primitives trash-talk 0bozo's Secretary of Education

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024338994

Oh my.

Where's the dysmenopausal Kansas school teacher, Anne, when one needs her?

"Bold" as in original.

madfloridian (79,096 posts)   Thu Jan 16, 2014, 12:20 AM

Arne Duncan "teachers in America often come from the bottom of the academic barrel"

He is fighting back hard now against teachers and bloggers who question his policies. Some of his words are truly rude and full of contempt toward public school teachers.
 
Have you noticed that there are few if any Democratic leaders speaking out against his hateful attacks on public education? This is the guy in charge of our education policies, and he can barely control himself when he speaks about these schools.
 
This is the hardest thing for me as a retired teacher to watch. Our Democrats refusing to support public education. It simply blows my mind.
 
Arne Duncan School Expectations Are Too Low in the United States

The former head of the Chicago public school system, Duncan told parents that there is a sense of complacency regarding education in the United States, but also a lack Duncan said, but also a lack of action by politicians.
 
"Both South Korean and U.S. citizens believe that the caliber of teacher matters tremendously, and the great teachers make a huge difference in children's lives," Duncan said. "The difference is: they act on their belief. We don't. We talk the talk, and they walk the walk."
 
While teachers in America often come from the bottom of the academic barrel are disproportionately teaching students from disadvantaged backgrounds, Duncan said, teachers in South Korea are selected from the top of the class and are rewarded for working with low-income students.
 
He has been showing his disregard for those of us who are or have been in the field of education. He actually used the words armchair pundits.
 
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan spoke publicly of Diane Ravitch in an interview in 2011, where he said: "Diane Ravitch is in denial and she is insulting all of the hardworking teachers, principals and students all across the country who are proving her wrong every day,"
 
Yesterday he expanded a bit on this sentiment. Though he did not mention Ravitch by name, he seemed to have her in mind when labeling his critics "armchair pundits" who are "so supremely confident in their perspective that they have simply stopped listening to people with a different viewpoint."
 
Those we are supposed to be listening to are the very ones profiting from the taxpayers' money which is being diverted from public schools to charter schools, and now even to private religious schools in the form of vouchers. He has turned education over to those who know the least about it, and he is fighting back against the rest of us.

TFA blogger Gary Rubenstein recalls some of Arne Duncan's quotes which indicate his lack of true understanding of education...to put it mildly.
 
The lack-of-wit and lack-of-wisdom of Arne Duncan

Some of the quotes:

“I see extraordinary schools where 95 percent of children live below the poverty line, where 95 percent are graduating, and 90 percent of those who graduate are going on to college.“
 
In almost every case those percentages have been disproven. They are words of charter schools with high attrition rates bragging about untrue statistics.
 
“The vast majority who drop out of high school drop out not because it’s too hard but because it’s too easy.”
 
Baloney.

“if we had 95,000 good principals, we’d be done.”
 
That's not a very intelligent comment.

“I think the best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans was Hurricane Katrina.”
 
There is nothing to be said to that.

If he wants to get his agenda through, he must first discredit the public school system. Looks to me like the man the president put in charge of public schools is doing a very good of it.

Lots of primitive comments, most of them utterly predictable.

nadinbrzezinski (128,996 posts)    Thu Jan 16, 2014, 12:37 AM

3. I considered teaching

but all the "reforms" made me turn away in disgust to be honest.

Question.

An honest question, sincerely asked, as I really don't know.

What subject does one imagine the cousin would teach?

[Ralph Wiggum]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024338994


Question.

An honest question, sincerely asked, as I really don't know.

What subject does one imagine the cousin would teach?

Anything she wants, because she knows everything! 

[Dori]

I'm no fan of Duncan's, but there was a report out recently stating that getting a teaching degree is like the fall back position when students can't make the grade in other majors.

[Karin]

The fact that nadin is not teaching children is proof positive that God's hand was at work. 

[DumbAss Tanker]

He doesn't have to look any farther than his own party's reliance on education industry unions for political money and power to find the reason.

[franksolich]

He doesn't have to look any farther than his own party's reliance on education industry unions for political money and power to find the reason.

I'm appalled at the number of primitives who suggest teachers need to be paid more, to attract the best and the brightest.

That's something that's never going to happen; up the pay, and teachers such as Anne and Pamela stay in the career, being displaced by no one.  All we'd be doing is paying lousy teachers more money.

[tanstaafl]

I'm no fan of Duncan's, but there was a report out recently stating that getting a teaching degree is like the fall back position when students can't make the grade in other majors.

It's the fallback if they can't cut the muster far a Business or Comm Degree. Which is where all the C students congregate.

[thundley4]

Don't most states require a degree in education, versus a degree in the subject they teach?

[Skul]

<snipage>
Question.

An honest question, sincerely asked, as I really don't know.

What subject does one imagine the cousin would teach?

South American history, of course. 

[98ZJUSMC]

Arne Duncan "teachers in America often come from the bottom of the academic barrel"

I think that is the most truthful thing I have heard a Marxist ever say.  Of course, the reasons behind that are completely wrong, but hey....whatever.

I'm no fan of Duncan's, but there was a report out recently stating that getting a teaching degree is like the fall back position when students can't make the grade in other majors.

I've read that, too.  I want to say over at Instapundit, but I can't remember.

[Wineslob]

What subject does one imagine the cousin would teach?

Armpit hair braiding.

[USA4ME]

"Both South Korean and U.S. citizens believe that the caliber of teacher matters tremendously, and the great teachers make a huge difference in children's lives," Duncan said. "The difference is: they act on their belief. We don't. We talk the talk, and they walk the walk."
 
While teachers in America often come from the bottom of the academic barrel are disproportionately teaching students from disadvantaged backgrounds, Duncan said, teachers in South Korea are selected from the top of the class and are rewarded for working with low-income students.

Not sure what the madfloridiot primitive is talking about since that is most definitely a Democrat/liberal position. Problem is even if you take the best teachers and give them additional incentives to work with those the gov't views as being from "disadvantaged backgrounds" it won't change until the culture in those communities change. And cultivating that culture has nothing to do with money and everything to do with those in that circumstance having a proper attitude regardless of their situation and conditions.

.

[thundley4]

Not sure what the madfloridiot primitive is talking about since that is most definitely a Democrat/liberal position. Problem is even if you take the best teachers and give them additional incentives to work with those the gov't views as being from "disadvantaged backgrounds" it won't change until the culture in those communities change. And cultivating that culture has nothing to do with money and everything to do with those in that circumstance having a proper attitude regardless of their situation and conditions.

.

That's the truth. Children that want to learn, and parents that want those children to learn will make it happen even in the crappiest of schools.  Right now, the black culture has a high disdain for education and all the best teachers and money in the world won't help with that problem.

[HawkHogan]

There are teachers in South Korea who make millions of dollars a year throughout online tutoring programs.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887324635904578639780253571520

It's amazing when a country attempts to attract the best teachers, instead of being boggled down in teacher union BS. 

[jukin]

I know some teachers and they are very good and very smart, hell even my friends. The problem in teaching is the unions. Only the unions. Where else can people get a guarantee for life, good wages, a pension of 1055 of last years earnings at 55, and 3 months of vacation with not a single wit of worry about doing well in their profession? Pretty much nowhere else.

Unions, particularaly teachers unions exist only to make the bottom of the barrel unfireable.

In my book 80% of teachers = good. 100% of teachers unions = bad, terrible, horrendous.

[HawkHogan]

I know some teachers and they are very good and very smart, hell even my friends. The problem in teaching is the unions. Only the unions. Where else can people get a guarantee for life, good wages, a pension of 1055 of last years earnings at 55, and 3 months of vacation with not a single wit of worry about doing well in their profession? Pretty much nowhere else.

Unions, particularaly teachers unions exist only to make the bottom of the barrel unfireable.

In my book 80% of teachers = good. 100% of teachers unions = bad, terrible, horrendous.

The unions also have helped increase administrative positions by 700 percent since 1950. 

Such a farce.

http://dailycaller.com/2013/03/28/study-school-administrative-bloat-increases-700-percent-since-1950/

[BlueStateSaint]

I know some teachers and they are very good and very smart, hell even my friends. The problem in teaching is the unions. Only the unions. Where else can people get a guarantee for life, good wages, a pension of 1055 of last years earnings at 55, and 3 months of vacation with not a single wit of worry about doing well in their profession? Pretty much nowhere else.

Unions, particularaly teachers unions exist only to make the bottom of the barrel unfireable.

In my book 80% of teachers = good. 100% of teachers unions = bad, terrible, horrendous.

Agree 100%.  I have teachers among my friends.  They genuinely care about the children they teach.  It's the unions that are the culprit.

[GOBUCKS]

The unions also have helped increase administrative positions by 700 percent since 1950.

When I was in high school, we had a principal, an assistant principal (a new position that had just been established) and a secretary. Enrollment was a little less than a thousand kids.

Of course there was no teachers' union.

I'm not aware of anything that needed to be done that wasn't done.