Paul Horton, who teaches history at the University of Chicago Lab School, here analyzes the origins of neoliberalism and its attack on the public sector.
The “rhetoric of economic freedom” has put a price tag everything. Self-interest and me-first have become the ideology of the day, and anyone who dares to think of what is in the best interest of society or how to raise up the poor is scorned as a Marxist or collectivist.
Horton writes:
“In effect, “the invisible hand” behind the push to create new education markets is coming from Wall Street investors who are flush with capital for investment. Wall Street bundlers and investment firms are buying up stock in charter school companies and big education vendors. These bundlers not only fund both party’s campaigns, they also sell stock, betting on the futures of big education vendors, start-ups, charter schools, and vouchers. They “encourage” political leaders to pursue policies that will hedge their bets on education products and to view all schools as portfolios that will increase in value as long as the Feds and the states pursue policies that encourage privatization.
“But Wall Street bundlers are far from the only group that embraces a radical version of libertarianism as a way to legitimate opening new markets in education. “Hardcore libertarianism has been making inroads among a younger set of tech entrepreneurs, who see its goals of limited government as being compatible with their general hatred of innovation-stifling regulation. And as more and more tech founders become phenomenally wealthy, many are naturally drawn to the right-wing political ideologies that help them preserve more of that wealth,” according to Kevin Roose in an article for New York magazine.
“Not surprisingly, this same set of Silicon Valley and Seattle billionaires has teamed up with Wall Street bundlers to push neoliberal attacks on public education by pushing an agenda that supports charter schools, computer driven learning, and assessment schemes that are designed measure success of students and teachers in “real time.” Value added measures (VAM) for teachers based on student test scores are designed to reduce the power of unions by making it easier to get rid of ineffective teachers. Charter schools are created both as competition for public schools to give parents “choice” and as a way to hire nonunion teachers at cut rate salaries–teachers who can be hired and fired with no job protections or due process.
“This neoliberal-libertarian agenda for education violates the values of the American Revolution that affirmed that promise of public education in the Northwest Ordinance that reserved the proceeds from the sales of public lands to build public schools and the later Morrill Land Grant Act (1862) that used the proceeds of public land sales to create public universities that would serve the interests of the public.
“Neoliberal corporate education reform is nothing short of an attack on the political DNA of the United States. This agenda makes a mockery of Jefferson’s idea about a school as an “academical village” designed to create leaders to serve the commonwealth. Corporate education reform also disgraces the legacy of the fight for integration and equal funding during the Civil Rights movement by encouraging the resegregation and the resource starving of public schools to create more “choice” in the form of charter schools.
“The Tea Party might rant on and on about liberty and taxes these days, but Republicanism, or the idea that we have to “rise above faction” to serve the commonwealth was the glue that held the American revolutionaries together…..”
“Nothing is sacred: public servants, those who promote the humanities and the arts, and those focused on caring for others are viewed by neoliberals as naïve at best. Public servants deserve little or no respect because only the market can truly establish value. They are contemptuously seen as the new “welfare queens,” or the “forty-seven percent” because the very idea of the public is emasculated, shorn of value, a heavy drag on a fine tuned and lean market system. Neoliberals believe that almost everything public should be strangled and flushed, to use Grover Norquist’s intentionally crude image.
“Toward this end, public schools and public teachers have been subjected to a relentless barrage of negative propaganda for almost thirty years. Many corporations want to force open education markets, Microsoft and Pearson Education to name two of the largest, demand “free markets,” “choice,” and “free enterprise.” Public schools are defunded and closed, so that parents can choose among competing charter schools supported by city, state, and Federal policies. Politicians of both parties at every level are funneled campaign contributions from charter school investors for their support of “school choice.”…….
“The privatizers want us to forget all of this history; they want us to forget the idea that public anything is a good idea. Parents who demand quality public neighborhood schools are as American as apple pie. The corporate education reformers are motivated by ideas that have no respect for tradition or for common human decency. They devalue the aspirations represented in the Declaration of Independence. We need to push back and demand a limit to privatization and a defense of the Commons.”
The North Carolina teachers created this video slide presentation to educate the public about the relationship between neoliberalism and public school reform.
When did American values get so corrupted by this idea of market value, or have they always been so?
GE2L2R,
Markets values will dominate if we do not push back. This is the history of American reform movements.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Agreed. The structure of government is supposed to support this pushback. The idea that privatization of public services combined with deregulation somehow improves economic health? Makes about as much sense as dumping criminal law & expecting human nature to create peaceful neighborhood all by itself.
GE2L2R & Paul AFT 2063: “market value” & “market values.”
There is a great deal about the self-proclaimed “education reform” movement that only makes sense if you keep in mind a certain kind of business model, one of whose names is “free market fundamentalism.”
For example, on the one hand being a citizen of a democracy and sending your children to a local neighborhood public school. On the other hand, being a client/customer/consumer that sends your children to an Centre of EduExcellence $ucce$$ where the little tykes are “serviced” [aka undergo value-added tweaking] by Eduproduct Delivery Specialists [née teachers] so the owners/operators/contractors/consultants can collect some of those bounteous taxpayer monies. For the former, there is at least the expectation/assumption/hope that there is some measure of “choice AND voice” while in the latter there is just “choice—what someone else allows/mandates for you.”
That is why when supporters of public education criticize the leading charterites/privatizers for cherry picking/counseling out/expelling students [e.g., remember the midyear dump that is increasingly a common practice] the “choice” crowd reacts with astonishment, horror and disbelief. After all, think of the many restaurants that you go into that sport some variation of a sign that says “We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone.” Why, they reply in shock, horror, and disgust, should they have to do anything different from such businesses as nationwide fast food franchises and adjust their expectations of ROI [return on investment] downwards just to take care of Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s “uneducables” and Michael J Petrilli’s “non-strivers”?
What sort of ‘bidness’ model is that?
Time to call them out on trying to sell us a business plan that masquerades as an education model.
Thank y’all for your comments.
😎
I appreciate the clarification KrazyTA particularly the restaurant analogy.
If my students do not like what I am serving, they are free to eat elsewhere.
If my administrators do not like my serving techniques, they are free to send me elsewhere.
A cook in a diner probably has more control over his destiny than a public school teacher.
NJ,
I agree that the short order cook has more control over his destiny in that the cook has far more influence over his pay than a teacher has.
I am curious about how students are free to leave your class. That would not be the case outside of high schools in my district, and even in high schools there are some required classes that are only ever taught by a single teacher (a poor practice in my estimation).
TE,
My district has around 40,000 students. There are public schools and charter schools. There is a lot of mobility.
NJ Teacher,
I thought the goal here was to eliminate charter schools. Am I wrong about that?
In my district, it is relatively easy to transfer into a school with a relatively high percentage of students with a free and reduced price lunch (that is what my youngest did), but much much harder to transfer into one with a low percentage of students on free and reduced price lunch, especially if it would make that fraction even lower. Is it the same in your district?
TE,
I was at a renew school, which was the bottom end of the spectrum. Schools in the better neighborhoods are at “overcapacity.” There is mobility in the midrange however. Charter schools are selective.
As far as a goal, I have no particular expectation of eliminating charter schools. If I make it to retirement in one piece, it will be a miracle.
NJ,
My local district, while one of the largest in the state, has about a fourth as many students as yours, and has one charter high school that is run by the local school board. The relatively wealthy can choose from a variety of private schools.
I am curios about how you define better and midrange neighborhoods. The elementary schools in my local district range from a little less than 20% free and reduced price lunch to a little more than 70% free and reduced price lunch. There are two high schools, one with 25%, the other with 40%. How does your district compare?
Sorry TE,
I am not good at remembering percentages of free lunches.
The renew schools are in neighborhoods with public housing and vacant buildings. Newark has gangs and frequent street shootings.
The more affluent neighborhoods have more businesses including a lot of restaurants.
Take a look at Jersey Jazzman’s blog. He is working on his doctorate and specializes in statistical analysis. He has written a few reports about Newark and has testified before some committees.
NJ,
I had no idea of those figures for my local district until this blog inspired me to look them up.
TE,
I thought you found those numbers of interest because you are an economist. If you think, I am going to look up the numbers, you have made a serious miscalculation!
NJ,
I am certainly not suggesting that you look up anything at all.
Good TE! I am sort of watching Letterman.
For a great look at whether we should question the increasing application of market values to spheres of life where they they don’t belong, I HIGHLY recommend Harvard philosopher Michael Sandel’s What Money Can’t Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets. A fascinating read that should be on every edu-blogger’s summer reading list. Nearly all the way through it now and very impressed. I hope Sandel will write more directly on Education issues as he frames the issues brilliantly.
Here is an Atlantic article which which excerpts some of Sandel’s book:
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/04/what-isnt-for-sale/308902/
Would you argue that private education is immoral?
TE … As usual you try to divert the conversation by asking an inane question that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. Although you are a master at such diversionary tactics, have you noticed that they are seldom successful here among intelligent and thoughtful people? But yet, you persist.
Most of the time I choose to ignore your hopeful persistence, but today I think that you deserve to be recognized. I have decided that you have earned an A- for tomfoolery. Congratulations…. sorry, would have been an A+ but that would not leave any room for improvement… 😉
By the way thank you, Kate, for the link to the article from Atlantic.
Betsy Marshall,
Poster Kate suggests in this thread that Michael Sandel would argue that the moral limits to markets apply to education. Michael Sandel’s basic argument is that markets are immoral when the exchange of money corrupts the values of the interaction. So, for example, the prostitution corrupts the human values that we place on physical intimacy. IF SANDEL”S ARGUMENT APPLIES TO EDUCATION, IT APPLIES WITH THE GREATEST FORCE TO PRIVATE SCHOOLS WHERE THE VALUE OF EDUCATION IS CORRUPTED BY THE PAYMENT OF TUITION.
You may think that Michael Sandel’s work is not applicable to education, but poster Kate clearly does.
I should add that if you think Sandel’s arguments apply, it is not at all clear that teachers should be paid to teach. The only way to educate children without corrupting the interaction would likely be home schooling.
Sandel points out two key arguments about the limits of markets–both are relevant to when there are widespread, systematic privatization IMO of education–1) fairness 2)corruption. Beyond that, I’ll leave you to debate yourself and for others to read Sandel’s arguments, which raise appropriate questions. The point IMO is that before we destroy our public goods, we should at least have an open discussion about what we are doing and what the ACTUAL implications are.
Kate,
Sandel is using the word corruption in exactly the way my post uses it. He argues that
“The second reason we should hesitate to put everything up for sale is more difficult to describe. It is not about inequality and fairness but about the corrosive tendency of markets. Putting a price on the good things in life can corrupt them. That’s because markets don’t only allocate goods; they express and promote certain attitudes toward the goods being exchanged. Paying kids to read books might get them to read more, but might also teach them to regard reading as a chore rather than a source of intrinsic satisfaction. Hiring foreign mercenaries to fight our wars might spare the lives of our citizens, but might also corrupt the meaning of citizenship.” (from the Atlantic article)
If paying for education corrupts education, private education is surely the most corrosive part of the system. I think you could also argue that paying teachers to educate your children might be seen as corrupting the meaning of being a parent, much like paying mercenaries to fight our wars corrupts the meaning of citizenship.
Thanks Kate, this is and excellent book!
TE @ 1:08,
“That’s because markets don’t only allocate goods; they express and promote certain attitudes toward the goods being exchanged.”
NO! Markets do not “allocate goods” and they don’t “express and promote certain attitudes”. Markets can’t do anything as they are not people, animals or plant life. They are a very human description of a certain part of human interactions and that’s all.
This is a fundamental conceptual error, an error of epistemological* and ontological** concern in which a description of events-the market-is viewed as alive, as having a will, as acting in a certain fashion. The market does no such thing and to use the term in this fashion perpetuates a false narrative, that, just conveniently, happens to fortify the very inequitable status quo. Using false narratives will get one false answers to all the wrong questions.
And for those who think that those two big words shouldn’t be used, here you are:
*Epistemology (from Greek ἐπιστήμη – epistēmē, meaning “knowledge, understanding”, and λόγος – logos, meaning “study of”) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge[1][2] and is also referred to as “theory of knowledge”. It questions what knowledge is and how it can be acquired, and the extent to which any given subject or entity can be known. (from Wiki)
** Ontology is the philosophical study of the nature of being, becoming, existence, or reality, as well as the basic categories of being and their relations. Traditionally listed as a part of the major branch of philosophy known as metaphysics, ontology deals with questions concerning what entities exist or can be said to exist, and how such entities can be grouped, related within a hierarchy, and subdivided according to similarities and differences. (from Wiki)
Oh, and for those who think that philosophy has no place in society, is passe and/or elitist understand what Comte-Sponville has to say about philosophy: “Philosophizing is thinking without the benefit of proof.” Which is what the vast majority of human communications are-“thinking/interacting without the benefit of proof”.
Duane,
That is a direct quote from Micheal Sandel, so it seems your argument is with him, not me.
Of course saying that the market allocates goods is a bit of a short hand, like saying that school boards allocate students to traditionally zoned schools. School boards are not, after all, people, animals or plants, and to say a school board does anything at all is the same type of error that you are criticizing Sandel for.
TE,
Thanks for the correction as I didn’t realize it was a quote. I guess I’ll have to brush up on my “close” reading skills, eh!
While what you say about school boards and/or or versus markets is true in a sense it’s a matter of degree. Yes, school boards do make those decisions (legally as well as practically as a conceptual matter) as a matter of voting to act like “one” person/entity whereas markets have no such mechanism. “Market” is a description of human interactions, a school board is a legal entity. Big difference.
Kate,’
Thanks for the link. Sandel’s question, “Do we want a market economy or a market society?”, focuses on the essential issue. The question highlights the change that occurred when wealth became concentrated and oligarch’s imposed policy.
Linda,
I read Sandel’s to argue that some relationships between people to be sometimes best done through markets, sometimes not. The interesting question is if the student teacher relationship can be incentivized with money or if that is a fundamental corruption of the teacher student relationship.
That’s funny. Isn’t he one of the frontrunners in the MOOC (massive online college classes) sphere -?Harvard is offering his course on Justice online.
Capital & Main-Bonanza! Silicon Valley Sees Gold in Corporate-Driven School Reforms: by Bill Raden and Gary Cohn
http://capitalandmain.com/bonanza-silicon-valley-sees-gold-in-corporate-driven-school-reforms/
Thanks for the link, AlwaysLearning.
It is ironic that Paul Horton, teaches at the University of Chicago Lab School because that is the origin of the neo-liberal ideas that destroyed Chile’s public education system. Today and for the past few years students in Chile have been organizing to improve their schools. It is discouraging that we are not learning from their pain. Economic model like fair trade make me hopeful. I am constantly wondering, if us, teachers, can use such a model to save our public schools?
Heather,
I get this a lot. Keep in mind that we have a very strong union in our school that stands in solidarity with the CTU. I hope that you can write about Chile for this blog so that we can learn more from you.
“. . . the University of Chicago Lab School because that is the origin of the neo-liberal ideas. . . ”
The neo-liberal ideas were developed at the UC Lab School?
Me thinks you need a rewrite of that statement.
Thanks for the clarification Paul. To correct my statement Duane, I should have said, “the University of Chicago Lab School because it is across the street from the University of Chicago, the origin of neo-liberal ideas.”
Is that correct? Sorry for my ignorance and thanks for educating me.
Not ignorance just a misstatement. Anyone who has written much of anything has misstated things. Tis the nature of the beast of writing.
And I am still interested in your thoughts of “fair trade” and how that might be a model for education.
“Economic model like fair trade make me hopeful. I am constantly wondering, if us, teachers, can use such a model to save our public schools?”
In what way may that model-fair trade be used to “save our public schools”? What is a “fair trade” model? Please define.
TIA!
Duane,
To clarify, I am wondering what we, teachers, can learn from the fair trade model and/or similar socially responsible economic models in response to privatization of schools.
Here is a resource that explains it with examples: http://www.fairtraderesource.org/uploads/2007/09/What-is-Fair-Trade.pdf
My wonderings have to do with a major component of fair trade is fair treatment of workers by paying them a fair wage. Again, I look to this model because we do not have unions in Wisconsin, which normally would protect workers and working conditions.
It may be a far stretch, but I think there are lessons to be learned from the model in terms of treatment of workers and quality of products. Pearson produces tons of educational products that schools purchase. I relate Pearson’s products to Folgers coffee. Both are mass produced and have major environmental consequences (in the case of schools it is our social environment rather than our physical).
Like small farmers, teachers produce materials everyday for their classroom, and some sell it through distributors like Teachers Pay Teachers. Their products have not eliminated Pearson, but is there a critical point in which they could disrupt the market place?
Today, Folgers does not carry a fair trade coffee line, but Starbucks does and that was in response to consumers demand.
Can we, teachers, create socially responsible products that disrupt the educational market place like fair trade coffee has?
Can school boards change the direction of privatization of our schools by consuming more socially responsible products?
Thanks for a space to share my thoughts and windmill chasings.
Heather,
Thanks for the explanation!
I kind of thought that’s what you were getting at but I wasn’t sure. It’s an interesting concept. I believe Plowshares was one of the first organizations to attempt to bring local indigenous products to a larger market without the middleman taking such a huge cut of the price.
I’ve not heard of “Teachers Pay Teachers”. Will have to look it up.
Speaking of fighting windmills, I hope you join in my Quixotic Quest to rid the educational sector of the educational malpractices that are educational standards and standardized testing (which forms the foundation for the privatization, commercialization and monetization of the public education sphere.
Heather,
Public school teachers are more like sharecroppers than small farmers.
Thanks Paul. I am glad you get it. I teach in Wisconsin and the horrid death of our unions has left me cynical. However, CTU, your words, and Chilean students bring me hope. Keep on fighting! I will post more about the Chicago Boys, Carmen Vallejo, and the student movement in Chile. Thanks for your encouragement.
Thanks Duane! Heather, the Chicago School is right across the street from the Lab Schools and they represent diametrically opposed philosophies. If you read Westbrook on the background of Dewey’s ideas, you will see that Dewey’s thought is grounded in the cooperative movement in the late 19th century.
I recommend my colleague’s book, “The Illusion of Free Markets,” Bernard Harcourt.
Excellent article, Paul!
http://www.academia.edu/1836169/Neoliberal_education_and_student_movements_in_Chile_Inequalities_and_malaise
Laura, this is a fantastic article, thanks for sharing! Neoliberalism is the new religion. So may of our young people are growing up thinking that this is the way it is and must be.
Great article, Laura. Thanks!
I think public education is going to have to hire some lawyers to challenge some aspects of privatization. Charters and vouchers should not be used by religious institutions. There should also be some aspect of law that prohibits starving public education while funding charters and/or vouchers. Public education is going to have to organize and fight. We need to get the message out that most charters fail and waste valuable resources. We need to connect public education with democracy while associating privatization to the robber barons of the past. Fight fire with fire.
From the article on neoliberalism posted by Laura above.
“……. The neoliberal paradigm supporters claim that by introducing more privatization, schools will have to improve because they will have to compete for students, while also arguing that parents will have more freedom to choose the best school for their children due to this competition. However, the lower- and middle-class students cannot choose, because the system is private and elitist. This structure was designed during Pinochet’s dictatorship, with the provision of neoliberal intelligentsia imported to Chile by the‘Chicago Boys’. Free-market fundamentalism”….
… at its best?
“Free Flaws”
I have found a fatal flaw
In the market free
Something that I never saw
Parasites in thee
“I have found a flaw” [in free market theory]…I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interests of [business] organizations… were such as that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders”
Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan said that in response to questioning by Representative Henry Waxman, about the behavior that led to the financial meltdown of 2007-2008.
But he could just as easily have been referring to businesses involved in public education.
Of course, the “shareholders” [or is it sharecroppers?] in the case of public education are the general public (teachers,parents and society at large) and the “shares” are the students.
Substitute Raj Chetty/John Friedman/Jonah Rockoff for Alan Greenspan.
Why let a few facts and a bit of good sense get in the way of blind devotion to free market fundamentalism or belief in the pristine infallibility of high-stakes standardized test scores used for Value-Added Modeling?
Didn’t anyone of them—just one?!?!?—take a class in ancient Greek history rather than an endless series of grad courses in the banality of bean counting?
“A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true.” [Demosthenes]
😎
P.S. Am I betraying my all-too-human “psychological bias” to “focus on” outliars [thanks, larry!]?
If so, I’m not changing my tune and trimming my sails to suit edupreneurs and their educrats enablers and edubully enforcers and accountabully underlings.
“I reject that mind-set.” [Michelle Rhee]
Even a broken clock is right two times a day.
😜
Didn’t anyone of them—just one?!?!?—take a class in ancient Greek history rather than an endless series of grad courses in the banality of bean counting?
Gates, Chetty et al are geeks, not Greeks (and Gates never took undergrad classes [or if he did, he skipped most of them], to say nothing of graduate classes)
These folks wouldn’t know Plato from Play-doh and undoubtedly believe that Western Civilization started with the invention of the PC.
You sure seem to know your Greek, though.
You quote some very interesting stuff.
For example, before seeing one of your posts, I was not familiar with the original Aristotle “Those that know, do. Those that understand, teach”, just the ignorant perversion “Those who can do, those who can’t, teach”.
With regard to “A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true.” [Demosthenes], Nobel Physicist Richard Feynman said something very similar about the scientist:
“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself – and you are the easiest person to fool”
Nothing new under the sun. Those Greeks were way ahead of their time –and certainly way ahead of the geeks in most regards.
If i had to guess I would suspect that some or all of the people named had taken some ancient philosophy classes. I doubt Alan Greenspan took any when he was studying at Julliard, but could you get through an undergraduate program at NYU in that era without philosophy?
Federal policies are aiding and abetting large-scale “transformations” from favored advisors.
Consider USDE’s vision of 21st “teacher education, recruitment, deployment, retention, and compensation” marketed under the really cynical title RESPECT–Recognizing Educational Success, Professional Excellence, and Collaborative Teaching.
RESPECT means you really love pay-for-performance. You adore having no job security. It means you want to to be stack ranked as a “highly effective” or an “effective” teacher in 3 of every 5 years of service. It means you will suck it up if you miss that mark and are sacked. Those ratings of course, are based on student outcomes, the discredited VAM lives on. RESPECT means you can earn bonus pay for working in “hard to staff” schools and subjects. If you like the idea of being a “master” teacher, be prepared to take charge of 150 students in 90 minute class periods.
Every teacher destined to be a professional must agree to longer work days, reduced vacations, more use of technology for “differentiated and personalized learning” in classes with 150 students. Nothing by evidence-based practice will be honored. Unassigned and spare time must be dedicated to recruiting and managing a flow of community resources to the school or district–engaging parents, seeking “partnerships” or grants from corporations and foundations.
The USDE vision of “professionalism” offers a plan for pensions with sacrificial “savings” extracted from older teachers if they survivor this new regime. Those savings would be “reinvested” in higher salaries for others. The 2013 RESPECT report actually recommends a salary ladder based on tiers of teacher service in one position. Each tier of service is defined by: a) an indication of the scope of duties, b) years of service required for a step-wise advancement, and c) annual measures of “effectiveness”
I think this effort is one of many others intended to strip local school boards of significant authority, in addition to union busting and making all public school teachers teachers more at risk of losing their jobs than they already are. The branding of this initiative, and posturing about “elevating the profession” only adds insult to injury…and students will be the losers, not just teachers.
Just as the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) were marketed as “state-led,” the RESPECT project is said to be teacher-led. Perhaps so, if you believe that Teach Plus and The Center for Teacher Quality are also grassroots organizations. Teach Plus has received $9.5 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The Center for Teacher Quality $5.6 million from the Gates’ Foundation. In fact, these two organizations (credited as progenitors of the RESPECT project) have also received funds from 29 long-time corporate and foundation supporters of pay-for-performance.
USDE pays “teacher ambassadors” to push the RESPECT agenda. The ambassadors have a marketing tool kit. It tells them how to pace a meeting structured around a “discussion paper.” That paper has no author or date– but two of four notes refer to a widely circulated “Top Talent” report from McKinsey & Co. on how to make sweeping transformations of the U.S. teaching profession based on McKinsey’s studies of Denmark, Singapore, and South Korea (along with some push surveys from teachers circa 2010-2011). See one of the McKinsey reports at http://mckinseyonsociety.com/closing-the-students-gap/
The most polished marketing tool from USDE is the April 2013 report. It is replete with the preferred rhetorical devices in several McKinsey reports (e.g., recruiting “top talent,” gifted teachers, top performers, and a diagram introduced in that discussion paper early in this campaign). http://www2.ed.gov/documents/respect/blueprint-for-respect.pdf
The 2013 report also chronicles the role of the following organizations as participants in, contributors to, and endorsers of, and referents for the RESPECT project: American Association of School Administrators (AASA), the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), the Council of the Great City Schools (CGCS), the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS), the National Education Association (NEA), and the National School Board Association (NSBA), Microsoft, Pearson, and the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). That list is by now familiar to a lot of people not willing to go along in order to get along.