Jersey Jazzman Jammin' All Week
Intimidation & Harassment From Montclair's Reformy BOE
If you are a former member of the East German Stasi and are looking for work, may I suggest sending your resume to the Montclair, NJ Board of Education?Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey obtained a temporary restraining order yesterday to stop the Montclair Board of Education’s effort to identify an anonymous critic who the board believes was involved in the public releas
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When Chris Christie isn't yelling at individual teachers, he's busy bashing their unions (11/3/13, Newton, NJ):(5:26) I will tell you, there are the forces that will always fight against us. You see it on TV every day. The folks who believe that the government and your tax dollars are their personal piggy bank to play with and to social engineer. We've got to send a strong message in the last three days, especially to the New Jersey Education Association. It is time to send a strong message.Here the rubes who are actually working for this man applaud him. Poor suckers: they actually think he's
Chris Cerf, NJ Education Commissioner, at the New Jersey Educators Association convention, Atlantic City, 11/8/13*:I always look forward to this event and I'm really delighted. And I want to extend my appreciation particularly to the leadership of the NJEA, with whom I feel that we've had a sometimes spirited discussion, but always a positive and a respectful one.NJ Governor Chris Christie, 11/5/10:“These teachers have all summer off. Can’t they have their convention during the summer?’’ the governor said as he spoke to a clutch of high schoolers surrounding him.“They got to get two days off f
Veteran journaliust Bob Braun is off the chain - and New Jersey, and the nation, are better for it. In a terrific series of posts (here, here, here, and here ), Braun has been skewering the state-appointed superintendent of Newark's schools, Cami Anderson, for what can only be described as an offensive and racist comment - one mailed to the parents of Newark, no less:Cami Anderson, the Christie-appointed Newark schools superintendent, apparently will pay no price for sending out a letter to Newark families contending that, when their children are home from school, they get into trouble, crime
DEC 04
Everything You Heard Today About NJ Teachers Is Wrong
So I guess someone at the NJ Department of Education decided that today (the day after PISA Day) was the perfect time to tell the world that many of our state's teachers suck: More than a quarter of teachers who were reviewed in a two-year pilot program of the state’s new evaluation system were rated only "partially effective" or worse in one part of the new system, according to a new r
DEC 01
'Twas the Night Before PISA Day!
'Twas the night before PISA Day, when all through the foundationsThe wonks were all dreaming about Bill Gates's donations;The rankings were crafted for each nation with care,In hopes that more grants would come from billionaires;The children were tested and stressed at their desks;While visions of bubble sheets made them feel quite grotesque;Suburban moms in their 'kerchiefs, and dads in their cap
Sunday Music: Pierce Turner
Heard Pierce Turner last night at Joe's Pub in the city. If Joyce played guitar...It was a really good show: quirky, fun, epic in a small way (we Irish are good at that sort of thing (and by "we Irish," I mean "we" as in "we Americans who pretend we're Irish")). Pop music's a funny thing: I really don't know why some stuff hits and some doesn't. But no matter what, yo
REALLY Dumb Things White People Say About Schools: Lawrence Harmon
Your "duh" moment of the day, ladies and gentleman:BOSTON’S TEACHERS are succeeding swimmingly in their chosen profession, with 93 percent landing in the exemplary and proficient categories on a new teacher-evaluation system. Yet about two-thirds of the city’s schools rank in the bottom 20 percent statewide based on student test data. What’s going on here?“There’s a disconnect between ou
Why Won't Charter Cheerleaders Acknowledge The Facts?
I've got to give my old buddy Tom Moran, chief of the op-ed page at the Star-Ledger credit: he managed to write a column on education today where he didn't blame the teachers unions for everything. Must have been hard to repress those urges...Cami Anderson, the superintendent of Newark schools, has taken enormous heat for nurturing the growth of charter schools, which now educate roughly 1 in 4 ki
NOV 29
The REAL Christie Legacy: "We Deserve Better!"
In the largest high school in Trenton - New Jersey's capitol - the beautiful, brilliant children of this state are forced to learn in a building that is unsafe and disgusting. This terrific piece of citizen journalism, courtesy of Rebecca Burr, details what is happening in a school that is almost literally under Chris Christie's nose. We Deserve Better, Part One: Begging In Paradise from Princeton
When "Reform" Is Really Union Busting
Once again, here's NJ Education Commissioner Chris Cerf on teachers unions:I always look forward to this event and I'm really delighted. And I want to extend my appreciation particularly to the leadership of the NJEA, with whom I feel that we've had a sometimes spirited discussion, but always a positive and a respectful one.As I documented in that post, Cerf's words in no way match the actions of