Catalyst Chicago has been reporting on Chicago education for twenty-five year, operating as "an independent news organization that serves as a watchdog and resource for school improvement in Chicago." While they do offer plenty of space to features like guest writers plugging the awesomeness of reform, their news coverage is pretty balanced-- they do not appear to have any requirement that their reporters never cover bad news about charters.
But last week Catalyst ran the fluffiest piece of fluffery ever in Maureen Kelleher's paean to Arne Duncan. Surely this is not going to be the narrative that anyone pushes about Duncan as he approaches his post-federal earning years.
First, Kelleher flashes back to Duncan's elevation to the head job of Chicago schools (he was successor to Paul Vallas). Duncan's big success-- adopting a tracking method for freshmen. On the other hand...
Duncan also championed expanding school choice and lent new urgency to
the work of transforming struggling high schools -- initiatives that
drew heat from the political left. These efforts had more mixed results.
No kidding.
Next we move on to Duncan's career as Secretary of Education in, perhaps, some parallel universe.
Duncan has encouraged states to innovate around accountability systems, offering waivers from No Child Left Behind’s rules.
This is true in much the same way it's true that a mugger encourages you to put your hands up and offers to take all of your cash. To talk about the waiver program as if it was a mild suggestion, even a favor, to state systems, is to miss the whole point. States, over a financial barrel, and looking at the unachievable goals of NCLB (100% above average by 2014), had a choice about accepting Duncan's offer in the same way that apartment dwellers have a choice about whether or not to pay the rent.
Finally, we look into Duncan's future.
As noted by the Washington Post, Duncan's family is moving back to Chicago while Duncan says he's sticking out the rest of the Obama Presidency. While some have expressed skepticism, I can believe it. Summer is the time to move kids without messing up their world, and this summer is likely to be less messy than next. Why not. Of course, as widely noted, his kids will attend an elite non-Common Core unreformed private school. That would have been a good thing to mention.
But Kelleher turns to Peter Cunningham for quotes. Cunningham is a long-time Arne associate who now heads up the $12 million dollar website-that-will-not-be-named, but which now looks almost hard-hitting compared to Kelleher's piece. Cunningham says Duncan is no quitter, with grit and drive and stuff.
Duncan's sister confirms he's not looking for work right now. Probably true-- Duncan can line up consulting work in the ed industry with an hour's worth of phone calls, so why rush anything.
Considering what other education secretaries have done after their
terms, Cunningham doesn’t see Duncan returning to district leadership,
either. Consulting, elected office and work with think tanks and
foundations are more likely. While in CPS, Duncan’s team built
relationships with private foundations and federal grant administrators
that more than tripled the district’s take of competitive grant funds.
I'm not sure which thinky tank would have him, but I get a smile out of imagining him going off to work for Mike Petrilli at Fordham. The implication of that last sentence seems clear to me-- Duncan will be able to hook people up with some serious money.
So, not so much as a sentence to consider the reality, the controversy, or the legacy of Duncan's work in office. Between this and the Post profile, it's beginning to look like we're going to be subjected to a year or more of valedictory essays filled with attaboys but no consideration of the damage to public education done by Duncan.
Look, I have no desire to see the guy drawn and quartered and publicly pilloried, but he has presided over an unprecedented re-engineering of the entire purpose of US public education-- one of our oldest and most honored institutions-- and in the process has come close to destroying one of the legs on which democracy stands. Backlash against his work has created entire new movements that didn't exist a decade ago, and Congress has spent part of their time writing a new law arguing about just how much power should be stripped from his office simply in reaction to how he has used that power.
I don't need to see Duncan personally attacked, but any retrospective or faux retrospective has to look at where we are in education policy, what choices have been made, what the effects have been on us as a nation, if for no other reason than we need to have a serious talk about where to head next. A business as usual, nothing to see here, so how do you like living in DC puff piece is irresponsible.
Duncan's one gift is that he has such an aww-shucks lovable lunkhead air about him that people don't so much notice that he has been laying waste with a battleax. As he nears his exit from office, we cannot afford to pay attention only to the aw shucks and ignore the damage done with the battleax.
Here are a piece from the Ravitch blog about Duncan's hypocrisy:
ReplyDeletehttp://dianeravitch.net/2015/07/11/duncans-children-will-enroll-in-chicago-lab-school/
DIANE RAVITCH: "Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s children will attend the private University of Chicago Lab School, where his wife works.
Of course, everyone is free to send their children wherever they wish. What’s interesting about Duncan choosing this school is that it does not practice any of the policies that Duncan has promulgated. It is a progressive school, founded by John Dewey. No Common Core. No evaluation of teachers by test scores. No performance pay.
Duncan attended the prestigious University of Chicago Lab School. The teachers are unionized. President Obama sent his daughters there. Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his children there.
Julie Vassilatos, a parent activist in Chicago, notes that Duncan has chosen a school that is free of any of Duncan’s influence. This is how she describes the Lab School:
Lab is an excellent, well-resourced private school with a rich arts curriculum, small classes, entire rooms devoted to holding musical instruments, a unionized teaching staff that you pretty much never hear anyone suggesting should be replaced by untrained temp workers, and not one single standardized test until students reach age 14.
In other words, Lab School has to date experienced not one ounce of influence from Arne Duncan’s Department of Ed. Not one ounce of impact from his policies.
Not.
One.
He’s choosing to keep his kids out of the system that requires nearly continuous standardized testing each year: three iterations of the PARCC, three of the NWEA MAP, the REACH Performance Tasks; the NAEP, TRC + DIBELS, mClass Math, and IDEL specially for littles; and EXPLORE, PLAN, COMPASS, and STAR for bigs.
I know, he’s told us, like a father, it’s okay. Our kids can do this. It’s what’s best. It’s challenging. What kind of message does it send our children if we object to a challenge? He’s gotten this narrative out far and wide, so that folks who don’t have kids in school now can often be seen saying things in newspaper comments sections like, “Why can’t these whiners just shut up and take the test?” or “What a bunch of weaklings! These kids and parents don’t have any spines anymore if they don’t want to take the test!”
You’ll note, in these kinds of comments sections, that it is always the test. As if there is one.
What those commenters don’t know is that the endless stream of tests, accompanying prep, and supporting curricula are low-quality dreck, and they have very little to do with actual learning. They do, however, have a lot to do with bubbling in bubbles and guessing what adults expect.
No, those commenters may not know how bad the situation is for public schools right now in terms of testing.
But Arne Duncan does. He crafted the testing policy and now calls it a civil right.
He’s choosing to keep his kids out of a system that spends so much time and money on testing that there’s little time left, and no money, for stuff that’s not on the tests: history, science, art, music.
If only Duncan wanted America’s children to have public schools with the same rich offerings as the Lab School. Public schools that didn’t have to waste time and money on endless bubble tests. Duncan knows what is best for his children, for Rahm’s children, and for the President’s children. Why isn’t it right for other people’s children? John Dewey founded the Lab School to see what was best for public education, not just for the children of elites.
From Mercedes Schneider:
ReplyDeletehttps://deutsch29.wordpress.com/2015/07/11/arne-duncans-children-were-never-exposed-to-common-core/
Arne Duncan’s Children Were Never Exposed to Common Core
July 11, 2015
MERCEDES SCHNEIDER: I have read in the past where US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has stated that his own children attend public school.
Wow. What a good selling point for Duncan, pusher of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), associated consortium assessments, and test-score-driven reform in general.
However, let us consider the details behind the Duncan children’s “public school” attendance. The information below is from an April 2009 Ed Notes Online article:
When asked this question: As the second education secretary with school-aged kids, where does your daughter go to school, and how important was the school district in your decision about where to live?
Duncan replied: She goes to Arlington [Virginia] public schools. That was why we chose where we live, it was the determining factor. That was the most important thing to me. My family has given up so much so that I could have the opportunity to serve; I didn’t want to try to save the country’s children and our educational system and jeopardize my own children’s education.
(Arlington Public Schools QuickFacts include the following: 31 schools, 23 of which are elementary schools; average teacher salary: $79,579; teachers with a masters degree: 79%; cost per pupil: $18,616; Arlington median household income: $106,400; per capita income: $85,900; Arlington residents’ highest level of education: bachelors, 71.7%; graduate degrees, 37.4%– not sure how this totals more than 100%; 2014 on-time graduation rate: 92%.)
The Ed Notes Online article appeared only two months before Duncan began to publicly push CCSS and the consortium assessments that he said the feds would pay for (at the June 2009 National Governors Association Symposium).
But get this: Virginia never adopted CCSS. Duncan lives in Virginia; his children attend school in Virginia.
...
The former chief executive of the Chicago Public Schools has been a forceful cheerleader for the Common Core State Standards Initiative, a set of K-12 math and language arts curriculum benchmarks and high-stakes standardized tests now being used in public schools in most states. (RELATED: Arne Duncan Blames ‘White Suburban Moms’ For Common Core Pushback)
Duncan’s family moved into a home in an affluent area in northern Virginia when he became education secretary in 2009. His children attended public schools there in the intervening years. However, Virginia is not a Common Core state.
With the move back to Chicago and enrollment at the fancypants Lab School, Duncan’s children will be even further removed from the national standards.
High school tuition at the Lab School is $30,618 annually.
For the rest of the Daily Caller article, click here:
http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/10/arne-duncan-loves-common-core-for-your-kids-but-not-his/#ixzz3fbkCCQOD
Note that the Daily Caller highlights info on the schools that the Obama and Gates children attend. Let me add that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his own children to the University of Chicago Lab School, which he has told the press is a private decision even as he has pushed the Chicago Public Schools to adopt test-score-driven reforms that do not touch the world of the Lab School.
Privilege has its privileges. Hypocrisy is apparently one of them.
And here's one more from THE DAILY CALLER:
ReplyDeletehttp://dailycaller.com/2015/07/10/arne-duncan-loves-common-core-for-your-kids-but-not-his/#ixzz3fbkCCQOD
THE DAILY CALLER: "Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s wife has moved to Chicago so the couple’s two daughters can attend the University of Chicago Lab School, arguably the most elite private school in Chicago — and certainly among the most expensive.
Duncan has led the Department of Education since the outset of President Barack Obama’s administration. He will shuttle between Washington and Chicago for the remainder of Obama’s second term, reports the Chicago Sun-Times.
The former chief executive of the Chicago Public Schools has been a forceful cheerleader for the Common Core State Standards Initiative, a set of K-12 math and language arts curriculum benchmarks and high-stakes standardized tests now being used in public schools in most states. (RELATED: Arne Duncan Blames ‘White Suburban Moms’ For Common Core Pushback)
Duncan’s family moved into a home in an affluent area in northern Virginia when he became education secretary in 2009. His children attended public schools there in the intervening years. However, Virginia is not a Common Core state.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/10/arne-duncan-loves-common-core-for-your-kids-but-not-his/#ixzz3h6PqFpiL
With the move back to Chicago and enrollment at the fancypants Lab School, Duncan’s children will be even further removed from the national standards.
High school tuition at the Lab School is $30,618 annually.
Duncan’s wife, Karen, once worked at the prestigious school and will return to a job there.
The progressive Democrat attended Chicago Lab as a youngster himself before matriculating at Harvard University.
Duncan, who has bragged that he seeks employment policy guidance from Chicago street gang leaders, is not the only powerful Democrat who preaches the benefits of Common Core for America’s kids but then doesn’t actually allow his own kids to take part.
Obama, a strong Common Core supporter, sends his own teenage daughters to Sidwell Friends School in Washington, D.C. Tuition per student at the exclusive private school is $37,750 per year. The school boasts that this amount “includes a hot lunch.” (RELATED: The School Lunches Malia And Sasha Eat Vs. The Crap Michelle Obama Has Foisted On America)
Similarly billionaire software tycoon Bill Gates has poured millions of dollars into efforts to develop and promote Common Core. However, Gates and his wife, Melinda, have chosen to send their three children — Jennifer, Rory and Phoebe — to Lakeside School, a posh prep school in Seattle where annual tuition runs $29,800. (RELATED: Bill Gates Wants To Foist Common Core On Your Kids BUT NOT HIS)
In a 2005 speech at tony Lakeside, Gates fondly remembered his time and his teachers at Lakeside.
“Teachers like Ann Stephens. I was in her English class, and I read every book in there twice. But I sat in the back of the room and never raised my hand,” Gates reminisced.
“I never would have come to enjoy literature as much as I do if she hadn’t pushed me.”
The Common Core standards Gates has funded heavily mandate a nonfiction-heavy reading regime that devalues literature tremendously. Specifically, under Common Core, nonfiction books must constitute at least 70 per cent of the texts read by high school students. (RELATED: Under Common Core, Classic Literature To Be Dropped In Favor Of ‘Informational Texts’)
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/10/arne-duncan-loves-common-core-for-your-kids-but-not-his/#ixzz3h6Q9RHDt