Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog:
Schooling in the Ownership Society
Schooling in the Ownership Society
Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk
Schooling in the Ownership Society
Bridging Differences
Community Rejuvenation Muralist Desi Mundo
Desi MundoStrong coffee this morning with Desi Mundo, visionary artist and founder of the Oakland-based Community Rejuvenation Project. Desi grew up tagging and writing on the walls of Chicago and eventually became an airbrush artist of renown. His work in Oakland and surrounding towns has covered the walls of schools, grocery stores, housing projects, bridges, and buildings threatened with demol
MAY 29
In the 'Post-Racial Era': The Pre-school-to-Prison Pipeline
Manual Arts Senior High School student Damien Valentine, 16, worked with community groups to pass a proposal last year that bans suspensions of defiant students in L.A. Unified. (Christina House / For The Times)Black children make up 18% of preschoolers (mostly 4-year olds), but make up nearly half of all out-of-school suspensions. -- NPRQuick-trigger suspensions of African-American students, espe
MAY 28
For immediate release from N.C. NAACP
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEMay 28, 2014Contact: Sarah Bufkin, NC NAACP - smbufkin@gmail.com or 404.285.3413Workers and Clergy Members Arrested in Speaker Thom Tillis' Office for Petitioning to Repeal a Flood of Unjust, Destructive Laws Hurting North Carolina We Shall Not Be Moved | Tillis 15RALEIGH, NC - Hundreds of North Carolinians showed up yesterday to lobby their state legislators to repent f
As if Rahm didn't know...
MAYOR PLAYS DUMB ON POT ARRESTS... He asks top cop McCarthy to explain why misdemeanor marijuana possession means one thing on the North Side — and a very different thing on the South and West Sides. On North Side, cops write tickets for bogarting. On South and West sides its prison.ANSWER: The same reason Rahm's school closings and selective-enrollment school openings mean one thing on the North
We need a living wage
R.I.P. Maya Angelou (1928-2014)Find a beautiful piece of art. If you fall in love with Van Gogh or Matisse or John Oliver Killens, or if you fall love with the music of Coltrane, the music of Aretha Franklin, or the music of Chopin - find some beautiful art and admire it, and realize that that was created by human beings just like you, no more human, no less. -- Note to self LIVING WAGE...While Ra
MAY 27
Weekend Quotables
Christie tells Baraka, "We are the deciders..."Gov. Chris Christie to Mayor Baraka"I also made very clear to [Baraka] that it is the state government that runs the school system in Newark, and that while I will talk with him and hear his ideas, that we are the deciders on what happens in the school system.” -- Thom HartmanChicago Alderman "Slow Eddie" Burke“There are a lot
Zuckerberg is at it again
'The word 'policy' makes us think of politicians and bureaucrats. But what happens when powerful policy-makers aren’t elected or appointed? Today, billionaires are shaping education policy in the United States. Buying political influence—-even legally...' -- Robin RogersVast private donations have brought public dollars with them, giving America’s wealthiest people power over the public agenda th
MAY 24
IL Senate votes to kill Charter Commission. Bad news for Gülen charters?
Fethullah GülenThe IL Senate voted to abolish the State Charter School Commission which had the power to override school district decisions to reject charter applications. The bill to abolish was sponsored by Sen. Kimberly Lightford, D-Maywood and passed the Senate 34-22. It now goes back to the House for possible action next week.This watered-down version of the bill still leaves rejected charter
'Urban' Schools and Other Euphemisms
Meier: It's amazing the lengths to which we will go to avoid the questions that surround poverty and segregation, and how useful instead it has been to focus our animosity on schools.
MAY 27
Urban, Rural Schools Connected by Inequality
Klonsky: Small rural schools, which often served as community anchors, were (are) being closed by the hundreds.
MAY 22
We Need a Strong Alliance for Schools
Meier: States are making it easier to hand over our schools to private interests or providing money to existing private schools.