The New York Times is a great newspaper. It is the most influential newspaper in the world. It has great reporters and opinion writers.
But, sadly, the New York Times has one glaring deficiency: its editorials on education echo the greedy, free-market views of Betsy DeVos and the Koch brothers.
One person, Brent Staples, has written almost every education editorial for many years. He is a graduate of the University of Chicago. He is a brilliant man with a libertarian blind spot. Perhaps he studied under Milton Friedman or one of his mentees.
Whatever the case, the editorials of the Times sound as if they were written by the public relations staff of Charles Koch or Betsy DeVos.
New York Times: The time has come to decide which side you are on: those who care for the common good or those who believe in me first.
Note to the New York Times: defend democracy, not the plutocrats and privatization.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Unfortunately, it’s a blind spot many brilliant men and women share.
Does NYT have a financial interest in pushing Ed Reform positions?
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The same can be said about The Washington Post!
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At least the ‘Washington Post’ frequently has feature writers that point out the problems of privatization including Valerie Strauss and Carol Burris.
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I love Valerie’s Blog. I wish the Post printed it online to balance their bias towards Rhee, teacher bashing, charters, anything but public schools.
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One of my first posts on this blog was about how Bill Turque, Washington Post Education writer and Michelle Rhee critic, clashed with his pro-Rhee, pro-Corporate Reform editors.
At one point, then School Chancellor Rhee, in response to Turque’s scathing reporting, refused to talk to Turque and banned anyone in her office from talking to him.
Without asking Turque’s permission, or even informing him, Rhee’s superior and pro-Rhee boss (whose name escapes me) started re-writing Turque’s pieces in the middle of the night. She wasn’t just cutting sentences and paragraphs written by Turque. She was re-writing them and rephrasing his prose in a way to flatter Rhee, or weaken the criticism.
On his blog, Turque wrote a piece going public about this tactic, and that was spiked.
Oh, now it’s coming back to me. The pro-Rhee editor was Jo Ann Armao, and she basically acted as Rhee’s lackey, writing pieces where Rhee blathered propaganda.
In his blog, Turque called Armao’s column “the print version of the Larry King show,” and that Rhee had Armao in her back pocket
Another pro-Rhee honcho at the Washington Post, Fred Hyatt, was told of Turque’s blog post criticising Armao, and blew a gasket, ordering it removed from the Internet.
Turque also wrote about how Rhee gave illegal and special treatment to then-mayor Fenty and his children, getting them into a prized school out of the attendance boundary assigned to Fenty’s family, based on the address of his residence.
This, as per usual, was spiked without asking Turque’s permission or even informing him.
On that last point, here’s an excerpt from one of those pieces written by Turque (later spiked):
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
BILL TURQUE:
“Where this gets complicated is that board’s stance, and the chancellor’s obvious rapport with Jo-Ann, also means that DCPS has a guaranteed soft landing spot for uncomfortable or inconvenient disclosures—kind of a print version of the Larry King Show. This happened last September during the flap over the out-of-boundary admission of Mayor Fenty’s twin sons to Lafayette Elementary in Chevy Chase.
“The chancellor repeatedly sidestepped questions about whether policies and procedures had been followed to place the kids in the coveted school. A few days after the dust settled, an editorial offered, without attribution, an ‘innocent explanation’: the Fentys neighborhood school, West Elementary, had only one fourth grade class. Lafayette’s multiple fourth-grade sections made it possible to separate the twins, which studies show is developmentally desirable.”
“Are Fenty and Rhee gaming the system by using the editorial page this way?
“Of course.
“Is this a healthy thing for readers of The Post?
“Probably not.
“Is it going to keep me from doing my job effectively?
“Nope.”
x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
Turque was removed from the education beat shortly after this.
Here’s a couple articles — not from the WashPost, but from the outside looking in — on this:
https://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/city-desk/blog/13060685/washington-post-editorial-board-livid-over-turque-blog-post
https://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/city-desk/blog/13060675/washington-post-blog-post-critical-of-washington-post-disappears-from-web-site
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Yes, the Washington Post is just as bad, editorially, as The NY Times on education issues.
They chastised Gov. Northam during his campaign because he wanted less testing.
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Can I hear an Amen! I, and I’m sure Diane, have tried to penetrate the Times’s horrid editorial position for years – to no avail. They are simply not interested in anything beyond the pap produced by DeVos, Duncan, Koch, Moskowitz, Gates and, perhaps more than any other, Joel Klein.
He is seldom mentioned these days, but could be the poster boy for reform. He knows virtually nothing about education and learning, led the assaults on public education in NY, and then went on to enrich himself by partnering with Rupert Murdoch and others who are engaged in wholesale looting of America under the guise of helping children.
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Steve, amen! The Times thought that Klein was the greatest authority on education and never faulted his “public schools stink” rhetoric. As soon as he resigned, he signed up for his pension, then joined forces with Rupert Murdoch in a company called Amplify. The Times featured Amplify as the best new thing ever, I.e., learning on tablets. Murdoch invested $1 Billion. The Amplify tablets melted, the chargers caught fire, the company went bust. Murdoch bailed out after losing $500 Million. Klein went to work for an online healthcare company called Oscar, owned by Jared Kushner’s brother. Oscar will be in deep doodoo if Obamacare is repealed.
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Chicago and the rest of Illinois have a history driven by the holier than thou god of centrist pragmatism regarding public education. Whether it is mayor Daley prior to 1968 or Obama with Bill Gates, it is one of the nastiest enemies of democrats making a successful return to prominence. Don’t get me started on MO.
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And Paul Vallas. At least the New York Times has covered Gulen charter school issue, which is more than can be said fir the St Louis Post Dispatch or St Louis Public Radio.
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I’m starting to have the same feelings about the New York Times as I do about fennel…
I want to like fennel, I really do. So I keep trying it. I try it different ways—raw, sauteed, in a stew. And I still don’t like it.
I want to like the NYT. I think it’s important to support newspapers and journalism, more now than ever. So I keep reading the Times—and sometimes I like and value what I see—but more often lately, I just don’t.
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I’m starting to have the same feelings about the NY Times as I do about the flu.
Unfortunately, you can’t get a shot for the Times, though you CAN do shots (of whiskey)
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On second thought, you actually can get a shot for the Times
At the local bar.
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Fennel is fantastic!
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I have tried tried frying, stewing, broiling and roasting the Times. Their education position remains inedible and possibly poisonous.
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The news is first-rate. Most editorials on other subjects are fine. On education, it stinks.
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Why is it that the only non-partisan issue in congress today is that all the problems in America today are my fault because I am a bad teacher? They cannot agree on anything else, but they agree it is me.
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Read “Democracy in Chains” by Nancy Maclean. Goal of the right wing was and is the elimination of public education hence teachers/public education must be deemed a failure.
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All the Mainscream Media are encumbered by a conflict of interest when it comes to education at all levels as the see the entire enterprise of education and information as just another content delivery system that they are licking their chops at the prospect of biting off a major market share. We saw the amuse-bouche of this with Edumachination Nation and they fully intend to take the course of it from soup 🍲 to nuts 🥜
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Which editorial are you talking about, Diane? Multiple ones over the years or something specific? (I get it online and haven’t looked at the editorials that closely).
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Cathy,
I was not responding to a specific editorial but to years of them. Once in a while, a reasonable editorial appears, and I feel certain the regular editorial writer is on vacation.
I read the New York Times editorials daily. Since 2001, its editorials have favored NCLB, High stakes testing, charter schools, closing schools, whatever the charter industry wants, whatever the testing industr wants.
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I admire your fortitude. Try as I might, I just can’t read The Chicago Tribune editorials front to back on any day. I used to think it was my East coast roots. My parents were Republicans who never quite fit in with the Midwest version.
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“Blind spots”
The blind spot of a blind man
Is smaller in extent
Than blind spot of a Times man
A Koch supporting gent
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Not just the NYTimes.
Here’s a former Obama official slamming every public school in the country in yet another ed reform article cheerleading charters:
“The politics of choice has never been easy. The charter movement is up against a $600 billion monopoly that is reacting like any threatened entity: It circles the wagons and fights back with everything it has.
.The resistance comes from teachers unions facing the loss of members and dues, school administrators facing the loss of revenues as money follows children out of districts and school boards reluctant to share power. And, no one likes being shown up by an upstart that produces better results with the same kids.”
Got that, public school families? That’s how ed reform sees the school your child attends- as a “600 billion dollar monopoly”
When Obama officials look at a public school they don’t see families and children, they see an opponent to be vanquished. I guess the fact that 90% of families ARE IN the schools ed reformers oppose isn’t much discussed in DC.
Incidentally, this is EXACTLY how the Koch brothers describe public schools. Same words. The echo chamber is tightening. Now they’re impossible to distinguish from the Koch brothers.
http://educationpost.org/charter-schools-need-to-shift-power-to-parents-and-educators-of-color/
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The national media may be lockstep ed reform but it’s been really heartening to see state and local media start to question some of the dogma.
Without Ohio newspapers our state legislature would still be reciting ed reform boilerplate.
It took forever- 15 years- but it really was inevitable. They made such big promises and virtually none of them were fulfilled- charters aren’t better and they aren’t cheaper and they aren’t more equitable. They yelled and screamed about lobbyists for teachers unions and all we ended up with were thousands of lobbyists for charter chains and vouchers.
There are now lobbyists in Ohio for the entities that contract WITH charters- the management companies and accountants and legal services. They created an entirely publicly funded new industry.
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If you see that a local newspaper is covering ed reform “on the ground” in your state and doing a good job, subscribe to that newspaper.
They’re the only entity providing any local oversight and they’re all going broke. Without them all we’d have would be lockstep ed reform cheerleading.
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If you’re looking for newspapers who challenge the ed reform narrative, look local.
Here’s the Des Moine Register:
“Let’s just call the “school choice” movement what it really is: an effort to funnel taxpayer dollars from public schools to vouchers, private schools and home schools. Supporters seem to believe Iowa children are being held hostage in collapsing government education institutions.”
They go on to take the ed reform slogan apart, piece by piece.
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/editorials/2018/01/31/iowa-school-choice-legislature-vouchers/1079107001/
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Good find, Chiara!
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Good luck finding an editorial like this in New Jersey.
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I am envious. We do not have anything like this in Memphis—maybe in whole TN.
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We do get badass education journalists from time to time, but they leave, disappear in no time.
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Like Michael Winerip of the NY Times. Wrote articles critical of the “reformers” and was quickly reassigned.
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“Tennessee’s school turnaround district has had a rocky month, with two national charter networks announcing plans to close their schools and exit the Achievement School District.
Rocketship became the latest network to pull the plug when the California-based organization announced Thursday that it will shutter Partners Community Prep in Nashville at the end of the school year. The K-2 school just opened last fall, but only had 50 students enrolled. Leaders had hoped for 250.
Weeks earlier, Houston-based Project GRAD USA announced plans to close its Memphis high school this spring — also for enrollment reasons — effectively ending that network’s partnership with the ASD.”
Boy, it’s lucky Tennessee has some public schools left. Maybe time to start investing in the schools that stick around and actually enroll most of the kids?
https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/tn/2018/02/01/rocketship-becomes-latest-charter-network-to-pull-the-plug-on-tennessees-achievement-school-district/
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The Times seems to me to be a fair representation of the mainstream Democratic Party. Anti-intolerance. Pro-diversity. Pro-environment. Pro-meritocracy, and anti-union to the extent that unions interfere with meritocracy. Pro-globalism. And above all, pro-expertise, with expertise to be provided by the best and brightest from the professional class (lawyers, judges, bankers, economists).
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Diane – blood is thicker than water. Editorial page editor: James Bennet. Broad trained Denver Public Schools first reform superintendent: Michael Bennet. Brothers. Last month’s NYT list of NY school chancellor finalists included Jaime Aquino, first Chief Academic Officer under M Bennet. The Denver/east coast connections are staggering.
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I have read breathless exposes of the supposedly all-powerful NYC teachers’ union (NY Times, New Yorker) and I suppose that could be one of the roots of the Times’ adoration of corporate driven education management. All I can say is, my own teachers’ union had no muscle to flex, didn’t care how many hours I worked at night and on weekends, and was perfectly supine in the face of the private takeover of the public schools. It is very disappointing to see the Times fall for the nonsense. As for the politicians, well, they have to get their campaign funds somewhere.
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Exactly. Our national unions have been feckless. Maybe I’m too harsh in believing they’ve been more helpful to the Reform movement than not, but that’s how I feel.
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The big expose in the New Yorker was by Stephen Brill, who wrote a book attacking public schools and extolling the virtues of hedge fund managers, DFER, and charter schools. The teacher who was at the center of his narrative quit her charter school and went to work in the public schools, where she had the protection of the union.
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“I trust the NY Times”
I trust the NY Times —
Except for on Iraq
On latter, I’m inclined
To want my money back!
But that was just a quirk
Reporter’s whence it stems
Cuz Judith was a jerk
And all the rest are gems
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I just had to fact check that the NY Times was the most influential newspaper in the world and discovered it was ranked #3 behind the UK’s Guardian and #1, the Daily Mail.
http://www.trendingtopmost.com/worlds-popular-list-top-10/2017-2018-2019-2020-2021/world/most-read-newspapers-world-best-selling/
In addition, I’ve read more than once that the BBC is ranked the most influential radio/tv network in the world. I think Murdock’s News Corp comes in second.
Don’t forget that at its height, the sun never set on the British Empire and that reach and influence didn’t totally vanish during or after World War II. That old Lion can still roar.
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Sadly, no matter which news outlet are ranked highest, there appears to be a repeatedly blind support for “choice” schools and the hidden/not-so-hidden privatization of a long standing public service.
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Has there ever been any article in the Guardian which was supportive of school choice or general privatization?
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🙂 you make me hope NOT?
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The sun has set on the British empire but the sun has not set on the English language when you count Australia, New Zealand, the US, Canada, US territories, some African countries and the fact that English is the lingua franca of the world’s international airlines. The sun has not set on the Roman/Latin alphabet/script.
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True. And the Arabs hold sway over the writing of numbers like 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. . . . The Arabic numerals, eh.
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Which they encountered when the conquered the Indus River valley?
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Duane is also correct, though: only the decimal system (that the value of a digit depends on its place) was invented in India. The actual characters (digits) we use to write the numbers are of Arabic origin. While the decimal system is universally widespread, the characters/digits we use not so much.
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Though the really great invention is the decimal system.
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I, too, despise the NY Times editorial board on education. And I agree that the Washington Post is bad, too.
But while that does leak into the reporting side, I would say that generally (not always) the reporting on education issues is about as decent as most. Not stellar, but decent.
And unfortunately, aside from Ralph Northam, Tim Kaine, and some so-called “mainstream Democrats” who support public education, the progressive leaders have basically abandoned public education, too.
I am still waiting for Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren to strongly criticize charter schools — yes, even “public charters” — and their high suspension rates and other exclusionary tactics and explain why public education is so important. If they used their bully pulpits to make public education an issue, the Democratic Party would follow. What is stopping them?
And I am sick and tired of people saying “those progressive leaders have other issues to talk about and education just isn’t that important”. I’m sorry but public education IS important.
Public education is the backbone of our country. Bernie and Elizabeth and every other politician who calls himself or herself a progressive should be talking about it.
Force the other Democrats to take a stand.
Those progressives have a bully pulpit and could easily make public education an issue. And, in my opinion, it would be a WINNING issue in the 2018 elections.
But we can’t hide our heads in the sand. We need to recognize that Bernie endorsed a DFER candidate against the candidate who strongly supports public schools. We need to address that directly and not just be in denial and blame “mainstream democrats” as a scapegoat for the fact that somehow we supporters of public education are not getting through to them.
And if we can’t even get through to Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren convince them how important it is to support public education, how hard will it be to get other mainstream Dems to support it?
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I posted about this once before but didn’t explain clearly. Nancy Maclean’s “Democracy in Chains” explains how the Libertarians (Alt-right, Neo-liberalism) have succeeded in gaining power supporting unpopular causes using stealth and deception. A big factor in their succeess was the economist James McGill Buchanan, a Nobel Prize winner and UVA Chair of the Economics Department who saw the role of government limited solely to military and police functions. Any other functions that required taxation would be a theft from those who were forced to pay the taxes and an infringement on their liberties. Success of the Libertarians was minimal until Charles Koch of Koch Industries partnered with Buchanan.
Buchanan did not believe in public education. Ending public education was/is a goal of the movement. When the players involved discovered that the public strongly supported their public schools the players learned to not disclose their real goals and to even deceive if necessary by stating the opposite of what their goals were. Stealth became the modus operandi with public education being one of their main targets.
I suggest people read this book. It is very easy and will strike a chord with anyone interested in public education and the attacks on it.
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It’s on my nightstand–next up as soon as I finish “SPQR.” Thanks for the reminder.
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I also recommend going to You Tube to see videos of Nancy MacLean’s lectures and interviews. She’s great and nails the toxic influence of the libertarian phony baloney propaganda mills. Hey, if you’re a billionaire, libertarianism makes all the sense in the world, otherwise it’s pure poison.
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Libertarianism means cutting taxes on the rich and eliminating or privatizing all vital public services.
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It’s a real eye opener.
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Should we who are lifelong NYTimes readers write, maybe even circulate a petition, that they consider following Valerie Strauss of Tahoe Washington Post?
Of other journalists not far behind her, like Anya Kamenetz?
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Martha,
Next time you read an editorial applauding charters or school closings or high stakes testing, write and complain
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“But, sadly, the New York Times has one glaring deficiency: its editorials on education echo the greedy, free-market views of”
Only education and only on the editorial page. Education may only be one part of the economy where there is editorial bias. Foreign policy as well . I am not here to do a hit job on The Grey Lady . But on many issues the Times falls short of our expectations . That does not mean that it is not a valuable resource. But as consumers of media we have to always be skeptical of what we read. Unfortunately with the assault on the truth and the free press by the authoritarian fascists in control of the Nation ,that is a tough thing to ask for.
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