Our Crazy Language
I think the definition of "flip-flop" has expanded.
This is from Dana Goldstein, who may be interpreting Kevin Cary or giving credence to his point of view, I can't completely tell.
This is from Dana Goldstein, who may be interpreting Kevin Cary or giving credence to his point of view, I can't completely tell.
Kevin allows that although Ravitch's positions on testing and school choice have flip-flopped, she has been constant on the need for a core curriculum.Here's Ravitch on changing her mind.
Free Speech Zone
I have nothing to add to this. Robert Reich fills in some details, though. The First Amendment is being stood on its head. Money speaks, and an unlimited amount of it can now be spent bribing and cajoling politicians. Yet peaceful assembly is viewed as a public nuisance and removed by force.
Fun With Standards
This is from one of the groups that's trying to figure out the brave new world of 24/7 assessment, based on the CCS. There's an entire layer of people for whom these distinctions are the be-all. I've never met anyone who actually teaches children in schools who thinks that the constant rewriting of standards has any practical effect on anything or anyone. Seriously, read the distinction between old standard C and new standard C. Would that distinction inform any decision you made on any given day? And what does this all mean in the age of differentiation? I've served on curriculum... more »
Lost in Translation
I have this famous old fakey-German neologism-thingy posted in my computer help desk area, where we fix broken machines: *ACHTUNG!* ALLES TURISTEN UND NONTEKNISCHEN LOOKENPEEPERS! DAS KOMPUTERMASCHINE IST NICHT FÜR DER GEFINGERPOKEN UND MITTENGRABEN! ODERWISE IST EASY TO SCHNAPPEN DER SPRINGENWERK, BLOWENFUSEN UND POPPENCORKEN MIT SPITZENSPARKSEN. IST NICHT FÜR GEWERKEN BEI DUMMKOPFEN. DER RUBBERNECKEN SIGHTSEEREN KEEPEN DAS COTTONPICKEN HÄNDER IN DAS POCKETS MUSS. ZO RELAXEN UND WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN. To a man, modern kids look at this thing and then go immediately to Google T... more »
Creepy
Gibson tests, MRI's... Why they haven't hired phrenologists is beyond me. If you're ever in a hurry, and you need to find a terrible idea quickly, look to Texas.
Poor People Must Be Kept Away From Books
Ben Joravsky does a nice job with the library cutbacks here in the city. He even traveled up to my very branch library-- the one I like to write about. Quite often. I know this librarian; she's a hoot. Every Saturday I drop into this branch library and watch her keep the plates spinning as the line grows longer and longer. The books are piled upon piles of book piles. This woman is a saint, a bouncer, and a literary guru; she has reliable opinions on almost all of the books I check out. Mind you, we live in a city where 160 of the elementary schools don't even have librarians, an... more »
Worse Than Bedbugs
I only just today realized that I am basically a vector for everything wrong with our nation. In my wallet, I've been carrying around a credit card that I got through an MBNA/NEA arrangement ages ago. I don't know why it never registered with me before, but MBNA long ago became Bank of America, which is basically a criminal enterprise as far as I'm concerned. Bank of America is like some untreated gambling addict who's come to live in your house and is sniffing around your dresser for cash. I pay the damn bill every month, but in my mind the card has always been an MBNA card. I don... more »
Multiple Measures
I've seen some Twitter traffic lately on *multiple measures*. Duncan is always blathering on about *multiple measures*, and how he's in favor of them. The trouble is that *multiple measures* is an empty phrase. You can be in favor of *multiple measures* but if at the end of the day your policies increase the importance of multiple choice *tests*, then it doesn't matter how many times you say *multiple measures *on camera. After a few years of RTTT, we'll all see that *multiple measures* turned out to mean multiple multiple-choice *tests* throughout the school year. Although apparent... more »
Widget Watch
I've added a new Twitter feed over there on the side bar. I'm calling it RepWatch. Basically, I was hyped up about this cutting-through-the-bullshit article by Glen Brown over at* Substance*, and I wanted to figure out where my state representative would be in the near future so that I could go talk to her about it. Trouble is, she's hard for me to find because I don't do Facebook, where her public events seem to be announced. However, she's on the Twitter, so now I can find her and ask her what she's going to do about the structural revenue problem in this state. I also put the go... more »
Mic Check!
There was an interesting mic check up in my neck of the woods yesterday,written about nicely over at *Chicagoist.* There was a bit of Twitter traffic over the mic check-- one of the local journo's got his panties in a bunch over it. (My self-editing has gone to hell.) Listen, I too worry about mic checks if they drown free speech, but this one was brief and the alderman got his shpiel in, delayed by five minutes or so. In short, everyone's First Amendment rights were intact. For me, the more interesting part came out after it was over, and one individual described what it's been lik... more »
The New Graybeards
Rahm's new Community Destruction Officer is all of 32. He's been a teacher * and* a principal. What is surprising to me is that he hasn't yet been a superintendent, nor does he run a foundation. I, too, was a 32 year-old genius. I could have closed schools left and right. Give me a spreadsheet, give me some outside consultants, give me a quota, and *BLAMMO! *-- closed schools.
Thank God
And we're back. Every day I thank God that I haven't been brutally pepper-sprayed by police in Seattle, NYC, or at UC-Davis. In Chicago, we're approaching the deadline for CEO Brizard to announce his school closing list, which is how modern urban "portfolio" districts react to poverty. In an intensification of policies that have not worked, Brizard is going to recommend to the school board by November 21 which schools he's giving up on, and then the Board will finalize that list on December 1. The Board is appointed, accountable only to one man, Rahm Emanuel, who was elected by 23%... more »
Please Leave A Message At The Tone
Taking a couple days off here. Back on Sunday with a blockbuster scoop.* Meanwhile, enjoy the headlines courtesy of Mike Cooper. *does anyone have a blockbuster scoop I can borrow? *OMFG*. As soon as I posted this I saw some of the feed coming out of the Chicago News Cooperative about this person and that person demanding that Karen Lewis step down because she smoked pot in college and made fun of Arne Duncan. What asses the media are! Just for this, I'm making a cash donation to the Karen Lewis buy-yourself-a-drink fund! Ok, she made fun of the Secretary of Education and then ap...more »
Look! Books!
Linda Lutton has some words published in article form over at WBEZ about Rahm's media event over in Pilsen. I love how they prop him up in front of some books in Pilsen--- at one of the elementary schools that even has a library, even though 160 don't. Check it out. Stolen shamelessly from Linda Lutton Look at all the nice books! I don't know about you, but the one thing I'm sure of now is that elementary schools in Pilsen have lots of nice books. All of them. So, now we have another city report card. There's an army of data people producing a warehouses of report cards. This new o... more »
Strange Bedfellows
Gulp. Kind of horrifying, actually. Every time someone sniffs around a little bit, another right-wing billionaire has joined forces with Arne Duncan. The man's legacy will be this: he crafted federal education policy to those suit the needs of people determined to do away with public service, the public space, the line between church and state, and erase every remnant of the New Deal and the Great Society. For me, as a historian, the scary part is that our public schools have never before been subject to such a sustained assault on their very foundations. Never before were there s... more »
I Listen To Everyone
I don't have time for a blow-by-blow analysis, but my feeling is that there's a core emptiness to the man below on the left. What he's exceptionally good at is staying on message. For example, on the early question of international comparisons controlled for poverty, he inserts his soundbite on poverty not being destiny without answering the question. Many good questions. Joe Bower got his question in again--- and Duncan in my opinion had a Sarah Palin moment. Whoever asked that question on charters policing themselves is some kind of crazy genius. I think if Duncan had been asked ... more »
Nice New Feature At Substance
I see Substance is publishing education-related events now. Great idea--- I hope they extend it to two weeks out rather than just one. Give people time to plan. For example Monday night Rahm is keynoting at the UNO thing at the Fairmont. Who knew? I'm sure he'll have a lot of insightful things to say. It would be a great occasion for a candlelight vigil for all of the community schools that have bitten the dust in this town.
In Which I Reflect
Still in recovery mode after finishing John Banville's *The Sea*. Nobody writes about death and memory quite like the Irish. After finishing *The Sea *, I felt like jumping into it. There was a time when I would pick up a book like that one and read about all of these desiccated, decaying characters and think, "*I*'ll never be like that." Now it's more *Oh, yes. That.* Prior to that, another melancholy text. *Follies* is at Chicago Shakespeare Theater. I can't deny it, it's superb production, but we left right after *I'm Still Here, *which was knocked out of the park by Hollis Res... more »
The Classic Charter School Switch
Here's a good description of how a stealth charter invasion works in Chicago. It's a pretty sad history, and now Christopher House has decided to join it. Remind me to fight off Christopher House should they decide to come north into Rogers. Charter schools are miracle schools. Their very existence implies that more of them should exist. On the other hand, we couldn't possibly learn anything from all of the successful purely public schools out there.
The Big Macher
Chicago's mayor is determined to visit every bad idea imaginable on our public schools. It's as if he has a filter on his brain, and only the worst ideas get in. All the good ideas bypass his brain and go directly into the production of bile. If you took the $5m "donation" and asked a committee of principals how best to spend this money to improve achievement, they would not have come up with this plan in a million years. We're ruled by all of these would-be CEO types, who think they know what makes people tick. They don't. By the way, this value-added experiment the nation is goin... more »