"A Nightmare Of #2's" by Dr. Mike. Nightmare indeed! Give them two #2 pencils, a standard non-graphing calculator, and a couple hours: Washington seniors will do better on average in the critical reading and math sections of the SAT than seniors in every other state (at least, states in which more than half of the eligible students took the exam). What a crop of young 'uns we have to be proud of! Thanks to......

Photo by Grundlepuck from the Seattlest Flickr poolWorried about rising material costs, the Seattle school district has sped ahead with construction of new schools without waiting to get input from parents. "I mean, you could drag these things out for another two years...We have to say 'Did we do enough to move forward with the project?' That's what I'm really looking into," School Board member Harium Martin-Morris told the Times' Emily Heffter. Who are......

The most unfortunate victims of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor--which happened 66 years ago today--were surely the 2,333 military personnel who lost their lives. FDR called it, "a date which will live in infamy." Perhaps in 1941, a surprise attack on another country's military was infamous. But considering that in 1986 the U.S. launched a surprise attack on another country's civilians, 12/7 looks a lot less infamous than the direct domestic aftermath, felt especially......

A few weeks ago, singer/raconteur Jenny Owen Youngs was in town, playing at the High Dive the same time as the Fremont Bridge was being closed evenings, which led to our arriving mid-set in a state of high dudgeon. We decided to skip a half-assed review, and afterwards fired off some impertinent questions via email. We just heard back, and as you'll see, Jenny schools us a bit. Now we adore her even more. If......

All mass transit is not created equal; here in Seattle, a city with buses and, well, nothing else, unless you're specifically talking with someone about monorail or lightrail or streetcars (you know, theoretical mass transit), when you're talking about supporting mass transit, you're talking about supporting buses. And buses suck. Last week, Erica C. Barnett had a column in The Stranger that spoke to our experience riding the bus to and from work daily: It's......

It's not that development in itself sucks; it's that our county and city government doesn't believe in development for art's sake, despite all those studies about the half billion the arts return to the community. When we look around, we don't see a lot of public investment in the single most expensive thing that artists and smaller arts organizations have to face: a place to work, rehearse, show, perform. We did see this notice that......

Outfit called Not For Tourists has just published a guide to Seattle. It's a handsome book, looks just like Moleskine journal, complete with oilcloth cover, fat elastic closure, gorgeous paper. The Seattle version is tenth in a series, cobbled together by a design staff in faraway Noo Yawk with input by a locally based "city editor" named Fred Beldin, who contributes occasional music reviews to The Stranger. NFT Seattle starts out with a grid of......

Seriously, a 14-minute commute by bus to downtown Seattle? That’s lucky, you must live in Seattle city limits, you are probably thinking. Well, we would like to inform you that thanks to Seattle’s improved underground roadway and the Eastgate Park & Ride, (which is a place we hold dear to our hearts) you can get from Bellevue to downtown Seattle in 14 minutes or less. We did it this morning and even had enough time......

Other than the Apple Cup, Garfield High vs. Franklin High is the best sports rivalry this area has to offer. Both are "inner-city schools" (with all that connotes), and the guys on the teams have usually been playing against each other since they were kids. Winning this game means bragging rights in the neighborhood until you die. Unexpected things happen at rivalry games--like when we went last year, and Nate Robinson was there to watch......

With unseasonable weather descending upon much of North America, schools getting ready to reconvene, and sports seasons getting exciting, it's a busy time of year for us here in the Ist-A-Verse. Luckily, even with all the things we have to do, we still managed to get together to let you know what we've all been up to. After cooling down from a hot weekend of many badass Sunset Junction Street Fair photo dispatches, LAist asked......

-- What do Susan Paynter and The Stranger have in common? -- "Let’s make for some kick-ass elementary and middle schools . . . and the high school issue should take care of itself." -- One sin just got a little less taxed: 42-cents-per-liter liquor surcharge ends Sunday. -- Jobster and the blogosphere aren't getting along these days. -- Sonics fans, who last night were angry about the Ray Allen deal, are warming up......

The City Council finally got around to passing "adult cabaret" zoning laws that just might let Seattle develop a strip club scene worthy of a would-be world-class city. But there's a provision that kills one of our brilliant ideas: The new rules, which passed by a unanimous vote, require strip clubs to be at least 800 feet from elementary or secondary schools, child-care centers, community centers, public parks or open space where children tend to......

Over in Ballard, Archie McPhee sells a cheerful Lunch Lady action figure for $9.95. Tell the disgruntled lunch ladies in Chicago, who are demanding respect from a school system that pays them peanuts (well, $10.46 an hour) and expects them to serve slop to thousands of kids. "We're looking at each other like, 'I wouldn't eat that.' We wouldn't give our kid that at home," one lunch lady told the Chicago Sun-Times. No wonder that......

Last Friday we had that nightmare where we go back to high school, only we were awake and wearing clothes. From what we read in the papers, high school is a nightmare that has to do with standardized tests leaving kids behind, but that's not the impression we left with. Our friend Marissa teaches at Shorecrest HS, and she invited us to the launch of the kids' literary and arts magazine, Tattoo. Now, we make......

--The Pioneer Square building that caught fire Monday has a pretty cool history. --Sonics diehards give their answers to this prompt: "If the Sonics win the #1 pick, I'll ______." --Bellevue has four of the top 100 high schools in the country. Garfield is the only Seattle school at #361. --Sherman Alexie says all NBA fans are "racial" but he worries that some are "racist." --Pop quiz: what didn't Starbucks sell when the logo......

Mamadou Gueye, son of Dakar's leading neurosurgeon, was a scholar of Latin and Greek in his native Senegal. Sent to Nantes to prepare for one of the elite French graduate schools (the Grandes Écoles, training ground for top-level officials in government and industry), he studied international marketing ... and unexpectedly fell in love with the local wine, Muscadet. Hired by Muscadet's promotional arm, he visited Seattle regularly in the 1990's for the French-American Chamber of......

In Chicago, the food police are throwing people in jail for serving foie gras because it comes from obese geese. Elsewhere, they're trying to get rid of junk food in schools because it causes the kids to become obese. Meantime, there's a new, flexible tube that's supposed to make gavage (French for "fattening up") less painful. We say put the damn hose on the vending machines down at the high school. Pilot program at Garfield,......

The Huskies released their spring depth chart today, and oh-so-highly touted quarterback Jake Locker is listed as the #1 QB. Locker is expected by the type of Husky fan who spends a lot of time on message boards to lead the program back to excellence. He's 6-2, 210, and fast. Scout.com calls him "a bigger Marques Tuiasosopo with a stronger arm." Here, in pdf form, is all the info about spring football at the UW.......

Seattlest's former elementary school, Madrona, is the leading edge of a terrifying movement in Seattle Public Schools. No matter how many Microsoft stock options you have, no matter how many Jonathan Kozol books you've read, you can't stop it. Put your child in private school now or they'll be consigned to a life of stupidity...and blackness. Nine white families withdrew their kids from Madrona Elementary this year after a series of shocking indignities. But none......

Woodinville's fastpitch softball team, which finished 3rd in state last year, was beating Franklin 64-0 on Wednesday when the game was stopped because of the "mercy rule." Some mercy. It's an ugly thing, humiliating a team like that, but Woodinville's coach claims he felt did everything he could to avoid running up the score, in a long explanation posted on the team's website today.No one has been more disturbed about the final score of our......

Michael Dirda, in the New York Review of Books: In contemporary America, as Jonathan Raban reminds us in Surveillance, any quest for anonymity—"to live obscurely" according to the Greek ideal for happiness—has grown increasingly difficult, if not impossible. And it's not only an Orwellian Big Brother who is watching. We track each other. We check out the backgrounds of friends, Saturday-night dates, and business associates; we data-mine and Google-search; when on line we worry......

With the Dawgs and Cougs out of the running, we're bummed that we won't get to watch a late-round tourney game in a bar packed with partisans who cheer with every shot. But we can replicate it, thanks to transplanted Kansas and Ohio State fans who are gathering tonight for their schools' respective 3rd-round games. Kansas fans--including some very attractive girls (who knew?)--met in Spitfire's back room for the first round game last Friday, and......

Monday WOMEN & MONEY: Personal finance expert and author, Suze Orman talks about the complicated and dysfunctional relationship that women have with money in her book, Women & Money: Owning the Power to Control Your Destiny. 7:30pm // Town Hall // $5 AGORAPHOBES TAKE HEART: Everything you’ve been told about dating is wrong. Love Will Find You is a new approach to love from dating expert Kathryn Alice. It may be the first dating......

"We're gonna send you to military school" will no longer be an idle threat only of rich parents, if Governor Gregoire gets her way. She's backing a "boot-camp-style" academy for our state's high school dropouts.The governor is seeking about $6 million to build and operate the academy, which would serve about 300 dropouts each year — two intensive five-month sessions of 150 youths, drawn from around the state. After scouring the state for possible sites,......

We were jazzed, and, it appears, overly optimistic, when we heard Seattle U might go D1 in basketball again. Having two Seattle colleges in Division 1 b-ball looks less likely, or at least less likely to happen soon, now that the West Coast Conference has decided not to expand. The WCC--the one Gonzaga and U of P are in--seemed like a perfect fit for Seattle U: Most of the schools are Catholic ones, like Seattle......

MARDI GRAS: Greg Vandy, who hosts KEXP's Swingin' Doors from 6-9pm on Thursdays, hosts the Sunset Tavern's 9th annual Mardi Gras ball. Promising real New Orleans food and music. 7pm // Sunset Tavern [5433 Ballard Avenue] // $5 BASKETBALL: Roosevelt, who lost a heartbreaker in OT to Garfield on Saturday night, plays Redmond in a loser-out district game tonight. 8:15pm // Juanita High School [10601 NE 132nd St., Kirkland] // $7 MUSIC: One last night......

MUSIC: Ben Kweller's in town opening for Gomez at the Showbox, but the smart money is on going to see his in-store, since it's free. Go hear some great indie-pop to kick off your evening. 5:30pm // Capitol Hill Sonic Boom, 514 15th Ave E // FREE SPORTS/TV: If you're Seth, you're falling all over yourself with the King County 4A district playoffs. If you're anyone else, you're thinking tonight is a good night......

Once, Washington stretched all the way from the Pacific Ocean to the Continental Divide. From the Canadian border to the 46th Parallel. Lake Coeur D'Alene, Lolo Pass, it all belonged to us. Until a gangly thief, born 198 years ago today, emancipated it away. Imagine how magical it could be to get your car tabs in Missoula, or buy liquor at state-established markups in Kalispell, or pay 8.8% sales tax in Twin Falls. Sadly, because......

Monday A NADER REMEMBERS: Recalling his childhood in Winstead, Connecticut, former presidential candidate and longtime political and social activist Ralph Nader offers 17 values a child should learn to become a conscientious adult. Not helping elect neo-fascists was, unfortunately, #18. 7pm // Third Place Books // FREE Tuesday EROTICA: "One Foot on the Floor: A Reading of Erotica." Jennifer D. Munro (aka Dawn O'Hara) -- whose work has appeared in many collections, including "Best......

JAZZ: Though it's presented by Starbucks, the real stars of Hot Java Cool Jazz are the five area high school jazz bands. Each band (representing Garfield, Roosevelt, Shorewood, Mountlake Terrace, and Edmonds-Woodway) shows what they got, while all proceeds from ticket sales go back to the performing schools. It's pretty much win-win. 7:30pm // The Paramount // $8-$15 SPA: Now that sexy has been successfully brought back, work to maintain it at Salon Dewi. Tonight's......