Jay Mathews - Jay Mathews: Five strikes against an education writer - washingtonpost.com:
"It's almost December, time to sum up and see whether I added value to life on the planet this year. Others can assess my successes, if any. I prefer to dwell on my failures. Here are five I consider important.
-- I spent too much time covering political and ideological battles. Exhibit A is, of course, the controversy over Michelle A. Rhee's tenure as D.C. schools chancellor, particularly the firing of hundreds of teachers. My colleague Bill Turque has done a terrific job following that story, but I could not resist butting in, both in this column and in my washingtonpost.com/class-struggle blog. The distractions hurt everybody in the short run, something worth noting, but in the long run, such disputes rarely yield policies that raise achievement."
"It's almost December, time to sum up and see whether I added value to life on the planet this year. Others can assess my successes, if any. I prefer to dwell on my failures. Here are five I consider important.
-- I spent too much time covering political and ideological battles. Exhibit A is, of course, the controversy over Michelle A. Rhee's tenure as D.C. schools chancellor, particularly the firing of hundreds of teachers. My colleague Bill Turque has done a terrific job following that story, but I could not resist butting in, both in this column and in my washingtonpost.com/class-struggle blog. The distractions hurt everybody in the short run, something worth noting, but in the long run, such disputes rarely yield policies that raise achievement."