Hypocrisy Watch

I generally try to avoid non-education related politics. I don't like Republicans...and I don't much care for Democrats either. In short, I find politicians in the U.S. to be immature and hateful. However, today, the amount of hypocrisy just seemed to overwhelm me. We'll start with education and then move on...

I have little to say about any of these topics...I think the stories speak for themselves.

PARENT CHOICE

Deafening silence from the "Parent Choice" crowd on the parents choosing a public school.

RYH statement on Dyett Hunger Strike

As a citywide parent and community organization, we support the Dyett community in their demand for an end to the continued and intentional disinvestment of neighborhood schools and an end to the myth of “school choice” in our city. Open-enrollment neighborhood schools serve all children – not just those who can test into a school, have parents who know how to maneuver complicated application processes, can pay “school choice consultants” that do exist in this city, or can afford public transportation to go a high school across the city.

WE SUPPORT TEACHERS EXCEPT WHEN WE DON'T

The GOP's Education Problem

Yesterday confirmed what I have suspected, which is that if a GOP candidate talks about education for more than sixty seconds, the raft of self-contradictions come floating in. Standardization is bad, but students should all do the same thing. Local control is great, except when it should be eliminated. Teachers are great. Teachers suck. No federal overreach, but complete accountability for tax dollars.

WE'RE FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS EXCEPT WHEN WE'RE NOT

Back to ALEC, Back to (Private) School

Since Republicans took over our [Wisconsin] state Capitol in 2011, they have cut $1.2 billion from public K-12 education. Under this latest budget, 55 percent of school districts will get less general student aid than they did last budget cycle and Wisconsin is spending $1,014 less per public school student than it did in 2008.

Yet for the private school special interests, this budget was like Christmas morning, with presents that blew the student enrollment caps off the statewide private school voucher program, diverted an additional $600-800 million from public schools over the next decade and increased per-pupil spending in the statewide private voucher system more than what even Governor Walker had proposed. The cherry on top was the last minute, late night passage of the special needs voucher program, which funds private schools for special needs students without requiring specialized instruction, teacher training or current legal protections.

SATIRE...

Party That Mocked President’s Lack of Experience Favors One with No Experience Whatsoever
by Andy Horowitz
Today 9:40 AM

The R.N.C. chief, Reince Priebus, said that he sees “no contradiction at all” between Republicans’ contempt for Obama’s pre-White House résumé, which included eleven years spent in public office, and their rabid enthusiasm for G.O.P. rising stars Donald Trump, Ben Carson, and Carly Fiorina, whose combined years in public office total zero.

...FOLLOWED BY ACTUAL NEWS

CNN Breaking News today 12:56 PM

Breaking News
GOP front-runner Donald Trump and neurosurgeon Ben Carson have each posted gains nationally, according to a new poll.

The real estate mogul leads with 30% support, up 4 percentage points from August, in the first national Monmouth University poll since last month's Republican presidential debate.

Carson posted the biggest gain, jumping 13 points to 18% and taking second place from Jeb Bush.

MORE ACTUAL NEWS

Kentucky Clerk Fighting Gay Marriage Has Wed Four Times

The Kentucky county clerk facing potentially stiff penalties for refusing to issue same-sex marriage licenses has been married four times, raising questions of hypocrisy and selective application of the Bible to her life.

The marriages are documented in court records obtained by U.S. News, which show that Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis divorced three times, first in 1994, then 2006 and again in 2008.

She gave birth to twins five months after divorcing her first husband. They were fathered by her third husband but adopted by her second. [emphasis added]

Ky. clerk's office will issue marriage licenses starting Friday

U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning had placed Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis in the custody of U.S. marshals until she complies, saying fines were not enough to force her to comply with his previous order to provide the paperwork to all couples and allowing her to defy the order would create a "ripple effect."

"Her good-faith belief is simply not a viable defense," said Bunning, who also said he has deeply held religious beliefs. "Oaths mean things."

Davis, who was tearful at times, testified that she could not obey the order because God's law trumps the court.

"My conscience will not allow it," she said. "God's moral law convicts me and conflicts with my duties."

Where was her conscience when she was cheating on her first husband with her future third husband?

Leviticus 20:10 - And the man that committeth adultery with another man's wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

Mark 10:10-12 - 10 When they were in the house again, the disciples asked Jesus about this. 11 He answered, "Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. 12 And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery."

I'm reminded of...

Wallace in the Schoolhouse Door

On June 11, [1963] with temperatures soaring, a large contingent of national media looked on as Wallace took his position in front of Foster Auditorium. State troopers surrounded the building. Then, flanked by federal marshals, Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach told Wallace he simply wanted him to abide by the federal court order.

Wallace refused, citing the constitutional right of states to operate public schools, colleges and universities. Katzenbach called President Kennedy, who federalized the Alabama National Guard to help with the crisis. Ultimately, Wallace stepped aside and the two students were allowed to register for classes.

STATES RIGHTS

Mount McKinley Will Again Be Called Denali

The government formally recognized the name in 1917, and efforts to reverse the move began in Alaska in 1975. In an awkward compromise struck in 1980, the national park surrounding it was named Denali National Park and Preserve, but the mountain continued to be called Mount McKinley. [emphasis added]

Republican hopeful John Kasich says he, too, will re-rename that mountain

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, one of the current Republican go-to names among party leaders who correctly worry that all of the presidential candidates preferred by actual Republican voters are, well, nuts, has some choice words for the administration that granted Alaska's request to revert the name of their tallest mountain to its original name. President McKinley, you see, was from Ohio. That should count for more than what all those snobbish Alaskans want.

You know, I haven’t checked out the Constitution when it comes to naming mountain tops, but if I become president, I’m going to name it back to Mt. McKinley. This is not something we appreciate or agree with in Ohio.

~~~

Support Teachers of Conscience

The narrow pursuit of test results has sidelined education issues of enduring importance such as poverty, equity in school funding, school segregation, health and physical education, science, the arts, access to early childhood education, class size, and curriculum development. We have witnessed the erosion of teachers’ professional autonomy, a narrowing of curriculum, and classrooms saturated with “test score-raising” instructional practices that betray our understandings of child development and our commitment to educating for artistry and critical thinking. And so now we are faced with “a crisis of pedagogy”–teaching in a system that no longer resembles the democratic ideals or tolerates the critical thinking and critical decision-making that we hope to impart on the students we teach.

~~~

Stop the Testing Insanity!

~~~

A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public Education
Click here to sign the petition.

For over a decade...“reformers” have proclaimed that the solution to the purported crisis in education lies in more high stakes testing, more surveillance, more number crunching, more school closings, more charter schools, and more cutbacks in school resources and academic and extra-curricular opportunities for students, particularly students of color. As our public schools become skeletons of what they once were, they are forced to spend their last dollars on the data systems, test guides, and tests meant to help implement the “reforms” but that do little more than line the coffers of corporations, like Pearson, Inc. and Microsoft, Inc.

~~~

~~~

~~~