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Category Archives: Schools and Politics
A Roof Over One’s Head
an item about local big timers Pearl Jam caught my eye, not for their music, but for their public role in raising money to ease homelessness. Continue reading
An Immigrant Story
Though some immigrants enter the United States with skills, or money reserves, or family members already arrived to keep them afloat, in the beginning their story typically is one of poverty, of hardship and of lives tested….. Continue reading
The Age of Janus and the Challenge to Teachers’ Unions
The ground has shifted under us, my friends of the public school landscape. The age of Janus is upon us. Continue reading
Posted in Schools and Politics
Tagged agency fees, conservatism, ESSA, First Amendment, free speech, income inequality, Janus, right to work, strikes, teachers' unions
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Si, Se Puede; a Hopeful Slice of School Change and Its Politics
The truth secured to the underbelly of the myth is that prior privilege abides, and whites and accumulated wealth perpetuate; the poor and citizens of color are excluded from the spoils by institutional rigidities and other illness in the fabric. Continue reading
Is the God of Testing Dead? Or Just More Dimly Lit in the Firmament?
The god of testing may have run its course and its power diminished. The reduction of teaching and learning to its quantifiable data points, a child of market thinking and a need for accountability, is necessarily here with us to stay, but perhaps in a more proportional role Continue reading
A Curious Thing Happened on the Way to School
In the intersection of social media movements and red state parsimony grass roots teachers’ strikes erupt in West Virginia, Oklahoma, and Kentucky. Continue reading
The Battle on the Horizon: An Assault on Teachers’ Unions
In a replay of past legal challenges to private sector unions’ ability to organize workers, conservative donors and foundations line up to challenge public sector unions, which eventually may put teachers’ salaries and their collective political clout in harm’s way. Continue reading
Bring Those Charters into the House!
Charters are gaining ground. High time for public school boards, including Seattle’s, to make their peace, authorize a limited number of charters over time, and harness their creative energy. Continue reading
Yet in the Shadows: School Topics for the Light of Day
Institutional leadership in the charter era, the fate of a deep student underclass, and the teaching of civics are three topics which mistakenly get short shrift in the current conversation around schools. Continue reading
Dubious Tales: Don’t Build It and They Won’t Come
While the Seattle School Board votes to fight a zoning waiver for a new Green Dot charter high school, the Board members seem to ignore complex forces gathering at their door. Continue reading
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