#COVID19 | Page 392 | Vital Football

#COVID19

Calvin Plummer said:
Being a communist probably is more damaging to your election prospects in this country (sadly), the terrorist part though was the clincher.

Mrs T was a lawyer so I doubt its effective point scoring with her party too.
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Don't worry, the media will paint Starmer as a paedo in no time if their paymasters don't think they'll get what they want/ need from him.
 
The total death figure is very misleading. It is actually the total registered, which can be several weeks if not months old. Last week on one day the total was actually 4. All in North West. On Tuesday it was nil. This poor reporting is not only lazy but stokes fear. The rate of infection in Gedling, popes constituency is presently 0.2% Nottingham 0.3% Leicester is hitting a spike at 1.3%. The number of people becoming very ill is markedly diminishing.

Just looking at Championship over 1000 people are tested twice a week. In first tests 9 out of over 1000 reported positive. Last week 3. All have been asymptomatic. Similar picture in premiership. Even widespread community testing picks up very low numbers, most asymptomatic. Very different picture from March and April. As if it was a different virus.
 
Polly 433 said:
The total death figure is very misleading. It is actually the total registered, which can be several weeks if not months old. Last week on one day the total was actually 4. All in North West. On Tuesday it was nil. This poor reporting is not only lazy but stokes fear. The rate of infection in Gedling, popes constituency is presently 0.2% Nottingham 0.3% Leicester is hitting a spike at 1.3%. The number of people becoming very ill is markedly diminishing.

Just looking at Championship over 1000 people are tested twice a week. In first tests 9 out of over 1000 reported positive. Last week 3. All have been asymptomatic. Similar picture in premiership. Even widespread community testing picks up very low numbers, most asymptomatic. Very different picture from March and April. As if it was a different virus.
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Some of the Italian doctors have been telling us that it has effectively become a different (and less deadly) virus so that is interesting.

Nottingham has one of the fewest infection rates in the country, with not a single new case this week
 
Pope John XXIII said:
Apparently the Trump administration has sent $1.4b of stimulus cheques to dead people.

In fairness, the dead are quite an important voter demographic in America. I believe both Kennedy and Nixon found the deceased vote very beneficial to election victory.
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The book The Dark Side Of Camelot by Seymour Hersh is a fascinating critique of the Kennedy family; it certainly paints a very different picture to the one put forward for public consumption
 
Pope John XXIII said:
Apparently the Trump administration has sent $1.4b of stimulus cheques to dead people.

In fairness, the dead are quite an important voter demographic in America. I believe both Kennedy and Nixon found the deceased vote very beneficial to election victory.
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In a recentish Zimbawean election, Mugabe romped home to victory in an election where 5% of voters were over 100 years old.

I suppose you have to respect the wishes of the ancestors.
 
I've just been watching our evening TV and first up are pictures of the British public packing the beaches and being cleared off by the Police. What a load of absolute idiots, with no regard for life, either their own or anyone elses. And it's only yesterday that our papers were stating that your deaths were in the order of 54,000. It's obvious that this bloody virus is here and still going strong, even over here where we've been working hard, much harder than you, and it will still be here until a vaccine is found. And the problems to follow regarding the economy and loss of jobs will be horrible. It's tempting to think that your Govt has made a right bogup and is still on the wrong foot.

It's also beginning to look as though the UK public is beginning to listen too much to the USA's Trump.
 
Old Red Fart said:
I've just been watching our evening TV and first up are pictures of the British public packing the beaches and being cleared off by the Police. What a load of absolute idiots, with no regard for life, either their own or anyone elses. And it's only yesterday that our papers were stating that your deaths were in the order of 54,000. It's obvious that this bloody virus is here and still going strong, even over here where we've been working hard, much harder than you, and it will still be here until a vaccine is found. And the problems to follow regarding the economy and loss of jobs will be horrible. It's tempting to think that your Govt has made a right bogup and is still on the wrong foot.

It's also beginning to look as though the UK public is beginning to listen too much to the USA's Trump.
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I am surprised by how much time our media gives to American news. Someone shot on Denver is given equal standing as someone shot in Dorking. Trump gets more headlines than Boris and TV, when not London centric, is USA centric. We behave as if we are a state of America. As for b list celebs! Don’t get me started.
 
Calvin Plummer said:
Interesting move from the government to combat institutional racism in academia:

https://www.theguardian.com/educati...versity-applications-to-after-a-level-results
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Difficult on the racism thing because I can't say I have seen it.

Reality is that poverty and parental culture are the biggest factors. Asian and particularly Indian parents tend to be extremely ambitious for their children, which leads to ambitious and ridiculously hard working students, even where they come from very deprived backgrounds.

That is simply something you rarely see amongst both black and white families from deprived backgrounds. Far too often (not a majority by any means, but too often) the parent's concerns are more about them and their own chaotic lives and problems.

This idea has been floating around for a while and in my experience I honestly don't think it will make a damned difference to BME students. I can think of only one BME students that I have under predicted; their results were a real surprise to everyone, including themselves, and they got a better uni through adjustment.

I would be interested to see how it's supposed to work for schools. Currently our involvement is very high; we orchestrate the process from start to finish and provide detailed references. You are now talking about either schools having little or no involvement, or us having to do this after the students have left the school and are off roll.

The first scenario I would be extremely sad about. Running UCAS is one of my favourite aspects of my job; as hard work as it is, I would be gutted to not go through that with the students anymore.

If it's the second one, it's going to be problematic. References would have to be written in a busy term for students no longer with us, who we kind of shouldn't be talking to anymore from a safeguarding point of view. The timescale for us completing this would be much shorter and you are going to have far more cases where staff who taught them have left. No one reads school references anyway to be fair, but you can't expect to get as much out if schools if they do it after. For a start, a lot of the process I need to actually do with the student in front of me as a conversation; if they have left I can't do that.
 
Pope John XXIII said:
Difficult on the racism thing because I can't say I have seen it.

Reality is that poverty and parental culture are the biggest factors. Asian and particularly Indian parents tend to be extremely ambitious for their children, which leads to ambitious and ridiculously hard working students, even where they come from very deprived backgrounds.

That is simply something you rarely see amongst both black and white families from deprived backgrounds. Far too often (not a majority by any means, but too often) the parent's concerns are more about them and their own chaotic lives and problems.

This idea has been floating around for a while and in my experience I honestly don't think it will make a damned difference to BME students. I can think of only one BME students that I have under predicted; their results were a real surprise to everyone, including themselves, and they got a better uni through adjustment.

I would be interested to see how it's supposed to work for schools. Currently our involvement is very high; we orchestrate the process from start to finish and provide detailed references. You are now talking about either schools having little or no involvement, or us having to do this after the students have left the school and are off roll.

The first scenario I would be extremely sad about. Running UCAS is one of my favourite aspects of my job; as hard work as it is, I would be gutted to not go through that with the students anymore.

If it's the second one, it's going to be problematic. References would have to be written in a busy term for students no longer with us, who we kind of shouldn't be talking to anymore from a safeguarding point of view. The timescale for us completing this would be much shorter and you are going to have far more cases where staff who taught them have left. No one reads school references anyway to be fair, but you can't expect to get as much out if schools if they do it after. For a start, a lot of the process I need to actually do with the student in front of me as a conversation; if they have left I can't do that.
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My Mrs has some experience from the other end (works at a uni) and she suggested the Sutton report is an interesting window into unconscious bias in predicted grades for BAME students.

Perhaps unconscious bias as opposed to institutional racism would have been a less provocative term from me. I hadn't meant to insinuate that you were (though I do believe we all are to some extent) but the process of predicting grades is clearly frought with danger and not always super accurate.
 
Calvin Plummer said:
My Mrs has some experience from the other end (works at a uni) and she suggested the Sutton report is an interesting window into unconscious bias in predicted grades for BAME students.

Perhaps unconscious bias as opposed to institutional racism would have been a less provocative term from me. I hadn't meant to insinuate that you were (though I do believe we all are to some extent) but the process of predicting grades is clearly frought with danger and not always super accurate.
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It isn't remotely accurate and never can be.

I don't know about unconscious bias but it's all guess work.

If a student comes to me wanting AAA and the best test evidence I have is BCC they aren't going to get what they want no matter what their heritage.

If they come to me for AAA and they are on ABB (maybe even a little less) and teachers are telling met there is real sign of steady progress then I'm going to give them that, especially if they honestly believe they'll get it.

That's the problem with making predicted grades 6-9 months before exams; there is a hell of a long way to go, the most important work hasn't been done yet and if you are going to do justice and change lives you have to speculate a bit and believe in them.

In fairness, I know people who do similar roles to me who are much more robotic and by the book than I am, far less idealistic and maybe unconscious bias comes in there..
I feel sorry for your Mrs because what they are getting from us, especially at the lower end is dodgy as hell. But the universities respond with hardly any courses offering below BCC. So what else are we supposed to do with a student predicted CDD? You believe in their chance of improving, you aim to generate an offer for them and hope it gets them motivated. Both sides are playing the game. The unis are desperate for students at the end of the day and what they are accepting on results day is a joke compared to their up front requirements.

One problem with doing applications after as well is that I suspect you are going to lose a lot of disadvantaged students and especially boys, many if whom are simply not as good at seeing the bigger picture and working to very long term goals. Far too many boys I work with, in the face of hard work and pressure will just think "fuck it, I'll just apply to a bottom tier uni if I don't get the grades". Under the current system they have an offer and the horror of not getting that place and having to go somewhere random through clearing gets them working.
 
ZedRed said:
In a recentish Zimbawean election, Mugabe romped home to victory in an election where 5% of voters were over 100 years old.

I suppose you have to respect the wishes of the ancestors.
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2013 I think.
Big changes since. We're working over there with the current boss :) They kicked all the white industry guys out a few years ago and are having to beg borrow and steal talent
 
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