Rahm, Arne, Brizard -- Please read this article

Pedro Noguera and Michelle Fine, writing in The Nation, assure us (why is this even necessary?) that Teachers Aren't the Enemy.

It’s hard to think of another field in which experience is considered a liability and those who know the least about the nuts and bolts of an enterprise are embraced as experts.

Arne at Princeton

If clichés were hoops, he would be in the NBA.

"If you look at (education) as a civil rights issue, as an economic imperative, as an issue of national security -- I look at it through all three of those lenses -- we have to get better faster than we ever have in education."

Arne, how about looking at education once in a while, as teaching, learning, growth and development, and democratic engagement?

"Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good."

Translation: Even though high-stakes standardized tests are a crappy way to evaluate teachers, schools and kids, do it anyway.

"Anyone who tells you poverty is destiny, that poor children can't learn is part of the problem."

Of course, no one says that. But anyone who tells you that poverty and racism are just "an excuse" for not making AYP is definitely part of the problem.

"Getting better, faster."

Sounds like a passage from Chairman Mao's Red Book

"If we're serious about closing the achievement gap, we have to get our babies off to a great start."

Yes, let's start testing them in the womb.