Peter Greene actually is a plan to reconfigure American education. This is not humor or parody. The is not fake news. It is real.
http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-hard-rights-planning-document-for.html?m=1
The religious right has waited a long time to put one of their own in charge of the Department of Education. Now they have succeeded. Now the plan begins.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Just posted a link to this as a comment to this post about the fascist who is whispering to our president: http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Steve-Bannon-Cited-Italian-in-General_News-Alt-right_Fascist_Fascist-Americans_Ideas-170212-315.html#comment645098
Submitted on Sunday, Feb 12, 2017 at 5:26:02 PM
“And for those of you, who know I write about education… here is the Hard-right’s plan to reconfigure American education. “This is not humor or parody. This is not fake news. It is real!” says’ Diane Ravitch– WHO WAS, the assistant SECRETARY OF EDUCTION for 2 administrations, and is one of Politico’s 50 Most important Americans. She wrote: How Not to Fix Our Public Schools and in her book Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools ( embedded ) links at the comment itself”
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I sent the link to Peter’s post to all of those I know who have become newly energized and aware of education policy because of Betsy DeVos. This is the kind of info we need to share to maintain our energy level. Very enlightening and frightening.
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This should be a wake up call to those of us who want to avoid theocracy. While we still have public schools, we need to rededicate ourselves to teaching TRUE facts with gusto so as not to leave room for this Crazy. But, ridiculously, most of us don’t believe we’re really in the business of teaching facts. Instead of our current fetish for teaching vague skills –years and years on teaching “finding theme” or “inference making” or “analysis of random stuff” –why don’t we set out a curriculum that prescribes a semester on the Christian sectarian wars of the 16th and 17th centuries that LED to our secular Constitution? How about a semester on Hitler and Stalin –an interdisciplinary unit that includes novels like 1984 and Darkness at Noon? Let’s have a semester on the Bible, like they want, but NO cherrypicking. Read it for what it is: a survival guide for the Hebrew tribe. That might immunize them from crackpot ministers’ malicious glosses. How about years and years of great world literature –NOT as friggin grist for CC skills practice ! –but as insight into other humans’ souls. That might develop some compassion in these people who would casually nuke the Middle East –or slaughter liberals. English/language arts has been so corrupted and degraded. It is a travesty to reduce it to teaching “theme”. Literature teaches about humans and the world: that is the point of it. Our schools do need radical reform, just not the kind De Vos imagines.
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I agree with Ponderosa on this. Also, some of the quotes are self-contradictory, as others here have noted.
Also, this below quote from the site contains a direct attack, not on “secularism” which has its real problems, but on “secularity” which is an essential aspect of the First Amendment; that is, distinguishing between the powers of church and state. This point was foundational to Jefferson himself, who read history in its original languages. If anyone knew the importance of this distinction, Jefferson did.
But as stated, it’s a breach of the Constitution itself as SECULAR government:
“Far better is the promotion of a gradual, voluntary return at all levels to free-market private schools, church schools and home schools as the normative American practice. We believe such a move will benefit the public at-large, open their eyes to the deficiencies of government-run secular education and provide an attractive, superior alternative, as was once the norm in American education.
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Public schools are at a real disadvantage because half of politicians are ideologically opposed to their continued existence.
Ed reform ignores this, but it’s true.
Here’s the political climate for public schools- Republicans are opposed to them and Democrats are “agnostics” and refuse to advocate for them.
As a practical matter, that leaves them with no advocates in government.
This is not true for charter schools and vouchers. Both Republicans and Democrats advocate on behalf of charter schools and Republicans advocate on behalf of vouchers.
Public schools should demand real advocates in government. Charters and vouchers have them. We deserve them too. I don’t want an “agnostic”. I want an advocate who values my son’s public school. I don’t understand how 85% of children in public schools ended up omitted – w/out representation. That should be corrected.
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Democrats are advocating for public education now that they are out of power. The same holds true for the Affordable Care Act. Now that they are out of power they are defending Obamacare, whereas when they had the White House they ran away from it. This is why they lost across the board in 2016. Feel the Bern.
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I don’t actually believe DeVos will go after public schools. Instead I think she views public schools thru the very narrow lens of the “choice” faction in ed reform. The “choice” faction don’t attack public schools- they completely ignore them.
This could play out in all kinds of ways but I would look at grants from the federal government for an indication of how deep the anti-public school bias goes.
CTE is fashionable right now. I’ll look and see how many federal grants go to CTE programs in public schools. I anticipate it will be “none”. Anyone who has read anything DeVos has said about public schools and believes public schools will get a fair shot at grant funding at her Dept of Ed is kidding themselves. Public schools will be essentially excluded from consideration in DC.
They don’t even hire GRADUATES of public schools to run the US Dept of Education- they’re certainly not planning on investing in our schools.
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Chiara: I would think as you do, that DeVos is not “after” public schools. Then I read the below from Peter Green’s blogspot: Read this quote, and then tell my WHY we should think DeVos is not “after” public education if not in the short term, at least in the long term, which they are clearly thinking in terms of. (my emphases) And “voluntary” means: “properly propagandized.”
“Far better is the promotion of a gradual, voluntary return at all levels to free-market private schools, church schools and home schools as the normative American practice. We believe such a move will benefit the public at-large, open their eyes to the deficiencies of government-run secular education and provide an attractive, superior alternative, as was once the norm in American education.”
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I was really struck by the ed reform arguments for why DeVos should be welcomed into public schools. It is up to public schools (apparently) to persuade the US Department of Education that they have value and are worthy of consideration. Furthermore, it is up to public schools to essentially train DeVos on how public schools work.
This is ridiculous. They aren’t there to serve ed reformers. Ed reformers are supposedly going in there to serve THEM.
These folks are so far off whatever their original “mission” was they’re on another planet.
My local public school isn’t an experimental site, it isn’t a testing center, it isn’t “an argument” for why public schools should or should not exist. It’s a school. The question I have as a parent is “what value do these folks add to my son’s school?” I’m not interested in debating whether the school should or should not EXIST nor am I interested in persuading federal employees to do their jobs. That’s not the relationship here- I’m not making my case to Secretary DeVos. She is making her case to me. If she’s there to campaign for vouchers she can stay in DC. Vouchers are irrelevant to our school.
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Chiara: Do tell me that I am wrong and provide evidence for this:
I think it doesn’t matter one hoot to DeVos that or whether any particular “government-run” public school is well-run, or even that it might provide an education for these particular children that they serve. Neither does it matter to her that SOME charter schools or voucher-served schools are corrupt or run badly.(And she is not embarrassed by buying her way into power because it’s “God’s will.”)
I think this because, from the available literature about her, she is religiously ideological (a deer-in-the-headlights religious zealot). This means that she is going at everything she does from an “above-downward” silo-view, and that “above” is an ideology that frames “NO PUBLIC EDUCATION (on principle, regardless of quality) and NO SECULAR GOVERNMENT-RUN SCHOOLS.” They are slated to be replaced by “free-market private schools, church schools and home schools.” (See Peter Greene’s blogspot.)
If that’s true (and again someone do correct me if I am wrong), then unless she undergoes a COMPLETE change of heart (an ideological conversion) which is highly unlikely, then insofar as she has power and influence over implementation of present policy and/or development of new policy, public schools are a thing of the past. Your school and all others are just hanging around waiting for the blade to drop and/or to be transformed (aka taken over) by the ideological cancer that comes from that already-built silo in DeVos’ mind.
Again, from Greene’s website: “Far better is the promotion of a gradual, voluntary return at all levels to free-market private schools, church schools and home schools as the normative American practice. We believe such a move will benefit the public at-large, open their eyes to the deficiencies of government-run secular education and provide an attractive, superior alternative, as was once the norm in American education.”
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Reblogged this on BLOGGYWOCKY and commented:
And meanwhile, the right wingers keep running around with their hair on fire, screaming about how George Soros is funding all the protesters against Trump and his policies.
Well, if Soros is, good for him, and he should continue.
Meanwhile, these wingers say not one word about the Center for National Policy. Assuming they even are aware of it. And those who are, most likely approve.
Apparently, none of them have read or understood the Constitution of the United States of America.
We are so scr*wed, unless we organize and fight back. Keep resisting.
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Where do I order my Ten Commandments poster? Is it available in Hebrew?
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WhiteHouse.gov, they’re revising it to reflect original intent. I also hear they sent an archeological team to Sinai (funded by the DeVos family) who excavated the pieces of the original, put them back together, and have also found some lost tablets. These miraculously support their interpretation of how Jefferson, Madison and Adams intended to found a theocratic state after all. Not sure if it was in Hebrew. I’m guessing it’ll be King James English since that was the original version.
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LOL GregB!
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Sorry, GregB, the KJ version is only a bastardization of the true bible, the Latin Vulgate Bible.
At least according to the pope and we know his word is his god’s word, by definition.
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I envision a whole unit on how Trump violates the 10 Commandments and how that makes his Christian supporters hypocrites. Or a whole unit on how “christians” violate the teachings of Christ.
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What are non-Christians to do?
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Abigail Shure: “What are non-Christians to do?”
We are up against two “walls” here: First, the neo-Christians who are first religious and then, by ideological osmosis, political; and, second, the fascists who are first political and sometimes, but not always, religious–sometimes fascist regimes forbid religion because it is a threat to the fascist’s power. Though fascists often take up religious symbolism and even transform history, it’s usually at the service of political and not religious ends. In that sense, it’s more of a collapse of the religious into the political.
But the answer to your question on both counts is supporting a SECULAR Constitutional Democracy. Both of the above are dead-set against a secular state with ensconced freedoms–we’ve been fortunate enough to have a DeVos who is too stupid to hide her existential threats to the rest of us. The first because they see secularISM’s real moral and spiritual flaws, and the push of some against religion at all; and the second because of what you see on television today: Voter Voices Defending Their Freedoms–while we are able. Historically, things change on that score when the blood starts to flow.
This morning on MSNBE, Miller was oh-so-nice to say that we are within our rights to protest, his cold stares notwithstanding.
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Ponderosa: It’s okay, though (I was told). God forgives sinners.
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“The Reformation ”
Reform is a religion
With Friedman as its god
And Betsy D. as profit*
To follow and to laud
With charter as the chappel
Where people bow and prey
With hymnal pads from Apple
To rapture them away
The fundamental tenet
The key to Heaven’s Gates
Is righteousness of market
That’s sealing all our fates
*Some sects follow the Profit Gates
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Super clever. Especially like the puns on “profit” and “prey”.
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That would be Milton (not Thomas) Friedman for any who don’t know their history.
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We need a Renaissance.
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Or maybe a “Runaskance” — to run away from the Ninety Five Feces as fast as our feet will go.
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Very scary stuff. Wouldn’t Trump and the GOP have to repeal federal education laws, too, such as ESSA, IDEA, FERPA, etc, including those covering higher education?
“For the duration of its existence,Fire every single person at the Department of education “from Assistant Secretaries to the mailroom” and replace them with people who believe in the Trump/DeVos vision.”
There have been indications that Trump wants to do this with all federal departments, which means firing unionized civil servants and reverting back to the spoils system, so he can hire people based on their political loyalty to him. It has been reported that Trump wants government employees to sign non-disclosure agreements. Since Trump fought against his own employees from unionizing, and the GOP hates unions, I’m guessing they’ll try to do away with unionized government employees as well.
People had better be very vigilant in monitoring Trump and the GOP, because there are laws preventing these very things, such as the 1883 Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act and the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978. My guess is that, since they control Congress now, the GOP plans to soon enact new legislation gutting any laws that would get in their way.
Based on Trump’s executive orders, it’s evident that he and his minions didn’t know that he is not an omnipotent king who can just issue decrees that become the law of the land unquestionably, since they argued that the courts had no right to review his orders. But they are learning and cunning, so if we want to hold onto everything that Trump & the GOP want to take away from or impose on us, we have got to be one stop ahead of them, which mens we have to learn to think like crooks, liars and fascists, too.
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Many people resent this unpopular opportunist, and they know he can’t be trusted. People of left leanings are watching carefully, and that is one reason for some of the civil unrest. We need to have the courts and the ACLU on stand by.
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Everyone better educate themselves on Quiverfull. They are real and they have been waiting a long time to free their army for Jesus upon the world. Josh Duggar should have been the tip off when his indiscretions were revealed. He was a quiverfull “golden boy”, sent into DC politics for a reason. This is very scary and no one has been watching. DeVos and Pence are the right people to bring this to fruition….in their minds. Sorry if it sounds conspiracy theory, but it is just so…..logical to me, that this is the plan.
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Senator Chris Murphy posted this link from Facebook with this comment.
“Unreal. 3 days in, DeVos aligns with congressional Republicans to roll back civil rights protections, confirming all our fears. In her hearing, she said, “I support accountability.” But she didn’t even wait a week to abandon accountability standards for disabled & minority kids.”
“Instead of fighting to preserve accountability rules, DeVos’s letter to the states says they aren’t required to follow them. “States rights” was the rallying cry for segregationists. Racism still exists.”
https://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/us-education-secretary-devos-issues-letter-chief-state-school-officers
I read the letter and press release but don’t know enough about ESSA or Title laws to understand. Can someone help explain.
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“Racism still exists”
Racism is not the underlying cause. The underlying cause is christo-fascism and the dominionists need to supposedly fulfill the biblical prophesies so those christo-fascists can be rightly (in their feeble thinking brains) raptured into an orgasmic heaven forever.
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Thanks to Peter Greene for the info and to Diane Ravitch for sharing!
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Makes me want to watch Dr. Strangelove again. And, these people do have their fingers on the nuclear launch controls.
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From the CNP letter, front and center:
“We submit this report to the Donald Trump/Betsy DeVos administration with the hope that our organization may be of assistance with the restoration of education in America, in accordance with historic Judeo-Christian principles which formed the basis of instruction in America’s schools for its first 300 hundred years.”
Hmmm, “America”, i.e., The United States, has been around for 300 years? The quoted statement is so wrong that one can only assume a purposeful misstatement, in other words, a LIE.
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I’d be hard-pressed to make up such garbage:
“Argue that a Federal D.O.E. is unconstitutional, illegal and contrary to America’s education practice for 300 years from early 17th century to Colonial times.”
Did the committee writing this all attend xtian home schools?
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I don’t have the patience to read it, but, by chance, was there any reference in that letter to dinosaurs threatening schools in Colonial times?
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Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
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JUST IN from http://www.EdWEEK.org: Governors, State Lawmakers Roll Out School Choice Proposals
http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2017/02/15/governors-state-lawmakers-roll-out-school-choice.html?cmp=soceml-twfdbltz-ewnow
Governors, State Lawmakers Roll Out School Choice Proposals
Republican-led legislatures are considering charter school and voucher bills at the state level even as a high-profile school choice proponent takes the helm of the U.S. Department of Education.
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FURTHER ALONG: The below is quoted from two sections of the report on the website of the Southern Poverty Law Center about the Council for National Policy where Betsy Devos’ father was president for two multi-year periods.
The Leaders and Money
“The CNP founders, including then-Moral Majority leader Tim LaHaye, were a colorful cast of characters: oilman Nelson Bunker Hunt, a one-time member of the John Birch Society’s ruling council and a billionaire before he went bankrupt as a result of his effort to corner the silver market; T. Cullen Davis, a multimillionaire from Texas who was tried and acquitted in two separate murder cases; William Cies, a wealthy John Bircher and major CNP funder; and Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the Heritage Foundation and the American Legislative Exchange Council. . . .”
“Those are not the only wealthy people associated with CNP. Its past presidents, in particular, include many extremely well off businessmen. Among them are Nelson Bunker Hunt; Richard DeVos, the co-founder of Amway whose net worth was estimated at $5 billion in 2012; and Foster Friess, a stock picker who was recognized in 2011 for contributions exceeding $1 million to the right-wing funding apparatus started by brothers Charles and David Koch. Friess is notorious for throwing himself an almost $8 million birthday party and saying on TV that women used to avoid pregnancy by putting a Bayer aspirin “between their knees.”
Read more at the below site:
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2016/05/17/council-national-policy-behind-curtain
The Council for National Policy: Behind the Curtain …
http://www.splcenter.org
The Council for National Policy, a highly secretive group, is a key venue where mainstream conservatives and extremists mix.
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