Don't we need more Galileos?

What Aristotle Knew

“It Is the Mark of an Educated Mind 

To Be Able To Entertain a Thought Without Accepting It.”

 Ok, Aristotle wasn’t always right, but if it wasn’t for his quote, Galileo would never have proven him wrong about objects falling at rates according to their weight. Imagine the spectators at the Tower of Pisa when he dropped a rifle ball and a cannonball, and they landed simultaneously.  He entertained Aristotelian thought without accepting it.

Galileo asked critical essential questions of Aristotle’s theory.How is the motion of falling objects determined? Of course, one question led to a series of interrelated subsidiary questions that needed to be asked in order to answer the big essential questions. Does the weight of objects really impact the rate of their fall? Why didn’t Aristotle actually test his theory? What was he thinking?

The best questions to develop natural, critical, thinking skills naturally build on our natural, childlike curiosity. Naturally. Critical-thinking ability depends upon a person’s ability to answer questions by manipulating information, rather than being manipulated by scaffolded questions leading to information overload. The distinction between those who can solve a problem and work their way out of a situation is in the ability to ask the right, critical questions to identify the problem, and then ask what it takes to solve it.

If students practice how ask and answer those questions because teachers expect it of them, then we won’t have need test prep for those pitifully constructed standardized tests. Why? Because the kids have been doing it every day.

Now it is our turn to be Galilean. We must ask of the corporate reformers, “What were they thinking?”

“Who’s on first?” “Naturally.”

HOW TFA MIGHT TEACH GALILEO

http://dcgmentor.wordpress.com/2014/12/04/what-aristotle-knew/

Was Orwell Clairvoyant about the Garner incident?

This morning an article by Jim Dwyer in the New York Times took a different approach to the Garner grand jury decision. In it he tells of a chance meeting on an “A” train in Harlem with a fellow passenger, Galvin Harris. Harris noticed that Dwyer had a print out of a 1936 George Orwell Essay entitled “Shooting An Elephant”. The conversation continued because Harris had read it in college. He observed, “It’s a good analogy.”

Written in first person, Orwell’s description of how it felt to be a “sub-divisional police officer of the town”, a white man in Burma, clearly expressed both his fear and loathing of his position. “All this was perplexing and upsetting.” “As for the job I was doing, I hated it more bitterly than I can perhaps make clear. In a job like that you see the dirty work of Empire at close quarters.” I have often heard my police buddies say that many days being on the job were like “looking up the asshole of NY.”

Orwell’s policeman says,

“All I knew was that I was stuck between my hatred of the empire I served and my rage against the evil-spirited little beasts who tried to make my job impossible. With one part of my mind I thought of the British Raj as an unbreakable tyranny, as something clamped down, in saecula saeculorum, upon the will of prostrate peoples; with another part I thought that the greatest joy in the world would be to drive a bayonet into a Buddhist priest’s guts. Feelings like these are the normal by-products of imperialism; ask any Anglo-Indian official, if you can catch him off duty.”

Clearly the British Raj is a far cry from NYC. However his turn of the eloquent phrase, “evil-spirited little beasts” isn’t that far removed from what I have often heard police mutter when they think they are out of earshot or criticism, “fukn N….rs.”  I have also heard a few choice phrases uttered about a couple of Harlem “priests,” especially one known for his activism.

In Orwell’s story, a suspect domesticated elephant had been “looting” local areas and had “apparently” killed a local man. The protagonist had gone after it, first with just an idea to scare it with a weapon inadequate to use for deadly force. But after seeing the dead man, he switched to a weapon designed to inflict deadly force.

Next comes the crux of the actual story.

“The elephant was standing eight yards from the road, his left side towards us. He took not the slightest notice of the crowd’s approach. He was tearing up bunches of grass, beating them against his knees to clean them and stuffing them into his mouth.”

“As soon as I saw the elephant I knew with perfect certainty that I ought not to shoot him. It is a serious matter to shoot a working elephant – it is comparable to destroying a huge and costly piece of machinery – and obviously one ought not to do it if it can possibly be avoided. And at that distance, peacefully eating, the elephant looked no more dangerous than a cow. I thought then and I think now that his attack of “must” was already passing off; in which case he would merely wander harmlessly about until the mahout (his handler and owner) came back and caught him. Moreover, I did not in the least want to shoot him. I decided that I would watch him for a little while to make sure that he did not turn savage again, and then go home.”

But his focus changes.

“But at that moment I glanced round at the crowd that had followed me. And suddenly I realized that I should have to shoot the elephant after all. The people expected it of me and I had got to do it; Here was I, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd – seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in reality I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces behind.”

This next two comment resonate greatly.

“I perceived in this moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the conventionalized figure of a sahib: A sahib has got to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind and do definite things.”

“For at that moment, with the crowd watching me, I was not afraid in the ordinary sense, as I would have been if I had been alone. A white man mustn’t be frightened in front of “natives”; and so, in general, he isn’t frightened.”

“Afterwards, of course, there were endless discussions about the shooting of the elephant. [L] egally I had done the right thing, for a mad elephant has to be killed, like a mad dog, if its owner fails to control it. Among the Europeans opinion was divided…. And afterwards I was very glad that the coolie had been killed; it put me legally in the right and it gave me a sufficient pretext for shooting the elephant.”

The officer in Orwell’s essay never intended to kill the elephant, yet he did. He felt pressure to. There is no way to discover the intent of Officer Daniel Pantaleo. His lawyer claims, ” His client told the Staten Island grand jury that he never intended to injure or harm anyone.”

Clearly though he, as was Orwell’s protagonist, a product of the “empire” and his prejudices about the “local natives”. He was also a product of psychological pressures to perform what he felt was an expected duty and maybe he felt, as did Orwell’s man,

“I often wondered whether any of the others grasped that I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool.”

http://dcgmentor.wordpress.com/2014/12/05/was-orwell-clairvoyant-in-his-1936-essay-shooting-an-elephant/

New York Charter School Audit Finds $28,000,000 Wasted

a clip from the Daily News:

. . . The state controller’s office and state Education Department have audited 62 of New York’s 248 charter schools, according to Serrette’s report. All told, Serrette’s group estimates wasteful spending at charters could cost taxpayers more than $50 million per year.

Eighteen audits targeted charters in New York City, representing about 9% of the 197 charters in the five boroughs. Each audit found issues.

A 2012 audit found Brooklyn Excelsior Charter School was paying $800,000 in excess annual fees to the management company that holds its building’s lease.

A 2012 audit of Williamsburg Charter High School revealed school officials overbilled the city for operations and paid contractors for $200,800 in services that should have been provided by the school’s network.

A 2007 audit of the Carl C. Icahn Charter School determined the Bronx school spent more than $1,288 on alcohol for staff parties and failed to account for another $102,857 in expenses.
The city spends more than $1.29 billion on charters annually.

State Education Department officials and a spokesman for the state controller’s office declined to comment on Serrette’s report.

Northeast Charter School Network CEO Kyle Rosenkrans said the schools already get plenty of oversight because they are subject to audits and must have their charters renewed at least every five years.

“Charter schools are the most accountable public schools there are,” the charter advocate said. “If we don’t perform or we mismanage our finances, we get shut down.

Profiting from Preschool

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 Comment posted in response to "Poll: Californians strongly in favor of preschool" Education Week December 4, 2014 and in response to "Poll shows support for high-quality preschool," EdSource, Dec, 2, 2014.

Preschool would be great if it were really preschool. But it is now "school." Preschool is now "academic," filled with academic standards and tests.  Every test given, (excuse me, every "assessment") is profit for the .001%. (Eager parents, in fact, can download preschool tests (see e.g.  tests available at the oddly named "have fun teaching" website: http://www.havefunteaching.com/worksheets/test-practice/preschool-test-practice.)

I suspect that at least some of the pious pronouncements we hear about the importance of preschool are because more children in preschool means more tests are given, and this increases profits for the testing industry.

Posted at:

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/early_years/2014/12/poll_californians_strongly_in_favor_of_preschool.html?cmp=ENL-EU-NEWS3

and: http://edsource.org/2014/poll-shows-support-for-high-quality-preschool/70548#comment-16535  

This post at: http://skrashen.blogspot.com/2014/12/profiting-from-preschool.html

Charter School Crime Log Update

Rudd Angry That U of Memphis Faculty Are Not Eagerly Embracing His Privatization Plans

Two days ago the University of Memphis Faculty Senate gave a big thumbs down to President Rudd's private sweetheart deal with the bogus teacher prep outfit, Relay School of Education.  Not only did Rudd act as if he could disregard the faculty governance structure of the university, but he also seems to think that the College of Education does not need to vote on a plan to create a teacher prep caste system inside that department.

So far Rudd's only rationale for the racist plan is that it is for the poor black kids of Memphis.  Is there some virtue that can be linked to offering prospective urban teachers Relay's dumbed-down test preparation curriculum that focuses on how to apply thumb screws to children living in poverty to produce higher test scores, and thus justify the elimination of legitimate teacher preparation programs across the state of Tennessee?

Below is the letter from Rudd setting out the sweetheart deal.  Does anyone else think public money should handed over to charter profiteers and hedge fund operators? Click on document to enlarge.

Student Privacy and Opting Out

from Peggy Robertson:

Student Privacy Matters has recently posted information to support parents in understanding how they can exercise their rights to protect their children’s privacy under federal law.  As we have reviewed the documents there are a couple things that stand out as absolutely urgent for all parents to know. First, for parents of children under age 13, you have the right to review and REFUSE any online programs and online testing that your child is using – programs in which your child is entering the data (this does NOT include online programs the teacher is using to enter student data). The Children’s Online Privacy Protecting Act (COPPA) allows parents to control what information is collected online from their children twelve and under. Therefore, as a parent, you have a right to find out what information is being collected, you can review what information is being collected, and you can REFUSE to allow your child to participate in the online program.  You can simply opt your child out of the program – or the online test. . . .

Read the rest here.

Scraping Off the Hedge Fund Scum

 

Anticorruption activist Zephyr Teachout in a protest on the the steps of the Tweed Courthouse in New York City. Molly Hensley-Clancy for BuzzFeed News

From BuzzFeed:

A small group of parents and activists targeted hedge fund billionaires Dan Loeb, Paul Singer, and Paul Tudor Jones in a protest today over New York state education funding.

Led by Zephyr Teachout, an anti-corruption activist who ran against Andrew Cuomo in the recent New York governor’s race, the protestors decried the political influence of New York’s wealthiest financiers on public education — namely through the billionaires’ longstanding political and financial support of charter schools.

The group’s rallying point was a rumored special session of the New York legislature, which Teachout said was likely to take place next week. At that session, Teachout said, Governor Cuomo will push to raise the maximum number of charter schools allowed by the state, at the urging of charter advocates like Loeb. If the cap is not raised, as it was in 2010, there will likely be just 17 slots left for new charter schools in New York City.

At the protest, drenched in freezing rain on the steps of Tweed Courthouse in New York City, demonstrators held signs printed with the faces of hedge fund billionaires. Beneath were the campaign contributions each had made in New York, mostly to pro-charter advocates. Protestors chanted, “Hey hey, ho ho, these hedge funders have got to go,” and “Hey governor one percent, who do you represent?”

Teachout said today’s protest would be the beginning of a week-long effort to fight against increasing the charter cap and advocate for more funding of public schools. In coordination, she released her first white paper, “Corruption in Education: Hedge Funds and the Takeover of New York Schools.”

Teachout pointed to the pro-charter group Families for Excellent Schools, which spent almost $6 million in a lobbying blitz in the first half of 2014, largely on a fight for charter school space, which the group won. The New York Teachers’ union spent $2.6 million in the same period.

As with most education debates in New York City, rhetoric at the protest quickly turned to Eva Moskowitz and Success Academy, a charter school that has long been a lightning rod for pro- and anti-charter advocates. Moskowitz’s charter school group is poised for a massive expansion in New York City, adding 14 schools in the next two years and bringing Success to a total of 50 schools in the city.

Loeb, the CEO of Third Point Capital, has been an outspoken supporter of charter schools and especially of Success Academy, where he chairs the board of directors. He has a net worth of $1.5 billion. Tudor Jones, Singer, and the billionaire Carl Icahn have all prominently backed other charter schools and legislation. . . .

Einstein Never Would Have Passed a Standardized Test

Albert Einstein might or might not have had dyslexia but he didn't do well with the  standardized curriculum in Germany primarily because of its authoritarianism . That's a fact and his parents left Germany because they didn't like the rote memorization and mindlessness inherent in the German schools. It's all in his biography.

Mindlessness and blind obedience is not a recipe for a healthy society.

From the American Museum of Natural History:

He loathed Germany's rigid education system, which was based upon rote learning. "It's a true miracle," he commented years later, "that modern education hasn't yet completely smothered the curiosity necessary for scientific study." If Albert had remained in Germany until he was 16, he would have been obliged to perform military service. The sight of soldiers marching through the streets had always frightened and appalled him, and he was not willing to join them. So Einstein left high school and Germany, and joined his family in Milan.


Here's more info on people who had dyslexia and would have done poorly on a standardized test:

Agatha Christie - (15 September 1890 - 12 January 1976) Agatha Christie was the world's best selling book writer of all times only truly surpassed by the Bible and equaled by Shakespear, her books sold approximately 4 billion copies worldwide. Agatha suffered from dyslexia but in no way did it stop her from being creative and learning how to write, her mystery novels have always been some of the most captivating of all times. Her bestselling book was without a doubt "And then there was none" which was a source of inspiration for novelists and movie makers even many years after.

Albert Einstein - (March 14, 1879 - April 18, 1955) Being one of the most important great minds of his century Albert Einstein was then known to suffer from dyslexia mainly because of his bad memory and his constant failure to memorize the simplest of things. He would not remember the months in the year yet he would succeed in solving some of the most complicated mathematical formulas of the time without any trouble. He may have never learned how to properly tie his shoelaces but his scientific contributions and theories still have a major effect on all of todays current knowledge of science

.Alexander Graham Bell - (3 March 1847 - 2 August 1922) Well known as the inventor of the telephone Alexander was actually attempting to find a way that could make deaf people hear. His mother was slowly becoming deaf when Alexander was only 12 years old making him extremely sensitive to disabilities. Once older he was constantly seeking a way to cure them through technology. He himself had dyslexia which would cause him problems at school, but he always kept his interest for science, especially biology. He would show a great indifference for everything else and would have poor grades. Today Alexander Graham Bell is also well know as one of the founders of the National Geographic society.Cher - (Born May 20, 1946) Cher was a fatherless child and was most of the time very poor. Her mother tried to make money by singing and acting which ultimately brought Cher to follow into her footsteps. Due to dyslexia cher decided she would quit school and try to take some acting lessons in Los Angeles to finally do what she loved. One day while at the renowned Aldo's Coffee Shop her life changed upon meeting Sonny Bono, which was at the time successful in show business. They eventually made songs together and through fantastic duos with Sonny.

Dale S. Brown - Dale Brown is a strategic leadership consultant at Washington D.C and an author. Her most recent book is called "Steps to Independance for people with Learning Disabilities" which was published by Learning Disabilities Association of America in 2005. Dale suffers herself from dyslexia and wants to tell the world that learning disabilities does not have to stop you from being who you want to be. It does not have to stop you from striving or harm your capabilities to integrate to everyday life.

Danny Glover - (Born July 22, 1947) A great actor in both Lethal Weapon with Mel Gibson and Predator 2. Danny Glover suffered dyslexia at school when he was younger and the school staff would label him retarded. This definitely was not very encouraging for him but he ended up finding ways to feel better about himself. He says that dyslexia had given him the feeling that he was not worthy to learn and that the people around him would not care of what would happen to his education. With time he eventually regained his self esteem and became a great actor.George Burns - (January 20, 1896-March 9, 1996) An Academy-Award winning Jewish-American actor and comedian George Burns was a man filled with joy. He and his wife Gracie Allen would frequently team up on radio and television which made them both well known. George was an entertainer until a few years before his 100th birthday. Dyslexia never kept him from being who he was, a legend who had one of the longest American careers in show business history

.Hans Christian Andersen - (April 2 1805 - August 4 1875) Being an author of children's fantasy stories, he was a victim of dyslexia and showed the world that when you want something, nothing can stop you from obtaining it. The books that he wrote have been translated into hundreds of different languages and continue to be distributed even today in millions of copies. Hans wrote books such as "The Emperor's New Clothes", "The Princess and the Pea" "Thumbelina", "The Snow Queen", "The Ugly Duckling" and "The Little Mermaid".

Henry Winkler - Henry Franklin Winkler (born October 30, 1945) is a Golden Globe Award-winning American actor, director, producer and author. He is perhaps most famous for his role as Arthur "Fonzie" Fonzarelli on the popular sitcom Happy Days (1974-1984). Winkler attended the McBurney School and received his bachelor's degree from Emerson College in 1967 and his MFA from the Yale School of Drama in 1970. In 1978, Emerson gave Winkler an honorary doctorate of humane letters. Winkler has also received a Doctor of Humane Letters from Austin College. Having struggled throughout his school years with unidentified dyslexia Winkler, at age 31, finally understood what he'd been grappling with all his life, when making a documentary about dyslexia, Winkler himself found that he was dyslexic.

Jackie Stewart - Sir John Young Stewart, OBE (born 11 June 1939 in Milton, West Dunbartonshire), better known as Jackie, and nicknamed The Flying Scot, is a Scottish former racing driver. He competed in Formula One between 1965 and 1973, winning three World Drivers' Championships. Former F1 champion Sir Jackie Stewart, said he thought he was "thick" at school before discovering he was dyslexic. Sir Jackie said "word blindness" meant he had to race to keep up with other pupils. In those days dyslexia wasn't something that got identified in many schools.Leonardo Da Vinci - Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, (April 15, 1452 - May 2, 1519) was a Tuscan polymath: scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, painter, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician and writer. As an engineer, Leonardo conceived ideas vastly ahead of his own time, conceptualising a helicopter, a tank, concentrated solar power, a calculator, and the double hull, and outlining a rudimentary theory of plate tectonics. He also had the gift of dyslexia. Most of the time, he wrote his notes backwards. Although unusual, this is a trait shared by many left-handed dyslexic people. Most of the time, dyslexic writers are not even consciously aware that they are writing this way.Magic Johnson - Earvin Effay Johnson, Jr. (born August 14, 1959 in Lansing, Michigan) is a retired American National Basketball Association (NBA) basketball player for the Los Angeles Lakers. Johnson is acknowledged as one of the most popular NBA basketball players of all time, being well-known for his uncanny passing and dribbling skills, and for his cheerful nature on and off the court. In the words of Magic Johnson: "The looks, the stares, the giggles . . . I wanted to show everybody that I could do better and also that I could read.

"Thomas Edison - Thomas Alva Edison (February 11, 1847 - October 18, 1931) was an American inventor of Dutch origin and businessman who developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph and a long lasting light bulb. In school, the young Edison's mind often wandered. He was noted to be terrible at mathematics, unable to focus, and had difficulty with words and speech. This ended Edison's three months of official schooling. The cause of Edison's deafness has been attributed to a bout of scarlet fever during childhood and recurring untreated middle ear infections. Thomas Edison was dyslexic, a problem child, and a mischief-maker. He talked when he was supposed to be listening and did not listen when the teacher talked. He had no patience. He was not well-coordinated and did poorly in sports. He applied himself with a passion to whatever caught his attention, but his attention was easily diverted.

Tom Cruise - Thomas Cruise Mapother IV (born July 3, 1962), more commonly known as Tom Cruise, is an American actor and film producer. Cruise has said that he suffered from abuse as a child. This was partially due to him suffering from dyslexia. He stated that when something went wrong, his father came down hard on him. Having gone through fifteen schools in twelve years, Cruise, who dropped his father's name at age twelve, was also a victim of bullying at school

.Walt Disney - Walter Elias Disney (December 5, 1901 - December 15, 1966) was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. Disney is notable as one of the most influential and innovative figures in the field of entertainment during the twentieth century. Walt Disney had dyslexia, which is a learning disorder characterized by reading difficulties. While Walt Disney was attending high school he also went to the Academy of Fine Arts. This caused him to have double the school work than an average student on top of the fact that he also dealt with being dyslexic

.Whoopi Goldberg - Whoopi Goldberg (born November 13, 1955) is an American actress, comedian, radio host, TV personality, game show host, and author. Whoopi Goldberg was born Caryn Elaine Johnson in New York City. Whoopi had a lot of difficulty in school, but it was not until she was an adult did she learn that she had dyslexia. Despite her dyslexia, Whoopi Goldberg has gone on to have a highly successful film and television career.

Winston Churchill - Churchill described himself as having a "speech impediment", which he consistently worked to overcome. After many years, he finally stated, "My impediment is no hindrance." Although the Stuttering Foundation of America has claimed that Churchill stammered, the Churchill Centre has concluded that he lisped. Churchill's impediment may also have been cluttering, which would fit more with his lack of attention to unimportant details and his very secure ego. According to several sources Winston Churchill was not dyslexic and had no learning disability whatsoever. In his autobiography he played up his low grades at Harrow, undoubtedly to convince readers, and possibly himself, how much he had overcome; but in this he exaggerated. He was actually quite good at subjects he enjoyed and in fact won several school prizes.

Woodrow Wilson - Former president of the United States. Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856-February 3, 1924), was the twenty-eighth President of the United States. Wilson did not learn to read until he was about 12 years old. His difficulty reading may have indicated dyslexia or A.D.D., but as a teenager he taught himself shorthand to compensate and was able to achieve academically through determination and self-discipline. He studied at home under his father's guidance and took classes in a small school in Augusta.Fanny Flagg - (born September 21, 1944) is an American author and actress. Flagg has spoken publicly about being dyslexic. Flagg has said she was enormously challenged as a writer because she was "severely dyslexic and couldn't spell. So I was discouraged from writing and embarrassed". Her burgeoning writing career was put on hold for much of the 1970s, but Flagg overcame her fear and completed several novels and screenplays.George Patton - George Smith Patton GCB, KBE (November 11, 1885 - December 21, 1945) was a leading U.S. Army general in World War II in campaigns in North Africa, Sicily, France, and Germany, 1943-1945. Patton not begin his formal education until age 11, most likely due to dyslexia. Patton attended high school in Pasedena. Upon graduation, Patton was accepted at the Virginia Military Institute. He spent a year at VMI before being accepted to West Point.Harry Belafonte - Harold George Belafonte, Jr. (born March 1, 1927) is an American musician, actor and social activist. One of the most successful Jamaican musicians in history, he was dubbed the "King of Calypso" for popularizing the Caribbean musical style in the 1950s. Due to problems with dyslexia, Belafonte dropped out of high school and at the age of 17, he joined the US Navy for a couple of years. After that, he returned to New York and settled there. Belafonte became involved with the American Negro Theatre and soon began singing in clubs around the city.Richard Branson - Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson (born 18 July 1950) is an English entrepreneur, best known for his Virgin brand of over 360 companies. Richard Branson has been involved in a number of world record-breaking attempts since 1985, when in the spirit of the Blue Riband he attempted to cross the Atlantic Ocean in the fastest recorded time. Branson has dyslexia, resulting in poor academic performance as a student. School was something of a nightmare for him. He was the captain of football, rugby union and cricket teams, and by the age of fifteen he had started two ventures that eventually failed, one growing Christmas trees and another raising budgerigars.Nelson Rockefeller - Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller (July 8, 1908 - January 26, 1979) was the forty-first Vice President of the United States, governor of New York, philanthropist, and businessman. Rockefeller was born in Bar Harbor, Maine. He was the son of John Davison Rockefeller, Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller. He was the grandson of Standard Oil's founder and chairman John Davison Rockefeller, Sr. Nelson Rockefeller died on the evening of Friday, January 26, 1979 at age 70 from a heart attack under circumstances whose details have never been completely revealed.Neil Bush - Neil Mallon Bush (born January 22, 1955 in Midland, Texas) is the fourth of six children of former President George Herbert Walker Bush and Barbara Bush (Barbara Lane Pierce). Neil is the younger brother of President George Walker Bush, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, and the late Robin Bush. At age 11, he entered the exclusive private St. Albans School in Washington, DC. He struggled through school. A counselor told his mother that it was doubtful the boy had the potential to graduate. He was later diagnosed as having dyslexia, and his mother spent much time coaching him through his learning disability. Eventually his grades 
What else is there to know?

Dr. Rudd and the Planned Assisted Suicide of the College of Education at U of Memphis

University of Memphis Faculty Senate meeting: December 2, 2:40 PM, Rm. 261 University Center 

Be There to Protest

 

The University of Memphis Faculty Senate will hear details of CorpEd's teacher miseducation plan tomorrow, which will divide UofM's college of education into two castes: one for teacher candidates trained to serve corporate charter schools that impose the penal "no excuses" teaching model on the children of the poor.

This group of teacher candidates are to be Relay-ed into poor and black schools after they are indoctrinated in techniques for grinding out test scores and imposing a paternalistic, inhumane behavioral and instructional regimen that seeks to culturally sterilize poor kids. 

On the other wing of UofM's College of Ed, teacher preparation will continue for the other caste of teachers, who are going into the leafy suburban schools where curriculum, child development, educational theory, and educational sociology and psychology remain relevant topics.  

What this new program will do, if approved, is to make University of Memphis complicit in the continued segregation and mistreatment of children in school environments that no faculty member would ever allow for their own children.  

UofM's president, David Rudd, was recently appointed to his post by corporate education insiders at the state and corporate foundation levels, and it looks as though he is wasting no time in killing the legitimacy of the College of Education at the University.  

Who is David Rudd?  Here is a bioclip from YouTube, where Dr. Rudd appears in an interview filmed during a stint at the University of Utah in 2010:

Dr. David Rudd is an expert on clinical suicidology. He has served as a consultant to the United States Air Force, the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense and the Beijing Suicide Prevention and Research Center. In the past year he has twice testified before the U.S. Congress on issues related to veterans’ suicide.

According to the YouTube video, Rudd at the time had a contract to study suicide prevention among veterans.  I find it interesting that Rudd references "resiliency training," which is an outgrowth of Martin Seligman’s work that became the centerpiece of Seligman's big sales jobto the Army for using his ludicrous positive psychology approach to combat PTSD.

Rudd sat on the committee that eventually gave a thumbs-down to Seligman’s fanciful, though lucrative, use of positive psychology to treat traumatized Army veterans.

Interesting, too, are Seligman’s connections with “performance character” training for KIPP and the other total compliance charter schools.  Even more interesting is the fact that Relay is using performance character resiliency training in its misedcuative teacher prep program that Rudd hopes to bring to U of M.  

Could it be that Rudd has plans for big grant funding at UofM to do what Seligman and his disciple,Angela Duckworth, have done and are experimenting on children at UPenn and in the poorest schools of Philadelphia.  It is a form of character resiliency training that hopes to make children living in poverty into little automatons who are impervious to the effects of poverty.

There are huge grants, both federal and private, for this kind of neurological tampering within the skulls of poor children.  Will Dr. Rudd be given free rein to set up his experiments on Memphis's children of the poor?