Monthly Archives: November 2017

Minneapolis’ Ed Advocates Go Bueller

Blog / / by

Bueller? Bueller?

 

 

I’ve been sitting at the keyboard for the longest time, trying to write a post about the upcoming closure of the contract talks between Minneapolis Public Schools and its teachers’ union and honestly, it’s like enduring Ben Stein on the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. You wake up in a slick of your own drool, and it’s still going on.

You’re forgiven for not having a clue what’s up with the negotiations. There’s been precious little coverage, and what little there’s been has focused on the fact that MPS and St. Paul Public Schools are in deficit-plugging mode and so there’s not much to bargain over.

The Minneapolis Federation of Teachers, meanwhile, has been engaged in a pale facsimile of the exercise their St. Paul brethren carried out a couple of years ago wherein negotiators managed to convince at least a swath of the community that the talks were centered on getting families the schools their children deserve.

I’ve read both sides’ proposals and there’s plenty in there worth unpacking, but to be truthful it feels like the crucial juncture demanding to be marked right now is a different one.

There are a lot of people in this town who have made big promises to our kids, and who are drawing big salaries to do the work of delivering. This is true within the district. It’s true within the federation. And it’s true within the philanthropic organizations that are supposed to be the community backstop to anyone trying to do the hard, risky work of demanding systemic change.

Anyone? Anyone? Continue reading →

How Two Twin Cities Teachers Gave DeVos Political Cover

Blog / tagged , , , , / / by

What’s the old saw about all the news that’s fit to print?

I am wracking my brain to think why two local news outlets ran a hugely – potentially catastrophically – important story without some basic context that might help readers make sense of it. A third skipped the topic altogether.

This one’s so bad I’m not actually sure what to call it. Malpractice? Ineptitude? Bias by omission? Rank shittiness?

It’s a clear and present danger to democracy, anyhow. I mean, no less than Abraham Lincoln observed that if you want to influence tomorrow’s civic culture you had best pay attention to the classroom of today.

In the name of her anti-government, pro-free-market ideology, U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos is considering rolling back a sweeping, landmark set of civil rights rules laid down by the Obama administration that pushed for an end to disparities in school discipline and the school-to-prison pipeline. Because, you know, protecting the least among us is “government overreach.” Continue reading →

All Hail Michael Walker and His Kings

Belief Gap, Blog, Minneapolis / tagged , / / by

A Race-Equity Success Story from Minneapolis Public Schools

With the river of red ink and controversy issuing forth from Minneapolis Public Schools just at the moment, we could do a lot worse than to celebrate the progress made by Michael Walker and the kings served by his Office of Black Male Student Achievement. So much is going so right on Walker’s watch, and there are multiple reasons to call it out now.

To wit:

  • Not one nickel of the $33 million budget shortfall should be made up by endangering this work.
  • The various philanthropies and advocacy groups that mean to support Minneapolis students should be paying attention to Walker’s effort. Even if his budget survives this season’s bloodletting, his is work that merits serious, sustained funding. Education advocates should be prepared to put a floor under Walker.
  • And if the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers is serious about restorative justice, which they have made a centerpiece of their ongoing contract negotiations with the district, they need to line up behind Walker in a big way. Doing so would send the signal that talk of race equity is more than window-dressing designed to give the talks a gloss of being about kids’ needs.

Continue reading →

Day of the Dead, Mark Twain and Cognitive Magic

Belief Gap, Blog, Fat Paragraph / tagged , , , , , / / by

This is gonna be short, but incredibly sweet.

This here photo is of a Day of the Dead altar built by students, teachers and parents. It seems Mark Twain had a thing about San Antonio – and who doesn’t? – and so the community at Mark Twain Dual Language Academy and Middle School there set out pan dulce and marigolds, among other ofrendas, under the curmodgeon’s portrait.

It was my privilege today to spend time at the school, which features a kind of state-of-the-art bilingual education unique, at least in Texas. This particular school teaches some children who arrived speaking only Spanish, some speaking only English and a sizeable population whose parents lost their Spanish as children because historically in U.S. schools the goal has been to move kids into English-only instruction, and as quickly as possible.

Some of the sweet kids I talked to today – schools in San Antonio enroll kids as young as 3 — may soon be able to speak to their grandparents. Go ahead and let that wash over you a second before we move on to today’s most interesting bit of learning – for me. Continue reading →