I have never understood how "reformers" could admire "An Inconvenient Truth," and not understand the concept of ecology. Filmmaker Davis Guggenheim is correct about "
the barbaric cruelty" of our urban schools, but he clearly doesn’t understand that they are complex ecosystems. I have seen plenty of horrible teachers. I continually see hopelessly incompetent probationary teachers, who have no due process rights, but who are granted continuing contracts by principals who need a warm body for our toughest classrooms. I have seen unions fulfill their contractual obligation to represent bad teachers. But I have never seen the union undercut a legitimate termination process. I have seen the union continually offer to help remove ineffective teachers. Guggeheim should think globally and dramatize Linda Perlstein's
Tested. He should think ecologically and ask how teaching talent can be recruited by tarring the entire profession and undercutting our ability to resist the educational malpractice of NCLB.
Blaming Randi Weingarten for bad schools is like blaming Greenpeace for global warming because they failed to usher in a Green Revolution. Blaming unions for poor teacher quality is like blaming the ACLU for defending
