Fourteen Words that Are Cursing America's Children

By:  Jo Lieb

Words do matter. They do have life. They do have power. They can hurt our souls and bring us down or they can heal our hearts and raise us up. They can cause us to love and they can cause us to hate. We can take words and use them to spur us to actions or we can take words and use them to spur others to act in ways we desire. Words are power and words give and take life.

With that said, I want us to examine these 14 words that are shaping the future of American education. These words were spoken by Common Core wizard David Coleman at a NY State Department of Education presentation, in April of 2011:

“…people really don't give a s*** about what you feel or what you think.”

If you replace the “you” with “students” and the “people” with “teachers” we now have a pedagogical statement that truly shatters my heart. Now it reads:

…teachers really don’t give a s*** about what students feel or what students think.

Let’s paraphrase this educational dogma less explicitly and reveal a sense of Coleman’s message to America’s educators:

Teachers should not care about what students feel or think.

Is it just me, or is this the antithesis to what a good teacher should be doing? A mere decade ago, the mantra “It’s All About the Kids” pervaded everything that was being done in my CT district.Almost before my eyes, we are now teaching in a time where the mantra has changed to “It’s All About the Data.”

Now I do not have anything against data teams and data sheets and data collection. But data is just that – DATA, NUMBERS,lifeless characters on a page. Good data can inform our instruction. It can reveal deficiencies and strengths in our teaching. It can help kids improve.But it’s just an inanimate tool. Each one of my students is much more than a place holder on a spreadsheet.

If we accept Coleman’s directive and not care about what our students are actually thinking and feeling, then, I guess, it is easier for some teachers and administrators to view their students as justdata. It’s like being a piece of merchandise in a retail store. The student is just inventory and the worth of the student is determined by the value in the spreadsheet. If the student isn’t making a profit, then the student should be reduced in value and eventually written off the books. This is a chilling way of looking at our young people.

My hope on this Sunday morning is that each and every educator, administrator, and parent would come to their senses and see just what is happening to our children in our schools. With one voice, we must all speak out and say that our kids have hearts, minds, bodies, emotions,talents, questions, and needs that must be valued. Our kids deserve to be seen and they need to be heard. With one voice, let us all proclaim these fourteen words and turn a curse into a blessing over America’s children:  Teachers, parents and administrators must deeply care about what our students feel and think.
Those are Coleman's words rephrased from his "curse" to our "calling."

A Call to Action from a Badass Teacher

At some point something has to give, something has to break inside every one of us. At what point are you ready to say that it's time to either sit behind your computer screen and whine about a problem that you claim to be horrified by (or worse, ignore it all together hoping it will go away) or finally get up out of your seat, feel the surge of justified ire and a need to go take solid and well-planned action against serious wrongs fill your veins? At what point do you decide to stop being a meek, uneasy sheep who is afraid of what might happen as a result of your disagreement with what is and rise to the occasion as a duty to your high standards? At what juncture do you decide to make your mind, abilities and life count for something more than the status quo or simply "good enough" for your kids, familial and classroom? What is your threshold of tolerance for blatant wrongdoing? Sometimes, some days, you MUST ask yourself those questions...

As an educator, a parent and a human being, I find myself asking those questions more and more, each day that crawls by. YES, I fear losing my job because I am becoming more and more outspoken about the horrendous and vile things that are being done to my profession by those who seek to profit from it. YES, I am enraged by what I hear and see here in print and via shared articles each day. And at times, I too can be that meek sheep. It's easy to do. It's easy to sit back and hope that someone else will handle the situation for you. We've all been there; it's a very human thing to do. But as educated people who all obviously and wholeheartedly share the fears and the outrages of the current direction we find ourselves being tugged in, we have an ultimate responsibility to RISE ABOVE the fear and DO SOMETHING. Perhaps not all of us are speakers, or organizers or as daring as the next in taking risks to get a point across or information shared, but we can all do SOMETHING to fight back. We can leave behind opt-out info and information about data mining at public libraries and supermarkets for parents to find. We can leave a BATs business card on a community bulletin board. We can DO a daily action. We CAN. ALL OF US. There are 52,000 of us here and the number grows daily. That, folks, is a small army. But only if the entire army is willing to do its part to fight to the best of its ability and not leave the generals floundering without troops. If we don't all do our parts, and if we ALL don't start to feel and act upon the rage towards what's going on, and we ALL decide that it's just too hard to sign petitions or send tweets or take care of a simple activist action day to day, then soon enough we won't HAVE the ability or the RIGHT to speak up or fight. It's not a mirage or a dream. It's a very REAL possibility. We stand at a cusp here, and we can make the difference between a beautiful, thoughtful future or a bleak dystopian data-driven nightmare straight out of "1984."

It's all very well and good to gripe and vent and put up articles that we find. I find them as informative as the next person, and I certainly do my fair share of griping and venting; but go beyond that and ponder on what YOU need to do to rip yourself out of that blase meek sheep's skin and come out ripping and roaring your true inner lion through ACTION. These data jackals and stuffed-shirt capitalist demon-dogs are playing for keeps. If we don't resist as lions, we'll simply wind up as lamb-chops for the vultures to pick apart. Let's make this happen, brothers and sisters in the cause. Let's stop bleating and start roaring! What say ye?

(I'll remind you that this post was NOT meant to offend. We have many steadfast and dynamic risk-takers and leaders here, each in their own way and on their own levels of ability and comfort. I reach out to those thousands who silently belong to the group and yet who may sit at the sidelines wondering if they SHOULD get involved. My answer is an emphatic YES. Leap out of that shadowy den and get your long razor-sharp claws out. Make a difference and make your abilities and knowledge count for something as important as saving education from the braying hyenas who are circling it with teeth bared. Some meat to chew on this weekend. Solidarity and a good evening to you all!)

Posted anonymously Sept 19, 2014 

Arne meets Meghan!
 BY:  Meghan Vaziri.

Here is my report from my meeting with Arne Duncan. I held up two signs at the rally (picture included). A neighborhood man asked me about the signs and said he had heard of this TCAP - I told him he could refuse it for his kids or grand kids, and he was surprised - then he asked if he could hold a sign! After the very short rally, complete with high school marching band, it was announced that "guests" of the town hall meeting should enter the building. I stuffed my signs behind a bush and entered as if I were a guest. 
I sat near the middle of the library (which was very sparse in terms of books) and took out my sketch pad. They had a performance of high school kids who were dancing to Elvis songs, and moving their lips to them - not singing themselves. I wrote on a sheet of paper: Arts Education NOT Test Prep and held it up. Some very well dressed men behind me told me they agreed with my sign - but they clearly didn't want everyone to know they agreed with me. I saw some people I know - "education reformers" - Marc Sturgis, formerly of Stand for Children, now with Strive, Jacklyn Zubrzyski, reporter for Chalkbeat (she took the photo below), the Assistant Superintendent of the I-Zone schools, and others. The ones I knew seemed to find it odd that I was in that meeting - but they didn't tell on me! No one even asked me to put my signs down, which I was surprised about - I suppose they didn't want to cause a scene. 
I held up signs the whole time Arne Duncan was talking - Lower Class Sizes when he said the answer to 30-student Kindergarten classes was
for "faith-based" organizations to offer free tutoring to these large classes, Refuse the TCAP, Trust Teachers and Listen to Parents, and others (I would change them when I got bored of holding them - I think everyone was reading my signs, they were the least boring thing in the whole meeting). Arne Duncan was looking very uncomfortably at me the whole time - afraid I would start arguing in the middle of the town hall, I guess. Maybe I should have. The President of the MSCEA Keith Williams sat down behind me. At one point, he asked a very good question: Will there always be takeover of the bottom 5%, even if the bottom 5% improve and are doing very well? Barbic claimed there will not always be takeover of the bottom 5%. When I raised my hand to ask a question, they would not give me the mic. At one point, a man who had been raising his hand just started talking- they listened. I guess I could have done that. Someone asked Barbic, Superintendent of the ASD, why those test scores weren't so good, and he said it was the quality of the teachers in the ASD that was the problem. I knew he was this type of person, so I wasn't surprised he threw his teachers under the bus, but I know he convinced a lot of people he supported them - in order to convince them to work for his district. A few years later, they're the problem. At the end of the meeting, I left early to go stand by Arne Duncan's bus and hold a sign. They had thrown away the signs I put behind the bush. Luckily, I had more signs in my bike bag! I stood next to the bus and a security guard grabbed my sign, "I'm gonna have to take this sign." Me: "Where do you want me to stand?" "It doesn't matter where you stand, I need to get this sign." I didn't let go of the sign. He was pulling pretty hard. "This is MY sign. I'll stand where ever you tell me to stand, but you're not taking my sign." "Okay, go stand on the other side of the street." "Okay, I'll go stand on the other side of the street." And I did. When people walked by to leave the meeting, I would yell "Teachers not Test-givers!" or "Refuse the Test!" A lot - maybe even 50% of them -- responded positively with a thumbs up or "you're right." These were the same people who were so silent and docile in the meeting with Arne, which I had also sat through holding signs. So, clearly, they'll act like they agree with the corporate testing agenda to save their jobs, but many of them don't really agree with it. I had a long and very entertaining conversation with the bus driver, Glenn. During that conversation, a high-powered-looking business man came over to me and tried to argue with me, "So why do you think we shouldn't have tests?" "We should have tests - teacher-made tests, but standardized tests are turning learning into nothing but test prep. In kindergarten, children test prep all day - they aren't allowed to learn by playing." "Okay," he said, making fun of me (trying to get the bus driver on his side), "Have you ever run a business?" "Have YOU ever looked at the educational system in Finland? They don't test kids until they're 16 years old and they have the best scores in the world." "Yeah, but they also have really great teachers." "Because they TRUST their teachers." Him: "Okay, I guess this is a chicken and egg thing." And I said "Yes guess so." and turned to talk to some more people walking by. The high-powered business man walked off. Jeff Peck, former editor of the Commercial Appeal, gave me his card when he was leaving. He now works for a philanthropy group and doesn't know much about why I'm protesting, but would like to know more so they can donate their money more effectively. I'm supposed to meet him for coffee sometime. At one point a whole car full of people gave me the thumbs up when they drove off-- they had been in the meeting, too. As I stood on the sidewalk, a kid bicycled past, and I said, "You don't have to take the TCAP!" He said "Really?" He was very surprised. I said yes, tell your parents. An old woman went by in an electric wheelchair and I told her you could refuse the TCAP for your kids. She stopped to ask more questions. Well, that's about all, until Arne Duncan finally came out in an SUV with his Secret Service. As they pulled out of the drive, he got out of his vehicle and came over to me, saying, "I know we disagree on a lot of things, but I want to thank you because you care." I should have said "ALL teachers care, you scheduled this during school hours or you would have had a lot more teachers here." But I didn't think of that. I do think he was implying that I was the only teacher who cared or disagreed with him. I told him about test prep in kindergarten and so on. He asked me, if I wasn't teaching right now, what was I doing? "I'm doing art." "Art?!" he said, as if he must have misheard me. Why was he so surprised? "Yeah, you can look at my website, meghanvaziri.com " He said he would do that (although he didn't ask how to spell it or anything) and then he asked if he could shake my hand. I held my signs in one hand and shook his with the other. His camera guy got a photo. And then he left, and Glenn said, "See, I told you he was a nice guy." I said, "I'm not saying he's not a nice guy, I'm just saying he doesn't know anything about education." And then I said goodbye to Glenn and left. (By the way, later that night I went to the Member meeting of the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center - Memphis BATS needs to get in contact with that group - they can help us organize and they are friendly to our cause.)

Here is a further report of Arne's visit to TN in TN Ed Report

http://tnedreport.com/?p=938

Here is Luci BAT

https://www.youtube.com/watchv=SRIVbzXG7Yg

BATS at the Forefront of Exposing the Dangerous Lie

BY:  Ernest Anemone,  Attorney and Education Activist

We often talk about the attack on public education as a money-making scheme (which it is, of course) but we must remember it is primarily a psychological problem being exploited for profit. If I am a person with great wealth and status, what happens if I discover that my privilege is not the result of my own hard work? Well, I'm likely to have an existential crisis, which I'd rather avoid. I might ask silly questions like: do I truly deserve what I have? Do other people deserve to not have the things that I have? This is why, as a rich man, I must continually prove to myself (and the world) that the poor are poor because they refuse to ma

ke an enterprise of themselves -- like I did. As we know, there are all sorts of interesting ways I can demonstrate the failures of the poor through the 'neutrality' of data. The good news is that we are slowly beginning to wake up to what's happening. As a nation, we are slowly beginning to see the cracks in this highly polished veneer. Do CEO's work hundreds (sometimes thousands) of times harder than their lowest paid workers? They certainly do not work any harder than Maria Fernandes (a woman who worked 4 jobs and died while napping in her car  http://rt.com/usa/183720-four-jobs-car-nap/  ) who like generations of people before her worked themselves to death. Nonetheless, all of us -- rich and poor -- are still bewitched into measuring our own worth by money and then pretending that it is hard work, not money, that determines our worth after all. This is what keeps leading us to the inevitable and erroneous conclusion that people who do not have money must be lazy. This is why as a nation we can so easily ignore every chart that tracks standardized test scores along socioeconomic lines -- or explain it away with logical fallacies. The truth is that the lie is comforting not just for rich, but also the poor, which is why BATS meet resistance on all sides. Wouldn't you rather be a "temporarily embarrassed millionaire," as Steinbeck quipped, than "poor," which is such an ugly and disempowering word. Enter the 'empowerment' of school 'choice.' If I live in poverty, I want to believe that I can be 'better' if I make 'better' choices in the future. And, if I'm rich, I need to believe that I am already 'better' because I made 'better' choices in the past. Well, this is the illusion that feeds corporate reform and it is the illusion that will destroy us all if it is not stopped. This is what makes us want to out-compete one another instead of working together to build a better future. BATS, you are on the forefront of exposing this dangerous lie, and when you do it will not be to upset the rich or redeem the poor, but rather to restore the humanity of both. Unfortunately, this also means you will be attacked from both sides, as we have seen time after time. But, take comfort in this: unlike all other labor groups, you were made for this mission. You are the group the entire labor movement has been waiting for -- because it's in your blood. You are teachers. You do not tell students what to think but you show them how to think. You do not teach to the rich student or the poor student, but to all students. And, right now, if you let all of America be your classroom, there is no way you can lose.

The California PAR Program- How Teachers Unions Have Collaborated in the Removal of Veteran Teachers and Helped “Whiten” The Teaching Profession

By:  Dr. Mark Naison

 During the last fifteen years, the teaching profession in the United States has  undergone a massive upheaval. The average length of a teaching career has declined to 5years;  many  veteran teachers have left the profession,either voluntarily of through forced termination, and the percentage of teachers of color, especially African American Teachers, has declined precipitously in many American cities. There are many reasons for these changes- among them a sharp rise in  testing, the imposition of test based teacher evaluations; school closings and charter school preference mandated by Race to the Top- but one little examined factor has been union approved protocols for  removing allegedly“bad “ or incompetent  teachers” which has led to tens of thousands of teachers, often those at the highest end of the salary scale, being pushed out of the profession, or in the case of NY, Los Angeles and Chicago,  being pushed into a teacher limbo where they represent a surplus labor pool.

     One of the most publicized and highly praised of such protocols has been the PAR ( Peer Assistance and Review Program) which has been widely implemented in the state of California.   PAR is a program which gives teachers, appointed by their union, input into the evaluation and rehabilitation of teachers given a “U” rating by their administrators.  The program sounds great on paper. It has been praised as a model program by  AFT President Randi Weingarten, and has been strongly supported by critics of dominant education reform policies such as Diane Ravitch and Anthony Cody.  However, thanks to research done by Brian Crowell, a highly rated African American teacher from Berkeley, California who was given a “U” rating when he became a thorn in the side of administrators and union leaders in his city PAR in California has been exposed as an abettor, if not an actual collaborator, in destructive and discriminatory policies. What Crowell discovered, when he asked for PAR Data from major California cities, is that a large and statistically improbable proportion of teachers referred to PAR were veteran teachers at the highest end of the salary scale, that most were women and that a disproportionate number were teachers of color. Worse yet, the pattern of teachers terminated at the end of PAR resembled those initially referred to the program.   To quote Brian Crowell “,

 I found it was over 80% women over 55 years old, masters degrees, tops on the pay scale and disproportionately minority. This was the data I uncovered in Berkeley, CA with the same trends following in Oakland, San Francisco, and San Diego, California. A massive austerity and discriminatory program signed off on by the union at the pleasure and delight of school districts. Oakland was so laser like in its data that literally the most expensive teacher (with very few exceptions) was referred for remediation and possible termination. I can’t tell you how many teachers have gone through this ordeal getting no support or representation from their union.


       Crowell came to his devastating conclusion:  that PAR actually ended up aiding and abetting California school districts efforts to  cut costs by removing the highest salaried teachers,and in the process, undermining resistance to the very controversial “reforms”they were implementing, ranging from VAM, to Common Core, to intrusive teacher observations.   Worse yet, instead of mobilizing resistance to these top down policies, teacher union leaders were signing off on them and implying they were teacher approved- participating in what amounted to a campaign of intimidation of rank and file teachers in which the union and school administrators were allied. In Brian Crowell’s words:

 “The outspoken teacher, the active union representative, the highly paid teacher are now arbitrary discipline targets of school districts. Couple that with CCSS and Common Core removing academic freedom no wonder the demoralization of teachers unions and the inability to fight back.”

 It is time that teacher advocates, teacher union leaders, and all those who care about the future of public education stop endorsing the narrative that “Bad Teachers”are the main threat to the quality of our public schools, and to withdraw support from all measures which make it easier to remove veteran teachers until those measure are proven not to discriminate on the basis of age, race, gender, and position on the salary scale.

 PAR, and programs like it, have let to a cruel, and massive assault on veteran teachers all over the United States, documented brilliantly in Laurel Sturt’s brilliant book Davonte’s Inferno: Ten Years inside the New York City Public School Gulag,as well as Brian Crowell’s important research. They have also contributed to a shocking whitening of the teaching profession in major urban areas, even though many cities are reluctant to reveal that data. In Chicago, the percentage of Black teachers has fallen from 44% in 1995 to 18% today, and most major California cities have seen the percentage of Black teachers go down precipitously in the last ten years. In California as a whole,there are 4,000 fewer Black teachers than there were in the year 2000.

   There is something badly wrong when teachers unions have become collaborators in brutal cost cutting, in age, race, and gender discrimination,and in the removal of teachers most likely to lead resistance to the destructive policies imposed on public schools by the last two Administrations in Washington.

   It is time for rank and file teachers union activists to stand up and call for a suspension of PAR and an immediate review of all protocols for,evaluating and terminating teachers that have shown themselves to reinforce age, race, or gender discrimination. And the time to do this is now

   Thank you Brian Crowell and Laurel Sturt for sounding the alarm. Enough is enough

Why we should all be concerned about the teachers who sported those NYPD shirts.

By:  Dr. Yohuru Williams

In the introduction to his 1962 publication The Other America: Poverty in the United States, Michael Harrington notably observed that what the U.S. poor needed most was “an American Dickens”—somebody who, through their writing, could make the poor visible, or better yet real, to those blinded by their own privilege and comfort.

Unfortunately, the same may be true with regard to the issue of common sense and cultural sensitivity for a group of New York teachers who elected to wear NYPD t-shirts on the first day of school as a sign of solidarity with the New York City police, whose questionable practices regarding minority suspects came under scrutiny again this summer with the chokehold death of an unarmed black man named Eric Garner.

Despite being advised by the United Federation of Teachers not to wear the shirts as a matter of maintaining objectivity and out of concern that community members, parents, and students might rightfully misconstrue their support, the group elected to wear the shirts anyway.

The backlash has been swift and understandable. It is not only the incredible insensitivity of the act but the brazen disregard for the notion of both police and teachers as public servants that is irksome. In an age when so much abuse is heaped on both teachers and police, ostensibly for being out of touch with those they serve, the gesture was more than inappropriate it was damaging.

It was unfortunate for another reason. In the aftermath of rioting in Ferguson, Missouri, following the killing of another unarmed Black person, teenager Michael Brown, teachers from around the country responded in a variety of ways, from fund raising, to social media, to reach out to a community in need. In New York, the United Federation of Teachers even backed a march led by Al Sharpton in support of justice for both Garner and Brown that was intended to be a step toward reconciliation. The UFT’s decision to support the march, however, upset some members critical of Sharpton and what they saw as a rush to judgment against police. It was ostensibly this concern that led the teachers at the center of the current controversy to elect to wear NYPD t-shirts as a demonstration of unity and support.

As a strong supporter of teachers, and one who appreciates the important role they play as educators, counselors, and role models to youth, I was not only disappointed but also saddened by the choice of this group.

As a strong supporter of teachers, and one who appreciates the important role they play as educators, counselors, and role models to youth, I was not only disappointed but also saddened by the choice of this group. While by no means indicative of the majority of persons within the profession, their choice does require a response.

In lieu of an “American Dickens,” in a society and culture still highly polarized by race, teachers occupy a unique place as facilitators of thought and discussion. On important social questions, beyond the family, they remain critical first responders. Therefore, their classrooms must remain safe spaces where students are invited to share informed opinions not conditioned by a hard line taken by teachers or of fear of reprisal.

In this sense, the t-shirts worn by those teachers sent the wrong message. They clearly communicated to students where those teachers’ sympathies lay. In the process they likely discouraged any substantive conversation or questions by students, especially to an authority figure clad in pro-police t-shirts and sporting pro-police signs.

More importantly, they signaled to the largely black and brown students in those classes that perhaps these teachers saw them much in the same way that many believe the NYPD and Ferguson police saw Eric Garner and Michael Brown—as problems, not people.

Thankfully, many teachers—both in New York and across the country—took a very different approach, not only by encouraging dialogue, but organizing students and communities to meet the humanitarian needs of those affected—especially in Ferguson.

The teachers who took this approach deserve our applause for opening up the door to frank and honest discussion about police brutality, citizen rights, public safety, and the importance of civic engagement, in one of the safest and most productive spaces to have them, classrooms.

Surely dialogue is not the sole remedy for broaching peace and understanding—but it is a start and it can’t come in the form of so called educators sporting the logo of one of the agencies that young black and brown students see, rightfully or wrongfully, as the enemy.

“Rare, indeed is the Harlem citizen,” James Baldwin wrote provocatively in July of 1960, “from the most circumspect church member to the most shiftless adolescent, who does not have a long tale to tell of police incompetence, injustice, or brutality. I myself have witnessed and endured it more than once.”

Those who teach have a duty to be aware of the legacy and power of this perception and be prepared, when appropriate and necessary, to help contextualize, channel, and hopefully redirect what Baldwin described as the “accumulating contempt and hatred of a people” toward those who “represent the force of the white world.”

By wearing those t-shirts, the teachers in question forfeited this opportunity, becoming yet another manifestation of the force of the white world, instead of partners in healing and placing trust in a city in need of communication and understand. 

About Yohuru Williams

Yohuru Williams is an author, Professor of History and Black Studies, and education activist. He is also an administrator in the Badass Teachers Association. 

You can also see this article first published here on LA Progressive

http://www.laprogressive.com/teachers-support-nypd/?+utm_source=LA+Progressive

Reflections of a BadAss Teacher – Year Two

Getting ready for work this morning, I experienced something I had never felt before.

I was not ready to go back to work.  

I am sure that my working at the school for four weeks during the summer had something to do with it.  But it was more than that.  Trying to pinpoint exactly what it was at first was hard.  Last year I had found BATs before going back in September.  Last September I was energized, excited, aware and awake. 

Where were these feelings this year?  BATs had worked hard over the past year, forming relationships in our fight against corporate education reform.  Strides had been made, bringing our pushback to a point that I had not predicted, that passed my expectations. 

So then I should be even more energized, right?  I should be strapping on my virtual boxing gloves and tightening those laces.

Why the hesitation this year?  Why the lack of enthusiasm to go into the classroom?  I could hardly believe that, as I got dressed this morning, I toyed with thoughts of finding yet another career, even though that would almost guarantee that I worked until the day that they wheeled me out on a stretcher.

Thinking about all of this as I sat in our opening day staff welcome sessions I thought about what had made me become a teacher in the first place.  We all know it wasn't for the money, (minimal) or the summers off, (a myth) or the 8am to 3pm workday (a joke).  So what was it.  Why had I become a teacher in the first place?  What had changed since then?

Sitting in these meetings, with three more days of meetings still ahea, I realized what had changed.  I knew what had shifted in focus this year.

The children.

The children have not changed.  They will always be these creatures with sponge-like brains that have new ways of doing things.  Different ways, that we as adults, will always struggle and race to keep up with.  That has not, and will never, change. 

But education no longer focuses on the children.  It has become a political tool that is used in an attempt to shift power.  To shift power from one political party to another, to shift power from the have-nots to the haves, to shift power from the people to those that rule their state with an iron fist.  From a field of study that was about best practices and learning theories to budgets and government control.  It is about data, information, political jockeying, market analysis, community segregation, ranking, test score comparison, and standardization. 

As a teacher, how can I focus on the children when so many other things are pushing in to take emphasis off of them, the ones that need us the most? 

As we enter another school year, I think it is important to reflect upon these things, to remember why we got into this fight in the first place.  To remember what it is all about.

The children. 

An after-thought. 

We all have our little ways of reading signs in the universe to reaffirm our choices, a barometer to check to see if we are on the right path.  My love for music tends to be one of mine.  Emotions that songs bring out in me are my reminder to stay true to myself.  As I was driving home today, my favorite 'revolution' song came on the radio.  I invite you to read through the lyrics.  To me, they are always a beacon call to keep fighting. 

                                           "Throwing Stones"

Picture a bright blue ball just spinning, spinning free
Dizzy with eternity.
Paint it with a skin of sky, brush in some clouds and sea
Call it home for you and me.
A peaceful place or so it looks from space
A closer look reveals the human race.
Full of hope, full of grace, is the human face.
But afraid, we may our home to waste.
There's a fear down here we can't forget hasn't got a name just yet
Always awake, always around singing ashes to ashes all fall down.
Now watch as the ball revolves and the nighttime calls
And again the hunt begins and again the bloodwind calls
By and by again, the morning sun will rise
But the darkness never goes from some men's eyes.
It strolls the sidewalks and it rolls the streets
Stalking turf, dividing up meat.
Nightmare spook, piece of heat, you and me, you and me.
Click, flash blade in ghetto night. Rudies looking for a fight.
Rat cat alley roll them bones. Need that cash to feed that jones
And the politicians throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Commissars and pin-striped bosses role the dice
Any way they fall guess who gets to pay the price.
Money green or proletarian gray, selling guns instead of food today.
So the kids they dance, they shake their bones
While the politicians throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Heartless powers try to tell us what to think
If the spirit's sleeping, then the flesh is ink.
History's page, it is thusly carved in stone
The future's here, we are it, we are on our own.
If the game is lost then we're all the same
No one left to place or take the blame.
We will leave this place an empty stone
Or this shinning ball of blue we can call our home
So the kids they dance, they shake their bones
While the politicians are throwing stones
Singing ashes, ashes all fall down.
Shipping powders back and forth
Singing "black goes south while white comes north"
And the whole world full of petty wars
Singing "I got mine and you got yours."
And the current fashions set the pace.
Lose your step, fall out of grace.
And the radical he rant and rage, Singing "someone got to turn the page"
And the rich man in his summer home,
Singing "Just leave well enough alone"
But his pants are down, his cover's blown
And the politicians are throwing stones
So the kids they dance they shake their bones
Cause its all too clear we're on our own
Picture a bright blue ball just spinning, spinning free
It's dizzying, the possibilities. Ashes, Ashes all fall down.

                                                                                                                                    John Perry Barlow

~LL~