The New Jersey Kidz Are Alright
Reader: it is rare indeed these days that we encounter the kind of feel-good news story to which we can tip our collective wine boxes. Today’s episode of ‘we lift our wine boxes’ comes to us via New Jersey. I am referring of course to the feel-great story of 27-year-old Education Pioneer and Jersey Boy Wonder Andrew Buher who has just been named chief operating officer for the New York City schools, the nation’s largest school system. But who is this young man whose meteoric rise has been nothing less than meteoric? Are Education Pioneers the new Boy Scouts? On what will he spend his new $200K salary? And is a total lack of experience the new black?Alas, all of these important questions will have to wait as today we are saluting an actual story of hope and inspiration from New Jersey: the walkout by 1,000+ students from the Newark Public Schools last week to protest school budget cuts. The story received very little press coverage as most of the education reporters in the tri-state area were busy that day, covering stories of charter school outstandingness (did you know that students at this Newark charter are outperforming the Chinese???) Or that Newark students at this academy of rigorous excellence are putting their college dreams into practice by reading essays by literary critic Frederic