Dress for success? In Texas, wear pads

Dress for success? In Texas, wear pads In basketball, they rate guard play by a turnovers-to-assists ratio. In football, they use interceptions-to-touchdowns to rate quarterbacks. I propose we start rating schools on their football-coach-to-guidance-counselor ratio. If we did, we’d start improving our turnovers/assists ratio. Assists: when we actually help a student figure out where he…

Stamped as ‘college material’?

In NBC’s series “Friday Night Lights,” a pampered high schooler goes into a senioritis death spiral. Why? She’s suddenly realized that with her middle-of-the-pack grades, the two Texas-college color schemes of her dreams — burnt orange and maroon — are out of the question. It’s hard to sympathize. Every student in this state with an…

De-exorcising science

In The Exorcist, the 1973 film that made Linda Blair a star and caused pea soup consumption to plummet, a man arrived at a house with a black bag and a Bible to drive out evil spirits. But what does one bring to undo an exorcism? Comparable tools, actually. Barack Obama swore on Abe Lincoln’s Bible. This…