There is something about corporate education reform that encourages chutzpah. Chutzpah is a Yiddish word for arrogance. Reformers think they are on the front lines of the civil rights movement. They think that making tests harder helps kids who are already struggling. They think that if the failure rate for black and Hispanic kids goes higher, these kids are getting the help they need. Please don’t ask me to explain the logic behind their train of thought. I suppose their inflated opinion of themselves leads the corporate reformers to reach absurd conclusions.
Take New York State Commissioner John King. His teaching experience is limited to three years in a no-excuses charter school where poor kids were expelled for minor infractions. Having been chosen to lead the Empire State, where only 3% of children are in charters, he has decided that the Common Core standards are his heroic mission. He has compared himself to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. And just a few days ago, he said that the advocates for the Common Core were like the all-black World War II unit called the Tuskegee Airmen.
Please don’t ask me to explain the logic. There is none. In the first administration of Common Core testing, 95% of children with disabilities failed. More than 80% of African-American and Hispanic children failed. These tests have passing marks designed to fail most kids, and the burden falls most heavily on minority children. Instead of help and reduced class sizes, they get more tests. What part of this scenario would be supported by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr? What part is similar to the bravery of the Tuskegee Airmen?
It makes no sense. But then, Common Core makes no sense. It was underwritten by one man, Bill Gates. It was imposed by making it a condition of Race to the Top. The tests were federally funded (an act of dubious legality). It eviscerates state and local control of education. It sets poor kids, black kids, Hispanic kids, and those with disabilities on a road to failure. What part of this terrible scenario resonates with the civil rights movement?
The only thing Dr. John King has in common with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is his last name. The current Dr. King should have the decency to refrain from comparing himself to a man who distinguished himself by his humility, his compassion, his decency, his astonishing intellect, and his genuine concern for those who had the least. He sought equity. He fought for unions, good jobs, good housing, fair wages. In my reading of Dr. King’s work, I never once encountered a passage in which he said that what black children need most is testing.
The “reformers” don’t think they’re on the front lines of the civil rights movement. They just like to say so because they are desperately trying to validate their criminal motives in destroying public education for their own greedy gain.
This is what John King really thinks of
parents who “opt out”, or even complain
about his “education reform.”
http://www.southbronxschool.com/2013/10/fine-dining-with-new-york-state.html
King draws an asinine analogy between
parents bitching about Common Core, or
excessive or inappropriate-for-grade-level
testing or whatever…
to…
the lack of restraint to a customer
would show at a restaurant when that
customer has a problem with
the wine or food served to him:
http://www.southbronxschool.com/2013/10/fine-dining-with-new-york-state.html
He puts himself in a higher order of class
than those belly-aching parents because
when a waiter brings him substandard
food or wine… well… in such a situation,
he doesn’t complain, or send it back. He
sits there and eats it whether he likes it
or not…
(*** actual quote… no joke***)
JOHN KING: “When I’m in a restaurant,
and the waiter opens the bottle of wine for
me to taste, I never say ‘No,’ send it back,
even if it’s horrible. The same with my
meal; if I don’t like it I’ll eat it anyway.”
AND DAMN IT!!! THAT’S WHAT THE
PARENTS AND STUDENTS IN NEW
YORK STATE SHOULD DO AS WELL!!!
Your eloquence on this matter echoes that of Dr. Martin Luther King.
There were several town halls
scheduled to sell Common Core to
the parents of New York state
schoolchildren. N.Y. State Education
Commissioner was the presenter,
with the events organized and
presented by the N.Y. State PTA.
However, after yesterday’s first
suchtown hall, N.Y. State
Education Commissioner King
strong-armed the N.Y, State PTA
into cancelling the remaining town
halls with the following statement:
https://www.facebook.com/nyspta
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
“While our goal was to provide
an opportunity to learn and share,
based on review of the initial
October 10 meeting, the
Commissioner concluded the
outcome was not constructive
for those taking the time to
attend.
“Please know that NYS PTA
will continue to work with all
education and child advocacy
partners to keep our members
updated andinformed on
education, health, safety and
welfare issues affecting children
and families.
“We apologize for any
inconvenience this may cause
and express our sincere
appreciation to those who have
given their time to assist with
organizing this initiative.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Well, you can “review” for yourself
the crucial final 20 minutes of
yesterday’s town hall here—
the colorfully titled YouTube video
“Commissioner King Gets Spanked”:
This meeting was a Rhee-like
farce where King spoke for 2
hours straight, and was scheduled
to to be followed by 1 hour of
public comments and questions.
Note that… ***was scheduled to
be followed…***
The best laid plans…
Indeed, 20 minutes in, neither
King nor the NYS PTA
moderator “could stand the
heat, so they got outta the kitchen.”
They were totally unprepared by
how well-informed and
onfrontational these parents were.
At about the 10 minute mark, one
parent brought up the fact that King
sends his own kids to a Montessori
School which has a curriculum that
is the antithesis of Common Core
as a Montessori school is…
(to quote its wikipedia entry)
– – – – – – – – – – – – –
“… characterized by an emphasis on
independence, freedom within limits,
and respect for a child’s natural
psychological, physical, and social
development….
“… and has these elements
as essential:[1][2]
” — Mixed age classrooms, with
classrooms for children aged
2½ or 3 to 6 years old by far the
most common
“— Student choice of activity
from within a prescribed range of
options
“— Uninterrupted blocks of work
time, ideally three hours
“— A Constructivist or ‘discovery’
model, where students learn
concepts from working with
materials, rather than by direct
instruction.
“Specialized educational materials
developed by Montessori and her
collaborators
“— Freedom of movement within
the classroom
” — A trained Montessori teacher
“In addition, many Montessori
schools design their programs
with reference to Montessori’s
model of human development
from her published works, and
use pedagogy, lessons, and
materials introduced in teacher
training derived from courses
presented by Montessori
during her lifetime… ”
– – – – – – – – – – – –
This disclosure and implied attack
on King pretty much ended things.
King made the dubious claim that
his Montessori school scrupulously
follows “Common Core”
“This totally enraged the audience
of parents as it was and is a
ludicrous and demonstrably false
claim that was rightly met with
skepticism and loud booing,
enraging the crowd… if for
no other reason that folks
don’t like to be lied to or have
their intelligences insulted.
The flustered moderator then
quickly wrapped it up, “We’re going
to allow two more people to speak.”
At which point people began
screaming even louder:
“WHAT HAPPENED TO ‘ONE
HOUR’ ?!!!”
This is absolutely riveting video.
Again, you can see that crucial
final 20 minutes at:
They are steadfastly sitting at the lunch counters of profit, boycotting the buses of community, and demanding that we stand in line with the neediest while they take whatever seats they deem themselves entitled. I can see where they might be confused . . . or rather deluded. One hopes that with all of this tireless spin, they will eventually get dizzy.
RE-POSTED from last October:
I was hoping that someone had
actual information about the Montessori
school where King sends his kids,
the Woodland Hill Montessori school.
So far, I’ve yet to find out exactly
what occurs during a typical
school day at that specific Montessori
school—schedule, curriculum,
activities, subjects taught, etc.
Thankfully, both Montessori’s
official site and its Wikipedia
page details what happens at
almost all Montessori
schools—i.e. the ones that are
functioning in a way consistent
with the Montessori educational
philosophy and methods. If
the Montessori to which King
sends his children does not
operate this way, they are an
exception, and not a true
Montessori school—sort of like
a restaurant purporting be a
McDonald’s and uses the name
McDonald’s, but instead that
sells hot dogs instead of
hamburgers.
However, I was able to discover
a blog post from Carol Burris
who DOES have information about
the Montessori school to which
King sends his kids. It’s at the
top of the COMMENTS section:
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/finding_common_ground/2013/06/when_the_ny_state_education_dept_complained_about_this_blog.html
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
CAROL BURRIS (regarding the
Montessori school where King
sends his kids):
“A friend whose employee attends
the Montessori School (and
therefore knows that the children
attend it) informed me that the
school does not give all of the
tests at all of the grade levels.
“Teachers are not evaluated by
the scores, nor is the school
evaluated by the scores.
“That has been confirmed.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
In the video, King described
his children’s Montessori school
being part of NY state’s
“community of schools”.
Apparently, not all of NYS’s
educational institutions
are in sync with the policies that
King demands that the public
schools follow—i.e. the
non-public school where he
sends his own children.
The article that this COMMENT
is responding to is pretty
incendiary as well. It’s from
the “FINDING COMMON
GROUND”, blog written by
elementary school principal
Peter DeWitt.
According to the webpage,
DeWitt “writes about students’
social and emotional health,
and how educators can help
young people find common
ground. He was selected as
the 2013 New York State
Outstanding Educator of the
Year by the School
Administrators Association
of New York State.”
The story is about how
officials from the N.Y. State
Education Dept. harassed
him at his school office in
response to comments he
wrote about… you guessed it…
the subject of King’s sending
his children to a Montessori
school.
The attempts to intimidate,
censor, and implicitly threaten
DeWitt are as creepy as
anything to do with the recent
Town Hall fiasco.
For example, Tom Dunn,
King’s Director of Communications,
volunteered to DeWitt…
“It’s not like I’m going to call your
superintendent … ”
… to complain about DeWitt,
should DeWitt refuse to cooperate
and do what he says—i.e. edit out
the stuff about King’s kids
attending a Montessori school.
That remark has a very mafioso-ish
type ring to it—along the lines of…
“It’s not like we’re going to
and harm your wife and kids if
you don’t play ball with us. We
wouldn’t want anything to happen
to them, now. Would we?”
If you’re not going to do
something, and you’re not
actually threatening to do so,
then why even bring it up?
These are the final paragraphs
of DeWitt’s article in their entirety:
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
PETER DEWITT:
“(Ed. Commissioner King’s)
communications director should
spend less time trying to coerce
and intimidate educational
bloggers who are trying to get
out the truth, and spend more
time listening to the voices of
teachers, parents, students and
principals.
“Collectively, there were thousands
of them who converged on Albany,
NY yesterday for the June 8th Rally.
I hope some leaders from State
Ed were in the crowd because
one thing is for sure…our voices
won’t be stifled. ”
“My concern over the phone call
is ‘what’s next?’ One phone call
for an error. A second one
because I used strong language
or criticized the commissioner?
“What will be the next thing I
write that State Ed does not like?
If there is something untrue about
my blog, post a comment at the
end or send an e-mail like everyone
else.
“My secretary is too busy to take
calls about my blog, nor should
she have to. I don’t post blogs at
school, and my students and staff
are my first priority. We are trying
to meet the deadline of getting
through our End of the Year SLO’s.
“Unfortunately, Mr. Dunn’s phone
call seemed less about correcting
an error (which may or may not be
true) and more about flexing his
NY State Education muscles. We
have about as much time for State
Ed phone calls as they do for
ours.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Again, you can read the whole
thing at:
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/finding_common_ground/2013/06/when_the_ny_state_education_dept_complained_about_this_blog.html
There is a stink tank somewhere that spends it’s time and the deformers money on figuring out ways to use the real civil rights movement as a Trojan horse for their policies. Since it’s all spin, pointing out how and why that’s the case is easily done and that puts the egg right on the faces of the deformers. Call them out on their hypocrisy, use their own lies against them. Once folks find out how they’ve been played for fools, they’ll never believe the deformers again. Doing this is one of the big ways we’ve been gaining ground and numbers.
A little humor to lighten things…
What occurred backstage with John
King and his advisors after King fled
the stage last September:
Other than their general debasement of language, I can think of no more cynical and grotesques strategy by the privateers than their repeated conflation of their attempt to privatize the school system, destroy unions and reduce education to job training then their with the civil rights movement. Herein is the noblest impulse in American history dragged into the sewer of public relations and perception management so as to forge an emotional response and allegiance to policies that have nothing remotely to do with civil rights? Thank you, Diane, for your eloquent rebuttal to the latest of John King’s obscene claims.
Pardon the typo in the above:
Other than their general debasement of language, I can think of no more cynical and grotesques strategy by the privateers than their repeated conflation of their attempt to privatize the school system, destroy unions and reduce education to job training then their conflation of the same with the civil rights movement. Herein is the noblest impulse in American history dragged into the sewer of public relations and perception management so as to forge an emotional response and allegiance to policies that have nothing remotely to do with civil rights. Thank you, Diane, for your eloquent rebuttal to the latest of John King’s obscene claims.
Clearly, they believe in magic!!!
Do you?
Why does he insult those airmen like this?
“A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true.” [Demosthenes]
Nailed to the wall by a very dead, very old and very Greek guy.
And on a more personal note: I knew someone—a young woman who was just graduating from my high school three years ahead of me—who went on Mississippi Freedom Summer 1964. She had more moral and physical courage in one little finger of her slim frame than John King will ever know.
And I knew others, of all colors and backgrounds and ideas, who participated in pretty dangerous civil rights actions.
NY Commissioner John King is engaged in petty self-delusion when he covers himself with the glory earned—the hard way—by others. I am not sure if he is more self-serving or more clueless. How does one choose?
Let’s remember people who endured far more and paid a far higher price than John King will ever be willing to pay.
See my comment about Rigoberto Ruelas under today’s posting entitled “Peter Goodman: A Report from Inside the AFT Convention.”
Then compare him, what he did with his life and what he endured at the hands of self-styled “education reformers” of the “new civil rights movement of our time” like John King and the leaders of the charterite/privatizer crowd.
Make up your own minds.
😎
Actually, a more accurate analogy of the Common Core with the Tuskegee Airmen is how those brave but vulnerable black soldiers were exploited by our government in the unethical, untreated “syphilis experiment” for 40 years:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment
Sorry, my mistake. The analogy should be with the Tuskegee Institute, since black sharecroppers not airmen were involved in the study.
See Examining Tuskegee faqs, which explains why the two are often confused:
http://www.examiningtuskegee.com/faq.html
“Please don’t ask me to explain the logic. ”
Really?
Isn’t it obvious?
“Tuskegee Air Corps and Common Core Supporters
larry: wow!
You must have gotten the “Kommoners Kore For Dummies” book and done all the recommended ‘closet reading.’ *Don’t forget to bring extra flashlight batteries in case they close the door on you.*
Or not. Apparently sarcasm and satire are not on the CCSS menu today.
Nor is critical thinking or healthy skepticism or caring about context and meaning.
Go figure [a numbers/stats joke].
As Duane Swacker would write:
TAGO!
😎
LOL..next phrase out of his mouth: ‘grapes are just like toothbrushes’…
MLK was tirelessly organizing the Poor People’s Campaign prior to his assassination. He understood where the real problem lies whereas John King does not look like he has a clue.
and finally, remember, his own children are not being exposed to Common Core.
Quite sick, actually. Not just hyperbole, but a twisted appropriation of the legacy of authentic heroes.
Battling the Luftwaffe of core resistant suburban soccer moms in their flying minivans.
TAGO!
“In my reading of Dr. King’s work, I never once encountered a passage in which he said that what black children need most is testing.”
Well, that may be, but he did famously say that he had a dream that his own children would one day be judged by the content of their charter.
A direct plug for charter schools.
@Larry… you said this in quoting MLK, “… but he did famously say that he had a dream that his own children would one day be judged by the content of their charter…” (and I think you meant “character”…)
So why do we dehumanize and demoralize our neediest youth with tests that do not measure who they are in the least nor what they know???
Why? Corporations make profit and that is the great 1 percent way.
I said that tongue-in-cheek.
What does King hope to accomplish by throwing out absurd comparisons? If this were an essay on the assessment, he’d get a one for disjointed thinking or failing to adequately connect with the topic.
Smoke and mirrors don’t magically turn into reality. And if King believes the words spewing from his lips, he needs to stop drinking his own kool aid.
the children may be like the Tuskegee Airman in that they are the victims of experimentation for the benefit of a large corporation and are given drugs
to study their effects. Common Core and Testing lead to a “syphilis” of the mind.
You get a gold star.
Unfortunately, that is not the comparison John King had in mind.
But I do like that syphilis analogy. I think it’s already an epidemic.
Right on, Dr. Ravitch!
Martin Luther King had a dream and John B. King is destroying it.
laurencoodley: are you implying that the heir apparent to the glory and courage of the Tuskegee Airmen would say one thing and do another?
He couldn’t possibly be one of the people Homer was talking about, could he?
“Hateful to me as are the gates of hell, Is he who, hiding one thing in his heart, Utters another.”
Or should we drag in another very old, very dead and very Greek guy?
“A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true.” [Demosthenes]
Choice, choice, choice…
Ah, but then there’s that inconvenience called facts that helps resolve doubts and uncertainties.
[start quote]
At this point, it’s fairly widely known that the head of New York State’s public education system sends his own children to a private Montessori school in North Greenbush.
State Education Commissioner John King has taken criticism from many of his opponents for sending his daughters to Woodland Hill Montessori, much of that ire stemming from an accusation that his kids aren’t subject to the same new Common Core learning standards and assessments the state has rolled out under his tenure.
King, though, has tried to debunk such criticisms. “Woodland Hill has been great for Common Core,” he told the Times Union earlier this week.
On Thursday, Susan Kambrich, the head of Woodland Hill, explained exactly how the Common Core factors into the teaching philosophy at the school.
The short answer: It doesn’t, exactly.
“When I looked at the pedagogical shifts that are part of the Common Core, it felt like we were already doing those things,” said Kambrich.
The school has made no adjustments to its teaching model or curriculum to account for the Common Core. Indeed, inside the school’s warmly lit, greenery-filled classrooms, students are already learning math by building visual representations of numeric values, delving into nonfiction reading, and drawing artistic representations of new vocabulary words to help discern their meanings — all in pursuit of building deeper knowledge, as the new state standards also call for.
“Montessori education lends itself very well to the initiatives of the Common Core,” Kambrich wrote in a letter to parents earlier this year.
Woodland Hill does participate in annual state standardized exams in English, math and science (like many schools, public and private, it did worse on the new exams this year), as well as the Iowa Tests, another series of standardized skills tests.
Formal assessments throughout the school year, however, are less likely in the Woodland Hill classroom, particularly in the younger grades.
“Our assessment is done very naturally,” said Kambrich. “As the kids get older, the assessments do get more formal.”
Kambrich explained that much of the way students learn at the school makes such assessments unnecessary. For example, if a student is using a puzzle to help learn geography skills and the puzzle pieces don’t fit together, it will be obvious that their answer was not correct.
“Woodland Hill recognizes that standardized tests do not adequately measure the full range of a student’s academic abilities,” the school’s website explains. “We use detailed evaluations along with narratives to measure a child’s progress.”
[end quote]
Link: http://blog.timesunion.com/capitol/archives/201300/kings-kids-private-school-and-the-common-core/
Also go to a posting on this blog of 11/3/2013 entitled “Montesorri Teacher to John King: Montessori Is Not About Testing and Common Core.” Nicely tides things up.
So maybe a large helping of Demosthenes topped off with a piquant dash of Homer.
If NY Commissioner of Education John King has any questions, he may contact me via this blog. And no, just because Common Core and Montesorri share the letters “o” and “m” and “n” and “r” doesn’t count.
😎
“Kambrich explained that much of the way students learn at the school makes such assessments unnecessary. For example, if a student is using a puzzle to help learn geography skills and the puzzle pieces don’t fit together, it will be obvious that their answer was not correct.”
Is that a timed test? Not in my experience. Montessori promotes hands-on learning, so most Montessori equipment consists of three dimensional objects.and the materials are typically self-correcting, like puzzles are, so kids can work on them until they get them right. Yes, Montessori teachers keep track of what material each student is ready to handle, but so do teachers in neighborhood public schools, only the latter don’t get to pick and choose which material goes into high-stakes tests.
Common Core tests are timed, multiple choice, one shot deals completed on computer. There is absolutely nothing similar between Montessori and Common Core assessments.
I’m sure that many public school teachers in neighborhood schools would love to return to the days when they, too, were trusted to determine their own tests, including using hands-on materials to do double duty for teaching and assessment.
If there is even ONE person in a high position of leadership in this country who claims to be promoting civil rights and carrying the torch for Martin Luther King and supports policies that further these aspects of MLK’s dream, I would love to know who it is:
I “dream of a land where men will not take necessities from the many to give luxuries to a few… a land where all our gifts and resources are held, not for ourselves alone, but as instruments of service to the rest of humanity.”
~ Martin Luther King, Address at the Religious Leaders Conference May 11, 1959
Somebody needs to stand up to the entrenched interests of parents over their children’s education.
We all know that Cmr King ‘s gaseous emissions for what the are. What we miss is that his ‘line ‘ is always an element of his narrative. His narrative is Cuomo’s narrative; there is an identity relationship. The words , per se , are total bull. The narrative , in all its variations, is what we must resist.
How many adults and kids were kicked out of Freedom Schools during Freedom Summer? How many adults were kicked out of Highlander Folk School? The legacy of the Civil Rights Movement is inclusion, not resegregation, discarding students with learning issues, or failing 90% of kids of color who are ELL or live in poverty or both. We need to meet with John Lewis and explain our point of view.
Bertis, this is a task for you, I can’t stand Atlanta traffic and I would rather try to stay cool here in Chicago. It is an hour to Decatur for you!
Yes, it is certainly irritating. But in fairness to the corporate reformsters, they are simply following the script the political left has used on any number of issues for the past 50 years. And given how many of the reformsters are from the political left, this makes perfect sense — it more or less comes as naturally as breathing. Besides, for those who actually believe that standards-based education junk is real reform, they might actually believe their own hype.
Jack’s allegiance to right-wing dogma was never more evident than his scapegoating of the “political left” for education “reform.”
50 years ago, this “reform” era started with the Republican President Eisenhower over the space race and Sputnik incident. It was reignited in the 80s by the GOP’s Reagan with “A Nation at Risk,” and Bush I started the practice of not permitting educators to participate in education summits and the establishment of national education goals.
When Clinton formed the “New Democrats,” he turned the Democratic party hard right, to garner the Southern vote, so ever since, the party has been led by right-wing, free market neoliberals –a GOP favorite under Milton Friedman. Clinton took up the national goals gauntlet from Bush I and pushed TFA to the forefront. Bush II carried the banner under NCLB, as did “New Democrat” Obama with RttT –both with bipartisan support.
It’s funny when supposedly educated people have not noticed that Democrats and Republicans have long been on the same page regarding education.
Education “reform” comes straight from right-wing politicians in BOTH parties and it’s supported by the right-wing ALEC and big business.
“his scapegoating of the ‘political left’ for education ‘reform.’”
IF that is what I had actually written, you would have a very valid point. However, that is not what I wrote, and it is certainly not what I believe.
“…in fairness to the corporate reformsters, they are simply following the script the political left has used on any number of issues for the past 50 years. And given how many of the reformsters are from the political left…”
This, Jack, and your response when called out on it, are both a crock. NONE of “the reformsters are from the political left.” They are all right of center, support free market neoliberal economic policies that benefit corporations much more than the masses, and they come from both parties. The “political left” are not in the “reform” equation.
Deny it all you want, but Obama and the Democrats are certainly on the political left. Maybe not as left as you would desire, but on the left nonetheless. But that’s really beside the point.
Regarding what I said about “following the script of the political left,” I was not referring to a “script” of corporate education reform. I was quite clearly referring to the script of invoking the legacy of the civil rights movement to advocate for completely unrelated policy positions and implicitly cast opponents in the role of Bull Connor.
Pure crapola. Just because “New Democrats” are not right-wing enough for this guy’s liking doesn’t mean they are not, in fact, conservative on MANY matters. It was the Democrats in the 60s and early 70s who actually WERE the advocates of civil rights, not the Republicans. That’s WHY the Democrats lost the South to the GOP, which LBJ predicted, and they tried to recoup with the formation of the “New Democrats.”
Obama does not advocate for civil rights or on behalf of his own people –who continue to be impacted most by social and economic injustice in this “incarceration nation”. The media has often noted how rarely he even mentions poverty, too. Traditional civil rights organizations were bought off by Gates:
“Corporate Funding of Urban League, NAACP & Civil Rights Orgs Has Turned Into Corporate Leadership”
http://blackagendareport.com/corporate-funding-urban-league-naacp-civil-rights-orgs-has-turned-corporate-leadership
Just ignore the right-wing ranting and left-wing bashing from this troll.
ALSO FROM LAST OCTOBER:
from:
http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2013/10/commissioner-john-king-throws-gasoline.html
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Saturday, October 12, 2013
Commissioner John King Throws Gasoline Onto The Common Core/inBloom/Endless Testing Bonfire
The only thing worse that NYSED Commissioner John King could have done after his meltdown in Poughkeepsie the other night, where he threatened to take his microphone and lectern and go on home if the audience didn’t sit quietly and let him pontificate about the wonders of Common Core, Endless Testing and the inBloom data base, was to cancel the remaining meetings with parents across the state.
One major criticism King and NYSED, along with Merryl Tisch and the Board of Regents, have been taking over their education reform agenda is how they have rammed it down the throats of students, parents and teachers in the state without taking into consideration any of the cares or concerns of the other stakeholders.
By canceling the remaining PTA-sponsored town hall meetings with the public, King reinforces the meme that SED officials are out of touch and do not care one whit what anyone outside of their own offices or the Gates Foundation thinks about their education policies.
The smart move would have been to take the verbal beating in Poughkeepsie, take the verbal beatings elsewhere, acknowledge some of the concerns and say “Oh, we’ll conduct a study over that…” or something to that effect and just keep on keeping on like they’ve been doing.
But Commissioner King is not a smart man, certainly not politically at any rate, because he did the absolute worst thing possible in these circumstances – he took his microphone and lectern and went back to Albany in a huff, canceling the rest of the town hall meetings and underscoring in one feckless act how little he cares about what the public thinks and how little he can handle criticism or challenge.
As Leonie Haimson put it in this post:
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
“These cancellations have provoked even more anger and resentment, with parents saying that while King won’t allow their schools or children to opt out of the Common Core, standardized testing or data sharing with vendors, he is opting out of an important dialogue with parents.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Leonie says there is one meeting that was not sponsored by the PTA that King is still slated to attend – October 15 in Oyster Bay, co-sponsored by Senator Marcellino.
If King was a smart man, an astute politician, he would attend that meeting and make believe he actually cared what the attendees were telling him there rather than act as he did in Poughkeepsie and get all defensive and snooty about things.
He can take some of the fuel off the Common Core/inBloom/Endless Testing Bonfire by acting like most politicians and making believe he cares what people think and feel about these issues rather than showing how little cares about what the public thinks or feels about them.
In other words, he would fake it.
Not that faking that he cares when he really doesn’t would put an end to the criticism and the fight SED and the Regents are going to takeover their education reform agenda.
It won’t – not with parents in the affluent suburbs up in arms over the agenda.
But it certainly would put a little bit of a damper on the tumult and fury King set off with his imperious act in Poughkeepsie the other night.
We’ll see if he even shows up to October 15 meeting and then, if he does, how he handles criticism.
As of now, King is making things worse for himself and his compatriots in reform at SED and the Board of Regents.
On a humorous note, I found
this over at STUDENTS LAST
last October:
————————————————
THE KING’S DICTIONARY:
New York – The reigning Commissioner of Education for the State of New York, John King, has released the following dictionary of terms that he would like distributed at any other town hall meetings he deigns to attend.
accountability — fireability, what the King is above
child — learning unit available for sale to corporations (notable exceptions include: King’s child(ren))
critical voices — that to which the King is deaf
democracy — a form of government in which people choose their leaders and their leaders choose not to listen to them because it is time-consuming and inconvenient
dissent — that to which the King is impervious
education — marketplace
educators — pawns
experience — overblown requirement for teaching
evidence — that which does not exist to support the use of Common Core Standards
knowledge — facts, information and skills not necessarily required before implementing state-wide learning standards
money — short cut around democratic process
parent — easily manipulated adult unit in charge of child (see above)
Ravitch — she who must not be named
respect — what silent acquiescence shows
rigor — developmentally inappropriate
schooled — what the King got on October 10, 2013 in Poughkeepsie, NY
special interests — those who disagree with the King’s policies
Town Hall meeting — gathering at which the King speaks and you listen
——————————————–
This is at:
http://studentslast.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-kings-dictionary.html
Here’s a great column on King from
last October on this blog, written
by on Arthur Goldstein:
Arthur Goldstein, who teaches at Frances Lewis High School in Queens, New York, observed the video in which John King was completely unable to maintain order when faced with an audience of angry parents. He condescended to them, which seems to be his default mode, and they responded angrily. He could not control the class. He probably wanted to expel them, but he couldn’t. They were not “bad students,” they were outraged parents and taxpayers. He forgot that he works for them. They are his boss, not his subjects.
Goldstein wrote the following about John King’s debacle.
ARTHUR GOLDSTEIN:
John King? Or King John?
The spectacle of NY State Education Commissioner John King losing his composure while speaking to Poughkeepsie parents last week was remarkable. I’m just a lowly teacher, but even I know that’s not how you face an audience you’re trying to persuade. I tell young teachers that every time you lose your temper, you make the kids trying to distract you happy. Not only that, but you also embolden and multiply your opposition.
I don’t mean to condemn critical parents or students here. I’m simply saying that educators ought to be able to accept differences of opinion without getting emotional. There are many viewpoints I do not share with my students, but that doesn’t mean they can’t express them in my classroom. How can I engage kids if I don’t tolerate their expressing themselves?
Honestly, how can King, who deems the public schools he administers unsuitable for his kids, tell us with a straight face that they’re good enough for ours? And how dare he suggest we have no right even to ask this question?
Young teachers in my school have concerns similar to those of upstate parents. One tells me his daughter, who used to love to read, is now spending hours doing homework for which she is not developmentally prepared. He says she now cries as a result of being overburdened.
A young mom with whom I work tells me her second grader is overwhelmed by demands he do algebra. She visited his school, claimed he left something in his desk, and surreptitiously used her iPad to photograph every page of his English and math books. She says that’s the only way she can effectively help him with his homework.
These are fundamental issues that are not effectively answered by pontifications on the wonders of Common Core. In fact, I’m amazed at the format utilized in Poughkeepsie. As a teacher, one of my prime directives is to engage my audience. Were I to attempt a two-hour lecture, with a twenty-minute comment period after, my teenage audience would likely engage in open revolt. This would be particularly true if I’d chosen a topic with which they disagreed strenuously, and would be exacerbated if my presentation failed to influence them or address their concerns.
King, ostensibly our state’s foremost educational authority, showed communication and management skills that would be unacceptable in a second-year teacher. He would not have fared well under the Danielson framework city teachers now face. There can be serious consequences for teachers who fail to engage their audiences, but I’ve seen none for King.
Even worse, after this exchange, Chancellor King saw fit to cancel the rest of his appearances. I’ve seen teachers, overwhelmed by the pressures of facing 34 teenagers at a time, get up and walk away. However, I’ve never seen them cancel all future classes and get to keep their jobs.
Last I looked, we’re still a democracy, and We, the People are the ultimate voice. John King is supposed to represent us, not dictate to us. If King cannot abide by what we and our children want and need, let alone allow us to question him, he ought not to keep his job either.
Also, about John King, there was a great guest column on Edushyster’s blog by Sue Altman, describing John King , with all his tone-deaf actions, has been the best thing ever to happen to the Opt-Out movement. He has single-handedly multiplied the numbers of parents currently opting their kids out of standardized testing:
http://edushyster.com/?p=3419
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
John King’s Gift to Parents
Posted on October 16, 2013
John King just gave New York parents the perfect spark to fuel the boycott fire.
By Sue Altman
John King cancelled a town hall style meeting in Garden City, NY this week where he was scheduled to discuss policy around testing and education reform. Following a raucous meeting in Poughkeepsie, King accused “special interests” of “manipulating parents” and called off the show.
Gasp! My goodness, will someone please tell us, who are these “special interests” that lurk so menacingly this October? Are they swashbuckling pirates wheeling and dealing crooked deals in yachts off South Hampton? Or thuggish crowbar-swinging hit men sent by mobsters from Merrick? Who are these henchmen so prevalent and powerful that King John feels he must hop on his headless horse and flee to Albany?
I was confused myself, since I know that everyone you meet in college is from Long Island—so who better to know what it takes to be *college and career ready*? It turns out there is a little something brewing on Long Island, and it’s not iced tea or a late summer hurricane.
The testing opt-out movement, a boycott of standardized tests, is 10,000 strong on Long Island. Ten thousand!!! You think that has something to do with King’s avoidance of the place? Maybe he knows he might have trouble explaining himself to a crowd of well-informed, well-organized, angry Long Islanders.
Garden City might well have become an epicenter of controversy for thousands of angry, frustrated parents demanding answers from King. And, if that town hall had taken place, we would have heard stories from the students themselves (very eloquent and well-educated, despite what the make-believe scores say) about the countless hours of new testing, the anxiety starting in third grade, the stressed-out teachers and the crying in the bathroom. Maybe we would have heard about double sessions in reading and math. About lost time for arts and music. About how private school kids get those things in abundance, but students attending New York public schools don’t. The meeting, and King’s appearance, would have given thousands more confused moms and dads who have heard about the testing boycott, a chance to hear both sides before deciding what to do this fall.
The opt-out movement is well organized. It is headed by parents, whose members include lawyers, stay-at-home moms, academics, secretaries, small-business owners. No, they are not sent by the unions. No, they are not influenced by mobsters, henchmen or, ahem, billionaires. They. Are. PARENTS. Opt-out members cut across districts, race, socioeconomic status, and, most importantly, political party lines. They have one thing in common: they are parents. And they are highly suspect of anything that makes their child hate school. The right hates the governmental influence in education; the left hates the testing part. And everyone hates seeing unhappy children.
These people want to make sure that their children, who have one shot, right now—receive an education that is well-resourced, well-balanced, and inspiring. They are parents whose special interest is…their children.
These New Yorkers refuse to believe that test scores, created by the Department of Education, scored by the Department of Education and calibrated by the Department of Education mean anything at all. They refuse to believe that these numbers measure the value of their child, the value of their child’s teacher, or the value of their school. The mantra “Our children are more than test scores” nails it. These parents are boycotting because they love their children, but also because they believe that something terrible, something big-picture, is happening in education. And, as history shows, boycotts are a means to empowerment when democracy has been suspended.
These citizens are sick of being treated as “consumers” and their children as “products” for whom education is “delivered.” When you treat people like consumers, you get a consumerist response. Angry consumers who want to make a point about something engage in boycotts. The testing boycott is about something larger than tests; it’s an expression of frustration at being excluded from a vital democratic process. The boycotts are last resort of people who feel the state and national departments of education are ignoring them and their children; it is the last weapon they have against this wave of corporate-inspired accountability reforms.
John King’s cowardly decision to skip Tuesday’s town hall in Garden City and cancel the rest of the meetings in New York State is an example of an awful trend of anti-democracy in education. But for boycotters, these moments are a call for others to join the cause.
John King has given New York parents the perfect spark to fuel the boycott fire. This might be King’s greatest legacy.
—————————————————
Sue Altman recently completed a dual Master’s degree in International and Comparative Education and Business Administration at the University of Oxford, UK. Her thesis focused on parent motivations for the boycott of standardized tests in New York, 2012-13. Prior to her time at Oxford, she taught history for four years in New Jersey. Follow her on Twitter at @suealtman.
While we’re at it, here’s a great letter from parent Ali Gordon to John King at:
——————————-
ALI GORDON:
This is the message I recently sent to the Board of Regents and my state representatives:
I have been very vocal about my concerns regarding the implementation of the Common Core Standards, testing, and curriculum in NYS. I have written letters and emails to my NYS representatives and made phone calls. I organized a rally which drew over 2000 people to Comsewogue High School to remind everyone that our students are not defined by their state test scores. I’ve been involved and aware. I joined with other concerned community members to create the group Students, Not Scores.
Tonight this fight became very, very personal.
My ten year old daughter asked me what it would take for me to let her stay home from school forever.
Forever. Not tomorrow… not this week. Forever.
Isabella is very well spoken; very bright. She describes herself as a feminist, and loves to debate adults about the inequity of womens’ pay for equal work. She is committed to calling out bullies in school and helping those people she sees that need a little boost. She can carry on conversations about interesting points and people in American history most kids have never heard of. She can tell you all about the Women’s Suffrage Movement. However, Bella doesn’t learn some things as quickly as other kids do. She struggles with reading at grade level, and has difficulty memorizing math facts. Math word problems are confusing to her, and take her longer than her peers. She has to work really hard to be successful academically. And she does work very hard.
But tonight Isabella decided she has had enough. “School is too hard now.” She said. “I’m too stupid to do this math.” I can assure you we do not use the word ‘stupid’ in our home to describe anything, especially not people. But in the one hour conversation we had in which she was begging me to let her quit school, Isabella used that word- stupid- to describe how she felt about herself more than 10 times.
So, now I have had enough.
No matter the intent, good or bad, in creating and implementing these Common Core standards… if they are hurting children, causing them to give up on themselves at ten years old, there is a problem no one can deny. This problem is bigger than the left wing – right wing debate over states rights and Federal overreach. This problem is bigger than corporations spending billions to influence education policy. This problem is bigger than data mining and privacy. This problem is bigger than Bill Gates, Arne Duncan and Commissioner John King.
Because when a child is broken in spirit, when they have lost their self worth and confidence, that damage is not erased easily. When children hate school to the point that they attempt to avoid it at all costs, there will be no desire to be college or career ready.
Now, before you say I just want my child to succeed no matter what, and I must be one of those ‘everyone gets a trophy for participating’ parents, let me say this: I want my children to be challenged. I want them to have to work to be successful. I want them to sweat it out occasionally, and have to ask questions to clarify. I want their curiosity to lead them down paths I’ve never imagined. I want them to want to know more… about everything.
But when they have no confidence, they will not try. They will not raise their hand to ask a question. They will fear homework, quizzes and exams… and the voice they hear in their heads telling them they can’t, will create a self fulfilling prophecy… so they won’t succeed.
If these insane policies pushing developmentally inappropriate curriculum on our children are allowed to stay in place, what will the future hold for those students who do not fit in this one size fits all approach? What will happen when the precious data doesn’t show the growth these education reformers want to see because so many kids just give up? How many kids have to be hurt before we stop? How many kids have to use that word to describe themselves before we realize the damage that is being done?
Tomorrow morning I will bring Isabella to school. I will tell her that I know this is hard, but she has to just try her best. I will tell her I know how smart she is, and so does her teacher. I will kiss her head and whisper “I love you” with a smile.
And after she walks down the long school hallway, I will use very ounce of passion and compassion I have to call on my elected representatives to stop the abuse. I will contact every media outlet and offer my story- Isabella’s story. I will call, write, tweet, and email the Board of Regents and NYSED Commissioner. I will request meetings with policy makers. I will rally friends and family to do the same. I cannot, no I will not sit back and wait for someone else to get this done.
No one has the right to implement policies that are downright abusive, no matter how lofty their goals. These policies have hurt my child- and that is unacceptable. You’ve heard the phrase ‘Hell hath no fury like that of a woman scorned’…. that is nothing compared to that of a mother protecting her child.
~Ali Gordon
Well said and dead on to the point, what’s sad is that their will be parents that are not informed, they will continue to send their children into battle without support. They will think it’s their child that is not trying hard enough and this will break the sprit of countless children, keep up the good fight !!!
BREAKING NEWS:
The AFT convention debate is totally rigged in favor of supporting Common Core.
Only pro-Common Core party liners are being allowed to speak.
Watch it live NOW:
http://www.aft.org/convention/live.cfm
Oh, and here’s a great letter from one Mikey Jackson, the parent who broke up the Poughkeepsie meeting. As soon as he mentioned that King’s kids went to a Montessori school, his mic was turned off, but not before that revelation caused Hell to break loose in the room. (You turned it off too late, guys, everyone got to hear it… you need to be a little faster with the censoring next time.)
(John King had claimed that Jackson and others at the meeting who spoke against Common Core were “paid agents of special interests” who had posed as parents, so these imposter parents could infiltrate and disrupt the meeting… that turned out to be a bunch o’ baloney, of course.)
Jackson is the guy in the freeze of the YouTube video below: (he starts speaking at 12:13)
Here’s his letter to Dr. Ravitch at:
—————————-
Dear Diane,
I’m the parent in the video who raised the point about Montessori school…http://youtu.be/P_Eiz406VAs (Spackenkill High School. PTA Sponsored Meeting about the Common Core). I hope to set the record straight on my comments.
Sincerely,
Mikey Jackson
As I Was Saying…
Last Thursday evening, I travelled up to Spackenkill High School in Poughkeepsie to attend the PTA-sponsored Common Core town hall where State Education Commissioner John King spoke. I made the hour-long drive by myself with nothing more than a prepared statement I had typed earlier in the day. I was not part of any group. No one lobbied me to go. I had no plans to pick a fight with Mr. King. I was there on behalf of my 8 year old son, his mother and me. I got there very early and thanked the PTA reps for organizing the event while I signed up on the list to make a statement. The PTA told me that Mr. King would not be answering any questions or responding during this portion of the night and would only be listening to concerns.
Before Mr. King gave his presentation, the crowd was told that their concerns would be heard and listened to very carefully. Mr. King went on to give an hour-long PowerPoint presentation and video about the Common Core. Some of it was very interesting. A lot of it made sense. The biggest point I took away from his speech was that we need our kids to do better in math and science to compete in the global job market. That notion makes a whole of lot of sense to me—but the plan of action that the Dept. of Education has decided on to get us there is wrong. It is completely based on number crunching and textbook publisher lobbying, etc. The Board of Ed. can claim whatever statistics they want, but suddenly making great teachers follow scripts or “modules” in the classroom is obnoxious and leaves very little to zero room for any imagination or flexibility in educating. (Homework, for instance, consists mostly of prescribed worksheets.)
My statement was cut short at the regulated two-minute mark and the microphone was turned off. Anyone can see my full statement online, but I wanted to clear something up and finish what I was saying. The NY State Education Commissioner sends his children to private Montessori school. In Montessori, the learning is child-centered and child-specific; from my experience sending my son to Montessori preschool, the kids dictate the speed at which they learn. Common Core and everything that goes along with it could not be more different. Montessori is a proven method of learning. The kids that I know who went to Montessori have all the intellectual benefits that Common Core hopes to achieve. I had no intention of taking Mr. King to task for sending his kids to private school, and I completely understand why someone in the public eye would do so. But after listening to his informative, yet boring, presentation about how great the Common Core is—while knowing how much stress it is adding to my son’s life (and the lives of his teachers, principal, friends, and my parent friends)—I thought Mr. King did himself a giant disservice by not listening to parents’ and teachers’ very real concerns.
The school and district my son attends have always been known for having amazing teachers, arts, sports, and more. Our college rate was already good. Why fix what wasn’t broken? Mr. King, the problems in our schools are community-based problems. This is where you should be putting your attention. How can we make schools in poorer areas just as good as the schools in districts with lots of money? How can we give the districts guidelines, then make sure they know that they are just guidelines and that no teacher or school will be penalized because a seven-year old didn’t fill in a bubble fully? How can we make Art, Music, Physical Education, Technology, Social Studies and reading FICTION just as important as Math and Science? How can we keep big business from influencing how our educrats dictate policy?
This issue is NOT Liberal or Conservative or Progressive. It’s about our kids. My kid. My “Special Interest.” I want him to love school! I want to build him up and let his imagination thrive. The Common Core and the State Assessment tests are hurting our schools, and if Mr. King and the NYS Board of Education don’t want to hear the voices of parents who are on the ground fighting for their kids’ right to learn and be healthy and happy, then they should go get other jobs.
-Mikey Jackson
Parent
Cornwall on Hudson, NY
PS: Here is a picture of me and my “Special Interest” Group.
(I presume that’s a picture of him with his kids & wife… JACK)
Great !! Glad I could read your whole point of view !! If we all had the money left after paying taxes for public education then maybe a private school would be our choice also. What a concept a child learning at the pace that’s correct for them,
And here’s a letter from yet another parent at the infamous Pougkeepsie meeting:
This is at:
—————————-
DR. RAVITCH:
A parent in Poughkeepsie writes about the infamous meeting where John King lectured for 1 hour and 40 minutes and was then hooted by parents and teachers:
– – – – – – – – – – – – –
Parent:
On October 10, 2013, SED Commissioner John King spoke at the Spackenkill School District in Poughkeepsie, NY. This was the first of several forums on the Common Core Learning Standards (CCLS) that NYS adopted on July 19, 2010.
It has been widely seen in social media that Dr. King’s presentation was not well received by the audience. However, his perception of what transpired is not shared by those in the audience. He is quoted in Newsday as saying, “The disruptions caused by the ‘special interests’ have deprived parents of the opportunity to listen, ask questions and offer comments. Essentially, dialogue has been denied.”
Au contraire. If you take the time to watch the video (http://youtu.be/swWm9b_LUAU), you will see that Dr. King dominates the first hour and 40 minutes. At that point, audience members were allowed to speak for a whopping 23 minutes. Between speakers, Dr. King was defensive and tried to control the “dialogue”. A dialogue is supposed to be a two-way conversation where both sides speak and are listened to. The audience did their part by listening to him. King failed to do his part.
What “special interests” is he talking about anyway? Parents and teachers are not special interests. Pearson, inBloom, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, et al, are special interests and their interests are money, not children. He tries to depict the audience as having been infiltrated by an angry mob with an agenda. If you take the time to watch the video, you will see that the entire audience was filled with parents and teachers who have legitimate concerns for their children. Their frustration and yes, anger, were delivered to the man it belongs to.
Some have expressed concern about this anger – that it may come across as unseemly or unprofessional. I say that their anger can be defined as “righteous anger”. In John 2:13-22, Jesus shows his righteous anger toward the “money-changers” doing work in his Father’s home. This is the way many of those adversely affected by the reform movement feel. The work we do is sacred. What could be more sacred than working with children? In Matthew 18:6, Jesus talks about the special care given to children; woe to those who would harm one hair on their heads.
The parents in the audience were angry, very angry. It is justified and righteous. Dr. King has harmed a lot of children with his dictates and mandates. He has aligned himself with the “money changers” and they have assembled themselves in one of our sacred places – our schools. He has violated a trust that we have in education and he needs to suffer the consequences.
Dr. King is a failure and if he were evaluated with one of the tools in which we evaluate our teachers, he would rate as “ineffective”. Please join the many parents from across the state who will be demanding King’s resignation this week. Please call Governor Cuomo’s office (518-474-8390) and demand his resignation. Take back the schools from the corporations and give them back to our teachers and students. They deserve it.
Here’s something interesting.
First, once again, here’s the video of the Poughkeepsie meeting.
This is how King views the same event:
(at: http://polhudson.lohudblogs.com/2013/10/15/john-king-forums-were-not-a-constructive-context-for-dialogue/ )
—————————————————————
John King: “(The behavior of the “special interest” plants) made it impossible to have constructive dialogue…. We’ll look for other opportunities to create constructive dialogue, but there’s nothing constructive about a room of people just yelling and heckling.
“My own view is that parents should have the choice of which schools they send their children to and that the children of public officials should not be an object of political debate. That said, the tone was raucous throughout the meeting. There was yelling throughout the meeting. Actually, one parent tried to ask people to quiet down so that he could hear the conversation, and instead people screamed at him, yelled at him.”
———————————————–
If you look at the long version, the parents actually sat very politely through King’s interminable 2 hour presentation extolling Common Core. The only shouting occurred when he interrupted the parents’ promised 1 hour of comments to claim that Montessori follows the Common Core (a ludicrous and demostrably false claim), and then a bit later—a mere 14 minutes into the promised 1 hour of parent comments—King directed the moderator to say, “This is the last question.”
Finally, here’s an old post of mine:
Every word that King utters is hollow…
if only becausehe’s spending tens
of thousands of dollars of his
Gates-originated money to make sure
his own kids are, figuratively speaking,
kept as far away from the Common Core
he’s pushing as his Gates’ money will
allow him.
Here’s an old post I directed at
Lawrence Steinberg at an old
thread here:
What if a U.S. Surgeon General
told the nation’s parents that a
great new vaccine has just been
invented, and it’s going to
revolutionize the health of
children and their ability
to fight off disease … blah-
blah-blah…. all the while
the Surgeon General is
being handsomely
compensated for pushing
this vaccine.
And then someone asks,
“Mr. Surgeon General… why
don’t you give that new vaccine
to YOUR OWN children? If the
vaccine is so great, why do
you spend tons of your own
money so that your kids get
an entirely different, and—
by all measures—a superior
vaccine?”
“My children’s vaccination is
none of your business, and
not fair ground for discussion.”
And to add insult to injury,
the hypothetical Surgeon
General intones, “Your kids
are all going to be forced
to take this vaccine whether
you like or not.” With the
power of the state behind
him, he says that, figuratively
speaking, he and the state
will shove it down your kids’
throats, or strap them to
a chair and forcibly inject
into their biceps whether
or not their parents desire
such a vaccine.
“This is what we’re doing,
and there’s nothing you can
do to stop us… so just shut
up and accept it.”
You can see how parents
might be a little vexed by
such a prospect.
Of course, you know I’m
talking about New York State
Ed. Commissioner John King
and his forcing Common
Core on other people’s
children, while keeping his own
children… figuratively
speaking… as far away from
Common Core as his Gates-
originated salary can afford.
Seriously… if Common Core
is the greatest thing ever
for a kid’s education, why
does King spend tens of
thousands of dollars on
expensive private school
tuition to make sure his own
children are kept away from it?
Check out the crucial final 20 min.
of last October’s town hall in
Poughkeepsie, New York,
where NY State Ed.
Commissioner John King
faced the public over his
backing of Common Core.
Here is the colorfully titled
YouTube video —
“Commissioner King Gets Spanked”:
(NOTE: this has been watched 57,767 times!!!)
One other point:
I just noticed something while
watching this video. King
sends his kid to a “private
school”… but he doesn’t
use the phrase….
Instead, he calls his kids’
school a “non-public school”…
(at 15:52)
KING: “Non-public schools
are part of the community
of schools in our state… ”
It’s part of some Neuro-
Linguistic Programming
technique to subliminally
get the people in the
audience to not associate
King with elitists who avoid
the public schools and
instead send their kids to…
yes… PRIVATE schools…
No, he’s just like all you
“public” school parents.
I think it’s called “negation”
where what follows the
negation… in this case..
the negation is the weasel
prefix “non”, and what follows
it is “public”… with the “public
being what actually is actually
processed by the mind..
By calling it “non-public”
the word “public” is in the
phrase, and that’s what
gets processed… with
people then NOT associating
King with “private” schools…
i.e. avoid using the word
“private” at any cost.
Well, geez… I guess you learn something every day. I didn’t know that the Tuskegee Airmen were a bunch of wealthy, politically-influential, white men.
In reference to John King’s previous statement, I do know, as an elementary Montessori teacher, that Common Core and Montessori education (private or public) have absolutely nothing in common. Here is my “short list” of Montessori education: hands-on materials, experiences & activity, follow-the-child, community, freedom & responsibility.
What is on the “short list” of Common Core?
Marianne, College and Career Ready and Rigor??? Otherwise there is not short list. The PreK standards and indicators number between 400 and 500. I lost count one day as I tried to figure it out.
I’ve been doing some basic carpentry around the house lately and, boy, let me say, Diane, you really hit the nail on the head with this one. I mean, it’s like you sunk a tenpenny nail clean into the lumber with one big swing of your “hammer”!
Your comments on the NYS Commissioner of Education could not be more accurate or well written. And, it’s great to read what everyone else wrote, too.
I’ve tried to put myself in this guy’s place. Like you say, I don’t know what his logic is. I’ve never met him.
“Dupe” is the word that one of your readers has used and it’s a good one.
Of course, throughout history sometimes well meaning people have at times ended up causing huge amounts of havoc and misery.
For a guy who professes to want to increase critical thinking in our schools, he seems to do very little of it (at least in public) when it comes to his own ideas. I mean, when was the last time he admitted he was wrong about any of this?
From Los Angeles as a delegate to the AFT convention, I wasn’t planning to read all the stuff in my mailbox, but this one demanded my attention. As you may or may not know, Diane, many of the Tuskeegee airmen returned after the war to Chicago, where many of those got jobs teaching school. In the city’s real public schools. As the city created all that massive segregation that swept across the city during the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, and into the 1980s… When corporate “reform” began in the 1990s under Paul Vallas and went to warp speed under Arne Duncan in the 2000s, it was the schools in which many of those men had served that were obliterated early through “small schools,” or “turnaround” (both Gates funded) or closings. The decimation of Chicago’s schools by corporate stooges like King, Vallas and Duncan is a matter of the record of history. But there are, as we all know, a thousand lesser stories in every major historical narrative (something AFT honors as “Everyday Heroes” at conventions like this one). And long after they were no longer over Nazi Germany in P-51s (while my Dad was walking down there fighting the same enemy with the 44th Infantry Division), those men were in Chicago working to continue their fight against all that racism. And Chicago was as big a challenge, whether it was providing armed support to homeowners during the dozens of vicious “race riots” of the 1950s and 1960s in Chicago (the last of those white attacks on black people were ending during the 1970s…) or organizing against school segregation — well, let’s remember to correct that historical record. And thanks for calling out the liars of history, like this guy…
Isn’t King TFA? Then let’s posit that he is sincere (and not all that bright). He drank the Kool Aide which allows imbibers to believe that they are “exceptional”, because, well, they are. And everyone else – LIFO’s in regular schools – are just haters. So he ends up believing that his cause is righteous and his means are just, and that he is being persecuted for being on the side of the angels.
Many sincerely believe in things that are false.
“Many sincerely believe in things that are false.”
You mean a thing like educational standards and standardized testing are valid and ethical means to “measuring” student “achievement” and teacher performance????
TAGO!
: )
I have no intention of defending John King; I’m just trying to explain him.
The TFA’S aren’t educated, they are trained (or indoctrinated). Like a child (or a parent) that has been KIPPed since kindergarten, they think THIS is how school is. Lacking any other frame of reference, and never having learned to think for themselves, they just go through life on a SLANT.
Christine Please!
King sincerely believes that his own children should not be subjected to all the insanity the rest of us deal with daily. I would recommend not relying too heavily on his sincerity.
But his children don’t need to be saved, because they’re his children. Only other people’s children need to be saved.
Wow getting off of this site, too many people seem to only be in attack mode, that’s never helpful , I’m looking for true answer’s and help for my child. Just blowing off steam and blasting other people’s comment’s isn’t what I’m into. Good luck folks !!
There’s a “tell” for me about those folks who are all righteous about education. Their sentences begin with the phrase “These kids need to…”. Real teachers, who know and love their students even when they drive us crazy, begin the phrase this way: “What my kids need is…”
Language matters.
There are many good reasons why teachers have so much steam to blow off. Become familiar with the truths revealed on this blog which “reformers” like King attempt to conceal though propaganda. Someone with a few years experience teaching at a charter school is not an expert in public education and is not qualified to tell an entire state, with many veteran teachers, how to do their jobs. Neither is a federal Secretary of Education who has a BA in sociology and no teaching experience.
King would never support public schools in deciding their own learning standards, let alone condone that public school teachers design their own tests using hands-on instructional materials to determine if students have met those standards. And yet, that is exactly what occurs in the private school where King sends his own kids. This is a common practice with “reformers” who dictate polices to the masses, including Obama, Emanuel, Rhee and Gates, while they send their own children to similar private schools. Having taught in many private schools like that, I can tell you a key feature of such schools is that learning is fun. What “reformers” prescribe for other people’s children is sheer drudgery. Teachers are standing up for YOUR child when they contest double standards like this.
Instead of calling him John King, I’m going to call him King John. His hubris is that enormous.
Let us, just for a second, look past the absurd inappropriateness of comparing Common Core advocates to the Tuskegee Airmen, and take his analogy seriously. If this movement is truly that important, THEN WHY ISN’T KING SENDING HIS CHILDREN TO SCHOOLS THAT USE THE COMMON CORE?
Either King is lying about the importance of the Common Core, or he is lying about his sincerity.
Agreed, Neal. I heard the speech live. The first part was a checklist of what attendees needed to do to promote CCSS when they return to their schools. When he began with the anecdote about the burial at Arlington, I was confused about where he was going. The speech, initially, lacked the hubris of previous speeches. But an important piece missing from this discussion, a thread that flowed through many presentations that week, was the emphasis on citizen education. So there is a subtle shift from standards to citizenship, and I don’t think he means the citizenship people of a certain age think about. This new citizenship has to do with group think and its formation through cognitive dissonance, or in the words of the reformers, rigor. Get ready for round 2. RTTT money may be running out, as King mentioned at the end of his speech, but the next assault is just beginning. This is the legacy King is paid to establish.
Diane, thank you for making this point!! It does take a great deal of arrogance for John King to attempt to borrow the dignity of our cherished civil rights leader! I don’t get the connection and why he thinks anyone would let him get away with the farce. His claims are especially incongruent since John King has shown a willingness to sacrifice “other people’s children” to a corporate scheme to dismantle public education. We will know he is half serious about children when he enrolls his children in a public school and joins the PTSA.
It suddenly occurred to me…
The comparison is apt if you think of it this way—
The Tuskegee Airmen were not given due credit for a long time for the role they played in winning the war against fascism and its attendant evils.
If you think of John King and those he runs with, they are not being given sufficient credit—at the moment—for the part they are playing in the war against public school staffs, students, parents and the communities those public schools serve. All they are doing is heroically engaging in the assault of public education in order to cleanse society of all its attendant evils.
Yeah, right, he’s risking life and limb bringing the benefits of Common Core from the Montessori school his child attends to the undeserving majority in their “factories of failure.”
Always keeping in mind, that Rheeality Distortion Fields also affect those that generate them.
“As a vessel is known by the sound, whether it be cracked or not; so men are proved, by their speeches, whether they be wise or foolish.” [Demosthenes]
😎
Panel discussion at WNYT in Albany, NY. Assemblywoman Patricia Fahey and School Superintendent Dr Theresa Snyder with education commissioner King.King repeatedly falsely expressed that teachers including early childhood and k-elementary all wrote the common core curriculum . Also ducked and avoided questions about test length and test secrecy. Dr. Snyder and Assemblywoman Fahey deserve our thanks for speaking truth to power and standing up for Public Education.