 1 felt rather embarrassed about the situation and would terve hen quite understanding had conductor George I (ouslander and his group of musicians and dancers decided that it was hardly worthy of their time and talent to commence with the performance. However, continue they (lid, and the superb quality of the performance added to one's disappointment that so few were on hand to enjoy it The 45 musicians have been hand- picked from across the province. Not on- ly are they the hest of our young musical talent in Ontario, tney are among the hest of our musical talent of any age. Our community is not often graced with bands of this calibre. The response would suggest that only a handful care. • . Most area residents,and those involved in community fund raising projects of various nature, will be watching with in- terest the disposition of the situation sur- f rounding the Ailsa Craig Gala Days tur- tle races ! 1 i Charges have been laid against some of those involved for keeping a common gaming house. Those charges arise from parimutuel betting that was conducted on the first night of the event. it may all sound akin to a big lark to some who are watching from the outside. BATT'N AROUND with the editor but the fact remains that the situation could result in some serious implications tor those charged. My old weekly newspaper cohort. David Scott (he succeeded the writer as editor of the Clinton News -Record a few decades ago) could he seriously hampered in his present capacity as travel editor of the London Free Press if he should be convicted. Hopefully the whole mess will be resolv- ed with a happy ending, but there are some lessons to he learned, regardless of the outcome. 1•. The first and foremost is that the cause can not always justify the means and even projects that are for charitable or com- munity betterment can not be conducted outside the law, regardless of how stupid or unfair that law may appear. Perhaps equally as important is that people involved in organizing special events are responsible for many aspects of the event. This is something that too few consider although there have been precedents in both civil and criminal law that should make them consider more seriously the role they may be playing and the respon- sibilities which come with it. Parade organizers, for instance, have a responsibility to ensure to the best of their ability that entries in that parade will not endanger other participants or spectators. Being found negligent over an accident in that regard could prove very costly. Another aspect arises for groups involv- ed in the sale of alcoholic beverages. They have a responsibility. the same as other licenced establishments, to ensure that underage patrons are not served or that people are not served in such quantities as to become a risk when they leave to drive their vehicles home. Licenced establishments, even those operated by community service groups, have learned the hard way that civil suits which found them negligent were finan- cially devastating There are other pitfalls to be considered by volunteers but all can be avoided with the use of some common sense and a periodic review of their responsibilities. "1 think our nest egg's been poached!" Basic In thirty plus years as an editor, a parent, and a teacher, I have been inun- dated (though not quite drowned) by several waves of self-styled "reform" of our educa- tional system, especially that of Ontario. ' Each wave has washed away some of the basic values in our system and left behind a heap of detritus, from which teachers and students eventually erberge, gasp- ing for a breath of clean air. Most of the "massive" reforms in our system are borrowed from the U.S., after thirty or forty years of testing have proven them dubious, if not worthless. We have borrowed from the pragmatist, John Dewey, and American, who had some good ideas, but tried to put them into mass producton, and endearing but not necessarily noble trait of our cousins below the border. We have tried the ridiculous,."See, Jane. See Spot run. Spot, see Jane vomit," sort of thing which completely ignores the child's demand for heroes and witches and shining maidens, and things that go bump in the night. We have tried, "teaching the whole child", a process in which the teacher becomes father/mother, un- cle/aunt, grand- father/grandma, psychiatrist, buddy, confi- dant, and football to kick around, while the kid does what he/she dam -well - pleases. And we wonder about teacher "burn -out". We have tried a system in which the children choose from a sort of Pan- dora's box what subjects they would like to take, and giving them a credit for each subject to which values they are "exposed", whether or not they have learned anything in it. That was a bit of a disaster. Kids, like adults, chose the things that were "fun", that were "easy", that didn't have exams, that allowed them to "ex- press their individuality". New courses were in- troduced with the rapidity of rabbits breeding. A kid who was confident that he would be a great brain surgeon took everything a it .. washed pendulum. Parents discovered that their kids know something about a lot of things, but not much about anything. They got mad. The universities, a little red in the face suddenly and virtuously announced that many high school graduates were illiterate, which was a lot of crap. They were the people who decided that a second language was not necessary. They were the Aft :4<iiIrkr Sugar and Spice Dispensed By Smiley 44411 from basket -weaving to bird -watching because they were fun. And suddenly, at about the age of seventeen, he/she discovered that it was necessary to know some science, mathematics, Latin, history and English to become a brain surgeon (or a novelist, or a playwright, or an engineer, etc.). There are very few jobs open in basket -weaving and bird -watching or World Religions or another couple of dozen I could name, but won't, for fear of being beaten to death by a tizzy of teachers the day this col- umn appears. The universities, those sacrosanct institutions, where the truth shalt make you free, went along with the Great Deception. They lowered their stan- dards, in a desperate scramble for live bodies. They competed for students with all the grace of merchants in an Arme- nian bazaar. Another swing of the people who accepted students with a mark of 50 in English, which means the kid actually failed, but his teacher gave him a credit. Nobody, in the new system, really failed. If they mastered just less than half the work, got a 48 percent, they were raised to 50. If they flunked every subject they took,. they were transferred to another "level", where they could succeed, and eyen excel. The latest of these politically -inspired, slovenly -researched reforms in Ontario is call- ed SERP, and it sounds just like, and is just like NERD. Reading its contents carefully, one comes to the conclusion that if Serp is accepted, the result will be a great leveller. Out of one side of its mouth it suggests that education be compressed, by abandon- ing of Grade 13, and out of the other side, that educaton be expanded by ajding a lot of new things to the curriculum. How can you compress something and expand it at the same time? Only a commission on education could even suggest such a thine There will be lots of money for "Special Education" in the nes, plan. There will be less money for excellence. Special Education is educational jargon for teaching stupid kids. Bright kids are looked down upon as an "elite" group, and they should be put in their place. The universities would enjoy seeing Grade 13 disappear. That would mean they'd have a warm body for four years, at a cost of about $4,000 a year, instead of three. I am not an old foggy. I am not a reactionary. I believe in change. Anything that does not change becomes static, or dies. Idea's that refuse the change become dessicated. I am not against spen- ding lots of money to teach stupid kids, or emotional- ly disturbed kids. But I am squarely against any move toward squelching the brighest and best of our youth, and sending off to university people who are in that extremely vulnerable stage of half - adolescent, half -adult, and turfing them into classes of 200 or 300, where they are no more than a cypher on the books of a so-called hall of learning. And I have the proof right before me, in the form of several brilliant essays by Grade 13 students, better than anything i ever write, who have had a chance to come to terms with themselves and with life, in a small class, with a teacher who knows, likes, and encourages them, rather than a remote figure at a podium. Temper with judgement "i'll never stop again to help somebody on the highway . " That was the comment of a friend i;fter hearing about the brutal slaying of a woman on Highway 402 fest recently. She and her amily had gone out of their way to stop and help an apparently disabled vehicle. 1 must admit that the same thought ran through my mind. You're going along the super -highways at 100 kilometres per hour. By the time y6ti-come by a stalled car �rou wonder whether there were People still in it. There's a big transport right on your duster so you keep on go- ing and of course, there's always that nagging doubt there about whether you did the right thing. One scorching hot day discovered a lady and her mother, plus three children all under five years of age. They had been sitting there for Perspectives By Syd Fletcher down near Woodstock we spied a stopped car. There were little kids bouncing up and down in the back. When we got back to it we almost an hour and a half and no one along that busy road had stopped i can remember being stranded during several terrible storms and hav- ing people take me in, feed me and give me a place to stay overnight, and then refuse to take any money in exchange. i would hate to think that because some person does a terrible senseless thing such as this killing that people will stop doing the good things that make the world a better place to live in and that the princi- ple involved in the story of the Good Samaritan will be forgotten forever. At the same time it seems that generosity will have to be tempered by one's good judgement at times. 1