NationStates Jolt Archive

Due to the rude and hostile response recieved by many of the posters in this topic, I have chosen to continue my efforts for this proposal elsewhere. If you still have a comment on how to IMPROVE this proposal, please send me a telegram. DO NOT telegram me to say that you think this is garbage, I will report you to the moderators. - Hersfold

Musical Education Directive
A resolution to promote funding and the development of education and the arts.

Category: Education and Creativity
Area of Effect: Educational (possibly Artistic – unfortunately overlaps)
Proposed by: Hersfold

Description: BELIEVING that musical education is an essential part of a basic education in today’s modern society;

KNOWING that music is a large part of all cultures, and therefore should be included in educational studies to increase one's knowledge of one's culture and society;

FINDING that musical education is a tremendous benefit to an educational environment;

NOTING that musical education has been clinically proven to lower the susceptibility of minors to illicit drug use, increase performance in school, and increase coordination skills;

WISHING the best possible education for all, to ensure a greater standard of life;

RECALLING previous attempts to improve educational standards by the United Nations, including Resolutions #28, #54, #79, #97, and #101;

THE UNITED NATIONS HEREBY RESOLVES:

1. That all member nations shall provide a program for musical education in all publicly-funded schools, if in existence;

2. To strongly encourage privately-funded educational organizations to adopt similar programs;

3. To strongly encourage member nations to require a basic amount of musical education for all primary and secondary educational programs;

4. To assist in the formation of exchange programs between academic education facilities and musical education facilities, to increase awareness of musical education and that of other cultures; (Note: Probable addition to original draft)

AND DEFINES musical education as any sort of formal training in the areas of instrumental music, vocal music, musical theory, or musical composition.

RESOLVED, THIS DATE, BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE UNITED NATIONS.

I'm looking for comments, etc., on how to improve this draft. It has not yet been submitted, and I'm going to have the mods look it over before I do anyway. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. Thanks!

Edit: Ack! Tags didn't copy too well...

Don't tell us how to educate our children.

Respectfully,
Sheik Nadnerb bin Cluich
Cluichstani Ambassador to the UN

If our children are being forced to learn music, what are they going to be doing on the battlefield? Singing? Ha...there are better places that my education funds could be going. Like teaching combat.

Respectfully yours,


Nicolae sin Teodor
Chief Policies Analyst of Lysistrin

Don't tell us how to educate our children.

Respectfully,
Sheik Nadnerb bin Cluich
Cluichstani Ambassador to the UN
But we (the UN) already are.

If our children are being forced to learn music, what are they going to be doing on the battlefield? Singing? Ha...there are better places that my education funds could be going. Like teaching combat.

Respectfully yours,


Nicolae sin Teodor
Chief Policies Analyst of Lysistrin
...?
Anyway, the proposal only strongly encourages 'member nations to require a basic amount of musical education for all primary and secondary educational programs', which is not a mandate.

I'm looking for comments, etc., on how to improve this draft. It has not yet been submitted, and I'm going to have the mods look it over before I do anyway. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. Thanks!
I don't have to time offer a more substantive response to this right now, but I do want to offer a thumbs up and encourage you not to give up yet, despite the early opinions about the issue. I'll be back to provide critique and advice (including how to word it and soften it a little to help the education-hating authoritarian hypocrites-who-call-liberals-child-haters-but-don't-like-welfare,-health care,-or-gun control vote for it[Take THAT!])

We feel that basic education needs to cover certain subjects of which music is not one.. However we do, once we find chidren have triats that may lead to music skills, provide them with training in that area after they finish the required basic courses and complete the early parts of their National Service.. Thus by age twelve they are free to enter training for what will become their future contrubution to our society.. If that is to be in a music related field then they get trained in it under our National Service system so that by age sixteen they can play an instrument or sing all they want.. However they still must have completed basic eduction and special training in national defense areas or medical areas before they move into what they want to do for rest of their lives.

Thus we in looking at this see no problem as long as it don't mandate we change our current education system since we do include music courses at a proper time... not as part of basic education or even mandatory in secondary education. As we want productive citizens not talented citizens...

Also we see music as part of our faith and thus chidlren learn early in this area when they attend church services or related affairs.. Our basic school systems teaches language skills, math skills, our history, and understanding our laws which one must to become a citizen.. We also rely on parents to teach their children certain things thus leaving our school system to deal with treaching those basic subjects not raise their chidlren for them...

Tonless Nosingur,
Minsister of Education Zeldon

I think you're taking this from the wrong approach. Musical education seems very much a national concern - even if we may agree it's generally something worthy of being promoted (music forms an integral part of the education system in Gruenberg).

Rather than telling us how or what to teach our children, provide people with the opportunity to discover music no matter what country they come from or education they receive. Some sort of UN service to promote music would be more effective. For example, a central database of public domain recordings; or, a means for musicians to win small grants (perhaps in exchange for undertaking "goodwill ambassador" work, or aiding in publicity campaigns); or, establishing exchange programs between schools and music academies, so that children can absorb other cultures' music.

The UN can do quite a lot of things quite well. Trying to run national education systems isn't one. There's plenty else it can do productively, though.

~Rono Pyandran
Chief of Staff

I think you're taking this from the wrong approach. Musical education seems very much a national concern - even if we may agree it's generally something worthy of being promoted (music forms an integral part of the education system in Gruenberg).

Rather than telling us how or what to teach our children, provide people with the opportunity to discover music no matter what country they come from or education they receive. Some sort of UN service to promote music would be more effective. For example, a central database of public domain recordings; or, a means for musicians to win small grants (perhaps in exchange for undertaking "goodwill ambassador" work, or aiding in publicity campaigns); or, establishing exchange programs between schools and music academies, so that children can absorb other cultures' music.

The UN can do quite a lot of things quite well. Trying to run national education systems isn't one. There's plenty else it can do productively, though.

~Rono Pyandran
Chief of Staff

Damn straight, Rono. I'm entirely in agreement with your points.

HotRodian UN Representative
Accelerus Dioce

Damn straight, Rono. I'm entirely in agreement with your points.

HotRodian UN Representative
Accelerus Dioce

As are we. As usual, our Gruenberger friends have stated our objections more, shall we say, eloquently than we have ourselves.

Respectfully,
Sheik Nadnerb bin Cluich
Cluichstani Ambassador to the UN

Since my contry's youth (my country of origin, not the fictional one) feels more and more attracted to abnormal musical manifestations (by abnomral I mean - culturally uninstructive noise performed by talentless morons), I will support this proposal !

Thank you, Party Mode, for your response above.

Yes, the way this draft is written - and the way the final draft will be written - the only thing that member nations will be required to do is set up a music program which it would be optional to take part in. That way, music is there for those who want to take it, and those who don't want to don't have to.

Norderia, thank you for your support. I await your advice whenever you have the time to give it.

Thus we in looking at this see no problem as long as it don't mandate we change our current education system since we do include music courses at a proper time... not as part of basic education or even mandatory in secondary education. As we want productive citizens not talented citizens...
From what you've described, it doesn't sound as though you would require much change - you may be required to change your basic education structure slightly, but I don't think it would be a very large change at all from what you've described. Part of the reasoning behind this proposal is that musical education has been proven, in clinical studies, to improve performance in school and other environments. If you'd like me to post some statistics I have, I would be happy to do so. But if this bill were to pass, your citizens may well become more productive as well as more talented, simply due to their increased exposure to music.

@ the next three: The UN has already passed several resolutions concerning education - this proposal is not much different than those. This proposal seeks to advance the musical arts while improving the standards of our existing educational systems. Allowing students the option of taking musical courses should not negatively affect the operation of the schools - on the contrary, musical education, as I've said, has been proven to increase performance of students in other fields.

The difficulty with forming organizations is not only the extra work involved in making sure the proposal is legal, but also the funding. The UN has no money to speak of, so any funding would have to come in by donation - which tends to get even MORE people angry, afraid that this legislation isn't going to be able to function due to a lack of or insufficent generosity. I can attempt to work some of your ideas into the proposal - for example, your exchange program idea - but I am of the opinion that this is the best way to go - killing (or rather, improving) two birds with one stone - advancing music and improving our education.

The UN has already passed several resolutions concerning education - this proposal is not much different than those.
True. And given we in Gruenberg oppose those too, our opposition to this is also "not much different".

It's not about opposition to music, or believing that this would be an unworkable or undesirable program, per se. It's about the appropriate level of jurisdiction. The UN should not be telling us what to teach in our schools. Yes, I know it has done so in the past; yes, I know by virtue of its nature, it can do so again. I just don't think it should. In order to be effective, the syllabus of education must be determined on a level appropriate to the student. The obvious arbitor of that is not some UN bureaucrat, but those closest to the student. This is not a decision for the UN to be making, but at the very highest level, national governments.

~Rono Pyandran
Chief of Staff

What if the idea were to promote some sort of cultural exchange?

OOC: How many players here have created anything related to music in their RP? Myself, I recently created Death Key (http://ns.goobergunch.net/wiki/index.php/Death_Key) and I've been sitting on creating a Miervatian Philharmonic (sp?) Orchestra. The reason I bring this up, as I do find cultural development interesting ... but I wasn't sure how many players tend to do this. It always seems as though most players take on a much more military / political focus in their national development.

True. And given we in Gruenberg oppose those too, our opposition to this is also "not much different"...
...This is not a decision for the UN to be making, but at the very highest level, national governments.
Then I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree. Thank you for your respectful opinion.

Gruenberg had suggested something along those lines in his first post, Mik, and I think I'm going to add it in. As for your OOC comment, that is one aspect to this I hadn't thought about. Hopefully it will expand NS's role-playing a bit. :)

Then I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree. Thank you for your respectful opinion.

Gruenberg had suggested something along those lines in his first post, Mik, and I think I'm going to add it in. As for your OOC comment, that is one aspect to this I hadn't thought about. Hopefully it will expand NS's role-playing a bit. :)

OOC: Yeah, sometimes you just have to take a bit of initiative *and* set very small goals. I've enjoyed it when the International Democratic Union have hosted small regional events (sports, film awards, cheese festivals), thus allowing us to explore international and domestic nation building.

IC: Though my government understands the opinion of other nations that wish to exercise their own authority over domestic matters including education, the people of Mikitivity are open to the idea of some level of UN statement supporting the arts.

Thank you for your support. :D

Are there any other comments for the draft?

OOC: Well, I actually wouldn't add the exhange idea into this proposal. I was thinking of something like ERASMUS, and I think that'd be best served in a separate proposal of its own.

Ok. Still think it'd be a good idea, but I'll take it out.

So we're still left with the original version. Hm.

The citizens of Unified Narnia could never accept this proposal. One it does not lower childrens rate to taking drugs. That study is a farse. Two we do not force something onto children unless it is a must. Music is just an elective or choice and must never be forced. Three I say no to this proposal.


Sincerely,

Supreme President Klaus Lehmann
of Unified Narnia

The United Nations would "require" member states to provide musical education?! To quote the former OMGTKK ambassador to The Eternal Kawaii: "Well now, isn't that special?"

I got some news for you: local school boards don't always have the means to fund every program parents might want for their children; when it comes down to crunch time, and you're in the hole by some millions of tree-fiddys, you have to cut back on stuff. That would include painful choices on what programs they have to scrap in order to get out of the red. Given the choice between elective programs such as music, drama and the arts, and core subjects like math, science, P.E., basic combat training and superfluous administrative budgets, what do you think school boards are gonna choose? I'm sorry, but sometimes, Einstein's gotta take precedence over Mozart. That's just the way it is.

Now you're telling me that if local school boards faced such a predicament, the United fucking Nations by its eminent wisdom would force them to keep music and scrap English? Yeah, that's gonna happen.

Simply put, the Federal Republic will not support this proposal in its current form. It's a pretty safe fucking bet that it wouldn't support this proposal in any form, but whatever.

Now, let's get nitpicky! Terms such as "publicly funded" and "privately funded" are not hyphenated;
Why does the United Nations need to "resolve" the operative portion twice? Once is plenty.Enough of this. The night's young, and so am I, and [insert clever metaphor about the Thessadorian ambassador here], if ya know what I mean.

Sammy Faisano
Ambassador to the United Nations

I'd like to insert something into the Thessadorian ambassador...

Respectfully,
Sheik Nadnerb bin Cluich
Cluichstani Ambassador to the UN

The government of the St Edmundan Antarctic also feels that the contents of nation's educational programmes should be none of the UN's business.

Hersfold? The nation responsible for an earlier 'Education' resolution in which an apparently misplaced apostrophe means that money gets diverted from every other UN member's education budgets into their own one? Let's read this proposal verrry carefully, folks...

I'd like to insert something into the Thessadorian ambassador...I don't know what you mean. :p

Hersfold? The nation responsible for an earlier 'Education' resolution in which an apparently misplaced comma means that money gets diverted from every other UN member's education budgets into their own one?
It was an apostrophe, but yes.

It was an apostrophe, but yes.

Earlier statement duly corrected in the record.

I don't know what you mean. :p

You wouldn't. Your citizens are stupid, remember? ;)

One it does not lower childrens rate to taking drugs. That study is a farse. Two we do not force something onto children unless it is a must. Music is just an elective or choice and must never be forced.
One, the study would be a "farce", not a "farse", and I don't quite know how you can claim that when I haven't posted the source yet.
Two, if you would read the resolution again, it does not force students to take music - it simply requires member nations to make music education available in public schools to those who wish to take it.

Now you're telling me that if local school boards faced such a predicament, the United - Nations by its eminent wisdom would force them to keep music and scrap English? Yeah, that's gonna happen.
Please point out where in my proposal I stated that such a thing would happen. As for your nit-picking, those terms do not require hyphens, and the double resolution is to make it a more formal format, something I would have thought was obvious. If you do not have anything useful or intelligent to comment, take yourself and your obscenities elsewhere.

Please point out where in my proposal I stated that such a thing would happen.Oh, I'm sorry. You mustn't have read your own proposal. It "requires" member states to provide musical education programs in all public schools -- meaning that if there was a budget crisis and local school boards had to cut costs, they would be obligated to save music and scrap something, you know, useful. School boards have to make decisions about what programs they need to 86 in the face of drastic budget cuts all the time; I live in California, and we were $37 billion in the hole just a few years back, so don't try and tell me it never happens.

Your proposal would only make it more difficult for school boards to make those tough choices. Good on you.

And if you can't see a swear on the Internet without freaking out, then you really need to grow a pair, buddy.

((You stupid asswipes try to make this board an English lesson. As long as I, or anyone else, state their point for that matter, quit correcting people on their spelling or being such a fucking prick.))

OOC: I'd appreciate you not taking your frustration with Cluich out on everyone. Baiting folks like this isn't going to help matters anyway.

((You stupid asswipes try to make this board an English lesson. As long as I, or anyone else, state their point for that matter, quit correcting people on their spelling or being such a fucking prick.))

OOC: You don't need the commas surrounding "or anyone else" and then you can omit "for that matter." Or else, include the aforementioned commas and move "for that matter" to be inside of them.

When a Resolution is going to go on the books, there should be an effort to ensure that proper spelling, grammar, usage, and other linguistic mechanics are used. Correcting the spelling in a proposal is not something that ought to be frowned upon. You have a tendancy to post very confrontational things. Most of them appear to be IC though, so that's alright, however no apparent change between your angry IC posts and your OOC posts has occured. I would suggest that you not be so belligerent in your OOC posts before you get both wordslapped by the players, and warned by the mods.

OOC: Furthermore, UNEC highlights the importance of this:

which shall resolve all of these problems in our nations' educational systems by providing funding to these systems

which shall resolve all of these problems in our nation's educational systems by providing funding to these systems

Lucky Hersfold.

IC: Back on topic, we couldn't concur more fully with Ambassador Faisano. Mandating education on a non-essential subject, where education in essential subjects has only been encouraged or never even mentioned, strikes us as counter to the very rationality of the school system.

~Rono Pyandran
Chief of Staff

I hope my opinion on the matter has not been missed. I've been busy doing nothing else.

I would definitly support a proposal that encourages musical education, however I find that such would be an impossibility without a strength of mild, and operative clauses that did not mandate a very big change to each nations' education system. As Kenny said, music is a great subject, but it has to be secondary to the 4 big ones of math, language, science, and social studies. If you can change this proposal in a manner that ensures it would not jeopardize any of those subjects in special circumstances, I would support it.

Perhaps continuing the mandate that Kenny showed as problematic, and then including a clause that renders it null during times where a budget cannot support a music program without damaging the other important ones. That way it provides a loophole for the poor nations, and one for people like Kenny and the Creative Solutions Agency, while still being effective for those countries who do not pay so much attention.

As Gruenburg more eloquently put it, this is yet another breech of national sovereignty. If you really want this to get some support from the nation of Kethland or from any in the Region of Gatesville, (may I remind you we are not short of regional power) you must first play to the sovereigntists. The nation of Kethland is not as hard-nosed as many nations. We understand that some concession must be given in order for all of our nations to prosper together. This resolution, on the other hand, has little or no influence on international relations. Its only purpose is to force your values onto me. You may believe the children of your country deserve an education in music. Let them have one. I may believe in teaching the gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster in my schools, but I will not make you do the same.

Kethland, I'm not expecting any support from Gatesville. I'm fully aware that you lot vote against everything (except possibly repeals), regardless of content. No offense, but I quite feel that that would be a lost cause.

Since it is rather clear to me that this proposal will not get any actual suggestions on how to improve it on this forum (Since that IS what this topic was intended to do), I will continue to push my efforts to advance this legislation elsewhere. Thank you to those few who actually attempted to contribute or supported this proposal.

A moderator may lock this topic if they wish, most preferably after issuing some moderation to the flame-baiters who have apparently taken over the UN forum.

Edit: Norderia, I will attempt to add some sort of clause like you suggested. Once again, thank you.

Kethland, I'm not expecting any support from Gatesville. I'm fully aware that you lot vote against everything (except possibly repeals), regardless of content. No offense, but I quite feel that that would be a lost cause.
No they don't. They voted for UNSA, Nuclear Armaments, Representation in Taxation - I think they even voted for The Microcredit Bazaar. And they voted for Child Pornography Prohibition.

Since it is rather clear to me that this proposal will not get any actual suggestions on how to improve it on this forum (Since that IS what this topic was intended to do), I will continue to push my efforts to advance this legislation elsewhere. Thank you to those few who actually attempted to contribute or supported this proposal.
We suggested improvements: make it milder, make it more useful. Not only didn't you listen, you didn't even bother rebutting us.

Can you blame us for not being able to contribute much more?

See, the way this "drafting" thing works is when people point out flaws in your proposal, you try and correct them. As the sponsor of previous legislation, we assumed you knew it. It appears we assumed too much.

Still, for the wholly vain purpose of engaging in a pointless exercise (for why should we endeavor to highlight more flaws, when you can't see the ones we've already shown you?), I ask that if and when you pursue this bill "elsewhere," you may want to consider narrowing the requirement in the first clause, to apply to "publicly funded secondary schools," or somesuch, unless you seriously expect state-funded medical schools to offer music lessons.

As to our concerns about this document's cosmetics, which you summarily dismissed, I would point out that redundancy and extraneous punctuation (and proper expression of the plural possessive) are things the Hersfoldian envoy ought to have learned in grammar school. We strongly feel that any global initiative on education should at the very least demonstrate that its author paid a modicum of attention when he acquired his.

Sammy Faisano
Ambassador to the United Nations

As to our concerns about this document's cosmetics, which you summarily dismissed, I would point out that redundancy and extraneous punctuation (and proper expression of the plural possessive) are things the Hersfoldian envoy ought to have learned in grammar school.

Perhaps the representative was too busy learning to play the triangle to be bothered with trivialities such as grammar and punctuation.

Respectfully,
Sheik Nadnerb bin Cluich
Cluichstani Ambassador to the UN

Perhaps the representative was too busy learning to play the triangle...A lesser man would post a picture of Ed Grimley (http://www.secondcity.com/scimg/grimley.gif) at this. But I would never stoop to such levels.

A lesser man would post a picture of Ed Grimley (http://www.secondcity.com/scimg/grimley.gif) at this. But I would never stoop to such levels.

Don't think I didn't consider it. Ed Grimley is, after all, a pretty decent guy, I must say... ;)