The most striking aspect of these posts attacking NCLB is the glaring lack of details and the almost exclusive reliance on rhetoric. This is true of Mr. Mann's posts where he repeatedly states that NCLB is designed to promote charter schools yet and repeatedly fails to explain how. Here again in Mr. Hoover's post we have a number of unspecified attacks and no direct evidence to support them. It is difficult trying to prove that devil is not hiding in the woodshed if people are unwilling to open the door and look, but instead want to rely on their faith that the devil is indeed there.
Gary Hoover wrote: > Thursday evening was "Parent Information Night" at Barton > School, where my children go to school. It was a very good > evening over all. One highlight was the short address from > our school's principal, Steve DeLapp, who addressed this topic > very directly. > > If I can get a transcript of his talk -- perhaps it will be > posted to Barton's website -- I'll get the url. Meanwhile, > it would be a terrific op-ed for SWJ or even the Star and > Tribune to pick up: very thoughtful, well-illustrated, and to > the point. (Not to mention well-informed about the specifics > and probably more "fair and balanced" than I am about the topic!) I would enjoy responding to this address, so please post it here so that we can all read it. However, until that time you should recognize that it's somewhat unreasonable to expect someone to counter hidden arguments that are referenced, but unspecified. > I think that NCLB seriously underfunds our schools, then asks > why they are not doing well. NCLB is not about developing > curriculum and learning environments which are responsive to > the great variety of needs of learners, but is designed to be > a club with which to beat public education into oblivion. Well it great to think these things about NCLB, but for rational discourse it would help if you would explain how NCLB seriously underfunds our schools, rather than just believing it. > Just as the neo-con agenda has been stated loud and clear: to "shrink > government to be small enough to drown in the bathtub." NCLB > is the neo-con agenda for public education. Pawlenty provides good > cover for the neo-con agenda in Minnesota, and students -- especially > those in Minneapolis Public Schools -- will pay for it for the rest of > their lives. Ah, here's the devil again. Not only the devil, but the neo-devil who will steal the souls of school children. But, just how will the devil obtain these souls? > Education is a "common good" and a "public good" -- we all need to > wake up to the real, rather obvious agenda behind NCLB. The people > who fund the administrations (national, state, and local) behind NCLB > are very clear about this agenda. Great, then it should be very simple to provide references, links, and quotes to identify the details of this agenda. > Don't many of the people behind NCLB want exclusive private schools > and most especially exclusive religious schools for those > who can afford them, without the burden of dealing with the > needs of the children of those who are poor? I am sure that *some* people behind NCLB want exclusive religious private schools, but I am not sure that "many" do. > What is the political context of NCLB? Having grown up in > the "religious right" and having been educated in "religious right" > colleges, I'm very familiar with at least one significant group > behind the political movement which has given birth to NCLB. > We would be disingenuous to discuss NCLB without reference to at > least one agenda behind the policy, which is to ultimately dismantle > public education and to replace it with religious indoctrination. > It seems to me that many people are afraid of the racial, > religious, ethnic, and cultural diversity of "public education" and > so hope to strangle it -- or at least to "drown it in the bathtub." > The "religious right" I grew up in is often in league with a > "privatize everything" capitalist heresy. This concentrates power > in the hands of a few, encourages conformity and an authoritarian > (usually patriarchical) culture. Is that true in the case of NCLB as > well? So here we have a testimonial from someone who has actually lived with the devil. Okay, so who is this significant group behind the political movement that gave birth to NCLB? Even if true, multiple hands have been laid on NCLB (see: http://www.educationnext.org/20034/62.html). Have all of these people been possessed by the neo-cons? Please explain how NCLB's goal is to "...ultimately dismantle public education and to replace it with religious indoctrination." It seems to that there is plenty of "faith based religious indoctrination" right here in your post although it may not be the same religion as that of the neo-cons. For an interesting aside on this issue here's a link to an essay by H.D.Hirsch on the "religion" of public education: http://www.tc.umn.edu/~athe0007/HirschArticle.html > Doesn't NCLB label schools as "losers" while pulling funding > for programs for students in these same schools who need specific > and real help over a period of years in order to achieve at grade > level? Is that not what is being done here in Minneapolis? > There are no examples that I know of that NCLB has done any good > in the Minneapolis Public Schools -- or anywhere else, for that matter. > So far it has been about two things: turning people away from public > schools, and about cutting funding to public schools. Okay, NCLB is pulling funding from programs in the MPS. Please cite specific examples. Well, I suppose that I can provide one trivial example of how NCLB has done some good, it is currently helping my family to decide where to send our children to school. I am not sure if any schools have reached the stage when they are required to provide tutorial services, but I would hope (if well implemented) that this would be an example of good. > Perhaps having grown up in the "religious right" has made me too > sensitive to the power of the religious right in shaping current > policies, but NCLB sure fits the pattern. Isn't this short-sighted > and narrow? Why are so many people so compliant? Have we been poorly > educated.....? Hmmmmmm........ Perhaps so. If I've somehow missed all of the factual details supporting the evils of NCLB please reiterate them. Otherwise, I must conclude that short-sightedness, narrowness, and compliancy is shared just as much by the "religious left" as the "religious right." Michael Atherton Prospect Park REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. 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