h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Where are the major policy decision made? And what about administrators, lunchroom workers, janitors, etc.?

On education: The general policies are made nationally (entry and exit levels)but schools have some freedom in how to fill in their education program. Part of the final exam (counting for 50%) is nationwide.

Administrators fall under the government responsibility. Janitors and lunchroom personnel are generally part of a commercial business.

That sounds very different from how we handle education in the U.S.

Well usually, we in the UK look down with a mix sense of wry amusement, horror, and thank bod that's not here on how things like that are done in the USA....

... usually ...

Maybe the history departments like current events. History is certainly being made. Just wondering what the books will say in a few decades. Anyone with a time machine cares to go and have a look?

I got my German passport today. So now it's all sorted.

Certificate of Nationality - check
ID card - check,
Passport - check

Now to go and do my Esta application for the upcoming trip to California. Hope there won't be any problems with the same person applying with a different passport/different nationality. The last time, of course, I went with my British passport......

" we in the UK look down with a mix sense of wry amusement, horror, and thank bod that's not here on how things like that are done in the USA" [Orcus]

You are justified in doing that, at least somewhat. We have some excellent public schools, so not all school districts are run by [insert animals here, being careful not to insult their intelligence].

At the moment, there's a terrible scandal about some well-connected people who got their children into prestigious colleges by fraudulent means . I get a fair bit of schadenfreude form seeing that a college which rejected me long ago was gulled by this fraud. See? It's all rigged.

Yeah I saw that, ouch! Quite a big scandal, and a *very* famous Uni...

Now that they know where to look, I expect that they'll find far more admissions scams.

how long did your German citizenship application take to go through? just got mine confirmed (don't yet have the certificate, I have to make an appointment to get that)

I applied on 12th Feb and it came through on 16th March.

I applied at the beginning of October and have a letter from them dated 10 October that they have received it and are working on it. I only found out that it was all approved when I phoned some time in January and I didn't receive the letter with official notification of this until 24 January. As I wanted to book a flight to see my mother in February, this was rather short notice, and I was glad I had had advance notice.

when I called them in the first week in February they told me they were fast-tracking British applications and that if we could get them in the following week, we'd hear in time for Brexit-day.