This op-ed piece by Paul Krugman does a clear and succinct job of explaining the power of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) over legislative action at the state and even at the local level. The reason this clear and compelling op-ed piece is important for readers of this blog is that ALEC has been instrumental in persuading (read “paying”) state legislatures to increase their support of publicly funded charter schools (with […]
This article by Nick Hanauer in the July/August 2014 edition of Politico Magazine (see here) is an eloquent argument for the imperative need to raise the minimum wage. As I’ve written in earlier posts and comments, those truly interested in “eductional reform” in this nation should be “manning the barricides,” or rather “peopling the barricades,” to demand that this be done. Good for Nick Hanauer, one of the elite group […]
I’ve just completed a three day literacy retreat led by the incomparable Kylene Beers and Robert Probst, assisted by Linda Rief, Penny Kittle, Donalyn Miller, Chris Crutcher, and Lester Laminack. Here’s my contribution, and tribute, to these wonderful educators: The Smartest Person in the Room is . . . the Room There is an essay in Lewis Thomas’s Lives of a Cell entitled “Living Language.” Thomas begins this […]
Originally posted on radical eyes for equity:
Few things are worse than mainstream media coverage of education. Except for that sentence above, which stretches hyperbole beyond credibility. But that is exactly where the mainstream media finds itself when covering education. Journalists, in their quest to maintain the traditional commitment to “fair and balanced” journalism [1], consistently endorse and perpetuate organizations without credibility (such as NCTQ) and baseless claims (such as cries of…
Originally posted on Diane Ravitch's blog:
Jonathan Lovell has been leading writing workshops for many years. In this delightful post, he describes his struggle to finish his own dissertation, and the flights of fancy that kept blocking his path. He uses graphics creatively to reflect his state of mind. You watch his thinking evolve. Watch a writer at work and lament with him that the Obama administration eliminated the…
The small but heavy cardboard box had been opened, closed, and put aside–part of a larger project to plow through the accumulated debris of twenty-eight years of marriage. Its moving label read “Home Office. Books. His.” My daughter Stephanie called me to ask if I might pick it up as part of my upcoming trip to Berkeley. Why not? Steph’s husband Mike, mindful of my weak lower back, hefted the […]
Today’s Huffington Post article by Arthur H. Camins, Director of the Center for Innovation in Engineering and Science Education at the Stevens Institute of Technology, places our nation’s track record following Brown vs Board of Education in a useful and sobering perspective. His primary message? We can do better–a whole LOT better! The 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision provided a catalyst to advance but not fully achieve racial and […]
