The nation’s largest teachers union sharply attacked President Obama’s most significant school improvement initiative on Friday evening, saying that it puts too much emphasis on a “narrow agenda” centered on charter schools and echoes the Bush administration’s “top-down approach” to reform.
The National Education Association’s criticism of Obama’s $4.35 billion “Race to the Top” initiative came nearly a month after the president unveiled the competitive grant program, meant to spur states to move toward teacher performance pay; lift caps on independently operated, publicly funded charter schools; and take other steps to shake up school systems. The NEA’s statement to the Department of Education came a week before the end of the public-comment period on the administration’s proposal, and it reflected deep divisions over the White House’s education agenda within a constituency largely loyal to the Democratic Party.
The union, which boasts 3.2 million members, charged that Race to the Top contradicted administration pledges to give states more flexibility in how they improve schools. “We find this top-down approach disturbing; we have been down that road before with the failures of No Child Left Behind,” the union wrote in its comments, “and we cannot support yet another layer of federal mandates that have little or no research base of success and that usurp state and local government’s responsibilities for public education.” Source: Washington Post More at this LINK
We have a whole lot of teachers who stop by OJ regularly. It would be nice to get your input. I believe CTA is a part of NEA. Do you agree with your union umbrella on this issue? *
* You WILL be graded and your pay scale will be impacted, depending upon your answers. Proceed with caution!
(Kidding of course! ) 😉
I am waiting for Michelle Quinn to post haha…where is she?
She got into an un-winnable ruckus with Sean and I think she took a well-deserved break off from posting or she got busy etc…
I hope she weighs in on this one – she usually has a lot to say about education. This will put her in a bit of a pickle, because I don’t think she really supports either side at all: Unions vs. Obama admin.
Jill, there were a lot of good comments left at the Washington Post site. Here’s one I agree with:
One Nation Under God spends about $465 billion a year on bullets and bombs and about $60 billion on education. An F-35 is eighty-five million. My county has charter schools and there were many cases of misappropriating funds. There wasn’t proper oversight and now my county has a mandatory drug testing program it can’t afford. Socialism? It’s illegal. How can you force innocent children to submit to a mandatory drug test to obtain a mandatory public education their parents are taxed to provide? Recently, news agencies announced American cash is stained with illegal drugs. This is another lawsuit coming to a school board near you like a runaway freight train. Also, requiring every graduating student to read a mandatory book, “Fighting For Freedom Isn’t Free,” is another lawsuit. Take Jesus and politics out of schools. Fund public education.
Posted by: rhyer | August 21, 2009 9:51 PM
Well, since I get a slip every year, naturally I want them to get rid of teachers who don’t score very well so I am not just a “# number”…but I am not a fan of using test scores and money in the same sentence because it will just promote “cheating”. I want the educ code UPDATED and I want the districts to do away with using a “hire date” as the basis of keeping teachers. I am torn on this issue.
Ok, just this once:) RED YOU BAD!
And really it makes my day to take on thugs like Mr. Mills, I don’t want to post any more because he has the ability to minipulate my posts.
The nation’s largest teachers union sharply attacked President Obama’s most significant school improvement initiative on Friday evening, saying that it puts too much emphasis on a “narrow agenda” centered on charter schools
Of course they did! Charter schools can have non-union teacher’s. The teachers union is nothing but a poliical group that gains power and money using teachers due’s, this lot could not care less about the kids.
About 9mons ago i went to a PTA meeting in Costa Mesa, they had Kevin Gorden speak, he ranted on about how the CTA, “got up every morning thinking about the kids”, well it did not take me long to standup and say “your full of crap”, i gave it to him and then, i was asscorted out by an English woman who was a member of the Orange County PTA, if ya think this group is for the kids “JUST SAY NO’, all a bunch of hacks who make a lot of money, from kids failing in schools.
No matter how much money you pump in to these schools, it will not make one ounce of difference, because the teacher quality in Califoria is graded by the National Council on Teacher Quality as being D+, even though they are the highest paid teachers in the nation.( look up National summary 2008, State Teachers policy Yearbook).
we have been down that road before with the failures of No Child Left Behind,” the union wrote in its comments, “and we cannot support yet another layer of federal mandates
Yeah, the scum realise they could use title one schools to get more teachers in the door!.
The QEIA 3. billion dollars to 488 schools only for the very “Narrow”, approach of smaller class room size’s, with no oversight of teacher quality.
Even the LAUSD Educational Board Member, Stated,” that the QEIA did nothing to improve schools, that its only real purpose was to increase the number of teachers which mean’s more dues for the union”.
The HPSG was 2.+mil. with the same approach, of smaller class size, but did not improve the schools, infact some schools scored higher without the HPSG, QEIA, with the same demographics and socical economic conditions of the students.
of course as stated by Barbara Kerr, AKA,the “MOB BOSS”, states, “this is putting money where our heart is -with schools serving mostly POOR OR ENGLISH LEARNER STUDENTS ACROSS THE STATE’. Again the hispanic’s to the rescue, to make all types of mobs a nice little penny from tax money!.
(read this yourself: at Quality education investment Act awardee’s- year 2007.)
I think most teachers would know about re-classifiction. The state department’s buget office stated “districts are not reclassifing kids fast enough because they loss federal and state grants”.
So the moral of the story is: Obama this just might be your saving grace!. Everything else your doing is shit:(
And the CTA is about to get the boot, once and for all from the bloody schools. “man i wish, i could just see kerr’s face, if this goes in to effect”.
And when the teachers, principles and the districts start having to do their jobs, they are not going to be so layed back with brat students or losser parents, RIGHT?? 🙂
So i can’t believe i am saying this “GO OBAMA GO”!.
Obama’s goal seems to be to try to put forth solutions that he believes will work regardless of the politics of them.
That is not the way Washington usually works and will not win friends amoung those who usually control the agenda.
Michelle,
What a nice surprise! Thanks for the comments!
Jim, I think the education reforms needed are going to take more thought than the current top-down approach happening right now.
Santa Ana certainly has different issues than say Irvine or Orange. Those kinds of differences are present all over the country, so the strategies on how to raise performance for schools, students and teachers will have to be much more thoughtful than the carrot/stick approach that has been present for so long.