Former Supreme Court Justice Switches to Video Games

TechDirt is reporting that former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has moved into the one industry that I don't think anyone might have expected, video games. Not only did she speak at a recent gaming conference, she is also working on creating a video game about the courts. "There have been many similar 'civic education' video games out there, like the UN video game to teach kids about world hunger and, my personal favorite, a video game to teach kids how to gerrymander voting districts to get political support. It's not clear how successful any of these sorts of games really are, but it's nice to see a former Supreme Court Justice taking an interest in these sorts of things. Though, some might point out that this could be seen as something of a gimmick, and students might just be better served by adding a decent civics curriculum back into school (it's apparently gone thanks to No Child Left Behind)."

Comments

Re:No Child Left Behind

[serutan]

Yes, it was a drive to setup and adhere to standards, but not exactly unfunded. The people who created the standards and the slew of accompanying rules and training materials got paid plenty. The overall result was to turn the public education system into a test prep system. To be fair, it was an attempt to respond to a serious decline in basic readin' writin' and 'rithmetic skills, as measured by businesses having to train their employees to do things they should have learned in school. Employers don't need you to know how the government works.

No Child Left Behind was a far-right pendulum swing in the ongoing battle over whether the purpose of public education is to train people to function as workers or to lead better lives. In the past 4 or 5 decades public education had drifted quite far to the left. Rather than attempt to create a philosophical shift back toward basics, which requires people skills and time, No Child Left Behind simply imposed rules and financial consequences, which can take effect quickly.

Re:O'Connor Voted for "No Child Left Behind"

[Doc Ruby]

I just posted cited facts in a restrained tone.

You just posted exactly the kind of bullshit that you projected on me with your post, like a loyal Republican. You people never quit, do you? Unless it's quitting a lifetime obligation to rake in some private sector money, with your sick spouse as your excuse.

Re:No Child Left Behind

[ChromeAeonium]

If you want to improve education in the USA, stop letting the dumbest folk breed like bunnies. Or you could just accept the fact that 'dumb' people don't have to be and ensure that a strong effort is made to educate their kids, hence eliminating 'dumb' people. But that solution just wouldn't satisfy pretentious elitists who have a pathological need to look down on others, would it?

Oh, that's dumb.

[tjstork]

I should probably explicitly state that this includes abortion.

That won't happen in a million years. Americans are split evenly on abortion, but, nearly unanimously would prefer that the morons that get themselves pregnant take care of their own problems.

Besides, why do you want the country to have less kids? I would think that, we should have even MORE native children, so that we can have a huge army and take over the world. In any case, the vast majority of the welfare state that the USA has become is basically a tax on young people to take care of the old. Just look at how the US budget is stacked for old people - social security, medicare, and more. You need to have more young people paying taxes, or grandma has to live in a refrigerator box.