SOS pre-convention chatter

The SOS National Steering Committee begins meetings this morning to work on the organization's internal structure, decision-making process and other matters of internal life. Interestingly, this will be the first face-to-face meeting of the NSC since it was elected after last year's march. Hopefully that will change in the coming year.

Last year's march and rally drew very little media coverage and the little it did draw focused entirely on superstar Matt Damon who gave a great pro-teacher speech. We're not marching this week. Too difficult and expensive to pull it off right on the heels of both teacher union conventions and as I mentioned above, getting our own house in order takes precedence right now. But SOS is about action and we're all looking forward to the next national gathering to meet current corporate reform policies head-on.

The first bit of coverage this year is this pre-convention Newsday story by Jo Napolitano. Jo lived in my Chicago, Logan Square neighborhood while attending Northwestern University so she much be a good reporter.

After interviewing several of us, she writes:

Participants also said former President George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind program is a proven failure and President Barack Obama's Race to the Top initiative only doubles down on the previous administration's misguided policies.

You got that right, Jo.