The Los Angeles Times is trying to figure out why Michelle Rhee is so evasive about being “a public school parent.”
Rhee lives in Sacramento. Her daughters live in Nashville, where her ex-husband is State Commissioner of Education (having been communication director for TFA). He is a major proponent of charters and vouchers.
In Tennessee, she told the Nashville reporters that she is “a public school parent.”
For some reason, she prefers not to admit that one of her daughters attends an elite private school in Nashville that has small classes, lovely facilities, a rich curriculum, and experienced teachers; better yet, the students do not take standardized tests. (Rhee herself graduated from an elite private school in Toledo, Ohio, with similar policies and practices.)
Why should she hide that fact?
Is it because she advocates that Other People’s children should have large classes, inexperienced teachers, merit pay, evaluations based on test scores, and nonstop testing?
Michelle Rhee should read some Dewey, at least one line:
“What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child, that must the community want for all of its children. Any other ideal for our schools is narrow and unlovely; acted upon, it destroys our democracy.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Is Michelle Rhee a public school parent? Let’s back up and ask, Is Michelle Rhee a parent? Is she raising her own children? Perhaps they are being “ghost raised,” just like her book Radical was “ghost written.”
Let Michelle Rhee enroll her kids in a Tennessee charter. Let her publicize their test scores in the manner that she likes to publicize teacher eval scores and film fired principals. Then let he claim to be “like the rest of us.”
Couldn’t care less if the Rheeject believes she is a “public school parent”. I know for a fact that she is a North Korean Spy Agency plant sent to destroy America’s public schools so that NK can finally become the top dog nation of the world it so deserves to be!!!
Tuition at the elite private schools in NYC is now approaching $40,000 per year.
Is it your view that NYC should double its education spending?
Talk is cheap.
The point is Rhee is a liar and a hypocrite. It’s fun to experiment on other people’s children. It’s her very lucrative hobby.
Well put, Linda. Like many reformers, Rhee uses words to make her appear to connect. The truth is that the serial lying becomes increasingly obvious to those who pay attention.
Make no mistake: Rhee is a serial liar.
It is more than $40,000 at several, and as anyone who sends their kids to such schools will tell you, there is a gap between tuition and the true cost to educate each child that is closed with fundraising. So we’re looking at something more like $50-52k, and rising annually at at least 2x the rate of inflation.
Many people don’t want too hear this but Michelle Rhee and President Obama are on the same page with this.
They are on this page: corporate privatizers and always have been. All you have to do is a little research and you will find out that Barack, Michelle, Duncan, Rhee and the rest have always been this way. What is so difficult about this? Ideology and true believers is all it can be. That is a one way ticket to hell in the long run. Ask anyone in a cult either religeous or political.
Trolling is cheaper, still.
R u calling Michael a troll because he has a great deal of knowledge about the NYC system and has a very good reputation.
Don’t forget: pre-school, job, interview (supposedly of the “child”), address, references, and clubs. Don’t forget to add the after school activities, tennis lessons, golf, swim at the club, trips, and other expenses. Tutors if your child is lacking that Stanford fighting spirit.
Vacays that your child must show to the class as presentation. Sorry, no hotdogs and beans at a campsite upstate. I am not a very popular
parent as my teeth grinding spouse can tell you.
It is NOT about the tuition. $60K+ is coins in the sofa for
most of the parents of these kids. It is about association, social
rank, passive-aggressive competition, and ego.
Of course, I am talking about the parents, myself included.
The kids are alright; they will do fine at these schools.
The only kids that I would give a fighting chance would be the kids
at Stuy, Bronx science or some other specialized school, which
is ironically all based on test scores. Desire and hard work >>
privilege.
Michelle Rhee, please. She must be a clone of many clones
at my kids’ school.
But a good education is not cheap.
My point exactly. It’s very easy to say “all children should have small classes and great facilities.” It has the ring of justice and it gets people’s heads nodding. But one thing it doesn’t do, I’ve noticed, is produce small classes and great facilities.
Decide what the maximum class size should be. Demand legislation that mandates that schools not exceed that size, with no waivers. Be honest about the cost and come up with a plan to handle it. If public education advocates did this, I promise that, as a citizen and as a parent, I will be interested and I will be very supportive. If not, I will sink back into my depression and watch the race to the bottom.
Like I said, Google it!! Many NYC newspapers have reported on these costs. I know other NYC bloggers have reported on these costs as well, but I am sorry I did not keep a running record for you. I even recall a contract with some chef to improve meals at “certain” schools. The money given to Caroline Kennedy for her “project” also comes to mind, but alas I cannot remember that number either.
I do know this, both the state and city comptroller tried to stop the no-bid contract with Murdoch for both the city and state that was supplied by Joel Klein. And that was a big chunk of change. Now Joey works for that same division. Conflict of interest anyone???????? And don’t expect the NYPost to have that story. Perhaps you should contact the Comptroller’s office for this info. Like I said, you must have come to this rodeo late not to know these contracts exist. But frankly if you really want the exact numbers, go check on them yourself!!!
If NYC spent less on testing and accountability, on no-bid contracts with IT frauds and consultants, it would have more to spend on the arts, librarians, physical education, and reducing class size. NYC actually got hundreds of millions to reduce class size but didnt do it.
And, yes, I would be happy to pay more taxes if the schools spent it to provide better education.
“And, yes, I would be happy to pay more taxes if the schools spent it to provide better education.”
Ditto!
I have heard this a thousand times. Every time, I ask how much of NYC’s annual budget goes to no-bid contracts or “IT consultants.” I have NEVER gotten an answer. (A link to a story about the CityTime fraud doesn’t count.)
I’ve also investigated the argument that NYC misapplied hundreds of millions of CFE funding. It’s not impressive, given that NYC’s state funding was falling, and its pension and healthcare costs were exploding, during the same period in which it was supposed to be somehow lowering class sizes. I’ve asked Leonie Haimson several times how much money it would take to get NYC’s class sizes down to 20, or 15. No response other than quoting back what the DOE’s own estimates of the cost from several years ago. My own take is that the whole Campaign for Fiscal Equity litigation has been a waste of time. It hasn’t lowered class sizes. It hasn’t even mandated lower class sizes. What it’s mandated are “goals” and processes and new litigation about whether the processes were followed. (We don’t need to litigate whether the goals were met, because everyone knows they haven’t been met.)
So let me make an iron-clad prediction: Without a law that expressly mandates a maximum class size, class sizes will NOT fall. In my view, everyone involved in education policy or politics (whether reformer or anti-reformer) who is not demanding such a law is signing off on higher class sizes.
I’m glad to hear you’d be willing to pay more taxes. But would you advocate increasing NYC’s per-student spending to the levels at NYC’s private schools? If not, why not?
Maybe you came to this rodeo a little too late. But we should not be the ones doing your research. CityTime was the tip of the iceberg. There is also the A&M contract, the Murdoch contract, the Pearson contract, the assessments contracts, and all the non-educator contracts and positions that went to Bloomberg’s Harvard friends as “consultants”. A Google search will yield the results you are looking for. These monies don’t ever go directly to the classroom hence teachers pay a lot of money out of their own pocket just for supplies. Do private school teachers have to pay for paper and art supplies, or even paper clips???
You are right about the CFFE, it’s a joke. Monies were withheld for the main purpose of lowering class size mostly by Guomo. And please don’t blame pension and healthcare costs. When you enter a profession with a low-paying salary and it takes 22 years to reach a maximum salary, and when it’s mandatory to pay for your own advanced degrees, benefits should not be an issue. People don’t realize that teachers also have a copay and deductions, And if you go outside your plan, you get back $30 for a $500 visit only after reaching a very high deductible because we are still subjected to 1970 rates.
Just Google it!!!!!
If someone asserts that NYC could afford to lower class sizes if it spent less money on “consultants,” but they don’t know how much money is actually being spent on consultants, then that person hasn’t made a persuasive argument. If that person cares about persuading me, it’s his job to do the research. If he doesn’t care about persuading me, that’s fine. As it happens, I care about this stuff, so ultimately I will try to do it myself. But that doesn’t mean it’s “my research.” It should be “our research” for anyone who genuinely cares about how the money raised for education is spent.
As for the research itself, it takes more than a Google search when the question is “how much money are we talking about,” which is the predicate for any argument that class sizes could be meaningfully reduced by, for example, hiring fewer “IT consultants” or entering into fewer “no-bid contracts.” The reason nobody knows how much money could be saved is because this stuff is on a level of detail that isn’t in the annual financial reporting, and even “investigative” reporters rarely do more than look at the annual reporting. You have to piece it together from a bunch of sources. It’s painstaking but it can be done. I’ve actually done some of this by collecting public data on DOE contract payments, although I’ve never gotten around to reconciling and confirming the data. But my initial observations were that the cost of “IT consultants” are overstated, and that the highest, fastest-growing (and, reportedly, worst supervised) payments to contractors are special education-related.
“Do private school teachers have to pay for paper and art supplies, or even paper clips???”
…or tissues, or Band-Aids, or glue sticks, or writing paper, etc.
Flerper, I think that your comments deflect from the purpose of Diane’s post.
If Rhee’s reforms were so stupendous and on target, she would send both of her children to the schools that follow her edu-prescription because she is all about “excellence”. She doesn’t do this and she avoids answering questions about her status as a public school parent.
Doesn’t that give her a “phony” impression, at the very least?
You have summed up the characteristics of a Real Education.
Why do these people in the Testing Hierarchy seem to think that the arts and physical education are no longer an important part of our educational system?
The RTT money has been spent on nothing but TESTING and more TESTING.
I would like to see records of the monies spent on Improving Test Scores.
Isn’t it amazing that these home builder fascists like the Broadfather and Gates have no appreciation for art even though the Broadfather is one of the larges owners of art in the world. And then you have Boeing, Northurp-Grumman and JPL who are in public stating and having a recent conference at the Northurp-Grumman facilities here in L.A. on the absolute importance of the arts in the long term financial future of these high tech, high level thinking organizations as art is what lets people think “Outside of the Box” and that is the only way for them to stay on top of technology. What is this disconnect? We were amazed to hear industrialists saying this absolute truth on their ability to compete in the future. How do you think commercial aircraft today operate as efficiently as they do and we send these space probes out to the limits and they work? Accident, no way, it is the influence of arts and a whole person that makes it happen. Want to argue? We can put you in touch with the point persons at these organizations.
The more interesting question is WHY DON’T HER KIDS LIVE WITH HER IN SACRAMENTO??? Could it be related to the seven allegations of child sexual abuse made against her current husband, KEVIN JOHNSON, a former ‘entitled’ basketballer and charter founder and now mayor of Sacramento, backed by local and national corporate right interests, including Goldman Sachs and Koch Brothers, ALEC, and the billionaires boys club???
He prefers them around 16 or 17.
Rhee’s evasiveness indicates that even she knows she is a fraud. When will others figure this out?
I agree Lehrer. I don’t know how she even likes herself. But then again, she probably doesn’t care that she doesn’t like herself.
Sociopaths do not care what others think.
While we’re exposing Rhee’s lies — she also gave an interview to a Nashville newspaper in which she represented herself as a Tennessee resident. She never mentioned in the interview that she is married to the mayor of Sacramento, Calif., and actually (or supposedly) lives there — didn’t even hint at it. It’s a mystery whether she flimflammed the reporter or the reporter chose to participate in the deception.
Michelle Rhee is about as much of a “public school parent” as a doorknob or a bag of shoe laces.
Sorry, Ms. Rhee, you are a profit seeking, privatizing purveyor of free market systems in education, and I gather your own personal portfolio has grown exponentially.
That Dewey quote belongs as the centerpiece of school policy and action–thanks for sharing this story.
It should be engraved at the entrance of every school.
I do not know about the Rhee-Huffman kids, but many wealthy parents send their kids to very high priced private schools UNLESS their children have IEPs or learning issues. Wealthy parents turn to the public schools for their, special needs kids.
Is my state the only one that has IEP’s for gifted and talented students? Just curious.
Most states don’t require IEPs for gifted students. Here’s a list of those that do and don’t: http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/mandates.htm
Thanks for the information. I asked because folks have been using the number of students with IEPs as a measure of the number with learning disabilities. It seems that this might be valid in some states, but completely incorrect in other states.
Rhee gave up custody of her own children to Huffman. This never happens. What kind of woman does that and then tells everyone else what to do with their children. Talk about a twisted person and mind. Why does anyone believe a thing she says as the proof is in the pudding. She has been a loser for public school children from the beginning. She only taught for three years and was not good at that. Then big money comes in behind her. Questionable, at least. If you will sell your soul to the devil Gates and Broad et al will give you a lifetime job you must just do their bidding 150% of the time. They went against Zimmer in LAUSD because they only got 90%. This is what a mess they really are and how little they care about you and your children. Do your research, it is easy.
Michelle Rhee’s own mother worried she was a sociopath. In her Frontline interview Rhee admits her mother said she never cared about the feelings of others even as a child. She still doesn’t, and that’s the definition of a sociopath.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/education-of-michelle-rhee/
Another telling detail – she tells about her mother’s worry as if it’s a point of pride. Definitely sociopath.
It would be a giant leap forward if someone were able to get Rhee or her spokespeople to even define what “public school parent” means.
“Public school parent.” What a mumbling mouthful of nothing.
I am sure this quote was taken out of context. What she really said:
I am (a person who lives near) a public school (who also happens to be an absent) parent.
Lehrer: the English-to-English translation is much appreciated.
🙂
Glad to be of service! I can also translate bureaucratese!
Do you mean the “Orwellian Doublespeak?”
Rhee does not deserve the time or words we all are wasting on her. Can we just pretend she doesn’t exist?
Unfortunately not.
Thanks to Davis Douche-enheim (WAITING FOR SUPERMAN), TIME
Magazine, Newsweek, Oprah Winfrey, etc. … a significant portion of the American public believes she has credibility.
Eventually history will prove all of the above to be on the side of evil… when it comes to so-called “school reform.”
Welfare benefits based on student test scores in Tennessee. http://money.msn.com/now/post.aspx?post=6848a068-50e7-4d64-8ebc-c34d713d235f
What? No parental observations or surveys for the children for a more accurate VAM to determine welfare benefits??
Wow, the fun never stops.
No one mentioned, where does her other daughter go to school (or daughters, does she have more than 2)? Maybe that one goes to public school? Not that I’m giving her any credit…I just wondered.
I see she just has two..Please ignore my very silly questions…since I can’t delete my comment (-:
I read the LATimes article and the numerous comments that followed [131 when I was on their website]. The quality of Michelle Rhee’s character, behavior and proposals are well illustrated by the comments of her defenders. Read for yourselves and make up your own minds.
I don’t expect Michelle Rhee (or almost anyone else) to be instantly ready with an answer to a question like “What do you think of the modified Angoff method for setting performance standards?” However, a public figure of Rhee’s stature (e.g., Chris Christie) should rightly be expected to answer directly, succinctly and honestly a question that touches on where her children attend school and the quality of the education being offered there, given that she is playing a central role in mandating where OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN can go to school and what the quality of the education will be at those schools.
It is a sad day when double standards are applauded and lauded by some.
The fact that Michelle Rhee doesn’t even live with her daughters tells me all I need to know about her. How many divorced women give up their children? Not many. They fight like hell at times to keep them. What does it say about her as a mom when her ex-husband got the kids? Put up or shut up Rhee.
I don’t think attacking Rhee’s private life is the way to go. That’s gutter politics and gossip pages crap.
And public record:
Click to access Phoenix_Police.source.prod_affiliate.4.pdf
http://discuss.today.com/_news/2009/07/28/3083158-are-moms-held-to-an-unfair-standard-when-it-comes-to-child-custody
I don’t really care who raises her kids. I never mentioned that…I am appalled at the hypocrisy of her schtick.
She parades around bashing teachers for a whole host of problems when she was a mediocre temporary intern at best and she was busy covering up the KJ scandals.
It is all a circus act designed to promote herself. High standards, accountability and transparency for everyone but her.
Rhee’s involvement in the probe stems from the statements of Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez, a former St. Hope staff member, to federal investigators. According to an interview report, Wong-Hernandez told an investigator that Rhee was well known as someone who filled several roles with Johnson’s St. Hope organization and would use Johnson’s office when she was in town. Wong-Hernandez said that Rhee ‘played the role as “Damage Control”. When there was a problem at St. HOPE, Ms. Rhee was there the next day taking care of the problem.’
When the sexual misconduct allegations were raised, Rhee contacted Wong-Hernandez to figure out what had happened, telling her “she was making this her number one priority and she would take care of the situation.” Subsequently, Wong-Hernandez found out that Johnson’s lawyer had contacted the accuser, after which the accuser dropped the complaint.
Disgusted with how the incident had been handled, Wong-Hernandez quit St. Hope, and it was Rhee who conducted the exit interview. She told Rhee the reason she was leaving was the way St. Hope had handled the sexual misconduct allegation. According to the interview report, “Ms, Wong-Hernandez also informed Ms. Rhee that she didn’t trust the management at St. HOPE. Ms. Rhee documented the interview in her daily planner and responded to Ms. Wong-Hernandez by thanking her for bringing it to her attention how disorganized the program had become. Ms. Rhee didn’t try to talk Ms. Wong-Hernandez into staying.”
http://rokdrop.com/2009/11/23/michelle-rhee-linked-to-kevin-johnson-sex-scandal-cover-up/
Totally disagree. If she can’t handle parenting her own children, then she has no business telling others how to educate theirs.
I’m with you purple. I can dislike what Michelle Rhee advocates without speculating about her psychological health with quite so much relish. It diminishes us when we glory too much in gossip in a public forum. (It’s for coffee at the kitchen table.)
You are who you are as a total person especially when in the public paying for you and effecting public spending and policy. A teacher can be at the same time a good teacher and child abuser. When they have no hold on what they will do are you going to put chains on yourself? Is it any wonder they have gotten this far so easily if this is the attitude. I learned a long time ago that they do not want to be rational almost all the time. You must adapt to the problem at hand. It would be real nice if they did not make it this way but it is the way it is whether we like it or not. I say study history.
Not only do I most agree with SingleMom, one must consider the enormous amount of–quite possibly–irreparable damage this sociopathic (yes, sociopathic!) woman has wreaked upon the whole of America–she has absolutely ruined our public school systems and our education economy, and continues to do so based upon greed, malice and lies. She has caused untold misery for hundreds of thousands of people–children, teachers who have lost their jobs on the basis of faulty tests (not to mention their families, who suffer the economic fallout as a result of their parents’ job loss), non-certified school personnel, administrators, communities and businesses.
Looking at the later post about the Atlanta cheating indictments: Michelle Rhee, above all, deserves to be indicted for her role in the D.C. cheating scandal.
If not that, she should be indicted for perpetrating fraud upon the American people, and, further, should immediately have her assets frozen.
As long as all is above board and with “Due Process.” We cannot become like them and eliminate all due process and ethics. Fighting them legally with a full court press is the only way to do this. They are not used to a full court press. Chicago and CTU is doing just that. If more did this would end rapidly as fear is all that controls them.
Yes, by all means, George, go the legal route. That having been said, now is the time to do this. Since she has already lawyered up
(a gentleman by the name of Weingarten, as I have read), can it be that something’s afoot?
More likely than not she is prepared. Remember the Boy Scout Motto? She knows what she is doing and her puppet masters have lots of cash to protect their front person. Just the cost of doing business. I am betting that their arrogance and people getting tired of this is what is going to bring them down. I have some pretty damning stuff on LAUSD that is for sure. You have to do it properly if you want the proper outcome. One thing for sure is that the pressure must be kept on them as they do not know how to handle it.
Where does her other child go to school?
A public magnet school.
So, in conclusion, yes, she is a public school parent. Moving on.
Only until her youngest completes 8th grade, not much longer, and then she will attend the very fine private school with her sister, most likely.
Once Rhee is indicted, we will all move on, Tim. Not to worry.
Happy Easter. Happy Passover.
Magnet schools are nice but they are not exactly like other public schools, are they? Not every child has access to the high quality that magnets are supposed to be providing. The public school of fine arts where I live requires interviews and essays to get in and has a reduced lunch participation rate that is almost half that of even the suburban school district where I live.
Duly noted, Linda. On the day that Rhee’s youngest child leaves 8th grade and presumably moves on to the elite private school her sister attends, she will no longer be a current public school parent. And the earth will shudder and hopefully not fall off its axis.
Seriously, who cares. Diane Ravitch has zero years (I’m pretty sure) as a public school parent; what difference does it make?
Her children do not live with her as it is. She is in Sacramento and Huffman is in Tennessee. What kind of woman gives up custody of her children? You answer that question, I already have. Career is most important. If you have another rational answer I would like to hear it.
Tim,
You miss the point and throw in a diversion instead. She is a hypocrite, a liar, a fraud, a drop out teacher and a deceptive administrator. You can keep defending the sociopath. We will move on and continue teaching, learning and supporting children and their families, something she never accomplished.
Linda, I am with you completely. I could not have stated it better.
I agree that she’s a fraud and a charlatan. I’ll stop short of saying she’s a sociopath. I couldn’t care less if she’s a ‘drop-out’ teacher; I don’t even know what that means.
My point, one you choose to ignore, is that the focus on penny-ante details of her personal life detracts from the very powerful case you can make on the merits against her policy beliefs and her tenure in DC.
Since when is it a fact that you are not the total of yourself. Do you really believe in compartmentalization? That is only good for people with serious mental illness such as multiple personalities. Too many excuses.
Drop out teacher = TFA who stays in teaching for 2-3 years and then moves on to his or her real career and is happy to have once helped a poor child stuck in a low performing public school saddled with lazy good for nothing union thugs. Happy Easter or Passover.
TFA is now just a way to pay off student loans and to receive some money instead of being an intern and paying to work. Joke is on the students first and then the rest of society at the benefit of the 1/10 of 1/10 of 1% as they are the ones who benefit. 1% includes down to $350,000/yr. and that is not a player even if a politician as politicians are not the “Shot Callers.”
Amazing how difficult it is for people to understand this point.
http://www.marieclaire.com/world-reports/news/mothers-giving-up-custody?click=pp
Thank you, Jack, for this article. While giving up physical custody of my children is a decision I never had to make, I found the automatic condemnation of Michelle Rhee for doing so uncomfortable. I also feel that we should remember that what we say here is public, and might reach and hurt Rhee’s daughters. I do not admire Rhee for her role in the destruction of public education, but I have no business dissecting her private life publicly. Just because the tabloids have made private lives the subject of public discourse does not mean that we should, too. I would like to think that we are here for more important reasons. I know I sound preachy; I am no less guilty, but what we want to accomplish should not be derailed by the all too human tendency to want to draw and quarter the enemy.
I wonder if we would be as concerned about this if Rhee were a man.
Rhee was in DC while we were there. She was sent to destroy and demolish public education by no other than Bloomberg who told Mayor Fenty to hire her. Unfortunately, black leaders were greedy for money, hated their own skin color and wanted to be up there with white people and gave into destroying the younger black generation.
Bloomberg has that Stop and Frisk in NY also. They destroy black males between the ages of 14-21. Google it.
Rhee gave up custody of her own children. If she will do that what else do you think she is capable of? And do not forget that Rhee is just a puppet for Gates, the Broadfather et al. We need to make sure that we do not lose sight of who the real enemy is and that is always the leader of the pack of wild dogs.
Was Steve Jobs a sociopath? http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidcoursey/2011/10/12/steve-jobs-was-a-jerk-you-shouldnt-be/