Posted on 08/18/2011 2:59:25 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Danger, Danger Arn Duncan. Your job is in jeopardy.
“This whole class size thing is a bunch of hooey. No reason you can’t have 50 in the room, with a competent teacher.”
I take it that you have never been in charge of a typical classroom (public)....
Amen to that!
You can't make this stuff up!!
Ha ha. That would be great!
Funny tag line!
Thinking back (which is not always easy!), wasn’t the congress demoncrat dominated?
The genius of Reagan was that he could work with Tip O’Neil and the other democrats and he would ultimately get his way. Reagan would appeal directly to the American people; I remember that clearly. But I cannot remember anything but that the DOE was on his agenda.
It’s a miracle that he was able to accomplish what he did considering the odds. But, like I said, that was his ‘genius & skill.
I don’t know what the reasoning was that the DOE was not disbanded altogether but I suspect that it was low priority and at that time, not the threat and abomination that it is today, so it was allowed to ‘slide’ by.
Unlike many FReepers here, I do have a child in a public school, and frankly have very few complaints about the level of education she is obtaining from her classroom teachers.
The gripes, complaints and issues I do have, are all related to administrative practices and proclamations, that have little to do with “education”.
As in every “government run enterprize” there exists a bloated bureaucracy that often seems to outnumber the actual “essential personnel” who do the work.
Arne Duncan is NO ONE to talk about "Education."
Sorry for yelling, just wanted this FACT to become WIDELY KNOWN.
I wonder if Arne Duncan knows how the Education System is set up in Texas and what role the Governor plays. Apparently not.
http://www.tea.state.tx.us/index4.aspx?id=4214
SBOE History and Duties
Establishing policy and providing leadership for the Texas public school system are the responsibilities of the State Board of Education. By adopting policies and setting standards for educational programs, the Board provides the direction necessary to enable Texas public schools to prepare today’s schoolchildren for a successful future.
Composed of 15 members elected from roughly equally populous State Board of Education districts, the Board adopts rules and establishes policies that govern a wide range of educational programs and services provided by Texas public schools. The commissioner of education serves as chief executive officer of the Board and supervises the administration of Board rules through the Texas Education Agency. Together the Board, the commissioner, and the Agency facilitate the operation of a vast public school system consisting of 1,235 school districts and charter schools, more than 8,300 campuses, more than 640,000 educators and other employees, and more than 4.7 million schoolchildren. The Board establishes goals for the public school system and adopts and promotes four-year plans for meeting those goals.
Well, it was useful in dispersing federal funding. Ever since the elementary and secondary act of 1965. the Federal government had been funding money into the public schools. The problem is that what drives the ever increasing level of funding at every level is the notion of “equity” The idea that somehowe the public schools can provide virtually the same quality of education to everyone regardless of their condition. It is utopian, to say the least. But there is hardly a politician to be found who dares say that this goal can never be achieved, can never even be approached. Not, of course withour leveling the quality of education for all. The public schools are socialist institutions.
yea and Dallas has two of top ten high schools in America!! according to US NEws
Cargill’s immediate predecessors in the chair were, like her, a part of the majority-Republican board’s tightly knit gang of six social conservatives.
Because of that, her appointment “doesn’t change a lot,” said Dan Quinn, the spokesman for the Texas Freedom Network, a liberal watchdog of the board and fierce opponent of its social conservatives.
“She has voted in lockstep with Gail Lowe and Don McLeroy in the past," he said. "There's no real space between them."
McLeroy held the chairmanship from 2007 to 2009 and said Lowe and Cargill share many qualities. “She is so similar to Gail with her complete integrity and honesty," he said. "Those two ladies are some of the finest I ever met."
McLeroy suffered the same fate as Lowe during the 2009 legislative session. The Bryan dentist, who lost to current member Thomas Ratliff in the 2010 Republican primary, describes Cargill and Lowe as some of his best friends. He said Cargill was “the scientist on the board” and that she was known for independently investigating all the issues that came before it.
The board’s longest-serving current member, David Bradley, echoed McLeroy. “She does her homework,” said Bradley, who consistently votes with Cargill. “Sometimes she would make light of the fact that when I get to the meeting I'm just opening my agenda for the first time.”
He also praised her modesty, a quality he said would serve her well as chairwoman. “I don't think you'll ever find her using the word 'I,'” he said. “She blushes at the drop of a hat, quicker than Gail Lowe. So the guys on the board have to be very careful.”
Cargill’s critics point to her role in the rewrite of science curriculum as evidence that she has used her position on the board to promote her own political and religious beliefs. She was instrumental in pushing the new science standards that students "analyze, evaluate, and critique" evidence for scientific explanations for theories like evolution — a move praised by the Discovery Institute, which supports research challenging what its website refers to as "neo-Darwinian theory." During the debate on science curriculum, she also passed an amendment that added the discussion of different scientific estimates on the age of the universe to the standards. <<<<………………
May 2008: Plan to rewrite English standards prompts criticism…………….>>>AUSTIN — Don McLeroy "has created havoc" as chairman of the State Board of Education and should be replaced, the senior member of the board said in a letter to Gov. Rick Perry.
"It is such a shame that after all these years of trying to improve public education in Texas, we are taking steps backwards because of Don McElroy," Mary Helen Berlanga of Corpus Christi said in her letter to Perry, misspelling McLeroy's name.
Berlanga, who has been on the 15-member board since 1984, said McLeroy's leadership has been a disaster and asked Perry to replace him with "a moderate conservative who can work with all members of the State Board of Education and the citizens of this state."
Berlanga faults McLeroy for the way he has engineered the rewriting of the state's English language arts and reading curriculum, which will go to the board for a final vote on Thursday.
[snip]
She said McLeroy has ignored board instructions to Texas Education Agency staff by issuing separate dictates and deceived public school teachers, ignoring their recommendations in favor of out-of-state teachers in the development of new English language arts and reading standards.
And she renewed earlier criticisms of McLeroy for inviting experts in topics ranging from special education and dyslexia, but not including Hispanic experts in the development of English standards. "Any intelligent, logical person would have named an expert who had dealt with Hispanic children and language minority children since more than (47 percent) of the 4.5 million students in our public schools are Hispanic," Berlanga wrote.
[snip]
She does not expect Perry to accede to her request, but the governor should, at least, speak to McLeroy about her complaints, she said.
"He can certainly encourage him to change his behavior ... (and) tell him that he can't behave this way anymore," Berlanga said Tuesday. "His tactics, I don't think anyone can change, but he's got to let the teachers speak and don't yell at them and don't be rude."
Berlanga should take her objections to the full board, Perry said, "and the board will appropriately make the right decision."
"I would suggest focusing on the issues that are important to the people of the state of Texas, not on whether I particularly like someone's personality," Perry said.<<<<………..
Wouldn’t that be wonderful.
Many local school boards (the ones who do take education seriously — who don’t view it as a piggy bank or social justice warehouse) already do wonders (curriculum and budget) despite the feds.
Great candidate for Secretary of Education. How many Republicans in the Senate voted to confirm this guy? Just asking...
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