Caveat: Giganta et al

Giganta

"I never knew that a playground could look like a fun-loving giant robot and a prison for hardened criminals at the same time." – Thus writes someone at Komboh blog. How could I disagree? – this is fabulous. Plus, I really like the guy's blog website design. It's really awesome.

I have been addicted to graphic design websites since before they existed. Um… how is this possible? Well I don't really mean websites, do I? When I worked for the University of Minnesota Libraries, in the late 1980's, I discovered a magazine called Graphis (the magazine still exists). It was a glossy collection of the best of graphic design and advertising design. I would spend hours paging slowly through back issues. It was almost a kind of meditation. It was also a way to kind of stay in touch with my creative side, and to get a feel for the world. So now, all these years later, I still page idly through graphic design and arts magazines – I just do it online, now. I visit My Modern Metropolis blogs almost daily, for example. And I regularly discover new sites like Komboh, referenced above.

Caveat: Ripping Out Concrete

I read an article in the LA Times about a school, that drew correlations between the fact that it had recently ripped out its concrete playground and planted a biodiverse garden, and improved test scores. It was an uplifting, positive article on education, such as are all too rare in the US media, these days, and the correlations drawn seem plausible, at least anecdotally. I'm sceptical, however… who is to say there weren't other causes for the improved test scores? There could have been demographic shifts in the school's neighborhood, there could have been curricular or staff changes, etc.

I love the story of it – the narrative – but I'm frustrated by it at the same time, because it's preceisely the type of muddle-headed thinking education is supposed to be ameliorating. Sigh. How to react? It's great to see schools tearing out ugly concrete playgrounds. It's wonderful that any inner-city school can improve student performance dramatically. But how about some actual science behind this alleged improvement in science scores?

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