Emma Gonzalez Speech Transcript - Read Full March for Our Lives Speech #MarchForOurLives #NeverAgain

Emma Gonzalez Speech Transcript - Read Full March for Our Lives Speech:

Here's Emma Gonzalez's Gut-Wrenching March for Our Lives Speech in Full
"Fight for your life before it’s somebody else’s job."

Parkland shooting survivor Emma Gonzalez has become a powerful activist, and when she took the stage to speak at today's March for Our Lives in D.C., the crowd was moved by her stunning speech, which lasted 6 minutes and 23 seconds, the length of the Parkland shooting.

"Six minutes and about twenty seconds. In a little over six minutes, 17 of our friends were taken from us, 15 were injured, and everyone, absolutely everyone, was forever altered," she began.

"Everyone who was there understands, everyone who has been touched by the cold grip of gun violence understands," she said.

She continued: "No one could comprehend the devastating aftermath or how far this reach or where this could go. For those who still can't comprehend because they refuse to, I'll tell you where it went. Right into the ground, six feet deep."

She went on to list the names of her classmates and teachers who died that day.

"Six minutes and twenty seconds with an AR-15 and my friend Carmen would never complain to me about piano practice. Aaron Feis would never call Kira, 'Miss Sunshine.' Alex Schachter would never walk into school with his brother Ryan. Scott Beigel would never joke around with Cameron at camp. Helena Ramsey would never hang out after school with Max. Gina Montalto would never wave to her friend Liam at lunch. Joaquin Oliver would never play basketball with Sam or Dylan. Alaina Petty would never. Cara Loughran would never. Chris Hixon would never. Luke Hoyer would never. Martin Duque Anguiano would never. Peter Wang would never. Alyssa Alhadeff would never. Jamie Guttenberg would never. Meadow Pollack would never."

She then stopped speaking and stared into the crowd, tears streaming down her face.

She ended the silence with, "Since the time that I came out here, it has been six minutes and twenty seconds. The shooter has ceased shooting and will soon abandon his rifle, blend in with the students as they escape and walk free for an hour before arrest. Fight for your life before it’s somebody else’s job."Emma Gonzalez Speech Transcript - Read Full March for Our Lives Speech:

To Strengthen Democracy, Invest in Our Public Schools | Deborah Meier on Education

To Strengthen Democracy, Invest in Our Public Schools | Deborah Meier on Education:

To Strengthen Democracy, Invest in Our Public Schools
By Emily Gasoi, Deborah Meier

Who could have imagined that, more than 150 years into this bold project of preparing successive generations for informed citizenship, our system of universal education would be as imperiled as it is today? One of the original ideas behind establishing a system of “common schools”—as one of the early advocates for public education, Horace Mann, referred to them—was not that they would all be mediocre, but that children from different backgrounds, the children of workers and the children of factory owners, would be educated together. As Mann wrote in 1848, “Education … beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of the conditions of men—the balance-wheel of the social machinery.”1

Of course, Mann’s own understanding of equality and citizenship was surely limited, as he wrote these words at a time when only white men had the vote, the Emancipation Proclamation was yet to be signed, and the children of workers were more likely to be working in factories themselves than they were to be attending school. And while schools have historically mirrored society’s inequities as much as they have inoculated against them, our public institutions nevertheless have at their foundation the ideals set forth in Mann’s quote and in our most soaring rhetoric about individual freedom and the common good.

And yet, in our current reform climate, our system of public education is often referred to as a “monopoly” rather than a public good. As such, in districts around the country, public schools are being shuttered at an alarming rate, with more than 1,700 schools closed nationwide in 2013 alone.2

Nowhere is this trend more dramatically played out than in Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’s home state of Michigan, where entire school districts are losing the battle against unregulated privatization through for-profit charter management entities and voucher programs. And while there is no evidence that school choice alone helps to To Strengthen Democracy, Invest in Our Public Schools | Deborah Meier on Education:

My latest books

Posted on March 24, 2018 by debmeier

Emily Gasoi and I published last fall These Schools Belong to You and Me: Beacon Press, and so we have been busy promoting it around the country.

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I will mention again that Matthew Knoester and I had a book published by TC Press last summer:  Beyond Testing: 7 Assessments of Students and Schools More Effective Than Standardized Tests.  And, by the way, more compatible with the purposes of schools.

A Merger for the Rabbi and the Labor Leader - The New York Times

A Merger for the Rabbi and the Labor Leader - The New York Times:

A Merger for the Rabbi and the Labor Leader

Randi Weingarten and Rabbi Sharon Anne Kleinbaum are to be married March 25 at La Marina, a restaurant in New York. Judge Michelle Schreiber of the New York City Housing Court, is to officiate, with Rabbi Sharon Cohen Anisfeld, the president of Hebrew College, leading the religious ceremony, which will include the signing of the ketubah.

Ms. Weingarten (left), 60, is the president of the American Federation of Teachers, which has headquarters in Washington. She graduated from Cornell and received a law degree from Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University.

She is the daughter of Gabriel Weingarten of Suffern, N.Y., and the late Edith Appelbaum Weingarten.

Rabbi Kleinbaum, 58, is the senior rabbi of Congregation Beth Simhat Torah in New York, a synagogue with a significant number of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender congregants. She graduated from Barnard College and from Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in Wyncott, Pa.

She is the daughter of Josephine Leve Kleinbaum of Teaneck, N.J., and the late Max M. Kleinbaum.

In the mid-1990s, Rabbi Kleinbaum and Ms. Weingarten knew each other peripherally.

“We were two lesbians in New York fighting for different things,” Ms. Weingarten said. “We liked each other. We had good banter. It wasn’t as if there were a lot of high-profile gay women who were active in leadership roles. I thought she was fun, witty and smart.”It continued that way until 2006. Both were at the Empire State Pride Agenda dinner, when Rabbi Kleinbaum asked Ms. Weingarten to speak at the Gay Pride Shabbat service.

“I’d just turned 50, I’d never publicly come out and said, ‘I’m a lesbian,’” Ms. Weingarten said. “Sharon allowed me to see myself as who I was. It shifted my thinking that it wasn’t simply about having a gay pride speaker. It was about shifting me. I was very moved by it.”

Rabbi Kleinbaum recalls the “ask” a little differently.

“She’s one of the most significant labor leaders in America,” Rabbi A Merger for the Rabbi and the Labor Leader - The New York Times: