Marie Corfield: This week in NJ ed 'reform': The truth is out there

Marie Corfield: This week in NJ ed 'reform': The truth is out there:

This week in NJ ed 'reform': The truth is out there

This was quite a week in the battle over public education in the Garden State: Gov. Christie's testing study commission heard mountains of testimony from concerned parents and citizens in three different venues; educators continued to host parent Take the PARCC nights; NJEA released a bombshell new poll showing massive numbers of NJ parents oppose the test; and NJ101.5 capped several days of PARCC discussion with a debate over the test. 

Here are my thoughts:

A more perfect-er life for only $19.95

My daughter and I have a running joke: All the world's problems can be solved for only 3 easy payments of $19.95. If we just went out and purchased every single as-seen-on-TV product, our lives would be perfect.

That's what ed 'reformers' want us to believe about the PARCC test. Just like the PedEgg, the Bacon Bowl and theUro Club, PARCC promises to magically transform your child's entire life from dull to dazzling—with just 10 easy hours of testing! No more struggles with 'bad' teachers who lazily sit around waiting to collect their pensions. PARCC will send them packing. White suburban moms will magically accept that their kids really aren't brilliant when they see those crappy test scores. But wait! Call now, and Pearson will upgrade your flunkie kid's educational experience with all sorts of Common Core/PARCC aligned learning materials guaranteed to make them College and Career Ready! (Just pay the cost of cuts to arts and foreign language programs.)

When TV pitch-men run the country

The reality is that the road to miraculous cures and a better, shinier, awesomer life is paved with money back guarantees that somehow never seem to materialize. Whether it's the infomercial host or the President of the United States, carnival barkers have been selling the American public an endless stream of bad ideas, sketchy products and outright colossal failures since 1893 when Clark Stanley sold his first bottle of snake oil. Here are some of my favorites from big business/pharma/government:

• Cigarettes
• Weapons of Mass Destruction
• The Pinto
• Lead Paint
• Accutane
• Asbestos
• NAFTA
• GMOs
• Phen-phen
• DDT

Feel free to add your favorites in the comments section.

Number 1 on my list is DES. 77 years ago, American doctors wanted pregnant women to have 'trust and confidence' (more on this phrase below) in a little life-changing drug called Diethylstilbestrol. Here's what the CDC says about it:

Diethylstilbestrol (DES) is an estrogen that was first manufactured in a laboratory in 1938, so it is called a "synthetic estrogen." During 1938-1971, U.S. physicians prescribed DES to pregnant women to prevent miscarriages and avoid other pregnancy problems. As a result, an estimated 5-10 million pregnant women and the children born of these pregnancies were exposed to DES. Physicians Marie Corfield: This week in NJ ed 'reform': The truth is out there: