Matt Damon and Mother Reject Union's Award
The actor Matt Damon and his mother, a professor of education, on Wednesday turned down an award from the country’s largest teachers union after reading an opinion article that the union’s president had co-authored with the founder of Teach for America.
Writing that she was “confused by your collaboration” with Teach for America, Dr. Nancy Carlsson-Paige said she and her son, Mr. Damon, no longer desired to be nominated for the National Education Association’s Friend of Education Award.
In the opinion piece that Dr. Carlsson-Paige referred to, Dennis Van Roekel, president of the N.E.A., and Wendy Kopp, founder of T.F.A., urged the importance of evaluating and improving teacher training programs across the country. Yet in her e-mail to Mr. Van Roekel, Dr. Carlsson-Paige said she finds this message somewhat disingenuous on the part of T.F.A.
“I am very familiar with TFA and believe that its short-term, minimal training of teachers undermines teacher quality and harms children who too often get an inadequate education with its teachers,” the e-mail states.
http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2012/01/05/matt-damon-and-mother-reject-unions-award/
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