Public Education Matters
4.30.10
Bennett v. ISTA
I understand that my state (Indiana) is not unique in its decision to not go for the second round of RttT funds. Several states have come to the conclusion, as I did, that the amount of money is just not even worth the bother. Even Arne Duncan in an interview on NPR’s Talk of the Nation more or less stated that the RttT money really is just a drop in the bucket over the entire US education budget. I gather from listening to a portion of the segment on the radio show that Mr. Duncan’s intent with RttT was not to touch existing programs but rather to stimulate the states to start thinking about doing other innovative things on top of what they were already doing. (Which is fine, except for his support for the firings of the Rhode Island teachers.)
Anyway, the rub seems to be that the states seemed to think of RttT either as a way to replace state funds that they were taking away OR they were taking this as license to try and destroy teacher’s unions, who in their eyes, get in the way of what they want to do.
My feeling is that in my state, our state superintendent Tony Bennett was trying to do both those things. Why do I think that? Well, ok, first, my state’s economy is like every other state’s economy --a bit “wonky” right now. Times are tough and well, I’m sure our Governor and Dr. Bennett thought it would be great to have money come in while they were taking money out. (Governor Daniels wishes to cut 300 million of state funds from education.)
Second, there has been this little “back and forth” between Dr. Bennett and the ISTA. Dr. Bennett says that the Union killed the second application because they refused to meet with him. And it’s slightly true, they did refuse to endorse his plan, but the reasons they refused were because he only opted to meet with them a. AFTER he realized that his first attempt where he didn’t even seek to work with the Union was one of the reasons his Fast Forward plan was rejected in the first round competition (before that he never even asked for input.) And b. when Dr. Bennett did realize he needed the Union support, he only offered a superficial “opportunity” to work together. (He invited the ISTA to meet in ONLY 1 work session and with the media present.) Basically, he wanted to them to sign a “blank check” with no time to meaningfully consider what they were signing.
And as I predicted, when the Union refused to be railroaded in this manner, Dr. Bennett played the blame game and said that it was all the Union’s fault that Indiana wouldn’t be applying. Also, as I predicted he had the state’s major media outlets in his back pocket with headlines bashing the ISTA.
I have to tell you that this all rings really hollow to me. I’ll tell you why. In between the time the first application was rejected and the time that Dr. Bennett “offered” his superficial “opportunity” to the ISTA to try to seek the second round application- when his first attempts to coerce the Union into endorsing his plan as written didn’t work- he up and decided to try and take it to the “streets.” He sent out an email to all of the state’s teachers saying he didn’t want to hear what the Ista had to say, he wanted to hear what we teachers had to say. He seemed to think that the ISTA did not in fact represent our thoughts and that we were somehow victims of the ISTA’s dictates.
I responded by sending Dr. Bennett a link to this blog, so that hopefully he could see that while the ISTA doesn’t tell me what to think, they do represent my interests. I very much resent that he seems to think that my thoughts and opinions are controlled by a Union or by anyone for that matter. I wished him to see that independently I personally questioned his Fast Forward Plan. ( You can read about his reactions to that in prior posts on this blog. )
Anyway, his request for our input without the ISTA seemed rather strange to me then when he pitched a fit to the press that the Union wouldn’t cooperate with him. Did he want anyone’s input really? Or did he just want to hear what he wanted to hear and when he didn’t hear it from the ISTA, he thought he’d try another tack? To use a “popular” internet expression- wth?
One of my colleagues in our state responded with a very sincere but “tongue in cheek” letter that is posted below. I applaud her for standing up and calling a “spade a spade.” But before you read that I’d like to cite the words of the 1993 Teacher of the year, Nancy Flanagan. She is from Michigan and she has a blog called “Teacher in a Strange Land.” The particular blog post from which this excerpt is from is called “The Union Label” It is not necessarily complimentary to teachers unions, but even so she does recognize that teachers unions do serve a purpose. I’m inserting this because I would like Dr. Bennett and the public to understand that while the unions may not be perfect, that they are in fact necessary and the solutions to public education’s issues and the solutions to our nation’s economic problems cannot be found by destroying the Unions. Without further ado, Ms. Flanagan…..
“Unions are sometimes the only bulwark between ill-advised policy and the little-understood complexities of good teaching practice. Unions unabashedly insist that teachers' skills and contributions are worth a great deal to society--and should be remunerated in kind. They do serve a purpose. Most of the hackneyed clichés about the evils of teacher unionism are muted by comparing academic outcomes and programs in strong-union states and right-to-work states. A non-union workforce may be more compliant, but they're not necessarily more professional.”
Now before I post the letter I mentioned above, I’d like to emphasize my belief that teachers unions are not the evil that I believe Dr. Bennett believes them to be. I believe that he doesn’t like them because they are not compliant to his or our Governor’s taste. I think Dr. Bennett and Mr. Daniel’s would very much like to operate in a state (or a world) where no one ever questions their ideas or their plans or their motives. I’d like to state how dangerous a world or a state I think that would be.
We can all see how well a lack of checks and balances has worked out for us with the corporate and financial world lately. We can all see from history how well a lack of checks and balances has worked out in many a civilization.
I’d like to remind Dr. Bennett and Governor Daniels that every teaching position cut is also a cut to the state’s economy; that we teachers are also tax payers and consumers. I also want to see that the best and the brightest are in my field, but I’m just not going to accept a system that can’t really even determine who the best and the brightest are and also seems to really just want the most compliant and the cheapest.
I’d like to state that I’d appreciate it if some actual research on effective education and education reform were consulted before state plans were conceived by politicians. I’d also like to proffer that if Dr. Bennett thinks teachers should be judged by standardized test scores as he wanted the ISTA to agree to- that he read the letter below and take a moment to consider what he’s suggesting. Perhaps he’ll see that it’s not quite fair- if he sees the tables turned on him.
My colleague's letter:
“Dear Superintendent Tony Bennett,
I am a special education teacher at Eastern High School in Greentown, Indiana. I am taking time out of my busy schedule to write to you today in response to your e-mail asking for input from educators across the state. It is my understanding my pay and my teaching license may very well depend on how much gain my students make on standardized tests and you, along with Governor Daniels wholeheartedly support this reform. I think it is only fair I have the opportunity to commend you and Governor Daniels for your gains as well.
Since we all agree that circumstances and factors beyond our control have little to no impact on our overall effectiveness, I think you too will be proud of the gains you have made. In fact, in many categories, you have helped Indiana lead the nation.
. Indiana's unemployment rate has increased from 5.3% in 2004 to 10.1% in 2009.
. The amount of children in Indiana under the age of 18 living in poverty has grown from 15.7% in 2004 to 17.9% in 2008.
. Since 2004, 16,330 students have been added to the free/reduced lunch program.
. In 2004, Indiana schools only had 31,956 limited English speaking students, now we have 45,885.
. From 2004 to 2006, Indiana gained 54,267 more individuals receiving food stamp assistance.
. Since 2004, the percent of 12th graders NOT taking the SAT has grown by 4%.
. Indiana has expanded their student enrollment in public school by 46,263 students since 2004.
. In just one short year, 2007 to 2008, Indiana dramatically increased bankruptcy filings by 20.8%.
The gains you and Governor Daniels have made in the state of Indiana are nothing short of remarkable. You have set the standard on how one can be effective regardless of the circumstance. Initially I was skeptical of the impact of tying student performance on tests to teacher pay and retention but now I realize that not only am I an effective teacher, I am also a prime candidate for Superintendent of Public Instruction and Governor.
Sincerely,
Crystal Bramel
Crystal Bramel
Special Education Teacher
Eastern High School”
Thank you Crystal for speaking up! I enjoyed your letter immensely. I suspect Dr. Bennett did not. Also. a Thank you to my new “breakfast club” from NMS. Thanks for reading my blog and I hope to see many of you on the 13th!
Friday, April 30, 2010
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Public Education Matters
4.18.10
A Weekend Discussion of Public Education
I’ve mentioned my brother ( the fiscally conservative Republican lawyer) before in this blog and I want to tell you that over the course of this past weekend, I took a lot of good natured teasing from my favorite (only) sibling about this blog. He tells me to cease and desist with my “liberal, socialist ways” and that no one wants to listen to my thoughts. I reminded him that this is America, full of freedom of speech and democracy, and I do happen to have the right to state my own personal opinions on my own blog. :-)
The occasion for my brother and I to be together this weekend was because my father was posthumously inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame. (If you scroll down below Ernie Pyle a bit, you’ll see him in the list of 2010 inductee at the far left.) One of the criteria behind inductions to this hall of fame, besides contributions to the field of journalism, is the contribution to community and society in general. Per that criterion, I unabashedly say that there never was a person more deserving of this award than my father.
The induction speech, given by our friend and one of my father’s former employees, Justin Peeper, spoke specifically to that my father was most often the first in our community to “weigh in” on issues of public concern and that many very fine causes were successful because of his editorial support. Mr. Peeper also cited my father’s high degree of fair-mindedness and his vision and the trust that the community had in him.
I’d also like to note the presence at the ceremony of the widow of our former Governor Frank O’Bannon. One of the other very deserving inductees was Randy West, former Editor of the “The Corydon Democrat” the newspaper owned by the O’Bannon family. This coincidence triggered the memory of other honors that my father was bestowed in his lifetime. He was twice named a Sagamore of the Wabash, once by Governor O’Bannon and he was the first recipient of an award that Mr. West also was presented- the Charlie Biggs Commitment to Community Award.
So, why is all this important to my “lowly” blog about public education? Well, because my father was maybe the BIGGEST supporter of public education that ever walked the earth. His mother was a teacher, his wife was a teacher , his granddaughter just received her degree in education, and of course, there’s me, his daughter, who has worked 30 plus years in education.
Perhaps the greater point though is that my father was also one of the biggest supporters of democracy that ever walked the earth and if you had the opportunity to ever talk with him about it, he would have told you in no uncertain terms how vital PUBLIC education is to our (or any) democracy, in fact to the very survival of democracy.
I was privileged to have had many long discussions about my field with him when he was alive. While we didn’t always agree about everything, I can tell you without equivocation that he was against the use of the public dollar for vouchers and eventually against the charter school movement and that he was vehemently against the property tax cuts because they were not replaced by a stable source of income for our schools.
Originally, my father leaned towards support of NCLB (I did mention that by and large he leaned toward being a Republican, no?) until I loaned him a book about it (forgive me for not remembering which one) and after discussion between the two of us and reading it, he then came to much the same conclusion, as did Diane Ravitch in her book “The Death and Life of the Great American School System" . He came to believe that the reforms sought with NCLB would severely weaken, if not destroy, the public school system in this country.
All of this is not to say that my father was not for accountability in our school systems, but he believed we were ALL accountable: teachers, parents, the community, legislators, school board members, unions, administrators, and students! To him, it was a SHARED responsibility that political motives and uneducated, uninformed policies had no place in. He meant “shared” in the truest sense of the word.
It is also not to say that he didn’t believe that at times the teachers unions needed to re-examine some of their policies and stances. He did believe, however, that there IS a definite place in the world for teachers unions. He felt strongly about their existence. He simply wished that they and the Departments of Education would work together more for the common good.
My father covered numerous school board meetings in his day, he editorially and enthusiastically supported building drives and positive educational programs. He actually understood complicated school budgets and the politics involved (Ironically he was not a journalism major in college, but rather an economics major) and he endeavored to stay current on national and state educational policies.
He covered events and wrote about issues and did interviews with school administrators and teachers . I would be so bold to say that there was no community newspaper that ever provided more coverage of all (not just athletics) school activities and events than his newspaper did. Yes, it’s true, part of this was to sell papers, but largely it was because he believed in the good of all these things. He believed in showing the community what was good in our local systems. He believed students, administrations, and teachers should get public recognition for the good work that they did. And he believed that there was a TREMENDOUS amount of good in the public school system.
So , part of what my father was honored for this weekend was his support of our community and society through his support of public schools. This weekend of honor for his work was very bittersweet for my entire family. As we shared in the honor and as my brother teased me, I felt the loss tremendously- because I know that my father would have bridged it all by teasing us both and then we’d have had a wonderful discussion of it all examining all the perspectives; my father thinking rings around the two of us, I’m sure. He was the best sounding board I ever had about my field and more than anything I would love to discuss the current issues with him.
I know my father and I would have had many deep discussions about the Race to the Top issues, the good and the bad. I know he would have weighed in about Tony Bennett’s Fast Forward Plan. I do not believe he would have been in support of it either. I think he would have said that he’s going about things from a completely wrong direction and I believe that he would have written then about what he thought was the right direction which is collaboration, not a punitive move to destroy the teachers union. What’s more, I believe that people in this community at least would have listened to him.
I am basically a “nobody” with a blog, while my father was a respected leader in the community, known for his intelligence, and his fairness, and delightfully for his sense of optimism even when things look very bleak, as they do right now for Indiana’s public school system.
But he is no longer with us, so I have to make do without him when I want to discuss education, so I turned to my brother this weekend. And, I love and respect my brother of course- all differences of political opinion and teasing aside. But in the absence of my father, thank goodness for my brother’s wife! Lorie is quite an intelligent person herself but in particular she was appreciated yesterday because she herself is a school board member of their local school system in Michigan and as part of her duties she just returned from a National School board convention where she had the opportunity to hear Diane Ravitch (see link above) talk. Amazingly she had not heard of her before and had picked the session randomly. She came away from the session as firm of a believer in what Ms. Ravitch is saying about school reform as I am.
She had also had the opportunity to hear Anthony Mullen (National Teacher of the Year) speak about his personal experiences in teaching. I personally believe that his story about the effectiveness of a caring and involved teacher can do more to reform education than ANY browbeating, punitive measure hammered into place by a school superintendent or a legislature. I believe the public should hear his perspective.
Also chiming into the ongoing discussion was Justin (mentioned above as the speech giver and my father’s former employee.) An interesting thing about Justin is that he is now a young teacher and even a Department Head, himself. He also believes deeply in the public school system. He also still works part-time for my father’s paper (the Bluffton News-Banner) and you’ll often see an editorial by him there. Moreover, often those editorials are about public education’s importance. It’s a delight to see him carry on my father’s tradition of weighing in on public education issues with the same optimism for the future and the same belief in the preservation of public education that my father held.
Justin, it should be noted, had just flown in from taking a group of high school journalism students on a field trip, arriving at 4 in the morning to be back just in time for breakfast, a walk around Bloomington’s campus and self-led tour of the Ernie Pyle Journalism building, the luncheon, his speech, and our discussion.
All in all it was a marvelous and happy weekend and a time for reflection. It was a weekend that filled me with pride for many things, but foremost, pride that I am the daughter of such a wonderful man as my father was. And despite my brother’s light-hearted urgings to cease and desist, I believe I’ll follow the example of my father and continue speaking out on and for the things that I believe in. (-: This is America and this is a democracy and freedom of speech is both a privilege and a responsibility.
Reading this blog and hearing what I have to say is an option for the reader. My only real hope in writing here is that the blog posts will cause people to think, consider, and maybe re-examine their actions.... just as my father’s reporting and writing in the newspaper often did.
You might remember in the last blog post I spoke about the exchange between Indiana’s Union President and Tony Bennett, the State Superintendent of Public Schools. I don’t believe I told you that in answer to another email sent by Dr. Bennett to all of Indiana’s teachers stating that he would like to hear our opinions regarding education in our state not filtered through the ISTA, I replied with a link to this blog. ( I figured I’d take him at his word that he wanted to hear my opinion even if my brother does not. (-:)
On Thursday, a member of Dr. Bennett's staff emailed me back to tell me that Dr. Bennett wanted her to get back with me as soon as possible and indicate that it was clear from this blog that while we clearly had differences of opinions, it seemed we both shared the same concern for students. I’d like to believe that assertion is true.
I appreciate that Dr. Bennett took the time to have a member of his staff email me back. I’d have appreciated if she’d spelled my name correctly, but that’s really a trivial concern. What’s more important to me is that this gives me just a glimmer of hope that Dr. Bennett or at least a member of his staff might follow this blog from here on out. It gives me a glimmer of hope that he actually might consider different thoughts on educational reform other than his own or those of Mitch Daniel’s.
I realize that I will never be as influential as my father, but I’d like to think that my opinions and thoughts do matter a little bit. I’d like to believe that the thoughts and opinions of my fellow educators matter a little bit to “the powers that be” as well. I’d like to think that someone is listening. Thank you if you're someone who did.
4.18.10
A Weekend Discussion of Public Education
I’ve mentioned my brother ( the fiscally conservative Republican lawyer) before in this blog and I want to tell you that over the course of this past weekend, I took a lot of good natured teasing from my favorite (only) sibling about this blog. He tells me to cease and desist with my “liberal, socialist ways” and that no one wants to listen to my thoughts. I reminded him that this is America, full of freedom of speech and democracy, and I do happen to have the right to state my own personal opinions on my own blog. :-)
The occasion for my brother and I to be together this weekend was because my father was posthumously inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame. (If you scroll down below Ernie Pyle a bit, you’ll see him in the list of 2010 inductee at the far left.) One of the criteria behind inductions to this hall of fame, besides contributions to the field of journalism, is the contribution to community and society in general. Per that criterion, I unabashedly say that there never was a person more deserving of this award than my father.
The induction speech, given by our friend and one of my father’s former employees, Justin Peeper, spoke specifically to that my father was most often the first in our community to “weigh in” on issues of public concern and that many very fine causes were successful because of his editorial support. Mr. Peeper also cited my father’s high degree of fair-mindedness and his vision and the trust that the community had in him.
I’d also like to note the presence at the ceremony of the widow of our former Governor Frank O’Bannon. One of the other very deserving inductees was Randy West, former Editor of the “The Corydon Democrat” the newspaper owned by the O’Bannon family. This coincidence triggered the memory of other honors that my father was bestowed in his lifetime. He was twice named a Sagamore of the Wabash, once by Governor O’Bannon and he was the first recipient of an award that Mr. West also was presented- the Charlie Biggs Commitment to Community Award.
So, why is all this important to my “lowly” blog about public education? Well, because my father was maybe the BIGGEST supporter of public education that ever walked the earth. His mother was a teacher, his wife was a teacher , his granddaughter just received her degree in education, and of course, there’s me, his daughter, who has worked 30 plus years in education.
Perhaps the greater point though is that my father was also one of the biggest supporters of democracy that ever walked the earth and if you had the opportunity to ever talk with him about it, he would have told you in no uncertain terms how vital PUBLIC education is to our (or any) democracy, in fact to the very survival of democracy.
I was privileged to have had many long discussions about my field with him when he was alive. While we didn’t always agree about everything, I can tell you without equivocation that he was against the use of the public dollar for vouchers and eventually against the charter school movement and that he was vehemently against the property tax cuts because they were not replaced by a stable source of income for our schools.
Originally, my father leaned towards support of NCLB (I did mention that by and large he leaned toward being a Republican, no?) until I loaned him a book about it (forgive me for not remembering which one) and after discussion between the two of us and reading it, he then came to much the same conclusion, as did Diane Ravitch in her book “The Death and Life of the Great American School System" . He came to believe that the reforms sought with NCLB would severely weaken, if not destroy, the public school system in this country.
All of this is not to say that my father was not for accountability in our school systems, but he believed we were ALL accountable: teachers, parents, the community, legislators, school board members, unions, administrators, and students! To him, it was a SHARED responsibility that political motives and uneducated, uninformed policies had no place in. He meant “shared” in the truest sense of the word.
It is also not to say that he didn’t believe that at times the teachers unions needed to re-examine some of their policies and stances. He did believe, however, that there IS a definite place in the world for teachers unions. He felt strongly about their existence. He simply wished that they and the Departments of Education would work together more for the common good.
My father covered numerous school board meetings in his day, he editorially and enthusiastically supported building drives and positive educational programs. He actually understood complicated school budgets and the politics involved (Ironically he was not a journalism major in college, but rather an economics major) and he endeavored to stay current on national and state educational policies.
He covered events and wrote about issues and did interviews with school administrators and teachers . I would be so bold to say that there was no community newspaper that ever provided more coverage of all (not just athletics) school activities and events than his newspaper did. Yes, it’s true, part of this was to sell papers, but largely it was because he believed in the good of all these things. He believed in showing the community what was good in our local systems. He believed students, administrations, and teachers should get public recognition for the good work that they did. And he believed that there was a TREMENDOUS amount of good in the public school system.
So , part of what my father was honored for this weekend was his support of our community and society through his support of public schools. This weekend of honor for his work was very bittersweet for my entire family. As we shared in the honor and as my brother teased me, I felt the loss tremendously- because I know that my father would have bridged it all by teasing us both and then we’d have had a wonderful discussion of it all examining all the perspectives; my father thinking rings around the two of us, I’m sure. He was the best sounding board I ever had about my field and more than anything I would love to discuss the current issues with him.
I know my father and I would have had many deep discussions about the Race to the Top issues, the good and the bad. I know he would have weighed in about Tony Bennett’s Fast Forward Plan. I do not believe he would have been in support of it either. I think he would have said that he’s going about things from a completely wrong direction and I believe that he would have written then about what he thought was the right direction which is collaboration, not a punitive move to destroy the teachers union. What’s more, I believe that people in this community at least would have listened to him.
I am basically a “nobody” with a blog, while my father was a respected leader in the community, known for his intelligence, and his fairness, and delightfully for his sense of optimism even when things look very bleak, as they do right now for Indiana’s public school system.
But he is no longer with us, so I have to make do without him when I want to discuss education, so I turned to my brother this weekend. And, I love and respect my brother of course- all differences of political opinion and teasing aside. But in the absence of my father, thank goodness for my brother’s wife! Lorie is quite an intelligent person herself but in particular she was appreciated yesterday because she herself is a school board member of their local school system in Michigan and as part of her duties she just returned from a National School board convention where she had the opportunity to hear Diane Ravitch (see link above) talk. Amazingly she had not heard of her before and had picked the session randomly. She came away from the session as firm of a believer in what Ms. Ravitch is saying about school reform as I am.
She had also had the opportunity to hear Anthony Mullen (National Teacher of the Year) speak about his personal experiences in teaching. I personally believe that his story about the effectiveness of a caring and involved teacher can do more to reform education than ANY browbeating, punitive measure hammered into place by a school superintendent or a legislature. I believe the public should hear his perspective.
Also chiming into the ongoing discussion was Justin (mentioned above as the speech giver and my father’s former employee.) An interesting thing about Justin is that he is now a young teacher and even a Department Head, himself. He also believes deeply in the public school system. He also still works part-time for my father’s paper (the Bluffton News-Banner) and you’ll often see an editorial by him there. Moreover, often those editorials are about public education’s importance. It’s a delight to see him carry on my father’s tradition of weighing in on public education issues with the same optimism for the future and the same belief in the preservation of public education that my father held.
Justin, it should be noted, had just flown in from taking a group of high school journalism students on a field trip, arriving at 4 in the morning to be back just in time for breakfast, a walk around Bloomington’s campus and self-led tour of the Ernie Pyle Journalism building, the luncheon, his speech, and our discussion.
All in all it was a marvelous and happy weekend and a time for reflection. It was a weekend that filled me with pride for many things, but foremost, pride that I am the daughter of such a wonderful man as my father was. And despite my brother’s light-hearted urgings to cease and desist, I believe I’ll follow the example of my father and continue speaking out on and for the things that I believe in. (-: This is America and this is a democracy and freedom of speech is both a privilege and a responsibility.
Reading this blog and hearing what I have to say is an option for the reader. My only real hope in writing here is that the blog posts will cause people to think, consider, and maybe re-examine their actions.... just as my father’s reporting and writing in the newspaper often did.
You might remember in the last blog post I spoke about the exchange between Indiana’s Union President and Tony Bennett, the State Superintendent of Public Schools. I don’t believe I told you that in answer to another email sent by Dr. Bennett to all of Indiana’s teachers stating that he would like to hear our opinions regarding education in our state not filtered through the ISTA, I replied with a link to this blog. ( I figured I’d take him at his word that he wanted to hear my opinion even if my brother does not. (-:)
On Thursday, a member of Dr. Bennett's staff emailed me back to tell me that Dr. Bennett wanted her to get back with me as soon as possible and indicate that it was clear from this blog that while we clearly had differences of opinions, it seemed we both shared the same concern for students. I’d like to believe that assertion is true.
I appreciate that Dr. Bennett took the time to have a member of his staff email me back. I’d have appreciated if she’d spelled my name correctly, but that’s really a trivial concern. What’s more important to me is that this gives me just a glimmer of hope that Dr. Bennett or at least a member of his staff might follow this blog from here on out. It gives me a glimmer of hope that he actually might consider different thoughts on educational reform other than his own or those of Mitch Daniel’s.
I realize that I will never be as influential as my father, but I’d like to think that my opinions and thoughts do matter a little bit. I’d like to believe that the thoughts and opinions of my fellow educators matter a little bit to “the powers that be” as well. I’d like to think that someone is listening. Thank you if you're someone who did.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
The Heart of the Matter
Public Education Matters
The HEART of the Matter
4.14.10
Today I received an email from the President of my state’s teacher’s union. In it it is explained that they have refused our State Superintendent of Public School’s request to get behind Indiana’s Fast Forward Plan to apply for the 2nd round of Race to the Top money. Included in the email was Dr. Bennett’s request to the ISTA and then the response. Respectively, I’ll post those links here. Bennett RttT request to ISTA.pdf and ISTA's response to Bennett request.pdf
As you can see if you read the links, the ISTA will NOT be throwing their support behind the Fast Forward/Race to the Top application. All I can say is “YIPPEE!!!”
I say this for two reasons. One I do not think the amount of Race to the Top money will be worth it and I do not like the whole Race to the Top program’s emphasis on competitiveness.
The second reason is that I do not at all support my state’s Fast Forward plan and I also do not believe the ISTA should give in to Dr. Bennett’s stipulations to the ISTA that go against both what is good for teachers and what is good for students.
Furthermore, Dr. Bennett is basically asking the ISTA to sign away to anything and everything the IDOE decides to do in the future. What person with even half a brain would sign a contract with anyone like this? For the ISTA to do so would be irresponsible on their part.
Now, the heart of the whole matter is not what I personally think. The heart of the matter is that Dr. Bennett and his Fast Forward Plan espouse almost everything that has been proven NOT to work in providing effective and successful education reform.
Don’t believe me? Then I ask you to read Diane Ravitch’s “The Death and Life of the Great American School System.” In this book she provides arguments and documentation about some of the very programs that she formerly supported when she was a top player in George Bush’s education administration (the administration that brought us NCLB.) She is now renouncing all that. Furthermore, she is stating why she no longer supports the type of “reform” that does not revolve around teacher input and collaboration as Dr. Bennett's does not. She doesn’t just make statements, she provides substantiation and documentation of her current assertions.
The heart of the matter here also is that I believe my state capital’s leading newspaper (the Indianapolis Star) to be so partisan and so wrapped up in supporting every little thing that our Governor and Dr. Bennett spew out that I believe that the next thing that will happen will be a great deal of press coverage supporting Dr. Bennett and Mr. Daniels - suggesting that it is the fault of the teacher’s union that our state will not be applying for Race to the Top money (round 2.)
I’d like to put it out there right now that this is NOT at all true. I want to put it out there before all the "yes people" in the state's media try to tell you all otherwise. Yes, it’s true the ISTA will not be supporting the Fast Forward plan, but to dig a bit deeper- one should see WHY the association will not support it- because THAT is the HEART OF THE MATTER.
The HEART of the Matter
4.14.10
Today I received an email from the President of my state’s teacher’s union. In it it is explained that they have refused our State Superintendent of Public School’s request to get behind Indiana’s Fast Forward Plan to apply for the 2nd round of Race to the Top money. Included in the email was Dr. Bennett’s request to the ISTA and then the response. Respectively, I’ll post those links here. Bennett RttT request to ISTA.pdf and ISTA's response to Bennett request.pdf
As you can see if you read the links, the ISTA will NOT be throwing their support behind the Fast Forward/Race to the Top application. All I can say is “YIPPEE!!!”
I say this for two reasons. One I do not think the amount of Race to the Top money will be worth it and I do not like the whole Race to the Top program’s emphasis on competitiveness.
The second reason is that I do not at all support my state’s Fast Forward plan and I also do not believe the ISTA should give in to Dr. Bennett’s stipulations to the ISTA that go against both what is good for teachers and what is good for students.
Furthermore, Dr. Bennett is basically asking the ISTA to sign away to anything and everything the IDOE decides to do in the future. What person with even half a brain would sign a contract with anyone like this? For the ISTA to do so would be irresponsible on their part.
Now, the heart of the whole matter is not what I personally think. The heart of the matter is that Dr. Bennett and his Fast Forward Plan espouse almost everything that has been proven NOT to work in providing effective and successful education reform.
Don’t believe me? Then I ask you to read Diane Ravitch’s “The Death and Life of the Great American School System.” In this book she provides arguments and documentation about some of the very programs that she formerly supported when she was a top player in George Bush’s education administration (the administration that brought us NCLB.) She is now renouncing all that. Furthermore, she is stating why she no longer supports the type of “reform” that does not revolve around teacher input and collaboration as Dr. Bennett's does not. She doesn’t just make statements, she provides substantiation and documentation of her current assertions.
The heart of the matter here also is that I believe my state capital’s leading newspaper (the Indianapolis Star) to be so partisan and so wrapped up in supporting every little thing that our Governor and Dr. Bennett spew out that I believe that the next thing that will happen will be a great deal of press coverage supporting Dr. Bennett and Mr. Daniels - suggesting that it is the fault of the teacher’s union that our state will not be applying for Race to the Top money (round 2.)
I’d like to put it out there right now that this is NOT at all true. I want to put it out there before all the "yes people" in the state's media try to tell you all otherwise. Yes, it’s true the ISTA will not be supporting the Fast Forward plan, but to dig a bit deeper- one should see WHY the association will not support it- because THAT is the HEART OF THE MATTER.
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