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==Education Budget Cuts, Collective Bargaining, Curriculum==
===May 05, 2011===
• [http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-we-made-tough-choice-to-bring-excellence-back-to-classrooms McMillin : “We Made Tough Choice to Bring Excellence Back to Classrooms”]
====Comment 1====
Anyone with a working long-term memory knows where this agenda to Starve Public Schools Out Of Existence is coming from.
Good thing there's web search for the rest of us —
# http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-fTAhc4QC4
# http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/04/972949/-Blackwater-In-Law-DeVos-outlines-stealth-plot-against-Public-Education
# http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/3/12515/58655/Front_Page/Strategy_for_Privatizing_Public_Schools_Spelled_out_by_Dick_DeVos_in_2002_Heritage_Foundation_Speech
====Comment 2====
If you are on Facebook, there are several groups who are tracking the corporate feudalism agenda of the ALEC, DeVos, Koch, Heritage Foundation, Mackinac Center axis. Here are just a few that come to mind:
# http://www.facebook.com/KochBrothers
# http://www.facebook.com/wearredforpubliced
# http://www.facebook.com/democracy.watchdog.action.network
# http://www.facebook.com/pages/Support-Bill-Cronon/163419837045434
===May 23, 2011===
• [http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight School Leaders Hoping for Update, Feedback During Forum Tonight]
===May 24, 2011===
• [http://rochester.patch.com/articles/marleau-mcmillin-and-mull-speak-about-funding-cuts-to-rochester-community-schools Marleau, McMillin Update School Audience on State Budget Cuts]
===May 31, 2011===
• [http://rochester.patch.com/articles/mcmillin-mentioned-in-cnn-blog-about-school-funding McMillin Mentioned in CNN Blog About School Funding]
===June 07, 2011===
• [http://rochester.patch.com/articles/rochester-teachers-to-demonstrate-after-school-today Rochester Teachers to Demonstrate After School Today]
• [http://rochester.patch.com/articles/teachers-across-rochester-protest-state-budget-cuts Teachers Across Rochester Protest State Budget Cuts]
==May 23, 2011 — School Leaders Hoping For Update==
==May 23, 2011 — School Leaders Hoping For Update==
Strategy for Privatizing Public Schools Spelled out by Dick DeVos in 2002 Heritage Foundation Speech
Strategy for Privatizing Public Schools Spelled out by Dick DeVos in 2002 Heritage Foundation Speech
• http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/3/12515/58655/Front_Page/Strategy_for_Privatizing_Public_Schools_Spelled_out_by_Dick_D
• http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/3/12515/58655/Front_Page/Strategy_for_Privatizing_Public_Schools_Spelled_out_by_Dick_DeVos_in_2002_Heritage_Foundation_Speech
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_770258
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/school-leaders-hoping-for-updates-feedback-and-solutions-during-budget-forum-tonight#comment_770258
P.S. Speaking of funky software, the new version of Patch is acting weird. I'll go ahead and post this again and see what happens.
P.S. Speaking of funky software, the new version of Patch is acting weird. I'll go ahead and post this again and see what happens.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_977669
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_977669
Comment 10
Comment 10
By way of review — since we all know how important that is when it comes to learning, recall, and retention — here's a culmulative reading list on our brave new breed of “Venture Philanthropists”, to use the Broad Foundation's own name for their favorite game:
By way of review — since we all know how important that is when it comes to learning, recall, and retention — here's a cumulative reading list on our brave new breed of “Venture Philanthropists”, to use the Broad Foundation's own name for their favorite game:
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_978482
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Comment 11
Business Insider • “Rupert Murdoch, Who Bought 90% Of An Education Software Provider, Launches Initiative ‘To Make Education A Top Issue In 2012 Presidential Campaign’”
Business Insider • “Rupert Murdoch, Who Bought 90% Of An Education Software Provider, Launches Initiative ‘To Make Education A Top Issue In 2012 Presidential Campaign’”
• http://www.businessinsider.com/rupert-murdoch-news-corp-education-2012-presidential-campaign-2011-5
• http://www.businessinsider.com/rupert-murdoch-news-corp-education-2012-presidential-campaign-2011-5
Daily Kos • “The United Gates Of America”
Daily Kos • “The United Gates Of America” (May 22, 2011)
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/22/978218/-The-United-Gates-of-America
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/22/978218/-The-United-Gates-of-America
Daily Kos • “The Broad-Way — Fleecing America's Schools” (Jun 25, 2011)
• http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/25/988664/-The-Broad-way:-Fleecing-Americas-Schools
Jim Hightower • “Billionaires' Front Groups Attack Workers, Public Schools, and Young Voters”
Jim Hightower • “Billionaires' Front Groups Attack Workers, Public Schools, and Young Voters”
• http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/node/2680
• http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/node/2680
Mike Klonsky • Debunking Jeb Bush's ‘Florida Formula’
Huffington Post • “Walton Family Foundation Gives $157 Million Toward Education Reform”
• http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/28/walton-family-foundation-_n_886112.html
Mike Klonsky • “Debunking Jeb Bush's ‘Florida Formula’”
• http://michaelklonsky.blogspot.com/2011/06/debunking-jeb-bushs-florida-formula.html
• http://michaelklonsky.blogspot.com/2011/06/debunking-jeb-bushs-florida-formula.html
Rachel Levy • “Teach For America — From Service Group to Industry”
• http://allthingsedu.blogspot.com/2011/05/teach-for-america-from-service-group-to.html
Michael T. Martin • “Waiting For SuperFraud”
Michael T. Martin • “Waiting For SuperFraud”
• http://ksdcitizens.org/2010/12/22/waiting-for-superfraud/
• http://ksdcitizens.org/2010/12/22/waiting-for-superfraud/
Mark Naison • “Teach for America and Me — A Failed Courtship”
• http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2011/06/dr-mark-naison-teach-for-america-and-me.html
Seattle Education Blog • “The Broad Foundation”
Seattle Education Blog • “The Broad Foundation”
Seattle Education Blog • “Eli Broad’s Last Hurrah In Detroit?”
Seattle Education Blog • “Eli Broad’s Last Hurrah In Detroit?”
• http://seattleducation2010.wordpress.com/2011/04/25/eli-broad’s-last-hurrah-in-detroit/
• http://seattleducation2010.wordpress.com/2011/04/25/eli-broad’s-last-hurrah-in-detroit/
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_978495
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Comment 12
The invasion of cash from so-called “philanthropists” is known in the Biz as a “Loss Leader”. Big bucks are pumped into the system to make it look like the raid is a smashing success. If that strategy works as badly as it has elsewhere, a lot of data will get cooked and lot of Agenda-Driven Statistification (ADS) will get trumpeted all over the Corporate Air Waves to make it look like there was any improvement at all.
The invasion of cash from so-called “philanthropists” is known in the Biz as a “Loss Leader”. Big bucks are pumped into the system to make it look like the raid is a smashing success. If that strategy works as badly as it has elsewhere, a lot of data will get cooked and lot of Agenda-Driven Statistification (ADS) will get trumpeted all over the Corporate Air Waves to make it look like there was any improvement at all.
These people are not philanthropists — “lovers of humanity” — they are investors. They don't give money away — they invest money for the sake of making more money, acting in tandem with their need to force their personal ideology on the rest of the world. If they destroy the American way of life in the process — that's just collateral damage.
These people are not philanthropists — “lovers of humanity” — they are investors. They don't give money away — they invest money for the sake of making more money, acting in tandem with their need to force their personal ideology on the rest of the world. If they destroy the American way of life in the process — that's just collateral damage.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_978501
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Comment 13 (Reply)
Mr. Reno,
Whether you find it convenient to acknowledge it or not, there is an ever increasing number of your fellow citizens, from all walks of life and spread throughout the sphere of otherwise diverse political opinions, who are becoming increasingly concerned about the future of public education in this country, and whether it will even have a future given the raids that are currently being mounted on all sides.
If you do not wish to inform yourself of those developments, you are of course free to do so, but that does not mean they are not occurring, and other people have a need and a right to stay informed about them.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_978997
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Comment 14 (Aside)
I'm still not seeing replies at all, but it looks like posting replies as regular comments will work until they get the bugs out of the system.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_979248
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Comment 15
Speaking as a survivor of the Sputnik era, the New Math, and more curriculum reforms in math and science than I can count since then, let me just share what tuppence of wisdom I have gained on the matter —
The most important factor in learning mathematics is having teachers who are all round solid human beings, who love mathematics and its teaching, and who have the time to find what sparks that same level of fascination in each individual student. Everything else is purely incidental.
Then again, it's pretty much the same with any subject.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_981095
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Comment 16
It is well past time we woke up to the fact that the wool being pulled over our eyes in the realm of public education extends to the entire sphere of public infrastructure and public services, all the things that the American People simply cannot afford to abdicate to the agents of private corporate profit, not to mention foreign national interests. Just by way of a hint, here's a recent article —
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_983138
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Comment 17
Dylan Ratigan • “America for Sale — Is Goldman Sachs Buying Your City?”
• http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dylan-ratigan/america-for-sale-is-goldm_b_877285.html
<quote>
In Chicago, it's the sale of parking meters to the sovereign wealth fund of Abu Dhabi. In Indiana, it's the sale of the northern toll road to a Spanish and Australian joint venture. In Wisconsin it's public health and food programs, in California it's libraries. It's water treatment plants, schools, toll roads, airports, and power plants. It's Amtrak. There are revolving doors of corrupt politicians, big banks, and rating agencies. There are conflicts of interest. It's bipartisan.
And it's coming to a city near you — it may already be there. We're talking about the sale of public assets to private investors. You may have heard of one-off deals, but what we'll be exploring with the Huffington Post is the scale and scope of what is a national and organized campaign to shift the way we govern ourselves. In an era of increasingly stretched local and state budgets, privatization of public assets may be so tempting to local politicians that the trend seems unstoppable. Yet, public outrage has stopped and slowed a number of initiatives.
</quote>
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_983143
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Comment 18
Back on the topic of “Unproud Moments For Education” —
The Answer Sheet • “New Data Reveal The Real Problem In Education”
• http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/new-data-reveals-the-real-problem-in-education/2011/06/30/AGDuYZtH_blog.html
It's just like what one wag on Facebook said, “It's the poverty, stupid.”
I know, I know, “But what does that have to do with our dale of the hills?”
And the fact that anyone even has to ask that —
But never mind, sufficient unto the day are the unproud moments thereof.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_984558
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Comment 19 (Reply)
Mr. Reno,
I don't know what you think is going on here, but this is not a session of the Legislature, it is not a meeting of the School Board, it is not even a chat in the Faculty Lounge. No one asked you to dictate the agenda, no one elected you Chair, and no one appointed you Moderator. So please try to recall what I am provisionally willing to assume you learned at home or school about what it means to be an equal citizen, a peer among equals.
What I personally see here is a self-selected sample of citizens who are sharing information and opinions bearing on their concerns with the current state and the possible future of education in their neighborhoods. If those are honest and true concerns then they will necessarily involve the consideration of many matters connected with education that go far beyond the boundaries of those neighborhoods.
If your field of vision is so narrow that you cannot or will not see those eminently evident facts, then you are certainly entitled to live your life within those confines, but no one gave you the right to impose your blinkers on your peers.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_986150
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Comment 20 (Reply)
Mr. Reno,
The article at the top of the page is titled “Not a ‘Proud Moment’ for Education, Board Says Before Budget Approval”.
I have read the article several times. The moment is as poignant as the title says, and I sympathize with the frustrations of many that are expressed throughout the article. Maybe the Governor and the Republican dominated legislature are proud of themselves that they misappropriated education funds to corporate interests and left their constituents to fight it out among themselves for the remainder that was left. But how could we be proud of ourselves that we let this happen?
But your first post dismissed the moment of the occasion and set off on a tangent of your own. As for the rest of the thread, all and sundry conducted themselves in the usual manner, raising the topics that engage their several interests in more or less free association with the article or the last subject mentioned.
I can't imagine why it should be any other way. No resolutions will be passed here. No actions will be taken in anything but tangential relation to what is discussed here.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_986490
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Comment 21 (Reply)
Mr. Reno (cont.),
The teachers will keep trying to do the jobs they were hired to do until they are utterly prevented. Same for the other staff. The school board will keep trying to do the job they were elected to do with the resources they were given. As a general rule, school boards and teachers are more open to input from their clients than any other set of officeholders or professionals I have ever run across, but I can't see any way that folks with real jobs to do could implement the irresolutions of this our beloved but very motley crew. So I can't imagine that being our job.
All we can do here is try to educate ourselves about the current state of things, by sharing our scattered bits of information and opinion, and that may help us do our job as citizens a little better on the next high-stakes test of our civic performance.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_986503
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Comment 22 (Reply)
Ms. T,
It is something of a paradox to me that people appear to value education, and they appear to understand, if more tangentially, that a lot of what they desire for their own children, whether it be in the arts, athletics, sciences, or specialized services, depends on the education and the experience of the teachers in their schools — and yet they turn around and minimize the value of education and experience in those very teachers.
Any hack journalist or political pundit is regarded as more of an expert on what constitutes a genuine education and how to get it than any of the people who have actually taken the trouble to acquire the requisite education and dedicated their lives to applying that knowledge.
No one who is brought up on the value of critical thinking expects to be accorded unquestioned authority in any matter, even one where they have demonstrated expertise, but that does not diminish the relevance of their education, experience, and expertise to questions about the quality of education. And yet some people appear to think the educator's education counts for nothing.
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1000505
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Comment 23 (Reply)
Mr. Reno,
I was trained as a systems thinker. One thing that means is that I think in terms of whole systems. Another thing that means is that I understand the value of feedback in relation to system objectives. Let us hang onto those thoughts, they have many consequences.
There are people who will try to sell you on the idea that this or that industry or institution is fully capable of regulating itself, without critical feedback from the public whom that industry or institution is formed to serve. I am not one of those people.
So the question is always — What forms of regulation promote the optimal functioning of the whole system?
Well, I have to take my car in for service, so this will have to be continued …
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1001199
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Comment 24
I am most gratified to see that my perspective-broadening influence on this Kaffeeklatsch Patch has led more and more of us Rochester Hillbillies and Hobbits to pay attention to what goes on in the wider world beyond the Shire. I myself spent a couple weeks last month tracking the revolting developments a little closer to home, to wit, the Emerging Corporate Raid on the Detroit Public Schools, and all the revelations about fraud, graft, and misappropriation of funds that occurred under the previous Emergency Magnifier. For those who had trouble telling one Robert Baron from another without a program, here's a bit of the blow by blow as it blew by.
Rick Snyder to announce sweeping DPS reforms Monday (June 19, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110619/NEWS01/110619015/Rick-Snyder-announce-sweeping-DPS-reforms-Monday
Governor Rick Snyder to announce sweeping DPS reforms today (June 20, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110620/NEWS06/106200359/Gov-Rick-Snyder-announce-sweeping-DPS-reforms-today
Sweeping reform plan empowers principals, teachers in low-performing Michigan schools (June 20, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110620/NEWS01/110620027/Sweeping-reform-plan-empowers-principals-teachers-low-performing-Michigan-schools
How new Michigan school district for low-performing schools would work (June 20, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110620/NEWS01/110620033/How-new-Michigan-school-district-low-performing-schools-would-work
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1009950
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Comment 25
Emergency Magnification (cont.)
Snyder had idea for changing DPS even before he was governor (June 21, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110621/NEWS01/106210388/Snyder-had-idea-changing-DPS-even-before-he-governor
DPS's scholarship promise is short on details and resources (June 21, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110621/NEWS06/106210390/DPS-s-scholarship-promise-short-details-resources
New start for Detroit's worst schools (June 21, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110621/NEWS01/106210383/New-start-Detroit-s-worst-schools
Editorial • Stronger medicine for sick schools (June 21, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110621/OPINION01/106210320/Editorial-Stronger-medicine-sick-schools
Eastern Michigan faculty side with teachers' unions, refuse to work in Detroit schools (June 22, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110622/NEWS01/106220413/Eastern-Michigan-faculty-side-teachers-unions-refuse-work-Detroit-schools
Art dealer's trial to begin in DPS corruption case (June 22, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110622/NEWS01/106220383/Art-dealer-s-trial-begin-DPS-corruption-case
Roy Roberts to cut non-teaching jobs, cancel supplier contracts in effort to transform DPS (June 22, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110622/NEWS01/110622024/Roy-Roberts-cut-non-teaching-jobs-cancel-supplier-contracts-effort-transform-DPS
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1009966
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Comment 26
Emergency Magnification (cont.)
Eastern Michigan faculty side with teachers' unions, says they weren't consulted about plan (June 22, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110622/NEWS01/106220413/Eastern-Michigan-faculty-side-teachers-unions-says-they-weren-t-consulted-about-plan
DPS spent $1.6M on travel, gave raises to consultants (June 24, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110624/NEWS01/106240431/DPS-spent-1-6M-consultants-travel
Under Bobb, consultants got raises, perks (June 24, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110624/NEWS01/106240443/Under-Bobb-consultants-got-raises-perks
Michigan Senate OKs teacher tenure changes (July 1, 2011)
• http://www.freep.com/article/20110701/NEWS05/107010436/Michigan-Senate-OKs-teacher-tenure-changes
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1010007
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Comment 27
Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin
Bob Sikes • “The Atlanta Cheating Scandal, the Broad Foundation, NCLB, and the Peril of Attaching Cash to Student Test Scores”
• http://bobsidlethoughtsandmusings.wordpress.com/2011/07/07/the-atlanta-cheating-scandal-the-broad-foundation-nclb-and-the-peril-of-attaching-cash-to-student-test-scores/
Ann Kane and M. Catharine Evans • “Who's Responsible for the Government Schools Cheating Scandals?”
• http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2011/07/whos_responsible_for_the_government_schools_cheating_sandals.html
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1012390
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Comment 28
Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin
Bob Sikes • “Detroit Charter Schools Not Getting it Done Either”
• http://bobsidlethoughtsandmusings.wordpress.com/2011/07/07/detroit-charter-schools-not-getting-it-done-either/
Mark Gruenberg • “Probe shows union-busting Michelle Rhee wrote Michigan anti-teacher law”
• http://www.peoplesworld.org/probe-shows-union-busting-michelle-rhee-wrote-michigan-anti-teacher-law/
http://rochester.patch.com/articles/not-a-proud-moment-for-education-school-board-says-before-budget-approval#comment_1013227
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</pre>
</pre>
==Jul 08, 2011 — Lansing Visit Offers Time To Reflect And Ponder==
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder 08 Jul 2011 • 5:30 am]
===Comment 1 (Reply to Mike Reno)===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1013715 08 Jul 2011 • 9:50 am]
Welcome to the Reno Casino, where SuperStar Teachers™ who prove themselves Ready 4 Prime Time™ will crush their competitors before cheering hordes of fans in the EduMart SuperBowl™, win Rheebok Shoe™ endorsements, and make a bundle in the Privately Owned States Of America™ Edumachination Industry™.
===Comment 2 (Reply)===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1015253 08 Jul 2011 • 1:30 pm]
Mr. Reno, Ms. T,
If you knew many good teachers, and were actually capable of hearing what they have to say about the realities of teaching, they could tell you how many things are wrong with the things you keep saying. They would know a little — and some would know a lot — about the history of education, especially in the U.S. over the last hundred years, a little from their personal experience of school politics and teaching practice and a little more from their academic courses and professional reading.
But of course you don't know any good teachers who could teach you those things — they quit being good teachers just as soon as they tell you what you don't know. And that is precisely why the history of education in the U.S. over the last hundred years has taught those who are capable of learning from it the critical importance of academic freedom, peer review, seniority, and the tenure system.
===Comment 3 (Reply)===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1015930 08 Jul 2011 • 3:06 pm]
Now, Mr. Reno, you know what he's saying. It is known in logic as “Argumentum ad Squirrelum”. The public begins to smell a Big Greedy Rat stealing their cheese — so our corporate owned politicians and corporate owned media yell “Squirrel !!!” at the top of their well-funded lungs and point their bony fingers at poor public service workers just getting by on peanuts.
===Comment 4 (Reply)===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1016056 08 Jul 2011 • 3:20 pm]
To my way of thinking, communication is a two-way street. I'm just not seeing any evidence from his statements that Mr. Reno has absorbed anything more than cookies from his tenure on Sesame Street.
===Comment 5 (Reply)===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1016102 08 Jul 2011 • 3:35 pm]
Re: “If they don't represent us, then who are they representing?”
Hint. Go Ask ALEC.
===Comment 6 (Reply)===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1016353 08 Jul 2011 • 4:24 pm]
Mr. Reno,
Mr. Raymond wrote: “I understand the frustrations you are having with legislators not being responsive to their constituents. I've found the same problem in our own school district.”
Mr. Raymond was astute enough to recognize a similar dynamics operating at two levels of government — a top-down, 1-way street, my-way-or-the-highway form of dictation, intended to communicate a pre-fabricated agenda downward to the constituents, as opposed to communicating the concerns and interests of the constituents up the line to those elected to legislate and act. I think many people have been noticing the same pattern pretty much all over the place lately.
I do not think the similarities are purely coincidental.
===Comment 7===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1016565
This just in …
Timothy D. Slekar • “Cheating or Protecting? Depends”
* http://www.huffingtonpost.com/timothy-d-slekar/cheating-or-protecting-de_b_892067.html
Sorry, Ms. T, I couldn't find the Wobblie Spin on this, so this Little Libbie Ragtime will have to do for now.
===Comment 8===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1016780
John Kuhn • “Stop Labeling Teachers, Label The Lawmakers”
• http://mineralwellsindex.com/opinion/x1281108295/Letters-to-the-Editor-April-10-2011/
<blockquote>
Did you know that over the next five years, Texas lawmakers will send half a billion dollars to London, to line the pockets of Pearson’s stakeholders. That’s 15,000 teacher salaries, sacrificed at the altar of standardized testing. $500,000,000 for a test! I’m sure it’s a nice test, but it’s just a test. I’ve never seen a test change a kid’s life or dry a kid’s tear. Tests don’t show up at family funerals or junior high basketball games. They don’t chip in to buy a poor girl a prom dress. Only teachers do those things.
</blockquote>
Them Darn Texican Commies …
===Comment 9===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1016893
I've been following these developments just long enough to observe that the same patterns of behavior are coming to light across the spectrum of charter and public “Reform Schools”, from Washington, DC, to Baltimore, MD, to Atlanta, GA. I think we can expect to see a lot more.
I think that a violence was committed on our educational system when the Bush Administration infected a core function of our democratic society with an alien market dynamics. What we are seeing today is a consequence of that violation.
But it's Fajita & Margarita Time — so Adios for now !!!
===Comment 10===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1017932
For those of you who just joined the program, it appears that the inmates of Stalag 13 did not take Colonel Klink's dictates very seriously.
===Comment 11===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1017992
Susan Ohanian maintains a useful site for following the controversies arising out of NCLB and RT³ —
* http://susanohanian.org/
===Comment 12===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1019984
The point of my little parody is that something has gone seriously wrong with the introduction of market dynamics into the usual routines of evaluation in education.
Education is a public resource, a core component of a democratic society, not a private commodity to be merchandised by private interest corporations.
It is obvious from their own position statements that a number of obscenely well-funded forces are striving to inject market psychology into people's hearts and minds for the express purpose of doing away with universal free public education. Other people may be drawn into the game from a lack of information about its ultimate purpose. As with any astroturf pyramid scheme, it is always hard to draw a hard and fast line between the shills and the marks, but I do not believe the great majority of people would be happy with the consequences if they could see where the con is headed.
===Comment 13===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1021635
Schools Matter • “Jonah Edelman Spills the Oligarchs' Blueprint for Crushing the Teaching Profession”
* http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2011/07/jonah-edelman-spills-oligarchs.html
<blockquote>
As Lisa Guisbond said, “this is an amazing video from the Aspen Ideas Festival in which Stand For Children’s Jonah Edelman explains how he, with the support of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Arne Duncan’s senior advisor Jo Anderson (former Executive Director of the IEA) out foxed the CTU, the IFT and the IEA’s Ken Swanson and Audrey Soglin into agreeing to Senate Bill 7.”
We do know some of what goes on at the Aspen Ideas Festival besides getting a chance to smell and touch sewer rats like Rupert Murdoch. Here is a great example of massive ego mixed with manipulative glee that was posted and quickly pulled from the Aspen site, but not before Fred Klonsky captured a copy for the world to see and hear.
In this Machiavellian masterpiece, we see Jonah Edelman of Stand for Children infamy describe in great detail how great wads of hedge-fund and other corporate cash came to bear on the last legislative election in Illinois, how all the best lobbyists were bought up by Deform (including minority ones), how unions were outspent and how politicians followed the money, how teacher unions were lured to the table and how they were totally manhandled by the best lawyers and negotiators that money can buy, how union leaders became complicit, scared, weak, groveling.
</blockquote>
===Comment 14===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1029600
Updated Info On ALEC —
Many of the Boilerplate Bills that are coming out of our Nation's Statehouses these days are being written as fill-in-the-blank form-laws by a crypto-lobby known as the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).
Several sites are now tracking the ALEC program of ghostwriting bills for the people we elect to represent our concerns and interests, and not the Will of ALEC.
Democracy Watchdog Action Network
* http://www.facebook.com/democracy.watchdog.action.network
Wear Red For Public Ed
* https://www.facebook.com/pages/Wear-Red-for-Ed/221599601212557
Support Bill Cronon
* http://www.facebook.com/pages/Support-Bill-Cronon/163419837045434
Bill Cronon is a distinguished history professor who came under attack when he wrote an article about ALEC and the Mackinac Center, so the people who came to his defense began collecting data about these issues.
Related Tags at the Daily Kos —
* http://www.dailykos.com/news/ALEC
* http://www.dailykos.com/blog/Exposing%20ALEC
Current updates at the Daily Kos —
* http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/09/983573/-Exposing-ALECJune-Update-on-ALEC-Activities,-Articles-and-Links
* http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/15/985433/-EXPOSING-ALEC2nd-Update-with-important-news-and-links
* http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/20/986970/-Exposing-ALECupdate-3-+-Petition-for-your-State-Lawmakers
* http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/07/01/989671/-EXPOSING-ALECALEC-Relationships-and-Update-4
===Comment 15===
* http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/lansing-visit-offers-time-to-reflect-and-ponder#comment_1029691
Finally, a refreshing bit of honesty —
ThinkProgress • “Pro-Voucher Tea Party Group Admits It Wants To ‘Shut Down Public Schools And Have Private Schools Only’”
* http://thinkprogress.org/education/2011/07/11/265663/voucher-tea-party-go-away/
==Nov 05, 2012 — McMillin, VanRaaphorst : Candidate Questionnaire Form==
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/mcmillin-vanraaphorst-candidate-questionnaire-form 04 Nov 2012 • 8:14 pm]
===Comment 1===
* [http://rochester.patch.com/blog_posts/mcmillin-vanraaphorst-candidate-questionnaire-form#comment_5350630 05 Nov 2012 • 1:10 pm]
Since I can't imagine many people will be changing their minds between today and tomorrow, I find my own mind turning toward the day after tomorrow and the challenges ahead for the future of Michigan and the Nation.
Whatever mix of executives, judges, and legislators we elect to each branch and level of government, they will all be charged to represent the People's Will in making one critical choice — the choice between democratic government and corporate government. That is a choice that affects every other — from education, the environment, equality of opportunity and protection under the law, to public safety, public service, and whether we even continue to have a meaningful public sector in the future.
As far as education goes, it is clear that all of us and all of our elected officials need to become better informed about the consequences of the paths we choose — the very viability of our democracy is at stake.
The necessary conversation is not a new one, but it seems necessary to renew it from time to time, and this is certainly one of those times. One of the places the needed conversation is occurring with rather more light than heat these days would have to be on the following site.
* http://dianeravitch.net/
I recommend it to you all. If we don't become better educated about education, I fear we are doomed.