Reprinted from dianeravitch.net
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's children will attend the private University of Chicago Lab School, where his wife works.
Of course, everyone is free to send their children wherever they wish. What's interesting about Duncan choosing this school is that it does not practice any of the policies that Duncan has promulgated. It is a progressive school, founded by John Dewey. No Common Core. No evaluation of teachers by test scores. No performance pay.
Duncan attended the prestigious University of Chicago Lab School. The teachers are unionized. President Obama sent his daughters there. Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his children there.
Julie Vassilatos, a parent activist in Chicago, notes that Duncan has chosen a school that is free of any of Duncan's influence. This is how she describes the Lab School:
Lab is an excellent, well-resourced private school with a rich arts curriculum, small classes, entire rooms devoted to holding musical instruments, a unionized teaching staff that you pretty much never hear anyone suggesting should be replaced by untrained temp workers, and not one single standardized test until students reach age 14.
In other words, Lab School has to date experienced not one ounce of influence from Arne Duncan's Department of Ed. Not one ounce of impact from his policies.
Not.
One.
He's choosing to keep his kids out of the system that requires nearly continuous standardized testing each year: three iterations of the PARCC, three of the NWEA MAP, the REACH Performance Tasks; the NAEP, TRC + DIBELS, mClass Math, and IDEL specially for littles; and EXPLORE, PLAN, COMPASS, and STAR for bigs.
I know, he's told us, like a father, it's okay. Our kids can do this. It's what's best. It's challenging. What kind of message does it send our children if we object to a challenge? He's gotten this narrative out far and wide, so that folks who don't have kids in school now can often be seen saying things in newspaper comments sections like, "Why can't these whiners just shut up and take the test?" or "What a bunch of weaklings! These kids and parents don't have any spines anymore if they don't want to take the test!"
You'll note, in these kinds of comments sections, that it is always the test. As if there is one.
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