Open letter to Obama

I am one of thousands of folks who have signed on to the Nation magazine's “Open Letter to Barack Obama” calling on the candidate to “stand firm on the principles he so compellingly articulated in the primary campaign.” You can read it and sign on too, right here.

One of these key points in the letter has to do with educational equity and NCLB, although none of the original signers were recognizable education activists (Bolder, Broader coalition?) or teacher union leaders. I wonder why not?

PreaPrez on Tennessee shooting

It was during the Spring camp in March of 1965 (I was 17) that we got word that the Reverend James Reeb, a Unitarian minister who was organizing for the great Selma March, was attacked by a mob of Klansmen and murdered. That night we gathered in Reverend Reeb’s honor with candles under the pine trees. Many of us were already active in the school desegregation battles raging in Los Angeles at the time. That night we all pledged to do more.

Read the rest here…

Good job, Kette…

Does this mean that Eli Broad will take back his award? Probably not.

But still, Eduwonkette has the straight dope on N.Y.’s student achievement data and it ain’t pretty—certainly nothing like what we’ve been told. It seems that Bloomberg/Klein have been spreading a lot of political fertilizer around.

According to Kette:

The achievement gap in New York City has increased in the last five years, and the decreases in the achievement gap in grade 8 ELA have come at the expense of white and Asian students. Coupled with my analyses of NAEP achievement gaps - which also showed no progress and in some cases growing gaps - these findings are quite troubling.

Looks like a job for the DOE’s new "Truth Squad."

"The unkindest cut of all..."--W.S.

Mark Kleiman’s happy—sort of-- that they found that the small growth removed from John McCain’s face was cancer-free.

But Mark can’t resist retelling the old tale about a political rival's remark when a tumor on Lord Randolph Churchill's lung proved benign: that the doctors had "found the one bit of Randolph that wasn't malignant and cut it out."

Side note: The next time someone tells you that the media is playing softball with Barack Obama (and I’m not saying some aren’t), ask them why, faced with one of the great banking crises in U.S. history, no one is asking John McCain about his role in the Keating Five scandal?

*****

NYT on blogger/satirist Gary Babad

Soft-spoken with a strong sarcastic streak, Mr. Babad, 56, hardly seems like a rabble-rouser; more like the kind of man who would rarely raise his voice. He is a social worker with two daughters who have attended city schools since kindergarten. But he has a bit of a protest pedigree: Grandma was a Communist, and Mom was the president of the local teachers union in Ardsley, N.Y...

the whole article here.

You can find Gary at: http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/