I posted recently about the growing exodus of teachers from Arizona due to low salaries, testing, mandates, and poor working conditions. Do the legislators and governor understand the consequences of their actions? This teacher says they do. They know exactly what they are doing.
Here is his comment:
“I’ve been teaching in Arizona for 16 years (having come here from Texas). It is harder now than it’s ever been. I happen to live in a community that strongly supports public education. However, the community itself is poor with one of the highest non-reservation levels of unemployment. Still, the board is seriously looking at raising tax rates to try to compensate for salaries that have been frozen for 8 years. While the state has shrugged off its obligation to fund public education, it has made the problem worse by making it more difficult for local communities to raise funds themselves. It is difficult to look at the mess we are in here and come to any other conclusion than that this is a concerted effort to destroy public education.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
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Well, Duh …
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The defunding disrupting destroying deformers. D4E, Dunderheads for Educide.
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I don’t know what to do about it. Our lawmakers seem to be so out of touch they live in a different world.
These are the US Secretaries of Ed and Labor, talking about Philadelphia:
“As the columnist Tom Friedman points out, 21st-century workers need the knowledge, flexibility, and ingenuity to thrive in jobs that haven’t even been invented yet. That requires creativity and foresight from our nation’s schools. Students should have a solid foundation in the basics, but they also need technical know-how to match the technology they’ll inevitably work with. And they need employability skills — like critical thinking, collaboration, and communication.”
Tom Friedman is a pundit who is literally a multi-millionaire – I have no earthly idea why he seems to be their go-to on advice for working people 🙂
Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/thinktank/Philly-others-should-adopt-K-14-school-model.html#rfAVxtV1ePwxCoBc.99
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“…but they also need technical know-how to match the technology they’ll inevitably work with.”
Craziness. The technology they will “inevitably” work with hasn’t been invented yet. And anyway, the point of technology is to make our lives easier. The tech itself is easy to use. That’s why schools in the 1980s didn’t need to have courses on how to use a microwave. To the extent technology needs to be taught at all, it’s only as a tool to support and advance learning and exploration and how to do that exploration safely and figure out what are trustworthy and worthwhile sources.
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They’re talking about adding vocational training to a core curriculum in Philadelphia, but this is the actual situation in Philadelphia:
Overall, he said, “Things feel different this year. This is the first time we are talking about opening schools without having to reduce, cut or close something.”
The schools there nearly didn’t OPEN last year, right, and didn’t we find out yesterday they’re hiring 5000 temps?
http://thenotebook.org/fall-guide-2015/158917/hoping-year-without-reductions-closures-and-cuts
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Also, I don’t know if they’re just confused but the Toledo Technology Academy is a public magnet school that was started in 1997.
It wasn’t “modeled” on any of Duncan’s efforts because it predated the Obama/Kasich market-based ed reform.
He has it backwards. Tom Friedman had nothing to do with it.
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Mz. Ravitch, I apologize for the off-topic comment, but I thought that maybe you’d like to see this story:
Why Liberals Should Learn to Love Charter Schools by Johnathan Alter
The author name checks you personally, and accuses you of cherry-picking statistics. He also makes some rather bald assertions about the state of education in New Orleans. And he mentions Democrats for Education Reform, the Wall St. backed group that pushes privatization.
The whole piece is really something. A sort of “gish gallop” of education reformster talking points.
Anyway, I thought you’d want to see it.
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Thanks, Will. Mercedes Schneider and Peter Greene wrote about this column by Alter. He is a charter cheerleader, and he doesn’t tolerate any criticism of them. Of course, his own children go to an elite private school.
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Diane,
Johnathan Alter’s nephew was a TFA teacher.
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I just read this article. What a load of BS! As a liberal, I’m basing my opinions on what I’ve actually seen and experienced. And I am perfectly capable of agreeing or disagreeing with Diane (mostly agreeing) after carefully reading her posts. She even invites courteous descent.
And yes, some charters are full of minorities – almost 100% black and/or Hispanic. They call it re-segregation. And that is NOT a liberal concept.
Being liberal does not equate to being stupid.
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please see article May 23, 2015 by Laurie Roberts in the Arizona Republic, Arizona’s Governor Doug Ducey and dark-money, threats to business leaders, Arizona owes billions to public education and he refuses to pay, talk to her, she is the only one that writes about it
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 2015 15:02:04 +0000 To: p_bechtel@msn.com
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Dear Diane,
He describes what is going on in our state very well. It’s a disaster for children and for teachers. As of yesterday, those in financial control are committed to getting rid of our Secretary of Education who is against Common Core. I’ve done after-school programs and speaking at assemblies of students here for years and have good relationships with many teachers. This is devastating to teachers, students and parents of kids in our schools. What a mess we have!
Kas Winters The Mother of Family Ideas The /Sneaky Mom/ on WordofMom Radio
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Please note: this would never happen in the more affluent suburbs where parents would revolt. In NYS property values are directly impacted by the quality of the school district.
When you pay high taxes, you expect more services from the government. It sounds like in your case, they want to raise taxes but reduce the quality of education.
My philosophy is you get what you pay for and if the goods aren’t up to snuff then there is definitely some explaining to be done.
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Schools shouldn’t be funded by property taxes in the first place.
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I live in an upscale neighborhood with the best school district in Western New York. The kids get all the perks – full time librarians, computer labs, an excellent music program, foreign language from 5th grade on, etc, etc, etc. People move here so their kids can get a great education. They know in advance that their property taxes will be a little higher. Of course, NYS taxes also go into the mix as well as some Federal funding.
How do you propose to pay for public education?
I’ve read how some states do it, and whatever they are doing doesn’t seem to be working very well. There seems to be too much misdirected funding.
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Indiana is just one more to emulate this kind of abomination.
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Of course, the elites send their kids to private academies like the Brophy Academy so who cares about the masses…..after me the deluge….The sad fact is the good teachers and the ambitious teachers will leave the state or leave the profession. So it goes in America. Can we honestly say we honor and respect teachers more than sports stars or even policemen or prison guards. What a country! Prison guards make more money and have more solid careers than teachers. And the way things are going we are going to need more prison guards and more jails. Maybe even concentration camps in the Mohave desert for undocumented immigrants.
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They, of course, don’t want to eliminate public education, since the ultimate purpose is to channel the public money to private hands. My bet is that their plan is to transform the system to in-class online education:
“Unfortunately, we don’t have teachers in our state anymore, and so we cannot wait any longer, but to turn to the educational method of choice in the 21st century: online teaching and testing. We’ll break down some walls in your schools to make classrooms that can accommodate 100 students each. Each such classroom will be turned into comfortable, movie theaterish computer labs, with 3 expertly trained and properly armed guards maintaining strict discipline, and kids will watch educational videos all day long. We, of course, have to raise the state sales tax to 15% to pay for the multitude of companies that will provide the necessary equipment for the fancy classrooms. Your kids will love it, believe us.”
I doubt anybody would find this idea farfetched. Colleges and universities have already started down this road. In our university, not only we already offer online versions of classes (which are more expensive than regular classes), but by cutting our graduate student budget, we cannot afford to have graders, so in most classes, we use online grading systems.
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I agree. It is like Las Vegas’s teacher shortage after an unprecedented funding increase. It is purposeful.
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I hope you’ve all registered as Democrats to vote for Bernie Sanders in the primaries/caucuses. The others are all part of the corporatocracy.
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What are Bernie Sander’s views on K–12 education? I’ve seen he wants free college and Pre K, but where does he stand on charters, numerous standardized tests, teacher salaries tied to test scores, teacher unions, due process, etc.?
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