The nutty demonization of Randi Weingarten by Valerie Strauss

[proud2BlibKansan]

It's not easy being Randi Weingarten these days.

First, the film “Waiting for Superman” by Davis Guggenheim wrongly portrayed the president of the American Federation of Teachers as the face of the dastardly opposition to school reform.

Then NBC turned her into a punching bag during last week’s “Education Nation,” when she was put in the position of being chief defender of traditional public schools against an army of aggressive attackers who blame unions for the ills of urban districts and see charter schools as public education's salvation.

Then an anonymous column on Huffington Post equated Weingarten with Osama bin Laden. Yes, bin Laden, the terrorist. And a number of readers posted comments agreeing with the sentiments.

THEN, Joe Williams, director of the political action committee Democrats for Education Reform, or DFER, felt a strange need to dignify the idiotic column with a defense of Weingarten.

DFER promotes public charter schools (which has become the favorite cause of some founders of wealthy hedge funds); the two major teachers unions, Weingarten’s AFT and the larger National Education Association, oppose the expansion of charters as they are today. (The biggest research study on charters to date showed that students at most charters do no better or worse on standardized tests than their counterparts in traditional schools.)

“It struck me,” Williams told me, “that if things are going to get this kooky as a result of ‘Waiting for Superman,’ it makes a discussion impossible.” (In fact there hasn't been a real reform discussion in years because today's school reformers denigrate anybody who disagrees with them, calling them defenders of the miserable status quo.)

more . . . http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/teacher-assessment/the-nutty-demonization-of-rand.html

[wtmusic]

1. "today's school reformers denigrate anybody who disagrees with them"

:rofl:

The irony and hypocrisy of that statement alone is self-evident.

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. Kick