Why Teachers Are Political [A Rant]
I think it’s time for new political parties, and I mean it. After the debacle that was the release of teacher data reports, we saw a well-rated teacher say it’s crap, and a badly-rated teacher say it’s crap. Yet, the people chosen to represent “us” have yet to outright dismiss the multimillion dollar monster they created and unleashed upon our villages. NYC Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott and others implicitly think it’s Frankenstein’s monster: misunderstood and unintended for the public. The rest of us see this as the original Godzilla, crushing buildings and breathing fire into our public edifices at the taxpayer’s expense. (Joel Klein, in fact, wanted the monster to be released upon the villages, even when he knew it wasn’t safe. Mad scientist, indeed.)
Unfortunately, we can’t reopen all the closed schools and undo the damage to the thousands of kids affected.
Because of this, teachers don’t have much of a choice when it comes to their political identity. Our current education system is a function of our government, and our views about education is a piece of our core beliefs.