> LP: tsk, tsk, vinegar. Do you think the NCES is part of us radical
> mainstreamers? Actually it's part of the very U.S. Department of
> Education we want to sue for breaching the civil rights of everyone
> in the United States, since we firmly believe that when girls' rights
> are not enforced, that injures yours, Ted, too--Or? You think we
> aren't annoyed at the OCR and the USDE? Perchance they are missing
some
> underreported garbage? Seems very likely, since we are hollering over
> case after case, and the governmental agencies say they have
> no records of that, and look the other way. Statistics are often
false
> and manipulated; and reports of achieved democracy are also a bit
> previous.
Of course Linda is correct in noting that statistics can be
manipulated, some statistics more than others. The more difficult
measurements are on the more qualitative properties. More loosely
defined numbers, such as which sex gets more attention in class,
present special problems in both the measurement and the definition
of attention, and the numbers are much less reliable. The cut and
dried count of how many of each sex has a particular math class
recorded on his or her transcript is inherently more reliable.
Robert Weverka <weverka@optivision.com>