Monday, July 30, 2012

Teachers Take A Stand. Will You? | OurFuture.org

Teachers Take A Stand. Will You? | OurFuture.org:


Teachers Take A Stand. Will You?

If you've noticed lately the tendency in car commercials to show the vehicle against a background of an empty city street, you can assume it's likely due to the abundance of empty city streets available in the place famous for being home to the major automotive companies -- Detroit.
While many of America's biggest cities are experiencing large influxes of new residents, Detroit stands in stark contrast, losing a staggering 25 percent of its population from 2000-2010.
During the day, the city's still-grand architectural feats are silent sentinels towering over sparsely populated sidewalks. At night, pockets of bright lights -- a constellation amidst a darkened cityscape -- mark the few destinations where families and revelers can come to dine, drink, and gamble.
Yet, it was amidst this twilight landscape that the American Federation Teachers chose to stage its annual convention.
When AFT decided to locate its meeting in Detroit -- likely some time ago -- they perhaps were ready for this landscape of vacant buildings and empty parking lots. But it's doubtful they anticipated they'd be descending into the epicenter of the most vicious attack, so far, on American public education.
Welcome To Detroit's Education New Normal
The Huffington Post's ever-useful Joy Resmovits has the necessary background on the situation in Detroit. But