I’M GRATEFUL TO HOPE REESE OF THE ATLANTIC, WHO WROTE A WONDERFUL INTERVIEW WITH ME TODAY. MY FIRST DOSE OF MEAN COMMENTS, EVER, SO I’M STARTING TO GROW MY CARAPACE RIGHT NOW!
http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/11/it-feels-like-education-malpractice/281837/
How gratifying to be using my teaching experience and comprehension of the stakes in high stakes, to get the word out about the disastrous scam that’s passing for education these days. Wish I’d had another couple hours to Bloviate on Bloomberg, but Helen Fielding, the “Bridget Jones” author, was up next and scratching her acrylics at the door.
This morning I started the “morning drive” radio interviews for Davonte’s Inferno straight from my kitchen table and out to the world! One station in Cleveland brought the perfect opportunity to rip into mayoral control, which they’ve had since 1995 and has yielded nothing but the lowest performance. Another Philly station got my riff on the horrific school budget deficit thanks to Governor Tom Corbett’s (named on the Worst Governors List) 2011 slash of $1 billion. Last I heard they didn’t even have people to answer the phones (though to be fair to Corbett, he DID cut taxes for corporations, too!). Along with the school warriors in Chicago, valiant Philly educators give us awesome inspiration–there was even a hunger strike last summer to protest!
Davonte’s Inferno: Ten Years in the New York Public School Gulag will be released October 15th or soon after on ebook. The print release is November 12th. Thanks for your patience!
October 9, 2013
Today between 4:00 – 6:00 PM, MORE — the Movement of Rank and File Educators–will protest the illegal teacher evaluation system negotiated by the UFT and New York State. Join us at 52 Broadway, (Wall Street, 4 train). Wear your outrage, and red!
October 9, 2013
This morning I saw former Indiana union-busting governor Mitch Daniels on MSNBC, here for NBC’s annual Miseducation Nation. Daniels’s main claim to education was his attempt to censor Howard Zinn’s writings from state schools, dismissing them as “crap” and “propaganda.” Now as president of Purdue, this heavy-hitting intellectual is seeking to expand high-stakes testing to college kids, in the name of accountability. In the neocon vision of the future, there’s no escape from inundata–they’ll do whatever it takes to choke the joy from learning.