"Why Isn't Closing 40 Philadelphia Public Schools National News?

[kpete]

"Why Isn't Closing 40 Philadelphia Public Schools National News? In what should be the biggest story of the week, the city of Philadelphia's school system announced Tuesday that it expects to close 40 public schools next year and 64 by 2017. The school district expects to lose 40% of current enrollment to charter schools, the streets or wherever, and put thousands of experienced, well qualified teachers, often grounded in the communities where they teach, on the street. Ominously, the shredding of Philadelphia's public schools isn't even news outside Philly. This correspondent would never have known about it save for a friend's Facebook posting early this week. Corporate media in other cities don't mention massive school closings, whether in Chicago, Atlanta, NYC, or in this case Philadelphia, perhaps so people won't have given the issue much deep thought before the same crisis is manufactured in their town. Even inside Philadelphia the voices of actual parents, communities, students and teachers are shut out of most newspaper and broadcast accounts. The black political class is utterly silent and deeply complicit." Apparently, today's black and civil rights "leadership" gets too much funding from charter school advocates to ask questions about the damage being done to black education in America.

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/9043-why-isnt-closing-40-philadelphia-public-schools-national-news

[malthaussen]

1. Much that happens in Pennsylvania seems to fly under the radar

... even in Pennsylvania. And when it comes to the trashing of the public education system anywhere, much of that flies under the radar as well. Follow the money.

-- Mal

[leveymg]

2. We have an Education Sec'y who's committed to this sort of thing.

[malthaussen]

3. You observe that even when it is forcibly brought to DU's attention

... nobody has anything to say about it.

... well, almost nobody.

-- Mal

[Fumesucker]

4. People are too busy racing to the top..

It's bipartisan, hence not controversial.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

8. Repeatedly posted too

[PDJane]

5. America is no longer a democracy, if it ever was.

It's a fascist state, and I'm not entirely sure when the change occurred. I've been looking, and it's not really apparent.

What is clear is that blacks and latinos have become a useful permanent underclass, and that slavery has never really been eradicated. Now, of course, it's called the prison system, but it works exactly the same way, replete with cruelty and sadism.

The ruling class, and there is one, seems to be determined to take the entire country back, not decades, but centuries. It appears to be working as planned, with the cooperation of the brainwashed and ignorant voter.

I'm afraid it's in the process of happening here, too; the corporate class is greedy, stupid, short-sighted, and destructive. They seem to think that civilization will continue even as they destroy it.

[Zalatix]

10. Civilization will always continue for the rich. For everyone else, it's The Road.

[solara]

6. Ed Schultz has been covering it on his show on MSNBC

he has been interviewing some of the teachers and says he will continue to follow this story

[BumRushDaShow]

7. When the state took over the school system

in 2001, that was the beginning of the end.

[jp11]

9. Schools closing aren't interesting cause they are closing

because they are failing and will be replaced/restructured or so the narrative goes.