Okay, I’m sure that if you’re looking at Webmacster87.info, you’re wondering, “Whoa, what happened? Where did the great big W go? Where did the beautiful-looking theme go?” (If you’re reading this post in some kind of RSS fead reader, go to Webmacster87.info and start reading this post over again.)

Well, today is the third annual CSS Naked Day, and also the first one that I heard of in time to make the necessary preparations to participate in. The purpose of today is to promote the purpose of web standards and its importance in our everyday use of the internet. In fact, I think that Lorelle VanFossen said it best:

This is the third year of the annual CSS Naked Day which honors web design and designers around the world who help make our websites and blogs look “pretty” to the eye while still being totally functional under the hood. Dustin Diaz wanted to give the web world an opportunity to remind everyone of the benefits of CSS web page design. By removing the stylesheet for the day, the world would see naked web pages, giving a little more appreciation for the skills of web page designers.

Webmacster87.info is one of hundreds of websites going naked today for this cause. My blog will be entirely CSS-free all day today (in my timezone, anyway, as defined by the clock on my website), and since the event is done in honor of designers, I want this to honor my good friend Hans Reikmann (macattacks10), who has graciously volunteered his time to do numerous designs for me over the years, including the artwork for both this version and the previous version of my website, some of my 2005-era forums, and all of my podcasts.

If you want to go naked on your blog or website today, there’s still time, and Lorelle has suggestions for how you can participate. In the meantime, enjoy this low-fi version of Webmacster87.info!

Oh, and while we’re on the subject, today is the 100th Day of 2008! Woo hoo!

Tags: blog, community, CSS, design, event, internet, naked, standards, web design, Webmacster87.info

It’s April, and for California public schools, that means STAR Testing time. This thing called “Standardized Testing And Reporting” means nothing more than two weeks of craziness as different grades are given tests in different subjects requiring a bunch of confusing schedule changes even though there’s still six weeks of classes left in the year. Crazy? You bet. Welcome to California.

Tomorrow (4/8) will be the California Language Arts Standards Test, which mostly boils down to reading stuff and answering questions about it, and then correcting badly written “student drafts.” Wednesday (4/9) will be the California Mathematics Standards Test, which is a bunch of math problems written by people who obviously AREN’T mathematicians or people having ANYTHING to do with math because of the idiotic way that at least 10-25% of their questions are written. (As someone who excels in math, when I say that the questions are worded stupidly, I know what I’m talking about.) Thursday will be the California Social Studies Standards Test (aka U.S. History), which probably is the most topical of all the tests on the plate. And then, finally, next Tuesday (4/16) will be the final STAR test: the California Science Standards Test, which is again mostly a drill & grill of science subjects. Woop dee do. And then, I get a super-late start on Wednesday (4/17) because that’s a Sophomores-only test.

The crazy thing about these tests is twofold. First of all, they really don’t say much about me, but about my school. As in, if there aren’t enough kids proficient in these tests (or even if not enough kids are there for these tests), the school gets burned on this magic number called the API. But worse, by the year 2014, if 100% of all students in the school aren’t proficient, then the school gets marked for Program Improvement (PI), a very scary thing which eventually spells doom for the future of public schools. And can you realistically expect that 100% of all students will be proficient? No. Ladies and gentlemen, say hello to the #1 flaw of No Child Left Behind.

The second problem is that as an assessment of my personal academic performance, these tests STINK! Math is my best subject, I got a 710 on the Math section of the SAT, and yet on the STAR tests, Math has been my lowest score for the past four years. Why? I can tell you why–all those math questions are worded so darned strangely that a good portion of them are near impossible to figure out what they’re trying to get across! I swear, there is something VERY WRONG with those tests.

Luckily, next Tuesday, I will be able to celebrate. As an eleventh grader. this is the LAST YEAR I HAVE TO TAKE THE STAR TESTS!!! After taking these tests yearly for the last ten years, I will be done with these wastes of partially-recycled paper forever! And yes, I am excited about that, and not just so that I’ll be able to get even with those rub-their-nose-in-your-face seniors who get to sleep in for five days while the rest of us are stuck with the tests.

So, here we go with a few strange days at school…

Tags: California, education, rant, schedules, School, standards, STAR, tests

A big high-five to my home state of California. The announcement came today that the state is suing the Environmental Protection Agency, because the EPA is refusing to give California a waiver on federal emissions standards. California wants to make these environmental standards stricter in our state, and the federal government is refusing to allow them to do so.

This should be particularly important, given the recent significant oil spill which happened in the San Francisco Bay a month or two ago. I would say without a doubt that the majority of us Californians want stricter environmental standards.

Isn’t this ironic? Most waivers are usually applied for by folks who want to make the standards looser. Here, California wants to make them stricter, and are being denied permission. So, hats off to California for suing over this ridiculous denial, and the best of luck.

I never thought I’d say this, but way to go Arnie.

Tags: Bay Area, California, environment, EPA, lawsuit, oil, spill, standards