Klein and Weingarten On the Road

Elizabeth Green has another interesting piece in the NY Sun:
Schools Chancellor Reaches Into Presidential Contest

"In a speech to the National Council of La Raza's convention in California yesterday, Mr. McCain said he supports charter schools, efforts to "weed out" incompetent teachers, and plans to "hold schools accountable" for their results. He also called improving schools attended by poor students "the civil rights challenge of our time" — the same phrasing Mr. Klein often uses."

It looks like McCain will endorse their campaign.

Klein and Sharpton met with Obama yesterday.

Obama will be a little more careful but will sign on to a lot of this plan since most politicians love to talk about accountability and quality teachers. And the tough liberals like Kahlenberg (include the AFT/UFT/Clinton wing) bring up student/parent accountability to justify their support for a phony system of school and teacher accountability.

Green also reports on Weingarten's plan to call for revisions in NCLB.

Speaking at the union's national convention in Chicago, Ms. Weingarten yesterday laid out a vision for a revamped federal education law that would promote "community schools."

She said such schools would serve needy children by incorporating many government services into one building, services that do not just include schooling but medical care, child care, and homework assistance.

Funny how Weingarten did not propose these ideas all these years in NYC where the union could have used its muscle with the state legislature to try it out in a few schools. Just one reason why I view the entire plan as a PR move to make it appear she is for the more comprehensive Richard Rothstein approach to educational reform, while in NYC she went along with much of Klein's plans.

I mean, if you never tried to get this done in NY where the UFT was one of the major lobbyists, why would you would people take it seriously when it is proposed on a national level?

I guess on the national level she can take stronger stands since she will never have to negotiate a contract. This will lead to favorable press similar to what BloomKlein have gotten - much of the praise has been due to their ability to get Weingarten to capitulate in exchange for money.


Ed Week's blogger reports on the convention (live feeds on the sidebar) also talked about how Randi attacked NCLB in her speech.

She called the federal law a four-letter word, and vowed to work to overhaul it. NCLB, she said, is not about teaching, but about testing.


The Ed Week blogger even used the word, "Ouch!"

I would use multiple 4 letter words to describe just how much bullshit this is.

Watch what Randi Weingarten does, not what she says when it comes to testing and NCLB. Note she says she will work to "overhaul" not abolish NCLB. She and her predecessor Sandy Feldman were supporters of the original NCLB and Sandy sat on the commission to draft it. Has Randi ever said it was wrong to play this role?

She talks about the evils of testing in NYC but then signed on to an agreement that will give teachers bonuses for raising test scores that have proven to be bogus.

When mayor Bloomberg and Joel Klein bragged about their high test scores, who was standing on the podium with them?

When Eli Broad gave Bloomberg and Klein the Broad prize for raising test scores and phone grad rates, who was there in Washington with them to accept congratulations? Guess?

TRIPLE OUCH!