A reader shares the great new dictionaries of Reformy rhetoric, where language is turned inside out to disguise reality.
Volumes 1, 2 and 3 are out!
Archives for category: Corporate Reformers
Keith Gamache, an art teacher at South Side High School in Rockville Center, Long Island, New York, ran for school board and lost. He plans to run again.
He wrote the following, drawing on the inspiration of anti-Nazi theologian Martin Niemöller:
First they came for the large, inner city public schools, and
I did not speak out
Because I did not live in the city
Then they came for the poor and rural public schools, and
I did not speak out
Because I was not poor and did not live in a rural community
Then they came for the suburban public schools,
the principals, the teachers and their unions, and
I did not speak out
Because I as a teacher felt insecure and defeated
Today, [I am running for the East Rockaway School Board, and]
I am speaking out
Because our public education must be preserved.
Anthony Cody explains that the nine most terrifying words in the English language to an educator are, “I’m from Big Business, and I’m here to help.”
Business ideas about competition and incentives, he says, don’t work in schools.
Profit-driven reforms don’t work either.
Businesses and schools have different bottom lines.
As he concludes:
“The market system demands winners and losers, and the biggest losers of all are the students who find themselves left behind in schools that are unprofitable, or because they are more difficult to educate, and thus are liabilities to whatever schools they enroll in….
“I wrote a week ago that our schools are like a living organism under attack by those who wish to divert resources into profitable ventures. Those of us resisting this are perhaps becoming more activated, like white blood cells are activated when the body’s immune system detects an invasion. We need to understand the reasons business interests are realigning our schools, and work to preserve the core mission of our public education system. Our schools do not exist to prepare students to be compliant workers in an ever more efficient economic system. We are in the business of creating thinkers, not workers, creators, not drones.”
In an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad heaps praise on the much-maligned report of the National Council on Teacher Quality. For a foundation that claims to care most of all about performance, not inputs, Broad is surprisingly willing to endorse a report based solely on a review of course readings and catalogues, not results. That is probably because his foundation helped to support the “study.” He is impressed that the report was “eights years in the making,” but doesn’t mention that the NCTQ was created only 13 years ago by a conservative think tank to act as a battering ram against schools of education. This report is the culmination of its ambitions.
Bear in mind: NCTQ is not a professional association; it is not a research organization; it is not a think tank. It is an advocacy organization that promotes alternative ways to become a teacher, that is, alternative to going to an education school.
Broad’s recommends that future teachers be deeply grounded in their subject and that they participate in a high-quality residency program.
He writes: “We would never allow a medical student to perform surgery without participating in a high-quality residency program and studying under the careful eye of an experienced physician. We shouldn’t force new teachers to enter the classroom without the same type of support and training.”
Medical students are not allowed to perform surgeries without years of training in medical schools, internship, and residency. That leaves out Teach for America.
Is Eli Broad turning his back on Teach for America?
Mark Naison, one of the founders and leaders of the Badass Association of Teachers, explains why BAT became necessary, and why its numbers have grown so dramatically:
When Reason Doesn’t Work: Another Explanation for “The Rise of the BATs”
Many people have criticized the “Badass Teachers Association” for its unprofessional sounding name and in your face image, but the meteoric rise of this group didn’t come out of nowhere. All over the country educators have faced policies imposed from above by education officials-political appointees all- which violate their best practices and common sense, but have had no success whatsoever modifying these policies by writing position papers, mounting petition drives or testifying before the few open forums where such policies are discussed
Let’s use New York State as an example. During the last year, the Governor, the Legislature, and the State Education Department have imposed on school districts throughout the state protocols for teacher evaluation that are expensive, complicated, time consuming, unfair, and in the judgment of most principals in the state, completely unworkable. Some of the best principals in the state organized to challenge the new system. They wrote an extensive, well researched critique of the policies, circulated a principals letter with thousands of signatures, got even more signatures on a parents letter, and tried to testify at allegedly “open hearings” held by the state’s
“Education Reform Commission,” but found themselves marginalized and rebuffed. The policies have been literally rammed down the throat of school districts by the Governor, who now have to cope with massive demoralization of teachers and administrators, the smothering of creative pedagogy in favor of “teaching to the test” and the cancellation of beloved art, music and sports programs to pay for the unfunded mandates the new system requires.
This misapplication and intensification of high stakes testing provoked a huge statewide test revolt organized by parents, concentrated in Long Island, the Hudson Valley and Western New York, as well as a broad based movement against Common Core Standards, but is it any wonder that teachers, whose union leaders reluctantly supported the plan, are also rising up?
Teachers and children’s lives are being destroyed every day in New York State and some teachers decided that maybe a new, more confrontational style was required to deal with the arrogance of policy makers and the astro turf, billionaire supported education policy groups behind the new policies. So Badass Teachers Association was born, fueled by that rage and disappointment.
That is touched a chord with teachers throughout the nation, and the world, says something about how much concentrated power, and concentrated wealth, has undermined even the the pretense of democratic discussion regarding education policies.
Maybe it’s time to fight fire with fire.
In this post, Richard Eskow describes the manipulation of public opinion by people who call themselves reformers.
The attack on public education, he writes, is an attack on children and our nation’s future.
The playbook has been carefully planned and orchestrated. And the media fell for it, with few exceptions. Instead of calling them “reformers,” he says, they should be known as “demolishers.”
Here is a synopsis of the playbook:
“Pretend that “budgets” are the real crisis — but never mention that corporations and the wealthy are paying less in taxes than ever before in modern history.
“Make scapegoats of innocent people to draw attention away from yourselves. For Social Security they’ve attacked “greedy geezers,” but it’s hard to come up with a catchy equivalent for kids. (“Insatiable imps”? “Avaricious anklebiters”?) So they vilify teachers instead.
“Sell a fantasy which says that the private sector can do more, with less money, than government can. (Never, never mention that private insurance provides far less healthcare than public insurance, at much higher cost. And don’t bring up the mess privatization’s made of prisons and other government services.)
“Find a name that doesn’t use words like “money making.” How about “charter schools”?
“Describe yourselves as “reformers” – rather than, say, “demolishers.” That’s why “entitlement reform” is used as a euphemism for cutting Social Security and Medicare. (Michelle Rhee even called her autobiography “Radical.” Apparently “Shameless” was taken.)
“Employ the political and media elite’s fascination with (and poor understanding of) numbers. Suggest that “standardized” and “data-driven” programs will solve everything — without ever mentioning that the truly ideological decisions are made when you decide what it is you’re measuring.
“Co-opt the elite media into supporting your artificial description of the problem, as well as your entirely self-serving solution.
“Use your money to co-opt politicians from both parties so you can present your agenda as “bipartisan” — a word which means you can “buy” a few “partisans” from both sides.”
This is an alarming account of the frenzied efforts by Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Department of Education to cement his “legacy” of opening privately managed charter schools while abandoning the public schools for which he is responsible.
The high school named for the famed Socialist Norman Thomas will be closed and set aside as space for privately managed charters. This is a way of spitting on the memory of a crusader for the public sector, that is, if anyone at the New York City Department of Education ever heard of Norman Thomas.
The new charter high schools will not accept any transfer students; after all, they are not public schools, so why should they comply with the same rules as real public schools?
The article by Gail Robinson of City Limits says that the charter school community of hedge fund managers and equity investors is worried about what will happen after Bloomberg leaves office. There is always the risk that someone might be elected who doesn’t want to privatize public education.
“Until then, Bloomberg is doing what he can. When the new school year starts, the city will open 24 new charter schools, for a total of 183, with spending on the publicly funded, privately run schools set to top $1 billion. And the city Department of Education (DOE) continues to allocate space in public school buildings to many charter schools, which use the rooms rent free.
But the department is also looking beyond Bloomberg’s term, carving out rooms in district buildings for schools that will not open until fall 2014. One, PAVE II, got space in a Bushwick middle school building even though the state has not yet approved its existence. And DOE also has set aside space for a charter that was supposed to open in August 2011; the plan now is for it to finally begun admitting students in September 2014.”
PAVE Academy was started by a billionaire who prefers free space in public buildings, rather than buying or leasing space. Who can blame him? Why not take free public space if the mayor wants you to have it?
Bloomberg himself plans to open four new charter schools, in partnership with billionaire George Soros.
We can only hope and pray for a mayor who takes seriously his responsibility to improve the public education system, which enrolls more than one million children. The needs of those children have been treated as a measurement issue for a dozen years; the public schools have gotten no support, only threats of closure, as the mayor blithely pursues a free-market system, with favor and preference for schools that he does not control, the privately managed schools that enroll 6 percent of the city’s children. Who will care for the other 94%?
The first thing a new mayor should do is clean out the top layers of administrative personnel, those who have abetted the privatization of public education in the City of New York. Shame on them.
In this post, Jonathan Pelto assembles a timeline of the stunning court decision to remove Paul Vallas as superintendent of schools of Bridgeport, Connecticut. He includes Vallas’ tenure as superintendent of schools in Chicago, where he was hailed for “saving” the schools and in Philadelphia, where he installed the nation’s most sweeping privatization plan (to that point). Philadelphia and Chicago are now in crisis. Vallas then went on to New Orleans, where he oversaw the almost total privatization of that city’s schools after Hurricane Katrina. New Orleans is hailed by the media as a success but the Recovery School District is the lowest performing district in the state of Louisiana, its top schools skim, and it is propped up by infusions of millions of philanthropic dollars.
Just when you thought that you had heard it all, that “education reform” couldn’t get any zanier, EduShyster discovers that 50CAN is offering a Hogwarts University of Reform.
You won’t believe the faculty–many of whom unfortunately are deceased–and it won’t surprise you to learn that there is only one major.
Laugh along with EduShyster, but when you are done, ask yourself who makes up this foolishness, and does anyone believe it?
In this guest post on EduShyster’s blog, Susan Altman asks whether education reform is based on antiquated, obsolete ideas about business.
Altman is pursuing a master’s degree in International and Comparative Education and Business Management at Oxford University.
Yes, indeed, she says, the reformers look on schooling as a product, not a service. As a product, they seek to standardize it.
She writes:
“Think manufacturing, think Henry Ford and Model Ts on a conveyor belt. Think Taylorism. Now substitute fourth graders and math class for steering wheels and fenders and you have a disturbingly accurate picture of the business principles that inform much of contemporary education reform. According to this factory vision, students are all identical widgets while teachers are nothing more than mindless factory workers.”
This is not a 21st century paradigm, she says. The Ed reformers are stuck in an early 20th century way of thinking.
