Category: Administrative

I have temporarily disabled my blogrolling.com based blogrolls due to very slow loading. I will look into what can be done. Some blogrolls can probably be restored using another method.

For the moment, however, the site was unusable with those blogrolls enabled.

Akismet has grabbed a few comments again, largely on the Jena 6 issue. If anyone did comment and thought you had been censored, it was inadvertent. Check for your comment now. If it still does not appear, enter it again. I would appreciate a comment on this post letting me know when you commented and on what post in that case.

My comments policy remains as open as I can possibly keep it. I reject obvious spam, and use the Akismet plug-in as my first filter. Otherwise, I only remove comments that I believe cross the line into questionable legality.

I had some database problems and I’m temporarily on a backup. This backup is missing two posts from June 22, but I will be able to restore them soon. Please bear with me as I work on it.

For those who don’t regularly read the home blog of the Moderate Christian Blogroll, I want to call your attention to this post which explains a recent run of links that result apparently from a single post on a former blogroll member’s blog. Please comment there.

I got my ears pinned back (very politely) in a comment by Mary on my previous post on this topic, and the commenter made such good points I think it is appropriate to promote her comment there to a post so more people will see it.

You’ve asked some interesting questions about UC’s admissions policies. Most of them can be answered by a close read of the UC admissions web pages.

The UC campuses have many more well qualified applicants than can possibly be accommodated. Anywhere from a third to half must be rejected, and it is only fair to give preference to students who can demonstrate that they are most likely to succeed. There are several ways for students to demonstrate that they are qualified. Very high test scores are one, special exemption is another, and there are other ways for transfer and nontraditional students to get in, but the easiest path for freshmen is to get good grades in a UC-approved core curriculum in high school.

UC takes the approval process very seriously: it examines the textbook, the syllabus, any supplemental materials, sample lesson plans, and so on, to determine that each approved class actually teaches the material UC wants its incoming freshmen to know, at a college-prep level, accurately and completely. Students who have not demonstrated that they know this core material (because they didn’t bother to take the approved courses, or because they were home schooled) can still get in using the other pathways, although students relying on test scores alone must have higher test scores than students whose grades also demonstrate that they actually learned something in high school.

One could argue that this arrangement is unfair to home schooled students, but as you pointed out, the quality of home schooling is hugely variable, and UC has no way to tell which parents have provided a good education. It is important for a university to have a student body with diverse interests and backgrounds, but it benefits neither UC nor the students themselves to accept unqualified students. In principle and in effect, UC’s requirements are no different from an employer giving preference to a job applicant who presents evidence of actual relevant job experience over one who scores well on an aptitude test, but doesn’t present evidence of relevant job experience.

UC has no intention of closing its alternative paths to admissions, and Calvary Chapel’s students can use them even if they haven’t taken the proper coursework, just like any other applicant. Alternatively, a Calvary Chapel student can sign up for the appropriate number and kinds of UC-approved courses (the school has sufficient approved courses to offer students some choice while still fulfilling the requirements). What Calvary Chapel and its students can’t do is substitute unapproved Bible Study classes for the required science, history, and other academic classes, and expect a world-class secular university to go along with it. One has to wonder at the sheer hubris that leads them to file this lawsuit.

Let me add a starting link to UC’s freshman admission policies. I have no way of knowing how these are actually applied myself, but the process described by Mary seems very rational to me.

Specific answers to the process for home schooled applications start here.

. . . is posted. I want to thank Allan Bevere for his hard work is regularly posting the roundup. I’ll be praying for him as he goes to speak outside the country. The MBWR will be missing for the next two weeks.

I’ve been using Akismet for months now, and I have been nothing but happy until last night, when I found that some perfectly good comments were never posted. On reviewing my last 15 days spam, I found all four of the missing comments and “de-spammed” them, but unless the user had e-mailed me, I might never have realized there was a problem. I would be very, very loathe to get rid of Akismet. It’s a lifesaver. I am wondering, however, if anyone else has had such problems, and if so, what solutions they might suggest.

To review my not-very-public comments policy, I do not delete comments unless they are clearly spam, illegal, or threaten a family friendly rating, i.e. excessively use obscene language. That means I don’t remove off-topic comments, so long as they have some content and thus don’t fall under the spam heading. I don’t remove comments because they are discourteous, including to me. You can call me an idiot, a liar, or whatever your heart desires right here on my blog. Just avoid doing it with four letter words, and keep it within legal boundaries.

If you have made comments that should have appeared, but have not, e-mail me and let me know when and on what post.