No Child Left Behind No More!

No Child Left Behind Law: 8 States Get Waiver From Education-Testing Rules

Posted: 05/29/2012 3:10 pm Updated: 08/29/2012 11:03 am

Less than a week after presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney lambasted the Obama administration for not fighting inertia and special interests in America's public schools, the U.S. Education Department announced its latest attempt to free states from federal regulations decried for holding back education.
"Children cannot wait any longer, teachers cannot wait and America cannot wait, so we're moving forward," U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said on a Tuesday call with reporters.
Duncan said that eight more states could escape some of the strictures of No Child Left Behind, the sweeping 2001 federal education law that required the annual testing of students in English and math and mandated federal sanctions based on those scores. Due to broad dissatisfaction with the law, the Education Department is allowing states that implement pieces of the Obama administration's education platform to work around NCLB's broadest provisions. Specifically, states are granted conditional waivers from NCLB if the Department of Education accepts their proposal to raise standards, tie teacher evaluations to test scores and create new accountability systems that reward or punish schools based on performance.
The administration approved the first group of NCLB-free states in February. The newest states to emerge from under NCLB will be Connecticut, Delaware, Louisiana, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Rhode Island, making for a total of 19 states that are no longer bound by the law. Seventeen other states and Washington, D.C., also applied in the second round, but their plans have not yet been accepted. (Vermont also applied but has since dropped out.)
NCLB expired in 2007, and both Republicans and Democrats agree on the need to revamp the law, due largely to widespread concerns about the effect of standardized testing, which is said to encourage educators to teach to the middle and lower academic standards. Obama gave Congress a fall 2010 deadline to overhaul the law, but the only bipartisan attempt at revision died in committee.
The administration first announced its plans to exchange waivers for reforms this fall, putting the plan under its rhetorical "we can't wait" banner. Duncan said Tuesday he would still prefer a bipartisan bill "that fixes what is wrong with the law while preserving what's right."
The plan is divisive on Capitol Hill. "I have significant concerns about the administration's conditional waivers plan," said Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.), who chairs the House education committee. "It's a temporary band-aid on a problem that must be resolved through legislation."
It has also been criticized for its continued emphasis on standardized testing and for making education plans incoherent across states.
The close timing of the Romney campaign's announcement and the latest news on No Child Left Behind waivers sheds light on the contrasts between the two presidential candidates. When Romney unveiled his education platform in a speech to the Latino Coalition's Annual Economic Summit last week, he pushed back on the "we can't wait" slogan.
"In his speeches, President Obama likes to tell us 'we can't wait,'" Romney said. "If only he would say that and mean it about education reform -- because millions are waiting for change, and so many are missing their chance."
Romney's campaign also released a white paper that called for a rollback of NCLB's federal accountability, replacing sanctions with states' public "report cards" of student performance (the publication of student performance information is already mandated under NCLB.) Romney also advocated open enrollment and the ability for students to use Title I money -- set aside to help schools with large low-income populations -- to help pay for private schools.
"The overall rhetoric is confusing and pretty inconsistent," said Kevin Carey, an analyst at the bipartisan education think tank Education Sector. (Education Sector's interim director John Chubb recently left Romney's education advisory group.) "Most of what the Obama administration has done is to try to give states more flexibility, which sort of cuts against the accusation of a top-down approach."
A Romney representative did not immediately return request for comment.
Romney's plan, Carey says, simultaneously calls for less federal control of education while actually mandating more. "Romney's plan is just as controlling and represents just as robust a potential exercise of federal power," Carey said. "He just wants to exercise it in pursuit of the education policies he likes, which are more focused on school choice."
Civil rights advocates and education experts worry about the lack of federal accountability, because when federal money comes without strings, school systems might spend it on other, less expensive goals. "Romney wants to strip everything bare to just make it test scores that are available to the public," said Jack Jennings, a former longtime Democratic congressional education aide. "I don't see any documentation that there would be any further accountability."
Sandy Kress, a Republican lobbyist who worked on NCLB in the Bush administration, is generally supportive of Romney's plan. "But the weakest part of it is its vagueness on accountability," Kress told The Huffington Post.

Is Race the Problem?

Education Reform is Impossible Without Addressing Racism

Posted: 10/04/2012 1:49 pm

 

I'm tired of talking about education reform. Tired of yapping with other "reformers" who are trying to figure it all out. I'm done. I'm throwing in the towel. But this doesn't mean I will let my lips turn blue from silence; I'm taking my rant to the picket lines. It's time to lead the conversation about education reform, with race: the structural organizing factor that determines educational access and opportunity in education institutions.
Let's face it, race inequity may not be a deliberate goal of education policy and practice (or maybe it is) but neither is it accidental. The result is a whole lot of seemingly well-meaning people trying to evoke change in an education system that never intended to educate people of color in the first place. Educational institutions are places that actively reproduce ways of thinking, feeling, believing, and acting that work to the advantage of white students. If we want to "reform" education, it requires that we acknowledge and dismantle the power structures that are embedded in the system. It involves understanding that the conversation about education reform takes place in the shadow of slavery and Jim Crow.
The outright denial of the institutional racism that afflicts our schools and classrooms is reinforced through bad policies and educational malpractice. This lends little value in criticizing the circumstances in public schools when most schools fail to even recognize the presence or impact of racism. Yet, it's a problem because the actual process of dismantling racial inequality in education requires an outright revolution. Power structures and institutions cannot change without getting everybody involved.
The conversation has to begin with the assertion that many teachers and teacher educators reflect internalized deficit assumptions about students of color. Teachers are gatekeepers to learning and they can empower their students to challenge our nation's ideology about black and brown inferiority. Teachers can be led either to continue to project racism in their classrooms, or to build their capacity to challenge institutional racism that is affirmed, appropriated, or resisted within their school site. Engaging educators in the process of building an anti-racist movement for public education creates solidarity that is not separated by race but explored and appreciated in order to better understand the way power works.
Today, education policies have barely responded to the disparities in the system that systematically disadvantage students of color. Democrat's policies have aligned with the corporate education agenda. The GOP and the Tea Party have made strong endorsements for school choice and have essentially suggested eliminating the Department of Education. We can't rely on our government for this one. Achieving an anti-racist education system will require an uprising from the ground up that demands anti-racist policies and carries out systematic anti-racist education among teachers and students. Until then, we will only pretend to care about education reform.

Higher Education Reform in Motion

Posted: 08/27/2012 12:16 pm

It's been said that necessity is the mother of invention. As we have shown in our first three posts in this series on higher education, there is much necessity. This necessity has spawned "inventions" and innovations ranging from system changes at the federal, state and local levels to individual initiatives.

In this final post, we provide a Whitman's sampler of some of the approaches that are being discussed or are underway in the areas that we analyzed in our prior posts: costs; graduation and placement rates, return on investment, career education and skill development, teacher preparation; technology and education; and the nation's primary and secondary education system.
Corralling Costs: As Andrew Martin reports in his May 14 New York Times article titled, "Slowly, as Student Debt Rises, Colleges Confront Costs," colleges have begun the cost control conversation but there has been little real substantive progress to date. Jeff Selingo, editorial director of The Chronicle of Higher Education, reinforces Mr. Martin's perspective in his June 25, 2012 New York Times article stating, "...university leaders desperately need to transform how colleges do business." Fortunately, there are numerous resources such as James Garland's Saving Alma Mater: A Rescue Plan for America's Public Universities that the leaders of higher education institutions can consult as they initiate their transformation journeys.
Enhancing Graduation and Placement Rates: Public, private sector and for-profit institutions are placing a renewed emphasis on graduation and placement. The national Commission on Education Attainment chaired by E. Gordon Gee, the president of Ohio State University, has the goal, as expressed in its press release of October 17, 2011, "to chart a course for greatly improving college retention and attainment..." The Commission is scheduled to deliver its report on how to accomplish this in the fall of this year. We are certain that one of the works that the Commission will consider in crafting its recommendations is Bowen, Chingos and McPherson's, Crossing the Finish Line: Completing College at America's Public Universities.
Ensuring Value: In 2011, the U.S. Department of Education passed "Gainful Employment" regulations which, according to the Center for Analysis of Postsecondary Education and Employment, "will require most for-profit programs and certificate programs at public and non-profit institutions to pass at least one of three metrics to remain Title IV eligible." The Department of Education has also partnered with the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to provide tools to student borrowers to enable them to easily understand student loan debt and repayment requirements. It's not just about regulations and protections, however. Some institutions already excel at value creation. For the first time ever, in its college rankings, the Washington Monthly included "a cost adjusted graduation rate performance ranking." The three institutions at the top of this list were: University of Texas at El Paso; North Carolina A&T State University; and Texas A&M University.
Building Job Skills and Academic Competence: This was an area of important focus and concentration for the Bush administration and is even more so for the Obama administration. As Kevin Manning notes in his August 7, 2012 Huffington Post blog, "President Barack Obama's 'Skills for America' initiative is a step in the right direction. By encouraging partnerships between community colleges and industry, students will be able to connect their educations to careers, many in new and emerging industries." Valencia College won the 2011 Aspen Prize for Community College excellence for its leadership in developing a "focused curriculum" targeted and tailored to the needs of industry. Another community college model worth noting is the City University of New York's (CUNY) Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) which is focused on low income students and emphasizes workshops and intensive advising and tutoring. According to HCM strategists, ASAP is graduating students at "three times the rate of the average CUNY community college."
Improving Teacher Preparation: Probably the most radical reform on the horizon is in the area of teacher preparation and licensing. The Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning and Equity has developed a new model called the "Teacher Performance Assessment" that will be tested across the country over the next few years. As we noted in our last post quoting a July 29 article by Al Baker of The New York Times, "New York and up to 25 other states are moving toward changing ...in favor of the more demanding approach that requires aspiring teacher to prove themselves through lesson plans, homework assignments and videotaped instruction sessions." It can't be just about assessment though, it has to be about improving the preparation process itself. Over the past few years, diverse groups ranging from the American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education to the Center for American Progress have weighed in to describe innovations and better ways to teach teachers. We are not qualified to assess if there is a "best" way. We are qualified to know that "continuous improvement" is the hallmark of healthy organizations and professions and must be the same for teacher preparation.
Making the Connections: The U.S. Department of Education named August "Connected Educator Month." In recognition of this, on August 1, Katherine Schulten -- who blogs for The New York Times learning network -- asked 33 educators to share their learnings and recommendations for sharing with their counterparts. The educators provided hundreds of references proving the extraordinary value of these peer-to-peer connections in developing true learning communities that can be effective counterweights to top-down decision-making that has frequently caused education to careen from one fad to another. MOOCs (massive open online courses) represent a new way of connecting students world-wide to curriculum and faculty from elite institutions such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard and Stanford. MOOCs are in their infancy. They could be transformative or they could merely be a variation on the online delivery theme. Time and technology will tell.
Passing the Test: No Child Left Behind has been left behind -- and its successor appears to be the common core standards. These standards which define the "knowledge and skills that students should have in English language arts and mathematics within their K-12 educational careers" were developed as a state-led initiative of the National Governor's Association for Best Practices and the Council of Chief State School Officers and launched in June of 2010. The standards have been adopted by 45 states and three territories. Thus, a uniform set of standards has gained initial acceptance across the nation. The great debate, however, revolves around the testing related to those standards. As the "Sunday Dialogue: Improving Our Schools" in the July 22 issue of The New York Times demonstrates, there is great fear within the educational community that the standards are driven by an obsession with testing rather than focused on improving student performance or dealing with root causes of performance problems such as poverty and poor parenting.
So, that's the higher education report card near the end of August, 2012. If we were giving grades, most of them would be "incompletes." That might be disappointing to some but not to us. The attention being paid and the dialogue and discourse in all of these areas -- even if some is in the early stages -- are signs that reform is in motion and the higher educational system is "unfreezing."
Staying the same is not an option. That's not our opinion. It's that of President Gee of Ohio State who Andrew Martin quotes in his New York Times article as saying, "The notion that universities can do business the very same way has to stop." It has to stop because we are at a pivot point for the future of higher education in this country.
Jeff Selingo referred to the period between 1999 and 2009 as the "industry's 'lost decade.'" The evidence suggests that the industry has begun to work the pivot points and there is forward momentum. If higher education, its allies and customers, can continue to plot and chart the course that has and is being laid out, they have the potential and opportunity to make the period between 2010 and 2019 the industry's "found decade."

Check This Out!

We Need an Education System that Promotes Creativity, Innovation, and Critical Thinking

Posted: 03/23/2012 1:53 pm

This is the second in a three-part series on the need for education reform in the United States. The first installment, "Doubling-Down on Dumb: The GOP War on Being Smart," explored the emerging political discourse criticizing public education and being well-educated, and how the toxic environment it creates makes real reform even more problematic. This installment argues in favor of a paradigm shift in primary and secondary education.
In early October 2011, I wrote "Three Innovative Ideas, Which Could Help the Economy,... but No One's Talking About Them," In that blog entry I argued that comprehensive education reform was one "innovative idea" that could help transform the domestic economy. Specifically, I suggested that:

Reforming the U.S. public education system to make it less like a factory processing future workers, and focusing instead on creating a nation of thinkers, might seem counterintuitive to matching up high school and college grads with scarcely available jobs. And, indeed, this kind of "trade school approach" to recasting secondary and post-secondary education is something recently suggested by The Economist's Matthew Bishop, author of "The great mismatch," Sept. 10, 2011.
However counter-intuitive this notion may appear, fostering a nation of creative thinkers will serve the U.S. well in an increasingly global and technological economy. After all, one of the most successful and profitable companies in the world (high-tech or otherwise) is Apple. Until August 25, 2011, Apple was led by CEO Steve Jobs, who stepped down (for the second time) for health reasons. Jobs was one of the most creative thinkers of the past 50 years and was not trained by the American university system for such greatness. He was a creative thinker, not the toiler of a particular trade conferred upon him by some professional degree.

One of our greatest problems as a nation is the continued demise of long-term thinking. As the struggle to escape from the country's economic doldrums has slogged on, the focus on short-term fixes has, regrettably, become increasingly acute. I used to do a lot of work for colleges and universities (in addition and unrelated to teaching at the graduate level), which offered a very different perspective on long-term thinking. The average person tends to focus on the near-term: a 24-hour period; the time leading up to a holiday or event; an entire month, perhaps; maybe even a 365-day increment.
Academic institutions, on the other hand, tend to look at twenty-five, 50, and 100-year increments. The things they create are intended to have real permanence. Even when they build new buildings, the tendency is to have them designed and constructed as if to appear like they've always been there. We need to have this kind of long-term approach to reforming America's primary and secondary education systems.
Unfortunately, "new ideas" about fixing our public education system have a decidedly short-term nature. They are often focused on addressing a particular problem, making these proposed solutions more reactionary and less intentional; less well-focused. Much in the way of education reform these days is predicated on the need for cost-cutting and/or cost controls, with little to no regard for the potential negative consequences of such resource reductions. Additionally, some "reforms" are intended to allow (or force) school districts to purge the faculty, by creating metrics for success focused not on whether, what, and how students are learning but, instead, on evaluating teachers, school administrators, and school districts.
I have no problem with the concept of ongoing teacher evaluations. In fact, it's a pretty good practice. However, it seems to be putting the cart before the horse to do teacher evaluations in an environment where we may not be expecting the right kind of teaching out of them; defining and measuring "student achievement" in ways that say nothing about whether actual learning is taking place.
So then, what's the right approach to education reform? The right approach is not to assume that we already have the answer; that the current system is fine but just needs to be tweaked. The right approach is to start over, with two questions:

What capabilities, capacities, and knowledge do we want all children to have by the time they graduate from high school; and
what is the best way for students to acquire those things (as opposed to what's the best or, as is most-often the case, the easiest way for the school system to teach and measure them)?

In other words, the focus needs to be changed dramatically--a true paradigm shift--from how the system teaches to what and how students learn.
Sir Ken Robinson is an internationally recognized expert in human creativity. He has also become highly regarded for his views on education systems and educational reform. Robinson believes--and I wholeheartedly concur--that the public education system in the United States needs to be fundamentally reformed. Specifically, the American public education system has gotten off track, with an increasing emphasis on rote learning, and standardized testing as the metric by which we judge how good a job the system is doing in educating its students. The No Child Left Behind Act may mark the pinnacle of this kind of myopic thinking about education.
An RSAnimate video "Changing Education Paradigms," graphically presents some of Robinson's thinking on the subject. I strongly recommend anyone interested in education reform take the eleven minutes and 41 seconds it takes to watch this video. However, at the risk of preempting anyone keen on watching "Changing Education Paradigms" or the entirety of Robinson's speech to the Royal Society of Arts on which that video is based (or, for that matter, Robinson's 2006 TED Talk) from doing so, I will endeavor to summarize Robinson's proposition for changing our education paradigm.
The public education system in the United States, like all education systems throughout the world, is career-oriented, modeled on the expectations of post-secondary institutions or employers seeking employees with particular skill-sets. K-12 programs have become a process through which those who can afford it get to access colleges and universities; the end goal of matriculation at a college or university is the conferral of a diploma, which presumably gives the recipient entree into a particular job or career field (more on this in the third part of this series). Robinson states "The whole system of public education around the world is a protracted process of university entrance." This system of education has changed little since public education systems were first created in the 19th Century, in response to the emerging needs of Industrialism in developing nations.
What, one might ask, is the problem with an educational system predicated on the belief that its graduates should be fit for future employment? There are at least two problems with this narrow basis for an entire educational framework. First, a child entering Kindergarten in the fall of 2012, assuming they will be career-ready with a four-year bachelor's degree, will enter the workforce in 2029. Is there anyone who presumes to know what the global economy will require of its workforce just five years from now (in 2017), much less what will be needed in 2029? Viewed in this context, this predicate for our entire primary and secondary public education system seems not only antiquated but wholly absurd.
The second problem with this system is that the path to getting to this end goal works great for some students; only marginally well for others; and yet not at all for those with less academic-oriented interests and capabilities. The subject areas in which some students have tremendous talent, remarkable aptitude, and keen interest--the fine arts, for example--become increasingly marginalized in secondary schools in favor of those subjects that are viewed as more pragmatic; more "job worthy."
Ironically, studies have shown that students engaged in a well-rounded K-12 educational system, one that includes consistent exposure to the arts (music, fine art, drama, and dance) and some level of daily physical activity throughout the process, end up being more creative and innovative; they perform better in school; and they are more adept at problem-solving and critical thinking. Yet these are the areas in which most school districts trim their budgets the earliest and the deepest, making for a long, uninspiring school day in which teachers and parents lament that students seem to be tuning out in record numbers. Is it any wonder why?
In a longitudinal study on divergent thinking (which Robinson sees as an "essential capacity" for creativity) 98% of Kindergarten children tested at the "genius" level, suggesting that every child has the capacity for divergent thinking. However, when divergent thinking tests were repeated with the same children five years later, and five years after that, the percentage of students performing at the "genius" level dropped precipitously each time, to the point where very few still had the capacity to think divergently ten years after the initial testing. Land, George and Beth Jarman, Breakpoint and Beyond: Mastering the Future--Today (Leadership 2000, Inc. 1998).
Robinson has suggested that the reason why the students' capacity for divergent thinking diminishes as they get older is not a function of their age but the fact that "it's been pretty much taught out of them. They've spent ten years at school, being taught there's only one answer." There's little if any reward for divergent thinking in such a narrowly focused educational environment.
Microsoft; Apple; Amazon; Google; Facebook; Twitter; Research in Motion; E Ink Corporation; and Etak: You're likely very familiar with the first seven of these companies. E Ink Corporation, a spin-off from MIT's Media Lab, developed the technology that makes the Kindle, and competing Sony Reader, work. Etak developed the first operational GPS system adapted for automotive use; a market segment now dominated by the likes of Garmin and Tom-Tom.
What each of these companies has in common with each other, as well as with thousands of others, is that they all started out small, based on an idea generated by one or a few people with the talent, inclination, and motivation to innovate. Just imagine what 2012 would be like now if 50 years ago, someone decided to completely remake the primary and secondary public education system in America, shifting its focus away from merely producing "college-ready high school graduates," and toward fostering young adults with the abilities to create, innovate, and think critically. Rather than enjoying the episodic fruits of one-in-a-million creators and entrepreneurs like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Jeff Bezos, the U.S. would be the undisputed technological leader in the world economy. Imagine the technological innovations we'd be enjoying today, and that the rest of the world would be buying from the U.S.
Let's not wait another 50 years to reform the primary and secondary education systems in this country, because we can't afford not to. Let's start now.

Does Mitt Romney Really Love Teachers?

Mitt Romney's 'I Love Teachers' Remark Spurs Fake Valentine From Union

Posted: 10/23/2012 5:26 pm EDT

Just how much does Mitt Romney love teachers?
"I love teachers," he said repeatedly during a spirited exchange in Monday night's foreign policy debate that went off topic, to the annoyance of moderator Bob Schieffer, and delved into teacher hiring policies. But Romney also said he doesn't think the federal government should pay to hire teachers, even at a time when so many school systems have cut payrolls due to the recession.
Now, the National Education Association, the nation's largest teachers union, has created a "love letter" for Romney. The graphic, which the NEA is distributing widely to reporters and on its blog, is titled "My Funny Valentine" and features pictures of the former Massachusetts governor framed in hearts.
"Mitt Romney has a strange way of showing 'love,'" it says.
Several thought bubbles highlight his conflicting comments on education. "I love teachers!" one heart-surrounded Romney says. But Romney in a cracked heart repeats the GOP nominee's June quote, "We don't need more teachers." "The effort to reduce classroom size may actually hurt education more than it helps," another thought bubble says, quoting Romney in 2010. The graphic also quotes Donnie McGee, a Massachusetts community college professor who said, "When Romney was Governor ... students and educators struggled."
Shown the NEA's creation, a representative from the Romney campaign declined to comment.

The graphic is part of the union's get-out-the-vote efforts, which have so far mobilized 481,000 members to work on initiatives like phone banks, canvassing and voter registration, according to NEA spokeswoman Sara Robertson.
"Mitt Romney's form of love reminds me of being on the schoolyard as a kid. The only way you knew whether or not someone liked you was if they pulled your hair or made fun of you in front of their friends," said NEA President Dennis Van Roekel.
The NEA, of course, would stand to lose under a Romney policy of no federal funds for hiring teachers. Federal stimulus money saved 420,000 education jobs between 2009 and the 2010-11 school year, according to the U.S. Education Department.
A White House report found that between June 2009 and August 2012, more than 300,000 teachers lost their jobs. In August alone, schools cut 7,000 educators from their payrolls. Those losses have hit the union, too: Recent Internal Revenue Service reports show that in the 2010-2011 school year, 25 NEA state affiliates saw declining dues, and 15 ran state budget deficits, as blogger Mike Antonucci noted. Overall, Antonucci wrote, the NEA's active membership declined by 2 percent that year.
That trend might soon change in part because of Obama's stimulus plan, the NEA said.

In other ways as well, the NEA would have a lot to lose under a President Romney. The GOP nominee has said that he would use the Education Department to fight teachers unions and that unions should not be allowed to contribute to school board candidates. "We're going to have to have training programs that work for our workers and schools that finally put the parents and the teachers and the kids first, and the teachers unions are going to have to go behind," he said in Monday night's debate.
Romney's dispute with President Barack Obama over teacher hiring started a few months ago. In June, Romney made fun of the president for proposing the hiring of more public sector employees, saying:

[Obama] wants another stimulus; he wants to hire more government workers. He says we need more firemen, more policemen, more teachers. Did he not get the message of Wisconsin? The American people did. It's time for us to cut back on government and help the American people.

When his opponents seized on those comment, Romney tried to take them back, saying the idea that he was opposed to hiring more teachers was "completely absurd."
Then, during the first presidential debate on Oct. 3, he said, "Well, first, I love great schools. ... And the key to great schools [is] great teachers. So I reject the idea that I don't believe in great teachers or more teachers."
Soon after, Romney told The Des Moines Register that Obama's proposal to hire more teachers was misguided and would not result in economic growth. "Hiring schoolteachers is not going to raise the growth of the U.S. economy over the next three-to-four years," he said.
Which led to the Monday debate exchange:

Romney: I love teachers, and I'm happy to have states and communities that want to hire teachers do that. By the way, I don't like to have the federal government start pushing its weight deeper and deeper into our schools. Let the states and localities do that. I was a governor. The federal government didn't hire our teachers. ... But I love teachers. But I want to get our private sector growing, and I know how to do it.Schieffer: I think we all love teachers.

Romney might be seeking to channel the philosophy of the education reform movement, which argues that simply hiring more teachers won't help schools, but the NEA is attacking him for trying to have it both ways. "The same candidate who claims he loves teachers has opposed efforts to invest in teachers and reduce class sizes to help our kids succeed," said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, the nation's second-largest teachers union. "He pays lip service to the importance of teachers, but he's said he would preserve the U.S. Department of Education only so he'd have a club to go after their unions."

Obama himself followed up on Romney's declaration of educational ardour the next day. The president asked attendees Tuesday at a Delray Beach, Fla., event, "If you talk about how much you love teachers during a debate but said just a few weeks ago that we shouldn’t hire any more because they won’t grow the economy, what do you have?"

Uh-Oh!

Soup Kitchen In Paul Ryan Photo-Op Faces Donor Backlash

Posted: 10/18/2012 2:07 pm EDT Updated: 10/18/2012 9:49 pm EDT

 

WASHINGTON -- In the wake of Rep. Paul Ryan's embarrassing soup kitchen photo-op last week, the organization that runs the facility tells The Huffington Post that donors have begun pulling their money out of the Youngstown, Ohio charity.
Ryan may have suffered a few late-night jokes, but the fallout for the soup kitchen appears to be far more bruising. Brian J. Antal, president of the Mahoning County St. Vincent De Paul Society, confirmed that donors have begun an exodus in protest over Ryan's embarrassment. The monetary losses have been big. "It appears to be a substantial amount," Antal said. "You can rest assured there has been a substantial backlash."
Antal says he can't give an actual dollar amount. "I can't say how much [in] donations we lost," he said. "Donations are a private matter with our organization."
Antal's charity represents the kind of organization that conservative Republicans might champion. But that was before the Ryan incident went viral a few days ago. According to The Washington Post, Antal said that the moment should never have happened. He told the newspaper that the photo-op was not authorized and that the campaign had “ramrodded their way” inside.
Ryan supporters have now targeted Antal and his soup kitchen, Antal said, including making hundreds of angry phone calls. Some members of Antal's volunteer staff have had to endure the barrage as well, he said. "The sad part is a lot of [the callers] want to hide behind anonymity," he said, adding that if someone leaves their name and number he has tried to return their call. In addition to phone calls, people have posted a few choice words on the charity's Facebook wall, including statements like "I hope you lose your tax [sic] emempt status," Anyone who is thinking about donations to you should think twice" and "Shame on you Brian Antal!"
On the phone with HuffPost, Antal seemed worn out by all the vitriol. "Honesty, I really don't need any more attention," he said. "I really just want this to go away."
Antal said doesn't understand why donors would take out their frustration over the incident on those who can't afford to pay for their own meals. "I'm a volunteer,' he said. "I receive zero compensation. Withholding donations is only going to hurt the over 100,000 we serve annually."

Slow Change

Mitt Making The Rich Look Bad

Funny Stuff

GOP The New Titanic?

Obama vs. Romney

I was unable to post my wordles but I have them printed on paper. Romney's speech mainly consisted of talking about his life, he wasn't very specific about what he will plan to do if he becomes president. Obama on the other hand was a lot more specific about his goals concerning the government. He talked about fixing the economy, the environment, finding renewable energy sources, health insurance, social security, education, taxes, ect. It seems to me that at least he has a plan and is laying out ideas to pursue if he wins the presidency.

Obama Addresses Libya Attacks

Obama Addresses Libya Attacks, Death Of U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens

Reuters | Posted: 09/12/2012 10:02 am Updated: 09/12/2012 6:37 pm

By Matt Spetalnick
President Barack Obama on Wednesday strongly condemned the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other embassy staff, calling it an "outrageous attack," and ordered stepped-up security at U.S. diplomatic posts worldwide.
The targeting of U.S. diplomats, in militant violence sparked by a U.S.-made film seen as insulting the Prophet Mohammad, could raise questions about Obama's policy toward Libya in the post-Gaddafi era as he seeks re-election in November.
Obama, apparently seeking to seize the initiative in the aftermath of the attack, planned to speak to reporters in the White House Rose Garden at 10:35 a.m. EDT with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at his side.
"I have directed my administration to provide all necessary resources to support the security of our personnel in Libya and to increase security at our diplomatic posts around the globe," Obama said in a written statement.
Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other U.S. diplomats were killed as they rushed away from a consulate building in Benghazi, stormed by al Qaeda-linked gunmen blaming America for the film that they said mocked the Prophet of Islam.
Sean Smith, a foreign service information management officer, was identified as one of the diplomats killed, in a statement by Clinton. The names of the two others were withheld while the government notified their families.

Stevens, a 21-year veteran of the foreign service, was one of the first American officials on the ground in Benghazi during the uprising against former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi last year.
Gaddafi was ousted by rebel forces backed by NATO air power in August 2011 and was killed in October after months as a fugitive.
Obama had hailed Libya's election in July as a milestone in its post-Gaddafi democratic transition and pledged the United States would act as a partner even as he cautioned that there would still be difficult challenges ahead.
He had opted for a cautious strategy that steered clear of a dominant role for the U.S. military and faced criticism from Republican opponents at home for what was described as "leading from behind."
CAMPAIGN IMPACT
Before the full death toll and details of the Libya attack were known, Obama's Republican presidential challenger, Mitt Romney, on Tuesday night criticized the Obama administration's initial response to violent attacks at U.S. diplomatic missions in Libya as well as Egypt.
Pushing back hard, Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt criticized Romney for making a "political attack" at a time when the country was "confronting the tragic death of one of our diplomatic officers in Libya."
Obama was notified on Tuesday night that Stevens was unaccounted for and was told on Wednesday morning of his death, a White House official said.
"I strongly condemn the outrageous attack on our diplomatic facility in Benghazi, which took the lives of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens," Obama said.
"Right now, the American people have the families of those we lost in our thoughts and prayers. They exemplified America's commitment to freedom, justice and partnership with nations and people around the globe and stand in stark contrast to those who callously took their lives," he said.
Gunmen had attacked and set fire to the U.S. consulate in the eastern city of Benghazi, the cradle of last year's uprising against Muammar Gaddafi's 42-year rule, late on Tuesday evening as another assault was mounted on the U.S. embassy in Cairo.
The California-born ambassador was trying to leave the consulate building for a safer location as part of an evacuation when gunmen launched an intense attack, apparently forcing security personnel to withdraw.
A Libyan official said the diplomats were killed when "gunmen fired rockets in their direction." White House and State Department statements gave no details on exactly how the four were killed.
"While the United States rejects efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others, we must all unequivocally oppose the kind of senseless violence that took the lives of these public servants," Obama said.
Clinton also denounced the attack, calling it "vicious and violent."
(Additional reporting by Margaret Chadbourn; editing by Bill Trott and Mohammad Zargham)

Palin Blasting Obama

Sarah Palin: Libya, Egypt Attacks On American Facilities Show Obama Needs To Grow 'Big Stick'

The Huffington Post | By Nick Wing Posted: 09/12/2012 10:44 am Updated: 09/12/2012 6:15 pm

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) wasted no time blasting President Barack Obama in the wake of attacks on U.S. compounds in Egypt and Libya on Tuesday, suggesting that he lacked the "big stick" needed to be strong on foreign policy.

"America can’t afford any more 'leading from behind' in such a dangerous world," Palin wrote in a Facebook post. "We already know that President Obama likes to 'speak softly' to our enemies. If he doesn’t have a 'big stick' to carry, maybe it’s time for him to grow one."
The recent clashes in Egypt and Libya provided new fodder for conservatives to target the president on foreign policy as the nation remembered the 11th anniversary of the September 11 attacks. On Tuesday, protesters outraged over an anti-Islam film stormed the U.S. embassy in Cairo, tearing down an American flag and replacing it with a pro-Islam banner. The violence was worse in Benghazi, Libya, where an attack on a U.S. consulate left Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other staffers dead.
From her social media perch, Palin continued her assault on Obama, accusing him of failing with his strategy in North Africa and suggesting that he was more concerned about "softball interviews," fundraising and golfing than he was about international leadership.
"These countries represent his much touted 'Arab Spring.' How’s that Arab Spring working out for us now? Have we received an apology yet from our 'friends' in the Muslim Brotherhood for the assault on our embassy?" she wrote. "It’s about time our president stood up for America and condemned these Islamic extremists."
Palin also criticized the "outrageous" tone of the U.S. embassy in Egypt's initial response to the assault on the building, a statement not authorized by the Obama administration, which later condemned the attacks in a statement of its own from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney's campaign issued a statement echoing Palin's tone Tuesday night, though theirs sought to more directly attribute the embassy's statement to the White House.

"It's disgraceful that the Obama Administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks," the statement read.
RNC Chairman Reince Priebus framed this attempted attack more bluntly, tweeting: "Obama sympathizes with attackers in Egypt. Sad and pathetic."
The White House had disavowed the statement by the embassy, which eventually reworded its dispatch. The Obama campaign responded to Romney, saying it was "shocked" that he would "choose to launch a political attack" at such a time.
Palin's whole Facebook post:

Apparently President Obama can’t see Egypt and Libya from his house. On the anniversary of the worst terrorist attacks ever perpetrated on America, our embassy in Cairo and our consulate in Benghazi were attacked by violent Islamic mobs. In Cairo, they scaled the walls of our embassy, destroyed our flag, and replaced it with a black Islamic banner. In Benghazi, the armed gunmen set fire to our consulate and killed an American staff member. The Islamic radicals claim that these attacks are in protest to some film criticizing Islam. In response to this, the U.S. embassy in Cairo issued a statement that was so outrageous many of us thought it must be a satire. The embassy actually apologized to the violent mob attacking us, and it even went so far as to chastise those who use free speech to “hurt the religious feelings of Muslims.” (Funny, the current administration has no problem hurting the “religious feelings” of Catholics.)But where is the president’s statement about this? These countries represent his much touted “Arab Spring.” How’s that Arab Spring working out for us now? Have we received an apology yet from our “friends” in the Muslim Brotherhood for the assault on our embassy?
It’s about time our president stood up for America and condemned these Islamic extremists. I realize there must be a lot on his mind these days – what with our economy’s abysmal jobless numbers and Moody’s new warning about yet another downgrade to our nation’s credit rating due to the current administration’s failure to come up with a credible deficit reduction plan. And, of course, he has a busy schedule – with all those rounds of golf, softball interviews with the “Pimp with the Limp,” and fundraising dinners with his corporate cronies. But our nation’s security should be of utmost importance to our Commander-in-chief. America can’t afford any more “leading from behind” in such a dangerous world. We already know that President Obama likes to “speak softly” to our enemies. If he doesn’t have a “big stick” to carry, maybe it’s time for him to grow one.
- Sarah Palin

Say What?

Mitt Romney Attacks President Obama Over Libya Crisis

Posted: 09/12/2012 12:08 pm Updated: 09/12/2012 1:06 pm

WASHINGTON -- On Wednesday morning, hours after the deaths of four U.S. diplomats, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Mitt Romney put his campaign on the line by attacking President Barack Obama and the besieged diplomats in the Middle East.

Romney, in a statement released Tuesday night, had called the president's handling of the Libya and Egypt attacks "disgraceful." Wednesday morning, Romney hastily scrapped a campaign rally in Jacksonville, Fla., dismantling a campaign stage, and instead held a small press conference in which he repeatedly defended his criticism of the administration, slamming embassy officials in Cairo and President Obama. "When our grounds are being attacked, and being breached, that the first response of the United States must be outrage at the breach of the sovereignty of our nation. And apology for America's values is never the right course," he said, slamming the Obama administration for "sympathiz[ing] with those who waged the attacks."
The attacks at the consulate in Libya, and a separate incident at the U.S. embassy in Cairo, came on a day of violence and anger over rumors of an anti-Islamic film scheduled for released in the United States and circulated on the Internet.
Romney's assault on Obama was rare among Republicans. Sarah Palin and Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus joined him in condemning the president, but no other significant GOP leader thought it prudent to immediately single out the president for criticism. House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) all put out statements on the crisis, none attacking Obama.
A host of Republican foreign policy officials were quick to blast the "utter disaster" that was Romney's response.
Romney's reference to an "apology for America's values" was directed at a statement the U.S. Embassy in Cairo put out on Tuesday morning, but that statement, which was itself responding to the outrage over the anti-Islamic film, was issued before the embassy was attacked, despite Romney's statement to the contrary. What's more, the statement does not apologize for America's values, but rather supports a founding American value, religious tolerance, while referencing the "universal right of free speech." The statement in full:

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims -- as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others.

Romney's rash condemnation of the president, released after it was known that there had been U.S. fatalities, calls to mind Sen. John McCain's snap decision in 2008 to suspend his presidential campaign to deal with the financial crisis. The move was judged deeply unpresidential and contributed to his defeat.

After the Cairo embassy's initial statement, as a mob protest outside the embassy heated up, even entering the compound, and commentators in the U.S. suggested the embassy condemn the protesters, the embassy responded through its Twitter feed: "Of course we condemn breaches of our compound, we’re the ones actually living through this."
The embassy added: "Sorry, but neither breaches of our compound or angry messages will dissuade us from defending freedom of speech AND criticizing bigotry."
The diplomats in Cairo survived the assault on their embassy. When the protests spread to Libya, diplomats there weren't so lucky: Four U.S. State Department officials, including Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens, were killed in an hourslong assault. Romney responded by attacking the diplomats in Cairo.
"The embassy in Cairo put out a statement after their grounds had been breached, protesters were inside the grounds," said Romney at his press conference. "They reiterated that statement after the breach. I think it's a -- a terrible course for America to stand in apology for our values."
Did Romney expect the Cairo diplomats to retract their defense of religious tolerance in the face of the attack? Or did Romney expect the Obama administration to denounce the diplomats who were under siege?
"It's their administration," said Romney, referring to the embassy in Cairo. "Their administration spoke. The president takes responsibility not just for the words that come from his mouth but also from the words of his ambassadors, from his administration, from his embassies, from his State Department. They clearly sent mixed messages to the world. The statement that came from the administration -- and the embassy is the administration -- the statement that came from the administration was a statement which is akin to apology. And I think was a severe miscalculation."
Reporters in Washington have been as quick to condemn Romney as he was to condemn Obama and the embassy officials. "Unless Mitt has gamed crisis out in some manner completely invisible to Gang of 500, doubling down=most craven+ill-advised move of '12," Time's Mark Halperin tweeted, referring to the Beltway establishment.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Obama, meanwhile, struck a somber and emotional tone, offering remembrances for the American diplomats who lost their lives in the violence.
In an appearance in the Rose Garden on Wednesday, flanked by Clinton, the president spoke about the events the night before, pledging that the incidents would "not break the bonds between the United States and Libya."
"We reject all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others," Obama said, referencing the anti-Islamic video, "but there is no justification for this kind of violence. None."
Libyan security workers had helped bring other American diplomats to safety during the crisis, Obama noted, and had transported the ambassador to the hospital.
"It is especially tragic that Chris Stevens died in Benghazi because it's a city he helped to save at the height of the Libyan revolution," Obama said.
Earlier in the morning at the State Department, a shaken Clinton talked about Stevens and the other diplomats who had been killed and strongly denounced the attacks at the outpost in Libya.
"This is an attack that should shock the conscience of people of all faiths around the world," she said. "We condemn in the strongest terms this senseless act of violence."
With her eyes occasionally watering, Clinton spoke at length about Ambassador Stevens, whom she knew well and whom she had personally dispatched to Libya at the beginning to the uprising against Muammar Gaddafi, to be the American attache to the rebel leadership.
"He arrived on a cargo ship in the port of Benghazi and began building our relationship with the Libyan revolutionaries," she said. "He risked his life to stop a tyrant, then gave his life trying to help build a better Libya. The world needs more Chris Stevenses."
Clinton too pledged to maintain America's relationship with Libya, although she conceded that events like those on Tuesday challenged even her certainty.
"Today many Americans are asking -- indeed, I ask myself -- how could this happen," Clinton said. "How could this happen in a country we helped liberate, in a city we helped save from destruction. This question reflects just how complicated, and at times how confounding, the world can be. But we must be clear-eyed even in our grief: This was an attack by a small and savage group, not the people or the government of Libya."

Who Needs A Voter ID?

Voter ID Ruling In Pennsylvania Cited Bigoted 1869 Court Decision

Posted: 09/11/2012 12:17 pm Updated: 09/11/2012 1:08 pm

A Pennsylvania judge's decision to uphold the state's tough new voter-identification law last month was based in part on a 19th century state court decision that at the time disenfranchised many Philadelphia workmen who the court didn't feel were virtuous enough to vote.
Voter rights advocates will ask the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Thursday to overrule the Aug. 15 decision by Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson. In his decision, Simpson heavily relied on an 1869 court case, Patterson v. Barlow, which legalized voting procedures uniquely for Philadelphia, with its large working class and immigrant populations.
"That process effectively disenfranchised the workmen who filled the city boarding houses at the end of the 19th century," University of Pittsburgh law professor Jessie Allen wrote in an opinion piece in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Tuesday.
Simpson, in his ruling, quoted from the Patterson ruling, saying the discretion to establish voting requirements "belongs to the General Assembly, is a sound one, and cannot be reviewed by any other department of the government, except in a case of plain, palpable, and clear abuse of the power which actually infringes the rights of the electors."
What he didn't quote were the parts of the Patterson ruling warning that allowing Philadelphians to vote according to the same rules as the rest of the state would be “to place the vicious vagrant, the wandering Arabs, the Tartar hordes of our large cities, on a level with the virtuous and good man."
A reader of the election law blog run by Rick Hasen, who is a University of California Irvine voting expert and author, also noted the bigoted aspects of the Patterson ruling last month.
The court of the time wrote: “Where the population of a locality is constantly changing, and men are often unknown to their next-door neighbors; where a large number is floating upon the rivers and the sea, going and returning and incapable of identification; where low inns, restaurants and boarding-houses constantly afford the means of fraudulent additions to the lists of voters, what rule of sound reason or of constitutional law forbids the legislature from providing a means to distinguish the honest people of Philadelphia from the rogues and vagabonds who would usurp their places and rob them of their rights?"

The parties who initially sued to overturn the law, argue in their appeal of Simpson's decision that "Patterson is an anachronism, predating the modern framework of differing levels of scrutiny by more than half a century and based on outright prejudice. Patterson is no guide to a current construction of the constitutional rights of Pennsylvanians."
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania also cites Patterson -- in its favor -- in its Sept. 7 brief to the Supreme Court.
The use of Patterson as legal precedent is particularly relevant, because opponents of the law allege that the current Pennsylvania legislature is similarly trying to use the law to prevent certain people from voting -- in this case, demographic groups that tend to vote Democratic.
The state's voter ID bill came as Republican legislatures across the country pursued bills that would make it harder for people to vote, and register to vote. GOP supporters argue that the laws are necessary to reduce voter fraud, but voter fraud in general is extremely rare, and in-person voter fraud -- the only kind that would be affected by voter ID requirements -- is virtually nonexistent.
The opponents of the law cite ample evidence that the Pennsylvania law will in particular disenfranchise minorities.
Allen wrote in her piece: "Wrenched out of context, the legal language that the Commonwealth Court judge chose to quote from Patterson sounds like a fair basis for upholding the new voter ID law. But, in fact, the old Patterson case represents the Pennsylvania Supreme Court's shameful failure to protect elections from a law designed to make voting harder for some people than for others."
As Bob Warner reported for the Philadelphia Inquirer on Tuesday, Simpson "himself teed up" for the state's Supreme Court the issue of what level of judicial scrutiny should be applied to the legislature regarding voting procedure.
"[T]he appropriate level of scrutiny raises a substantial legal question," Simpson wrote in his opinion. "Indeed, if strict scrutiny is to be employed, I might reach a different determination on this prerequisite for a preliminary injunction."

 

Need A Lift Obama?

Obama Picked Up By Scott Van Duzer, Florida Pizza Place Owner (PHOTO)

In Florida for his bus tour on Sunday, President Barack Obama made an unannounced stop at Big Apple Pizza and Pasta in Ft. Pierce. There, the shop's owner, Scott Van Duzer, lifted the president off the ground:

(Photo credit: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)
Obama entered the shop saying, "Scott, let me tell you, you are like the biggest pizza shop owner I've ever seen," according to a White House pool report.
Van Duzer, 46, is a big guy: He is 6' 3" tall and weighs 260 pounds.
After Obama was lifted up, he said "Look at that!" Man are you a powerlifter or what?"
He continued, according to the pool, talking about Van Duzer's big muscles.
"Everybody look at these guns," he said. "If I eat your pizza will I look like that?"
Van Duzer, by the way, is a registered Republican who voted for Obama in 2008 and says he will do so again in November.
"I don't vote party line, I vote who I feel comfortable with, and I do feel extremely comfortable with him," he told the press pool.

A War of Words Between Brown and Christie

Jerry Brown To Chris Christie: 'This Old Retread Can Beat You Any Day Of The Week' (VIDEO)

The Huffington Post | By Chris Gentilviso Posted: 09/09/2012 2:01 pm Updated: 09/09/2012 2:11 pm

Even at age 74, California Gov. Jerry Brown is never one to back down from a challenge.
In a Sunday interview on CNN's "State Of The Union," the veteran Democrat reiterated his request to square off against New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in a series of athletic events.
“I'll be 74 1/2 next month," Brown said. "And but here I am. You know, there is some experience. Hopefully, there's some wisdom. So I got kind of warmed up and went on my speech and I said, 'OK, Christie, I challenge you to a three-mile race. Try some chin-ups maybe and some pushups.'"
“Essentially saying that he's overweight?” host Candy Crowley asked.
“No, essentially says this old retread can beat you any day of the week,” Brown answered.
Back on August 27, Christie started a cross-country war of words at a Tampa, Fla. speech to California's Republican National Convention delegates. In the address, he accused the state of making a "bad choice" by electing Brown, calling the governor an "old retread."
"Jerry Brown?" Christie asked. "I mean, he won the New Jersey presidential primary over Jimmy Carter when I was 14 years old. And now I've got to sit at the National Governor's Association with this guy and have him come up to me and say, 'Gov. Christie, stop telling people that I want to raise taxes. I'm not trying to raise taxes.'"
Brown fired back a few days later, laying his competitive cards on the table by asking Christie to partake in some fitness competitions.
"There's nothing wrong with being a little retread," he said at a local union workers meeting. "Not as much hair, I've slowed down a little bit. But I have to tell you, I ran three miles in 29 minutes two nights ago. And I hereby challenge Governor Christie to a three-mile race, a push-up contest and a chin-up contest. Whatever he wants to bet, I have no doubt of the outcome."
Christie responded with little interest at a press conference last Wednesday, vowing that "Brown can have that contest with himself."

Reflection of the government surveys

I felt that going around asking people thier opinions on certain issues in government was very interesting. It was a little awkward asking people their age, religion, ethnicity, and political preference though. But other than that it was fine, before I even started asking questions I told them it was for my government class and they happy complied. It was pretty smooth sailing. I tried to keep it a balance of adults and seniors in high school, disregarding the fact that the majority of the people I asked were females.