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Sunday, April 15, 2012

Jersey Jazzman: The Incoherent Reform of Michelle Rhee

Jersey Jazzman: The Incoherent Reform of Michelle Rhee:


The Incoherent Reform of Michelle Rhee

Last Friday, Michelle Rhee was on Brian Lehrer's radio show. The segment, unsurprisingly, is a textbook example of the incoherence of the corporate reform movement.

I'll have more to say about the rest of the interview later, but for now, I want to focus in on a remarkable passage, starting at 18:19. I have transcribed it in its entirety because I think it needs to go on Rhee's permanent record (all emphasis mine):
Lehrer: So lets assume that you get all the flexibility you want principals to have and school systems to have to assign or remove teachers. I'll be honest: my impression, as a public school parent for the last 15 years, and still at it, is that that would only change things at the margins. Andthe much bigger challenge is to attract good people to the field in the first place, and then