Education reformer's "blunt talk freaks out almost everybody.” Illinois teachers were sold out.

madfloridian

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Wed Jul-13-11 01:23 PM
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Education reformer's "blunt talk freaks out almost everybody.” Illinois teachers were sold out.

Edited on Wed Jul-13-11 01:27 PM by madfloridian

Just like teachers around the country are being sold out to big money.

There is a transcript now of Jonah Edelman's remarks at Aspen. The video was taken down at the Aspen Ideas Festival website, but teachers and others got it right back up again. Then Caroline Grannan at Parents Across America transcribed his words.

Mike Klonsky's blog provided a link to a site called Capital Fax which had the great headline.

Jonah Edelman’s blunt talk freaks out almost everybody

Just some snips:

An education activist’s blunt tale of wooing House Speaker Michael Madigan and outfoxing teachers unions created a stir Tuesday by violating a cardinal rule of Statehouse power plays — what happens under the dome stays under the dome.

..."I’m being quite blunt here. The individual candidates were essentially a vehicle to execute a political objective, which was to tilt toward Madigan. The press never picked up on it. We endorsed nine individuals – and six of them were Democrats, three Republicans – and tilted our money toward Madigan, who was expecting because of Bruce Rauner’s leadership … that all our money was going to go to Republicans. That was really a show of – indication to him that we could be a new partner to take the place of the Illinois Federation of Teachers. That was the point. Luckily, it never got covered that way. That wouldn’t have worked well in Illinois – Madigan is not particularly well liked. And it did work.

More on where Rahm got the idea of a longer school day and how Houston kids went to school so much longer there.

So in the intervening time, Rahm Emanuel was elected mayor … and he strongly supports our proposal. Jim (apparently Crown) … talked about the talking point that we made up and he (Emanuel) repeated about a thousand times, probably, on the campaign trail about the Houston kids going to school four years more than the Chicago kids. That was another shoe that dropped, and it really put a lot of pressure on the unions, particularly on the Chicago Teachers Union because they didn’t support it.

..."After the election we went back to Madigan, and I confirmed – reviewed the proposal that we had already discussed and I confirmed the support. He said he was supportive. The next day he created an Education Reform Commission and his political director called to ask for our suggestions who should be on it. And so in Aurora, Ill., in December, out of nowhere, there were hearings on our proposal. In addition, we hired 11 lobbyists, including four of the absolute best insiders, and seven of the best minority lobbyists – preventing the unions from hiring them. We enlisted a state public affairs firm. We had tens of thousands of supporters. … We raised $3 million for our political action committee. That’s more money than either of the unions have in their political action committees.

Did you catch that? Rahm "talked about the talking point that we made up and he (Emanuel) repeated about a thousand times"

More from Caroline Grannan at Parents Across America.

Jonah Edelman on outfoxing teachers’ unions

Picture courtesy of Parents Across America website. Jonah Edelman, the son of children’s advocate Marian Wright Edelman, has raised millions of dollars in funds from the Gates and Walton Foundations, as well as many top business executives, and now pursues policies central to the corporate education agenda, including support of charter school expansion, the evaluation of teachers based on test scores and the elimination of their seniority protections.

Edelman spoke on a panel at the recent Aspen Ideas Festival (June 27-July 3, 2011) about how the organization, aided by the millions of dollars they raised from top Chicago corporate executives, was able to influence Illinois state legislators to get SB7 passed, landmark legislation that severely curtailed teachers’ rights and job security, and that has been hailed by Arne Duncan and other corporate reformers as a model for the nation.

During his remarks, Edelman boasted that his organization and other well-funded allies will be able to replicate this success in states throughout the country. After Aspen Institute posted the video of this session, so many people blogged and tweeted about it that it was taken down, though it is back up here. In case they take it down again, a key excerpt is still posted on Fred Klonsky’s blog.

Edelman has since apologized for what was a remarkably frank account of how power politics worked to their advantage in Illinois, when you have millions of dollars and the mainstream media on your side. The rest of the country should be forewarned.

My comment is that he only apologized because he got caught saying how they were screwing teachers with all their power and money. That's the real sin, getting caught.

And I am with Fred Klonsky when he admonishes the teachers' unions that if you sit at the table with dogs, don't complain about the fleas.

Amen. Illinois gave us the perfect example of how readily unions worked with the reformers to make themselves look good and feel important because they were "cooperating."