I will protect your pensions. Nothing about your pension is going to change when I am governor. - Chris Christie, "An Open Letter to the Teachers of NJ" October, 2009

Sunday, April 22, 2012

A Tale of Two Videos

First, watch this (h/t Brian Page):



Then, watch this (finally found a work-safe version):



They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying -- lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want -- they want MORE for themselves and less for everybody else. But I'll tell you what they don't want. They DON'T want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don't want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They're not interested in that, that doesn't help them. That's against their interests. That's right. They don't want people who are smart enough to sit around the kitchen table and figure out how badly they're getting ****** by system that threw them overboard 30 ******' years ago. They don't want that. You know what they want? They want OBEDIENT WORKERS. OBEDIENT WORKERS. People who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork, and just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly ******** jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime, and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it.


If anyone ever questions you as to why corporate interests are trying to take over American education, show them these two videos. A school set up in cubicles is the perfect place to train children to passively accept the norms of corporate culture: a culture that has led to massive income inequity and a political system bought and paid for by our aristocracy.

The rest of the world must be watching this and laughing their butts off. We are destroying ourselves; our competitors and enemies don't even have to lift a finger.

ADDING: More from Brian Page:
Pedagogy that uses technology as the primary leader in instruction sacrifice the critical social interaction that students receive with other students and teachers in promoting the goal to providing educational services at the lowest possible price.  We must ask ourselves what end product do these approaches envision?  Do we want graduates who can comfortably sit in front of a computer screen but freeze up when it comes to looking someone in the eye?  Will graduates of schools using these approaches be able to carry out coherent conversations?  Will they leave school prepared to be able to socially function in an increasingly complicated world? Our responsibility is to prepare our students for the 21st century, and as you can read in this article, many 21st century skills necessary for students to thrive cannot be learned in an online environment.
Yep.


2 comments:

Unknown said...

Carpe Diem is the exact model being pushed by Bill Gates and the Gates foundation and then backed up by companies like Pearson. Gee, nothing about that might benefit Microsoft or an educational software and testing company!!!
This school demographic, despite their claim about being identical, fails to mention several things. This model requires students who WANT to be in school and WANT to learn this way. I'm sure they counsel out the ones who don't "follow" their idea of learning.

Many inner city kids LOVE the time that they get with their teachers because for some of them it is the first time that they actually believe that somebody cares about them. I have had COUNTLESS students who, when left on their own to work on ANYTHING, will just sit there. But the second that I sit down with them individually they amaze me with their work. Then, when I move on to another student that student will either act out or once again sit and do nothing. These types of kids ideally would thrive with a personal teacher. Since that isn't economically feasible, the best we can do for them is to provide small class sizes and teacher's aides. Exactly what we are moving away from.

I just wish that people would open their eyes and start to wonder why would people, who would otherwise see them starve and die without healthcare, want to make sure that they had a quality education. Not only that but one where student "achievement," measured by an explosion of new and EXPENSIVE testing and evaluations, will "rate" the teachers. Christie, the king of frugality (except at lunchtime), has even admitted that this will have huge costs to implement while claiming it will be successful with no proof to back that up.

So let's see if you are paying attention here. In a time where they are crying about budgets, cutting social programs and safety nets, they have set no limits on the amount of money that they're willing to shell out in order to implement unproven reformy. And all that increased spending is supposed to benefit poor kids? ROTFLMAO! This should sound insane to anyone and everyone since it goes against everything that they stand for. WAKE UP PEOPLE!!!

Duke said...

Miss, it's obvious where Christie's going to get the money: "reform" of SFRA. He's going to take all the dough away from the former Abbotts and use it for this.

Just watch: if this goes through, there will not be a cut in property taxes. That money will go to Chris Cerf's friends.

Thx for the comment.