9486 in the collection
Barack Obama's Remarks in St. Paul. . . On Education
Ohanian Comment: Marion Brady offers a serious challenge, one we all must take to heart.
Marion Brady Comment: I've spun out my share of words in print raising questions about the
real motives and agendas of Lou Gerstner, Bill Gates, Lee Iacoca, members of
the Business Roundtable, the US Chamber of Commerce, and others who became
instant authorities on matters educational after A Nation At Risk.
I've never had a conversation with any of the "big" players, and I
don't doubt that the profit potential plays an important role in at least
some of the policies they push, but in my considerable contact with "mid-sized" ones in my part
of Florida -- business people, media types, state and local politicians,
I've never seen evidence of anything more sinister than ignorance in their
stands on matters educational.
I also visit classrooms, talk to lots of teachers and administrators,
and monitor listservs of working classroom teachers, and see plenty of
evidence that a discouraging number of them are no more sophisticated in
matters educational than the business and industry "experts" and are even
less interested in examining the assumptions that drive their practices.
I think it's entirely possible that some really smart and devious types
sold on the Milton Friedman and reading Ayn Rand deliberately engineered
NCLB to undermine public education. However, I also think the "prior" enemy
is us. How many generations have we been spouting off about the evils of
the "industrial" model of education, about the need to engage kids in
"higher order" thinking skills, individualize instruction, and stimulate
imagination and creativity? Are we any nearer delivering on that rhetoric
than we were when Whitehead addressed the Mathematical Association of
England in 1916 saying that we weren't?
It seems to me that the beliefs and assumptions about education held by
Kennedy, Miller, Obama, Clinton, etc. are those we've programmed into them.
Why should we expect them to approach the institution with imagination and
insight when most "insiders" also think the path to quality lies in merely
doing more diligently what we've always done?
The following transcript is from Senator Barack Obama’s speech to supporters on the last night of voting in the primary campaign . . on education.
And maybe if John McCain spent some time in the schools of South Carolina or St. Paul, Minnesota, or where he spoke tonight in New Orleans, Louisiana, he'd understand that we can't afford to leave the money behind for No Child Left Behind; that we owe it to our children to invest in early-childhood education; and recruit an army of new teachers and give them better pay and more support; and finally decide that, in this global economy, the chance to get a college education should not be a privilege for the few, but a birthright of every American.
That's the change we need in America. That's why I'm running for president of the United States. . . .
— Barack Obama with comment by Marion Brady
New York Times
2008-06-03
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
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