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The State of the Union’s Schools: What We'd Like to Hear from Obama, But Won’t
While everyone knows that Barack Obama's State of the Union speech is likely to continue to push for the agenda that we've been facing in Race to the Top — privatization, more testing and test based "accountability," Arne Duncan's meanderings, more charter schools, and the other policies that have taken the nation's public schools further towards ruin than anything imagined when George W. Bush was President — we can at least try an imaginary alternative. Hence, the following wording from a State of the Union speech that we won't hear (at least not from the current President of the United States): 
. . . . And now I would like to turn to a subject that all of us, including myself, love to talk about, even when we sometimes don’t understand exactly what we are saying — or at least don’t fully understand the implications of what we’re saying. The subject is education, and the state of the Union’s educational system is, well, not so great, if you live in one of the thousands of poor communities across our great land. In the leafier, middle class communities of America, things are pretty good. In fact, the most recent international test comparisons show that our middle class children are performing at or above the levels of children in other Western countries. That is why I want to spend a few minutes talking about how we can do better, particularly for that 20 percent, or that bottom quintile, of American children who now live in poverty, the same ones who are struggling against great odds with hopes of some day claiming a share of the American dream.
For the past decade, at least, our national education policies have had mostly negative consequences for the children they were intended to help. No Child Left Behind with its unachievable test performance demands for both poor and non-poor has resulted in the early failures, the urban public school systems, being blown apart by sanctions that punish the children and the teachers and shut down their schools while doing little or nothing to bring resources to bear to change the awful poverty that is largely responsible for the weak academic performance in these schools. Now I am not saying this in order that we once again blame the poor for the effects of their poverty, but, rather, to point out the need now to take what we know about who is struggling and who is failing, to finally deliver on our promise to bring educational hope and change to those who haven’t had much of it in the recent, or distant, past.
I am, therefore, ordering the Education Department to draft regulatory language that will freeze NCLB performance targets at their 2010 levels until a thorough evaluation of the current policy on testing and accountability can be undertaken. Toward that end, I am requesting the formation of a blue ribbon taskforce to be comprised of educators and educational leaders from K-12 and higher ed, education policy experts, representatives from both political parties, union representatives, and parent groups to come together, deliberate, and to make recommendations toward actionable legislation for the long overdue reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that, henceforth, will be known as the Education Debt Repayment Act (EDRA).
An education suitable for a hopeful future for all American children cannot be sustained by practices from a past that is better left behind. The practices of segregation and apartheid in America should hold no attraction for us, and yet our federal policies have urged us back in that direction, particularly with the encouragement of widespread charter schools. With zero tolerance charter schools as the only choice to weak public schools for poor parents, most middle class parents would not and will not send their children to these schools because they are so severe. On the other hand, we have the high-flying charter schools in white suburbs that do not provide public transportation or lunches for that poor children would need if they could be enrolled in them. In either case, the result is increased segregation.
Too, these segregating charters often drain tax dollars away from public schools that could use those funds for renewal, restoration, and renovation during these hard economic times, when the best research tells us that less than 20 percent of charter schools are doing better than the struggling regular public schools they are replacing. Therefore, I am declaring a moratorium on federal funding for all new charter schools until the Institute of Educational Science and the Government Accounting Office can complete a thorough review of charter school benefits, costs, and overall effects on America’s public schools.
At the same time, I am directing the Secretary of Education to devise clear guidelines for generous grant funding for any school, school system, or consortium to put in place programs to challenge the re-segregation trends in America’s schools today and in the future by creating new magnet school initiatives or by initiating or improving programs based on socioeconomic diversity with public school choice.
Finally, I want to announce a new initiative regarding teacher quality. Just as we cannot afford, either morally or economically, to return to an America that had segregated schools, we cannot turn our backs on our commitment to the most important and, of late, the most vilified of professions. I am speaking, of course, of teachers, who are daily in charge of that precious 20 percent of our population that constitute 100 percent of our future. Since the days of Horace Mann and the Common School Crusade, school reformers have pushed for more qualified and better-educated teachers. But in recent years, those standards for entering the profession, which were often weak already, have been weakened further by lowering requirements or by encouraging a Peace Corps approach to teacher recruitment in poor areas.
While we applaud those enthusiastic new graduates who sign up to teach two years in the hardest to staff schools, this is not enough for a country that believes that hope for a professionally-trained teacher and a quality public school should not be limited by one’s zip code. In order to make sure that every child in America’s public education system has a professionally prepared and highly-qualified teacher, I am announcing a new program to attract, recruit, and train this generation’s best and brightest college graduates who have the desire, character, intellect, and disposition to become teachers in America’s most challenging learning environments.
Under this new initiative, college graduates with liberal arts and science majors may apply for Teach America Grants (TAG). These grants will pay for post-graduate training at the level of Masters in Education and Teaching (MET), while paying a stipend for living expenses until TAG graduates find suitable employment in schools with America’s lowest-achieving children. I am requesting that Congress authorize $1.6 billion per year for the next five years to educate the first 100,000 TAG teachers.
Now with such an investment in making available the best and brightest teachers in poor schools, we cannot afford to leave these communities in disrepair from generations of malignant neglect. We cannot afford for the conditions of poverty to burn out and burn up our investments in educational hope and change. Because we know that when poverty and the effects of poverty are reduced, so will the schools in those communities improve if programs and teachers are put in place to coincide with those community changes, my Administration is announcing the creation of a new paradigm for educational policy. We are transitioning, then, from policies aimed at creating magnet schools, even though they can be helpful in the short term, to a new policy of creating magnet communities. These new magnet communities will attract diverse job opportunities and diverse populations to work, to live, to rebuild, and to restore the poorest areas of our cities.
That is why I am directing the Secretaries for Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Labor, and Transportation, to appoint representatives at the Assistant Secretary level to participate fully in the EDRA Taskforce deliberations, with authorization to bring to bear the full resources of their departments in crafting an education policy that treats the learning problem of the poor as not only a school problem, but as a jobs problem, a housing problem, a transportation problem, and a health problem. Until these problems are addressed with the appropriate resources required to do so effectively, the education debt that we owe to every parent with a child in a poor school cannot be paid.
And until that debt is paid, it is the President and Congress that must be held accountable by the American people. The old saying of “No Excuses” will no longer serve as an excuse for doing nothing to improve the desperate lives of the working poor and their children, who deserve an education that can sustain the hope that we as adults urge upon them.
These efforts to rethink and renew our commitments to quality public schools for all children follow a tradition that began over 200 years ago with Noah Webster and Thomas Jefferson. The future of our democratic and economic aspirations as a free people rests upon a well-educated citizenry, and that that can only happen as a result of equal opportunity being extended to all children, rather than the best opportunities for some with the worst for others. These educational changes that I am announcing tonight represent a new beginning for the restoration of a national commitment to educational equity and excellence for all. A free people demand nothing less, for as Jefferson still reminds us, "if a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
33 Comments so far
Show AllObama is firmly in line with His Class.
Obama and all the politicians (D or R) are in thrall to the billionaires' club which is behind this push to privatize our schools. Bill Gates, the Broads, the Waltons, the Dells, the hedge fund managers, etc., are not educational experts but they get to decide the direction that education takes now and in the years to come. And when the educational snake oil which they are pursuing fails, they will not be held accountable, they will just blithely move on to their next bogus initiative.
If not for all the money from the billionaires' club, there would be no charter schools, no vouchers nor any school choice.
I am glad that Jim Horn pointed out that our schools in strongly middle class and wealthier communities are just as good as the schools in high performing foreign countries and often better. We don't have a failing school system we have a society that is failing the poor and the communities devastated by poverty and inequality.
Horn is spot on; public schools only work for those in the upper tiers (classes) of our society. It is completely dysfunctional below this line. It's a huge problem on the scale of any of the other looming crisis, i.e. health care & unemployment. And it is clear that the Obama administration is content to leave the problem up to market forces to repair.
The rich have health care, the rich are employed, the rich have access to a quality education. This system works only for the rich. What about everyone else? How are we to get by? Does Obama and the corporatists expect the rest of us to docilely slip into our yoke and slave away forever on their corporate farm? This is not only an immoral system, it is crude and backwards. The system is bound to collapse under the growing social and natural forces that it helped to create.
Well said.
This whole thing looks like more of the same old bromides.
Freeze NCLB at 2010 levels? Dump it altogether along with all the teachiung to the test rubbish.
More money for schools? No proof that more money provides anything but more cost. Student education seems NOT to be hitched to money spent.
Charter schools? Not much different than most public schools it seems.
The real problem seems to be the students. Their attitudes and desires. That can reflect their parents attitudes and desires I suppose. But the real problem seems to be at this point. Not teachers, not too little money nor even enviornment, though obviously enviornment generates obvious parameters, but also obviously that is nopt the problem, just a factor.
And perhaps JerzyJoe has the other factor, "we have a society that is failing" our students. We as a society do not seem to have the courage to question the possibility we are asking the wrong questions, listening to the wrong people or refusing to consider possibilities that make us uncomfortable.
More money not the solution??? How about this example from a prior series of emails I've had with two brothers I've known all my life who are very successful businessmen who continually bash public education.
From one to me:
"CLAYTON SCHOOLS > Sophomores outshine global peers • Last year's crop of sophomores at Clayton High School can boast that they have outperformed students in 70 countries, at least in one measure. Last year, the high school tested all sophomores in reading, math and science on the International Student Assessment test, or PISA. The PISA results indicate that the students comparatively finished first in the world in reading, first in the world in science and second in the world in mathematics." (Clayton is one of the richer districts in the St. Louis area)
Part of my reply:
I guess one could say congrats to Clayton if congratulations are in order for a process that is fraught with error. When one has an outlier to statistical information (that is if one believes in the concept of the "normal" curve and all its accompanying statistical manipulations) one must look at why is this outlier (Clayton's PISA standing) is where it is. There could be many reasons, the first of which comes to my mind is cheating (yes, there is a long line of cheating around the world when it comes to high-stakes standardized testing). To start with, what needs to be known is what was Clayton's prior "standing" in these tests. Usually, upon closer examination, in these types of cases of supposed "educational" excellence stemming from standardized testing situations one finds lots of shenanigans going on. Hopefully, that is not the case for Clayton and perhaps what they are doing is "working".
So let's take a look at perhaps why Clayton "appears" to be succeeding. And since you both like statistical information (as flawed as it is and there is not doubt that it is flawed, example later) let me use MO Dept of Elementary and Secondary Education's (DESE) statistics from their annual report which can be found easily on line at their site to compare three districts, Clayton, St. Louis, and my own Warren County R3 along with MO average (all figures are for the 2009-2010 school year). A caveat on the stats: Notice that all the stats I am using hear are in the logical category of "quantities", that is they are things that can be counted and therefore can be considered "true and relevant" data or information whereas, as noted many times before, Clayton's test rankings can't be considered "true and relevant" because they are based on a "model" that is fatally logically flawed-attempting to quantify a quality of which student learning is a subset. Be that as it may I continue the discussion. (continued in reply to this)
(continued):
Average Daily Attendance: Clayton-94.6% WCR3-97% SLPS-90.8% MO-95%
Comment: Clayton's figure is probably the closest to being accurate. WCR3 is way high. I guarantee that it is nowhere near that figure because at the high school we struggle with getting an average daily attendance at the high school of 90%. That means that the elementary and middle schools would have to be near or over 100% (I didn't do the math to figure out what exact percentages would be needed to bring the 90% up to 97% just estimated). SLPS is also quite high as I know that the high schools struggle to get 85% attendance rate. Therefore the MO % is too high (but it looks good!!!). What really matters is that attendance rates are tied directly (in my mind) to parental involvement and attitudes towards education which usually ties in with parental (more importantly the mother's) socio-economic status. Which ultimately ties in with student "achievement" and teacher "performance".
Classroom teacher/students: Clayton-1/11 WCR3-1/20 SLPS-1/19 MO-1/17
% teachers with Masters or more: Clayton-87.6 WCR3-52.2 SLPS-43.5 MO-56
Teacher yrs experience: Clayton-16.3 WCR3-10.5 SLPS-11.1 MO-12.4
Average teacher salary: Clayton-$68,129 WCR-$38,895 SLPS-49,989 MO-45,148
Per pupil expenditures: Clayton-$17,871 WCR3-$7,554 SLPS-$16,082 MO-9751
Comment: I put these all together as they point to an interesting trend (with an outlier of course-the $ per student in the SLPS which can be attributed to a number of things, mainly the infrastructure costs for the aging buildings is quite a bit more than most districts, a perhaps bloated administration-I didn't look at administrative salaries, number of administrator/student etc. . .-and cronyism). But the data to me suggests that the more money we put into the system the better the results as Clayton has far more teachers with a Masters or higher, with more years of experience earning better dollars, with far greater per pupil expenditures and a lot better teacher/student ratio. Maybe all those things in combination with the parents socio economic status that connotes parental involvement in their child's education has something to do with Clayton's supposed success on the PISA.
And maybe, just maybe then, the solution to public education's supposed problems would be spend a whole lot more money so as to bring all districts up to the "benchmark" district that Clayton supposedly is?
OYE
OYE
Very interesting exchange.
Consider that we already spend more per student than any other country than Luxembourg. Granted that is an average and there are areas that do NOT have enough money, but not that many. Simply far, far too many districts that spend more than enough, in many cases more than the average with little result.
There just doesn't seem to be any great correlation to the amount spent to the success of education that I can find.
"And maybe, just maybe then, the solution to public education's supposed problems would be spend a whole lot more money so as to bring all districts up to the "benchmark" district that Clayton supposedly is?"
That would be one conclusion from what you presented...I simply don't believe it. There is no evidence to support that conclusion. In fact, data suggests that conclusion is wrong.
You mentioned the PISA tests, a presentation of those results broken down demographically suggests other reasons and in fact presents the argument that our schools are not the crux of our problem. Break down the full list of 65 nations, reading scores by race, then measure Americans by the countries and continents whence their families originated and the results are surprising. The danger of stats.
The Harvard Immigration project which followed 400 newly arrived children from the Caribbean, China, Central America and Mexico starting in 1997 found that successful and high achieving students came from families with "high human capital" such as parents with high levels of schooling who had the ability to explain how to be successful in their new country and system.
They found that even if they didn't speak English well, they knew it was the key to advancement and would aggressively study the language. They tended to come from more stable homes with at least two adults ( not necessarily both parents) and at least one adult with earned income.
There is also little doubt that the disproportionate number of Asians occupying seats in our elite colleges today is related to demographics and the most recent wave of Chinese immigrants (that fit the criteria) who fled the 1949 Communist revolution in China.
This tends to support the conclusion that it is the students that bring success or failure with them.
I much appreciate your time in formulating your critiqe and your points. It certainly helps me tighten my thinking and at times has brought up facts I hadn't considered. I am reaching conclusions but as you know you can trip over hasty conclusions so I intend to be very carteful.
Please, please fire away at any time.
This is a wonderful speech! The policies outlined in this speech are exactly what I stupidly thought we'd get by electing Obama.
It would be great if the feds would require a rigorous cost/benefit analysis of charter schools. One that includes the intangible costs associated with condemning the public schools so a few of Arne Duncan's acolytes can make names for themselves and perhaps end up in Bill Gates's foundation.
Obama is Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton, and W, combined on steroids, but worse.
And please don't hold up that monstrosity of a health care bill as evidence to the contrary. He serviced the corporations FIRST, while claiming to be fighting them. The health care industry monopoly loves the bill, because ultimately it entrenched their existing monopoly, increased government subsidies to their coffers, and set up a system that insures the big 5 insurers their monopoly backed by federal law that forces subservience by the monopolized.
Oh how PROGRESSIVE!!!!!!
Just like the farcical meme run amok in the MSM, that Obama, with his recent Economic Team appointments, is trying to repair his relationship with corporate America. Yeah, it's not like his original economic team was friendly to Wall Street, Big Oil, Big Pharma, the Big Medical Insurers, the Nuclear Power Industry, the MIC, or anything like that!
Obama with his intentionally covering up the crimes of the Bush Administration, and then by God, having some of that cake for himself and baking another…has become the most dangerous presidency.
He is set, to codify – either through Executive order, or aided by his new more kindred House majority – a system of indefinite detention.
Ah yes, can't you just smell how PROGRESSIVE he is!
Oh yeah schools. Obama the teachers union busting president!!!!
I teach at a community college that is facing an 18 percent budget cut on top of a 13 percent budget cut. When a student in my class said that we throw money at education, another student looked that up. Not true compared to other industrialized countries. We already have a faulty /antiquated heating/cooling system that sometimes is so hot in the summer that our students are literally passing out from the heat. Where I taught before in Louisiana k-12 at a public boarding school for gifted students, teachers now wear their gloves in the winter because they can't even afford to turn on the heat, that is teachers who still have their jobs. Others were let go right before retirement. Blame the parents? That's just too easy. Most are working at many jobs just to feed their families. Values come from the top, folks. So does money. So I'd suggest looking at a nation wide problem that trashes teachers and their unions as well as parents, while at the same time throwing away money for two wars but also refuges to reinstate fair taxes for the rich.
blend
"Not true compared to other industrialized countries."
Actually it is true. We spend more money on education than ANY country except Luxembourg. I would suggest you tell the student to look where the money is being spent...and how.
Frankly I'm coming to the conclusion the problem is the student. If the will to learn is absent, no amount of spending on schools, teacher salaries, educational consultants or new texts will matter.
Corporate America spends plenty on education. It's called advertising and public relations---or professional lying. Their total annual expenditures on this form of "education" for all ages equals or exceeds spending on formal or institutional education. And they work hard at it, using the most advanced techniques and studies of human psychology to make sure we get the message and learn it by heart. And they start at an early age, aiming to get children "brand identified" by an early pre-school age. Ever see a three year old in the supermarket shopping cart demanding/screaming for Cherrios, Twinkies or Coke or some other junk? Corporate education at work. Or consider the $4 billion or so spent on political campaigns and "education" in the 2010 election. Or the predicted $10 billion and up, much of it corporate money per Citizens United, that will attempt to blitz our minds in the 2012 election. All this is far more important to corporate capitalism than a truly educated citizenry which might have the critical/analytical thinking skills to see the system for what it is. So they are putting their money into the kind of education that serves their interests, not ours nor a democratic society.
What we need is a much more scientific approach to fixing education than we have seen to date (which is basically a joke)
From last two administrations, we've heard nonstop talk of the need for "higher standards" and "accountability and seen testing of students out the yin-yang but there is no data to back up the claims that testing kids more and holding teachers accountable for the scores actually improves education.
In fact, the data seem to show just the opposite. And it does a horrible number on teacher morale, creativity and motivation.
I taught for several years in the public schools, so I can say with some confidence that one of the primary problems is that teachers get no respect. Not from the students, not from the parents, not from the politicians and not even from their own administrators in some cases.
I have also worked in the high tech industry as a computer programmer and can say that my teacher colleagues were some of the smartest, most capable people I have ever worked with.
Smarter and more competent even than many (if not most) of those worked with in the private sector.
certainly smarter than 99% of the nitwit politicians -- including Obama, who knows how to read a speech anmd went to Haaavid law but would be lost if he actually had to do any real analytical work.
And the real irony is that if Obama's current "education reform" [sic] policies had been implemented back when he was in school, he would probably never would have gotten to where he has. That's not racist. That's reality.
Poverty, alcholic parents, absent parents, abusive families, unemployment, insufficient income etc. influence the performance of children. We should stop scapegoating teachers. We should put more resources into helping families and children (remember the gains of project headstart.)
Good point "shach." You can't scapegoat people. It is the system that was created by bad domestic policy by politicians who only see as far as the next election that is terribly flawed. Educational law is drafted in a frenzy and used as a political chip to be bandied about as if they (the politicians) really cared about communities and the welfare of people, because we know THEY DON'T.
There are still good teachers and outstanding students in some of our poor schools doing good things in spite of the horrid conditions. But it is a testament to their moral courage and character and not to the quality and direction of the public schools.
wow. what a load of ideological crap. institutional education -- public, private, charter, magnet, whatever-- has never never never been a means to reducing poverty, equalizing opportunity, equalizing living standards, meaningfully increasing social mobility. (hint: if you want to reduce poverty and inequality, redistribute wealth.)
compulsory education laws, first passed in this country in the 1850's, were, in fact, the beginning of a long, steady decline in literacy rates, self-sufficiency, and local economies and were designed to facilitate the needs of capital in an industrializing, urbanizing economy. institutional education, which has become the unquestioned righteous cause of "progressives" is nothing more than an entrenched system for sorting citizens and justifying the perpetuation of a class structure (isn't it amazing that wealthy kids keep turning out to be smarter and therefore more deserving of the privileged positions they assume in the culture! let's celebrate public education as it allows 1% of each generation of the underclass to assume their position in the ruling class as 1% of the progeny of the ruling class succumbs to drug overdose!). is it the belief of progressives that if we get all 9 billion people on the planet through a masters program in business everyone will be upper-middle class????
can we please stop dicking around here and just limit any american's total annual compensation to $500,000 (just for the record, i make substantially more than that so this would be a net loss to me). can we please stop taking 50 cents of every tax dollar and using it to kill people around the world to support multinational corporations and our own under-priced over-consumption. can we please use the phenomenal resources these policies provide us with to offer every citizen top-notch health care and a basic decent standard of living. can we please then just use the rest of the phenomenal resources to create non-compulsory, open-source, publicly-financed learning centers that will enable every american child the opportunity to reach his or her own maximum potential without some ball state teachers college graduate or the caring folks at the educational testing service kindly telling them why they just aren't up to snuff and will continue to live in squalor while some rich kid gets to deservedly continue to be rich.
look, i know most of you mean well, but this blind allegiance to EDUCATION as some salvation just makes you look stupid. the wealthy are nursing their martinis and bemusedly gazing down on you from their penthouses and private jets and chuckling while you struggle endlessly to figure out why the poor just don't seem to be doing any better under meritocracy than they did under aristocracy. maybe you are just stupid. kind, but stupid.
Is Momo against Montessori schools? He's against compulsory education. So what if some irresponsible parents aren't conscientious about getting their kids to school? Tough luck? Momo is very dismissive of the many hundreds of thousands of conscientious and hard working teachers in this country who bust their butts for the kids every single day. He's talking as if most or all of "institutional" teachers are clowns and jerks. Gee, thanks for the vote of non-confidence, just what teachers need in a country that spits on teachers and especially public school teachers.
Momo is complaining that institutional education doesn't reduce poverty or illiteracy. Education alone can't alleviate poverty and illiteracy but it certainly is an important factor in eliminating these problems. Kids who are bounced from school to school because his/her parents or parent are very transient often don't get a chance to develop their learning skills. He's calling for "publicly-financed learning centers;" we already have them, they are called public schools.
Momo says:
"compulsory education laws, first passed in this country in the 1850's, were, in fact, the beginning of a long, steady decline in literacy rates, self-sufficiency, and local economies and were designed to facilitate the needs of capital in an industrializing, urbanizing economy."
That is just patently false and ridiculous. Why not also blame compulsory education for wars, famine, earthquakes, plagues and genocide.
JerzyJoe
The whole country is not spitting on teachers Joe, its fashionable among politicians, its also fashionable to blame teachers in the field for the failures and misconceptions of the educational establishment.
Many parents whose children are receiving good educations value their local teachers very much. But the bad teachers who are very hard to get rid of tend to get the big ink.
I have not a clue as to what Momo is thinking, education is just a tool, it is not a guarantee.
"Spitting on teachers" is hardly confined to politicians or even school administrators looking for someone to blame for their own screwups.
Take it from someone who got a bachelors in physics, got a secondary teaching credential in NY and then taught secondary science for several years in the public schools.
Besides politicians (including Obama who saw no issue with firing all the teachers at a failing school), lots of parents, administrators and even students do it (the latter because the administrators allow them can get away with it).
Teachers are expected to be "professionals" (and from my experience most of them ARE very competent and professional) but they don't get treated (including paid) as such. In many cases, they get treated like dirt, which is the primary reason I left the profession and went on to become a software engineer.
If "teacher bashing" were not popular among the general public at large, the politicians would simply not do it.
Clowns like Obama have no clue what is required to fix education in this country, but instead of seeking out those who have actually studied the problem and DO understand (including teachers themselves), Obama drags out the same hackneyed crap about testing and teacher accountability.
John Taylor Gatto. Nuff Said. Any more is BS.
John Taylor Gatto ran for the state senate in NY as a member of the Conservative Party of NY.
Gatto is very popular with libertarians and has received awards from libertarian groups, including the Alexis de Tocqueville Award for Excellence in Advancement of Educational Freedom in 1997. So it would appear that Gatto is a conservative libertarian. He promotes home schooling and specifically unschooling. Oh yeah, home schooling will solve everything, it's a regular panacea (snark alert). Enough said, indeed.
Gatto taught many years (almost 30 years) in public schools and now he is collecting a publicly funded pension. It sure took him long enough to figure out that he hated compulsory public schools. He stays in compulsory public schools long enough to collect a pension and he's a conservative libertarian!! F**k this hypocritical right wing nutter. Gatto is BS on 2 legs and enough said.
"More money for schools? No proof that more money provides anything but more cost. Student education seems NOT to be hitched to money spent."
Untrue. If the athletic department is removed from Public Schools, including teachers and facilities, then the cost per student would be inline with European costs per student, and a better comparison could be made. Let the business community support athletics, not the schools. Athletics have a dampening effect on the educational culture of the school. Get rid of athletics and student academic performance will rise.
If business takes over schools the cost per student will rise dramatically but scores will not because the business model is inappropriate for education. It will just be another way for the wealthy to propagandize our children and drain our wealth for the privilege. Total bullshyt.
I think this is because in US, most school administrators have come from the athletic department ranks. Their lesson plan and grading work demands are next to nil, leaving extra time and energy to pursue advanced degrees that "qualify" them for the administrative positions. They also are usually paid additional salary to coach co-curricular activities so they have more compensation than average teacher.
A better alternative to the athletics in schools would be community-based recreational programs. This would permit broader participation in the community, with lifetime sports highlighted, such as walking, swimming, dance, open gym. Oh wait, insight! These aren't as competitive or youth-oriented, no wonder that's not happening here in 'Merka. If we spent commensurate monies in the larger community, it would free our schools from the overemphasis and undue influence of the narrow range of team sports and improve facilities for all residents.
From schoolsmatter.info:
The NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English) invited suggestions for its policy platform for 2011.
Suggestion for NCTE Policy Platform
The US has the highest rate of child poverty of all industrialized countries, which accounts for our less-than-spectacular scores on international tests. American children who live in middle class neighborhoods and who attend well-funded schools score at the top of the world.
The NCTE platform this year is that we are in no position to debate the subtleties of instruction such as the content of the literature standards. Our discussions of what is on the menu must wait until people are no longer starving.
The NCTE Platform: Make sure that no child is left unfed, all children have adequate health care and all children have access to a wide variety of reading material. Only when this is accomplished can we return to the business of what goes on in the classroom.
There is a scripture about this Great Teacher that stopped His lecture mid-stream to feed His students. He knew people with their most basic needs met, made better learners. If He wouldn't attempt to teach under those conditions, why do nominal "Christian" hypocrites expect me to exceed His performance?
And then I woke up. sigh.
The culture in many US schools is harmful. Drugs, violence, etc. In my area recently, there was a 'kick-a-cinnamon-day' I believe that is what they called it. The students were supposed to kick anyone with red hair.
At the college level - keg parties are the rule. In my town, one of the local colleges has a history of the annual 'dress-to-get-laid' celebration. I wonder if that event teaches mutual respect and responsibility in the sexaul area? Also, College has become big business. The student loan program has reduced many to a life of economic hardship.
Too little emphasis on critical thinking. Many enlightened teachers have told me that they are forced to teach the 'official' view of USA history. Very few schools allow Zinn's History to be used. No wonder so many are eager to enlist as soon as possible after H.S. graduation. Were you taught factual USA history in school or were you exposed to pro- militaristic propaganda? Where I live, the troops go into the class rooms where often peace advocates are banned. Students would learn more from watching C-Span and C-Span2 on TV.
After more than 50 years, in and out of the educational system, I now advocate for home schooling and charter schools that would be open to all regardless of economic status. As long as schools have a captive group of 'consumers' who have no choice, nothing will change. Money will not fix this.
About propagandizing students...
http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/05/the-texas-textbook-massacre/
It's certainly true that home schoolers can teach their kids whatever they want but charter schools take public money and charter schools would be subject to the same pressures of the community in which they are located. Charter schools are being promoted by billionaires who are not fans of Howard Zinn. Charter schools are hardly hot beds of liberalism and progressivism. If a charter school teacher tried to teach from Howard Zinn's books he/she would just be fired on the spot since there are no unions or tenure at most charter schools. I don't see how charter schools are so much better than traditional public schools. As Diane Ravitch has noted, all the tests and evaluations of charters have demonstrated that, by and large, they are no better than traditional public schools and there are more horrible charters than there are good ones. The corporate MSM and the politicians always push the myth that charter schools are so much better than regular public schools while they diligently ignore the average ones and the failures. It's called selective journalism, propaganda, lies and distortion in the service of the billionaires who are gung ho for charter schools. As for home schooling, only a small fraction of American parents can home school, it's not even a realistic option for most Americans.