WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Duncan's critics

Duncan must contend with critics on the right who don’t accept the federal government’s active role in education, and ones on the left who see him as a neoliberal enforcer, exploiting Obama’s Democratic bona fides to impose the free-market reform agenda on the unions. (New Yorker)

Quoting me

Small schools expert Mike Klonsky has written about the controversy on his blog, asking his readers to help school officials comb through the dictionary and find the offending words. "The problem for the book-banning officials is, they have to be able to read through the dictionary themselves in order to find more sex-related words," he writes. (Edweek)

CPS resists "at-risk" kids

In spite of Chicago Public Schools chief Ron Huberman's pledge to help at-risk teenagers, in some instances school officials are undermining that effort, making it difficult for such troubled youths to return to school after they have been incarcerated, according to judges, attorneys, probation officials and others in the juvenile justice system. (Tribune)