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Outrages

  

9486 in the collection  

    Dancing with NBC

    While eliminating parents and teachers from the panel, not to mention removing critical comments from the website, NBC pretends that since Diane Ravitch is unavailable, there's no one who could speak against current education deform.

    Here's one concerned person's interchange with NBC. She just doesn't take 'no' for an answer.

    by Sahila

    PART ONE:

    Over the past 48 hours, I've been involved in a little dance with NBC.

    My problem with the fake national education SUMMIT NBC is hosting next week is that the 'invitation-only' panel is stacked with pro education privatisation reformers and not a parent in sight.... nor any working teachers...

    The guest list is here:

    Guests range from Michelle Rhee to Joel Klein to Arne Duncan; the guests are all Broad or Gates Foundation people or charter school chain owners.

    National education system reform under discussion - where are the parents?

    And look at the Sponsors:


  • University of Phoenix

  • Members of Project American Express

  • Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

  • The Broad Foundation

  • W. K. Kellogg Foundation

  • Marvell

  • BlackBerry

  • Microsoft

  • Raytheon

  • Scholastic

  • American Airlines


    • All have a vested interest in making sure this education 'deform' agenda implementation is completed.

    I challenged NBC on why its leaving out of the discussion the biggest stakeholders in this equation, and so far, no response....

    I pointed them in the direction of highly informed, articulate people who were well qualified to participate in this 'dialogue' -- no response except to block me....

    Yesterday they were trying to buy my silence by offering an op ed space on the Education Nation website, today they've unfriended me and taken all my critical comments (and the research and references supporting those comments) off their pages...

    PART TWO:

    Here's the chronology, starting yesterday morning (Wednesday 15 Sept)...

    Just finished an interesting (power and control) phone conversation with Ryan Osborn, the producer of this website/programme.

    I couldn't get him to agree to put parents on the panel (he said they tried to get Diane Ravitch but she wasn't available. I suggested Prof Zhao as an alternative) but to buy me off and shut me up they've offered me an op ed piece on their website.

    Who has anything they want to say??????? No limit, just no slander!

    Here's what I wrote back (on the Education Nation facebook page): "I'd like to thank Ryan at NBC for contacting me and having a telephone conversation a few minutes ago. Ryan and I have something in common - we are both journalists with an ethical responsibility for providing both sides of an discussion/issue."

    While Ryan said he/NBC had heard our concerns he could not offer parents (the largest stakeholders in this education reform equation) and other critics of the education 'reform' agenda a place on the panel.

    He said that Diane Ravitch had been invited but was not free on these dates. I suggested he invite Professor Zhao - he did not give me an answer one way or another.

    He did very generously offer me the opportunity to write an op-ed piece for the Education Nation website, which I will gratefully accept... though I did point out that an op-ed hidden somewhere on a website that people have to search to find, is no match in terms of airing contrary perspectives for the public exposure the very wealthy education reformers will be getting from this summit.

    Sadly, most of us parents around the country do not have the billions of dollars that the Gates, Broad and Milken Foundations and Raytheon, Phoenix University and Microsoft etc have to throw at this effort to mould and control the discussion... But I will take what I can get, albeit a very small bone....

    Ryan did give me some feedback I shall bear in mind -- he felt my many posts were repetitive, intimidating and shutting out of other points of view. I will think on that -- though how that is possible on a facebook page, which has no limit on comment postings, I don't know....

    And I then added the comment:
    I just had feedback from someone in contact with Diane Ravitch that while she is in California on the dates of the Summit, she did offer to provide a taped segment as her contribution to the debate... apparently that was not good enough... quite sad, really...

    — Sahila
    Education Notes Online
    2010-09-18
    http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2010/09/leonie-smackdown-redux.html?showComment=1284666526382#c4962144800806016415

    INDEX OF OUTRAGES

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