Karen Lewis bravely led the teachers’ strike in Chicago. This was not an action that she or the members of the Chicago Teachers Union took lightly. They deliberated, they debated and in the end, 90% of the members (and 98% of those who voted) supported the strike. Given their near unanimity, no one could make the mealy-mouthed claim that they love teachers but not their union. In Chicago, the home of teacher unionism, the home of AFT Local 1, the union is the teachers, and the teachers are the union.
In this link, Karen Lewis addresses the Chicago City Club. This is a civic organization whose members include the civic, business and political leaders of the city.
Please watch this speech! It is a brilliant dissection of why “reform,” as presently defined, is failing. And it is a clear and realistic description of what students and teachers need to succeed. If you take the time to watch this, it will make your day!
Let us be thankful for Karen Lewis.
A reader, Prof. W., watched and said this:
What a great speech! City Club members are big shot business and political leaders and can be a tough crowd. I got such a kick out of how she answered this question, about 38 minutes in:
“Instead of corporate meddling, would you prefer that corporations sit on the sidelines and not try to help our schools get better?”
Karen said, “I don’t think they should sit on the sidelines. I think they should do what they do when they give money to the Lyric Opera. I don’t believe they go to the Lyric Opera, give money and then go tell the singers how to sing. I don’t believe they do that. So give your money –where’s Andrew Carnegie when you need him?– give your money and walk away, Buddies. Ya know, just leave it alone. When you don’t know something, don’t dilettante your way into it.”
Gotta love her honesty and chutzpah!
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I watched this twice and I sent to many. Why doesn’t our national leadership get this? Why aren’t Dennis and Randi speaking up for teachers, students and parents?
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Do you think it’s possible that Dennis and Randi do not have the ability to lead teachers in an attack against a national movement? It seems to me that they might not, and that’s why national leaders, such as Diane and Karen, are emerging.
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It’s not that alone, Linda. “There’s something rotten in Denmark…” could it have to do with money & job security for the union leadership (to which Dennis, Randi and others may have laid claim)? Why do the same people keep getting into office when, it appears. so many NEA & AFT members are clamoring for change, and were opposed to endorsing Obama without prior qualifications for said endorsement (e.g., demolish Race to the Top, replace Arne Duncan, abandon “standardized” testing)? How did the Karen Lewis leadership evolve? Lots of work–over years–by an opposition caucus within the CTU just as, hopefully, members of the UTF are doing with Unity. What must be done, obviously, is to recruit Karen Lewis (or a worthy clone, if such a fine person is to exist!) for the AFT presidency. Then, search high and low for an equally qualified person (I nominate Fred Klonsky, also of Chicago) to replace Dennis. This is not rocket science.
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Watched the video late last night before going to bed. It gives me hope that one day soon the tide will begin turning back in our favor. Back to where educators are allowed to educate children without interference from outside sources who know nothing about education. Back to a time when big corporations and greedy individuals were not allowed to raid the funding sources for public education under the guise of “reform”. I get a sick feeling knowing that our president continues to allow this agenda to move forward, even as the proof is all around us that this agenda is damaging an entire generation of students who can least afford it. This country will eventually pay the price for this madness. As Bertrand Russell said, ” It is a help towards sanity…to acquire the habit of seeing contemporary events in their historical setting, and of imagining them as they will appear when they are in the past”. I wonder how history will judge our actions.
Thanks to this blog and the community I find here, I will continue to educate children the best way I can, under difficult conditions, as long as I am allowed to. Thanks Karen, Diane, and all of the others on the front lines, who are our voices of sanity in a sea of insanity.
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Thanks for the link, Diane. Lewis is a voice that we desperately need during these dark times. Love the part where she calls out Arne.
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So here’s what Karen Lewis is really saying about Chicago:
“40% of our students are dropping out and we’re full of excuses as to why we can’t be expected to teach the rest some fairly minimal skills of reading and math. So just give us more money and walk away.”
Um, good luck with that.
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If that’s what you got from her speech, you never intended to “hear” anything but what you wanted to hear.
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This is the “no-excuses” mentality Karen pointed out when she described the differences in services provided to advantaged children and disadvantaged students, such as those who’ve experienced turmoil and violence but don’t receive the years of counseling and support needed to be able to work through those traumas. Yet it is expected that the disadvantaged will perform just as well as advantaged students. As Karen said, children attending all public schools in Chicago should have the same kinds of resources available to them as what the selective enrollment schools receive.
People who have strings attached to their donations are not giving altruistic contributions in the best interests of society; they are making investments upon which they are demanding a return. That is not charity and it should not be tax deductible.
Do you donate to the Red Cross and then tell them how to operate? People do not automatically become education experts because they attended school as students, any more than people become medical experts because they have had medical treatment or opera experts just because they listen to music. The policies and practices of any profession should be determined by experts within that field, not out-of-field know-it-alls with deep pockets and political clout.
After 20 years of top-down failed school “reform” experiments directed by political and business leaders in Chicago, it’s time to return education to the educators, parents and communities involved, including a democratically elected school board.
Politicians and business leaders should turn their focus to addressing poverty instead, especially the working poor, such as by requiring corporations to pay livable wages. If you want to talk about “no-excuses”, there is no excuse for billionaires like the Waltons to pay their Wal-Mart employees wages that are so low that they provide their workers with brochures on how to apply for Food Stamps, so they can feed their families. That is one of the reasons why we have such a high rate of child poverty in the wealthiest country on the planet and it’s unconscionable that it’s permitted.
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I loved how she answered questions, I mean, really answered questions. Her honesty and forthrightness in contrast to local politicians is striking. So often when the politicians speak, you have no idea what they said after they finished, which, of course, is the intention. Not so with Karen.
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To think that without DR blog I would not have listened to this speech makes grateful for DR.
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I wish Karen Lewis could have a tête-à-tête with President Obama. Possibly, being a fellow Chicagoan, she could get through to this man about the horribleness of his misguided so called educational policies. One can only hope.
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If Rahm doesn’t talk to her, I wonder if his former boss will. Obama is generally loyal to his friends, perhaps too loyal… They say it is real easy to get isolated from reality in his job.
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I have to say that, while I have had misgivings about IL Governor Pat Quinn, due to what he’s been trying to do with public pensions and the retirement age, I have to give him credit for his involvement in inviting Diane and Karen to the City Club. Makes me wonder if he might not be the best go-between for arranging a meeting with Karen and Obama.
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Wow….she really is one smart and caring woman. Just think what education could be if we could get a group of wise individuals to be in charge….What a team….we can start with Diane, Karen, and Carol Burris. I know there are many others too,( feel free to add to the list). Maybe one day President Obama will wake up and give them a call.
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We need a lot more union leaders to step it up like Karen, not to mention superintendents, governors, state representatives, etc., so they can get underneath the White House skin.
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Can someone help clarify her statements from 41:25-42:50 in response to the question about teacher evaluation? I get her sentiment about not liking test scores as part of evaluations, but does she actually believe that “there is no correlation” between teaching and learning, or that “it is insulting to assume that student outcome has anything to do with input”? Why have school or teachers at all if, as Karen passionately argues, nothing teachers do has any impact on students?
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She is responding to our way of trying to measure that impact. Testing has not shown a correlation. The science is not sophisticated enough to control for all the extraneous variables. Kids have an annoying habit of being influenced in their testing behavior by something other than the teacher the powers that be want to tie that performance to. It is also quite a leap of faith to use test scores as a surrogate for learning.
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