Yong Zhao’s NPE Speech, Transcribed– Part I
On Saturday, April 25, 2015, University of Oregon education professor Yong Zhao gave a keynote address at the second annual conference of the Network for Public Education (NPE). Zhao’s entire 55-minute speech can be found here.
It is a fantastic speech– truthful, yet also incredibly funny, and encouraging.
I was so impressed with Zhao’s words that I decided to transcribe his entire keynote. I believe his sppech is valuable enough to be preserved as a text. I also realize that many may not be able to srt aside 55 minutes to watch a video might be more inclined to read his words in more manageable installments.
I will post the speech in a series of five parts, each approximately 11 minutes long and consisting of under 2,000 words. In my last post, I will include a link to Zhao’s transcribed keynote in its entirety.
And now, for Part I:
Good afternoon. It’s great… you know, these kinds of gatherings, most of us, you did this in China, in Asian countries, would end up in jail. [Audience laughter.] Seriously, seriously. We are deliberately challenging the government. This is very serious, so, guys, better watch out with the airport tomorrow, you better consider. But, as I was telling Diane, I came to this country, this is the hope of this country: the individuals who think they can do something about something they don’t like, their government. We need a lot more of this; it’s happening [but] not happening fast enough.I was very surprised over the last many years. As an immigrant I had to do this myself. I thought you guys were taking care of this country for me[laughter] [so] I had to do it myself. I’ve gotta do something.[Points to projector screen] This is, uh, you can download. Those are the slides I use. This website, if you feel like to Tweet or follow me on Twitter, that’s fine. I don’t really tweet anything controversial, nothing [laughter] but just follow me anyway. It’s good, it’s always good to have. And, if you are on something, you can email me.This gathering this morning, I was hearing some of the comments about what we do, what kind of discourse we should have. But before that, I want [to] tell you that I have a personal problem with No Child Left Behind. I still think George Bush owes me money. [laughter] It’s a real story. It’s real. I have two children, and this is my daughter (shows slide of a girl blocking photo with her hand; no face visible) [laughter] And right now, she’s applying for college now. I have another child now who lives in Chicago. My son, he just, uh, this morning I heard someone, undergraduate from the University of Chicago. My son just graduated from Chicago, from University of Chicago and now is working in Chicago.The story, I said Bush owed me money, is this: My son had been [in] public school in Michigan for a long time and was perfectly happy, and one morning, about eighth or ninth grade, I forgot, says, we went to the quintessential American restaurant, Cracker Barrel, [laughter] [to] have a great American breakfast, and we were talking about education, and he said, “Dad, I really know how to get the best scores.” Anyone from Michigan here? MEAP. We used to have the MEAP test. So, saying that, “O man, I know how to get [a] perfect score on the MEAP.” I said, “How do you do that?” He said, “Well, you just write one statement and the three supporting statements.” I said, “Man, they’re ruining your education.” I said, “We’ve got [to] get out of here.”[laughter] That is why, so I had to send him, honestly, to a private school[3:00] and that’s really why Bush owes me three years of tuition. [laughter]That’s how I [got] started with this whole thing.And then, you know, right now in the US, what are we trying to do in education reform? The most popular phrase today in the US is called “readiness.”[laughter] Right? Readiness, readiness everything. Ready for college, ready for career, ready for kindergarten, I mean, really, every “ready” for something else, just not life. [laughter] Ready to die. It’s like a “ready” for death, you know. We have all these standards, there’s “readiness.” So, it’s been ready, a lot of us, so, what is the purpose of education? I think that’s what we want to talk about. What is the purpose of, is the purpose of education to always be ready for something you will never be? So, now, you know, everybody likes the Common Core. I’ve been going around debating with people. They love the Common Core [for] all kinds of reasons: Because it gets you ready for life and a career, college, right? So, I have a son who was ready for college. He went to college; he got into Chicago and was very good, competitive. But he was so ready that he got in, but he was not ready enough that he didn’t get any money. I had to pay for everything. [laughter] That’s, that’s another thing about life, life is really funny. As a professor, sure you know in education, we are, this is the worst part of living in America, when you are in the middle, right? We make enough money not to qualify for any assistance, right? And, but we don’t make enough not to care about the money. So, we, he graduated two years ago, and, by the way, in the middle, he was going to become, you know, like any Chinese kid would try to be, you know. You want to study economics. [laughter] So, that’s, uh, the kind of predetermined pathway for China so you can be ready for a banking job. [5:00] And so you can be ready to make some money.I didn’t object to that. It’s fine. Go for it. But then he went to Chicago. He’s somewhere nearby. I hope he’s not here, but I will share his story, anyway.[laughter] He said after two years, he said, “Dad, I’m not going to study economics anymore.” I said, “Why?” He said, “Well, there are too many darn Chinese there, and, uh…” [laughter] “and, uh, they all are better at, you know, than me in math.” I said, “Okay, fine. Okay.” And, I said, “What are you gonna do?” He said, “I’m going to start something else.” I said, “What are you going to study?” He said, “I’m going to study, uh, uh, um, art.”You know, that’s a very alien concept for a Chinese, but, [laughter] and so, I said, “What kind of art?” He said, “I’m going to do art history.” I said, “WhyYong Zhao’s NPE Speech, Transcribed– Part I | deutsch29:
Schneider is a southern Louisiana native, career teacher, trained researcher, and author of the ed reform whistle blower, A Chronicle of Echoes: Who’s Who In the Implosion of American Public Education.
She also has her second book available on pre-order, Common Core Dilemma: Who Owns Our Schools?, due for publication June 12, 2015.
