Funny, I kept thinking about this famous speech of student leader Mario Savio, who led the Berkeley student protests in the 1960s. And a reader read my mind after reading Liz Rosenberg’s post where she explained that she and her partner would not look at their child’s test scores. They don’t care. They don’t matter. They don’t care if their child has higher or lower scores than children of the same age in Hong Kong or France. Stop the machine.
This reader takes me back 50 years with this comment:
“As a retired educator with 30+ years service in Special Education, I can only say BRAVO to Liz Rosenberg, her partner and all the parents and educators who have joined in the struggle to turn back the tide of what has become the dominant paradigm for “Educational Reform”. Diane has provided a critical mechanism for cross-country communication by those who oppose these so-called reforms, Reading Liz Rosenberg’s communication, I am drawn back some 50 years to the words of Mario Savio one of the spokespeople for the Berkeley Free Speech Movement:
““There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious—makes you so sick at heart—that you can’t take part. You can’t even passively take part. And you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop. And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all.”
We are at that moment that Mario Savio spoke about. I take heart from those who resist the machine of “Educational reform”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Bravo, Diane! I’ve always found these iconic words of Mario Savio to be among the most inspirational ever spoken. This quote has always had great meaning for so many of us over the past 50 years.
However, now, in the midst of the fight for public education, these words take on more meaning than ever.
Thank you for these very timely and inspiring words. What a good way to start my day!
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The incredibly inspiring video of that speech is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spnHJMBOhlA go watch!
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qq8zFLIftGk
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Incredible courage. Thanks Robert.
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Thanks for reprinting my post re Mario Savio. Let’s not forget that we have a usable past from which to draw upon;it is appropriate yo use what we learned ‘yesterday’ to guide us and give us strength today.
One final thought. We can publish all the research in the world that supports us; but research alone will not stop the “levers of the machine”; the machine will not stop in the face of the evidence, though evidence is required. What will stop the machine,its operating power brokers and their minions is direct participatory democratic action by organized communities. What might happen if growing groups of parents ‘opt out’ AND turn their attentions to organizing their cohorts for changing the membership of school boards (committees) and local officialdom? What might happen if communities coordinated their efforts?
The stakes of losing have dire consequences that effect kids, parents, education workers, schools and communities.. An alliance of these groups into a veritable front populaire can make the machine stop. “If not now, when”?
Best.
john
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As usual, Diane, you find the perfect words and thoughts for the moment. Mario’s thick, rich description captures precisely what I’m feeling (and I’m sure many others as well). Thanks, again!
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Savio’s comments brought tears to my eyes. I have gone into a deep depression since school started this year, which is when we learned about CCSS. I feel as though I am complicit in child abuse with CCSS and cannot reconcile the divide between my own morals and Common Core one size fits all. I have one year left until I can retire, but I am not convinced I will be able to hang in there. Once out of this grim system, I plan to become as vocal and agitating as possible. I work with the students whom would be deemed Title One and low income, or homeless. Leaving them will break my heart, but I cannot as Savio says even “passively take part”.
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Thank you, Diane! 🙂
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Mario Savio’s words are some of the most powerful I have ever read. I take them to heart. We must all throw our angst on the destructive “machine” and stop it cold. Our students deserve nothing less.
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Unfortunately, the Koch brothers and friends understand that quote, too. They are defunding the US Government “machines” that provides programs which help people (not business). Education is just one of them.
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Hear, hear!
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Savio’s words so totally embody how I am feeling as a 30 year educator. And part of me wants to say just how did we get to such a place? The machine is going to have to be taken apart piece by piece.
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What the “Education Reform” machine does to students and teachers. From “Charlie Chaplin’s “Modern Times”
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Thank you all.
For me, the timing could not be more perfect. Courage! Freedom!
As I transition from teaching visual art to being a day to day substitue charged with delivering a scripted curriculm, I am horrified by what the children are enduring everyday. It is a travesty, as most here already know.
Today, 9/11, I opened up a writing project in fourth grade using the word “freedom”. I wanted the students to approach the work at hand in the manner they deemed appropriate. A boy immediately threw his hand up and asked “What is freedom”?
Question of the day, little man.
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The question that keeps coming up for me is this: if a student has to be two standard deviations below the mean to qualify for Special Education Services, what happens to students who are at an 85 IQ, but are performing at an 85, thus not receiving any services. Can a student with an 85 IQ cognitively pass the standardized tests?? I would argue that they cannot. And, if they cannot, then what?? We have a criteria that they are cognitively unable to match. Essentially, children with a measurable IQ of below 100 are being denied a diploma. Doesn’t this then become a civil rights issue? You can’t even get a job at Burger King now without a diploma, but we have a national criteria that is prohibiting some children from obtaining a free and fair education. It seems as though CCSS is in violation of other Federal Laws. What is the cognitive range required to pass the SBA? If the answer to that question, exceeds an IQ of 85-100 range then we have denied access to a diploma to a substantial range of children in our population.
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