Jonathan Pelto reports on Jeb Bush’s recent visit to Connecticut. While there, he saluted the “reforms” pushed through the legislature by Governor Dannell Malloy, especially his efforts to curb teachers’ tenure and seniority. And he boasted about Florida’s achievement (he didn’t mention the class size reduction initiative, which voters approved and he tried to roll back). And choice, choice, choice!
Funny that no one mentioned that Connecticut is one of the top two or three states in the nation on NAEP, even though it has strong teachers’ unions, seniority and tenure. It is far ahead of Florida. Since when does a state whose students are ABOVE the national average (8th grade math, NAEP) take lessons from one that is well below the national average?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
doing check, lost other comment on other post
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What I really wanted to say was “Screw Jeb Bush”. Haven’t we had enough of the Bush family destroying this country?
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Jeb Bush said choosing schools should be like shopping for milk. Genius. This Republican tactic is all about getting a voucher so that rich people do not have to pay for the expensive private schools that their kids go to. It is about breaking unions so Democrats do not get any support and Republicans stay in power with their 1% backers. It is about lowering taxes. It is about the kids, the rich kids that is. The poor kids stay behind in the underfunded public school while the rich ones take their voucher from the public funds and add their own money so their kids do not have to go to public school. It is about lowering the tax burden on wealthy families so they do not have to pay for the general public to go to school. But America is so easily swayed by the propaganda war. They take everything at face value and can’t imagine that maybe it isn’t about the kids, maybe it is about the rich. It is amazing that the public gets angry at teachers salaries, but couldn’t get upset at the 1% which was the topic of discussion before the wealthy redirected people’s anger toward education. People like Jeb Bush just keep repeating the same lies which have “truthiness”. They only sound true. Of course with the death of critical thinking in Republican controlled schools (I.E. Texas) we can only expect more of this. It is a self sustaining reaction.
Thank God for Diane Ravitch. Without her the truth wouldn’t have any voice.
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/08/jeb-bush-choosing-schools-should-be-like-shopping-for-milk.php
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Yes, Thankfully we have Diane Ravitch giving us truth.
Jeb bush and Michelle Rhee need to stop talking about what they don’t know.
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No. That isn’t what is happening. There is no voucher system in which rich people are taking vouchers instead of paying for public schools. What is in fact happening is that rich people are still paying for public schools anyway because nobody escapes property taxes, and regardless of the then already paid-for option of sending their children to public schools, rich people instead send their children to private schools despite the added expense. It is poor people and most working class people who are not sending their children to private schools because most people who are not rich can not, in addition to the taxes they must pay which fund public schools, still afford private schools anyway.
If it were there was a voucher system which presently does not exist, it might make it possible for poor people to make the choices rich people can already afford to make anyway. Rich people are not presently ripping off a voucher system at the expense of poor people – that isn’t happening and that isn’t at all the reason why they can afford private schools when poor people can not.
Furthermore, most private schools themselves allow for discounts on tuition for families with lower incomes than those of wealthier families and this is how many working class families who are otherwise willing to impoverish themselves, are able to swing sending their children to private schools and this difference in what one family might pay versus what another pays is paid for by wealthier families in higher tuition costs demanded from and paid for by wealthier people. If there were a publicly funded voucher system and poor families could offer private schools at least something in the way of tuition, they might actually have the options people of greater means are now taking advantage of.
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It’s not just about destroying public sector unions —
It’s about destroying public sector everything.
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Sure is where I’m at.
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We don’t want a Friedmanite, Chilean nightmare in the United States.
Jeb Bush and his ilk in both political parties need to get out of politics and leave our institutions alone.
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When Republicans begin praising Democrats on educational “reforms”, one should be afraid, VERY afraid!
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