The televised town hall after the Rockefeller Center screening of "Waiting for 'Superman' " was uplifting and frustrating simultaneously. After a screening, Davis Guggenheim joined Joe and Mika from the MSNBC Morning Show along with heroes of edreform Geoffrey Canada, Deborah Kenny and Michele Rhee.
To her credit, Randi Weingarten showed up knowing she'd get the short end of the stick; she insisted, "We can fix this system." When she squared off against Rhee, a subtle but important difference emerged. Randi wants a system that helps teachers "do the best they can," -- she starts with the adults as a given. Rhee starts with the kids and says, "Whatever it takes."
It is hard to take Randi seriously as a collaborator after she spent one million dollars to defeat Fenty leading to Rhee's likely dismissal.
Rhee was tough and on point, "When you look at the $100 million that New York City wastes on surplus teachers, you have to ask how is this good for kids?"
Geoff Cananda gets more powerful with every appearance. He's outraged that there is no downside to failure for the adults in failing school systems. He describes it like a massive fire and the staff leaves at 3 p.m.
John Legend, an exciting new edreformer calls education the civil right issue of our time, "If you care about justice and equality, you care about education."
Brian Williams hosted a patient two hour special with teachers before the screening. There was some hopeful dialog but just as much predictable defensiveness.
Near the end of the town hall, Joe Scarborough said, "it's not about charter schools." But it is, it's about a set of conditions that allows a great group of teachers to assemble around a clear and focused mission, it's about excellence in execution every day, it's about doing whatever it takes to help students succeed. Those conditions are very difficult to create in traditional public schools.
We'll take a few steps toward becoming an Education Nation if the conditions for success are created in a few more cities as a result of this movie. Legend summed it up, "These kids are our kids."
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"...the film's central themes—that all public school teachers are bad, that all charter schools are good and that teachers' unions are to blame for failing schools—are incomplete and inaccurate"
Well, that's a nice straw man to stand up only to know him down. The movie makes the point that the system tolerates teachers who put themselves first, who don't get into the minds of many students and who move slowly when opportunities are given to improve. "That's just not me" when I show teachers some new techniques that I've learned form Littky or High Tech High or or Mavericksineducation.com or QBESchool.com other innovative schools chadphila.org or blogs like TheStudentIsTheClass.com
metcenter.org has terrific questions to post on the wall... Here's what Littky recommends:
Teachers should be taught "one staff member at a time" (page 77). "Everyone has their own plan, and we look for things that the group as a whole needs. When one teacher is struggling, the other teachers aren't forced to sit through a three-hour training on a special issue."
The focus on treating everyone equally (which is a union imperative) makes it difficult to implement procedures that might seem unfair... but have the kid at the center of the universe.
We know even less about how to change this than we do about fixing struggling schools
making private school system and Gates wanted visas for Indian and Taiwanese tech workers he could pay lower wages to.
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2008/10/paul-moore-and-more-on-rhee-in-dc.html
http://perimeterprimate.blogspot.com/2010/07/gulen-schools-and-their-booming-h1b.html
Do your research. http://www.charterschoolwatchdog.com
There was also accusations of Islamic teaching in LA that led to a school searches and investigations that found nothing.
Here's a sad point: When the organizers of the Education Summit sent out invitations, they forgot to send one to Abe Fischler, president emeritus of Nova University. His blog http://www.TheStudentIstheClass.com is must reading for people who want to employ technology in school reform. I hope his talking points get heard, particularly "time is a variable" and the use of computers to allow students to progress at their own pace..... To learn more, visit The Student Is the Class blog... Thanks for reading. Steve McCrea www.FindaSmallSchool.com
Union Busting grab for Wall Street.
http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/73608
Teachers unions better start looking and acting like they are part of the solution rather than a big part of the problem or else they won't have any support except by the government employees and the dwindling ranks of the private sector workers still in unions.
As to poor teachers, no one, including teachers, feel they should be tolerated. If a teacher should be dismissed, there are procedures to accomplish this. When it doesn't happen, it is the fault of poor administrators, not tenure or teacher contracts.
There is a lot more positive that can be said about teacher unions and teacher contracts. They are a necessity and many times are helpful to the students.
However, since space is limited, I can't resist the following sarcastic remarks. "How dare teachers stand up for their wages, benefits, and working conditions! Just because we do the same is beside the point! They should be thankful for whatever the School Board offers! Low pay should be expected for the privilege of teaching our children! After all, they are taking our hard earned tax dollars to do such an easy job! I just can't understand their ungrateful attitude!"
There is a youtube video out there, brought to my attention by www.2mminutes.com, that shows a union president saying, "Children need their own union if they want someone to represent them. Teachers have the teacher's union and I am not the representative of children." Great. Take resources that could help kids to support higher teacher's pay. I just don't see it. my email is TLASteve@gmail.com