DEFEND DIANE RAVITCH FROM JOEL KLEIN'S MINIONS!!

New Tweed hack supremo Natalie Ravitz goes after Ravitch - could be a song. Where's our pal David Cantor when you need him? Here Steve Koss issues an appeal on Leonie's listserve.



This call to everyone on the listserv who supports REAL educational reform (not the Bloomberg/Klein kind).

Yesterday, Klein's new Director of Communications (P.R. hack), Natalie Ravitz, posted her first "column" on the Huffington Post website. Why she merits this forum and why HuffPost gave it to her is beyond my understanding, but she nevertheless chose for her debut performance a scurrilous attack on Diane Ravitch's recent writings concerning the new NYS exam standards and cut scores and the sham those changes have made of Bloomberg/Klein's claims of staggering educational improvement under their watch. Ms. Ravitz conducted her attack in a manner eerily similar to Andrew Breitbart's recent "outing" of USDA's Shirley Sharrod, by taking a three-year old article of Diane's and quoting it completely out of context. She also made numerous remarks suggesting that Ms. Ravitch regards NYC public school children as "slackers," that she disparages any progress students might make, that she revels in students' failures, that she is inconsistent in her assessment of the NAEPs, and that "everything they [NYC public school students] have accomplished thus far is meaningless."

Her best and most ironic line: "It is easy to hurl insults from the sidelines." Yes, Ms. Ravitz, you certainly proved that in your first major effort on Joel Klein's behalf. Hurling insults and using Breitbart tactics to suggest that a woman who has devoted her entire career to public school education actually enjoys seeing children fail -- coming from someone who is likely clueless about public education and is certainly clueless about it in NYC.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE. IF YOU CAN SPARE A MINUTE, GO TO THE HUFFINGTON POST WEBSITE, READ MS. RAVITZ'S RANT, AND POST A COMMENT. THERE ARE ALREADY 16 COMMENTS AS OF THIS MORNING, 100% OF THEM IN SUPPORT OF DIANE. LET'S MAKE IT 100 OR MORE!!

HERE'S THE LINK ADDRESS:


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/natalie-ravitz/

IF THAT DOESN'T WORK, JUST GO TO www.huffingtonpost.com and do a search on Kravitz. FROM THERE YOU CAN CLICK ON HER ONE AND ONLY "COLUMN."

I tried submitting a comment questioning HuffPost itself -- why did they give Ms. Ravitz, clearly a rookie in her position, such an undeserved platform, and aren't they ashamed to have one of their "columnists" debuting" with a dishonest personal attack on someone with far, far, far greater credentials and reputation than she (who appears to have ZERO background in education). The moderator wouldn't post it.

Steve Koss