Stormy Atlanta outside. Anger and common sense from the delegates inside.

[proud2BlibKansan]

The pounding of thunder outside the Atlanta convention center was so loud it could be heard inside the room where 7,000 delegates and 3,000 non-delegates met in the first large session of the RA.

From the preliminaries I was concerned that a push by the national leadership and President Dennis Van Roekel of the Common Core standards would cause a big unfortunate fight.

I had written earlier about his unscripted belligerent speech to the Retired Conference where he seemed to surrender the union’s core mission of collective bargaining in favor of pushing the Common Core.

In his keynote address to the RA this afternoon DVR was back on message. Now there was no mention of collective bargaining. It was all about “educator-led reform and student success.”

more . . . http://preaprez.wordpress.com/2013/07/03/stormy-atlanta-outside-anger-and-common-sense-from-the-delegates-inside/

[Warpy]

1. Well, that's two minutes I'll never get back

Not spelling out acronyms the first time they appear is a mistake. All the rest of us are left with is alphabet soup and we are as befogged after we've read the article as we were before we started.

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. RA is Representative Assembly

DVR is Dennis Van Roekel(sp?), NEA president.

[Warpy]

3. Thanks!

The author should have bothered to do that.

[proud2BlibKansan]

4. I apologize.

I should have added that to my OP.

[Warpy]

5. An apology from you is unnecessary

The author of the article should have known better.

[mbperrin]

6. Until a large longitudinal study is done tracing students' lives and events in those lives,

then we have no correlation to education, and no reason to believe that every child needs the same curriculum.

We already know that every student cannot be taught in the exact same way, so why worry about a uniform curriculum?

Seems to me we should worry about a curriculum that will enable each student to have success in life, whatever that means, and that's the first task: what is success? I suspect it will not be uniform, either.

Meanwhile, by putting all our eggs in one basket with one or another lockstep curriculum model, we know not what we're throwing away.

Two reasons this study will never happen:
1. Costly and time-consuming
2. Results may gore the wrong ox

Just my 2 cents' worth.

[femmocrat]

7. I don't trust Van Roekel one bit.

Especially after his address to the retirees. Now he is changing his tune? We need better leadership!

BTW: Here is a link to the transcript of DVR's Keynoter: http://www.nea.org/grants/55963.htm

It's very long... I might read it tomorrow. I can't find anything about the address to the retirees though.

[proud2BlibKansan]

8. You're not alone

I'm not an NEA member but that address to the retirees was repulsive. Talk about out of touch.