RAVITCH: Ed Sec Arne Duncan BOOED by education researchers

[yurbud]

Researchers in any field aren't exactly the most rowdy people, so this is really saying something.

Real research and teachers' experience are being ignored for top down corporations before kids policies backed business buzzwords and BS.

The quote from Mayor Bloomberg, who is using his money to force corporate friendly education reform and get himself elected and re-elected sums up the state of our democracy. When asked how the people could hold him accountable, he said, "They can boo me at parades."

A "Let them eat cake" statement like that tells you how profoundly corrupt our political system has become and how drastic a correction it needs.

Obama had window of opportunity to change this with true reforms with the support of the people, but he squandered it.

Eventually, the broad middle class (or what's left of it) is going to figure out how to wrest power from the dangerously morally bankrupt financial elite, and they might not have as much left as they would have if they had let (or told) Obama to do more to fix the mess they made.

I did not go to the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association in San Francisco, so was not aware of what is described in this post. Jennifer Jennings says that Arne Duncan was booed when he spoke, and she apologized to Secretary Duncan for the behavior of her fellow researchers.

Why was Secretary Duncan booed, and should AERA (or anyone else) apologize for the booing?
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Booing is the behavior of the powerless. Educators are angry--and Jennings knows this--because of the top-down, authoritarian way in which Duncan has imposed policies that are bad for children, ruinous for teachers, and harmful to the quality of education. Jennings also knows that Duncan holds all the power. Educators may write blogs, opinion pieces, books, and research studies, and they will be completely ignored by Duncan. To say the least, he is uninterested in dialogue and unwilling to change his hardened belief that his policies are successful, no matter what anyone says.[/font]

In New York City, our mayor proudly announced that the public should hold him accountable for improving the public schools. After he spent $100 million or so to win a new term, someone in the press asked Mayor Bloomberg how the public could hold him accountable. He answered: "They can boo me at parades."

http://wp.me/p2odLa-4Je

[DJ13]

1. I wish they didnt boo

Instead, they should have thrown shoes at him.

[yurbud]

2. I agree or chase off the stage like they did to Arnold Santa Monica College

[AnotherMcIntosh]

3. Best DU post today.

Thanks for the news.

[yurbud]

5. thank you.

[yurbud]

4. .

[blkmusclmachine]

6. Good.

[stuffmatters]

7. Excellent

[Igel]

8. Pathetic.

Ravitch was herself a supporter of high-stakes testing. Back when the research pointed that way. This kind of approach was applauded as being best practices and in the interests of the children. And it empowered researchers.

Now, research of no demonstrably higher quality says something else. If those results were being implemented by Duncan he'd be applauded. Because it empowers researchers. Advocates for their own agendas.

A lot of what the researchers say makes it into the classroom. Much of it is twaddle.

In some cases, some body comes along and exposes it as twaddle through a peer-reviewed study.

In most cases, some instructional specialist goes to be trained at a university then comes back with the Ultimate Solution to Being Off Task. USBOT. Teachers look at USBOT and say, "Ah, I've done that for the last 20 years. I was taught to do that but it had a different name then, and my teacher said it had a yet different name when he was learning it 50 years ago."

Or they look at it and roll their eyes. "Of course it's never been tried. Not by a teacher that had his contract renewed, at least. It's a foolish idea." And it's tried, the researcher applauds the innovative and forward-thinking school, and it flops. "You didn't implement it properly. You weren't trained properly. You misunderstood the basic principle." Etc. But 10 years later if you try it that same researcher, never admitting that his idea was idiocy, would decry it as wrong-headed.

At least Ravitch is honest. However, in this case there's a kind of implicit dishonesty: The researchers were all opposed to Duncan. However, had any one of the researchers' ideas been adopted, Duncan would still have been booed by a hefty percentage of the other researchers.

Such is education research. And why many teachers, when they say they have a masters, say it's a *real* masters and not a masters in education.