Yesterday I announced my intention to vote for President Obama, and given the choice confronting us, I will vote for President Obama.
I will vote for him despite his terrible education policy known as Race to the Top.
It is a disaster. It has all the faults of No Child Left Behind, and it is worse.
It is incentivizing the creation of more privately managed charter schools, which are more segregated than the public schools in the same district and which do not even get higher test scores. It is pushing more testing, more school closings, more destabilizing of communities, more labeling of children, more layoffs, more money spent for compliance with federal mandates.
Race to the Top is harmful to children, to teachers, to principals, and to the future of public education in America.
Education Week reporter Alyson Klein wrote an analysis of what lies ahead in a second Obama term, and it is more of the same. What is especially disgusting is that the President continues to believe that Race to the Top is a positive policy; he seems to think that it will improve public education. He has not heard anything that teachers and parents and principals across the nation have been shouting. Stop the high-stakes testing! Stop the evaluation of teachers by test scores! Stop the privatization!
Federal policy is supposed to be devoted to equity, to helping the neediest children, not to a race. What is the point of a “race” in education? Are we racing to get the highest test scores? How does that promote equality of educational opportunity?
What is even more disgusting is that your representatives in Congress are voting the funds to continue the advance of these toxic policies. Raise your voices. Let your Senator and member of Congress know that Race to the Top is racing for the edge of a cliff. Stop. Stop now.
Here is the article linked above:
| What Would a Second Obama Term Look Like on Education?
Posted: 24 Oct 2012 11:28 AM PDT President Barack Obama has talked a lot on the campaign trail about his education record—but not as much about what he would do in a potential second term. Yesterday, the Obama campaign put out a big, glossy brochure with ideas for next steps, including: • Cutting tuition growth in half over the next ten years; recruiting and preparing at least 100,000 new math and science teachers; None of the ideas outlined in the brochure are brand new—and at least one of them, Race to the Top for districts—is going to happen whether or not Obama wins a second term. But it makes sense for Obama to highlight some of the proposals still on his to-do list, to give voters an idea of where he wants to take education policy. As districts struggling to finalize their applications know, Congress has already provided $400 million for the district competition, and the U.S. Department of Education has already crafted the rules. The dollars are scheduled to go out the door by the end of the year, no matter what happens on election day. Still, if Obama is re-elected, there could be additional rounds of Race to the Top, which could conceivably go to school districts. And granting states waivers from parts of the No Child Left Behind Act isn’t a second-term idea, it’s already well way underway. Waivers for districts in states that didn’t apply are a whole other matter. When it comes to slowing the growth of college tuition, the Obama administration already has a bunch of ideas on the table—in fact there’s even a proposal to create yet another iteration of the administration’s signature Race to the Top franchise, this time to reward states for their efforts on higher education. So far, Congress has yet to bite, in part, I’m guessing, because of the program’s $1 billion price tag. The proposed competition would reward states that maintain their own spending on higher education, improve alignment between K-12 graduation requirements and higher education entrance standards, and seek new ways to curb costs without sacrificing educational quality. Mr. Obama has also floated the idea of tying some federal college aid—specifically campus-based aid programs, such as Perkins loans—to college outcomes, including graduation rates for at-risk populations, such as disadvantaged students, and the ability to keep tuition in check. As for the math and science teacher proposal, anyone paying attention to the campaign has probably heard it—the president mentioned it in his speech accepting the Democratic nomination this summer. So that’s not a new idea either, although, so far, Congress hasn’t acted on the proposal. The community college idea isn’t new either—it was part of a recent budget proposal. But it too, has not made it very far in a Congress bent on curbing costs. More here. What else might be in the hopper for Obama’s second term, if it happens? Comments section is open. – Alyson Klein |
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Arne Duncan, the Presidential bubble, Rahm, Bill Clinton touting charters, and all the neo-liberal nostrums of education reform seem to be complicating O’s understanding of education.
A rough and bumpy road indeed. Here’s an excerpt from:
http://monthlyreview.org/2011/07/01/testing-privatization-and-the-future-of-public-schooling :
“U.S. neoliberal goals are clear: control schools through tests, establish extensive charters and at least some vouchers, and replace long-term, often unionized, teachers with a steady parade of short-timers, particularly in urban, low-income areas (as with Teach for America).”
I am sure that B. Obama has chosen to listen to them. He is too smart to be bamboozled. I do think that they are doing it with his full support. That is not very smart, Mr. President! Listen to others who know a hell of a lot more than your advisors.
Diane, As usual I agree with your comments 100%. I already attempted to bring my concerns to my Senator, Sheldon Whitehouse. I think he is a terrific senator for RI and the country, and have had the chance to meet him at AFSCME Retired meetings several times. Recently I handed him my letter that I sent to President Obama when you made the call for letters last week. As a retired teacher of the deaf, a parent, and a concerned citizen, I poured out my heart in that letter. He had it in his hands. Did he read it? Doubtful. The other night there was a televised debate between him and his Republican challenger. When asked how he would improve education in his second term, he had the nerve to praise the Race to the Top policy! I’ll still vote for him, but I am beside myself. Why don’t they get it?
Because everyone keeps voting for them.
Face it folks, both parties (with a few, very few exceptions) are neoliberal fanatics controlled by those with the moolah. They believe that the “private” sector (supported and propped up by the government) and “free market” principles (an oxymoron if I’ve ever seen one–everything in a market has a cost) in which they mean they are free to rape, yes I said rape and mean it that way-to take by force, plunder and pillage what should rightfully be the “commons”, and now they are doing the same to public education.
And Obama is one of them to the core. I’d bet a dime to one hundred dollars that if Malcolm X were alive today he’d call Obama a “house nigger”.
I think we must work harder to understand the dynamics of the “money blanket” — the fuzzy soft medium now woven between the people and their supposèd representatives, that insulates executives, interpreters, and makers of the law from the real lives of the people, and that muffles the voices of the people more than any void between Horton and Whoville possibly could.
Obama is NOT out of touch. He knows perfectly well what good education should look like. That’s why he sends his kids to Sidwell Friends (and Rahm sends his kids to Lab School, and Duncan sends his kids to an elite public school in Arlington that’s run completely differently than what he’s imposing on everyone else).
I just started reading Linda Darling-Hammond’s “The Right to Learn”. I’m only a few pages into it, but something that I’m picking up on (and this could be my misinterpretation) is that there is a supply-and-demand element to good education. We know what works in education – a properly focused and developed progressive model that lets students explore, create and discover their own connections and meanings. But it’s extremely hard to do, especially without intensive professional development for teachers. Few teachers are naturally good at teaching both subject and students, so teachers often either misinterpret the aims of progressive education and just try to make education “fun”, or they focus on teaching the subject in a “rigorous” way.
It would take a massive investment to develop a nation-wide progressive model of education, and the country has made it clear that we’re not willing to spend that kind of money, at least not on anything that doesn’t involve blowing up our enemies. So the elite essentially end up hoarding many of the progressive teachers to make sure that their own little darlings get a rich, exciting yet challenging currculum, while they try to idiot-proof education for everyone else through scripted lessons, standardized tests, etc.
Also, there’s the matter that many people, especially those on the top, view it as a zero-sum game. If they allow all children to access quality education and develop creativity and critical thinking skills, then there will be that much greater competition for their own kids for the seemingly few jobs that require such skills. Few people would admit to such thoughts or phrase it quite like that, but it’s just human nature to protect our own first.
So long as we’re stuck in an ever more agressive spiral of cut-throat vulture capitalism, education is not going to improve. Until we can convince the majority of people that society will be better for everyone, including those on the top, if we allow everyone the chance to develop to his/her full potential, we’re going to have a multi-tiered system of education. The fact is that most Americans don’t truly believe in democracy – they only believe in it for themselves, not “those” people. Trying to actually achieve the ideals inherent in democracy only brings cries of “Socialism!”, as if socialism is a bad thing.
I cannot in good conscience vote for this man.
As a public school teacher, education is of paramount importance to me. However, it is only one of MANY areas in which the president has failed to deliver. I will NOT vote for the “lesser of two evils.” That doesn’t constitute a choice. My vote will go to Jill Stein the Green Party candidate, a woman whose values are closer to mine.
I didn’t vote for him; I voted for Rocky Anderson, who is a thousand times more a Democrat than that faker will ever be.
By the way, there was an excellent article from Counterpunch which lays out what Naomi Klein and others have tried to explain in book form. It is about what the author calls “monetary fascism” and applies to public education and all public institutions. Obama, as a neoliberal/Milton Friedmanite, subscribes to this, as do almost all of our politicians, despite the fact this economic theory has been repeatedly discredited and debunked:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/24/the-dark-age-of-money/
Scroll down a little bit and you will find the article.
Claiming Obama is “out of touch” makes him look like an innocent tool, but he is anything but.
Dienne is absolutely right: Obama knows exactly what he’ s doing, and people must shake themselves free from their “If only the Czar knew…” delusions. Obama is a highly intelligent man who understands how policies and institutions work. He was a state officeholder in Chicago when the hostile takeover of the public schools began there, and it is virtually inconceivable that he’s unaware of the implications and consequences of RttT.
Rather than begging for his indulgences, we should be showing him and other officeholders that there is a political price to be paid for destroying a public good and handing its carcass over to privateers.
I agree. I’m afraid that people who think we can change Obama after he’s elected are in for a rude awakening.
If I thought that Mr. Obama was simply ignorant or misguided about education, I’d consider voting for him on the chance that he could become informed. Since it seems clear that he knows what he is promoting, I will not give him my vote.
If we were witholding our votes that we had previously given him in 2008, perhaps we could test the efficacy of “loss aversion” strategies . . .
Watch him go after the New Deal. That will permanently split the Democratic Party. He’s pretty much outed himself as a tool of the other side.
Obama and Race to the Top are now inextricably entwined. He will not change course after he is elected. Some are voting for the devil they know vs. the one they don’t. I just can’t make myself vote for Obama.
As one who hoped that Obama’s election would bring a new perspective to the debate on public education, I am distressed to find myself AT BEST unenthused about a second term. The only difference between Obama and Romney appears to be Romney’s willingness to allow taxpayer funds to go to sectarian schools— but that difference will disappear as soon as someone wants to use their voucher to attend a private school in a mosque. The most distressing posts in this blog are the ones about local board elections being funded by privatizers: these guys have LOTS of money and they see public schools as an opportunity to make even more. I hope we can sustain the assault on public education in the coming four years.