News & Comment
Blogs and Opinion
Why the Chicago Teachers Won by Stephen Franklin, prospect.org | September 21, 2012
Consider the battle of Chicago’s teachers as a lesson for what’s ahead as the same struggle winds its way away around the nation. For the nation’s beleaguered labor movement, the six-day strike by the Chicago Teachers Union that ended on Tuesday is proof that a strike is not suicide, as has been the fate lately for most unions. Indeed, as the end neared and they were heady with an apparent win, the teachers’ talk catapulted from standing up for teachers to standing up for organized labor and ultimately to speaking for bullied, and exploited workers. read more »Standing Up For Teachers by Eugene Robinson, | September 19, 2012
Teachers are heroes, not villains, and it’s time to stop demonizing them. It has become fashionable to blame all of society’s manifold sins and wickedness on “teachers unions,” as if it were possible to separate these supposedly evil organizations from the dedicated public servants who belong to them. News flash: Collective bargaining is not the problem, and taking that right away from teachers will not fix the schools. It is true that teachers in Chicago have dug in their heels against Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s demands for “reform,” some of which are not unreasonable. I’d dig in, too, if I were constantly being lectured by self-righteous crusaders whose knowledge of the inner-city schools crisis comes from a Hollywood movie. read more »Headline o' The Day by Digby , OurFuture.org | September 17, 2012
Mayor's reputation tarnished in teachers union dust-up read more »Chicago School Teachers Give Us All A Lesson by Dean Baker, aljazeera.com | September 17, 2012
The Chicago school teachers managed to overcome the enormous money and power on the other side. This included the media, which is dominated by people who instinctively side with Rahm Emanuel and his Wall Street types whenever they confront workers. The teachers did an outstanding job making their case to the people of Chicago, and especially to the parents of school children. A poll of Chicago parents commissioned by the union found that two-thirds supported the teachers in spite of the inconvenience caused by the strike. The parents understood that if the teachers won their demands it would likely mean better educational outcomes for their children. The lesson from this strike is that even as money is becoming ever more important in politics, it is still possible for well-planned collective action to win out. The Chicago school teachers and their unions did their homework and moved at the right time. The rest of us can learn a lot from their example. read more »Teacher Bashing: The Inequality Psychology by Sam Pizzigati, OurFuture.org | September 16, 2012
In any society where wealth and income concentrate overwhelmingly at the top, the affluent will almost always come to sneer at public services and the men and women who provide them. In Chicago, those men and women have pushed back. read more »The Right-Wing Machine Behind ‘School Choice’ by Rachel Tabachnick, inthesetimes.com | September 14, 2012
In June 1995, the economist Milton Friedman wrote an article for the Washington Post promoting the use of public education funds for private schools as a way to transfer the nation’s public school systems to the private sector. “Vouchers,” he wrote, “are not an end in themselves; they are a means to make a transition from a government to a market system.” While Friedman has promoted vouchers for decades, most famously in his masterwork Free to Choose, the story of how public funds are actually being transferred to private, often religious, schools is a study in the ability of a few wealthy families, along with a network of right-wing think tanks, to create one of the most successful “astroturf” campaigns money could buy. Rather than openly championing dismantling the public school system, they promote bringing market incentives and competition into education as a way to fix failing schools, particularly in low-income Black and Latino communities. read more »Students Rally Behind Their Teachers in Chicago by Kari Lydersen, The Progressive | September 14, 2012
Marie Sklodowska Curie Metro High School is located in a hardscrabble neighborhood on Chicago’s southwest side. A coal-burning power plant lies just to the north and various factories and warehouses stand on surrounding streets. Gang violence is a serious problem in the area, and the economic crisis has hit many immigrant families hard. Students and teachers describe the school as a safe haven, a place where, despite a severe lack of resources, teachers offer innovative lessons with real-world context and organize clubs and after-school programs on topics like literature, science, and the environment. Curie students say they recognize the extra lengths their teachers go to in making sure they get a stimulating, top-flight education even in such trying circumstances. Hence many students and former students have spent the past few days on the picket lines with their teachers and former teachers. read more »Why I Support Public School Teachers by Erik Loomis, lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com | September 14, 2012
The Chicago Teachers Union deserves everything they are asking for because many of them are heroes. For some, for kids like me, they are role models who give young people social mobility and who teach them that learning is a great thing. The Chicago Teachers Union deserves the world because they take kids like me out of working-class families and help them fulfill their dreams. Those who attack them place themselves on the other side of the class divide, on the side that promotes social inequality and the side that provides no incentives for good teachers to stay in working-class schools since poor test scores, largely a result of poverty, will cost them their job. They claim to help children but don’t understand poor public schools; they claim to support policies that will improve education but promote ideas that will enrich capitalists at the expense of students. Which side are you on? I side with the people who changed my life. read more »Progressive Breakfast by Isaiah J. Poole, OurFuture.org | September 14, 2012
On the menu this morning MORNING MESSAGE: So Who Is It That Cares About The Deficit Anyway? Fed's Economic Booster Shot The Middle-Class Struggle For Survival Chicago Teacher Strike Update Breakfast Sides read more »Record Poverty Persists While Gap Between Rich and Rest of Us Increases by Karen Dolan, ips-dc.org | September 13, 2012
Sadly, those who "occupied" Wall Street and city squares across the country in 2011, were right: All of the income gains have concentrated at the top, while the rest of us saw a deterioration or stagnation in our wages and income. We can’t seem to stop having record numbers of people living in poverty in the United States. The richest continue to get richer and the rest of us continue to see our incomes get lower and lower. read more »
The Latest
Poll: Schools Not Preparing Kids, USA Today | June 30, 2008
Half of Americans say U.S. schools are doing only a fair to poor job preparing kids for college and the work force. Even more feel that way about the skills kids need to survive as adults, according to a recent Associated Press poll. more »
Food Prices Hit School Lunches, MSNBC News | June 9, 2008
The cost of staples that make up the backbone of school meal programs has soared in the past year, far outstripping federal subsidies. While inflation has driven up the price of milk by 12 percent, cheese by 15 percent and bread by 17 percent, the National School Lunch Program has increased what it pays local school districts to feed 30.1 million schoolchildren by only 3 percent. more »
No Child Left Behind Doomed?, time.com | June 9, 2008
There was always something slightly insane about No Child Left Behind, the ambitious education law often described as the Bush administration's signature domestic achievement. Educators cited its unattainable goals for schools and unrealistic expectations of students. more »
Student Loans to Bypass 2-Year Colleges, The New York Times | June 2, 2008
Some of the nation's biggest banks have closed their doors to students at community colleges, for-profit universities and other less competitive institutions, even as they continue to extend federally backed loans to students at the nation's top universities. more »
Government Enters Student Lending, The Washington Post | May 21, 2008
The Department of Education is preparing to exercise broad new powers in the coming weeks that could fundamentally recast how millions of students pay for college. This initiative could transform the federal government from a guarantor of student loans into the dominant provider, replacing the outside lenders to whom students and their families have long turned. more »
More Schools Failing, MSNBC News | May 20, 2008
The federal No Child Left Behind law says that by the 2013-14 school year all students must pass state tests in these subjects. According to a recent study, about half of the states have steady annual goals for increasing the percentage of students passing, or working at their proper grade level. more »
Failing Grade for Reading Program, The Washington Post | May 2, 2008
Students enrolled in a $6 billion federal reading program that is at the heart of the No Child Left Behind law are not reading any better than those who don't participate, according to a U.S. government report. more »
Education Act Reformed, MSNBC News | April 23, 2008
Unable to push education fixes through Congress, the Bush administration is taking its own pen to the No Child Left Behind law. The Education Department plans to make a host of changes to the education law through regulations. Among the biggest changes is a requirement that by the 2012-13 school year, all states must calculate their high school graduation rates in a uniform way.
1 Million Drop Out Annually, news.newamericamedia.org | April 20, 2008
A recent study found urban schools in metropolitan areas surrounding 35 of the nation’s largest cities have lower graduation rates than schools in nearby suburban communities. Approximately 1.2 million students drop out each year–about 7,000 every school day, or one every 26 seconds. more »
Student Loan Bill Passes House, The Washington Post | April 18, 2008
The House, trying to avert a looming shortage in available student loans, approved a measure allowing the Department of Education to buy federally guaranteed loans that lenders are unable to sell to private investors. more »
