Personal Blog of Bruno Behrend, social and political commentary designed to move people to the right, one conversation at a time
I can proudly say that I take a back seat to no one in lambasting politicians that kowtow to teacher’s unions. I’ve raked Sen. Meeks over the coals a few times on this site.
I can now say that, whatever differences we may have, I applaud the fact that he is throwing the Teacher’s Unions under the bus. I will gladly help him if he wants to roll that bus back and forth over their carcass a few times.
Save Children, Crush Teacher’s Unions.
If you want to know why this site takes a back seat to no one in attacking the vile public education system, it is because of stories like the one below. The people running our schools have a mindset that is so counter to the principles of this nation (not to mention reason and rationality) that they deserve nothing but derision, ridicule, and (hopefully someday) a trip the unemployment lines their awful system makes longer.
One can’t say enough about how vile these people are. Sadly, what too few of you are willing to admit, is that the mindset that pervades the entire class of education employees. It is why our schools are failing (and the nation with it).
Tuscon Schools create race-based system of discipline
Despite the budget-enforced closing of school libraries, the shuttering of arts and music programs and the layoff of teachers and counselors in other disciplines, the Post-Unitary Status Plan calls for a vigorous expansion of the program run by TUSD’s happy band of unrepentant political leftists.
The board’s plan also calls for changes intended (however counterproductive those plans may be) to improving the lot of minority students.
It wants to see more minority students enrolled in advanced-placement programs, for example – a laudable goal, certainly. But consider one significant part of the plan for “improving” the academic status of TUSD’s Black and Hispanic students:
The board is calling for a two-tiered form of student discipline. One for Black and Hispanic students; one for everyone else.
With the goal of creating a “restorative school culture and climate” that conveys a “sense of belonging to all students,” the board is insisting that its schools reduce its suspensions and/or expulsions of minority students to the point that the data reflect “no ethnic/racial disparities.”
From the section of the 52-page plan titled “Restorative School Culture and Climate,” subhead, “Discipline”:
“School data that show disparities in suspension/expulsion rates will be examined in detail for root causes. Special attention will be dedicated to data regarding African-American and Hispanic students.”
The board approved creating an “Equity Team” that will oversee the plan to ensure “a commitment to social justice for all students.”
If you live in Illinois and know of a district that practices this, please contact me. I will initiate a lawsuit against any district on equal protection grounds. These disgusting people are irreparably damaging the children of America with this apartheid drivel.
The greed of the people in question here is palpable. The corruption behind their secretive contract negotiations is rampant. The only question is whether Illinois’ jaundiced and cynical electorate has the decency to get angry about any of this.
Sadly, WIND’s John and Cisco Show covered this issue as only a toady apologist for public education greed can, with Big John comparing useless Superintendents to private CEOs (who frankly have their own issues with greed and opacity), and Cisco playing the outraged taxpayer as tepidly as one could.
A Niles Township school superintendent made $411,500 last year — a record in a year that saw top public elementary and high school administrators’ pay climb past $400,000 for the first time.
But the taxpayer tab for Neil Codell, 56, didn’t stop after he left his post June 30.
Codell continued to receive his superintendent’s salary — even while in a lesser job — for an additional six months. Niles Township High School District 219 now faces a potential penalty of well over $100,000 from the Teachers’ Retirement System because of Codell’s early retirement and large spike in pay, state officials say.
“This may turn out to be a platinum parachute by the time all the bills are paid,” said the agency’s executive director, Jon Bauman.
Codell topped the list of a Chicago Sun-Times analysis of teacher and administrator compensation at every public school in Illinois last school year, based on records kept by the state Board of Education. As in years past, the analysis found that most of the highest-paid administrators were at or near retirement and saw their final compensation swollen by annuities, bonuses and pension-fattening perks.
Codell, who oversaw Niles North and Niles West high schools, was no exception.
His contract, signed in January 2005, set his base salary at $182,500 with the option of two 20 percent raises before he retired.
Another contract option, for both Codell and his family, committed the district to cover 100 percent of hospitalization and major medical premiums for 10 years after Codell’s retirement. The deal also included, while he was employed, a $500-a-month auto allowance and a term life insurance policy for twice his salary.
These people are beneath contempt.
As you read the story linked below, please remember that the curriculum described there is in use (in some form or another) all over the United States. Your teacher (indoctrinated in and Ed School that actively ignores the science of learning) probably calls it “themed learning,” “integrated learning,” or some combination of those words.
It is a failure.
‘Tartan’ curriculum is a disaster as top school slumps to bottom of league table
A £20m school which axed traditional subjects in favour of a ‘tartan’ curriculum of lessons blended together has slumped to the bottom of a GCSE league table.
Bishops Park College in Clacton, Essex, emerged as the worst school in the country for raising pupils’ attainment five years after introducing an experimental curriculum which merged key subjects such as English, maths, science, history and geography into themed lessons that took up 70 per cent of the week.
“Slumped to the bottom,” as in the USA has “slumped to the bottom” in many subjects, and pays more for less and less “education.”
The 563-pupil school, housed in state-of-the-art buildings and trumpeted by Government curriculum advisers as a model for others to follow, recorded the lowest ‘valueadded-score of more than 3,100 state secondaries – the measure of how well a school helps its pupils make progress.
If teachers, who like to think of themselves as “professionals” despite the fact that they have sold their profession to a “Union drone” mindset decades ago, where held to “Professional Standards” for their work, most of them would be sued for malpractice.
For the 1000th time, this nation cannot afford your slavish devotion to these ineffective and corrupt public schools. Where they educate, they do so for far too much money. Where they fail, (and they fail much more than most of you are willing to admit) they so badly damage our society and the individuals they miseducate, that your support borders on enabling evil.
Fenty, Rhee Look for Ways Around Union
Proposals Would Set Stage For School System Rebuild
Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee are discussing a dramatic expansion of their effort to remove ineffective teachers by restoring the District’s power to create nonunionized charter schools and seeking federal legislation declaring the school system in a “state of emergency,” a move that would eliminate the need to bargain with the Washington Teachers’ Union.
Union’s penchant for protecting bad teachers exposes the myth that they support education. They support a bloated “full employment doctrine” for anyone who can squeezed under the wire. Once they get their dues, you get their protection, whether you incompetent or not.
Good teachers need to realize just how bad they look under the unionization of education.
If adopted, the measures would essentially allow the District to begin building a new school system. Such an effort would be similar to one underway in New Orleans, where a state takeover after Hurricane Katrina placed most of the city’s 78 public schools in a special Recovery School District. About half of the district’s schools are charters, and it has no union contract.
I’ve quipped that if every public school in America fell to rubble tomorrow, the educational outcomes in America would IMPROVE, as people did what was necessary to get their children educated. Hurricane Katrina has proven that theoretical scenario mostly correct, as the “disaster scenario” improved outcomes there.
The faster we can remove corrupt and mendacious unionization from our schools, the faster we can apply resources to actually educating our kids.
Lawrence Livermore Laboratories has discovered the heaviest element yet known to science.
The new element, Governmentium (Gv), has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons, and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.
These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.
Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert; however, it can be detected, because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to
complete.
Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2- 6 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.
In fact, Governmentium’s mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.
This characteristic of morons promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as critical
morass.
When catalysed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons.
Whenever a human comes into prolonged contact with either element, they are infected with terminal anal retentiveness!