Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
President Obama Comes to School (And It Is Not Good News)
It was a big, big day for the students at James C. Wright Middle School in Madison, Wisconsin, when the President came to town.
"The President of the United States is here in the same place where you walk the halls, where you learn," Wright principal Nancy Evans told the students. "Take this moment in history as nourishment."
Wright is a charter school with a mission to promote community involvement. It is also the school with the largest percentage of minority students, and students in poverty, in the Madison Metropolitan School District. Obama's visit lit up the crowd. Before the President walked into the gym to deliver a speech on education and pitch his "Race to the Top" initiative (a competitive federal grant program states must apply for), he met with forty students in the school library. The students who were picked for that meeting filed wide-eyed into the gym, where the rest of the school was assembled, just ahead of the President.
Eighth grader Deion Ford had shaved Obama's name into the back of his head.
The staff were giddy, too. "I learned today that I respect our President more than anyone in the universe and I respect his support for public education," the school band teacher enthused.
Obama's symbolic impact is hard to overstate.
The substance of his speech--an education policy talk that left the sixth, seventh, and eighth graders glassy-eyed--left plenty to be desired.
For too long, Obama told the crowd, "we've let partisanship and petty bickering stand in the way of progress. It's been Democrat versus Republican. it's been voucher versus public schools, it's been more money versus more reform. In some cases, people have seen schools as sort of a political spoil having to do with jobs and contracts instead of what we're teaching kids."
So began the pitch for what one activist education professor, Todd Price, who joined protests outside the school, called "No Child Left Behind on steroids."
Obama introduced "one of the best secretaries of education we've ever had," Arne Duncan, and explained the Race to the Top: States can get a chunk of $4.2 billion in federal grant money if they comply with certain requirements. The most controversial of these is the rule that they get rid of so-called firewalls, laws that, in some states, forbid linking teacher assessment and compensation to student test scores.
Obama criticizes some of the worst aspects of No Child Left Behind, including teaching to the test: "That's the last thing we want," he said. But he is still a proponent of standardized testing. The important thing, he said, is "not more testing," but to "get testing right." Tests need to measure "critical thinking, entrepreneurship, team work" "We are not just interested in 'can they fill out a bubble'?"
Still, the buzzword of the speech was "competition"--students must be more competitive with their counterparts in other countries, schools must compete to stay open, states must compete for resources from the federal government.
All that competing makes you wonder: Why must there be winners and losers in America's education system? Why can't we just make it federal policy to deliver the best education possible to all kids?
The competitiveness and personal responsibility themes carried right through Obama's speech up to the end, "There are always excuses for why schools can't perform," he said, "but what we want is an environment where everyone agrees . . . there is no excuse for mediocrity." Communities can compete for and win extra money from the Feds if they show that they can focus on underperfoming schools, "replacing a school's principal if it's not working, and at least half its staff, close a school for a time and then reopen it under new management, even shut down the school entirely."
"Lifting up American education is not a task for government alone," Obama said, moving on to the personal responsibility section of the speech. "It will take parents getting more involved in their child's education . . . . students accepting more responsibility."
In Bill Cosby mode, he told an anecdote about his own daughter, Malia, coming home with a 73 on her science test, and how she had to work to improve her grade.
"Malia and Sasha are just wonderful kids and Michelle is a wonderful mother," he said. But "there are times when kids slack off. There are times they'd rather be watching TV or playing a computer game than hitting the books."
In that crowd-pleasing, humorous-but-firm paternal style, the President described how he and his wife hold their own kids to high standards. He got a big round of applause from the parents and teachers when he told how his daughter thought getting 80-something on a test was good. "Our goal is 90 percent and up," he said when he straightened her out.
"Here is the interesting thing," the President continued. "She started internalizing that. So she came and she was depressed, 'I got a 73.' And I said, 'Well, what happened?' 'Well, the teacher -- the study guide didn't match up with what was on the test.' 'So what's your idea here?' 'Well, I'm going to start -- I've got to read the whole chapter. I'm going to change how I study, how I approach it.' So she came home yesterday, she was-- ' got a 95' -- right? -- so she's high-fiving. But here's the point. She said, "I just like having knowledge." That's what she said. And what was happening was she had started wanting it more than us. Now, once you get to that point, our kids are on their way. But the only way they get to that point is if we're helping them get to that point. So it's going to take that kind of effort from parents to set a high bar in the household. Don't just expect teachers to set a high bar. You've got to set a high bar in the household all across America."
Obama closed his speech on this shared-responsibility note: "It will take each and every one of us doing our part on behalf of our children and our country and the future that we share."
The President's role-model-in-chief routine has been heavily scrutinized. It strikes some people as condescending to African American families; on the other hand, the crowd at Wright Middle School loved it.
The more important question is, what is the Obama Administration doing about education?
Wisconsin governor Jim Doyle, speaking before Obama, joked that members of the audience at Wright Middle School should collar Arne Duncan and push Wisconsin's application for Race to the Top funds.
But those funds, even if the state qualified, would represent just a fraction of the money the governor recently cut from education funding in his state budget.
"We cut and reallocated over $500 million in Wisconsin from education in the state budget, and we are jumping through hoops for $80 million in Race to the Top funds," said Thomas J. Mertz, a history instructor at Edgewood College in Madison, and a parent of a Wright Middle School graduate who came out for the Books Not Bombs protest. "It just shows how desperate states are," he added. "It's like holding out a little piece of cake before the states and saying we may give you a bite if you jump through these hoops. It's cake, not the bread the states need, because it's targeted money for special initiatives."
Professor Todd Price, a teacher of education at National Louis University in Chicago and Kenosha, who also spoke at the protest, objects to the whole competitive, free-market education reform model. "States are in need of money not on a competitive basis but on an equitable basis," he said. The corporate speak particularly bothers him in light of the massive bank bailout by the Obama Administration. "If we taxpayers have already bailed out Wall Street, why do we have to compete for funds?"
Another group that came out to protest included Latina high school students who want the President to make good on his campaign promise to pass the Dream Act, which would help undocumented immigrants go to college.
"Our message is we want to go to college, too," said Madison East High School student Maria Santa Cruz. "We are still waiting for President Obama--he said it would be easy to do this right away when he got in office," Cruz said.
As the protest broke up, the students chanted "Sí se puede"--a poignant reminder of the Obama Presidential campaign.
- Posted in
54 Comments so far
Show All"Tests need to measure "critical thinking, entrepreneurship, team work"...
- Obama
But, what if those critical thinking skills lead one to reject the capitalist notion of "entrepeneurship"?
Bad boy! You are expelled!
- Obama is a neoliberal-privatizing capitalist nightmare. Anyone still think a Republican would have been worse?
I still believe we would actually be even worse off, but I think you're point is well taken. The problem (as shown in the recent elections) is democrats (especially <30) are not going to even bother voting for a neoliberal. For all the huge crowds Obama had during the campaign in 08, I doubt very few would show up today to hear him give a speech. If he doesn't change course, very few will show up at his campaign speeches in 2012.
Hello Lucky.
I would say that your response of "I still believe we would actually be even worse off" is very telling. Say you stepped outside and got hit by a bus and lost the ability to walk.
How could that be? What has Obama done that a republican wouldn't have done?
And I would take it further saying that Obama not only has done the same thing a republican president would be doing (bailing out banks, continuing the madness that is war, spending tax dollars on military rather education, not withdrawing from Iraq, allowing Israel to continue on with it's destructive ways, not ending the embargo in Cuba etc etc) but he has the "left" and "liberal" base of America, acting like he can do no wrong, because he is Obama and a democrat.
If a republican was at the helm, I bet their would be more people showing up at protests and being fed up.
Just a thought. Have a nice weekend.
"What has Obama done that a republican wouldn't have done?"
If McShame had won, Our economy would still be in free-fall, although as much or more money would have been poured into Wall Street, there would be NO oversight. Look at how the Bushies structured TARP. Look at how the stimulus was tracked. Night and Day. Oh, and the Stimulus package? Cash for clunkers, et cetera, wouldn't have happened. The support to states for education that was in that package would have been buried and the teachers that still have their jobs because of that stimulus would have been fired. The GOP are SO concerned about deficits.
The War in Iraq would not be winding down (actually a little ahead of schedule). In fact, it was the plan that Obama's campaign put forward that Maliki and the Iraqi Parliament siezed on and made into the SOFA that Bush was forced to sign, you could say that CANDIDATE Obama ended the Iraq War. McShame would have "surged" instead. And we'd have sent another 80 000 troops to Afghanistan unless we'd already nuked Iran in which case, it would be more like 500 000 and we'd be drafting every able-bodied young male for duty in the Fourth World War, with operations from Pakistan clear across to Syria.
We'd still be spending a huge pile on Bush's plan to put radars and missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic (it's a "Stimulus") and still would be at daggerpoints with Russia. Instead, we are talking with them about ways to defuse the tensions with Iran.
If McShame had won, the Hate Crimes bill that includes Gays would have been vetoed, if it ever got through Congress.
McShame wouldn't have told Netanyahu to freeze settlements, he'd have cheered on the genocide in Gaza and offered more weapons (as opposed to stopping shipments that were enroute during that attrocity).
McShame would not have opened sideline talks with Cuba at OAS and would have been the first to congratulate Micheletti on his "great victory".
And we wouldn't even have a healthcare reform debate in progress, the Insurance companies would be deregulated and could charge whatever, dump for whatever reason...
We'd still have hopeless cronies clogging up the Agencies, climate change deniers running EPA, Rudy Giulianni as Attorney General, another Scalia on the Supreme court bench
Need I go on?
I can.
But you get the message, right?
Not that Obama is perfect, I'd like to see him be a little more forward, but by comparison to what we could have been facing, there's no comparison.
As for people showing up at protests? The last few major protests while Bush was in office fizzled due to lack of turnout, why? Because the GOP (who own the Media), blacked out demonstrations so thoroughly that most of US gave up that method. It's expensive, time consuming and doesn't accomplish squat when no one knows that it happened.
We did see an uptick in Protests, actually, all summer long, a bunch of people that really hate Obama. And they got HUGE Media coverage. Maybe you'd be at home with them?
Um, You say, "McShame wouldn't have told Netanyahu to freeze settlements, he'd have cheered on the genocide in Gaza and offered more weapons (as opposed to stopping shipments that were enroute during that attrocity)."
What shipments of weapons to Israel did Obama stop during Israel's massacre at the Gaza Ghetto? I can't find any evidence that Obama did anything other than stay quiet during the massacre, thus encouraging Israel to continue it, and then send a big shipment of replacement weapons to Israel following the massacre.
So what if Obama "told Netanyahu to freeze settlements?" There were no teeth behind this "request," and Netanyahu has responded by speeding up Israel's theft of Palestinian land.
Sign me up as one of those who has noticed that the "change we can believe in" is the same old crap, right down the line, in education, in foreign policy, in healthcare (the "reform" is now just a giveaway to the insurance companies, thanks to Obama taking single payer off the table), etc., etc., etc.
On target pj, double speak, and let's not forget it was at an entrepreneur school.
*Everyone* needs to have good Critical Thinking skills. This has nothing to do with the political Right or Left. There are many resourcces on the web. Start with Logical Fallacies, just my suggestion.
Fact is, school reform requires big money. Four and a half billion won't cut it. It is easy to set high standards, reward teachers with fairly insignificant salary increases when their students perform well on standardized tests, and pontificate about how we all value education, but it is hard to come up with decent school facilities, a fair salary for those who work in education, and to develop methods of assessment that go beyond goofy multiple choice tests.
Only in America with No Child Left Behind do people give less money to schools with the greatest need. As a former teacher with over thirty years of experience, I despair that politicians can ever understand the teaching/learning experience. I wonder where all these "super-teachers" are going to come from. Certainly not from the ranks of intelligent, caring young people who wish to be given freedom to make classroom decisions without the likes of Arne Duncan looking over their shoulders.
Conniff touches on the core philosophical problem in Modern America, We have lost our sense of cooperation. Everything has been put on a competitive basis. Only the "Best" can win and only the winners get to survive, everyone else is off the island, disappeared into obscurity. It's at the core of Capitalism. It's the central philosophy of the Conservatives.
And it's killing US.
We can't consider Climate Change because responding to it will hamper our ability to compete. We can't cut back on our Military budget for same reason. Every child MUST bring home A's or the school will lose funding.
This is the unspoken subtext to the Republican/Conservative culture war. Winners make the big money and collect all the cream, everyone else are losers, fu(k 'em. It's all about the Star player, no mention of the rest of the team. Caring about other people? LOSER. This has been the popular mode since the end of the seventies and the rise of Reaganism. The Triumphalist, blowhard, tough guy stance that he portrayed made selfishness a virtue and cooperation a weakness.
How right you are! This will not change and it's the basic reason the USA is declining and failing. I don't expect anything to change in that regard.
I heartily agree with all you said but I would modify 'best' to 'perceived best' since many of the Masters of the Universe are nothing more than smart criminals who have, due only to their criminality, managed to game the system and control the spin about themselves.
When you control the media and have politicans worshipping at your feet, you can easily fool people into believing it was your smarts that entitles you to all the spoils...that you're indispensably smart...too-big-to-fail smart.
Yes, that's why Best was in quotes.
The emphasis on "competition" is just rhetoric to justify throwing the public to the curve, as in cutting public services and/or transfering them to private sector/cronies, and offshoring middle class jobs. This talk has been going on since the late 70's (I'm 53) and has been promoted by the national "leadership" of both parties as well as by the media/academia complex. The elites made a decision back in the 70's to throw the American public to the curve, and all of this "free market"/"competion" talk was just a means to sell this policy to the public, as in "if your job was offshored/public services shut down it's your fault" and screw you. Obama is just another version of Reagan; he charasmatically pushes the same neoliberal policies just from a different place on the court.
"The President of the United States is here in the same place where you walk the halls, where you learn," Wright principal Nancy Evans told the students. "Take this moment in history as nourishment."
Yes, the nourishment you get from a bag of Fritos or a Pop Tart. Obama, King of Empty Calories.
Good one
No CHild Left Without a Kick in the Behind was a 100% corporate takeover of public education,
Charter schools included.
The takeover will be complete in 2014 - with no school left behind.
How do I know?
Cause no school on the face of the planet will achieve the unachievable.
In 2014, a school must get 97% of a student body to pass the test.
Only 10% of special needs kids get a special test.
Clearly a set up - no challenge there.
Kaika,
"No Child Left Without a Kick in the Behind"
Very funny--hadn't heard that version of "No Child Left..." before. Thanks for the laugh.
Also, as an educator who works with middle school and high school students, I can attest to the fact that excessive competition is an education killer. Yes, it can be a useful motivating factor for the students at the top, but it devastates self confidence for those in the middle and below.
One of the major problems is that competitive testing does not take into account developmental differences in young students. Setting unrealistic goals for those children who are not cognitively ready to meet them is a recipe for disaster--no matter how many kicks in the behind we may "helpfully" give them.
Except for pressing for parental responsibility there is nothing in Obama's education speeches that make even the remotest sense for useful "education reform" and even with regard to "parental responsibility" it is rather vague what he means.
His stories about his own children make me pity them. One day my ten-year old youngest son came home and was reluctant to show me his grades. He had a failing grade. My response floored him. I said: "let's celebrate with getting an ice cream because you cannot be perfect all the time (he was usually straight-A). He has never forgotten that his dad did not round on him for one failing grade!
For a Montessori child like me I am appalled by nearly every scheme for "education reform" because these reformers do not understand how vulnerable education is and that the most destructive strategy is to try to change "education" every four years.
For me as a Montessori child the question is: "why go to school to get educated"? To become a mature/wise/knowledgeable person or another cog in the economic system? Everything I hear from Obama tells me that he favors the second.
The first thing that must be done to improve the educational systems of our country is the abolition of the Federal Department of Education. The only task Washington has is to make absolutely sure that School Districts do not discriminate with regards to race, ethnicity, gender, or funding. That alone is a 24/7/265 job.
A little Draconian, don't you think?--getting rid of the Department of Ed. I don't think it is out of place to assess districts, schools, teachers, or even students--providing the assessments are fair and a good measure of what is being learned. I think the Department could be a clearing house for exemplary practices in education. It could provide money for programs that benefit certain populations like those who do not speak English. The Department of Ed could fund research that answers practical questions that affect students' experience in schools. It could fund innovative curriculum as it did in the sixties with the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study.
Just because the Department is currently performing poorly does not mean it should be abolished. The real problem with it is that is divorced from teaching/learning--staffed with individuals like Arne Duncan who are far separated from schools and children. Such people need to listen, not always talk to educators, parents, and students. Obama's recent appearance in Wisconsin is a perfect example. He prescribes, never asks for input. Of course, with his private school upbringing he doesn't know squat about public education. Ignoring that gap in his knowledge, he feels free to give prescriptions and nostrums. Too bad--he communicates so well in other domains.
"The real problem with it is that is divorced from teaching/learning".
And what makes you believe that this will ever change because you describe what is widely known as a bureaucracy? Research into practical questions are probably better done at Universities than at the DoE. Assessing districts, schools, teachers, and students has led to the disastrous "leave no child behind" which is exactly what you describe as assessing etc. Getting rid of DoE draconian? What about liberating?
But it does seem kind of odd, doesn't it, that most countries in the world have a Department of Education? With our overwhelming sense of individualism we believe that government can do no good and that individuals can do better. Except, frequently, they can't. Why not have the Federal government insist that states meet certain standards in order for them to receive federal money? Standards that insist at-risk populations can fair treatment, for example. Or setting some kind of standard that insures students will not be getting inferior educations and not even knowing it?
Universities can do research, but most receive grants from the Federal Government. The Dept. of Ed provides the resources to do research. Much of it is half-baked, I agree, but that could be fixed.
I will never defend No Child Left Behind, but remember, it was not a product of the Department of Ed but was the result of politicians imagining they had all the answers and creating a law that was unfriendly to teachers, students, families, and communities. Politicians, by the way, of the stripe of Ted Kennedy as well as George W. Bush.
"Most countries on Earth" have educational systems which are totally different in their structure from ours. In the Netherlands about which I know the most, the schools are run by cities, that is to say professional politicians. Moreover, the Dutch DoE is just as much reviled by the population as is ours. Try again.
Don't know if the Netherlands, with a population smaller than one of our larger cities, is a good model for the US. The US has more diversity, more poverty, greater distances to deal with than that tiny country.
What's wrong with national standards? I think about seventy percent of learning should be common to all schools and students. You simply have to be able to do basic math, understand basic science concepts, read text that is written at an adult level. Every student should be able to write decently and should know a modicum of world and national history. That is not asking too much.
Without national standards what do you have? Students who know the Bible but not a whit of evolution? Basic arithmetic facts but no advanced mathematics? A knowledge of history that glamorizes religion and papers over its failings? There are states that would rewrite the curriculum if they could. A national curriculum would prevent that.
Why not hold the D of Ed to its own standards?
If it is not achieving too acceptable standards then defund it and shut it down.
I see no problem in allowing States to set their own standards, in fact it allows for more freedom and custom requirements.
This comment 10:25 AM -- is absolute Bull--- The Federal D of Ed does not teach students--- It manages money --- As to allowing states to set their own standards---- The one I live in would produce nothing but ignorance--- someone above said it well ---- there is a core of knowledge that is necessary to functional literacy.
But 0's not talking about assessing teachers. He's talking about pretending to assess teachers by assessing their students.
God forbid a teacher should take on a class of ESL students or students whose parents don't own a bookshelf!
The problem here is not that 0 doesn't communicate. He espouses policies that aim to corporatize education: to streamline education to serve corporate needs as opposed to the needs of students or the need of the commons for a literate and critically active populace.
This is not even a matter of 0 not understanding the shortcomings of what he suggests. 0 aims to centralize power, and aims to give centralized power a face that all the non-white people most put down by power can relate to and hope from.
The consistency with his policy to kill more Iraqis, Afghans, Pakistanis, Colombianos and likely Venezolanos is fairly complete.
I am the first to agree with you that simplistic assessments of students to evaluate teacher performance are not only unfair but also create an incentive to teach to the test and to cheat by giving answers, cherry-picking the students that take the test, as well as changing answers on the scoring sheet. I will never defend that proposed policy of O and Duncan. What experienced teacher would?
The corporatizing of education--that may be a byproduct of O's education policy, but I do not think it is a goal. Reliance on standardized testing to make judgments about districts, schools, and teachers certainly does serve corporate interests, both in the test construction, administration, and scoring as well as in steering learning away from humanistic goals and towards practical skills which benefit corporations.
I do not agree that O wants to centralize education. Not at the Federal level anyway. That requires serious money, which he does not have to give. He would like to set national standards and I am not so sure that is a bad idea. Most every advanced nation in the world has a set of educational standards. With us, those standards are created by states and they differ widely in quality.
I do not see the racism you do in present federal educational policy. Kids from underprivileged backgrounds--black, Hispanic, Indian, Asian, white--get the same treatment--which to say, treatment that does not recognize their backgrounds and treatment that does not recognize their strengths.
I do not see the connection between O's foreign policy--which you summarize as killing people--and his educational policy.
Granted we have some common areas, Drosera, let me move straight to your thoughtful objections.
As to whether the corporatization is or is not a goal, let me grant also that I cannot read minds. However, since corporatization of education results from the infliction of this kind of testing, since it is supported strongly by other organizations that move strongly to corporatize education (see the IMF's recent work in Oaxaca), and since these things are likely well known to 0bama and those in his administration who deal with education, and since none of this makes education cost more or less, I have concluded for present that corporatization is indeed the goal.
By centralizing education I do not mean federalizing or nationalizing it. Attaching funding, including pay of instructors, to the kind of one-culture-fits-all standardization that 0 recommends and that Bush championed deprives funding of potentially counter-culture projects and culturally reflective projects and deprives funding to multicultural areas, classes, and people. The testing is therefore inherently elitist, classist, and racist -- although I certainly do not mean to extend those characterizations to all who might support these tests, much less testing in general.
(I find Stephen Jay Gould's THE MISMEASURE OF MAN a glorious exploration of the inherent flaws in this type of thing, BTW.)
The racism in federal educational policy comes precisely from not recognizing cultural differences. There's nothing "color-blind" about this blindness: because they assume that an American standard is indeed a good-for-all and species-universal standard, they would hold all to a monocultural American standard. Holding all students to a monocultural standard may be damaging to all, but not equally or identically. The practice effectively targets minorities, though the folks pulling the trigger may or may not be blind to it.
Again, I don't read minds, but this seems an odd error for a man with 0's history.
I do not intend to "summarize" 0's foreign policy as killing, and I apologise for whatever unclarity may have given that impression. "Summary" seems to imply that there I find no other aspect to it.
I do find killing the most salient aspect of 0's foreign policy, though, so I do want to leave that foregrounded.
The connection works like this.
I assume that 0's murders come not primarily from any inherent bloodlust on his part, but to centralize power: "Just business" in a Don Corleone kind of way.
I think that because the large lines of US foreign policy, 0bama's or Cheney's, appear consistent to me if and only if I assume that they move to get near monopoly on hydrocarbon resources.
I'm open to other explanation.
I assume that the centralized power would be used to dictate terms and conditions of economic interactions, and I'd put that under the "nothing new under the sun" category. The elites would use it to enslave people, basically. That slavery might be as subtle or unsubtle as the elites find convenient, but we're probably equally uncomfortable with the history of such decisions.
Similarly, 0's moves in education work to centralize control over knowledge and data within a culture, a class, and a set of cultural assumptions. Accordingly, both move in consonance, moved by the same assumptions about human interactions. Since both centralize power, both operate in mutually supporting ways.
I find that the above indicates that neither move is accidental, though again, I don't read minds, and the chain of mutually contingent observations is admittedly rather large.
I'd love to see this refined or updated, for what that's worth.
Nice post, thanks. I enjoy responding to thoughtful communication rather than the rants that frequently fill this space.
As a retired teacher, I do hate standardized testing. I confess I even had a role in constructing the Michigan Science Assessment, though originally that was conceived as a test that would ask students to perform investigations and write out responses to questions that dealt with real world issues. Needless to say, because of cost, the form of the test changed to standard multiple choice emphasizing rote memory. I should have known better, but I felt at the time that, as a teacher, better that I should generate test items than someone who did not teach.
Where you and I disagree, you are apparently convinced O and Bush have a sinister agenda behind their pushing standardized testing as the method of evaluating schools, teachers, and kids. I am not so sure. I think ignorance of teaching/learning plays a major role in their education planning. Obama went to private schools for most of his life. Duncan is a businessman and does not really understand the issues except in terms of running a business. I assume Bush went to private schools mostly. Ignorance seems likely explanation for the choices they make.
Also, I am not totally convinced that your centralization of power is for economic gain. I know most visitors to this site feel that way, but I think our foreign policy has to do with the deeply felt conviction that the American way of life is superior to all others. That view explains missionary work over two centuries as well as some of our wars--the Mexican War of the 1840's, the Spanish-American War and the Cold War over most of the twentieth century. We do not fear attack from other countries but we do fear ways of life that are different from our own--be it communism, Islam, or--God forbid!--the socialism of the Nordic countries.
Of course, it is never the interests of our nation generally that are defended through foreign policy or educational policy, but the interests of the ruling class. We probably have some areas of agreement about racism in education--the system is not designed to be friendly towards minorities. We disagree in that I believe all people--white, black, Hispanic, Indian--should be able to do certain things when they graduate from high school--those standards are universal and are not biased in favor of any particular group. Being able to do mathematics and science and reading and writing does not imply any sort of racial bias.
No Child Left Without a Kick in the Behind was a 100% corporate buyout of the entire educational system.
The standarized test is simply a mechanism to phase in the takeoever.
The takeover is of all public schools, regular and charter.
How can you tell if info is correct?
In 2014, the law says that a school must get 97% of their students to pass the test.
10% of special needs kids get a special test.
A challenge or a set up?
When a school fails, a local school board gets to choose from 1 of 3 national corporations to run their school
The national corporation never looses their contract, doesn't have to live up to testing percentages.
Here's a multiple choice test for you...
The president is either:
a) stupid
b) complicit
c) a puppet
d) all the above
Watch the movie Food Inc
it shows how the corporations took over food
Watch The Money Masters
It shows how the fed operates to our all's disadvantage
Check out www.sudval.org
This web site illuminates A REAL EDUCATIONAL format
montessori has high points for me as an alternative
Sudbury Valley, however, has won me over completely!
best to you....
"We need to look forward as opposed to looking backward." -Obama
That's called irresponsibility Obama.
Personal responsibility begins at the top Obama.
Wow. I really feel sorry for Obama's kids. He's training them to be mini-imperialists.
This scam of "no child behind" only serves the empire to spit out future Harvard Law and Business school criminals.
It's very sad that children can not be individuals who are encouraged to be kind and explore the arts and other cultures.
We really need to retire this one to his ranch, or is it Martha's vineyard?
NO MORE years for Obama.
It's not going to get better, people.
deleted
Punish those who most need help and give more advantages to those who are already ahead.
As it is in banking, so be it in schools?
This is the American way?
Competition was mentioned because it breeds winners. Without competition you end up with mediocrity. The other key word equally important is cooperation. Both competition and cooperation are necessary to create the correct venue for teaching excellence. It is not required to place one of these methods ahead of the other as they are both equally important.
yes - a voice getting to the heart of the matter
No Child Left Without a kick in the Behind WAS a 100% corporate buyout of the entire public school system
charter schools included
in 2014, a school needs to get 97% of their students to pass the test
10% of special needs kids get a special test
If a school fails to meet the mark, then the school board gets to choose from1 of 3 national corporations to run their school
The corporations never have to live up to any testing standard
So here's the multiple choice question:
Is this....
a set up
or
a challenge?
Your right.
They privatized it
They stole it
In an Underhanded, low life kind of way
Archie Bunker?
"All that competing makes you wonder: Why must there be winners and losers in America's education system? Why can't we just make it federal policy to deliver the best education possible to all kids?"
This is the one thing that alienated me so much as a public school student. School was made out to be a big and lengthy game. It was all about "achievement" and "scores" and "performance." It was never about learning, discovery. Well, at times it was, but those times were few and far between.
They "tracked" us too. The affluent kids, mostly white, were put in advanced classes, then there was a "high tech" program for the middle income kids, and "mainstream" for the rest, meaning you were taught "the basics" by a bored suburbanite who wouldn't dare send their kids to the same school as you.
Oh btw, they keep closing schools in my city...
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09307/1010355-53.stm
However, they always seem to find money for new arenas and stadiums though. Hmmm. And UPMC, a sickeningly profitable "non-profit" doesn't have to pay taxes.
They always find MUCH MUCH more money for the military. Everything else is peanuts compared to what the military gets.
I'm as sick of people being starstruck with Obama as I am with the right-wing hatred. And it's largely revolving around his race! They love him 'cause he's black, they hate him 'cause he's black. It's insanity!
Your president must drop his "no mind" mantra to "Get it Right".
He obviously hasn't a clue, or he's "controlled".
Neither suggests that military/corporate governance is not in your future.
The political term for said governance is Fascism.
Just as the 1936 Germans were duped by NAZI propaganda,
so are Americans in 2009.
You're going to suffer...but you can choose how, and to what end.
Just from my brief perusal of many of these postings, I felt compelled to at least offer at least a few statistics as some sort of reality check. Below are just a few articles found on the topic:
Less centralized education system across the states:
http://www.newsbatch.com/education.htm
Lack of focus on subjects starting from earlier grades:
http://4brevard.com/choice/international-test-scores.htm
Less time spent on studying and more spent watching television:
http://www.usnews.com/articles/education/2008/01/30/comparing-american-students-with-those-in-china-and-india.html
And while I am certainly not making any concrete judgment on the veracity of these claims being the sole causes of where American students rank among those from other countries, they certainly merit consideration merit consideration.
Do we really want to test our kids on critical thinking? What if a kid said "This school system sucks and this test is BS" and tore up the test? Would that be a pass or a fail?
I think critical thinking is oft touted and rarely valued.
Joe
"Do we really want to test our kids on critical thinking? What if a kid said "This school system sucks and this test is BS" and tore up the test? Would that be a pass or a fail?"
There ya go.
"If you quietly accept and go along no matter what your feelings are, ultimately you internalize what you're saying, because it's too hard to believe one thing and say another. I can see it very strikingly in my own background. Go to any elite university and you are usually speaking to very disciplined people, people who have been selected for obedience. And that makes sense. If you've resisted the temptation to tell the teacher, 'You're an asshole,' which maybe he or she is, and if you don't say, 'That's idiotic,' when you get a stupid assignment, you will gradually pass through the required filters. You will end up at a good college and eventually with a good job."
Noam Chomsky
First, it's the teacher's responsibility to discipline and cram information down the throats of kids for them to regurgitate onto standardized tests. Then, it's the parents' responsibility to get the kids to cram the information down their own throats. Next, it's the teachers again.
The banks don't have to compete to get their trillions -- they just demand them. But all the taxpayers who bailed them out have to compete hard against each other to get the scraps that the bankers toss back in complete ingratitude.
And Obama's intentionally aiding them on. Good ole' double-speak double-standard Obama. The audacity of faux.
in a world of operational increasing, increasing scarcity, the winners win and the losers are allowed to die. Obatheprez won big..."Win like i did", he says to dick and jane; see dick and jane run; see dick and jane compete with jack and jill, see the winners win; see the losers lose....
Obatheprez and Arnedunc are happy,- but what's that smell? is it auschwitz? or just afghan and pakistani and gazan children burning with white phosphorus? See Arnedunc and Obatheprez playing basketball together....Obatheprez and Arnedunc are truly, truly happy...
Obama's education plan is worse than the malignant Bush plan. Arne Duncan took our third largest school system (Chicago) and militarized it. He closed schools, fired teachers, privatized and opened new schools and hired new teachers with the net results being a more segregated, more test oriented, much more militarized (highest ROTC presence in the country), less unionized system that looks like a pipeline for the poor to enter the military. Our children as canon fodder, the poor ones that is, as more and more of us struggle and join the ranks of the underclass. We have become the least socially mobile (your children will have it better than you did) of all the industrialized nations. Our misguided education system is a major culprit. What a sin to let our children down this way. We can and have done so much better.
The primary and most important educational institution in the US is the rear bumper of your car, where you can proudly display your true colors.
School are a place children go to be out of the house.
Thank you the for excellent commentary, Ms. Coniff.
I live in the Madison area and our state leg. just voted on a party line basis to support Obama's anti-research merit pay policy.
With no evidence that it works to improve schooling our Democratically controlled leg. just supported their Democratic president by requiring districts to include test scores as part of teacher evaluation. With no evidence available that this works we now will have an even higher profile for the out-dated, horse and buggy accountability measure known as the standardized test.
The other better reflections of what students know and can do: performances, exhibitions, portfolios, and learning records are not required. Indeed, most legislators don't even give evidence they know what they are.
The constricting of the curriculum, increasing passivity of the student mind, the straight jacketing of teacher innovation has now been furthered all as part of the sole misguided effort to improve the economy and get a high paying job---that won't for most of them ever exist.
The other parts of a child's education: learning to be caring, developing actively engaging citizenship skills, nurturing their artistic abilities, and so forth, are only relevant for private schools such as the one Obama's children attend, Sidwell Friends, where the teacher-student ratio is 15 to 1.
Just visit their website to see the kind of education that is not for the bunch o facts public schools.
Thank you the for excellent commentary, Ms. Coniff.
I live in the Madison area and our state leg. just voted on a party line basis to support Obama's anti-research merit pay policy.
With no evidence that it works to improve schooling our Democratically controlled leg. just supported their Democratic president by requiring districts to include test scores as part of teacher evaluation. With no evidence available that this works we now will have an even higher profile for the out-dated, horse and buggy accountability measure known as the standardized test.
The other better reflections of what students know and can do: performances, exhibitions, portfolios, and learning records are not required. Indeed, most legislators don't even give evidence they know what they are.
The constricting of the curriculum, increasing passivity of the student mind, the straight jacketing of teacher innovation has now been furthered all as part of the sole misguided effort to improve the economy and get a high paying job---that won't for most of them ever exist.
The other parts of a child's education: learning to be caring, developing actively engaging citizenship skills, nurturing their artistic abilities, and so forth, are only relevant for private schools such as the one Obama's children attend, Sidwell Friends, where the teacher-student ratio is 15 to 1.
Just visit their website to see the kind of education that is not for the bunch o facts public schools.
Obama: Just another Empire of Manifest Insanity's Death Star Chasm in the classroom!