Five reasons the Supreme Court matters for educators and public schools - Education Votes

Five reasons the Supreme Court matters for educators and public schools - Education Votes

Five reasons the Supreme Court matters for educators and public schools

By Amanda Meanas

Instead of waiting until the American people have had their say and the next president is inaugurated, President Donald Trump and the GOP-led Senate are determined to rush through Trump’s Supreme Court nominee. Those efforts led to a COVID-19 “super spreader” event at the White House. More than 20 people, including the president, tested positive soon after the event.

Voters should decide who fills Justice Ginsburg’s seat. But Senate Republicans are attempting to rush through President Trump’s nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, even though they have dragged their feet and failed to pass coronavirus relief legislation that would help so many Americans and public school systems across the country.

“Judge Amy Coney Barrett has sided with the powerful and well-connected throughout her career. … She has sided with the powerful against workers, allowed racially segregated workplaces, ruled in favor of Trump policies harming immigrants, and against those seeking to protect women from sexual assault,” said former science teacher and NEA President Becky Pringle.

The Supreme Court is a critical institution in our federal government for protecting the rights of those who might otherwise not have a voice in our institutions. That means the next justice absolutely must not be beholden to partisan or corporate interests.

Here are five reasons the Supreme Court and the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett matter for educators:

1. Judge Barrett wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act

In her short three years as a federal judge, Barrett’s record was alarming, and she has promised to continue to side with corporations over working people. While Americans continue to struggle through the global coronavirus pandemic, access to healthcare is at the forefront of conversation.If Barrett is confirmed, she is poised to strike down the Affordable Care Act, throwing millions off their insurance and ending protections for those with preexisting conditions. In fact, for the 7 million Americans who have battled COVID-19, those side effects could now be considered preexisting conditions.

2. The Supreme Court will vote on workers’ rights to join and form unions<

Educators could face increased difficulty in holding their employers accountable for illegal discrimination and unfair employment practices if Barrett is confirmed. During her time in the lower court, Judge Barrett limited workers’ tools to fight against racial discrimination in the workplace, wrote in favor of age discrimination when applying to jobs, and worked to set dangerous precedent that would hurt gig workers. The Court already weakened the rights of educators to collectively bargain in 2018, and the nomination of Barrett means unions will face CONTINUE READING: Five reasons the Supreme Court matters for educators and public schools - Education Votes

California parents mostly disapprove of distance learning - Los Angeles Times

California parents mostly disapprove of distance learning - Los Angeles Times

California parents mostly disapprove of distance learning, poll finds

As most public and private school students in California continue to study from home, a majority of voters say the state’s schools are not prepared to offer high-quality distance learning, although they are more positive about their own local schools, according to a poll released Thursday.

Parents worry that if children are at home for the rest of the year, it will result in learning loss for all students, but especially for the most economically vulnerable who suffer from hunger or housing insecurity. Low-income parents, in particular, worry that prolonged distance learning will mean they won’t be able to get back to work, according to a poll commissioned by EdSource, a nonprofit education news organization.

The poll was conducted online between Aug. 29 and Sept. 7 by the FM3 Research polling firm and surveyed 834 registered voters. At the time of the poll, the school year had already begun for three-quarters of the 200 parents or guardians surveyed.

One major issue that has emerged since the pandemic upended education nationwide is how to motivate children when they aren’t in the classroom and don’t have in-person contact with teachers.

These concerns are shared by parents. Four out of five say the biggest challenge of distance learning is sustaining their children’s interest to study. Parents also worry about insufficient instructional time with a teacher and say it’s hard for children to work on their own, as well as understand assignments.

“Many times, my granddaughter comes to my room to have a conversation,” said Anita Flemington, whose granddaughter attends school at the Pasadena Unified School District. “I ask her, ‘Are you on break?,’ and she replies, ‘No.’”

Fully 75% of registered voters, including parents, say that distance learning is worse than in-class instruction. A major reason parents hold such a dim view of distance learning stems from their experience in the spring when districts quickly had to make the transition. Just over half of parents rated their child’s spring experience with distance learning as “not too effective” or “not at all effective.” Only 7% rated it as “very effective,” with another 27% rating it as “somewhat effective.”

One-third of parents were unable to cite anything positive about their experience with CONTINUE READING: California parents mostly disapprove of distance learning - Los Angeles Times

South Carolina: Supreme Court Strikes Down Voucher Plan! | Diane Ravitch's blog

South Carolina: Supreme Court Strikes Down Voucher Plan! | Diane Ravitch's blog

South Carolina: Supreme Court Strikes Down Voucher Plan!

South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster thought he could use some of the state’s CARES Act money to create a voucher program.

The Supreme Court of South Carolina just struck down his illegal scheme to divert money from public schools to private and religious schools.

From TheState.com:

Public money cannot be spent on South Carolina’s private schools, the S.C. Supreme Court ruled late Wednesday afternoon.

The unanimous 5-0 decision was a high-profile defeat for Gov. Henry McMaster, who earlier this year announced he was designating $32 million in federal COVID-19 relief funds to go to pay one-time tuition grants of up to $6,500 per student for about 5,000 private school K-12 students across the state.

“We hold the Governor’s decision constitutes the use of public funds for the direct benefit of private educational institutions within the meaning of, and prohibited by, Article XI, Section 4 of the South Carolina Constitution,” CONTINUE READING: South Carolina: Supreme Court Strikes Down Voucher Plan! | Diane Ravitch's blog

CURMUDGUCATION: Has Miami-Dade Really Found The Secret Of Cheap Excellence?

CURMUDGUCATION: Has Miami-Dade Really Found The Secret Of Cheap Excellence?

Has Miami-Dade Really Found The Secret Of Cheap Excellence?

From school choice to school finance, Florida is the state education disruptors love to point at, though they tend to point verrrrry carefully at very specific features of the Floridian education landscape. For instance, here's Michael Q. McShane at Education Next running a piece about how Miami-Dade schools have "bucked the staffing surge trend" while still maintaining "student achievement." His thesis is right up front:

The Miami-Dade County Public Schools spends less per student than the only three larger districts in the country and still manages to deliver top-tier student achievement results.

The implication, popular with the conservative wing of reformsters, is that educational excellence is available for bargain prices if we just worked the right levers. But there are three large holes in his Florida argument.

About that staffing surge...

McShane starts by pointing out that Miami educates around 350,000 students, and according to the census folks, they do it for less than $10K a year, far less than other huge districts, even when adjusted for cost of living. This has not a surprise; Florida schools have been trying to shake off the "latest" budget cuts for years (here they are in 2011, and here they are this year). Florida is run by politicians who are openly hostile to public education, and they've been trying to bleed the system dry for years. 

But Miami-Dade, says McShane, is doing it "partly" by providing low-cost education by pushing back CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Has Miami-Dade Really Found The Secret Of Cheap Excellence?

WILL BETSY DEVOS AND THE USDOE ALLOW THE SCHWINIGANS TO CONTINUE UNABATED? – Dad Gone Wild

WILL BETSY DEVOS AND THE USDOE ALLOW THE SCHWINIGANS TO CONTINUE UNABATED? – Dad Gone Wild

WILL BETSY DEVOS AND THE USDOE ALLOW THE SCHWINIGANS TO CONTINUE UNABATED?

“Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.”

― George Eliot, Adam Bede

The hits from 2020 keep right on coming. Last week it was the legendary St. Lous Cardinals pitcher Bob Gibson. This week, it’s guitar hero Eddie Van Halen.

Any of you who grew up in the ’70s and ’80s can attest to the power of Van Halen and what it felt like the first time you heard those ferocious guitar licks. Dance the Night Away, off of the second album, will always epitomize the band for me – technical genius that brought forth joy when you heard it. Eddie’s impish grin is forever etched in my mind when a Van Halen tune came on the radio. A decided departure from the pained grimace employed by previous guitar gods. Eddie seemed to be having as much delivering the sound as we did receive it.

As sad as the passing of Van Halen is, there is some solace in that his death brought us all together, if just for a moment. Right, and Left was forgotten, as lasting memories were shared. For just a brief respite, it was refreshing to be able to leave behind the constant political wrangling, and realize that in some things we are more similar than different.

AND THE SCHWINIGANS CONTINUE

If you’ll remember, back in the Spring the Governor and his handmaiden concocted this fantastic – that’s sarcasm in case you missed it – idea to transform literacy in Tennessee. It called for employing only one method of teaching reading the Science of Reading. It increased testing by mandating that all LEA’s utilize a state chosen benchmark test administered 3x a year. It included mandates for teacher prep programs in Tennessee to change how they taught reading instruction. It would serve to rob LEA’s of local control. At its core was promised payday for the preferred textbook CONTINUE READING: WILL BETSY DEVOS AND THE USDOE ALLOW THE SCHWINIGANS TO CONTINUE UNABATED? – Dad Gone Wild

NYC Public School Parents: Why Covid has spread in Ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods and "Cutting School" -- how Black schools have been a focus of experimentation and profit

NYC Public School Parents: Why Covid has spread in Ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods and "Cutting School" -- how Black schools have been a focus of experimentation and profit 

NYC Public School Parents: Why Covid has spread in Ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods and "Cutting School" 

how Black schools have been a focus of experimentation and profit 

Today on my WBAI podcast "Talk out of School" I updated listeners on the additional school closures planned this week in NYC, first by Mayor de Blasio in nine zip codes in Brooklyn and Queens, and now in larger numbers in red and orange zones of high Covid positivity, determined by Governor Cuomo and his Covid task force.  

Naftuli Moster of Yaffed, who first appeared on the podcast in May, explained why many of the hot spots experiencing high rates of COVID positivity  in NYC are located primarily in areas with high concentrations of Ultra-Orthodox Jews. He said this was for two reasons: one, there is no science instruction at the Yeshivas, the schools that Ultra-Orthodox boys attend, and thus they don’t understand how viral transmission occurs. Two, the members of these insular communities have long flouted the law in areas of education and public health without any consequences, and in fact have received special favors and additional funding because of their political influence. Many have gotten used to violating rules set down by the city or state, in this case regarding the need to avoid mass gatherings, wear masks, and maintain social distancing. 

Naftuli suggested the best way the Governor and Mayor should address the refusal of many members of these communities to comply with the new restrictions would be by threatening their leaders with a loss of public funding, including discretionary child-care vouchers, funds which they have received at disproportionate levels in the past. 

Then I interviewed Noliwe Rooks, W.E.B. Du Bois Professor of Literature at Cornell, about her new book, Cutting School: Privatization, Segregation, and the End of Public Education, which analyzes the history of education inequity in the U.S. and the way in which the schooling of Black students has been repeatedly used as an opportunity for experimentation and profit by education reformers and entrepreneurs. 

Instead of providing these students with the same opportunities wealthy white students receive, such as small classes, experienced teachers, and plenty of extracurricular activities, including art and music, as well as intensive support when they are struggling,  Prof. Rooks explained how their schools continue to be defunded and privatized, through the expansion of charters, vouchers and online learning.  You can subscribe and download other episodes of "Talk out of School" here.

Episode Notes

Resources:

• Young Advocates for Fair Education [Yaffed]
• Cutting School: Privatization, Segregation, and the End of Public Education by Noliwe Rooks

NYC Public School Parents: Why Covid has spread in Ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods and "Cutting School" -- how Black schools have been a focus of experimentation and profit 

Jeff Bryant: How online learning companies are using the pandemic to take over the classroom - Alternet.org

How online learning companies are using the pandemic to take over the classroom - Alternet.org

How online learning companies are using the pandemic to take over the classroom

This article was produced by Our Schools.

Opening schools during a pandemic in an underfunded urban district like Providence, Rhode Island, where buildings are in miserable physical conditions, is already a huge undertaking, but the situation is made worse when district leaders bring in private contractors who know nothing about the community and make no effort to collaborate with public school teachers. That's what's happening in Providence, according to Maribeth Calabro, the president of the Providence Teachers Union, who spoke to me in a Zoom call.

As part of its plan to start the new school year with a gradual opening for in-person learning and an online option for all students, the district announced the creation of a new Virtual Learning Academy operated by Scottsdale, Arizona-based company Edgenuity.

When Calabro looked into Edgenuity, she found out the parent company, Weld North Education, was owned by a private equity firm, which had recently acquired Odysseyware. She recalled that when Providence had used Odysseyware for a high school credit recovery program there were problems with students cheating. "Students were quickly flying through courses that should have taken weeks or months," she remembered.

Calabro is also concerned the Edgenuity platform requires little to no human instruction from Providence teachers and will instead rely on learning coaches, who are expected to be the parent, guardian, or someone else in the household of each child. She feels most parents signing up for the program may not realize this because the district's description of the program largely relegates the complete explanation of the responsibilities of a learning CONTINUE READING: How online learning companies are using the pandemic to take over the classroom - Alternet.org

U.S. ranks near bottom of advanced nations in child wellness -- new report - The Washington Post

 U.S. ranks near bottom of advanced nations in child wellness -- new report - The Washington Post 

U.S. ranks near bottom of advanced nations in child wellness -- new report 

The United States ranks near the bottom of dozens of advanced nations in terms of the well-being of its children, according to a report with data from before the coronavirus epidemic.

The rankings were published by the United Nations Children’s Fund, known as UNICEF, which show that of 38 advanced countries for which data was compiled in a range of wellness markers, the United States was No. 36. (See ranking chart and full report below).

The Netherlands, Denmark and Norway topped the list, which takes into account data on the mental and physical health of children as well as their skills as measured by international exams. Mental well-being includes both life satisfaction as well as suicide rates; physical health includes rates of overweight and obesity as well as child mortality, and skills focuses both on proficiency in reading and mathematics as well as social skills.

But the report noted that in many of the advanced nations on the list, children are not doing well; in fact, in nearly half, more than 1 in 5 children live in poverty. Of 41 nations ranked on child poverty, the United States was fourth from the bottom.

In 11 of 41 countries, at least 5 percent of households do not have safely managed water, and high levels of air pollution still threaten the physical and mental health of children, who suffer the greatest harms.

Even before the covid-19 crisis, which presents new threats to child well-being, the report said the daily lives of millions of children in the world’s richest nations fell far short of what anyone would call a good childhood.

“They suffered stress, anxiety and depression, lagged behind their peers at school, and were physically unwell,” it says. “Living in a wealthy country did not bring them happiness. Nor did it guarantee them better health or education

(UNICEF 2020)

For the new rankings, data was analyzed from 41 advanced nations (though because of gaps in information, only 38 were ranked on the list below), and a broader view of child well-being was taken CONTINUE READING:  U.S. ranks near bottom of advanced nations in child wellness -- new report - The Washington Post 

Work Or Online Learning? Homeless Families Face An Impossible Choice : NPR

Work Or Online Learning? Homeless Families Face An Impossible Choice : NPR

Homeless Families Struggle With Impossible Choices As School Closures Continue

The closure of school buildings in response to the coronavirus has been disruptive and inconvenient for many families, but for those living in homeless shelters or hotel rooms — including roughly 1.5 million school-aged children — the shuttering of classrooms and cafeterias has been disastrous.

For Rachel, a 17-year-old sharing a hotel room in Cincinnati with her mother, the disaster has been academic. Her school gave her a laptop, but "hotel Wi-Fi is the worst," she says. "Every three seconds [my teacher is] like, 'Rachel, you're glitching. Rachel, you're not moving.'"

For Vanessa Shefer, the disaster has made her feel "defeated." Since May, when the family home burned, she and her four children have stayed in a hotel, a campground and recently left rural New Hampshire to stay with extended family in St. Johnsbury, Vt. Her kids ask, "When are we going to have a home?" But Shefer says she can't afford a "home" without a good-paying job, and she can't get a job while her kids need help with school.

For this story, NPR spoke with students, parents, caregivers, shelter managers and school leaders across the country about what it means, in this moment, to be homeless CONTINUE READING: Work Or Online Learning? Homeless Families Face An Impossible Choice : NPR

NYC Educator: If You Like the DOE, You'll Love Trump

NYC Educator: If You Like the DOE, You'll Love Trump

If You Like the DOE, You'll Love Trump

So the DOE now says that testing isn't, you know, mandatory for students, but that those who decline, "may be required to learn remotely" if they don't receive enough forms. Of course, that defeats the entire purpose of the testing program, as random samples are not self-selected. Also, that's absolutely not the agreement they made with UFT. UFT will now have to waste time and energy enforcing yet another agreement the DOE made but doesn't care to understand.

Anyway, if you like agreements that work like that, you need to vote for President Trump. He's out there saying there will be no relief bill until after he's re-elected. I'm old enough to remember 2016, when he said he would release his tax returns if he were elected. I remember him saying Mexico would pay for the wall. I remember him saying he had a great health plan that would protect those with pre-existing conditions. It turned out his plan was for everyone to get sick and die ASAP. 

In fact, he's still saying he has a plan. Meanwhile, 210,000 Americans are dead because he's failed to make a national plan to deal with COVID. Originally, he decided not to bother because it looked to his thugs like it would only affect blue states. That's us, of course. We didn't vote for him so we can all go to hell. I guess if you're sufficiently racist or xenophobic, Trump's willingness to give a wink and a nod and say that's fine is kind of comforting. 

Of course if you're a teacher, there are other reasons not to vote for Trump. Trump is a big supporter of so-called right to work, and if you aren't persuaded of that you need only look at the Janus case, which overturned Abood nationally and made union membership optional. After all, why should you pay dues when suckers like me will do it for you? Why shouldn't you enjoy benefits that the rest of us pay for? That's the Trump way. Who do you think pays for all those golf trips he takes? 

Here's the thing, though--when Abood was in force, individual states could opt out via "right to work." This weakened union and made it difficult for working people to organize. Less union means lower pay and fewer benefits for working Americans. That's precisely what CONTINUE READING: NYC Educator: If You Like the DOE, You'll Love Trump

'I'm overwhelmed': Single parents navigate virtual learning - NonDoc

'I'm overwhelmed': Single parents navigate virtual learning

‘I’m overwhelmed’: Single parents navigate virtual learning

Succeeding in the world of virtual learning can be difficult for students. It can also be difficult for single parents who are now wearing the hat of caregiver, teacher and financial provider.

Home offices have been turned into makeshift classrooms, kitchen tables are now school desks and parents are doing extra planning around their usual work day to ensure that their children are still able to get the education they deserve.

Liz Turner has a third and fifth grader that attend Zarro International Elementary School, a sixth and eighth grader that attend Carver Middle School and a child in pre-k in Tulsa Public Schools. The children attend multiple Zoom meetings a day, four days a week, while completing all of their usual curriculum virtually.

Turner, however, also works full-time for a promotional company, and while her workplace is family oriented, she knows those allowances can only go so far.

“I am uniquely lucky in that my work is very understanding and family oriented, but anyone could lose their job basically,” Turner said. “It’s in the back of your mind: My work is great, they support families and they let me bring the kids in if they’re sick, but at the CONTINUE READING: 'I'm overwhelmed': Single parents navigate virtual learning

Teacher Tom: Teaching Children to Be Incompetent

Teacher Tom: Teaching Children to Be Incompetent

Teaching Children to Be Incompetent

In 1973, I was 11-years-old, living with my family in a suburb of Athens, Greece. My brother was 9 and our sister was not even four. We lived a couple of miles from the American Club, a place that ex-pats from English speaking countries congregated. We primarily frequented it to use the swimming pool, movie theater, and book store. Us boys were pretty much free to go there whenever we wanted and we thought nothing of hopping on our bikes to, say, check out the latest comic book offerings. Our little sister, we all thought without ever even saying it, was too young for such solo excursions.

One day as we played in our garden, she asserted that she knew how to get to the American Club all by herself. My brother and I, not always being the gentlest of older siblings, doubted her, but when she persisted, we challenged her to back up her boasting and lead us there, which she proceeded to do. This was not a direct course, it was rather one that required many twists and turns, and covered, like I said, a couple miles. We boys began by teasing her, but as she competently led our expedition farther and farther, our mockery turned to respect. She guided us all that way without one false turn.

I share this story as an example of how we regularly underestimate the capabilities of young children to understand and navigate the world. Indeed, that is one of the reasons we create what John Holt called the “walled off garden of childhood,” a place where we keep our children to protect them from the outside world: a place where we round CONTINUE READING: Teacher Tom: Teaching Children to Be Incompetent

Even New Jersey, the State with the Best Funded Schools, Needs a 2nd Federal COVID-19 Relief Bill | janresseger

Even New Jersey, the State with the Best Funded Schools, Needs a 2nd Federal COVID-19 Relief Bill | janresseger

Even New Jersey, the State with the Best Funded Schools, Needs a 2nd Federal COVID-19 Relief Bill

In the midst of the COVID-19 recession, even New Jersey, the state with the nation’s best school funding system, can’t maintain its constitutional obligation without additional federal help through the relief package which was first proposed by the U.S. House of Representatives in May.  U.S. Senate Republicans have refused to consider a second COVID-19 relief bill through the whole summer and into the fall, but discussions had revived in recent days.  Just yesterday, however, President Trump seemed to kill any chance that a second federal relief package will be forthcoming before the November election.

In New Jersey, the state supreme court has held New Jersey’s legislature accountable for fulfilling its constitutionally defined responsibility to fund the state’s public schools.  In his 2013 book, Improbable Scholars, David Kirp, a professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley, describes the long series of decisions in New Jersey’s state constitutional case of Abbott v. Burke: “Beginning in the early 1990s, additional help came from an unexpected source—the New Jersey Supreme Court.  Over the past half-century, those justices have acquired a reputation for the boldness and controversiality of their opinions… None of the court’s decrees has made a bigger splash or taken a bigger bite out of the state treasury than the epic school finance case Abbott. v. Burke. In twenty-one decrees issued over the course of nearly three decades, the justices have read the state’s constitutional guarantee of ‘a thorough and efficient system of education’ as a charter of equality for urban youth. That 1875 provision, and the court in its historic 1990 ruling, Abbott II, meant that youngsters living in poor cities were entitled to an education as good as their suburban counterparts… Money cannot cure all the ailments of public education…. But the fact that New Jersey spends more than $16,000 per student, third in the nation, partly explains why a state in which nearly half the students are minorities and a disproportionate share are immigrants has the country’s highest graduation rate and ranks among the top five on the National Assessment of Education Progress, the country’s report card. The additional money also helps to account for how New Jersey halved the achievement gap between black, Latino, and white students between 1999 and 2007.” (Improbable Scholars, pp. 83-85)

However, pledges to rectify inequity depend on annual appropriations that sometimes don’t keep up with the promises. Even New Jersey has fallen behind in recent years.  While New CONTINUE READING: Even New Jersey, the State with the Best Funded Schools, Needs a 2nd Federal COVID-19 Relief Bill | janresseger

Laura Chapman: “GreatSchools” Rating System Is Funded by School Choice Billionaires | Diane Ravitch's blog

Laura Chapman: “GreatSchools” Rating System Is Funded by School Choice Billionaires | Diane Ravitch's blog

Laura Chapman: “GreatSchools” Rating System Is Funded by School Choice Billionaires

Laura Chapman, intrepid researcher, writes here about the billionaire and corporate money supporting the rating system for schools called GreatSchools. It clearly exists to promote school choice, not community cohesion or civic responsibility. GreatSchools recently announced that it would use “growth scores” to measure school quality, not just test scores, but the difference is miniscule, and the outcome is the same: to promote segregation and school choice by linking “school quality” and test scores.

Laura Chapman writes:

Great Schools is supported by income from Scholastic, Zillow and other advertisers, who pay for packages that can push up their page views or allow them to license the school ratings. The whole website functions as a tool to perpetuate redlining, charter schools, and advocates forf school choice.

Here are the largest financial pushers of the dubious ratings:

Walton Family Foundation, Laura and John Arnold Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Einhorn Family Charitable Trust, Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Trust, and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

These big funders are offered a display of their logos. Other supporters are: CONTINUE READING: Laura Chapman: “GreatSchools” Rating System Is Funded by School Choice Billionaires | Diane Ravitch's blog

CURMUDGUCATION: CAP: It's the School System's Fault

CURMUDGUCATION: CAP: It's the School System's Fault

CAP: It's the School System's Fault

The Center for American Progress (CAP) is nominally a left-tilted thinky tank, but they have always been solidly on the side of reformsterism, backing charter schools and relentlessly stumping for the Common Core.

They're also fans of the narrow reformster view of education as a mill for churning out meat widgets, and here they are at it again in a post from mid-September (you know, about ten years ago) entitled "Preparing American Students for the Workforce of the Future." It's a pervasive reform idea--that the point of school is as vocational prep (and college is just vocational prep for higher-paying jobs).

And yes-- if schools were cranking out graduates who were completely unemployable, that would be a disservice to those students. But the notion that the years 1 through 18 (or even 22) should be focused simply on making yourself useful to your future employer is such a cramped, meager, joyless, shrunken version of what a human life can be-- Well, I could go on and on, but let's settle for this--no parents with resources to provide their child with more would settle for thirteen (or fourteen or fifteen) years of meat widget training.

But CAP leaps right in with "The United States has failed to prepare all students for college and their careers" and follows up by citing TNTP's Opportunity Myth, one of those non-research "reports" that reformy groups crank out so that other groups can cite them as if they contain actual research. I've discussed it at length elsewhere, so I'm not getting into it here--short form: it's not a good sign.

CAP throws in some chicken littling about the pandemic's effects on the US healthcare, economy and workforce, noting that Black and brown people are worst hit, and they're not wrong. But their CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: CAP: It's the School System's Fault