I was interviewed by Jake Silverstein of the Texas Monthly and we talked
about testing, accountability, poverty, and what’s happening today. It is a very good interview, I think. He asked interesting questions.
Funny side note: my birth name was Silverstein but my parents
changed it to Silvers by the time I was in kindergarten. I don’t
think Jake and I are related because Silverstein was not my real family
name either. My grandfather had a different name, the story goes,
when he came from Europe as a young boy in 1858, but then he worked for a grocer in Georgia named Silverstein and took his name. Sounds crazy, but
that’s the story we were told by my father. Another story that I heard, which was confirmed by surviving family members, is that my grandfather ran the commissary on Henry Ford’s plantation in Georgia. But when Mr. Ford found out that he had a Jew on the property, he kicked my grandfather out. Then he opened a kosher butcher shop in the Savannah central market (who knew there were enough Jews in Savannah to support a kosher butcher shop?). Neither the shop nor the old market exists anymore. I never met my grandfather; he died long before I was born. But I digress.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I think the digression points to a compelling memoir….
My great grandfather was a traveling salesmen who sold clothing from NYC in the South. There were many Jews who owned dry goods/ clothing stores in the South and my great grandfather sold to them among others. When my father went to Air Force officer training in Alabama in the early 1960s, my great-grandfather knew the Jewish community there. My mother told me of her shock in seeing the full flowering of Jim Crow segregation and that she would drink from colored water fountains in Alabama or Orlando, Florida, where they were eventually stationed in protest. Thankfully, military bases were not subject to Jim Crow laws due civil rights activism that led Truman to desegregate the military in 1948. I agree with wgersen that your “digression points to a compelling memoir,” as a Jewish girl/women growing up in segregated Houston.
In the 30s and 40s, due to anti-semitism, a lot of American Jews changed their names. My grandfather, who was born in America, changed his last name then from “Israel” to the first name of the man who was Secretary of State at the time, Cordell Hull. I completely understand why, but that always struck me as an odd choice. I wonder if any men have changed their last names to Hillary.
Excellent interview by Jake Silverstein. One of the many great quotes from the interview by Diane: “DR: Right. They’re being blamed for economic changes that other people should take responsibility for. And they’re saying, “Oh, it’s the schools’ fault that we had to outsource the auto industry. It’s the schools’ fault that Apple decided to ship all its manufacturing to China.” Why? Because they’re paying people $17 a day there. Not because they can’t find enough people here to do the work. They can’t find wage slaves here who will sleep in a dormitory and be available 24/7. That’s true. American workers expect to get a decent living wage.”
Thanks Diane for your courage and persistence. One woman against the billionaires boys’ club (clubs?).
Joe, I like the odds.
Who knew there were Jews in Dillon, SC, until Bernanke. Years ago a dinner party guest at my house in Louisville, KY, told then Gov. John Y Brown & Phyllis George: “What Louisville needs is a good Jewish deli!” Instead of the pompous stuff the other guests stood up and said. Even me who said better public schools. Go Diane, you are on a roll. XO
Alan Schafer the man who created South of the Border, Dillon’s most famous landmark, was Jewish.
Another good exchange between Diane Ravitch (DR) and Jake Siverstein (JS):
JS: Now, the reformists would say the way to deal with that is to go into the schools and have the adults in the classroom be the sort-of first line of attack for those kids who don’t have advantages at home. If we can fix what’s happening in the classroom—
DR: That sure is a lot cheaper than doing something about income inequality! You have this dramatic maldistribution of income, and the reformers are saying that the answer is to send in different teachers?? Excuse me, but I’m not that stupid. It’s not a school problem. It’s a society problem. I’m not a socialist. I’m not a communist. I’m a Texan. I’m an American, and I think it’s un-American to have this kind of obscene wealth concentrated at the top while other people are struggling to have a roof over the head. That’s not my America. That’s not the Texas I grew up in.
Che bellezza!
Anybody interested in the Jewish history in Georgia might want to take a look at “Chant of Ages; Cry of Cotton”, just out by my longtime teaching hero Louis Schmier, recently retired professor of history at Valdosta State University: http://carefullteaching.com/
I don’t have a Jewish story that fits here, but I do have a Texas story. One of the men who works out in my gym (a business man who thinks there should be a dollar amount figured out by legislatures that travels with each kid that they can spend on schooling, and that looking at the NC education budget he did not think the cuts were bad and that as a business man efficiency is always best. . .you get the picture). Anyway, one time I asked him about his daughter and he said she had majored in Childhood Development at a NC university and then moved to Texas because she fell in love. So she decided to become a teacher and signed up to get certified with I-Teach. And she found a job. And then (and this is the part that really let me see that he was out of touch) she won teacher of the year for all of Texas in her first year!!! Well, of course, what he meant was she won teacher of the year for Texas with I-Teach (those who had been trained). And they flew down and took her flowers and surprised her at the ceremony.
I told him how great that was! But I was thinking to myself. . .that can’t be right. And it just showed me what a jigsaw puzzle of an education scene we have. . . that people see what they want to see for their own purposes. I was not about to burst his bubble (it was not the context or appropriate setting to dive into maintaining on honest view of public schools and all that goes along with them), but it gave me a snapshot of what a certain mindset can lead a person to believe.
Powerful, powerful interview – informative without inciting hate mongering.
Come on Diane, everyone knows Savanah was once a very major American port. It had a significant Jewish population, certainly large enough to support a few Kosher butchers.
Yes, it was a very good interview!
This thread has some excellent comments. I was struck by the following in the interview:
In his sixth question Jake Silverstein ends a good question with “Why should they put their faith in you, as opposed to the other guys?”
Diane’s answer begins with “I’m not asking anybody to put their faith in me. I’m asking them to put their faith in the idea of a democratic society.”
Her answer will be opaque and inexplicable to edufrauds and their followers who are obsessed with alleged edumiracles supposedly obtained by clever and cheap tricks, and shamelessly hyped to the point of absurdity. Consider but the following contrast. If you go to Dr. Steve Perry’s website, in big bold letters he proclaims himself “America’s Most Trusted Educator.” The owner of this website? “Diane Ravitch’s Blog A site to discuss better education for all.”
If you’re in the Ed Biz, the first website is effective in getting you a goodly share of $tudent $ucce$$. If you are in the Democracy Biz, the second will stir you to renew the struggle for a genuine and enriched learning experience for all.
It depends on what you hold most dear: “Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.” [Albert Einstein]
🙂
Diane does do a good job of not making this about her.
I need to remember to be that way.