Obama wants radical change in education, but not radical enough to make a real difference. Wouldn't want to offend all those robber barons who are suddenly so concerned about the future of our children by upsetting the natural economic order of things. Great Chain of Being and all that.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/race-to-the-top/the-elephant-obama-lauer-ignor.htmlThe elephant that Obama and Lauer ignored: Poverty and student achievement
About two-thirds of the way through President Obama’s interview Monday with NBC’s Matt Lauer on school reform, I thought the two were about to really dive into the biggest issue plaguing the country’s most troubled schools.
<edit>
The authors take the 2009 reading test results released in March from the National Assessment of Educational Progress -- considered to be the gold standard in K-12 standardized assessment -- and break down the numbers to show how well different groups of disadvantaged students are doing:
90 percent of low-income black students in high-poverty schools were not reading at grade level by fourth grade.
83 percent of poor black students in schools with moderate to low levels of poverty did not reach the goal.
88 percent of Hispanic students in high-poverty schools missed the mark.
82 percent of Hispanic students in schools with low or moderate rates of families living in poverty did not read at grade level.
<edit>
So the most important issue in school reform was ignored again.
Those who raise this issue are often attacked for resisting change and wanting to maintain the lousy status quo. It’s a silly, false argument; critics of the Obama administration’s reform agenda want to get rid of bad teachers just as much as anybody else, but they are pushing for workable, fair reforms, not turning back the clock. But the agenda has powerful backers. Obama, for example.
more...
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
