Some articles off Lexis-Nexis lately. Some dreary.... Nat
------------------------------------- 2004 Lakeland Ledger Publishing Corporation The Ledger (Lakeland, FL) November 8, 2004, Monday SECTION: Metro; Pg. B1 LENGTH: 462 words HEADLINE: SYSTEMATIC GAMES; STUDENTS PLAY, LEARN IN SLEEPY HILL'S METRIC OLYMPICS BYLINE: MATTHEW PLEASANT The Ledger BODY: The metric system is built on the number 10, multiplying with increasing units of measurement. A knowledge of the metric system was required for Sleepy Hill Middle School students who participated Friday in the Big Head contest, the Big Gulp contest and 24 other events as part of the school's Metric Olympics. Teacher Angela Chapman, one of the projects coordinators, modeled the Metric Olympics after similar events at other schools, personalizing it with games created by Sleepy Hill students. After two months of planning, the school's 1,100 students competed in the games. The Big Gulp contest, measuring how much water a student can drink in 10 seconds, was one of their ideas. "They have to know how to use the metric system in science," Chapman said. She hopes the experience will help familiarize them with converting measurements to the metric system. Another competition used a student-made hodometer, which measures distances, to pinpoint how far a soccer ball was kicked. The instrument consisted of a wooden plank with a revolving wheel attached to the end. The wheel equaled one meter, so when run the distance of the ball, the students could count how many meters it had traveled, Chapman said. "It isn't purely athletic. We have something for everyone," Chapman said. In the scavenger hunt, students were given specific measurements to retrieve in a field at the school. "It could be a blade of grass or a leaf," she said. The metric system is used by the majority of countries in the world, but the United States is not among them. "In the 1700s, we missed by one vote in Congress to have it as our measurement system," Chapman said. The English measurement system, inches and feet, is so ingrained in Americans that it would be hard to replace. Money and stubbornness, in Chapman's opinion, are part of the reluctance to use the metric system. "It isn't just science, but economic aspects also." Lee Brackman, one of the school's assistant principals, said the Metric Olympics idea expanded to all aspects of learning, including language arts and social studies. "With the Olympics that just occurred, the teachers used it to teach histories of countries and games," he said. "Everyone had a way they could tie in the games with what they taught." The event was staffed by 60 student volunteers. "They are really the work force behind this," Chapman said. Ambria Monroe and Alaia Bell, both seventh-graders, were student coordinators. Learning side-by-side with their friends is what they enjoyed most. "It was about how she got kids to learn," that was most effective, Monroe said. Before school let out, an awards ceremony was held, and overall winners from the school's three grades were declared. GRAPHIC: PIERRE DuCHARME/The Ledger: Zach Margazaano, 11, kicks a soccer ball during the first annual Metric Olympics at Sleepy Hill Middle School in Lakeland; Crystal Rogers, 11, participates in an obstacle course. At right, Christine McKinney, 14, watches Elda Arriaga, 12, create a 'density rainbow'; From left, Rein Antoine, 11, Nicholas Reshard, 12, and Juan Frias, 13, run the 50-meter dash during the Metric Olympics at Sleepy Hill Middle School. LOAD-DATE: November 10, 2004 -------------------------------------------------------- 2004 The New York Times Company 2004 Boston Herald Inc. The Boston Herald August 18, 2004 Wednesday ALL EDITIONS SECTION: EDITORIAL; Pg. 027 LENGTH: 800 words HEADLINE: Op-Ed; In America, metric doesn't measure up BYLINE: By Thomas M. Keane Jr. BODY: The temperature outside is 20 degrees centigrade. ``Oh,'' I think, ``I better put on a coat.'' That's the problem with the metric system. None of it makes any sense. A gallon of gas is a good amount, but sell it by the liter and I think I'm shortchanged. Tell me my waist measures 90 centimeters and I'll go on a diet. If my scale says I weigh 100 kilograms, I'm back to eating whatever I want. I enjoy a cup of coffee in the United States, but what do I drink out of in Europe? For almost 30 years, government officials, insisting it was good for us, have been trying to shove the metric medicine down our throats. In all that time, seemingly against all rationality, we've resisted, obstinately refusing to do as we're told. And, I'm pleased to report, we're winning. The latest victory comes in Maine. For the last decade, the state has mandated that transportation projects had to use metric: speed limits posted in kilometers per hour, square kilometers when surveying land, centimeters when specifying the dimensions of screws and bolts. And now it's retreating. Two years ago, Maine officials quietly decided to switch back to good old English measurements; the move caught the public eye just this summer. It turns out that, all the promises of the metric aficionados notwithstanding, metric was confusing and expensive. True enough. Five years ago, NASA lost the $125 million Mars orbiter because some poor souls used metric instead of English units. Ever since Frenchman Gabriel Mouton invented it in 1670, busybodies have been trying to push the ever-so-scientific metric system on everyone else. They've had much success. Even the Brits caved in 1965. The lone holdouts are three: the United States, Myanmar and Liberia. This is not good company to keep. And for a while, it seemed we too were going to join the fold. Thomas Jefferson was advocating metric back in 1790. The first international treaty adopting the system was signed in 1875 - the United States was even one of the signatories. By 1975, the metric lobby (amazingly enough, there really is one) got Congress to pass the Metric Conversion Act. That law was supposed to force the United States to switch within 10 years. Mysteriously, however, the 10-year deadline somehow was left out of the final version of the bill. Metricians got upset and managed to get the normally skeptical President Reagan to sign an amendment to the law proclaiming metric the ``preferred system of weights and measures for United States trade and commerce.'' That was followed by various executive orders mandating government agencies adopt the system. Some did so enthusiastically - that's why Maine went metric - while others passively did nothing. Aside from misguided Francophilia, why the big push for metric? Some argue it's better because it's a lot easier to multiply and divide by 10. I suppose that made sense back in the days when we all calculated using pencil and paper. But computers have made most of this irrelevant, a point Maine actually noted when it decided to revert back. Moreover, a decimal system isn't as easy as it sounds. One can easily divide a foot into thirds - 4 inches. But what's a third of a meter? 0.33333 - an infinitely repeating decimal. Try measuring that when you're about to saw wood. When you get down to it, the real reason for the United States to go metric seems to be that everyone else does it. Advocates for decades have been relentless in arguing that we had to adopt the metric system to keep our economy efficient and competitive in international markets. That kind of threat is probably why we resist. Much of America's success lies in its own exceptionalism, its refusal to take orders from the rest of the world and its determination to set its own course. Rather than mere inertia, I think our collective refusal to go metric - despite the prodding of our political elite - has more to do with our basic orneriness. So far, it's served us well. We're the world's richest country and its only superpower. I suppose some metric advocates think we could have done better had we gone along with their schemes, but it's hard to imagine how. Indeed, I wonder if metric might be a bit like Esperanto, the ``world language'' created back in 1887. Americans stubbornly stuck with English - heck, most of us refused to learn anyone else's language - and, lo and behold, English has now emerged as the de facto international language for business and science. Who knows? Maybe the rest of the world will eventually abandon centimeters and kilograms in favor of inches and pounds. It should. A pint of beer has more character than half a liter. And crossing the Maine border, it's good to learn that rather than 100 kilometers to L.L. Bean's, it's just a short 65 miles away. Talk back to Tom Keane at [EMAIL PROTECTED] LOAD-DATE: August 18, 2004 -------------------------------------------------- The New York Times September 11, 2004 Saturday Late Edition - Final SECTION: Section A; Column 5; Foreign Desk; Pg. 6 LENGTH: 54 words HEADLINE: World Briefing Europe: Ireland: Roads To Switch To Metric System BYLINE: By Brian Lavery (NYT) BODY: After forcing a generation of drivers to grapple with speed limits marked as miles per hour and distances marked in kilometers, Ireland will convert all its road signs and speed limits to the metric system, the transportation minister, Seamus Brennan, said. The current system ''is very confusing,'' he said. Brian Lavery (NYT) URL: http://www.nytimes.com -------------------------------------------------- 2004 Blethen Maine Newspapers, Inc. Portland Press Herald (Maine) August 10, 2004 Tuesday, FINAL Edition SECTION: EDITORIAL; Pg. A8 LENGTH: 313 words HEADLINE: Whatever happened to metrics? Even MDOT has given up; Changes in everyday ways of living don't come easily, after all. BODY: The decision by the Maine Department of Transportation to drop the metric system and return to English standard measures (with one small exception) makes good sense, even though it may seem to some to be a step backward. In that, it has something in common with the CarTest emissions control program of the 1990s, which held great promise but proved so unpopular that public sentiment sent it packing. So, too, with metric measurements: Their usefulness never overcame their foreign-sounding names and unfamiliar rules. Now, MDOT can change back because the federal government no longer requires bridges and highways be built by metric standards. Once, it seemed inevitable that the United States would follow the rest of the world in converting to the metric system. This country, however, has the world's largest economy, and for whatever reason, nobody ever sold the American people on the necessity (or even the desirability) of conversion. Something similar also happened with the dollar coin, which has now been an utter flop twice over. Despite the coin's utility, government and business never fully supported conversion. If dollar bills had been phased out, people would have been forced to use the coins - but that would have been unpopular. So, Susan B. Anthonys and Sacajaweas gather dust, while folding Georges still fill our wallets. As with the coins, so with kilometers, deciliters and hectares. People like their feet and inches and quarter-pounders and football fields measured in yards. They simply didn't want to change - and nobody dared to make them. The DOT, however, is still planning to measure things by tenths of a foot, not inches. Has it forgotten that people use "dozens" because 12 can be easily divided by 2, 3, 4, 6 and 12, while 10 is only divisible evenly by 2, 5 and 10? Tenths of a foot, huh? We'll see how long that lasts. LOAD-DATE: August 10, 2004
