Cheating our children: Suspicious school test scores across the nation

[chervilant]

15. Well, now...

I hope to encourage a macro-level understanding of what is happening and what WILL happen if the corporatists succeed in 'privatizing' our system of public education.

First of all, those of us who are voicing concerns about Arne Duncan, Bill Gates, Michelle Rhee, and their ilk have consistently identified these people's take on 'what's wrong with public education' as misleading and simplistic. Asserting that 'bad teachers' and 'villainous unions' are the reasons why education is failing our children ignores the complex and interrelated economic and sociocultural problems that have plagued public education for the past fifty-plus years.

Second, those of us who are voicing concerns about Arne Duncan, Bill Gates, Michelle Rhee, and their ilk have consistently questioned these people's truthiness, given such examples of deceit as Rhee asserting that it's almost impossible to fire bad teachers, but within minutes bragging that she has fired over a thousand teachers. Furthermore, both Arne and Michelle have misrepresented 'tenure' as a lifetime guarantee of a teaching position, and those of us who are voicing concerns have pointed out this misrepresentation before.

Third, those of us who are voicing concerns about Arne Duncan, Bill Gates, Michelle Rhee and their ilk have cautioned that charter schools are cherry-picking their students to insure that they can generate impressive statistics to support their contention that charter schools are better than public schools at educating our youth. Furthermore, most charter schools serve a particular population or create programs to appeal to specific groups, such as the charters that promise to teach creationism. Charter schools tend to promote inequality, particularly when they predominantly serve the needs of wealthier communities while disallowing attendance by special needs students, or low-income students.

Our nation has routinely underfunded and disrespected public education, a reality that is manifestly apparent when one considers the fact that fully 40% of our adult population is functionally illiterate. Over the past four decades, this nation's teachers have struggled to educate our children in the face of underfunding, bad administrators, overcrowded classrooms, and disintegrating school buildings (and this list could go on and on--bad food, no physical education, no art, no music, etc--ad nauseum). Are there bad teachers? Yes. Are bad teachers THE reason our schools are failing? NO!

I haven't even touched on public education's elephant in our collective living room: POVERTY. For many of our children, school represents the one environment within which they will get fed, nurtured, and encouraged. Sadly, children who live in poverty comprise an ever increasing percentage of the children who will not graduate from high school (by design?).

I've asserted on DU many times that I will continue to pursue a teaching position. However, I am going forward fully aware of the obstacles I'll likely face. Bottom line: our children are worth whatever crap they fling at us, and I'll continue to tough it out until--like so many other amazing teachers--I burn out or fall victim to their hedonism.