A superintendent, here using a pseudonym for obvious reasons, is fed up with Arne Duncan.
Duncan, he says, is always blaming someone else, never looking in the mirror.
According to Duncan, our kids are dumb. Their parents spoil them. The kids don’t work hard enough.
Furthermore, our culture stinks: No one takes education seriously, except Duncan, of course.
Everyone else is lying to the children. He is the only one who tells the truth about how stupid our children really are.
We are failing, he loves to remind us, and it is not his fault. It is always someone’s else’s.
The author writes:
President Truman famously kept a sign in the oval office that read, “The buck stops here.” Leadership leads, in large part, by owning the outcomes of its actions both good and bad, and by directly accepting the blame for failures of its oversight.
That’s what leaders do. It isn’t what politicians do. Politicians instead find someone else to blame. Leaders are chiefly concerned about successfully accomplishing the tasks entrusted to them; politicians are chiefly concerned with selling themselves to the public and maintaining their position. Leaders get things done; politicians market their own image, preened to perfection by dancing around challenges that a leader would confront head-on.
Our current US secretary of education, sadly, has shown little capacity to accept blame or take criticism for much of anything, but is a master of deflection. With Arne Duncan, time and again, the buck stops not here, but over there.
When it comes to education in the United States, the problem is, according to Mr. Duncan, “white suburban moms” who think their kids are smarter than they truly are. These silly women just don’t know enough to be as concerned as they ought to be about their kids’ brainpower. The problem, too, is career educators who have spent their careers lying to children and the public by not letting everyone know how dumb kids really are, in a callous and calculated effort to conceal the truth about themselves (i.e., that they, the public schoolteachers of America, are massive failures top to bottom).
The problems in American education can never, ever be traced back to federal policies or any activities in the purview of the Department of Education, if you listen to the man at the top of hat department. Duncan’s hands are clean, as clean as Pontius Pilate’s.
And what exactly is in the purview of Arne Duncan? How about ensuring equality of educational opportunity for children across our vast nation?
Are schools in the United States equitably funded, so as to provide comparable resources and instructional staff of similar wage and quality to all of our children? Nope–schools in the poorest neighborhoods across America are funded at levels far lower than schools in wealthy neighborhoods, and this occurs as a matter of policy, not by chance, providing wealthy schools (the ones that outperform most of the world on tests like PISA, though you rarely hear the administration mention that, as it doesn’t comport with the “all schools are failing” routine) with newer technology, far more well-stocked libraries, much more highly-paid teachers, more comfortable and confidence-inspiring learning environments, and any number of other advantages over their peers in the poorest areas. Yet Mr. Duncan never talks about the serial short-changing of education in poor rural and urban areas, perhaps because he can’t pin that one on parents and teachers.
Arne will always find someone else to blame.
I have known almost every Secretary of Education that has served since the Department was created in 1980-81.
I have never known any who had such a low opinion of our students, our parents, our teachers, and our public schools.
Why does he find it satisfying to knock everyone?
Why not take responsibility for fixing things, instead of demoralizing everyone?
We know he was a basketball player. If he were the coach of a team, would he constantly run down everyone on the team?
What kind of a leader does that?
Here is an idea for Arne, to show how serious he is about education.
Take the high school graduation test in any state. Take a test made up of NAEP 8th grade math questions.
Release your scores.
Please. Show us what smart looks like.
I love the idea of Duncan taking the tests. After all, he went to Harvard, so he should ace them.
Not only did he go to Harvard, but he graduated magna cum laude.
No wonder I don’t think much of Ivy League schools and think they are overrated.
He’d be labelled F, unless he had a chest sheet.
I dunno, Duncan is probably one of those ace test takers that thinks that skill makes him a genius. He would probably pass quite handily. That doesn’t mean he has a lick of sense.
He would have been an amazing basketball coach/leader if he was allowed to manipulate the score after the game. Exactly what he’s planning to do with CCSS scores.
“The gentleman helps others to realize what is good in them; he does not help them to realize what is bad in them. The small man does the opposite.” — Confucius
Thanks for that!
Arne is very Confused.
As much as I detest Dunan’s and Obamas’ policies on education, criticizing then from a point of view similar to that if nearly every other public school teacher I have spoken with, I personally don’t think Arne would fail the test. (Plenty of politicians and other public figures would). That putative failure isn’t why his policies are wrong.
“Criticizing theM”… “Point Of view”
Mea culpa
I tend to agree, Guy. Arne was probably a great test-taker. I was lucky to be one, myself. On the other hand, Arne clearly has a few things to learn (as do we all, and as acknowledged by all of the Nobel Prize winners I’ve met, but as denied by those who feel insecure). Arne is living proof that a single number on a written test can measure competence.
Arne would never do this, everyone would see the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes.
🙂 LOL
Arne’s truely good at his real task: privatization of the cornerstone of our democracy. See this link for Alfie Kohn’s perceptive gaze into the crystal ball from October of 2002 to see just how much Duncan has actually accomplished in furthering this goal:
http://nytechprepper.wordpress.com/2014/02/02/the-500-pound-gorilla/
Take a simple test and use demonstrated proficiencies to show what kids can really do. http://savingstudents-caplee.blogspot.com/2013/12/accountability-with-honor-and-yes-we.html An artificial test is developed for the purpose of keeping a child down. The time is now to develop an assessment that is designed for real learning. and then send it to everyone you know, and many you don’t
Ron: love the Confucius quote!
😃
A more contemporary take on leadership:
“You don’t lead by hitting people over the head — that’s assault, not leadership.” [Dwight D. Eisenhower]
But it does have the advantage of deflecting attention away from your own shortcomings. Or it does if people buy into it.
Fortunately for most of us, fewer and fewer people are buying the eduproducts the Secretary of Education is pushing.
With all due respect for the owner of this blog, I have a better test in mind for Mr. Duncan.
Let him take up his own speech of April 30, 2013 to the American Educational Research Association, “Choosing the Right Battles: Remarks and a Conversation.”
Link: http://www.ed.gov/news/speeches/choosing-right-battles-remarks-and-conversation
Let him defend his own words by explaining his three positions on high-stakes standardized tests—he is somewhat for them, somewhat against them, somewhat for/somewhat against them—in a one-on-one discussion with someone far beneath him, a teacher. Ok, I’ll make it easy: Dr. Mercedes Schneider. And while he’s at it, he should be able to defend the use of the scores generated by such tests in what he terms accountability for teachers (VAM), and for the labeling, sorting and ranking of students, schools and school districts.
Last but certainly not least, he should be able to convince Dr. Schneider—or at least the rest of us—that his citation of Campbell’s Law and the pernicious efforts it predicts can’t be applied with full force to his own actions as Secretary of Education.
Of course, he would only agree if she keeps it on his level: no mentioning standard deviations or the limitations and cautions associated with the sampling of expansive domains of knowledge or modified Angoff method or cut scores or bell curves or the weight that should be given to in-school and out-of-school influences on test scores and the like.
Simple, rheeally. Or to put it in his terms: let Dr. Schneider bring a basketball and try to shoot hoops with him in public. That’ll larn the varmint!
😎
Arne Dumkopf was never a teacher and knows little to nothing about how/what students should learn. His mother–an Obama crony from Chicago–ran an afterschool tutoring program. Arnie was a college basketball player who, unable to make the NBA, played in Europe. Another in a long line of substandard Presidential appointments. “Heck of a job, Dumkopf!”
He went to Australia to play pro basketball.
This is part of the agenda of privatization… no sense reforming and privatizing something that already works.
This happens a lot.
For an example of how truly insane the right-wing,
privatizers’ attack on unionized teachers and
traditional public schools is, check out Chris Christie’s
New Jersey.
Now, what would you think of a new owner / general
manager of an NFL team who—immediately after that
team won the Super Bowl—did not praise the team,
but instead publicly said:
— that the season & Super Bowl victory was “irrelevant”
— that the players suck, and are part of “a wretched system”;
and
— the most or all of the winning players need to be replacedl
all the while the new owner or general manager is doing and saying all this just so he adheres to some sinister agenda that his masters demand he follow?
A loaded question, I know, but bear with me.
Well, a couple years back, New Jersey—with a
significantly high-poverty population—scored
Number One out of all fifty states in academic
achievement. Amazing!
However, the “players” were—and are—UNIONIZED
public school teachers, and the privatizers’ playbook
mandates that no good word must ever be spoken of
them.
Goebells himself said Rule 1 of propaganda: “never
say anything remotely complimentary about ‘your enemy”.
Now check this out: Chris Christie’s newly-appointed
New Jersey Ed. Commissioner Bret Schundler said
that New Jersey’s No. 1 NAEP ranking—out of
all fifty states—was irrelevant and meaningless,
that it should be ignored, and that the
teachers were actually ‘wretched’.
He had to; “No sense reforming something that already works.”
It’s true, folks:
http://blog.nj.com/njv_bob_braun/2010/05/us_education_tests_ranks_nj_at.html
As you read what’s below… New Jersey was NUMBER ONE in the NAEP rankings out of all fifty states… NUMBER ONE!!!!!
——————-
“While New Jersey’s education officials might be expected to embrace good news, Schundler’s spokesman, Alan Guenther, dismissed the results as ‘irrelevant.’’
“Guenther lumped all of public education together as one ‘wretched system’ that fails students. In an e-mailed response, he wrote:
” ‘ The NAEP rankings are irrelevant. We should not take solace in the fact that we score well in a wretched system that fails to adequately teach such a high percentage of children.’
“Not everyone agrees, of course. The assessment program is a widely regarded measure of educational progress and, in the past, critics of New Jersey public schools used a poor showing as the sort of bad news that was good news to reformers.”
———————————————–
Don’t you see? A decade-and-a-half earlier, when New Jersey had a low NAEP ranking, the reformers cited this as “proof” that the system was failing, and needed reforming.
Now, that New Jersey’s No. 1 in NAEP rankings… well, now the same NAEP rankings are irrelevant and meaningless..
Here’s another link:
http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2010/05/if-you-can-hide-facts-that-dont-fit.html
——————————————
“In the case of the latter reform strategy of declaring the facts irrelevant, New Jersey’s (and the Business Roundtable’s) Education Commissioner, Bret Schundler, provides a prime example. Because the reality does not fit the ‘terrible teacher’ narrative that Governor Christie has adopted, two days ago Schundler denounced New Jersey Public Schools as a ‘wretched system’ and the state’s #1 national ranking on the NAEP in both 4th and 8th grade reading and math as ‘irrelevant.’
“Facts don’t fit the ideology? Just declare them meaningless.”
Here’s a great COMMENT below the first article / link above:
http://blog.nj.com/njv_bob_braun/2010/05/us_education_tests_ranks_nj_at.html
“This is so pathetic it verges on comedy.
“Schundler and Christie have been pushing merit pay,
yet they want to throw out NJ test scores???!!!
“These men are not interested in reform.
They are interested in destruction.
“They want accountability and call NJ’s high performance irrelevant. HOW DARE HE SAY THAT? It is an outrage.
“NJ’s teachers have succeeded in turning NJ into one of the highest performing education systems in the USA.
“We have a high achieving Education system now.
“Shame on us If we allow these men to succeed.
“Shame on us for voting Christie in.
“Shame on us for sitting by as he ruins education in NJ.
“Let Mr. Shundler go to a few schools and face the students. Mr. Shundler, tell our children to thier faces that the work they have done is irrelevant.
“Mr. Shundler and Governor Christie do not want fiscal responsibility.
“They do not want accountability.
“THEY WANT PRIVATIZATION AND DEREGULATION.
“It does not matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican, what they are doing is wrong, and you are being misled if you believe them.
“CHRISTIE IS A LIAR!
“Don’t let them end public education in NJ.”
Duncan is talking about HIMSELF. He’s the one who is spoiled, like a rotten banana. Arne is a third string basketball player. Bet someone got him that basketball “job”!
It would be interesting to see him be a substutute teacher for a week in a low income neighborhood middle or high school.
In her books and this blog, Diane has given all of us the information to refute the narrative that Mr. Duncan and his ilk put forth. We can help expose these educational carpetbaggers.
Whether it is through emails to those in an elected position (from school board to Washington) or to a local Letter to the Editor, offering to lead a chat with fellow church/civic group members, simply discussing this with our adult children (for those of us labeled “seasoned”), or joining up with a grassroots group for action, we can all push back.
As with any carpetbagger, this current crop must be laughed at, shamed, and run out of education.
I too am frustrated with Mr. Duncan and have expressed that in blogs and other media outlets. Having said that, he is what he is— a hapless administrator who is in way over his head—he was like that in Chicago also. I feel the best strategy moving forward are all the initiatives that this blog site as presented and the ensuring conversations. I understand that Mr. Duncan has a lot of power and doing a lot of damage, putting aside having the President in his basketball pocket, I feel it is more productive to just ignore him.
Arne Duncan NEEDS to go back to school and learn a few facts—I volunteer. Send him to my house and I’ll teach him one on one. In fact, I won’t let him go home until he proves he’s learning what I teach him.
For instance:
In 2003, 29% of adults read at the basic prose level; 44% at an Intermediate prose level and 13% at the proficient level.
Only 14% of American adults read below basic.
If those numbers are similar to 2013, that means 10.6 million adults are probably functionally illiterate leaving 254.4 million adults reading at basic or higher.
116.6 million US adults read at an intermediate prose level and 34.45 million at at the highest prose level.
Those numbers reveal that the majority of parents and their children are learning what teachers teach and keeping up.
But how do we discover who the parents and children are who aren’t learning at the same pace and why?
In a nationwide study of American kindergarten children, 36% of parents in the lowest-income quintile read to their children on a daily basis, compared with 62% of parents from the highest-income quintile (Coley, 2002).
Children from low-SES environments acquire language skills more slowly, exhibit delayed letter recognition and phonological awareness, and are at risk for reading difficulties (Aikens & Barbarin, 2008).
Students from low-SES schools entered high school 3.3 grade levels behind students from higher SES schools. In addition, students from the low-SES groups learned less over 4 years than children from higher SES groups, graduating 4.3 grade levels behind those of higher SES groups (Palardy, 2008).
In 2007, the high school dropout rate among persons 16- 24 years old was highest in low-income families (16.7%) as compared to high-income families (3.2%) (National Center for Education Statistics, 2008).
Children from lower SES households are about twice as likely as those from high-SES households to display learning-related behavior problems. A mother’s SES was also related to her child’s inattention, disinterest, and lack of cooperation in school (Morgan et al., 2009).
———————-
Many factors were found to predict at-risk status that were independent of the student’s
sex, race-ethnicity, and socioeconomic background. Controlling for basic demographic
characteristics, the following groups of students were found to be more likely to have poor basic skills in the eighth grade and to have dropped out between the 8th and the 10th grades:
● Students from single-parent families, students who were overage for their peer group, or students who had frequently changed schools; eighth-grade students whose parents were not actively involved in the student’s school, students whose parents never talked to them about school-related matters, or students whose parents held low expectations for their child’s future educational attainment;
● Students who repeated an earlier grade, students who had histories of poor grades in
mathematics and English, or students who did little homework;
● Eighth-graders who often came to school unprepared for classwork, students who
frequently cut class, or students who were otherwise frequently tardy or absent from
school;
● Eighth-graders who teachers thought were passive, frequently disruptive, inattentive, or students who teachers thought were underachievers; and students from urban schools or from schools with large minority populations.
awesome post, Lloyd!
Fantastic case building, Lloyd! You are a great resource.
Mercedes has a wonderful post mining the thoughts of TFA wanabees drawn mostly from the top tier universities. There is an obvious condescension to those of us with less stellar academic credentials. The world view expressed by many of them does quite a bit to explain Duncan’s attitude. After all the Overlords cannot possibly be wrong.
All I know is that Arne has one heck of a jump shot! He’s a very good dribbler too. Let’s focus on what’s important, people. If you have any doubt as to his credentials, just look at his old B-Ball videos on YouTube. They man had some sick skills! Word!
Ha! Remember “Heckofajob Brownie?” Sadly, I think Arne is his equal.
The corporate overlords have made it their top mission to destroy public education through privatization, and both political parties will do all they can to wreck it. Even the optimistic, unintellectual teachers in my school are starting to figure it out. The more intellectual (cynical and pessimistic) ones (like myself) have seen this coming for five years at least. Some people just don’t want to believe it. They can’t wrap their heads around it. They haven’t studied history. Logic has nothing to do with it. Granted, it is unprecedented. I have never read about this in world history. It’s going to be a circus freak show! This is how public education ends in America. I don’t see a good outcome.
A pathetic excuse for a leader, right up there with George W. Bush.
And Barack Obama.
I am always amazed by how really bright students are. The problem isn’t native ability, it’s the cuts and crowded rooms that allow that native ability to be supressed rather than shine. And whose fault is that? Seems to me it would fall on the leaders shoulders, particulary a leader that wants to take public money and give it to private corp.
I asked Arne in August to take the tests and publish his scores. Still waiting for a response. (Crickets…crickets…crickets..)
http://teacherbiz.wordpress.com/2013/08/22/arne-duncan-you-take-the-tests-and-publish-your-scores/
I love the article by the anonymous superintendent. He hit the nail on the head. I really find it despicable that the so called “leader’ of education in America continually bashes the very people and organizations he should be praising to lift morale. Barak Obama’s administration taught me to have absolutely no faith in our government. The reformers have used fear and intimidation as their tools to suppress any criticism of their worthless agenda. I saw some critical posts below the article about his anonymity. I definitely believe he should stay anonymous. I’m sure the posts were from Gates’ people.
I love this blog and am so grateful for all Diane has done to provide a forum for people to share ideas and information. I believe these conversations are a start but like many people have said in various posts – the time has come for us to speak up about the topics we feel passionate about. We need to flood the politicians we elected with letters/ emails to counteract corporate takeovers and reform. We also need to help these corporations know that they are demoralizing the teaching profession. I first came to this blog after my daughter’s horrendous experience with Teach for America. Since then I have been writing letters to companies who donate huge amounts of money to TFA. I also continue to write to my Congressmen and Mr. Duncan not just about TFA but about all the issues I feel strongly about – teacher training, testing, class size, vouchers, narrow curriculum rather than one rich in literature, problem solving, the arts….It takes determination but if we keep writing to them our voices will be heard. Money talks and if enough of their consumers are upset, they will start to listen. I’m pasting the names of some of the corporate sponsors of TFA as a place to start if people are interested.Midterm elections are coming up – your votes are important so if there is a time they will listen this is it. As teachers we are the experts and it is time we stand up for what we believe in and share our expertise.
Anonymous Robertson Foundation
Laura and John Arnold Foundation Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock
The Eli & Edythe Broad Foundation The Walton Family Foundation
Sue and Steve Mandel
$1 million – $4,999,999
Anonymous (2) Martha and Bruce Karsh
The Anschutz Foundation Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation
Arizona State University Mr. and Mrs. Michael Keiser Donor Advised Fund
Bank of America W. K. Kellogg Foundation
Barclays Kern Family Foundation
Carnegie Corporation of New York John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Cisco The Lenfest Foundation
Comcast NBCUniversal Lilly Endowment, Inc.
The Dalio Family Foundation, Inc. Lowe’s
The Feroz & Erica Dewan Foundation The Medtronic Foundation
The Dream Fund at UCLA Michigan Education Excellence Foundation
Susan and Thomas Dunn The Mind Trust
Emerson Collective Project LIFT
The Ewing Halsell Foundation Rainwater Charitable Foundation
Fidelity Investments The Rhode Island Foundation
Mary and Paul Finnegan Robert M. Hearin Foundation
Doris & Donald Fisher Fund Mr. T. Denny Sanford
Foundation For The Carolinas Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation
Thomas F. and Julie D. Frist State Farmᆴ
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation The UCLA Foundation
Glenview Capital Visa, Inc.
Hall Family Foundation Wells Fargo
H-E-B Grocery Company The Whitman-Harsh Family Foundation
Helios Education Foundation Windsong Trust
Tony Hsieh Zell Family Foundation
George Kaiser Family Foundation
Akamai Lotus Bakeries North America
Anonymous (2) Minted LLC
Artio Global Management LLC Parametric Portfolio Associates
AT&T Seventh Generation
The Capital Group Companies Charitable Foundation ShareGift USA
The Coca-Cola Foundation SunTrust Foundation
Coldwater Creek SurveyMonkey
Heitman LLC Williams-Sonoma, Inc.
Hostess Brands
Thanks for the list. It’s not enough to boycott these folks, they need to know exactly why you are choosing to do so. I, too, am a retired teacher and, well, sad.
As retired teachers we can share our knowledge with these people without risking our jobs. We have the time to write and the expertise to share. I feel that I’m retired but still so passionate about making schools the best they can be – our nation’s children deserve it. 🙂
You are right. Teachers who taught for twenty, thirty or forty years or more have a vast array of experience and knowledge and are safe from the dictators that are taking over the public schools from the President of the Untied States on down to any morally corrupt superintendents and other school administrators who are working for the CEOs and billionaires who want to get rid of the public schools.
Just because we are retired doesn’t mean we lost our passion for teaching. I retired in 2005, but I have friends who are still teaching and they keep me up-to-date with the nightmares that are taking place.
What I was being told angered me and now I maintain a Blog about education, teaching and parenting.
Maybe retired public school teachers will organize to support teachers who are still in the classroom under attack by these corrupt crooks. In fact, why not a protest march on Washington D.C. There might be millions of us by now.
Different kinds of minds must work together. Some possibly like gates and Duncan have minds that might not be conducive to understanding of human growth and development . This is not good for education but they might be ok on a structure. Listen to Temple Grandin who not only talks about the autistic mind but it relates to all minds.
Schools must be driven by the kind of mind that understands the differences in minds http://www.ted.com/talks/temple_grandin_the_world_needs_all_kinds_of_minds.html
Secretary Duncan, if you think China is teaching students so much better than the U.S. is, why do U.S. scientists get so many Nobel prizes in science and Chinese scientists have not gotten any?
Since Arne played basketball, imagine if a pro team was run the way he wants education to be run.
Instead of coaches guiding the training and game, all the companies that supply the equipment would.
The ball, jerseys, shorts, shoes, and jock straps would have to be replaced after every basket.
And if the team lost a game, the coach would be fired and the new coach would have to start by buying twice as many balls, jerseys, shorts, shoes, and jock straps–and bulldoze their stadium and build a new one.
Duncan’s boss, Obama, doesn’t take responsibility for anything and certainly has no experience or even a clue about leadership, so why does anyone expect Duncan to exhibit these qualities?