tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post2937310857974182921..comments2024-03-29T04:34:05.185-04:00Comments on CURMUDGUCATION: Awful Mean Naughty JournalismPeter Greenehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16511193640285760299noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-73378724353751607632016-02-21T13:19:09.525-05:002016-02-21T13:19:09.525-05:00I like the Bertrand Russell reference.I like the Bertrand Russell reference.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07228908566250306699noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-81959923835725866302016-02-21T13:18:34.822-05:002016-02-21T13:18:34.822-05:00I agree.I agree.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07228908566250306699noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-91416084008810463362016-02-21T08:57:32.294-05:002016-02-21T08:57:32.294-05:00Hard to take a writer (I cannot call her a "j...Hard to take a writer (I cannot call her a "journalist") seriously who responds to "screeds masked as journalism" with a screed masked as journalism.CrunchyMamahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14434606158400653601noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-49966694124662271992016-02-20T20:18:11.655-05:002016-02-20T20:18:11.655-05:00Regarding the shifting the onus of proof on the cr...Regarding the shifting the onus of proof on the critics:<br /><br />Russell's teapot, sometimes called the celestial teapot or cosmic teapot, is an analogy first coined by the philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) to illustrate that the philosophic burden of proof lies upon a person making scientifically unfalsifiable claims rather than shifting the burden of proof to others. Russell wrote that, if he claims that a teapot orbits the Sun somewhere in space between the Earth and Mars, it is nonsensical for him to expect others to believe him on the ground that they cannot prove him wrong. Russell's teapot is still referred to in discussions concerning the existence of God.<br /><br />The burden of proof regarding college and career readiness, higher order thinking skills, and closing the learning gap is just as preposterous as the claim of an orbiting teacup.<br />We have no obligation to disprove these scientifically unfalsifiable claims. Nor do we have any obligation to offer alternatives to their FAILED policies.NY Teacherhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06584135103498426410noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-78693014628025007252016-02-20T12:42:14.374-05:002016-02-20T12:42:14.374-05:00————————————————————-
And finally… From Michelle ...————————————————————-<br /><br />And finally… From Michelle Rhee<br /><br />http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/11/crusader-of-the-classrooms/307080/<br /><br />————————————————————-<br /><br />ATLANTIC MONTHLY: One of the other concerns I’ve heard voiced about alternative selection models is that the teachers aren’t making a thirty-year, or even a ten-year commitment.<br /><br />MICHELLE RHEE: Nobody makes a thirty-year or ten-year commitment to a single profession. Name one profession where the assumption is that when you go in, right out of graduating college, that the majority of people are going to stay in that profession. It’s not the reality anymore, maybe with the exception of medicine. But short of that, people don’t go into jobs and stay there forever anymore.<br /><br />ATLANTIC MONTHLY: So you feel like teachers can be effective even within a short term?<br /><br />MICHELLE RHEE: Absolutely, and I’d rather have a really effective teacher for two years than a mediocre or ineffective one for twenty years.<br /><br />ATLANTIC MONTHLY: One thing that I’ve encountered personally in talking to a lot of veteran teachers is this idea that programs like Teach for America or the D.C. Teaching Fellows de-professionalize education. They see it as a kind of glorified internship.<br /><br />MICHELLE RHEE: I’ll tell you what de-professionalizes education. It’s when we have people sitting in the classrooms—whether they’re certified or not, whether they’ve taught for two months or 22 years—that are not teaching kids. And whom we cannot remove from the classroom, and whom parents know are not good. Those are the things that de-professionalize the teaching corp. Not Teach for America, not D.C. Teaching Fellows. That, I think, is a ridiculous argument.<br /><br />—————-<br /><br />Put yourself in the shoes of a university student. Are you going to spend and/or incur debt in a range of $100,000 – 300,000 for tuition/room & board/other expenses, then face all of that?Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07280841123120011747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-75527849206225037942016-02-20T12:42:06.360-05:002016-02-20T12:42:06.360-05:00Here's Ravitch with some of the list:
http://...Here's Ravitch with some of the list:<br /><br />http://dianeravitch.net/2015/06/21/some-classics-of-teacher-bashing/<br /><br />“Let’s start with anti-corporate reformer Leonie Haimson:<br /><br />http://www.eduwonk.com/2010/08/unmasking-the-blame-the-teacher-crowd.html<br /><br />—————————————–<br /><br />LEONIIE HAIMSON: Scapegoating teachers has become the mantra of the so-called reformers. From Katie Haycock claiming (with no evidence) that the problems of low-performing schools are primarily due to poor teaching, to the recent cover of Newsweek, proclaiming that the ” Key to saving American education” is to “fire bad teachers,” with these words repeated over and over on the blackboard, this simplistic notion notion infects nearly every blog, magazine, and DC think tank, including this one.<br /><br />In what other sphere would we make this claim? Is the key to reforming our inequitable health care system firing bad doctors? Or the key to reducing inner city crime firing bad cops? No. But somehow this inherently destructive perspective is the delivered wisdom among the privateers who populate and dominate thinking in this country.<br /><br />———————————————————————–<br /><br />From corporate reformer Kati Haycock: (originally at NEWSWEEK—since deleted by NEWSWEEK) but still available at<br /><br />http://www.eduwonk.com/2010/08/unmasking-the-blame-the-teacher-crowd.html<br /><br />————————————————————-<br /><br />KATI HAYCOCK: But what we need to do is change the idea that education is the only career that needs to be done for life. There are a lot of smart people who change careers every six or seven years, while education ends up with a bunch of people on the low end of the pile who don’t want to compete in the job market. Kati Haycock, President of Education Trust, (Newsweek, 9/1/08)<br /><br />———————————————————————–<br /><br />From Corporate Reformer & hedge fund guru Whitney Tilson:<br /><br />http://www.eduwonk.com/2010/08/unmasking-the-blame-the-teacher-crowd.html<br /><br />————————————————————-<br /><br />WHITNEY TILSON : (Public school teachers are) gutless weasels and completely disgraced themselves in siding with the unions against meaningful reforms of a public school system that systematically, all over the country, gives black and Latino students the very worst teachers and schools, thereby trapping black and Latino communities in multi-generational cycles of poverty, violence and despair. (July 30, 2011 blog post)<br /><br />CONTINUED on next post:Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07280841123120011747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-20379376613192664972016-02-20T12:38:13.892-05:002016-02-20T12:38:13.892-05:00I could put forth dozens of quotes where reformers...I could put forth dozens of quotes where reformers bash teachers.<br /><br />Here's one:<br /><br />—————————————————–<br />KATI HAYCOCK: “But what we need to do is change the idea that education is the only career that needs to be done for life. There are a lot of smart people who change careers every six or seven years, while education ends up with a bunch of people on the low end of the pile who don’t want to compete in the job market.”<br />—————————————————-<br /><br />So Kati divides public school teachers into two categories:<br /><br />1) HIGH QUALITY: that small minority — the elite “smart people” (TFA & others) who, over a lifetime, “change careers every six or seven years”— with just one career being teaching, and the other five or six being non-teaching careers—and who, albeit briefly, deliver the highest quality of education to their students before moving on…<br /><br />… OR…<br /><br />2) LOW QUALITY: the vast majority — the “low-end-of-the-pile” slackers who make teaching a long-time career, merely to avoid having “to compete in the job market,” with teaching being a place to hide out and be lazy… and, in the process, willfully destroy the academic and career potential of millions of students… and who do so without the slightest twinge of conscience.<br /><br />In Kati’s deranged mind, if you teaching in classroom for more than five years—ten years at the absolute most—you’re guilty-as-charged of being one of those “low-end-of-the-pile” slackers that are driving our country to ruin.<br /><br />Seriously, teaching is “the only career done for life”? What is she smoking?Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07280841123120011747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-41102157065726294542016-02-20T10:41:28.755-05:002016-02-20T10:41:28.755-05:00Ah yes, Bermudez trots the good ol' straw man ...Ah yes, Bermudez trots the good ol' straw man argument. Criticize the critics of her shaky credentials, and the empty "data", supporting her argument, to shift the onus of proof on the critics. It would be laughable if this argument wasn't the main way our countries leaders get elected and impose their empty policies on very real people with very real lives... What a load of crap!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16376564342631262638noreply@blogger.com