This morning, as I was flying home from Chicago, where I spoke to the Modern Language Association about Common Core, the blog registered more than 9 million page views. The blog started in late April 2012.
Thank you for reading, thank you for tweeting, thank you for sharing with friends, thank you for commenting and joining the conversation.
How to account for the interest in the blog? I attribute it to the amazing energy of readers who share stories (with links) from their hometown newspaper and who come here for solace, support, inspiration, collegiality, and an open discussion about issues that matter to them. I attribute it to the fact that the blog has a point of view–I support the preservation and real reform of public schools, and I respect the men and women who work every day to educate the nation’s children. I attribute it to the fact that the blog welcomes dissent, so long as it remains within the bounds of civility.
The blog has become a clearinghouse for parents and educators seeking support and allies as they oppose privatization and punitive legislation and mandates. Readers have kept me informed about big events in different states and cities, and I, in turn, share what I learn from you.
As regular readers know, I write the blog without any assistants. There is no paid staff. Just me. When there are spelling or grammatical errors, they are mine, and they are usually the result of either haste or auto-correct. Just yesterday, the words “out in” appeared as “Putin.” I am grateful to readers for pointing out my mistakes.
A friend asked me the other day what I was doing to “monetize” the blog. I said “nothing.” I don’t want advertising or subscriptions. This is what I want to do. Nothing more or less.
Over these past months, I have blocked a small number of people for violating the simple rules of the blog.
They are:
1. No cursing, although an occasional “damn” or “hell” is tolerable. I have deleted comments that exceeded the bounds of civil behavior as defined by me.
2. Argue and disagree all you want, but no malicious accusations or vitriol. Some might slip through but if it is habitual, go elsewhere.
3. To sum up, my blog is my virtual living room. You are welcome. I expect you to say your piece, however you choose, but in a civil tone.
Now let’s go for 10 million!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Congratulations, Diane. We appreciate your efforts to make our voices heard.
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Congratulations Diane. Seeing push back to some #edreformers As the character in the movie Network says: “I’m mad as hell and won’t take anymore.”
Thank you for fighting for public schools and kids!
Congratulations. Thanks for giving local and state issues a national audience.
Thank you, Diane, for your tireless efforts on our behalf!
Congratulations on reaching another fantastic milestone!
There are many reasons for the success of this blog, I’ll add a few more to your list.
Diane, you are a great writer. You have an exceptionally deft way of describing extremely complex issues in simple, clear terms. This blog provides facts, but it also expresses the emotions of fighting for our children and our public schools. Anger and sadness, hope and joy, and a whole range of other emotions provide a strong undercurrent to many blog posts here. Finally, the blog is often very funny.
Keep up the great work, Diane, and we’ll keep reading!
I concur! Diane, you yourself are one of the reasons we visit your “living room” so often. Your personality shines through your writing and gives us all hope and inspiration. BTW, do you have a link to your MLA comments on the CCSS?
Ms. Ravitch, I teach eighth grade algebra in a small town in Idaho. In 2009, while refereeing a basketball tournament, for an end-of-the-year party, a student threw a basketball full court and hit me in the head. Two disks in my neck were ruptured. Had a fusion. This last summer the disks below collapsed and I was only able to work the first three weeks of this school year.
I was already pretty actively viewing your blog and had been debating our Luna Laws for a couple of years. For the past few months of my disability, your blog is absolutely the highlight of my day. I too am an early riser, so I look forward to the first “ding” of an arriving e-mail each morning. I also joined BATS due to your referencing the group.
I am typically a very active person and would have struggled mightily to stay positive without the BATS and you. I read and communicate for a big portion of each day as I am mostly chair bound. I thank you sincerely for everything you have done for public schools, students, and teachers. You have encouraged and assisted all of us to become truly professional in our ability to defend students, public schools, and our profession.
My wife also rises early, hears the dings and says, “Your girlfriend’s calling!” Thank you.
Yikes! What a freak accident (I do hope that was an accident anyway)! So sorry to hear you’re going through this – back and neck issues are no joke.
I too find Diane’s blog immensely healing, although I haven’t nearly as much to heal from.
Best wishes to you in your recuperation and to Diane in her continuing recuperation. Take care of yourselves, both of you!
9 million seems like a real exponential leap – it seems like only recently you announced 8 million views! The message is spreading rapidly! Thank you.
Thank YOU!
Our support of your blog was foretold long ago by one of those old dead Greek guys:
“Kindness is ever the begetter of kindness.” [Sophocles]
Your efforts here to ensure a “better education for all” proves right another one of those old dead Greek guys:
“A decent boldness ever meets with friends.” [Homer]
And thank you for forging ahead even when it has put you under baseless attacks, continuing one of the best American traditions:
“I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the abhorrence of others, rather than to be false, and to incur my own abhorrence.” [Frederick Douglass]
But where is the $tudent $ucce$$ in your endeavors? Or perhaps you have set yourself a different goal:
“Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.” [Albert Einstein]
Now on to ten million views. That’s just one more zero.
😎
Like…a lot!
Thank you for your wonderful blog. I look forward to your entries each day. They have been very healing for me. I have learned a lot and have been validated in my opinions many times. Telling the truth can be very risky when you are a classroom teacher. I was persecuted for my outspokenness, only finding relief in retirement. Now I want to get involved again to help others still under fire.
Great work and be well so we can continue to read your work for decades. I do want you to know that you frighten me. You remind me of other folks I know, your passion is so much fun to be apart of. Continued spirit to you. 10 million is on, here we go.
Diane, Your blog has educated me , so when I meet with Chiefs As Leaders, Secretary Mark Murphy in Delaware, I am knowledgeable and know what I am talking about . My voice is being heard and I am empowering other teachers to do the same. Thank you for your tireless energy and hard work for education . we need you. I will continue to share and learn .Thanks
Yeah!
Thank you for providing shelter from the storm.
Education is not preparation for life;
education is life itself.
John Dewey
Dr. Ravitch,
You said, “A friend asked me the other day what I was doing to ‘monetize’ the blog. I said ‘nothing.’ I don’t want advertising or subscriptions. This is what I want to do. Nothing more or less.”
It’s interesting to compare your “I’m-doing-it all-for-free” approach to that of your ideological counterpart Michelle Rhee, who also has had some success in getting her message out.
http://caaspeakers.com/michelle-rhee/
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“In the ever-evolving landscape of education in America, Michelle Rhee has been working tirelessly for the past two decades to give children the skills and knowledge they will need to compete in a changing world. From adding instructional time after school and visiting students’ homes as a third grade teacher in Baltimore, to hosting hundreds of community meetings and creating a Youth Cabinet to bring students’ voices into reforming the DC Public Schools, Michelle has always been guided by one core principle: put students first.”
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Wow, Rhee has “been guided by one core principle: put students first.”
How touching and noble of her? Given that moving statement, I’m sure that—like you, Dr. Ravitch—Ms. Rhee probably donates her time to give speeches and make appearances… at most only asking to have her expenses covered.
Wait a sec. I just found something on-line. It says that… Ms. Rhee… NO, I DON’T BELIEVE IT… she actually CHARGES MONEY (???!!!) for her speeches?
Say it ain’t so!
And that, when giving speeches, she is represented by the top Hollywood agency C.A.A., Creative Artists Agency?
Well, I’m sure her pay is just a small honorarium… as, like you, Dr. Ravitch, her true motives are to improve the educational lives of children, and to make sure every child has a great teacher at the front of his or her classroom, and to “put students first.”
What’s that? It’s NOT just a token honorarium. Let me guess…
$1,000?
$2,000?
Higher? You gotta be kidding!
$5,000?
$10,000?
Get outta town!
$15,000?
$20,000?
What? She gets more than that just for an hour or two of speaking and answering questions?
Really? It’s actually higher?
$25,000?
$30,000?
Okay, someone’s just winding me up here. There’s NO WAY she charges more than THAT!!!
$35,000!
BINGO!!!!!
$35,000???!!! I don’t believe it.
Somebody’s gotta be making that up to discredit Ms. Rhe. It’s probably some evil defenders of a failed status quo who put adult teachers’ interests ahead of children/students’ interest who are making up and spreading these lies in an effort to harm Ms. Rhee’s reputation, and protect their own selfish interest and cushy jobs-for-life.
Apparently not.
Some enterprising writer named Molly Bloom at the on-line publication STATE IMPACT actually got a copy of the contract that Rhee uses for her personal appearances and posted it on-line.
Gimme that link!
http://stateimpact.npr.org/ohio/2011/10/10/michelle-rhee-to-speak-at-kent-statestark-prompts-faculty-to-organize-counter-event/
What’s that? Just scroll down and you can see
a scanned copy of Rhee’s boilerplate contract? Hmmm….
Yep! There it is… $35,000 is indeed what she gets paid when she speaks somewhere, plus a bunch o’ FIRST CLASS expenses. ..
The contract posted is the actual one used for Ms. Rhee’s appearance at at Kent State University,
Why that’s second worst atrocity ever associated with that school. (“Four dead in O-hi -o… “)
I like how the Purchaser—the entity or person who hires her— sends the payment to:
“Rhee Enterprises, LLC” (PAGE 2)
Helping improve the education of children and “putting students first” is Big Business, apparently.
There’s more on PAGE 3:
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“a. Purchaser shall provide the Artist with one (1) First Class round-trip, unrestricted, fully-refundable airplane tickets, or cash equivalent, at Artist’s election;
“b. Purchaser shall one (1) VIP hotel suite; Purchaser to make and confirm reservations in consultation with the Artist; Artist reserves the right to choose hotel;
“c. Purchaser to provide the Artist with meals and all reasonable incidentals;
“d. Purchase shall provide Artist with a towncar and Professional Driver for round-trip transportation from the Artist’s home to the airport, airport to hotel, hotel to engagement, or any combination thereof;”
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Yes, that’s right… Rhee demands not just a hotel room, but a “VIP hotel suite” at a hotel approved by her, as well as a towncar with a chauffer to drive her around???!!!
Come one. Be fair. You need all that if you’re going to be “putting students first.”
Item 6 is telling. Michelle or her agent crosses out the following:
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“6. RESPONSIBILITY for EVENT-RELATED TAXES. Purchase agrees to pay any and all local, State, and/or Federal rental, amusement, sales or other taxes as required by law.”
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Next to the crossing out, Michelle or her agent scrawls, “TAX EXEMPT”, as Students First is a non-profit organization.
Awww, that’s too bad. That money would have gone to the state’s general fund for education, as Ohio schools are hurting for cash right now.
Item 9 is interesting:
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“9. ARTIST’S MERCHANDISING RIGHTS. Artist shall have the right, but not the obligation, to sell souvenir programs and other merchandising items on the premises on the place of the presentation without participation by the Purchaser, subject to local venue’s contract requirements, if any, of which the Artist is notified in writing.”
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(INSERT JOKE HERE… it’s too easy… i.e. Michelle Rhee T-shirts, action figures, etc.)
There’s also a pay-or-play clause, which means that if the event is cancelled for any reason, you have to pay Michelle her $35K anyway.
Reading this I feel like I’m watching a scene from the end of “THE WOLF OF WALL STREET”, where the slimebucket and convicted Wall Street felon Jordan Belfort now makes a cushy living as a “motivational speaker.”
God save us all!
Jack,
I don’t criticize Rhee for her speaking fees. I too am paid to speak—though I often speak pro bono. I criticize Rhee for peddling ideas that hurt public education and teachers, but not for being a professional speaker.
I’ve got more to say on this.
It’s interesting to compare the smoking gun above—a document proving that Michelle Rhee makes as much in an hour of bashing public school teachers & their unions as the average starting teacher makes in a year—with the outrageous stuff her supporters claim about how self-less and noble she is.
Below, we can read as one of them blathers about how Rhee is now “shunning high salaries” to “improve the lot of our nation’s students,” and how she was targeted and victimized in D.C. because she “put students first.”
Check out what WAITING FOR SUPERMAN director Davis Guggenheim wrote in his blurb accompanying her page in TIME Magazine’s 100 Most Important People list for 2011:
(CAPS are mine… Jack… it’s in the last paragraph)
http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2066367_2066369_2066128,00.html
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DAVIS GUGGENHEIM:
“She (Michelle Rhee) SET A GOAL TO IMPROVE THE LOT OF THE NATION’S STUDENTS, and she has stuck to that. And she PAID DEARLY FOR IT, stepping down from her D.C. post in 2010 after Mayor Adrian Fenty lost his bid for re-election, a public rejection that some saw as A REPUDIATION OF THE TOUGH STEPS to raise the standards of the city’s public schools.
“Subsequently, SHE SHUNNED ANY HIGH-SALARY OFFERS that resulted from her high-profile tenure and INSTEAD FOUNDED HER OWN ORGANIZATION.
” ‘PUTTING KIDS FIRST’ could be a pithy slogan. (For many it is.) FOR RHEE, IT’S A LIFELONG COMMITMENT.”
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Hey Davis, you know who else has to “pay dearly”? The folks who have to pay to have this woman speak for an hour or two!
Ms. Rhee may have “shunned any high salary offers” after the voters of D.C. ran her out of town, but she sure isn’t shy about lapping up her $35K / hour speaking fees!
It’s nice that her “lifelong commitment” to “putting kids first” pays so well.
***CORRECTION***
Ms. Rhee’s usual speaker fee is not $35,000.
It’s actually $50,000.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/guess-what-michelle-rhee-charged-a-school-to-speak/2011/10/24/gIQAen6GJM_blog.html
According to Valerie Strauss at the
Washington Post, “Rhee had actually
discounted her usual speaking fee of
$50,000 because Kent State is, after
all, a school.”
How generous.
$20,000 and a coffee maker in her room is not enough? Oh, Michelle. Education’s been good to you.
Rock on…er… FLAP on Mother Bat Ship! ^0^ ^0^ ^0^
You got me with that comment, Hannah!! Help me out with what your referring to/saying.
Thanks,
Duane
(I wasn’t going to comment on this particular post so as to not be accused of jacking up my total number of posts-ha ha-but you all have to realize that my posts amount to .0004% of the total views-just a spit in the ocean.) Let’s see if someone can find all the logical errors in that statement!
Congratulations, Diane! And thank you for creating a space for us, a space where the voiceless can have a voice.
On another note, I had not really thought about advertisements and the like. I don’t have anything against advertisements in general, but I must say that one of the reasons (not the only one, and certainly not the most important) that I have made this blog a daily stop-by is the elegant simpleness of it. The white space is pleasing to the eye, and makes reading easy. It’s the difference between having a conversation in someone’s comfortable, well-lit, though not overly bright, living room and having a conversation at a busy arcade. Thank you for that, too.
Congratulations, Diane!
It is gratifying to see so many posters here, in sharp contrast to the blogs of “reformers.” Not only that, but very few teachers and principals post on the blogs that support privatized charter schools, invalid and frenzied testing, vouchers or lower standards for teachers. Those who do are often selling something.
For those of you who are confused or undecided, please support the people who elect to be with the children each day.
Diane,
At times we disagree…but you are providing a great service.
Reblogged this on Roy F. McCampbell's Blog.
Wonderful! I love this blog and I love that it is civil. I won’t read blogs where people get nasty and go on the attack so I appreciate the standards you expect. We are all going through a process in education and we’re all evolving with information provided and debate from blog responses. It’s great and appreciated. xoxo
I stumbled upon this blog last August. After 4 years of teaching kindergarten, I had felt frustrated by the sense that many things were not being done in the best interest of the kids, that there seemed to be no good reason for many of the ways things are begin done in education. When I read this blog, it crystalized the issues and I discovered that thousands of educators, parents, students and leaders in many fields felt the same way. This is an invaluable resource. I still wonder though, are the people who need to, listening? How can we make change occur?
We love you Diane—from Newark, NJ.
Diane Ravitch’s blog demonstrates the power of ideas–what one great thinker can do. One woman on her laptop, without no enormous organization and no billions behind her, may well bring down the deform juggernaut. When this machine that has been rolling over teachers and students is, finally, immobilized, when we have turned to the REAL problems facing our kids and our nation, she will be the hero whom we all will have to thank for that.
I read a book recently that said, “Don’t sit around waiting for the Epic Fairy to tap you on the shoulder, because that’s not going to happen. Go out and do something epic with your one wild and precious life..”
Diane Ravitch is doing something epic here, and we are all in her debt.
cx:
Diane Ravitch’s blog demonstrates the power of ideas–what one great thinker can do. One woman on her laptop, with no enormous organization and no billions behind her, may well bring down the deform juggernaut. When this machine that has been rolling over teachers and students is finally immobilized, when we have turned to the REAL problems facing our kids and our nation, she will be the hero whom we shall all have to thank for that.
I read a book recently that said, “Don’t sit around waiting for the Epic Fairy to tap you on the shoulder, because that’s not going to happen. Go out and do something epic with your one wild and precious life..”
Diane Ravitch is doing something epic here, and we are all in her debt. On behalf of the millions of kids being harmed by these deforms, thank you, Diane, for your intelligence, your wisdom, your decency, and your perseverance.
Very well said!
We are lucky to have someone like you to organize and express out loud what is happening as education and educators are facing some extrodinary and mind boggling challenges.
We are fortunate to have you as a source of well documented information and as a supporter & signer of the “Protect New York School Children” petition for student data privacy http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/protect-new-york-state
I urge all readers of this blog to sign this petition. I was proud to do so.
Thank you, Dr. Ravitch, for creating and maintaining this blog. I cannot imagine how exhausting it must be. Your dedication to education and to bringing forth the truth in these dark times is appreciated by countless students, parents and educators. Congratulations on this milestone!
Way to go!
Diane, one of the reasons I read your blog daily is that–aside from all the timely education news coming in from all over the country–yours truly is”a site to discuss better education for all.” Even when commenters disagree with others, their wording is, generally respectful, and there is honest, intelligent discourse. Some sites that I read (particularly, local news media) contain extremely offensive, odious comments, such as “You’re so stupid!” Then, the commenters expound upon their senseless, name-calling statements.
But–none of that here (and when you’ve found something–rarely–truly awful, you have deleted it or refused to take further commentary from offenders). I, for one, really appreciate your diligence (especially since you’re doing it by yourself!), because I find the comments & opinions of your readers to be just as important–and informative–as the posts.
THAT’s why you have over 9 million page views. Congratulations, & thanks so much!!
“The woman who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The woman who walks alone is likely to find herself in places no one has ever been before.”
― Albert Einstein
Daine walked alone but we soon followed…Thanks Diane..
Thank you Diane for this needed and ever so helpful blog. I can’t tell you how much it means to me.
Congratulations, Diane. You inspire, give strength and challenge us like a great teacher.