Life in Canada

A school in Bedford has become the latest outpost of the public sector to turn to text messages as the answer to all its problems.

Newnham Middle School in Bedford is buying Truancycall, an automated system that will notify parents by text and email if their kids forget to turn up at school.

The system is pitched not just as a solution to truancy and the evils it begets – watching schools programmes, drinking cider, spitting on shoppers' heads down the Arndale Centre – but also as a child safety measure, alerting parents that their child might be missing.

Should a little angel not be in class when they should be, the Windows-based system sends a text to the parent’s mobile, and an email. Parents can respond directly to the automated phone call, either with their own text or with a verbal message. This way, the company says, the school is not deluged by a mass of calls saying, “Don’t you idiots know there’s an outbreak of norovirus/it’s lambing season/it’s the summer holidays.”

Should the parent not respond, the system will call again an hour later. In fact, it will continue to call until 8pm.

The firm says that, strangely, a third of parental responses come in between 6pm and 8pm. This of course is when they’re either getting home from work or getting tanked up at Happy Hour. So, perhaps it’s really only a child safety measure two-thirds of the time.

More importantly, though, the school then has a stack of responses it can view or listen to, so that it can update its own information management system.

So, the school secretary is happy because she’s not on the phone all morning, the school is happy because its records are up to date, and the kids are happy cos they’re eating chips down the high street.

The only people who might not be happy are parents who don’t have email or a mobile, or who have jobs where they’re unable to answer their mobile phones – such as say, teachers?

ADHD Checklist.

The child is much less likely than the other children in class to pay attention to school work and makes seemingly inexplicable mistakes.

The young person appears to have substantially more difficulty sustaining concentration when engaged in practical or play activities.

The child is described as failing to listen even when spoken to directly.

When the child is given a task which they are motivated to engage with, they do not complete it.

The child does not seem able to get hold of themselves and the set task sufficiently to be able to organize their thoughts and plan a reasonable plan of action, yet they do understand what is expected of them when questioned about the task.

Will actively avoid and clearly dislikes tasks and activities that demand sustained concentration and thought.

Teachers and parents complain that the child always manages to loose things. This becomes particularly apparent with respect to school essentials like pens, pencils etc. but they will also be mislaying items precious to them such as toys.

The child is easily distracted. When observed they appear to turn toward movement and noise. The child appears to be over alert.

Routine tasks are often forgotten, leading to frustration in those who have to manage the child, who may complain of the child deliberately avoiding routine tasks.

When observed the child appears much more restless than peers. When on the carpet for instance they may squirm from one side of the carpet to the other seemingly oblivious to what they are doing.

There is a very clear pattern of wandering around the classroom when the task demands the children are seated. They appear to be on the look out for any reason to leave their seat.

The child will take any opportunity to engage in running around or climbing this is particularly noticeable when it is an inappropriate activity and other children in the class are not engaging in these activities.

Quiet play is not something you would associate with the child.

An observer would see the child as persistently active having little need for rest periods.

The child would be described as saying things which are not thought out and as talking for the sake of it.

Answers are blurted out and hands are raised well before any of the other children in the class because the question has not been completed and the child would therefore have no real chance of knowing the answer.

Has real problems with turn taking.

Social skills are weak, using few appropriate strategies to join conversation or play beyond barging in.

The current position is not a recent phenomenon. There were strong signs of this type of behaviour pattern pre-school.

Canadian Privacy Commissioner: Just say no to intrusive DRM
( digital rights management )

For detailed discussion
Go to this site for more info

Jennifer Stoddart, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, is wary of DRM, and she's not afraid to tell other branches of government about her concerns. Stoddart has just sent a public letter to Jim Prentice, the Canadian Minister of Industry, telling him that his impending copyright reform bill should not protect any DRM that gathers and transmits personal data.

Stoddart wouldn't care much about DRM if it "only controlled copying and use of content." But DRM can also collect personal information and send it back to the "copyright owner or content provider, without the consent or knowledge of the user." Even if users do find out (and object), they wouldn't be able to strip the DRM or circumvent it because Prentice's bill will reportedly contain US-style anti-circumvention provisions.

Jennifer Stoddart Stoddart points to the Sony BMG rootkit fiasco as a real-world example of the problem. The Windows-only content protection software included on selected CDs cloaked its presence, collected information about what discs were played, and sent the data (and a user's IP number) to Sony BMG. That made the software a privacy concern, not just something for IP lawyers to debate. "That this occurs when individuals are engaged in a private activity in their homes or other places where they have a high expectation of privacy exacerbates the intrusiveness of the collection," Stoddart wrote.

Her concern in the letter is narrow, but it's heartening to see parts of the Canadian government, at least, taking issues of consumer privacy seriously. Canadian law professor Michael Geist, who has spearheaded much of the opposition to Prentice's bill, says that the letter "provides an important reminder that it is more than just copyright law that hangs in the balance as the government's plans could ultimately place Canadians' privacy at risk."

Prentice had initially readied the bill for presentation late last year, but the media firestorm over its introduction has already delayed it for over a month, with no word on when it will be officially introduced.

Art Elliott 2008

What a waste of money in Nova Scotia

It would seem that all persons who qualify and receive from Community Services, any type of financial support are not accountable for how they spend it..They can spend it just how they choose..thats RIGHT yes.??

1. Should there be some accountability in the Community Services Section for ensuring that generous allocated amounts of tax payers money issued purposely to aid a person in designated areas and thus help less fortunate people, is actually used for that purpose and no other purpose.
   
   The issue here is the accountability for ensuring needy targeted areas are actually reached and audited 'if say rent issued to a person to pay rent and is then used by that person for other purposes and not pay the rent what should happen?'.
   
   
2. .When a person is named as power of attorney (enduring) by a donor, and the person named is being treated for paranoid schizophrenia prior to taking on this role, should the ill person be allowed to take on the role of POA without proper supervision.
   
   When say using lawyers, and in my view this should be a free or at least tax deductable facility,for the signing a legal POA, should the donor be seen alone by the lawyer and privately without any recipient presence in order to not be influenced by a 'dependence situation' and should the recipient of the POA be questioned about their mental health. The donor or lawyer may not be aware or incapable of seeing these issues and trust the recipient. Once signed its sealed, and lets say incompetence of the donor happens at a later time, what recourse, apart from The Supreme Court, is there to have the POA stopped by family or friends of the incompetent donor. NONE
   
   The issue here is that in a co-dependence family situation that is all too common, the recipient of the POD who may be seen as a trusted capable friend or perhaps a son or daughter etc. may be themselves ill and by taking on this responsibility may in fact endanger their own and the donors life.