We'll start off with our "highs and lows" and get into some important societal survival skills and general goings on of the TwinCities and neighboring communities with news about the rest of the world here and there. Participation is simple. Just give us your highs and lows either in the comments of the article or on twitter by trending #ProverbialWisdoms or tweeting to me @E_HowardCo.

High: Seeking and finding opportunities to be engaged in the work that I love.
Low: Struggling with sacrifice for the sake of balance.

***The Sky is Falling***

I'm tired of bad news.

I participate in a ton of community discussions on how to address the complex issues that we face especially in the Twin Cities on various social, academic and economic levels. There's a time to focus on problems that arise and there's a time to take a real look at what success we are seeing and how to build upon that success. I'm interested in creating space for conversation about some wins in US education and employment. What do the wins mean? How do we create exponential growth in our success rates?

With that, I present a poem inspired by Henny Penny: "The Sky is Falling"

Consider the deplorable condition of our US educational system:

  • The average mathematics score for the nation's 4th-graders in 2011 was higher than the scores in the eight previous assessment years
  • Specifically, the average scores for White, Black, and Hispanic 4th-graders were higher in 2011 than in any of the previous assessment years.
  • Larger gains from 1990 to 2011 for Black 4th-graders than for White 4th-graders contributed to a smaller educational gap in 2011 than in 1990.College enrollment was 21.0 million in fall 2010, higher than in any previous year.
  • Between fall 2010 and fall 2020, enrollment is expected to increase by 15 percent.
  • Between 2000 and 2010 (the last year of actual data), the number of degrees conferred rose at all levels. The number of associate's degrees was 50 percent higher, the number of bachelor's degrees was 33 percent higher, the number of master's degrees was 50 percent higher, and the number of doctor's degrees was 34 percent higher.

[The Sky is Falling]

Consider the insurmountable woes of our US employment situation:

  • Employment in construction rose by 20,000 in September 2013
  • Employment in wholesale trade rose by 16,000 in September. Over the prior 12 months, this industry added an average of 7,000 jobs per month
  • Transportation and warehousing added 23,000 jobs in September.
  • In September, employment in professional and business services continued to trend up (+32,000). Over the prior 12 months, employment growth in this industry averaged 52,000 per month.
  • Employment in temporary help services continued to trend up in September (+20,000).
  • Within retail trade, job gains occurred in building material and garden supply stores (+5,000) and in automobile dealers (+4,000).
  • The us has around 9million millionaires.
  • 1.1million of those joined the millionaire club during the Obama administration.

Our entire prison population in 2011 was 2,266,800 in contrast the total number of people enrolled in post-secondary educational institutions in the US for 2011 was 21,557,259.

[The Sky is Falling]

- Ernest Comer III
(Sorry it doesn't rhyme)


Sources:

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/study-finds-9m-millionaires-u-s-article-1.1290334

http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d11/