Norm Scott is the quintessential education activist. He is a retired teacher with many years of classroom experience in tough schools. He brooks no nonsense.
In this review of Reign of Error, he asks the question: What is wrong with preaching to the choir?
He is right. When everyone else–the media, the pundits, the big foundations, the politicians–are agreed that the choir stinks, even though the choir is doing a fine job, the choir needs to hear some preaching. Some people think we can run schools well with novices who come and go every two years. They are wrong. Some people think that schools should be profit-making opportunities for canny entrepreneurs. They are wrong.
Norm knows: The choir needs some help. They need support. Nothing wrong with preaching to them when everyone is disparaging their work, especially when the critics can’t sing. Not even one note.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Well, yeah. As a member of said choir (and this analogy could not be more perfect for me, personally) Diane and her book are like a guest clinician coming in to help shape our tone, model better body alignment for the best support from the diaphragm, to help us articulate the text, the nuance of the music (historically informed), and to explore the subtext we are communicating. We are preparing a Masterwork that has been performed so many times it risks sounding tired and cliche, like yet another rendition of the Hallelujah Chorus. The clinician helps the choir find our voice for a freshness to bring the score to life.
In music Ed circles we joke that anyone who comes in to do a clinic who lives more than 40 miles away is an expert. But when Lenny Bernstein’s protege, or a Robert Shaw protege steps in to coach the choir, you know to pay attention. Diane is Lenny Bernstein. She is Robert Shaw. And I think the choir is listening. But we still have work to do.
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Diane and Lenny Bernstein: a brilliant and truthful, equalizing comparison. I think Mr. Bernstein would be gravely opposed to the refrom movement in public education because it devalues and de-emphasizes the arts. His son should be speaking out against the whole situation. . . . as should Lincoln Center and Julliard.
If not, the visual and performing arts will be a field only for the offspring of billionaires. . . .
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Amen.
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Norm Scott has been, for many many years, selflessly advocating for public education and trying to reinvent teacher unions to serve teachers and society in a much more truthful, just, fair, and equitable way. Norm does not have to do any of this. He is retired and could be traipsing around the golf course (a metaphor, not a literal statement!), but he chooses to infuse activsim into his life along with the pleasures of being retired after a long, hard earned career.
I salute Norm Scott for always exposing the truth and for never stopping his verve, vigor, and heroism. His is THE ultimate blog about NY City public schools politics and that of the United Federation of Teachers. But he also connects the NY City scene to the national one in a way that is comprehensive and dot connecting. He can be found at:
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/
Thank you Norm for you just being you . . . .
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This analogy has its limits. I’m a proud, loyal member of “Diane’s Choir”, but I only joined two years ago. And, I’m not an educator—at least not in the professional sense.
I’m a parent of a young student in a great urban public school. I feel very fortunate to be a part of this school and to be working with such committed teachers in the best interests of our children.
So, now that the choir includes me, it’s time for each choir member to build upon our group! Preaching to the choir is wonderful, as long as each person in that choir consciously helps to make it even bigger.
I constantly talk to the teachers in our school about Diane Ravitch. I gave our principal an autographed copy of Diane’s previous book. I bring out the book to show our dinner guests. I am willing to risk a little bit of personal popularity in our cause. (But I have yet to get a negative reaction from teacher or parent.)
So, it is OUR mission to Grow The Choir! The mainstream media will likely continue to ignore Diane Ravitch. But, WE can help spread her message, one person at a time: Retail Style!
And, at a certain point, the mainstream media WON’T be able to ignore something so big and so influential.
The time is right now. Let’s do it, people!
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I’m with you all the way. I am an NBC public school teacher who teaches low income immigrant populations.
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Robert Rendo: thank you for this and other comments. Your passion is most appreciated.
And most of all, thank you for keeping it real—not rheeal—by doing what the rheephormers and their edubully underlings won’t do—
Putting your own skin in the game.
Keep on keepin’ on.
🙂
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KrazyTA,
Thank you for the thank you.
Putting my own skin in the game has never been a choice. I do not criticize the very district I work in because I view so many LEAs in NY state to be as much of a victim as teachers. Superintendents and principals are getting clobbered and sucker punched like never before. I don’t know if I have as much empathy for districts in NY City. Too many administrators under the Bloomberg umbrella have identified with the enemy, including the UFT, the AFT, and the NEA. Too many of them are terrorized by Walcott.
Randi Weingarten is perhaps the most pernicious leader on a national front this country has ever encountered in the sense that she has politcally fornicated with the reformers rather than spltting up with them and then only encountering them again to pose opposition and confrontation. She is a dishonoralbe woman, and history will and should judge her the most harshly. She injures the very realm she is supposed to protect, not too unlike the phenomenon of maternal infanticide.
I do, obviously, hurl rancor and opprobrium toward the state and federal governments as well, and certainly toward the National Governor’s Association.
And in case I ever become a casualty of this movement, I will know I will have fought for dignity, humanity, and truth. It is a hill worth dying on, so to speak.
I am growing very very slowly a little more hopeful about reversing this reform illness, as more and more parents and taxpayers catch on. It will NOT be the teachers or their unions that do this mostly, but it will ultimately be parents.
We are all in this together.
We don’t have the funds to buy policies the way Gates does.
But we do have the truth because we educators are the truth.
Goliath was haughty and presumptuous . . . . . . .
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“. . . she has politcally fornicated with the reformers. . . ”
I certainly hope she used birth control so that no evil spawn can emerge from said relationship!
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Duane,
Can’t respond with my one liner here. I’ll get in trouble.
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While there are some thanking being exchanged, I should offer a thank you to Mercedes Schneider and Robert Shepherd. I nominate them for the next round of Skinny Awards . . . . Their eloquence and articulation, not to mention their scholarship and journalism are right up there with Krugman and Strauss.
I’m inspired.
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It was Norm Scott and “The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman” that lit my activist fire! Teachers like Norm who have the historical background for newly hatched activists is crucial to building a movement to make the changes we seek. Norm and others like him saw this coming were blowing the horn for many years, but most would not hear. Keep honking, Norm, and Diane and all of the incredible visionaries whose passion won’t stop until many more teachers and parents understand how important it is to stand up for our children and our schools. I will never tire of Diane’s preaching or Norm’s stories. Sing at the top of your lungs, for you are the food and fuel for this movement.
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I would take it further. I think public school advocates need to promote and celebrate public school successes. If we don’t, no one else will.
Media coverage is wildly skewed towards coverage of “miracle” charters and “miracle” reform schemes. There’s no follow-up, so the public is left with the impression that all public schools are “failing” and all reform plans are successes. It’s reached the point where reform plans are announced as successes even before they go in.
This is compounded when political leaders at the state and federal level ALSO trash public schools.
Politico has a piece up where the headline asks if public schools “stink”. Arne Duncan is identified as on the “public schools stink” side. That’s outrageous. It’s wrong.
I would like to see an effort by public school advocates to actually promote the vast majority of public schools that are NOT failing.
Again, there is no one else to do this. Incredibly, elected officials have decided to not only abandon public schools as far as positive support, but to actively denigrate them.
We should be heartened by the fact that the public does not agree that public schools “stink”. The schools they’re most familiar with, their local public schools, get high marks. It’s only when it’s taken to the abstract that they agree with reformers that public schools “stink”.
I would like to see less focus on charters and more advocacy FOR public schools. There are tens of thousands of successes, and they’re completely ignored. We should focus on these schools and these kids (95% of schools!) because no one else will.
High level media people don’t use public schools and they didn’t attend public schools. They probably BELIEVE that all public schools stink. We know that isn’t true.
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Putting my usual snarkiness aside for all of three seconds, I concur. You make a critical, excellent point!
Thank you! It is a serious and empowering vision, and not difficult to do.
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Norm Scott has been a guiding light for me in my two year battle with the NYC DOE. I may not have gotten this far if it wasn’t for his ideas and connections. He has been there from the beginning and even attends my public termination hearing. Thank you.
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Hey, this is a pretty big choir by now, and Reign of Error isn’t just preaching, it’s ringing the bell, to call everybody to get up and come on down to sing it out.
Did you know Noam Chomsky is approaching now, in full academic throat? We just need to wait for the fall issue of Radical Pedagogy.
“One person who has written very well about this is Diane Ravitch: she’s serious and, the more she learned, the more critical she became…”
“A way to privatize the system is, first of all, make it non-functional: underfunded, so it is not functional, and then people don’t like it so it is handed over to what are called charter schools, which, actually, are publicly funded and don’t do any better than public schools, even though they have a lot of advantages. That way you get rid of the general commitment of the public to solidarity and mutual support: the thinking that I ought to care whether the kid across the street can go to school, or whether the disabled widow across town should have food. For these guys, the « Masters of the Universe » (Chomsky points the title of the book on his desk), a phrase from Adam Smith, incidentally, that is the right attitude. You should only do things that benefit yourself, and I think the attacks on the public schools are like this…”
Noam Chomsky interviewed by Arianne Robichaud
Forthcoming in Radical Pedagogy, interview March 26, 2013
http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/20130326.htm
Reign of Error is more of a handbook than a sermon. We are going to stop this thing.
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Loved this, Norm! As another retired educator, I believe that our teachers need support and encouragement. This is definitely a difficult time to be an effective educator!
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