Ravitch Responds to Business Rountable "Thought Leader"
The Business Roundtable's attempts to deconstruct Diane Ravitch's withering critique of corporate education reform is now underway. The other day His Arrogance Andy Rottenham, the self-acknowledged edu-priest of"thought leadership" for numerous corporate sludge tanks including Eli Broad's, had a go at Ravitch in TNR, using terminology for which he had the patronizing courtesy to define for his "thought followership." Here isRavitch's response, too good to be missed.
A TNR Symposium.From: Diane Ravitch
- Diane Ravitch
- March 21, 2010 | 5:39 pm
To: Andrew Rotherham
Subject: We need to improve our education system—not tinker with models that affect tiny numbers of kids and can’t be replicated.
You complain that, in my new book and in this symposium, I fail to provide the way forward or at least a few silver bullets. You say that I do not show the way forward. So let me give it a try.
First, the punitive approach embedded in NCLB, in my judgment, has poisoned the atmosphere. Teachers feel fearful, beleaguered, and disrespected. A few months ago, a national survey found that 40 percent of U.S. teachers were "disheartened.” I have heard from many teachers (and posted some of their e-mails, often anonymously at their request, on my website atwww.dianeravitch.com). They are indeed discouraged because of the blame game that makes teachers the culprits for poor performance.