These days, the blogosphere has become a medium for democratic expression. With so few mainstream media still in existence, blogging has become an important forum for those who have no voice.
Today’s New York Times has an article about the controversy surrounding Paul Vallas in Bridgeport. Vallas speaks contemptuously of bloggers as “electronic graffitti.”
The article speaks dismissively of the fact that Vallas does not have the credentials required by state law to be superintendent. After all, he served as superintendent in Chicago, Philadelphia, and the Recovery School District. The article failed to review how Vallas performed in those districts, while suggesting that this real-life experience should suffice to qualify him as superintendent of Bridgeport.
Is Chicago a successful district after years of control by Vallas and then Arne Duncan? Hardly.
What about Philadelphia? Vallas introduced the nation’s most sweeping privatization experiment when he was in charge, and it was a colossal failure. When he left, the city was in deficit, and it is now facing financial and educational collapse after a decade of state control.
And the Recovery School District? Its partisans, who have poured millions into privatization, keep speaking of “progress” and rapid test score gains, but fail to mention that the RSD in Louisiana is one of the state’s lowest performing districts, where at least 2/3 of the charter schools are rated D or F by the state.
Note that Secretary Duncan defends Vallas and his lack of credentials. This is not surprising because Duncan never had the credentials or education experience to be superintendent.
A reader commented on Duncan’s remarks:
The article says, “Arne Duncan, the federal education secretary, said the opposition to Mr. Vallas was ‘beyond ludicrous.’ He said too many school districts were afraid of innovation, clinging to ‘archaic ideas.’
‘This, to me, is just another painfully obvious, crystal-clear example of people caught in an old paradigm,’ Mr. Duncan said in an interview. ‘This is the tip of the iceberg.’”
“I imagine that the “old” paradigm is the one about true education: students learning and teachers teaching, based upon their philosophies, knowledge, and assessment of the moment, etc. That is, their professionalism, compassion, and fortitude.”
This is my comment:
What is the new paradigm? Education reduced to test scores delivered by inexperienced people with no professional preparation. Principals and superintendents with no education experience.
How, exactly, is that “reform”?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
In New Orleans, RSD is second from the bottom, last only to St. Helena, a poor district with only three schools– an elem, a middle and a high school– and whose middle school is RSD-run, right into the ground. St. Helena Superintrndent Kelli Joseph is trying to get the middle school back since it is the only school that elem students can attend and since RSD has not only not improved it over three years but also made it worse.
Obviously, reform doesn’t imply improvement. It means change. It means that there is little respect for education schools, publuc schools, or teachers in the U. S. Why??? Money. It is a new frontier for profits and for setting the curriculum to support an ethnocentric, shallow, tunnel-vision world view. It is basically unimportant to allow students to form opinions or thimk for themselves is this new paradigm. It is patt of the last ditch effort to somehow deny full opportunity to anyone but the chosen. I am not sure how Arne Duncan got involved. Religious zealots and home schoolers have pushed this for years. God help American education.
Didn’t Rupert Murdoch once say that, “Education is a $500 billion a year industry that is ripe for exploiting.”? To me, that says it all.
In the corporate press release, News Corporation Chairman and CEO, Rupert Murdoch told reporters, “When it comes to K through 12 education, we see a $500 billion sector in the U.S. alone that is waiting desperately to be transformed by big breakthroughs that extend the reach of great teaching…Wireless Generation is at the forefront of individualized, technology-based learning that is poised to revolutionize public education for a new generation of students.”
Thank you for the clarification!
I got a kick out of this quote:
“But in public, he seemed skeptical of the requirement, at one point arguing, “That is like saying Michael Jordan can’t coach basketball because he doesn’t have teacher certification.” His detractors were outraged by the remark, saying it illustrated his arrogant approach to leadership.”
First of all, just because someone is an excellent athlete does not mean they will be a great coach.
Also, is he implying that his achievements in education are comparable to Michael Jordan’s in basketball?
Paul is a legend in his own mind.
Linda,
Allow me to add to your thought: . . . who is before his own time.”
Yes, he is that great, oh to be like him!
Your Vallas quote as well as Arne Duncan, the federal education secretary, saying the opposition to Mr. Vallas was “beyond ludicrous.” Tells us that they feel “special” people are above the law! Sickening!
Paul Vallas was RSD superintendent, which is not only New Orleans but mostly NO (both NO and other takeover schools in LA). See below for both RSD-NO and RSD-LA rankings. Since RSD-NO has a D, it only outscored the two districts with an F, one of which was itself (RSD-LA).
2012 School Letter Grades by Louisiana District:
Ascension Parish A
Orleans Parish A
Plaquemines Parish A
St. Tammany Parish A
West Feliciana Parish A
Zachary Community Schools A
Central Community Schools A
Allen Parish B
Beauregard Parish B
Bossier Parish B
Calcasieu Parish B
Cameron Parish B
DeSoto Parish B
Grant Parish B
Jefferson Davis Parish B
Lafayette Parish B
Lafourche Parish B
LaSalle Parish B
Lincoln Parish B
Livingston Parish B
Ouachita Parish B
St. Bernard Parish B
St. Charles Parish B
St. Mary Parish B
Vermilion Parish B
Vernon Parish B
West Baton Rouge Parish B
West Carroll Parish B
Winn Parish B
Acadia Parish C
Assumption Parish C
Bienville Parish C
Caddo Parish C
Caldwell Parish C
Catahoula Parish C
Concordia Parish C
East Baton Rouge Parish C
East Carroll Parish C
Evangeline Parish C
Iberia Parish C
Jackson Parish C
Jefferson Parish C
Natchitoches Parish C
Rapides Parish C
Red River Parish C
Sabine Parish C
St. James Parish C
St. John the Baptist Parish C
St. Landry Parish C
St. Martin Parish C
Tangipahoa Parish C
Terrebonne Parish C
Washington Parish C
Webster Parish C
City of Monroe School District C
Avoyelles Parish D
Claiborne Parish D
East Feliciana Parish D
Franklin Parish D
Iberville Parish D
Madison Parish D
Morehouse Parish D
Pointe Coupee Parish D
Richland Parish D
Tensas Parish D
Union Parish D
City of Bogalusa School District D
City of Baker School District D
Recovery School District – N.O. D
St. Helena Parish F
Recovery School District – LA F
It is not what you know, but who you know. That seems to be the new mantra for the deformers
The comment by Duncan is very self-serving since he himself has no education credentials and is totally unqualified to be the Secretary of Education himself. Of course he would defend the unqualified Vallas. We were sold a bill of good by Obama and told that Linda Darling-Hammon, who was highly qualified and widely respected, was too controversial for Republicans to confirm her as Secretary of Education because she was not opposed to unions. Instead we got a basketball buddy who followed Vallas’ lead in messing up the Chicago schools.
One of the worst things about contemporary “journalism” is that the paradigm is “he said, but she said…” Thus, a reporter for The New York Times can write about Vallas (and quote Arne Duncan) as if this were a debate between the old fashioned “defenders of the status quo” (us) and those innovative entrepreneurial pioneering heroes and heroines. Because Paul Vallas, Arne Duncan (who was originally hired out of nowhere by Vallas and then anointed to Vallas’s job after Mayor Daley fired Vallas) and Michelle Rhee can play this “he said, but she said” game, the story always ignores the facts (or downplays them).
The history of Vallas’s racism runs like a white hooded line through Chicago to Philadelphia to New Orleans and now into Bridgeport. Vallas’s victims beginning with the 1996 “reconstitution” of a couple of high schools were virtually all black. As Grady Jordan reported for us in Substance (now available again at substancenews.net) that Paul Vallas attacked and removed a large number of black principals while he was in power here. When Vallas reconstituted black schools, it was black teachers, other workers and principals who were fired — in Chicago and elsewhere.
Those are facts, for any reporter who wants to go back and actually check the facts rather than settling for inane sound bites from Arne Duncan and Paul Vallas.
By the time the Philadelphia controller investigated the financial corruption under Vallas there, Vallas’s privatization (especially giving all those real public schools to Edison Schools) was in collapse and the financial corruption the facts were really in your face. Our favorite was Cozette Buckney getting lots of dollars (and some other perks) going to Philadelphia part-time for Vallas. (She was also one of those black cronies who was always ready to “counter” the facts when people pointed out that Vallas’s policies were racist). Vallas’s departure from Philadelphia was never summarized with the detail we provided about his career in Chicago (see the stories we just reprinted at substancenews.net from “The Paul Vallas Hoax” which we originally published in March 2002), but apparently unless those facts are published they don’t exist.
Then there was New Orleans. Vallas came in after the United Teachers of New Orleans had been busted. That was a significant historical event, since UTNO was the most powerful black (largely black) union in Louisiana. Vallas’s racist deployment of resources away from the real public schools and the government’s support of the charter schools expansion there is a matter of record. But the objections, which grew months after month, to Vallas’s dictatorial nonsense from black people has largely been undocumented.
Now in Bridgeport, we’re back to Paul Vallas getting help from The New York Times to present himself as victim. The facts of the “Vallas record” and the “Vallas method” have been clear for years — if anyone actually paid attention to what happened, rather than what Vallas (and Duncan) said about what happened.
One of the reasons I like writing to a blog run by a historian is that eventually the fact of history have a chance, as all those of us reading and writing here know. It make take some time from “Birth of a Nation” through “Gone with the Wind” to break out of the racist propaganda and break through the rants of the racist propagandists, but it does happen, as we know today.
The Paul Vallas hoax has been profitably (for Vallas and his cronies, currently at large as “The Paul Vallas Group”) around now for a total of 18 years. The year 1995 was when it began in Chicago with mayor control in 1995 (when Mayor Daley appointed Vallas the first CEO of Chicago Public Schools). One of the underlying lies about it is that school districts where the majority of children are poor (and black and/or other minorities) need a Great White Hope (the CEO myth) to save them.
This is enough for me for today. I get home from vacation in Northern Michigan and today’s New York Times gives me another Vallas apologetic on its front page. (At least they spared us the photograph from page one, and the jump page photo is in black and white).
At this point in history, we could fill a medium sized public school stadium with the black teachers and other school workers who have had their careers destroyed by the “Paul Vallas method.” Those would begin with the Chicago principals and administrators who wouldn’t bend to Vallas nonsense in the 1990s and were forced out, often with Vallas and his publicists slandering them through carefully groomed media hacks. But it would include the union teachers (most of them black) from Philadelphia and New Orleans who were “reformed” out of their jobs through “reconstitution” and various other scams — all of which have failed, as I’ve already reported.
Not all of those fired or driven out of teaching by Paul Vallas, Arne Duncan, and their corporate ilk have been black (I’m white and was fired by the Chicago Board of Education — and subsequently blacklisted from teaching — on Vallas’ motion in August 1980). But the majority of those who have been destroyed by the “Paul Vallas method” have been minorities. And the victims beyond them have been minority children.
Paul Vallas was con man and a fraud in Chicago in the late 1990s, in Phiadelphia on the early 2000s, and in New Orleans later. All a reporter has to do is dig a little into the facts, as we did in Chicago, as the Philadelphia controller (and Notes) did in Philadelphia did in 2005, etc.
But as long as today’s “journalistic” paradigm is to play these silly “He said, but she said…” games with reality and history, we will continue to get guys like Vallas talking trash and getting away with their ripoffs and schemes, we will continue to face nonsense like today’s New York Times story. The Times certainly has the resources to investigate the wreckage Vallas has left behind. The Times might also not that Vallas (through the “Vallas group”) has just gotten a million dollars from Illinois (which is supposedly broke) and $18 million from Indiana to do “turnaround.”
So the wreckage will continue for some time to come.
Once again, George Schmidt’s passionate commitment to justice and relentless desire to expose the truth rise up above the propagandistic nonsense that passes for journalism in this country. Corporate media, corporate school reform, corporate health care–it is sickening but we cannot give up the fight. Mr. Schmidt, and the countless principals, teachers, social workers, and students who never wanted to support Vallas’s racist policies, are a tremendous example and deserve to be vindicated. Of course, it is impossible to know how many lives have been tragically shortened or permanently harmed by Vallas, Duncan, Rhee, and the rest.
Duncan is right, at least from the perspective of those he serves (meaning Gates, Broad and all the other smash-and-grab plutocrats): democracy, elected school boards, local control, professional autonomy for educators, public education in general, all so “archaic.”
And as noted on the thread this article and comment came from, this isn’t even about Bridgeport anymore (sorry kids).
This is a full court press to save the floundering, deceptive charade called “reform” and Vallas is the godfather.
Arne, Paul and Obama are all members of the original Chicago cabal and the curtain is being pulled back, one layer at a time.
I have posted before, but please read.
This IS the gang’s playbook:
http://www.mintpressnews.com/a-closer-look-at-the-joyce-foundation-shows-obamas-ties-to-chicago-school-privatizations/164972/
Thanks Jon, heard this the other day and thought the same. No more sounds of silence, we must shout!
GMTA
And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said, “The words of the prophets
are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls”
And whispered in the sounds of silence.
“Fools”, said I, “You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you”
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed
In the wells of silence
Can anyone find an Arne Duncan quote where he says something about, you know, the way humans actually learn? Where he mentions, even in passing, something that indicates he’s ever thought about the most effective ways to teach? I mean, I know he’s gotta be the big picture guy (and Vallas, too, of course), but I’d settle for just one comment, a phrase, even, embedded in a complex sentence, that gives us a shred of evidence that so-called reformers like Duncan and Vallas have had even a passing thought about how teaching and learning really happen.
Good luck on that search!
There’s always his iconic comment that Katrina was the best thing to happen to New Orleans public schools.
Not only did the NYTimes article speak contemptuously, when I got the email alert, the word “vitriol” was used to describe the action against Vallas. So in order to suppress the facts, no comments were allowed. Of course everywhere Vallas has roamed has turned out not so good for public schools and a landmine of profits for charters.
The NYTimes has found a way to turn what is supposed to be objective reporting into an editorial.
Send all concerns to this New York Times public editor. I sent the following links so they could finally conduct some real research. I will be awaiting moderation for a while. There are many..coming next.
Email: public@nytimes.com
I did however try to put something up on another article and kept getting an “error” message. Hmmmm…..
Thank you for your suggestion. I think we should all send the public editor a note saying this story was one-sided and deserves a comment section.
Here’s a concern ~ “union officials have denounced his insistence that administrators frequently visit classrooms as well as his history of enthusiastic support for charter schools.”
I’m a Bridgeport union rep, and not once of our meetings were these issues discussed, nor was there anything written in the CT Post, other papers or local blogs.
This article has some serious problems with ‘truthiness’. There are no links or research to support it’s ‘he said, she said’ statements.
The number of classrooms visits were already negotiated between the CEA and the state, and each one must be documented with a non-biased write up of strictly observed protocols by principals, who then spend hours of typing and note-taking to create informal and formal 2-4 page formal evaluation on their free (usually weekend) time.
Vallas doesn’t have the authority to override these CEA and state negotiated agreements . All this journalist, Javier Hernandez, had to do was to contact the Bridgeport Education Association and quote a union representative. Their number is in the phone book.
How sad for the NY Times this was a front paged article.
Vallas lies, they print it…write to the reporter here or try the public editor link above. I did both this morning. They need to hear from many.
Contact a Reporter
Send an e-mail to: Javier C. Hernandez
https://myaccount.nytimes.com/membercenter/emailus.html
Roger,
That link doesn’t work..go to the article, and click on the reporters name:
The reporter answered my email saying the piece was fair.
It appears we all got the same response. See this:
Never-been-a-teacher appointee rushes to the aid of never-been-a-teacher appointee. Sounds like a great plot for a Lifetime Movie.
http://radicalscholarship.wordpress.com/2013/07/22/nyts-foul-tip-in-paul-vallas/
I have been keeping track for a while now…easy to goggle Vallas and Pelto, Ravitch, Mercedes Schneider, Philly Notebook, George Schmidt, substance news.
Vallas launched the nation’s most extensive experiment in privatization, which was evaluated by the RAND Corporation.
Here is RAND’s report on Vallas’ foray into the “diverse provider model.”
Click to access RAND_RB9239.pdf
“The major findings of the analysis of achievement effects under the diverse provider model in its first four years of operation are as follows:
http://thenotebook.org/summer-2007/07119/vallas-leaves-changed-district-again-tumult
VALLAS FACTS: Philadelphia schools ‘bankrupt’? Only because austerity politics of the ruling class dictate that lies and the policies of ‘standards and accountability’ have been an expensive failure
http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4386
VALLAS FACTS: ‘The Paul Vallas I Knew’… Paul Vallas and the origins of the corporate ‘school reform’ policy to eliminate black teachers and principals in Chicago.
http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4397
VALLAS FACTS: ‘The Paul Vallas Hoax’ in the March 2002 Substance exposed every lie, half-truth, and self serving utteration of Vallas… But it took other places a decade to check out Vallas’s nonsense and try to stop his ‘school reform’ nonsense
http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4370
Indianapolis, $18 million
http://jonathanpelto.com/2012/08/13/paul-vallas-new-corporate-partnership-signs-18-million-deal-with-indianapolis-school-system/
Click to access revised-reco-and-provider-info.pdf
See claims page 10 and 11:
NOLA debunked:
Here is the deception: “combined school districts” means RSD and the 17-school Orleans Parish Schools (OPSB), which was primarily magnet schools turned into selective admission charters. Attempts to make RSD look better by combining its data with that of OPSB is nothing new. See this post:
Also, the “50% decrease in dropout rate” is an inflated stat; also, it does not include the fact that the definition of “dropout” was changed to exclude students who after dropping out decided to attend education programs (like night school). See this link:
http://www.thepelicanpost.org/2011/04/11/louisiana-dropout-rate-falls-31-percent/
Another word regarding Edison Learning (pg 13 of report): Jeb Bush used the Florida teacher pension money to bail out Edison, a company that never succeeded in what it said it could do: raise student scores for less money:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson/chris-cerf-there-you-go-a_b_835180.html
New Orleans’ Recovery School District: The Lie Unveiled
The school- and district-level data presented in this post unequivocally demonstrates that the state-run RSD is hardly a miracle. It should be an embarrassment to any reformer insisting otherwise. And it should come as no wonder why RSD doesn’t even mention school letter grades on its website.
The history of the state-run RSD in New Orleans is one of opportunism and deceit, of information twisting and concealing, in order to promote a slick, corporate-benefitting, financially-motivated agenda. It is certainly not “for the children.”
To other districts around the nation who are considering adopting “the New Orleans miracle”:
Reread this post, and truly consider what it is that you would be getting: A lie packaged to only look appealing from afar.
Paul’s program in New Orleans was not to rebuild public education after the hurricane, but to create a privatized system of schools.
The NOLA miracle that wasn’t:
God bless you Linda!!! Maybe you should work for the Times. Oh wait!! The editors only want pro-reformer reporters.
It must be good to have friends in high places. The New York Times article (or was that a paid advertisement?) hails Vallas as a “Change Agent.” I suppose that tips their hand on what rest of the puff piece is going to read like, but can we all agree that all change is not good and some agents are acting on the behalf of other powers? The corporate education lobby deploys “old paradigm” as an epithet and is careful not to ever actually define what the “old paradigm” was–because it includes embarrassing concepts like democracy, publicly-controlled education, and respect for the dignity of labor.
. .
If Vallas succeeds in corrupting the Connecticut State Supreme Court enough to retain his position, I would suggest that every teacher, administrator, and superintendent throughout the state file a class action lawsuit to recoup the costs of having to become qualified for certification, getting certified, and maintaining certification. After all, what is good for Vallas should be good for everyone else!
Recovery District is not one of the worst performing district in Louisiana. It is THE WORST. 38 % scored Proficient in New Orleans. 17% Proficient in Baton Rouge according to the Morning Advocate in Baton Rouge. This compares to 68% and 49% respectively in the Board run schools.
If they think it is “electronic graffitti” then let it be known that we are just beginning to shake up our spray paint cans really well. Perhaps twinkie1cat’s informative statistical analysis should be scribed onto the side of particular corporate buildings for the passing public to view (in an aesthetically pleasing shade of bright red). Unfortunately, it would only be whitewashed.
From the article:
– – – – – – – – –
“Arne Duncan, the federal education secretary, said the opposition to Mr. Vallas was ‘beyond ludicrous.’ He said too many school districts were afraid of innovation, clinging to ‘ archaic ideas.’
” ‘This, to me, is just another painfully obvious, crystal-clear example of people caught in an old paradigm,’ Mr. Duncan said in an interview. ‘This is the tip of the iceberg.’ ”
– – – – – – –
“… beyond ludicrous… ? archaic ideas… ?… old paradigm… ?”
Like what… not being allowed to hold a job that you’re totally unqualfiied for…
or when you wreak havoc and destruction in a school district, you’re then not given another opportunity to do so…
or being required to follow the law… and when you don’t, you pay a consequence?
According to the Secretary, these things are ludicrous, archaic ideas belonging to an old paradigm.
I have always felt angry when I hear “reformers” such as Duncan and Vallas complain about individuals being afraid of innovation or clinging to old paradigms. I have taught in an urban district for 24 years working with students in grades 1-12. I may have some innovative ideas for a new paradigm but no one has ever asked me. I have personally experienced the frustration of the old system and now I am exasperated with these “reforms” which are not helpful and are causing great harm to many students. I have not met the teacher that could not offer many suggestions for a new paradigm in urban education.
Is anyone writing a letter to the editor in response to the article?
Working on it, but as many as possible would make a bigger impact.
I already wrote for the public editor…letters here:
letters@nytimes.com
To not for…
Thank you, Diane for highlighting this issue.
I don’t know if Vallas ever taught, but he does have a graduate degree in political science even if not in education.
One issue that deserves more attention is the kind of education offered in schools of education. That is where the theory of teaching “methods” and “skills”–which you are rightly criticizing about the common core–originates.
Vivian Gruder
Sent from my iPad
Bottom line: they created a special program just for him, nobody else and he blew if off.
He passed in his “papers” and had a phone call conversation AFTER the lawsuit was filed. A judge ruled this was not a program…she also stated Vallas and Pryor were “less than candid”.
He now wants special treatment after not abiding by a law written JUST FOR HIM.
And now he believes he should be bailed out by friends in high places: US secretary of education, state commissioner, governor appointed Supreme Court justice, a fleet of lawyers, etc.
Did you read the court ruling? See here: http://www.scribd.com/mobile/doc/150609033
VALLAS FACTS: Was Paul Vallas ever really a teacher? NO. ‘It all depends on what your definition of ‘Is’ was then, sort of… Did Paul Vallas ‘teach’ and how much does it matter (except to show that he’s a liar)…
Sharon Schmidt – July 15, 2013
http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4398
Unfortunately, many academic subjects and master’s degree programs have drawbacks–not just education programs. The country is mired in anti-intellectualism and quick-fix mania. Although I have not researched most education schools, I’d be willing to wager that a masters in “political science” (usually they are more specific, say in public policy) is much less academically rigorous than a teaching master’s. I take anything Vallas claims he has done with a grain of salt, and that includes the supposed master’s in poli sci.
A funny question — does either Arne Duncan or Paul Vallas ever think about how human children actually learn?
That’s why they are both so qualified for their present jobs, hacking for the plutocracy’s version of “reform.” No teaching experience at all. Because they have neither education training nor experience, they have to speak in vapid cliches and pungent metaphors (Arne more for the vapid cliches; Paul for the pungent metaphors).
After we caught Vallas lying about his “teaching” experience during his run for the Democratic nomination for governor in 2002, he backed off — but only for a time (basically until he was gone from Chicago and nobody knew him as well as we did).
As soon as Vallas was out of sight (and with nobody from Chicago listening) he went back to the creation of his autobiographical myths. One of Vallas’s tricks was to get some reporter to report one of his lies or half truths, then blame the reporter “I’m too busy to check everything that’s written about me…” he would play, while watching every sentence that was said or printed about him and responding, either himself or through surrogates, immediately. His crazy person manic energy often wore down people trying to get to the facts. When that didn’t work, he’d attack the messenger (see how The New York Times today devotes more inches to the “Working People’s Party” than to the legal issues; typical Vallas…).
Arne, meanwhile, has vast “teaching” experience. (Hah!). From his privileged perch in Chicago’s University of Chicago cocoon (Dad a professor and heir to a well known fortune; Mom a do-gooder), Arne hung out, from time to time, with kids from Jackie Robinson Elementary School. That’s where Arne’s mother had a long-running after school tutoring program. Since getting to Washington, he’s spun that, depending upon the audience, into a vast “experience” with the “problems” facing little inner city kids. If you’re not careful, you’ll be believing that Arne came out of Chicago’s “South Side” (the “meanest part of town…” blah blah blah) instead of that cocoon of privilege (and wealth) the University of Chicago (where Arne attended the Lab School while slumming with the little ones from Jackie Robinson…).
But, as noted, the problem is not the ability of these guys to lies and circulate half-truths, but the willingness of the editors and reporters at some of America’s “great” newspapers to publish their nonsense without ever fact checking, context checking, or asking the third and fourth questions…
It would be a wonderful instance of poetic justice if George Schmidt were called as a witness in the historic case of Lopez et al v. Paul Vallas. The term “expert witness” exists for this purpose. I think even the idea that such a thing were on the horizon would send Paul Vallas scurrying!
By the way, it is CLEARLY time to Dump Duncan. He is an outrage.
Notice this is the ONE correction made to this article by the NY Times. Pathetic!
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: July 22, 2013
An earlier version of this article misstated the year that Paul G. Vallas lost the Illinois Democratic gubernatorial primary to Rod R. Blagojevich. It was 2002, not 2001.
I emailed the reporter. Will be interesting to see his reaction.
Here is his reply to my request for invetigative journalism and research vs. self-congratulatory quotes from Arne and Paul:
Thanks for sharing your views! I appreciate your feedback. Rest assured that I took pains to ensure that the article included a variety of viewpoints. The story was not meant to be an exhaustive look at Mr. Vallas’s time in other school systems. It focused on his work in Bridgeport and his record there. Thanks for writing.
Best,
Javier
—
Javier C. Hernández • Reporter • The New York Times • 620 Eighth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10018 • ph: (212) 556-1599 • javier.hernandez@nytimes.com • @HernandezJavier
Ha!! He must have that canned response ready because I got the same one. I replied that Vallas’ record was indeed the issue.
Ct post letter…closing and link:
It is time to start over. Instead of wasting our public money on defending someone who never planned to stay long in the first place, we can start searching for a new superintendent who is qualified and wants to be here. We can hire someone who will work with teachers, students, parents and the Board of Education. Maybe then we can address dropout and graduation rates, community involvement and leadership of our schools, and a more inclusive approach to education that doesn’t prioritize testing over real learning and student engagement.
Bridgeport’s schools are struggling, and the myth of a miracle turnaround has been dispelled. Paul Vallas didn’t come in and fix everything in a year, the way he said he would. He’s made things worse.
Now, with his position in flux, and so many questions up in the air, it is time for us to move on and find the right superintendent. Not one that promises the sky, or comes with a rock star reputation, but one that is willing to get down to work for the long haul and work with us to fix our schools.
Eric Alicea
Bridgeport
The writer is vice president-elect of Bridgeport’s District Parent Advisory Council
http://www.ctpost.com/news/article/Schools-need-to-leave-Vallas-behind-4680093.php
PLEASE, PLEASE stop referring to Paul Vallas or Arne Duncan as “Superintendent” of Chicago Public Schools. They were CEOs – because in Illinois, they were unqualified to be Superintendents. If you’re the CEO, you don’t need an education background.
I’m glad people are moving the discussion beyond the crazy stuff that pours out of Paul Vallas like sludge from a drainage pipe out at Lake Calumet. What’s more important is how the USA has arrived at the Chicago Boys — and how furiously The New York Times is committed to making sure that the myths and hoaxes they helped create continue.
None of the facts of these guys is any secret. Every good reporter has been able to find hundreds of teachers and others, from parents to kids, who could report that facts about Vallas, Duncan and their ilk. In fact, it takes more effort at this point in history to ignore the historical record and continue with the corporate reform script as front page news.
I covered Vallas the entire time he ran Chicago’s schools, and covered when Mayor Daley dumped him, after, among other things, Vallas was making fun of his boss (Daley) and Vallas was showing ambitions “above” his place in the Chicago political reality.
Duncan was brought in as a mid-level mope in a job that didn’t require certification while Vallas was CEO of CPS. Suddenly, with all kind of corporate support (Catalyst magazine loved Duncan; most people had never heard of him, let alone seen him in the real schools of the real world of Chicago), Duncan was Daley’s choice to follow Vallas as the second “CEO” of CPS. When Duncan began his term in July 2001, he began the policies that within a year became “Renaissance 2010” the most massive school closings in U.S. history — “100 new schools by 2010.”
There were thousand — yes, thousands — of people working in CPS in June 2001, when Daley dumped Vallas who had more qualifications, experience, and resumes to become the chief. Our friend Grady Jordan had served from the ranks all the way from teacher and principal to high school superintendent. Dr. Jordan was forced out by Vallas (and had to endure some slanderous persecutions) but stayed in contact with Chicago’s schools and the communities (west side, especially) he had worked in all his life.
Duncan was the outsider, the second “Great White Hope” for corporate school reform in Chicago. He rarely appeared in public without a seriously rehearsed script (I once sat unnoticed outside the “communications” office while the PR genius, Peter Cunningham, rehearsed Vallas on a bunch of things he clearly didn’t understand). By April 2002, less than a year after he was made CEO of CPS, Vallas announced he “had to” close Williams, Dodge and Terrell elementary schools to create a “renaissance” and, of course, “save the children” from those “failing schools.”
The Chicago papers praised him, the Sun-Times singling out his “courage” for taking on the hard jobs of closing schools.
Etc. Etc.
By the time Duncan left Chicago after being on the front page of The New York Times in December 2009 (Barack Obama and Duncan posed a la George W. Bush in a room full of black children at “Dodge Renaissance Academy” for the photo), he had more than seven years of rehearsals, and was ready to read the speeches prepared for him and repeat the various talking points prepared for him (first year, by that same Peter Cunningham).
That’s how the current national leadership was birthed and prepared from Chicago between 1995, when Vallas was first appointed by Daley, and January 2010, when Duncan was appointed by Obama.
The “Chicago Boys” had arrived on the national education reform scene in the USA in 2010.
They arrived just as the same ideology had “Chicago Boys” had come to Chile after those same “free market reforms” came alive following September 11 — September 11, 1973, not 2001. The one most people in most of the world remember best. I really was glad I went to the University of Chicago so I could learn about some of this nonsense first hand decades ago. It’s also one of the reasons why we are so furious about facts, chronology and accurate history around here. The great thing about now is that the Chicago Teachers Union has leadership that understands all this stuff.
The Chicago Boys have always given me nightmares, and I was always cognizant of what this meant regarding Paul Vallas, TFA, and other “usual suspects” going to work in Chile and Haiti. It is no coincidence that Haiti–the site of the first successful slave revolt–has been crushed and punished ever since, especially by the nation with the biggest commitment to racist chattel slavery, the United States. They can never forgive Haiti for having the temerity to rise up and throw off the yoke of slavery–the price of Haiti’s independence , won in 1804, has been to be the poorest country in the world, probably since then.
The impoverished educational system of the United States is pervasive–how many adults know anything about Chile, one of the worst dictatorships of the twentieth century, enabled and propped up by the United States, with justification from academics from places like the University of Chicago, Stanford, Harvard, and Yale?
I just started Finnish Lesson by Pasi Sahlberg. I must share this paragraph:
Even in business, these larger than life strategies of turnaround and improvement do not produce sustainable improvement. Companies may be broken up, assets sold off, and employees fired with impunity, and all this might increase short term shareholder returns, but few strategies of these sorts survive in the long term and many turn around companies eventually become casualties of their leaders’ reckless behaviors. Indeed, management expert Manfred Ket de Vries explains how many so-called turnaround specialists are little more than psychiatrically disturbed narcissists, sociopaths, and control freaks (Ket de Vries, 2006).
http://www.finnishlessons.com/
LETTER: Why Can’t Vallas Meet Requirements?
7:13 PM EDT, July 23, 2013
Regarding the editorial on Bridgeport Superintendent Paul Vallas, “Why Make It So Difficult?” [July 22]: A more accurate question might be, “Why Has Paul Vallas Made It So Hard For Himself?” True, the most significant issue here is improving the Bridgeport school system. However, the “overly strict certification requirements” referred to in the editorial were modified nearly two years ago to accommodate Vallas for his monumental charge and were miniaturized again as recently as April this year.
If Vallas cared so much for the Bridgeport Public Schools, why did he place himself — and in effect the school system — in this avoidable jeopardy? As mentioned in the New York Times article to which your editorial refers, Vallas compares the state’s certification requirement to “saying Michael Jordan can’t coach basketball because he doesn’t have teacher certification.”
Although the editorial advises against succession planning now, what happens if the Connecticut Supreme Court finds against Vallas? Would there be some harm now in asking every Bridgeport educator who has been recognized for their excellence by the Bridgeport Public Education Fund over the past five years to share their thoughts?
Great teachers might not be Michael Jordan, but they sure know how to fulfill certification requirements while educating and inspiring our children.
Pete Spain, Bridgeport
http://www.courant.com/news/opinion/letters/hcrs-15872–20130722,0,3234163.story
as of a few days later, still no Comments on this puff piece, but a helpful correction by the editors:
Correction: July 23, 2013
An article on Monday about efforts by a small number of advocates to unseat Paul G. Vallas, the school superintendent of Bridgeport, Conn., misstated the year that he lost the Illinois Democratic primary for governor to Rod R. Blagojevich. It was 2002, not 2001.
Just in case we didn’t know it’s a “small number of advocates” The Times is losing any shred of credibility with articles like this– give me Salon or Talking Points Memo or some of that “electronic grafitti” any day. Ever hear of Nate Silver? Oh those darned blogs . . . . go Diane go!