Some charter schools (organized by middle class professional parents who can't afford private schools) will actually be creative, interesting schools with a half-way decent curriculum. These will be the icons of the "choice" and "creative" aspect of charters. It will be impossible for the "wrong" kids to get into these. There will be auditions and entrance exams to keep the riff raff out. These will be the "arts" and "sciences" magnet schools.
But the vast majority of charters will eventually be subcontracted to Walmart or the Gates foundation (or the likes) who will suck up a ton of public money to create an assembly-line drill fest for the lazy minorities who must be beaten into submission. All the public money will go to the test creators and curriculum developers. The teachers will get jack shit & the kids will be screwed.
That's the plan. And that motherfucking asshole and his fucking basketball buddy who's in charge of this "educational model" cannot be forgiven for this. Ever.
Joanna
----- Original Message ----- From: "Michael Pollak" <mpollak at panix.com> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2010 7:50:32 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Obama: D.C. schools don't measure up to his daughters' private school
Oh dear. Is this stupid simplistic implicit idea really what all this support for RTTT comes down too? The idea that testing + charter schools --> public schools that are as good as private schools?
Because gawd that's stupid. Since (a) as Valerie Steele points out, it's a path directly away from that kind of schooling so long as all this signature testing is involved, and (b) it overlooks the HUGE OBVIOUS difference and obvious path to making them more equal: spend a lot more money per student on virtually everything. Which RTTT is a facile substitute for, if not verily a path towards spending less (firstly on teachers).
This is almost Victorian in its smugness.
Michael ___________________________________ http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk