Well, that was quick.
After the interwebs blew up with Clinton's ill-considered comment about closing below-average schools, Lauren Camera leapt up at US News to say, "Oh, no. Y'all just misunderstood. It was taken out of context."
I had read the original context when I first responded to her comment. It doesn't help.
The context is that she was discussing how Iowa's governor was crushing rural schools by starving them of necessary resources. She was discussing Iowa's wacky laws about not allowing school district deficits. And then she said this:
This school district and these schools throughout Iowa are doing a better than average job. Now I wouldn't keep any school open that wasn't doing a better than average job. If a school is not doing a good job then, you know, that may not be good for the kids, but when you have a district that is doing a good job it seems kind of counterproductive to impose financial burdens on it.
It is true that she did not suggest, as some slightly hyperventilating reports might have implied, that if elected President, she would make it policy to close all below average schools (i.e. slightly more than half the schools in the country). I will give her that much.
However, that doesn't change what was boneheaded about her comment.
Yes, it was an off-the-cuff comment. But if that's the comment that comes off her cuff, I have serious doubts about how well she understands the situation.
Clinton did NOT say, "If there are schools that are performing poorly, then the state should look hard at whether those schools and the communities they serve are getting the resources they need." That kind of comment would have fit perfectly in the context of the financial issues she was discussing. But she didn't say that. The context actually makes this part seem worse, because she skipped right over the financial issues that she was actually talking about.
Clinton used "below average" as shorthand for low-performing, which indicates a lack of understanding of exactly how schools end up tagged low-performing, and how the stack ranking of schools is pernicious, inaccurate, and guaranteed to always result in schools labeled low-performing (and for that matter, what "below average" really means). The use of false, inaccurate and just-plain-crappy measures to label schools and teachers as successes or failures is central to what's going on in education reform. If she doesn't understand that, she doesn't understand some of the most fundamental problems we're facing.
Clinton's glib use of "wouldn't keep any school open" shows a limited understanding of just what is involved in "closing" a school. What happens to staff? What happens to students? What happens to the community? Clinton shows no awareness of how huge a task she's glibly suggesting, nor does she suggest that there are other options that should be considered long before this nuclear option, which should be at the bottom of the list.
No, I don't think Clinton telegraphed some sort of legislative intent or policy plan. But I do think she opened a window to the bad, incorrect, and damaging assumptions that she carries into her consideration of education. And because of her long and cozy history with privatizers like the Waltons, those bad assumptions are especially troubling.
So, yes, I considered the context, and no, Clinton doesn't deserve a pass on this one. She said a really, really dumb thing. And it is just as dumb in context.
Wednesday, December 23, 2015
AZ: Creationist Charterista Now Head of Senate Ed Committee
Arizona Senate President Andy Biggs has named Senator Sylvia Allen to lead the education committee. This is not good news for public education.
Allen has had a colorful career. She is a Senator because a man fell off a horse. Twice.
Before she arrived in the capitol, she held down a number of jobs, including county supervisor. It was in that job that she was slapped for interfering with an investigation into her son-in-law's misbehavior as a detention officer with female inmates. After becoming a senator, she filed a bill to make it harder to investigate detention officers.
But her legislative career has featured other highlights. In a hearing about some uranium legislation, Allen made the observation that the earth has only been here for 6,000 years (and has done great without environmental regulation, so why start now). That was 2009. In 2013 she hit facebook with a post saying, "Never mind about global warming. What about those chem trails behind planes dropping mind control drugs on all of us."
More recently, Allen offered support for a concealed carry law because the country needs a moral rebirth. Wouldn't it be great, she mused, if we could make church attendance mandatory? It's an interesting thought from a Mormon who has perhaps forgotten that once upon a time, the US sent soldiers to settle religious differences with Joseph Smith using the barrels of the many guns.
The new head of the education committee never went to college, but she did help found a charter school. George Washington Academy is located in her home town of Snowflake.
Democrat Senator Steve Farley doesn't seem too worried. "She's made some interesting comments to the public, but it's not like she's going to be teaching," he said. "We have accredited teachers for that."
Well, perhaps. Although the rules for who gets to be accredited can certainly be rewritten by the legislature. Perhaps to weed out those who don't attend church, or who don't believe in the proper age of the earth. Farley may feel okay. I'm just feeling okay that I don't teach in Arizona.
Allen has had a colorful career. She is a Senator because a man fell off a horse. Twice.
Before she arrived in the capitol, she held down a number of jobs, including county supervisor. It was in that job that she was slapped for interfering with an investigation into her son-in-law's misbehavior as a detention officer with female inmates. After becoming a senator, she filed a bill to make it harder to investigate detention officers.
But her legislative career has featured other highlights. In a hearing about some uranium legislation, Allen made the observation that the earth has only been here for 6,000 years (and has done great without environmental regulation, so why start now). That was 2009. In 2013 she hit facebook with a post saying, "Never mind about global warming. What about those chem trails behind planes dropping mind control drugs on all of us."
More recently, Allen offered support for a concealed carry law because the country needs a moral rebirth. Wouldn't it be great, she mused, if we could make church attendance mandatory? It's an interesting thought from a Mormon who has perhaps forgotten that once upon a time, the US sent soldiers to settle religious differences with Joseph Smith using the barrels of the many guns.
The new head of the education committee never went to college, but she did help found a charter school. George Washington Academy is located in her home town of Snowflake.
Democrat Senator Steve Farley doesn't seem too worried. "She's made some interesting comments to the public, but it's not like she's going to be teaching," he said. "We have accredited teachers for that."
Well, perhaps. Although the rules for who gets to be accredited can certainly be rewritten by the legislature. Perhaps to weed out those who don't attend church, or who don't believe in the proper age of the earth. Farley may feel okay. I'm just feeling okay that I don't teach in Arizona.
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Clinton's Math Problem
In Iowa, Clinton displayed a lack of-- well, something. Math comprehension? Education reform understanding? Thinking things through?
She wouldn't keep any school open that wasn't doing above average. So... close half the schools? Of course, once you close half the schools, then the average will have to be recalculated, and then you'll have to close half of those schools. And so on until there is only one school left. Or maybe we close parts of that school. I am suddenly remembering the many hats of Bartholomew Cubbins and imagining a Seussian school at which a sky-reaching stack of students are seated at a single desk.
But maybe what she means is close half the schools and replace them with charters, which means we'll close a new half of the schools every year. Will we allow students to move around? Will low-scoring students become educational hot potatoes, thrown off by schools who don't want to fall in the bottom half.
It will be frustrating of course-- half of the schools (a few more, actually) will always be average or lower, so every year we will close half the schools and every year we will have to farm out the students and put together new schools in time for the fall.
Maybe she just missed the decimal point. After all, this is exactly the plan favored by the current administration and various versions of state-controlled Achievement School Districts-- only those folks only talk about the bottom 5% instead of the bottom 50%.
And this is not a small picky thing. Setting an "average" level for schools is awesomely difficult. What does that even look like? How do you even calculate such a thing?
And if such a thing can be calculated, is that really your policy response-- not fix it or analyze the issues or look at contributing factors or anything else except just "close it." That's what HRC has in mind for schools in America-- just close the ones that don't measure up to whatever imaginary measure someone cobbles together??
Maybe this is just thoughtless from-the-hip rhetoric from one more politician who finds it easy to crack wise about education without thinking about what it the policy choice would mean in the real world for real students. Or maybe this is a signal to charter fans that they can stop freaking out over Clinton's supposed apostasy.
Whatever the case, it is certainly proof once again (as if any were needed) that Clinton is no friend of public education.
She wouldn't keep any school open that wasn't doing above average. So... close half the schools? Of course, once you close half the schools, then the average will have to be recalculated, and then you'll have to close half of those schools. And so on until there is only one school left. Or maybe we close parts of that school. I am suddenly remembering the many hats of Bartholomew Cubbins and imagining a Seussian school at which a sky-reaching stack of students are seated at a single desk.
But maybe what she means is close half the schools and replace them with charters, which means we'll close a new half of the schools every year. Will we allow students to move around? Will low-scoring students become educational hot potatoes, thrown off by schools who don't want to fall in the bottom half.
It will be frustrating of course-- half of the schools (a few more, actually) will always be average or lower, so every year we will close half the schools and every year we will have to farm out the students and put together new schools in time for the fall.
Maybe she just missed the decimal point. After all, this is exactly the plan favored by the current administration and various versions of state-controlled Achievement School Districts-- only those folks only talk about the bottom 5% instead of the bottom 50%.
And this is not a small picky thing. Setting an "average" level for schools is awesomely difficult. What does that even look like? How do you even calculate such a thing?
And if such a thing can be calculated, is that really your policy response-- not fix it or analyze the issues or look at contributing factors or anything else except just "close it." That's what HRC has in mind for schools in America-- just close the ones that don't measure up to whatever imaginary measure someone cobbles together??
Maybe this is just thoughtless from-the-hip rhetoric from one more politician who finds it easy to crack wise about education without thinking about what it the policy choice would mean in the real world for real students. Or maybe this is a signal to charter fans that they can stop freaking out over Clinton's supposed apostasy.
Whatever the case, it is certainly proof once again (as if any were needed) that Clinton is no friend of public education.
Lamar Alexander: Privatization, Cronyism, and the Big Bucks
The rich are not like you and me. In fact, many of the rich get rich through avenues not remotely available to you or me. Would you like to see how it works?
Let's take a look at Lamar Alexander.
These days Alexander is the reasonably amiable, semi-avuncular senator currently known for helping to whip up our newest version of the ESEA. But once upon a time, Alexander was an up-and-comer with White House dreams. That kind of career sparked some big-league attention, most notably captured in an article by Doug Ireland that ran in the April 17, 1995 issue of The Nation. "The Rich Rise of Lamar Alexander" is available online only through The Nation's subscriber archives (though the bulk of the content is repeated here).
Ireland's opening gives you an idea of where this was headed:
If repeated White House leaks suggesting that Bill Clinton views Lamar Alexander as his toughest potential Republican opponent next year are true, it may be because it takes on to know one. The two ex-governors are both masters of the Permanent Campaign.
Ireland suggests that as a lifelong political insider, Alexander "is even less encumbered by principles than the man whose job he covets." Alexander is repeatedly characterized as a man whose political leanings are less stable than a sapling in a hurricane. He has often remade himself to suit the campaign he was running. He has made many friends. And Ireland gave him credit for excelling in one other area.
And in one respect he has clearly surpassed Clinton: Alexander has shamelessly used his political connections to make himself a wealthy man.
It would seem that Alexander has become a millionaire either through brilliant investments, incredible luck, or generous connections. Ireland reports that when Alexander was first elected governor of Tennessee, he was worth $151,000. When George Bush appointed him Secretary of Education, he was worth somewhere between $1.5 and $3 million. More recently he has remained among the wealthiest of senators, with a net worth as high as $28 million (2004). He took a huge dip in 2012, but in 2014 he was back up to $13 million.
What sorts of genius deals has he made? Well.
In 1981, Governor Alexander got in on a deal to buy the Knoxville Journal. He swapped his stock for some Gannett stock, and sold that stock for $620,000.
In 1987, he took time off from politics to go to Australia and write a book-- Six Months Off. The Wall Street Journal gave him a $45K advance, and he wrote off $123K as a tax deduction (he also sold the movie rights). And he was on the payroll of Belmont College in Nashville, which had hired him to create a leadership institute.
But Alexander's greatest gains have come from privatization of two public sectors-- education, and prisons.
Education and Big Bucks
Alexander scored big with an investment in Corporate Child Care, Incorporated in 1987. Alexander often liked to campaign as a co-founder of the company, but that co-founding didn't seem to involve doing any work there. But in about five years, Alexander's $5K turned into $800K. Ka-ching. A biography of Alexander's wife Honey (she'll be turning up again) calls the couple "co-founders" along with Bob Keeshan (yes, that Bob Keeshan). CCCI was launched with a $2 million investment from Massey Birch, a venture capital firm whose head, Jack Massey, we shall also meet again. Actually, we've already met him-- that leadership institute Alexander was setting up was for Belmont's Massey School of Business, named after Jack Massey.
Ireland quotes a former CEO of the company saying that Alexander was instrumental as a money-raiser, but not so much daily hands on. CCCI appears at some point to have disappeared into Bright Horizons Family Solutions.
Alexander also logged some time as "CEO" of the University of Tennessee, where by many accounts he was something of an absentee president. It paid a nice six figures, though at the same time he was making about the same money from various corporate board of director's stipends. Ka-ching.
Alexander's other big education venture was Whittle Communications. By 1995, Chris Whittle had already built and destroyed the proto-privatization empire in education. He had launched Edison, a pioneering for-profit education adventure, along with Channel One, a plan to put a television in every classroom thereby giving advertisers access to every set of school student eyeballs. But in 1994 he was trying to explain why he wasn't a huckster, and Business Week was writing his professional obituary. (That turned out to be premature-- Whittle had a few more second acts in him).
In the eighties, Alexander worked as a consultant for Whittle and that earned him the right to buy some stock. Which he did. In Honey's name. With a check for $10K that nobody cashed. Until after the company was sold and Whittle bought Honey's stock back for $330K. Ka-ching.
But we're not done yet. When Alexander was being confirmed as Secretary of Education, he promised to cut ties with Whittle, which he did. Then he sold his house in Knoxville to a top Whittle executive, who paid $977,500 for the house that Alexander had bought for $570,000 the year before. Ka-ching.
The Prison Biz
Alexander has gotten plenty of negative press for his ties to the for-profit prison business.
Around 1983, Corrections Corporation of America was founded by Tom Beasley, former Tennessee GOP chair and, according to Ireland, a guy who in college had rented an above-the-garage apartment from the Alexanders. Financing came by way of Jack Massey. Honey invested $8,900 in CCS in 1984. In 1985, Tennessee prisons were in a mess, and CCA had an idea. Tom Beasley declared that "the market is limitless" and proposed that CCA could "lock them up better, quicker, and for less."
Governor Alexander pushed for CCA to take over the entire Tennessee prison system, a ballsy move in 1985. But there was a conflict-of-interest problem, so Honey traded her $8,900 share to Jack Massey for 10,000 shares in South Life Corporation, a life insurance company. When Honey cashed that out in 1989, she was paid $142,000. Ka-ching. As for privatizing Tennessee prisons, that was a massive fail-- eventually the state had to take the prisons back-- but CCA continued to try to spread its influence. But the privatized prison move started some commenters worrying about the issues still before us thirty years later-- if profits become privatized and liabilities remain with the public, who gets screwed and who gets rich? And do you actually get the service you paid for?
CCA is still alive and kicking. Its history has been scrubbed of any reference to Alexander (Lamar or Honey), but on its board we find Charles Overby, a man who has his own intriguing history. On the CCA board since 2001, he also has a history as a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and head of the Newseum. He has worked for the Gannett chain, and more than a few people see a serious conflict between a journalist's devotion to the First Amendment and transparency versus the private prison industry's hard work to keep their operations hidden.
Oh, and Overby has held down another job-- special assistant for administration to Governor Lamar Alexander of Tennessee.
So what have we learned?
None of this is news. None of this is new. All of this is why some folks throw phrases at Alexander like "one of the biggest non-entities in the history of modern American politics" and write posts entitled "Why I hate Lamar Alexander Today."
This is the guy who helped bring us the New! Improved! ESEA. This is a guy who has made a career and a personal fortune out of privatizing public institution, and done it largely through his personal connections. And in all the reading I've done, I've to find someone accusing him of taking a hard stand on any issue as a matter of principle.
So if it seems as if the new education law is filled with opportunities for well-connected privatizers to get their hands on public education tax dollars-- well, it's not hard to see how Alexander might have been inclined to head in that direction. After all-- what's the point of getting involved in public service if you can't cash in?
And even if Lamar Alexander is a great guy, a wonderful father and husband, and a decent human being (and I don't know the guy from Adam, so hey-- he could be all those things) his career points to a world view that is both scruple-impaired and lacking in a sense of how public goods should be preserved and maintained for public benefit. If this is how he thinks the world works-- you call some friends, you make some deals, you look out for the Right People and they look out for you, and it's all cool if this gives you an inside lead on making some huge profits from nothing but your connections-- how can that worldview not infect the legislation that you create and support?
This is not about public service or responsibility. This is a guy who regularly ranks in the top 13-14 richest Senators who has no inherited fortune and no actual job, but who has gotten rich simply by being a well-connected politician, and by using those connections to push privatized solutions that erode necessary public institutions and make life worse for the people who depend on those institutions. This is about finding new ways the Right People with the Right Connections can cash in. Ka-ching. Not the sound we're looking for in public education or a US Senator.
Let's take a look at Lamar Alexander.
These days Alexander is the reasonably amiable, semi-avuncular senator currently known for helping to whip up our newest version of the ESEA. But once upon a time, Alexander was an up-and-comer with White House dreams. That kind of career sparked some big-league attention, most notably captured in an article by Doug Ireland that ran in the April 17, 1995 issue of The Nation. "The Rich Rise of Lamar Alexander" is available online only through The Nation's subscriber archives (though the bulk of the content is repeated here).
Ireland's opening gives you an idea of where this was headed:
If repeated White House leaks suggesting that Bill Clinton views Lamar Alexander as his toughest potential Republican opponent next year are true, it may be because it takes on to know one. The two ex-governors are both masters of the Permanent Campaign.
Ireland suggests that as a lifelong political insider, Alexander "is even less encumbered by principles than the man whose job he covets." Alexander is repeatedly characterized as a man whose political leanings are less stable than a sapling in a hurricane. He has often remade himself to suit the campaign he was running. He has made many friends. And Ireland gave him credit for excelling in one other area.
And in one respect he has clearly surpassed Clinton: Alexander has shamelessly used his political connections to make himself a wealthy man.
It would seem that Alexander has become a millionaire either through brilliant investments, incredible luck, or generous connections. Ireland reports that when Alexander was first elected governor of Tennessee, he was worth $151,000. When George Bush appointed him Secretary of Education, he was worth somewhere between $1.5 and $3 million. More recently he has remained among the wealthiest of senators, with a net worth as high as $28 million (2004). He took a huge dip in 2012, but in 2014 he was back up to $13 million.
What sorts of genius deals has he made? Well.
In 1981, Governor Alexander got in on a deal to buy the Knoxville Journal. He swapped his stock for some Gannett stock, and sold that stock for $620,000.
In 1987, he took time off from politics to go to Australia and write a book-- Six Months Off. The Wall Street Journal gave him a $45K advance, and he wrote off $123K as a tax deduction (he also sold the movie rights). And he was on the payroll of Belmont College in Nashville, which had hired him to create a leadership institute.
But Alexander's greatest gains have come from privatization of two public sectors-- education, and prisons.
Education and Big Bucks
Alexander scored big with an investment in Corporate Child Care, Incorporated in 1987. Alexander often liked to campaign as a co-founder of the company, but that co-founding didn't seem to involve doing any work there. But in about five years, Alexander's $5K turned into $800K. Ka-ching. A biography of Alexander's wife Honey (she'll be turning up again) calls the couple "co-founders" along with Bob Keeshan (yes, that Bob Keeshan). CCCI was launched with a $2 million investment from Massey Birch, a venture capital firm whose head, Jack Massey, we shall also meet again. Actually, we've already met him-- that leadership institute Alexander was setting up was for Belmont's Massey School of Business, named after Jack Massey.
Ireland quotes a former CEO of the company saying that Alexander was instrumental as a money-raiser, but not so much daily hands on. CCCI appears at some point to have disappeared into Bright Horizons Family Solutions.
Alexander also logged some time as "CEO" of the University of Tennessee, where by many accounts he was something of an absentee president. It paid a nice six figures, though at the same time he was making about the same money from various corporate board of director's stipends. Ka-ching.
Alexander's other big education venture was Whittle Communications. By 1995, Chris Whittle had already built and destroyed the proto-privatization empire in education. He had launched Edison, a pioneering for-profit education adventure, along with Channel One, a plan to put a television in every classroom thereby giving advertisers access to every set of school student eyeballs. But in 1994 he was trying to explain why he wasn't a huckster, and Business Week was writing his professional obituary. (That turned out to be premature-- Whittle had a few more second acts in him).
In the eighties, Alexander worked as a consultant for Whittle and that earned him the right to buy some stock. Which he did. In Honey's name. With a check for $10K that nobody cashed. Until after the company was sold and Whittle bought Honey's stock back for $330K. Ka-ching.
But we're not done yet. When Alexander was being confirmed as Secretary of Education, he promised to cut ties with Whittle, which he did. Then he sold his house in Knoxville to a top Whittle executive, who paid $977,500 for the house that Alexander had bought for $570,000 the year before. Ka-ching.
The Prison Biz
Alexander has gotten plenty of negative press for his ties to the for-profit prison business.
Around 1983, Corrections Corporation of America was founded by Tom Beasley, former Tennessee GOP chair and, according to Ireland, a guy who in college had rented an above-the-garage apartment from the Alexanders. Financing came by way of Jack Massey. Honey invested $8,900 in CCS in 1984. In 1985, Tennessee prisons were in a mess, and CCA had an idea. Tom Beasley declared that "the market is limitless" and proposed that CCA could "lock them up better, quicker, and for less."
Governor Alexander pushed for CCA to take over the entire Tennessee prison system, a ballsy move in 1985. But there was a conflict-of-interest problem, so Honey traded her $8,900 share to Jack Massey for 10,000 shares in South Life Corporation, a life insurance company. When Honey cashed that out in 1989, she was paid $142,000. Ka-ching. As for privatizing Tennessee prisons, that was a massive fail-- eventually the state had to take the prisons back-- but CCA continued to try to spread its influence. But the privatized prison move started some commenters worrying about the issues still before us thirty years later-- if profits become privatized and liabilities remain with the public, who gets screwed and who gets rich? And do you actually get the service you paid for?
CCA is still alive and kicking. Its history has been scrubbed of any reference to Alexander (Lamar or Honey), but on its board we find Charles Overby, a man who has his own intriguing history. On the CCA board since 2001, he also has a history as a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and head of the Newseum. He has worked for the Gannett chain, and more than a few people see a serious conflict between a journalist's devotion to the First Amendment and transparency versus the private prison industry's hard work to keep their operations hidden.
Oh, and Overby has held down another job-- special assistant for administration to Governor Lamar Alexander of Tennessee.
So what have we learned?
None of this is news. None of this is new. All of this is why some folks throw phrases at Alexander like "one of the biggest non-entities in the history of modern American politics" and write posts entitled "Why I hate Lamar Alexander Today."
This is the guy who helped bring us the New! Improved! ESEA. This is a guy who has made a career and a personal fortune out of privatizing public institution, and done it largely through his personal connections. And in all the reading I've done, I've to find someone accusing him of taking a hard stand on any issue as a matter of principle.
So if it seems as if the new education law is filled with opportunities for well-connected privatizers to get their hands on public education tax dollars-- well, it's not hard to see how Alexander might have been inclined to head in that direction. After all-- what's the point of getting involved in public service if you can't cash in?
And even if Lamar Alexander is a great guy, a wonderful father and husband, and a decent human being (and I don't know the guy from Adam, so hey-- he could be all those things) his career points to a world view that is both scruple-impaired and lacking in a sense of how public goods should be preserved and maintained for public benefit. If this is how he thinks the world works-- you call some friends, you make some deals, you look out for the Right People and they look out for you, and it's all cool if this gives you an inside lead on making some huge profits from nothing but your connections-- how can that worldview not infect the legislation that you create and support?
This is not about public service or responsibility. This is a guy who regularly ranks in the top 13-14 richest Senators who has no inherited fortune and no actual job, but who has gotten rich simply by being a well-connected politician, and by using those connections to push privatized solutions that erode necessary public institutions and make life worse for the people who depend on those institutions. This is about finding new ways the Right People with the Right Connections can cash in. Ka-ching. Not the sound we're looking for in public education or a US Senator.
CAP: More Silly CCSS PR Polling
In an era in which even Jeb Bush has stopped saying the name out loud, no group has cheered harder for the Common Core than the Center for American Progress (theoretically left-leaning holding pen for interregnum Clinton staffers). No argument is too dumb, no data set too ridiculous. If that dog won't hunt, CAP ties a rope around its neck and drags it.
So it's no surprise that CAP is back with yet another Pubic Policy Polling poll announced with the breathless headline "NEW POLL: WHEN NEW YORKERS SEE SPECIFIC COMMON CORE STANDARDS, THEY SUPPORT THE COMMON CORE." Partnering up on this raft of ridiculousness is High Achievement New York, a coalition of business groups like the Business Council of New York State and reformster groups like StudentsFirstNY.
The poll, found here in its entirety, is as fine an example of scrambled thinking used to fuel PR as you'll find anywhere. In the world of polling, there are two types of polls-- a poll that seeks to find out what people are really thinking, and a poll that tries to make it look like people are thinking what I want them to think. This would be the second type of poll.
There are twenty-two questions that cover basically three areas.
Math and ELA Standards
This is the basis for the headline, and it would make an excellent exercise in critical thinking for sixth graders. Here's the format. The pollster says, "I'm going to read you a list of possible language arts standards for 4th grade students, and then ask if you support or oppose students learning that standards." Then five specific goals are read, such as "Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English capitalization, punctuation and spelling when writing." The math portion follows the same technique.
And it turns out that people support these particular standards! Huzzah! So they really DO support the Core! They like it. They really like it!
This is artful use of a forest-tree fallacy. If you like this standard, you must love Common Core. If you like this tree in your yard, you must want to live in the forest. If you like tigers, you must love zoos. If you love cheese, you must like anchovy and pineapple pizza. If you like bears, you must want a bearskin rug. If you like blonde hair on men, you must want to marry Donald Trump.
Testing and Implementation
Have you heard? The Big Standardized Test has become kind of an issue in New York State. The pollsters would like to ask some questions about improving the whole standards and BS Testing situation.
This gets us into a different type of baloney. For instance, the first questions asks if you support limiting BS Test time to no more than 1% of class time (incidentally, a whopping 27% of respondents opposed this). This of course is a question that mis-states the issue, which is that even a 1% limit does not address the hours and hours and hours and hours spent on test prep. So this is like asking, "Should this guy wear nicer shoes while he's beating you with a stick?"
Next the poll reflects what New York Education High Boss Elia thinks is part of the problem-- should school districts communicate to parents, teachers and students the purpose of the BS Test? Respondents thought this was a swell idea-- 82% supported this. CAP paints that as a plus, but to me it suggests that 82% of New Yorkers don't think it has happened yet! 82% of New Yorkers are not saying, "No, that's okay, I'm good," but are rather saying, "Yeah, they should communicate this because I still don't know why we're giving the damn things."
The actual answer is, "Because the feds say we have to," which is no answer at all. But the feds don't know why we're giving the BS Tests, and neither do state authorities. We can go back to the standard list of excuses (to compare and rank students and schools, to inform instruction, to let parents know how things are going, etc) but those are all bunk.
Then we go to a flat-out stupid question. We will now measure support for
Eliminate all tests in school
Stupid. Stoooooooooo- pid. Almost nobody has suggested this, and it doesn't have anything to do with the issue at hand. But it serves the reformster purpose to conflate all tests from all sources for all purposes as if they are all pretty much the same business. I'm sure this is partly by design, to help with smoke and mirrors and ground cover for reformster ideas. But it also smacks of the usual reformster amateurism-- they really don't understand education well enough to understand the distinctions between different tests from different sources for different purposes.
Should we ensure that tests are grade and age appropriate? 84% say yes. What if a student is operating below "grade level" or her chronological age level? Never mind. The BS Tests have never been made age and grade appropriate anyway. Should we use multiple measures for school performance? Sigh. Yeah, instead of drinking my poison straight, I'd like you to mix a few spoonfuls of sugar with it. That'll make it all okay.
Give teachers more meaningful input for "crafting a tailored curriculum that's aligned to high standards"? Did you say "more"? I think you meant "some," but sure.
Finally, do you support creating a regular process to update the Common Core standards? Now that's an interesting question, since CCSS has never, ever had such a process in place. Remember the old days, when states were only allowed to add up to 15% to the standards and weren't allowed to touch so much as Common Core comma? It's not clear how a review and revise process could work on a national level now that so few states admit to having the Core in place, and if every state does its own review and revise, then the various standard sets will go off in every which way. But since "Common Core" means so many things now that it doesn't really mean anything, sure, why not? Let's have a review and revise process.
That's All, Folks
The remaining questions are demographic. Oddly enough, 48% of respondents were Dems, while only 27% were GOP (remainder Independent). Make of that what you will. And only 32% of respondents were parents. There are more detailed breakdowns by sub-group responses, but what is there to learn about how these groups respond to dumb questions?
It is one more lame and half-baked attempt to generate positive PR for the least-beloved brand in public policy. We can only hope that this Big Not News will be largely ignored in New York and the rest of the country as well, to fade away quietly. CAP is the energizer bunny of bad education policy; I'm sure there will be more Not News soon enough.
So it's no surprise that CAP is back with yet another Pubic Policy Polling poll announced with the breathless headline "NEW POLL: WHEN NEW YORKERS SEE SPECIFIC COMMON CORE STANDARDS, THEY SUPPORT THE COMMON CORE." Partnering up on this raft of ridiculousness is High Achievement New York, a coalition of business groups like the Business Council of New York State and reformster groups like StudentsFirstNY.
The poll, found here in its entirety, is as fine an example of scrambled thinking used to fuel PR as you'll find anywhere. In the world of polling, there are two types of polls-- a poll that seeks to find out what people are really thinking, and a poll that tries to make it look like people are thinking what I want them to think. This would be the second type of poll.
There are twenty-two questions that cover basically three areas.
Math and ELA Standards
This is the basis for the headline, and it would make an excellent exercise in critical thinking for sixth graders. Here's the format. The pollster says, "I'm going to read you a list of possible language arts standards for 4th grade students, and then ask if you support or oppose students learning that standards." Then five specific goals are read, such as "Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English capitalization, punctuation and spelling when writing." The math portion follows the same technique.
And it turns out that people support these particular standards! Huzzah! So they really DO support the Core! They like it. They really like it!
This is artful use of a forest-tree fallacy. If you like this standard, you must love Common Core. If you like this tree in your yard, you must want to live in the forest. If you like tigers, you must love zoos. If you love cheese, you must like anchovy and pineapple pizza. If you like bears, you must want a bearskin rug. If you like blonde hair on men, you must want to marry Donald Trump.
Testing and Implementation
Have you heard? The Big Standardized Test has become kind of an issue in New York State. The pollsters would like to ask some questions about improving the whole standards and BS Testing situation.
This gets us into a different type of baloney. For instance, the first questions asks if you support limiting BS Test time to no more than 1% of class time (incidentally, a whopping 27% of respondents opposed this). This of course is a question that mis-states the issue, which is that even a 1% limit does not address the hours and hours and hours and hours spent on test prep. So this is like asking, "Should this guy wear nicer shoes while he's beating you with a stick?"
Next the poll reflects what New York Education High Boss Elia thinks is part of the problem-- should school districts communicate to parents, teachers and students the purpose of the BS Test? Respondents thought this was a swell idea-- 82% supported this. CAP paints that as a plus, but to me it suggests that 82% of New Yorkers don't think it has happened yet! 82% of New Yorkers are not saying, "No, that's okay, I'm good," but are rather saying, "Yeah, they should communicate this because I still don't know why we're giving the damn things."
The actual answer is, "Because the feds say we have to," which is no answer at all. But the feds don't know why we're giving the BS Tests, and neither do state authorities. We can go back to the standard list of excuses (to compare and rank students and schools, to inform instruction, to let parents know how things are going, etc) but those are all bunk.
Then we go to a flat-out stupid question. We will now measure support for
Eliminate all tests in school
Stupid. Stoooooooooo- pid. Almost nobody has suggested this, and it doesn't have anything to do with the issue at hand. But it serves the reformster purpose to conflate all tests from all sources for all purposes as if they are all pretty much the same business. I'm sure this is partly by design, to help with smoke and mirrors and ground cover for reformster ideas. But it also smacks of the usual reformster amateurism-- they really don't understand education well enough to understand the distinctions between different tests from different sources for different purposes.
Should we ensure that tests are grade and age appropriate? 84% say yes. What if a student is operating below "grade level" or her chronological age level? Never mind. The BS Tests have never been made age and grade appropriate anyway. Should we use multiple measures for school performance? Sigh. Yeah, instead of drinking my poison straight, I'd like you to mix a few spoonfuls of sugar with it. That'll make it all okay.
Give teachers more meaningful input for "crafting a tailored curriculum that's aligned to high standards"? Did you say "more"? I think you meant "some," but sure.
Finally, do you support creating a regular process to update the Common Core standards? Now that's an interesting question, since CCSS has never, ever had such a process in place. Remember the old days, when states were only allowed to add up to 15% to the standards and weren't allowed to touch so much as Common Core comma? It's not clear how a review and revise process could work on a national level now that so few states admit to having the Core in place, and if every state does its own review and revise, then the various standard sets will go off in every which way. But since "Common Core" means so many things now that it doesn't really mean anything, sure, why not? Let's have a review and revise process.
That's All, Folks
The remaining questions are demographic. Oddly enough, 48% of respondents were Dems, while only 27% were GOP (remainder Independent). Make of that what you will. And only 32% of respondents were parents. There are more detailed breakdowns by sub-group responses, but what is there to learn about how these groups respond to dumb questions?
It is one more lame and half-baked attempt to generate positive PR for the least-beloved brand in public policy. We can only hope that this Big Not News will be largely ignored in New York and the rest of the country as well, to fade away quietly. CAP is the energizer bunny of bad education policy; I'm sure there will be more Not News soon enough.
Monday, December 21, 2015
Free Market Bad for Students with Disabilities
Disabilities Studies Quarterly, a peer-reviewed quarterly journal, published a paper back in 2012 that makes some sobering points about how a free market approach to schools works out (or not) for students with disabilities. In fact, it has a few sobering things about how free market schools treat all students.
"The Effects of Market-based School Reform on Students with Disabilities" was authored by Curt Dudley-Marling and Diana Baker at Boston College.
It begins with a history of the intersections between neo-liberalism, free market theory, and education. It's a handy primer, all fully sourced and pretty interesting. But the meat of the paper is the question of how various free market approaches work (or don't ) for students with disabilities. It's worth remembering that we're back in 2012-- but the conclusions here are still worth noticing.
Vouchers
There's not a lot of data available about the effects of vouchers on students with disabilities, but the available data is not exactly encouraging. The authors cite a study from 2011 that shows while Milwaukee has a SWD population of about 20%. However, SWD were only 1.6% of the voucher population. That seems to have been typical.
Charter Schools
The charter school system creates a new dynamic between students and schools-- specifically, it create a new role for students, and the writers of this paper explain it as well as anyone I've ever read.
...however they are structured, charter schools must produce acceptable test scores or risk the revocation of their charters (Swanson, 2004). In this context, students are transformed into "commodities" (Apple, 2000; Hursh, 2007a; Wills, 2006) who bring more or less value to charter schools. Students with high test scores enhance the reputation and, hence, the marketability of charter schools. Students who do not score well on tests threaten charters' competitiveness—and, ultimately, their survival.
Students' value is also determined by their impact on school budgets. For-profit charters, for example, seek to turn a profit; therefore, students who cost more to educate have less value than students who require fewer resources. Even in the case of charters managed by nonprofits, costly-to-educate students will have a disproportionate impact on fixed budgets. Students deemed to be disruptive will be valued least of all in such a system because these students both cost more to educate and interfere with the education (i.e., test scores) of other students. In a system where the survival of schools—and the jobs of teachers—depend on ever higher test scores, students with low scores or, worse, students who threaten the scores of other students by consuming a disproportionate share of scarce resources, including teacher attention, will be unwelcome.
Emphasis mine. And it doesn't take deep insight to see that this commodification of students has implications beyond simply the treatment of students with special needs.
The report follows up with study after study after study providing examples of how this plays up. I note in particular that it takes us back to the days when New Orleans was only largely charter, and the success of that charter sector was used to sell the idea of expansion-- even though studies showed that charters were avoiding low-value students and posting suspension rates through the roof. Boston, Texas, Chicago- the list just rolls on and on. The study also documents some of the practices such as counseling SWD out or discontinuing IEPs for students who needed them.
One can certainly argue that in the three years since the study, charters have totally cleaned up their acts, but this seems unlikely, and it tells us just how much the charters has grown without developing any plan for teaching more "costly" students other than "make them go away somehow." In other words, charters who want to deny their past better be prepared to explain what they've learned about operating differently in the last three years. They should also be prepared for folks to look dubiously upon them, since they were telling us for years that they totally had a handle on this and it turns out that perhaps they were a bit truth-impaired when they made those claims-- so how would we know that they're telling the truth this time?
Testing and Accountability
The study suggests that the standardization pushed by NCLB and its successor programs launched one-size-fits-all tests, which tend to drive one-size-fits-all curriculum, which is exactly the wrong thing for students with special needs.
The testing and accountability mandates of NCLB "define education as a commodity whose production can be quantified, standardized, and prescribed" (Lipman, 2007, p. 46).
And also this
This move toward standardization and one-size-fits-all curricula is potentially devastating for students with disabilities. Standardized curricula provide little space for teachers to make the necessary adaptations to address the specific needs of students with disabilities (Harvey-Koelpin, 2006)—as well as any student positioned outside the mythical norm (Dudley-Marling & Gurn, 2010). And when students with disabilities fail to achieve in the context of standardized curriculum, standardized assessment, and standardized instruction—all targeted to putatively "normal" students—failure is situated in the minds and bodies of students rather than in the schooling practices that produced failure in the first place (Dudley-Marling, 2004).
Yes yes yes. When we start with the assumption that our educational plan and program is perfect, and then a student fails to achieve, we can only conclude that the student is "defective."
Stating the Obvious
While the paper makes the point that free market schools (particularly as tied to the policies of two administrations) are bad for students with disabilities, it is clearly also true for students who don't have any kind of special label or diagnosis.
This paper may be a few years aged, but it lays out in clear language and supporting citations just how the reformster program creates a toxic dynamic in schools while creating an upside-down world in which students exist to serve the needs of the school-- and those who cannot serve the school well must be rejected. It's amazing the degree to which the last three years have gotten us used to this unhealthy mess; a quick trip in the wayback machine can remind us why the reformy mess must be cleaned up.
"The Effects of Market-based School Reform on Students with Disabilities" was authored by Curt Dudley-Marling and Diana Baker at Boston College.
It begins with a history of the intersections between neo-liberalism, free market theory, and education. It's a handy primer, all fully sourced and pretty interesting. But the meat of the paper is the question of how various free market approaches work (or don't ) for students with disabilities. It's worth remembering that we're back in 2012-- but the conclusions here are still worth noticing.
Vouchers
There's not a lot of data available about the effects of vouchers on students with disabilities, but the available data is not exactly encouraging. The authors cite a study from 2011 that shows while Milwaukee has a SWD population of about 20%. However, SWD were only 1.6% of the voucher population. That seems to have been typical.
Charter Schools
The charter school system creates a new dynamic between students and schools-- specifically, it create a new role for students, and the writers of this paper explain it as well as anyone I've ever read.
...however they are structured, charter schools must produce acceptable test scores or risk the revocation of their charters (Swanson, 2004). In this context, students are transformed into "commodities" (Apple, 2000; Hursh, 2007a; Wills, 2006) who bring more or less value to charter schools. Students with high test scores enhance the reputation and, hence, the marketability of charter schools. Students who do not score well on tests threaten charters' competitiveness—and, ultimately, their survival.
Students' value is also determined by their impact on school budgets. For-profit charters, for example, seek to turn a profit; therefore, students who cost more to educate have less value than students who require fewer resources. Even in the case of charters managed by nonprofits, costly-to-educate students will have a disproportionate impact on fixed budgets. Students deemed to be disruptive will be valued least of all in such a system because these students both cost more to educate and interfere with the education (i.e., test scores) of other students. In a system where the survival of schools—and the jobs of teachers—depend on ever higher test scores, students with low scores or, worse, students who threaten the scores of other students by consuming a disproportionate share of scarce resources, including teacher attention, will be unwelcome.
Emphasis mine. And it doesn't take deep insight to see that this commodification of students has implications beyond simply the treatment of students with special needs.
The report follows up with study after study after study providing examples of how this plays up. I note in particular that it takes us back to the days when New Orleans was only largely charter, and the success of that charter sector was used to sell the idea of expansion-- even though studies showed that charters were avoiding low-value students and posting suspension rates through the roof. Boston, Texas, Chicago- the list just rolls on and on. The study also documents some of the practices such as counseling SWD out or discontinuing IEPs for students who needed them.
One can certainly argue that in the three years since the study, charters have totally cleaned up their acts, but this seems unlikely, and it tells us just how much the charters has grown without developing any plan for teaching more "costly" students other than "make them go away somehow." In other words, charters who want to deny their past better be prepared to explain what they've learned about operating differently in the last three years. They should also be prepared for folks to look dubiously upon them, since they were telling us for years that they totally had a handle on this and it turns out that perhaps they were a bit truth-impaired when they made those claims-- so how would we know that they're telling the truth this time?
Testing and Accountability
The study suggests that the standardization pushed by NCLB and its successor programs launched one-size-fits-all tests, which tend to drive one-size-fits-all curriculum, which is exactly the wrong thing for students with special needs.
The testing and accountability mandates of NCLB "define education as a commodity whose production can be quantified, standardized, and prescribed" (Lipman, 2007, p. 46).
And also this
This move toward standardization and one-size-fits-all curricula is potentially devastating for students with disabilities. Standardized curricula provide little space for teachers to make the necessary adaptations to address the specific needs of students with disabilities (Harvey-Koelpin, 2006)—as well as any student positioned outside the mythical norm (Dudley-Marling & Gurn, 2010). And when students with disabilities fail to achieve in the context of standardized curriculum, standardized assessment, and standardized instruction—all targeted to putatively "normal" students—failure is situated in the minds and bodies of students rather than in the schooling practices that produced failure in the first place (Dudley-Marling, 2004).
Yes yes yes. When we start with the assumption that our educational plan and program is perfect, and then a student fails to achieve, we can only conclude that the student is "defective."
Stating the Obvious
While the paper makes the point that free market schools (particularly as tied to the policies of two administrations) are bad for students with disabilities, it is clearly also true for students who don't have any kind of special label or diagnosis.
This paper may be a few years aged, but it lays out in clear language and supporting citations just how the reformster program creates a toxic dynamic in schools while creating an upside-down world in which students exist to serve the needs of the school-- and those who cannot serve the school well must be rejected. It's amazing the degree to which the last three years have gotten us used to this unhealthy mess; a quick trip in the wayback machine can remind us why the reformy mess must be cleaned up.
Coleman to Catholics: Never Mind Common Core
In an exclusive interview with Catholic Education Daily, David Colman, architect of Common Core and head honcho at the College Board, offered some of the same old same old. But he also told Catholic schools that they could just nevermind the Common Core.
Do Catholics not love the Core?
Writer Adam Cassandra has put together a good overview of the odd and sometimes-difficult relationship between the Catholic school system and the Common Core-- or at least the Core's co-creator.
The Catholic system has been fairly direct about its resistance to the core, including a whole Catholic Is Our Core campaign. Their objections are familiar to the umpty-gazillion educators, parents and people on the street who have objections to the Common Core. For instance, Dr. Dan Guernsey and Dr. Denise Donohue of the Newman Society wrote a report last May called “Disconnect between Common Core’s Literary Approach and Catholic Education’s Pursuit of Truth.” That included this Fairly Excellent Quote:
In Catholic schools, we know we are not just producing workers and scholars, we are producing living, breathing, complex, contradictory, eternally destined, unrepeatable and immensely valuable human beings.
This is not new. Back in 2013, 130 prominent Catholic scholars signed a letter to all bishops, and it was not laudatory. As Valerie Strauss reported at the time:
It blasts the standards, saying they are “contrary to tradition and academic studies on reading and human formation,” and accuses Core proponents of seeking to “transform ‘literacy’ into a ‘critical’ skill set, at the expense of sustained and heartfelt encounters with great works of literature.”
The letter also used phrases such as "contrary to traditions and academic studies on reading and human formation" and "a recipe for standardized workforce preparation."
The Cardinal Newman society also published "10 Facts Every Catholic Should Know about the Common Core" which includes items such as "The Common Core is rushed, untested and experimental" and "The Common Core is (ultimately) about textbooks and curriculum."
The focus and concern seem to be on the Core as an agent of destruction against the liberal arts, which are a big deal for Catholics. Personally, I am not a huge Catholic school fan for a whole host of reasons, but this Guernsey quote in Cassandra's article is kind of awesome:
“We don’t open Catholic schools to get kids into college. We open Catholic schools to get them into heaven,” he said.
So what does David Coleman, who has mocked, dismissed and generally pooh-poohed people who object to the Core as being too narrow, inappropriately written, and poorly considered-- what does David Coleman have to say to these Catholics who are expressing the same concerns.
No Core? No Biggie!
Coleman has no mockery, dismissal, or poohing of the Catholic pooh.
First of all, it turns out that you don't actually really need Common Core after all.
“As president of The College Board it is my conviction that a child excellently trained in traditional liberal arts will do superbly on relevant sections of the SAT and other aspects of Advanced Placement work, ”Coleman said. “Rest assured.”
Well. This would be the same David Coleman who announced his intention to bring the SAT in line with the Common Core. So if you can do "superbly" on the SAT with a liberal arts education, and the SAT is aligned with the Common Core, the by the Transitive Property of Reformy Baloney, the Common Core are pretty much the same thing as a liberal arts education. And I'm pretty sure that nobody-- not even David Coleman nor Bill Gates-- has tried to make that argument. So somewhere in that little logic puzzle is something that is Not So.
It's in the Colemanian weasel words, as usual. The liberal arts will help you with "do superbly on relevant sections of the SAT..." says Coleman, which is kind of like handing a life jacket to a person about to cross the Sahara Desert on foot and saying, "Take this. It will help you in all the places where you have to swim across a lake."
But Cassandra has even more reality-impaired quotes from Coleman.
“The vulgar implementation of anything can have a reductive and destructive effect,” said Coleman. “My desire to celebrate, and name and specify some of the beauties and distinctive values of a religious education are precisely to avoid a leveling quality where you forget that there are special gifts that can be lost without attention.”
I would like "the vulgar implementation of anything can have a reductive and destructive effect" on a t-shirt. It is certainly the most elegant version ever of "the standards are awesome, but the implementation was botched" that I've ever seen. But Coleman can peg the needle on the baloney-meter even higher, as with this statement:
I just want to tell you how emphatically I’m trying to agree with your premise, which is a stultifying sameness is not the intention here.
Got that? Coleman's work-- his idea about what an educated person should be and his work to impose that vision on every public school student in America, both through Common Core and an SAT redesign-- that's not aimed at imposing a one-size-fits-all standard at all. Which is either a spectacularly bald-faced lie, or proof that Coleman doesn't understand what he's done at all. Pick whichever one you judge more likely from a guy who studied at Oxford.
This expressed love for religious schooling is not new for Coleman. Cassandra points us at a 2014 piece in the National Review in which Coleman sticks up for evangelical Christian Wheaton College, implying in his conclusion that religious schools, with their careful reading and quiet contemplation, do a better job of educating students than "secular colleges." (Actually, what he literally suggests is that the religious school students would write better papers).
Has David "Nobody gives a shit what you think or feel" Coleman acquired a soft spot for religion, or does he just need to keep doing his marketing for the Core and the New! Improved! SAT. Whatever the case, the National Catholic Education Association has asked Coleman to deliver the keynote address at its annual convention next March (you will be unsurprised to note that NCEA got a big Gates Core-implementation grant in 2013).
In the meantime, Coleman wants the rest of us in public schools to note that are paths to excellence beyond the Core, somehow.
I consider these remarks I’m making about the distinctive and potentially widely valuable benefits of religious training and religious education are less a challenge, frankly, towards religious schools than a challenge to all other schools — that they have much to learn from things that I think the best of religious schools do very well today.
Amen, Brother Coleman. Amen.
Do Catholics not love the Core?
Writer Adam Cassandra has put together a good overview of the odd and sometimes-difficult relationship between the Catholic school system and the Common Core-- or at least the Core's co-creator.
The Catholic system has been fairly direct about its resistance to the core, including a whole Catholic Is Our Core campaign. Their objections are familiar to the umpty-gazillion educators, parents and people on the street who have objections to the Common Core. For instance, Dr. Dan Guernsey and Dr. Denise Donohue of the Newman Society wrote a report last May called “Disconnect between Common Core’s Literary Approach and Catholic Education’s Pursuit of Truth.” That included this Fairly Excellent Quote:
In Catholic schools, we know we are not just producing workers and scholars, we are producing living, breathing, complex, contradictory, eternally destined, unrepeatable and immensely valuable human beings.
This is not new. Back in 2013, 130 prominent Catholic scholars signed a letter to all bishops, and it was not laudatory. As Valerie Strauss reported at the time:
It blasts the standards, saying they are “contrary to tradition and academic studies on reading and human formation,” and accuses Core proponents of seeking to “transform ‘literacy’ into a ‘critical’ skill set, at the expense of sustained and heartfelt encounters with great works of literature.”
The letter also used phrases such as "contrary to traditions and academic studies on reading and human formation" and "a recipe for standardized workforce preparation."
The Cardinal Newman society also published "10 Facts Every Catholic Should Know about the Common Core" which includes items such as "The Common Core is rushed, untested and experimental" and "The Common Core is (ultimately) about textbooks and curriculum."
The focus and concern seem to be on the Core as an agent of destruction against the liberal arts, which are a big deal for Catholics. Personally, I am not a huge Catholic school fan for a whole host of reasons, but this Guernsey quote in Cassandra's article is kind of awesome:
“We don’t open Catholic schools to get kids into college. We open Catholic schools to get them into heaven,” he said.
So what does David Coleman, who has mocked, dismissed and generally pooh-poohed people who object to the Core as being too narrow, inappropriately written, and poorly considered-- what does David Coleman have to say to these Catholics who are expressing the same concerns.
No Core? No Biggie!
Coleman has no mockery, dismissal, or poohing of the Catholic pooh.
First of all, it turns out that you don't actually really need Common Core after all.
“As president of The College Board it is my conviction that a child excellently trained in traditional liberal arts will do superbly on relevant sections of the SAT and other aspects of Advanced Placement work, ”Coleman said. “Rest assured.”
Well. This would be the same David Coleman who announced his intention to bring the SAT in line with the Common Core. So if you can do "superbly" on the SAT with a liberal arts education, and the SAT is aligned with the Common Core, the by the Transitive Property of Reformy Baloney, the Common Core are pretty much the same thing as a liberal arts education. And I'm pretty sure that nobody-- not even David Coleman nor Bill Gates-- has tried to make that argument. So somewhere in that little logic puzzle is something that is Not So.
It's in the Colemanian weasel words, as usual. The liberal arts will help you with "do superbly on relevant sections of the SAT..." says Coleman, which is kind of like handing a life jacket to a person about to cross the Sahara Desert on foot and saying, "Take this. It will help you in all the places where you have to swim across a lake."
But Cassandra has even more reality-impaired quotes from Coleman.
“The vulgar implementation of anything can have a reductive and destructive effect,” said Coleman. “My desire to celebrate, and name and specify some of the beauties and distinctive values of a religious education are precisely to avoid a leveling quality where you forget that there are special gifts that can be lost without attention.”
I would like "the vulgar implementation of anything can have a reductive and destructive effect" on a t-shirt. It is certainly the most elegant version ever of "the standards are awesome, but the implementation was botched" that I've ever seen. But Coleman can peg the needle on the baloney-meter even higher, as with this statement:
I just want to tell you how emphatically I’m trying to agree with your premise, which is a stultifying sameness is not the intention here.
Got that? Coleman's work-- his idea about what an educated person should be and his work to impose that vision on every public school student in America, both through Common Core and an SAT redesign-- that's not aimed at imposing a one-size-fits-all standard at all. Which is either a spectacularly bald-faced lie, or proof that Coleman doesn't understand what he's done at all. Pick whichever one you judge more likely from a guy who studied at Oxford.
This expressed love for religious schooling is not new for Coleman. Cassandra points us at a 2014 piece in the National Review in which Coleman sticks up for evangelical Christian Wheaton College, implying in his conclusion that religious schools, with their careful reading and quiet contemplation, do a better job of educating students than "secular colleges." (Actually, what he literally suggests is that the religious school students would write better papers).
Has David "Nobody gives a shit what you think or feel" Coleman acquired a soft spot for religion, or does he just need to keep doing his marketing for the Core and the New! Improved! SAT. Whatever the case, the National Catholic Education Association has asked Coleman to deliver the keynote address at its annual convention next March (you will be unsurprised to note that NCEA got a big Gates Core-implementation grant in 2013).
In the meantime, Coleman wants the rest of us in public schools to note that are paths to excellence beyond the Core, somehow.
I consider these remarks I’m making about the distinctive and potentially widely valuable benefits of religious training and religious education are less a challenge, frankly, towards religious schools than a challenge to all other schools — that they have much to learn from things that I think the best of religious schools do very well today.
Amen, Brother Coleman. Amen.
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