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Purchase Monkey Girl at Amazon Purchase Monkey Girl from Barnes at Noble Talk Radio Evolution — From my OpEd in the LA Times (and other papers nationwide): “WHEN I FIRST arrived at the Ronald Reagan Federal Building and Courthouse in Harrisburg, Pa., for what was billed as the second coming of the Scopes ‘monkey trial,’ a man mingling with the media gaggle handed me an invitation to a lecture titled Why Evolution Is Stupid...”Read more Festival of Books — I'll be on the Moments that Defined America panel at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books on Sunday, April 27, 10:30 am, at UCLA's Haines Hall (festival map here). Also on the panel are authors Douglas Brinkley (The Great Deluge), Michael Eric Dyson (April 4, 1968: Martin Luther King's Death and How it Changed America), and Bruce Watson (Sacco and Vanzetti: The Men, the Murders, and the Judgment of Mankind). The panel moderator will be Elizabeth Taylor, book editor of the Chicago Tribune. We'll all be signing books afterward, but if you miss me then, come on and visit between 1 and 2 pm at the Angel City Press booth, where I'll be joining some of the other authors to sign My California, the bestselling anthology of travel and adventure essays edited by Donna Wares, the proceeds of which go to the California Arts Council to support writing and arts programs for children. Roll the Dice — From my latest article at the Huffington Post: “Kirk Cameron, the former Growing Pains TV-sitcom teen idol, more recently known for his leading role in the apocalyptic Left Behind Christian film series, is now a vocal, if clueless, critic of evolution (the Talk Radio version, of course). He is promoting an unintentionally hilarious Darwin-bashing board game...” Read more A Monkey Girl sampler — Read from the Monkey Girl Prologue, then head over to CaliforniaAuthors.com for an exclusive excerpt, The Darwin Dilemma. Evolution vs. Intelligent Design — Listen to a my interview with Larry Mantle on KPCC's Airtalk about the issues raised in Monkey Girl. (RealAudio required.) The Dover Lowdown — WYNC's Leonard Lopate and I discuss Monkey Girl and the culture war between supporters of evolutionary theory and its critics, a conflict that seems to be spilling over into a larger debate about the nature of religious freedom and the very definition of science. Download the mp3 or listen to it here: Talk Radio Evolution — Over at Pharyngula, readers riff on my OpEd's description of the two versions of evolution (the real theory, and the cartoonish talk-radio version designed not to inform but to inflame and deceive). I was particularly caught by a line from commenter Blake Stacy, whose summation sentence offers sound advice to all sides of the evolution-creation-intelligent design debate: It's hard to see why we should say anything other than the truth, as best as we can figure it out — particularly when the truth is all we have to offer. A brief but revealing back-and-forth between opposing points of view on this Talk Radio Evolution theme can be found at Evolving Thoughts, while the creationist take from someone who calls herself ForTheKid can be found here. Monkey Girl in the Blogosphere — Two popular blogs have reviewed Monkey Girl. Red State Rabble brings a Kansas perspective to the story, having lived through and ably documented the evolution wars in the Sunflower State for years, while PZ Myers complains (ever so nicely) over at Pharyngula that Monkey Girl kept him up too late reading. Update: Evolving in Kansas finds Monkey Girl a good read, too. Monkey Girl at Ground Zero — York County, Pennsylvania, is the principle setting in Monkey Girl, the scene of America's latest real-life Inherit the Wind drama, so it's only fitting that Christina Kauffman and the York Dispatch are among the first to interview me about the book. Download the Monkey Girl Podcast or subscribe to the Monkey Girl RSS Feed for an exclusive audio preview and excerpt.
Talk Radio Evolution — When I first arrived at the Ronald Reagan Federal Building and Courthouse in Harrisburg, Penn., for what was billed as the second coming of the Scopes “monkey trial,” a man mingling with the media gaggle handed me an invitation to a lecture titled “Why Evolution Is Stupid.” Read more. Over Here, NPR and the Revival of the GI Bill —Interest in the history and aftermath of World War II has been piqued by Ken Burns' excellent new PBS series, The War, and the topic that has captured my imagination, the G.I. Bill, is now back on the table in a big way. NPR's Morning Edition has just done a terrific segment on the GI Bill and my book, Over Here: How the GI Bill Transformed the American Dream, featuring interviews with several of my main characters, George McGovern and film director Arthur Penn, along with yours truly. You can find the NPR audio here. The report also examines proposals to restore the current GI Bill to its past glories, so that's today's veterans can have the same opportunities that awaited the Greatest Generation when they returned home.
The Out of Towner — Philadelphia Weekly interviewed me for its short and sweet Out of Towner column. The twist is that I'm really a native of Philly, long departed: The Philadelphia of my childhood was a concrete, tarmac kind of neighborhood. There were no trees. Not a one. But you knew everyone. When the roofers would come they’d do every house that needed a repair. We used to follow them and say, ‘Balls, balls!’ They’d throw all the balls down we’d lost on the roofs. Read more... Facts and Myths: The Monkey Girl FAQ — Although most Americans hold strong views about evolution and its alternatives, creationism and Intelligent Design, there are many myths and misconceptions about these ideas. Here are just a few... Read more.
Evolution Sunday — 544 churches around the country haved signed on to deliver sermons about science, faith, evolution and creation on Feb. 11, the day before Charles Darwin's birthday, as part of national Evolution Sunday. The anti-evolution, pro-Intelligent Design Discovery Institute, meanwhile, has been harshly critical of the entire concept; Tara Smith responds at Aetiology.
Over Here And so it was: the post-World War II G.I. Bill. It revolutionized higher education, created suburbia, brought us the scientists, engineers, doctors, artists and teachers who built most of what is good in America today. My new book, Over Here: How the G.I. Bill Transformed the American Dream (Harcourt, Oct. 2006), recounts this sometimes surprising history and its lasting legacy. Consider it a book not of war stories, but of after-the-war stories, and in them you’ll meet film and theater director Arthur Penn (Bonnie and Clyde, The Miracle Worker, the Nixon-Kennedy debates), Nobelist Leon Lederman (helped invent modern particle physics), civil rights crusader Monte Posey, George McGovern, Bob Dole, Josette Dermody Wingo and many others. Hear an Audio Excerpt of Over Here and brief commentary by downloading my podcast here or get it in iTunes. American Dreamer — There was a time when our government helped everyday Americans realize their dreams and, in the process, lifted up the entire nation. An adaptation of Over Here I wrote for the Orange County Register tells the story of two inspiring veterans of World War II who used the G.I. Bill to change their world — and ours. Now more than ever, we need a reminder of the greatness America and its leaders once achieved, and could achieve again. And don't miss the very cool Over Here Slide Show, featuring photos of G.I. Bill veteran Bill Thomas (then and now), and postwar, GI Bill-financed suburban construction in Lakewood, California. CSM on Over Here — Steve Weinberg at the Christian Science Monitor has this to say about Over Here: “The human dramas scattered throughout the narrative are irresistible. Humes's handful of real-life protagonists invent sophisticated weapons for use in the cold war, populate suburbs with tract homes that alter the urban-rural equation, become beloved physicians and teachers and film directors - all because the GI Bill provided otherwise unimaginable opportunities.”
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McMansions in the Last Little Beach Town — For the last few weeks here in Seal Beach, you couldn't go to the supermarket for a carton of milk without being body-tackled by gaggles of angry citizens intent on defending their inalienable right to construct towering Tuscan villas on beach-shack-sized lots... Read more from my op-ed on mansionization in the LA Times. Seed Corn — YaGottaLoveIt at South Texas Chisme draws an eloquent farm analogy about the G.I. Bill, and how far we have fallen in terms of investing in America's future since it passed in 1944: Farmers understand that part of each crop, usually the highest quality part, must be set aside to plant the next crop. If you eat your seed corn you won't have a crop next year and will suffer for it. America's leadership, he warns, is eating our seed corn. Nine Words — When Ronald Reagan convinced the nation that the nine most dangerous words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help, the Gipper knew better. He was a member of the WW II generation, and half his colleagues in Hollywood, from Newman to McQueen to Matthau, were there because they got their educations, training and first homes through the biggest of big government programs, the G.I. Bill. My new column at HuffingtonPost examines how we once generously honored veterans and lifted up the whole nation in the process — and how we're cheating our veterans, and our future, today. Radio Over Here — Larry Mantle, host of KPCC's AirTalk and Ed Humes discuss Over Here and the G.I. Bill's unprecedented impact on our lives and our nation. Listen to the broadcast (RealAudio player required). Where's the G.I. Bill Today? Every politician, conservative and liberal, praises the miracle of the original G.I. Bill and promises to support the troops today. But the opportunities offered today to our brave service men and women are nothing like those given The Greatest Generation, and now the nonpartisan Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America has produced a stunning study of who in Congress does and does not support the troops. The results are shocking, and show that the most gung-ho proponents of sending our troops into battle are the least likely to support them when they come home. The Reviews of Over Here are in!
Steinbeck Country — You gotta love any event that brings together author and raconteur Thom Steinbeck (son of John), angelic singer and musician Sarah Lee Guthrie, (daughter of Arlo and granddaughter of Woody), the head of the National Book Awards, a legion of readers so enamored of John Steinbeck that they can name every character and memorable line in East of Eden, and a seemingly endless quantity of fine Monterrey Peninsula wine. I was there, too, invited to speak at the 26th annual Steinbeck Festival in the great author’s hometown of Salinas, California....
In School of Dreams, I tell the story of life inside California's top-ranked public school, where students often work nearly around the clock building futures to please parents as much as themselves. Their drug of choice? Caffeine. Their goal? Getting into a top college. Their greatest fear? Not living up to their families' stratospheric expectations. Teachers here struggle daily to find an elusive balance between creating great test-takers and fostering great learners. But what these kids have going for them is the extraordinary community within Whitney High — a school with doors open seven days a week, where teachers love teaching, and the students linger long after the school day ends. Their experience has much to teach us about what works, and what doesn't, in our public schools. School of Dreams is now available in paperback.
My California — My California: Journeys by Great Writers is in its fifth printing and continues to generate money for the beleaguered California Arts Council, supporting writing programs for school kids throughout the state. It's truly a Good Deed and a Good Read, featuring essays from such authors as Michael Chabon, T. Jefferson Parker, Firoozeh Dumas, Carolyn See, Matt Warshaw and 22 other California writers. All the writers involved donated their work to this great cause — I'm proud to be one of them, with my essay, The Last Little Beach Town — as did the publishers (Angel City Press and the incomparable CaliforniaAuthors.com), the artist David Hockney, publicist Jackie Green, and editor Donna Wares. Pico Iyer penned the introduction. Buy My California. Film Updates 2006 — I often hear from readers asking about the latest news about film projects. I’m happy to report that Mississippi Mud is active again and being developed as a feature film by Barbara DeFina. Stay tuned for more details. The real you in 750 words — Here’s a piece I shared with CaliforniaAuthors.com about the angst of writing the dreaded college admissions essay. School of Dreams Discussion Guide — The teachers at Hilliard-Davidson High School in Ohio shared their School of Dreams discussion guide with me when I visited with them, and I'll share it with you (with a few modifications). Excellent, thought-provoking questions from the teachers' point of view, though they are just as applicable to parents, kids and policy-makers. (Thanks to Steve Estepp, Assistant Principal.) College Prep — I had an interesting series of conversations about the college admissions arms race and the lives of high achievers with groups of parents, teachers and high school juniors at Flintridge Prep, a private school nestled in the foothills of La Canada Flintridge, Calif, where School of Dreams has been a topic of discussion and debate. From each group I heard a growing uncertainty about the future, thanks in part to escalating competition at elite college programs — and to the budget cuts at the University of California, where a longstanding promise to make room for the Golden State's top students is being broken for the first time in 44 years. Students at Flintridge, like thousands of others around the state, face being turned down by the UC system despite meeting all the requirements for admission, a dubious first for our new governor and his budget priorities, which have singled out higher education for deep cuts. “Kids are being wait listed who would have been admitted in the past,” one counselor told me. “They are crushed.” It is beyond sad to watch as the state's public schools, from kindergarten to university, once the finest in the world, decay and retreat from excellence, treated like just another crumbling old bridge or potholed highway. Except this infrastructure is for our most precious resource, our children, and will not be so easily mended. Educators Name School of Dreams a Must-Read— The editors of American School Board Journal have declared School of Dreams a “Must Read,” one of nine books published in the past 12 months celebrated in the January issue of the journal. School of Dreams a Book World Rave — The Washington Post just named School of Dreams a best book of 2003 in its annual Book World Raves. From the Post: “A masterly example of passionate yet even-handed reporting — as enthralling as Richard Hofstatder's classic Anti-Intellectualism in American Life. It deserves an A+, even without grade inflation.” Read the full review by Michael Dirda here. The Push — Read a review and a spirited discussion about School of Dreams, the days and nights of high-achieving students, why moms in India call a public school in Cerritos, California, begging to get their children admitted, and how standardized testing and Instant Messenger may be ruining kids' ability to write coherently. This and more at Diane Patterson's well-written blog, Nobody Knows Anything. Are only adults allowed to be children? School of Dreams, the future of public education, and the lives of top students are provoking some great discussions over at CalPundit and at Metafilter. Talk of the Nation on National Public Radio just had me on to discuss School of Dreams and California's Whitney High School with host Neil Conan. We talked about the lives of high-achieving students, our national obsession with standardized tests (and the difference between creating great learners and great test-takers), what's working in public schools... and what's not working. Link to the audio of the show, then fast forward to the 18:40 minute mark. Read EducationNews.org's new review of School of Dreams. Read an excerpt from School of Dreams on CaliforniaAuthors.com Read an author interview at HarcourtBooks.com. Buy School of Dreams
School of Dreams Discussion Guide Read more.
An Education on the Front Lines — Two seemingly unrelated stories on successive pages in today's New York Times together provide a telling portrait of the abysmal failure of Washington's current education policy, contrasted with an inspiring story of genuine, grass-roots, common-sense school reform. Read more.
A Place Where 'Fail' is the four-letter word — “The portrayal of minority high school students in books, movies and television usually follows the same tired template: They are invariably gangbanging, drug-dealing, menacing ruffians who need the strong hand of a saintly teacher to spark their interest in learning,” writes Miles Corwin in his Los Angeles Times review of School of Dreams. “Humes' fascinating book chronicles an entirely different group of students, with a different set of challenges...”
Failing with an A — The teachers and students at Berrien Elementary School in Fayetteville, N.C., just finished celebrating their school's dramatic improvements in achievement. The teachers received $1,500 bonuses for their stellar work. Parents were engergized. And then the No Child Left Behind Letters arrived with word that Berrien, like thousands of other schools considered rousing successes by their communities and state governments, had been labeled a failure by the feds. Read why in Michael Winerip's On Education column in the New York Times.
What's My Line? “I work more than 70 hours each week, often during the evenings and weekends. Today I reviewed test scores, searched the trash dumpster for a lost retainer, developed a spending plan for a $500,000 grant, talked to a distraught father about his daughter's body piercings, and met with officials from the nuclear power plant to discuss the distribution of potassium iodide in the event of a terrorist attack. Who am I? Why, a middle school principal, of course!” From Suzette Lovely's first-person column in the LA Times.
Leave No Test Behind — A new essay by Edward Humes. Forget the official slogan: Our public schools’ top priority these days is to leave no test behind. Read more.
Accountable to Whom? An intriguing new study has found that parents want school accountability to start at home, not in Washington — and suggests that the public may be ready to take on more personal responsibility for improving public education than politicians and bureaucrats currently believe (or allow). Perhaps we need a "Leave No Parent Behind" law.... Meanwhile, an interesting piece on Slate predicts that No Child Left Behind may soon get left behind.
D is for... “California has a unique system of government, known technically as the ‘Any Random Loon Can Put Any Random Thing On the Ballot If Enough Random Loons Agree’ system.” Dave Barry's unique perspective on California's gubernatorial recall election is must reading as he bemoans the possibility that the title of “The Doofus State” could be wrested from his home turf, the land of the hanging chad, Florida.
Testy — Great piece in the San Francisco Chronicle on the college admissions arms race by Marianne Costantinou. The headline says it all: "You can stick your head in the sand and forget Harvard, or you can join the maddening hordes paying their way through the admissions process, from birth to the SATs..."
Bakersfield Blues, Again — The Los Angeles Times Sunday Magazine features an excellent, if belated, look at the problem of the Bakersfield, California, witch hunt, a series of wrongful convictions overturned in recent years and examined in depth in Mean Justice. The Times' John Johnson looks at ongoing attempts to overturn one of the last cases standing, John Stoll’s, in a piece ironically titled Kids Don’t Lie — the naive and false mantra that fueled cases like the witch hunt nationwide in the eighties (McMartin Preschool being the prototype). Another of these witch hunt prosecutions by the Kern County District Attorney in Bakersfield recently led to a $4.25 million settlement.
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Monkey Girl — What should we teach our children about where we come from?
— Imagine telling an entire generation they could receive a free college education at any school that would accept them — Texas A&M, Harvard University, the Sorbonne — anywhere. Throw in a monthly stipend for living expenses, plus more money for books. And when you graduate, there's a government-backed home loan waiting, no money down and no credit checks — buy a house cheaper than renting an apartment. Throw in subsidized farm loans, business loans, free job training, free medical care, free job placement, and up to a year’s worth of weekly paychecks until you find work. What insane congressman, senator or president would ever approve such a costly boondoggle? It could never pass today, for it would be the most enormous, far-reaching, life-changing government program in the history of the world. 
Shout News — 
School of Dreams — Whitney High delivers everything we could ask of a school: a love of learning, a sense of mission, and SAT scores to die for. But there are unintended consequences to attending the school of our dreams, as I learned during a year immersed in this world of high achievement and high pressure. 