"Least influential of education's most influential information sources."
-- Education Week Research Center
"full of very lively short items and is always on top of the news...He gets extra points for skewering my high school rating system"
-- Jay Mathews, The Washington Post
"a daily dose of information from the education policy world, blended with a shot of attitude and a dash of humor"
-- Education Week
"unexpectedly entertaining"..."tackle[s] a potentially mindfogging subject with cutting clarity... they're reading those mushy, brain-numbing education stories so you don't have to!"
-- Mickey Kaus
"a very smart blog... this is the site to read"
-- Ryan Lizza
"everyone who's anyone reads Eduwonk"
-- Richard Colvin
"designed to cut through the fog and direct specialists and non-specialists alike to the center of the liveliest and most politically relevant debates on the future of our schools"
-- The New Dem Daily
"peppered with smart and witty comments on the education news of the day"
-- Education Gadfly
"don't hate Eduwonk cuz it's so good"
-- Alexander Russo, This Week In Education
"the morning's first stop for education bomb-throwers everywhere"
-- Mike Antonucci, Intercepts
"…the big dog on the ed policy blog-ck…"
-- Michele McLaughlin
"I check Eduwonk several times a day, especially since I cut back on caffeine"
-- Joe Williams
"...one of the few bloggers who isn't completely nuts"
-- Mike Petrilli, Thomas B. Fordham Foundation
"I have just three 'go to' websites: The Texas Legislature, Texas Longhorn sports, and Eduwonk"
-- Sandy Kress
"penetrating analysis in a lively style on a wide range of issues"
-- Walt Gardner
"Fabulous"
-- Education Week's Alyson Klein
"thugs"
-- Susan Ohanian
Smart List: 60 People Shaping the Future of K-12 Education
Yes, when parents and teachers team up as they did at 20th Street School in Los Angeles, they can force a district to make important changes. It’s significant that the parents at this school asked that all the teachers remain. In my many years of experience as a teacher, I found that the vast majority of parents appreciate the teachers in the schools attended by their children. As we’ve seen by the vast number (around 97%) of teachers who are graded “effective” or “very effective” in places like New Jersey and Florida (same as it’s always been) the majority of American teachers are doing an excellent job and have been for many years. That’s why our adults are so successful in innovation, technology, medicine, government, sports, arts, business, etc.
Parents know that when a school is “bad” it’s almost always because of unresponsive administrators and scant resources. My hope is that sometime in the near future, schools will be run by parents and teachers. Also, parents in affluent districts have long known how to force districts to make needed changes. Other nations know that our educational system is among the best in the world and that’s why so many of the world’s wealthy send their high school and college students to the USA to study.
Are you trying to denigrate our schools and our teachers? If so, you need to ask yourself why because it’s a terrible thing to do to our children and our nation. There are better ways to make a living.
Thank you for your affirming reply. I enjoyed and taught in the inner city for about 10 years but left primarily because the opportunities for advancement were limited.
It is also interesting to note how many doctors and professors today are foreign born but practicing here now. I don’t know what % of these attended U.S. colleges but I know that some of the best were schooled in universities such as Capetown, South Africa.
Good reply Bob….
From my line of work, I would say it was evasive. Of course, from your line of work, evasion is a bullet for the positive.
Why not join the real world of science where your kind of edu-speak is as foreign as a turtle that can talk?
Bobbie, IF our schools are so doggone bad, then why is my alma-mater, UC Berkeley, now ranked #2 in the world in applied mathematics? And why can the UC system now fill EVERY SINGLE SEAT with out of state tuition from the Pacific Rim?
And why are those seats also filled with foreign students who came to the state under visa, attended our local public high schools and then matriculated to the UC system?
Frankly, your anecdotal narratives are tiresome.
“I left the inner city because there were no promotion opportunities…”
So…. you taught inner city because it was good for your career.
That says it all. Btw, ten years in a specific occupation is p– in a bucket.
Are you anti-teacher? Who cares. You have chip on your shoulder the size of a 4X4.
Here is an idea. Go take two years worth of calculus based physics and then do statics and fluid dynamics, and then come back here.
Please.
Let’s talk about those foreign doctors…
I would EXPECT you to know that they can get a visa to this country, WITH a path to citizenship, IF they will work in a low income area.
I would EXPECT you to know that plenty of USA med. students go to foreign countries to study medicine, and then come back to the states to complete their clinicals.
I would EXPECT you to know that.
I will be as blunt as possible, folks like specialize in evasion. And in my line of honest, rigorous work, that gets people and societies destroyed.
The most nauseating thing about you and your posse, is your complete lack of honesty. It is alarming, and mirrors the decay of our market system and business leaders.
1 attrite in physics or math is the equivalent of 50 attires in the disciplines most edu-reformers studies.
There is absolutely NO equivalence between every single discipline and every single subject. Some ARE more DIFFICULT that others.
And right now, the edu-reform debate is NOT attracting or keeping our best and brightest in math and science.
But….you guys simply do not want to think about that.
Listening to you guys is much like calling AT&T to figure out a bill.