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Monday, April 11, 2011

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Erasurehead

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Erasurehead

Erasurehead


Replacing the broom as symbol for D.C. reform
What a tangled web Michelle Rhee has woven for herself. Erasure-gate is now the talk of the town in D.C. now that Rhee seems to have traded in her broom for a pencil with an eraser on its end. Even Rhee buddy Jay Mathews has turned on her. Maybe because Mathews' wife Linda, helped break the USA Today story which sparked a wild counter attack by Rhee when she went on the Tavis Smiley Show.
"When the academic achievement rates of a district like D.C. go up, people assume that it can't be ... because the kids are actually attaining higher gains in student achievement, but that it's because of something like cheating," Rhee told Smiley. When he asked Rhee if she believed the USA Today investigation to be lacking in integrity, she said, "Absolutely."
But even so... Mathews is now asking Arne Ducan if he'll take back the Blue Ribbon awarded Rhee and the district for its bump in test scores now that we know it wasn't a bump at all, but a pot hole. You may recall that Duncan gave D.C. the award on the eve of D.C. elections in November, his way of campaigning for defeated