Conservatives are supposed to conserve. however, these days conservatives are intent on smashing their community’s public schools and substituting a market-based system. this is Wall Street, not Main Street.
From a parent activist in Indiana:
“When it comes to public education, Indiana Republicans have been good at one thing – the deception of their own base of voters.
“Republicans lawmakers found themselves torn this year between traditional Hoosier conservatives and corporate sponsors who finance their campaigns. Conservative voters protested Federal overreach in education. Demanding Indiana maintain local decision-making for their schools, Hoosiers asked lawmakers to abandon the Common Core State Standards. However, the corporate ownership of the Common Core is pervasive.
“Republicans needed to quell conservative voter outrage at a Federal initiative taking away local control and costing taxpayers millions in compliance. Yet, they also needed to appease the big businesses that not only funded the Common Core, but funded their election campaigns as well. What were Indiana Republicans to do?
“Deceive us Hoosier Conservatives.
“Remaining loyal to their corporate sponsors, Republicans devised a scheme – rebrand the Common Core State Standards as the new Indiana College and Career Ready Standards. Confident they had cornered the voting booth, they stuck a new sticker over the Common Core and sold us out.
“State Republicans continue to deceive the public with their education platform of “supporting high state-based standards”. In fact, much of the Republican platform on education is written in deceptive terminology.
“The ancient Chinese general, Sun Tzu, said, “All warfare is based on deception.” The Republican Platform on education is nothing more than a declaration of war on our public schools. Unfortunately, Hoosier students are their casualties.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
And the next blow to public education comes this January when the GOP intends to put a bill on the floor of the General Assembly that lifts all restrictions for school vouchers. Vouchers for anyone and everyone. So good bye public education. They will not stop until they privatize the entire system. This is very scary.
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The OLIGARCHY wants to own us.
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Missouri’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) has done the exact same thing, renaming the Common Core the Missouri Learning Standards. These are a hybrid of the old Grade and Course Level Expectations and the Common Core, but lean far more toward Common Core, because we are still committed to taking the Smarter Balanced assessments this spring. What a waste, on so many levels. The students, teachers, and schools pay in the end.
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Please stop beating up on Republicans!
To be far more efficient (because beating up takes a lot of energy), you must lump them together with Democrats and beat them all up. They have acted in concert together to destroy teachers, labor rights, the public commons, fair taxation, single payer healthcare, and, oh, what’s the point, the list is too long for this blog. I don’t have time.
The vast majority of folks on both sides of the aisles are rotten and depraved.
What will it really take?
Bernie Sanders is one of few examples of people who are decent.
Mitch McConnell is dangerous, dangerous, dangerous. I wish he would accidentally drop a toaster into his bathtub . . . . . .
(Sizzle).
It will only be the people waking up and taking notice. . . .. It is shocking to see even educated people right here in NY not really understand what Bob Astorino is really about and what Cuomo is really about. They all rely on the most popular, slick, lowest common denominator (like “you breathe and you have a pulse”) style media to get their information, if they ever get informed.
It’s so sad, but until the very big 98% majority “strong and strapping” victims in this country realize they are actually stronger than the “skinny” bullies who get into office, they will continue to let the puny little technocratic geeky bullies beat the pulp out of their body-builder muscles. They will therefore continue to vote against their interests and be oppressed by those who promised to help them. They will continue to allow the wealthy to become wealthier and will slip out of the middle class and into poverty, uncertainty, hopelessness, and worst of all, ignorance.
The brain is mightier than the bicep . . . . . That’s the secret, folks.
Voice yourself always, vote, and be vigilante. The three Vs.
Viva la VVV . . . . . . .
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In Ohio, voters should vote Democratic. Former Democratic
Gov. Strickland co-chairs Democrats for Public Education. And, Ohio has Sen. Sherrod Brown, at the national level.
Ohio’s Plunderbund website posted an article on Oct. 30, 2014 titled, “The Republican Teacher No Longer Exists (and, hasn’t for years)”,
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same in NC.
Democrats now in NC. Then we can figure out what went wrong in the party and to push back at the DOE and Arne Duncan. But first, ALEC has to go.
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Yes, Linda, Sherrod’s not such a bad guy. Dennis Kucinich likes him, and his record is not bad, after having reviewed it.
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Robert, I think the point you make is that the oligarch is winning. Whichever party controls the power, Indiana is solid Republican, is in bed with the oligarchy. In NYC, you have a different story.
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An oligarch is in oligarch, blue or red. . . It is not the color or label; it is the behavior and motivation and content of character, nothing more.
Bill DeBlasio is better than what we had, but he is NOT a progressive by any means. Yes, he did get that $41 million dollar award to the 5 men accused of rape in Central Park, but he does not do anything against charters, Wall Street, and does almost nothing for ATRs falsely accused of actions that has them demoted, does nothing about APPR, does nothing to reduce class size.
He is Mayor Bill DeBlah-Blah, and he really wanted to have this job more than make a difference once getting it. Carmen Farina is a far better chancellor than Bloomie’s folks, but she is indifferent to teachers and administrators facing enormous poverty-ridden populations and she does not speak out against the federal government enough.
Farina does not care about teachers who have had their civil rights blatantly violated.
In NYC, we have gone from a Ford Pinto (Bloomberg and his Cathie Black mentality) to a Chevy Impala (slick and fast, powerful and smooth, and with no long term, substantive strength or quality).
Farina also does nothing to principals who have an acute track record of low scores on the school environment surveys.
I suppose going from a 1 to a 2 is better than staying at a 1, but I was aiming for a 9 or 10.
DeBlah-Blah is a dud, a tire with no inflation, a balloon with its helium lost . . . . .
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Robert, nationally both parties are destroying education. In Indiana, the destruction is coming from the Republican party, not true conservatives. Our state superintendent, Glenda Ritz, changed her political affiliation to Democrat just so she could run in 2012. In Indiana, a vote from a public educator for a Republican candidate is like shooting yourself in the foot (or face). However, if I were in other states, like New York, there is not way I would vote for the Democratic ticket. Ultimately, everyone needs to ascertain for themselves who the supporters of public education are, regardless of party.
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Perfectly put, Monsieur Bordeaux . . . . Do you speak French?
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Un peu, Monsieur Rendo, un peu. It’s a just a family name; I’m barely French.
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The deception is exactly what I remain worried about in NC. I don’t think ALEC was mentioned enough in this election.
People need to know about ALEC. Republicans who are members of ALEC are not thinking about the people who elected them.
But many folks think they could just never vote for a Democrat because they might go to hell for it or something.
think again. I’m thinking hell hath no fury like that of an elected ALEC member.
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Absolutely! You said it “deception” is right! The constant mantra of college and career readiness Meanwhile, just more of the same of dismantling the local public schools and forcing teachers out. The local administration overwhelmed the classes by mainstream of special needs students and by the lack of any normal rules for discipline and it has created an atmosphere of chaos designed to run the local public schools ripe candidate for state takeover and charter schools.
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In case you missed it (and I’m sure this is no surprise), ALEC named Indiana schools’ policies as the best in the nation: http://www.indystar.com/story/behind-closed-doors/2014/10/29/conservative-alec-names-indianas-education-policy-best-in-nation/18075837/.… Can StudentsFirst’s accolades be far behind?
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http://truthabouteducation.wordpress.com/2013/01/17/communist-funding-fl-charter-schools/
I’m wondering why this didn’t come up during the Florida gubantorial debates. No sir, time was given to much more important information. Now a group of Chinese nationals is going to visiting my school. I doubt if the students at school have as much to benefit as the people who are on the board of Enterprise Florida. The issue appears to be an elephant in the room that neither party wants to acknowledge.
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The ultimate deception the Hoosiers do not know — it no longer matters if traditional public, private, charter — really no longer matters anymore. Before you can have a school, you will need to find teachers. That is already a problem. If the public wants their children to be taught by a Teach for America teacher (the ultimate end run with the 3 month training of content university graduates that cannot find a job), then the plan is on track. Look at it this way. Your children is your most valuable asset. How many of you would go to a doctor that has 3 months of training? I thought not. Yet, that is the Indiana plan for staffing schools.
People tend to think that there is a glut of teachers. Maybe there once was, but no more. Our young people hate school and all its testing and stress so much they don’t want to be teachers. Teacher training is disappearing in universities due to lack of enrollment. And, to think that we haven’t hit bottom yet in Indiana. The really good teachers have either retired of pretty much left the system. Low pay, insane hours and responsibilities, and whatever they do is never enough nor good enough. Indiana has almost realized the education system they want — staffed by teachers under 30 that never really wanted to be a teacher — they just needed a job.
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Will education go the way of Sears? I think, possibly, if enough businesses fail through their Randian fantasy policies, schools may see the light and come back from the brink of disaster. After all, these hedge fund managers don’t seem to comprehend business or human interaction or society as a functioning entity or anything but money to line their own pockets. The wizards with all the answers are going belly up. So, let’s hope students aren’t permanently ruined before the ship rights itself.
http://www.salon.com/2013/12/10/ayn_rand_loving_ceo_destroys_his_empire_partner/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialflow
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Indiana ‘ s Governor, just yesterday, said that Indiana and the Republicans of Indiana are leading the charge in education, financial surpluses, and all things “good”. What these Education reformists, both Republican and Democrat, don’t care about is that this charge is piercing the heart of education, and leaving our students with standards that will surely not make them college and career ready. As an educator I am disgusted that the government still believes that they know what our students need.
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