President-Elect Trump should remember 'The Snake' song before he meets with Michelle Rhee today
Donald Trump plans to meet with Michelle Rhee today, according to his communications director. Rhee is considered to be on the short list of the President-Elect's candidates for education secretary. Hopefully, Team Trump will practice due diligence and not allow the former chancellor of DC Public Schools and CEO of the billion dollar StudentsFirst organization to slither her way into Trump's cabinet.
Rhee's radical roots go deep. She is not only a gun control advocate, she supports Michael Bloomberg on this issue as well.
In a December 18, 2012 StudentsFirst memo Rhee urged staff to publicly oppose SB59 in Michigan-- legislation that would allow concealed pistol license holders who completed additional training to carry a concealed pistol in schools and other places that currently are off-limits.
From Rhee's memo:
Accordingly, I have come to the conclusion that StudentsFirst must publicly oppose legislation that would bring firearms into schools, anywhere. That includes opposing SB 59 in Michigan. We urge our members to voice their opposition as well. While gun control issues fall outside our direct policy agenda, I have absolutely no reluctance taking this position. I am convinced that allowing firearms in schools cannot help advance student achievement or put the interests of students first.New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is right when he says that our nation’s leaders must not let this moment pass without taking strong action.
Michelle Rhee also happens to be a registered lobbyist, a no-no on Trump's list of pros and cons.
Moreover, Rhee had a board member on StudentsFirstNY show up in the wikileaks email scandal. Douglas Band served on the board in 2013 and has been called “the man at the center of Bill Clinton, Inc.” Band was the author of a memo, leaked in the Podesta leaks, that shows how much money he raised for Bill Clinton in his various and conflicting “non-profit” and for-profit ventures
On Common Core, Rhee accused Republicans not supporting the initiative of having "lost their minds."
From this youtube video:
Michelle Rhee: “I'm sorry, so. I'm a Democrat. I don't dislike Republicans, but Republicans have lost their minds when it comes to common core. Ya'll are wrong on this one. Okay? Common core is just, I mean, it's obvious, you need a set of internationally-benchmarked national standards to ensure that every kid regardless of where they live, whether its in Jackson, Mississippi or Sacramento, California or Kansas City, Missouri. The expectations that we have for them are high and uniform. There is nothing wrong with that. But, you know, now Common Core has become this, basically like a political football. And its because after Obamacare it was like “what else do we want to attack Barack Obama on-- oh yeah lets he's trying to take over, you know, the federal role in education,” which is just ridiculous."
This is the height of Rhee's duplicity. Not only did Obama strong-arm cash-strapped school districts into adopting Common Core State Standards in order to receive federal funds, Common Core also altered the method and content of what was being tested.
Rhee knew this since the non-profit she founded, The New Teacher Project, issued a 2013 report in collaboration with David Coleman's Student Achievement Partners (SAP) (Yes, the same Coleman that not only designed Common Core, but showed up as the Treasurer for StudenstFirst until 2012) that explicitly tied the standards to subject matter.
The observation tools used in the past to rate teachers have not been updated, the authors complained, "to reflect the Common Core -- especially the importance the standards place on teaching the right content." (emphasis mine)
Rhee’s own New Teacher Project collaborators then wrote the organization was developing a rubric that will direct the "observer" in the classroom to Common Core language and math standards in order to "ground conversations about lessoncontent in the language of the relevant standards."
According to its own creators, Rhee’s New Teacher Project and David Coleman, Common Core was designed to broaden the federal role into education beyond testing standards into content—the very goal Rhee mocked Republicans for suggesting in the video.
Mr. Trump needs to get a broom and sweep this rattler out of contention as fast as he can.
