Promoting LXDE

[smhardesty]

With the increase in the availability of inexpensive RAM in today's world, there is very little reason not to increase the eye candy and most of the folks out there appear to want it so the developers give it to them. Back when 256 MB or 512 MB was alot of RAM, it made sense to look for ways to to be a lean, mean, fighting machine. Not today.

I run 8 GB of RAM on all my laptops. Sure, I could buy more RAM since it is pretty inexpensive. I guess I might be the exception to the rule. I can't see throwing money at a PC just to keep up with bloated operating systems regardless of how inexpensive the RAM is. My four Lenovo laptops with 8 GB of RAM, running LXDE/Openbox are all faster than most new PCs with 16GB or more of RAM running Windows or one of the mainstream dostros with all the eye candy bloat. That keeps me happy. I don't begrudge anyone laying out the big bucks for a brand new PC with gobs of memory. I just don't understand why they do it. LOL!
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[drooly]

local Christian school.

What is that?
I surely heard of schools (public, local, private, whatever) but never "Christian school".

[smhardesty]

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What is that?
I surely heard of schools (public, local, private, whatever) but never "Christian school".

I read that 3 times to be sure I was reading it correctly. I can't be 100% certain if it is sarcasm or if you really don't know. In the event you don't know, A Christian school is a form of private school. It's a lot like Catholic schools. They teach a regular curriculum, but do it with a Christian frame of mind. I believe there was only one class a day that taught Christian beliefs directly and the rest of the classes were what you'd expect from a good, private school. Every day began with a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. As for the attitude of the school, it was a lot like public school from the 60s and 70s. Paddling was an accepted form of correction, but it didn't happen very often because all the kids loved being there and the teachers were the kind of people that were capable of controlling a class of kids simply by being who they were.

We put our son in that school in the 4th grade. We had our fill of ridiculous rules and regulations in the local public school and made the decision to place him in the Christian school. It turned him around about 180 degrees. His attitude changed, he began making As instead of the Cs and Ds he had been getting in public school. He opened up and became friendly to pretty much everyone instead of being a quiet, wallflower type person.

We then home schooled him for high school. He completed the courses ahead of time and enrolled in College early. He then went on to make the Dean's List every semester and graduated with what I still call high honors. I know colleges don't call it that, but you know what I mean. He also earned enough scholarships that we never had to take a loan to pay for his college. He had zero student debt when he graduated.

So, in the end, it seems Christian School and home schooling did a better job for him than continuing to try and push him through public school. He's 35 years old now and is pretty successful in his chose occupation. Apparently the lack of public schooling didn't hurt him any.
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[drooly]

I read that 3 times to be sure I was reading it correctly. I can't be 100% certain if it is sarcasm or if you really don't know. In the event you don't know, A Christian school is a form of private school. It's a lot like Catholic schools. They teach a regular curriculum, but do it with a Christian frame of mind. I believe there was only one class a day that taught Christian beliefs directly and the rest of the classes were what you'd expect from a good, private school. Every day began with a prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance. As for the attitude of the school, it was a lot like public school from the 60s and 70s. Paddling was an accepted form of correction, but it didn't happen very often because all the kids loved being there and the teachers were the kind of people that were capable of controlling a class of kids simply by being who they were.

We put our son in that school in the 4th grade. We had our fill of ridiculous rules and regulations in the local public school and made the decision to place him in the Christian school. It turned him around about 180 degrees. His attitude changed, he began making As instead of the Cs and Ds he had been getting in public school. He opened up and became friendly to pretty much everyone instead of being a quiet, wallflower type person.

We then home schooled him for high school. He completed the courses ahead of time and enrolled in College early. He then went on to make the Dean's List every semester and graduated with what I still call high honors. I know colleges don't call it that, but you know what I mean. He also earned enough scholarships that we never had to take a loan to pay for his college. He had zero student debt when he graduated.

So, in the end, it seems Christian School and home schooling did a better job for him than continuing to try and push him through public school. He's 35 years old now and is pretty successful in his chose occupation. Apparently the lack of public schooling didn't hurt him any.

Wow, it's hard to believe that that's legal. Not only because of corporal punishment but also because it sounds like religious indoctrination is being intertwined inseparably with education. And what's a pledge of allegiance? To god? To the teachers of the school?
In my corner of the world none of it would permissable.

I thought you mentioned it because it had some impact on your computer donations. Like it made a difference whether you donated to a normal or Christian school.
But since your son went to that school, I guess that's also a valid reason to mention it.

[smhardesty]

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It's legal because it is a private school. Catholic schools exist in many countries and the teachings in those schools is much more religious that the Christian schools here in the states. All private schools in the USA are seeing enrollments increase with all the hullabaloo going on with Critical Race Theory and sexuality being taught in public schools. Parents are finally stepping up and demanding to know exactly what is being taught to their kids. I just read where 71% of the Mathematics textbooks in the State of Florida were rejected by the Board of Education there. 71% of the textbooks contained specific CRT indoctrination. I don't understand why the publishers of those books think anything beyond basic math should be taught to kids. It's weird, to me anyway.

And to address your specific comment that religion is being intertwined with basic education, yes, it is. And I donated the computers because my kid was there and I knew how tight the school's budget was.

[drooly]

It's legal because it is a private school.

You say that like it means they're above the law.

Catholic schools exist in many countries

The way you define it, not many.

All private schools in the USA are seeing enrollments increase with all the hullabaloo going on with Critical Race Theory and sexuality being taught in public schools. Parents are finally stepping up and demanding to know exactly what is being taught to their kids.

Ah, the cat's finally out of the bag.

So far I have taken part in this discussion, but I ask you not to continue in case it might breach the laws of any particular country or International Law:

You agree not to post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful, threatening, sexually-orientated or any other material that may violate any laws be it of your country, the country where “LXDE Forums” is hosted or International Law.

(source)
And just to be very clear, lxde.org is hosted inside the EU.

[edward]

I run a Linux User Group and we accept donated computers clean them up, install additional RAM, and then install a Linux OS on them in preparation of donating them to individuals who cannot afford to buy a new computer. Many are really amazed how fast and efficient a Linux OS is, but there is the Linux learning curve that they have to overcome. It is a very rewarding activity and of course we are also learning as we go.

Hi Rex,

That's nice of your group to do that.

One of the local Linux groups I'm a member of, had quarterly installfests (as they call them) prior to the Covid pandemic, where they would install a Linux distro on a computer system that was brought in, but have not had any since the pandemic started. One of the local universities was kind enough to let the group use one of their rooms on the Saturdays that they were scheduled and the group is now working on the theory that they might not have the installfests again, because of the pandemic. Last I heard, the local university was not letting any private groups use rooms. The in-person meetings the group had, shifted to online using Jitsi.

Ed

[Rex Bouwense]

Thank you for your kind words Ed. We were forced to go virtual with our installfests when the pandemic started. Of course it is difficult to do installs that way but somehow they were accomplished. There are other places to hold installfests than local institutes of higher learning and we found them and bounced from location to location until we could once again find a permanent or semi-permanent place. Libraries sometimes have meeting rooms (ours does) that are available, coffee shops often have them as well (we have used them), senior centers, restaurants (providing you eat there), etc. Some locations required the wearing of masks which we complied with and others did not. If you have leaders that are persistent, they can find a location and then all you have to do is advertise to get the people to come out and do a little phone calling to get your members out. Most people are ready, willing, and able to help after being forced to remain behind closed doors. The Team leader of our state Ubuntu local community has chosen to continue virtual events instead of seeking out physical locations and of course attendance has eventually dwindled to almost nothing while my local LUG has attendance that is equal to or exceeding the pre-pandemic levels. This is Linux. There is more than one way to do something. (Maybe that is the reason there are over 300 distros.)

[edward]

The local group had one installfest at a library west of Boston back in 2018, IIRC, there was some call for it from folks out that way. But subsequent installfests were back at the local university (in Cambridge), until they had to stop them due to the pandemic.

But, we still meet online.

[chipskhaoo]

I'd really love to see Linux Mint sprout an LXDE community release. Either that, or I need to find another dedicated LXDE distro that will load and install on my laptops. Since I spent countless hours recently going through pretty much every available LXDE distro and never found one that would install correctly, I guess I'm temporarily stuck with doing the Mint XFCE to LXDE switch. It's working quite well for me and I haven't had a single glitch as of yet. mobdro 2022