Hmm. Just the guy to put in charge of education

I am starting to think that hope and change vision is really about Chicago style politics.

And you will see no improvement at all. Obama is just another puppet hanging from strings performing for the audience. Obama is just another "personality" to put your "faith" into in this cult of personality.

These government indoctrination centers are designed to dumb people down and make them obedient slaves to government and submit to its mindless dogma. These government indoctrination centers are there to train people to not think for themselves and submit to some "authority" or be punnished.

Why not pick someone from the best performing school district?

Too obvious I guess.

GeorgeKillen said:

Fox Story.

Obama picks Arne Duncan to head department of education

Awesome. Thankfully President-Elect Obama will bring us the Change We Need.

Have a nice day.

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Its the Conservative News Service now renamed the Cyber News Service. I wouldn't expect them to have integrity, and low and behold they don't. What is 17% is proficiency representing "[FONT=VJHAAA+TradeGothicLTStd][FONT=VJHAAA+TradeGothicLTStd]solid academic performance. Students reaching this level have demonstrated competency over challenging subject matter" [/FONT][/FONT]which is something more then the 44% who have a basic or above 8th grade reading level.

HERE pg 9 (warning PDF)

Have a nice day

Looks like the new administration isn't going to lay the 'blame the schools' game.

HerbieHeadley said:

I am starting to think that hope and change vision is really about Chicago style politics.

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And what proof do you have of that?
Ringo

So what you're saying is a decrease in of 10% of children below basic with an increase in both children at grade level and above grade level is a bad thing? What you're also saying is that these statistically significant improvements in performance are bad? Moreover, have the places that have higher scores had the same changes? It's sad when people misuse statistics to make false arguments. A 10% change in 5 years is a very good thing, so this thread fails miserably.

Steve Petersen said:

Why not pick someone from the best performing school district?

Too obvious I guess.

Click to expand...

Yes, it is too obvious.

You see, someone in charge of the best performing school district may just be lucky. They probably work in an educated middle-class district with few students from underpriviliged homes, few English-as-a-second-language students. They probably have a much larger budget to cover fewer students. And, there's a good chance the parents take a very active part in their children's education.

It's suprising how much parents take credit for the positive things in a school district, but never for the negative things. Yet parent participation and parents continuing to educate themselves are important parts of school's success.

The American public is all too willing to blame all problems with students on schools, and credit all positive upturns in school performance on parenting. The truth is that education is underrated in the USA. Teaching is an underappreciated and underpaid profession. Teachers are often seen as rivals of parental guidance, rather than partners. Knowledge and wisdom are valued less than wealth and prestige.

America wants world-class public schools without going through the process of creating world-class public schools through improved and extended professional educational training, smaller class sizes, increased classroom hours, increased parent participation, and increased flexibility. Guess what: without the improvents, American schools are going to stagnate.

Bill Ayers was available. He should have picked him.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Family/WM1.cfm

The only chance for education in the country is to focus on the family and forget the programs based garbage that's not working. You may find a sector where programs seem to be working, but without looking at the right data the correct source of the improvement will not be known.

Steve Petersen said:

Why not pick someone from the best performing school district?

Too obvious I guess.

Click to expand...

The reason some school districts are "best performing" is due to the affluence of the children attending same.

GeorgeKillen said:

Interesting. Point.

I wonder if this guy knows William Ayers.

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One would certainly hope so.

"Interests
guns
explosives
goats
wearing women's clothing to escape"

An interesting list, to say the least.

You're sure you are here for serious discussion, and not just "for teh lulz"?

jamesrwright3 said:

Bill Ayers was available. He should have picked him.

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Ayers faces the more daunting task of heading the task force investigating the subversives in the Talk Radio market and maintaining national security in the face of their misdeeds.

GeorgeKillen said:

So basically most students still don't test at their grade level.

Have a nice day.

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Which means the source of the OP, and your OP itself is a lie.
If one is to critique someone, accurate facts are usually nice.




Have a nice day

RacismIsBad said:

So what you're saying is a decrease in of 10% of children below basic with an increase in both children at grade level and above grade level is a bad thing? What you're also saying is that these statistically significant improvements in performance are bad? Moreover, have the places that have higher scores had the same changes? It's sad when people misuse statistics to make false arguments. A 10% change in 5 years is a very good thing, so this thread fails miserably.

Click to expand...

10% is better then declining, but most improved 18-20%(or was it national average? I thought it was by similar sized schools.. Probably the others made other(better?) changes.
My only question is, is this the best improvement in all the areas of disadvantaged students? Or was there a better person. If someoone better, why wasn't that person picked?

Texas Lynn said:

The reason some school districts are "best performing" is due to the affluence of the children attending same.

Click to expand...

Some. Some poor neighborhoods did well too.

The thread should be asking is this the best choice, rather then attacking the pick. Or if attacking the post, show how this is a "who you know, pick"