by dumbing down education in the name of ‘equity’.
As with all public schools in progressive-run cities, education is no longer Job #1 in Madison WI. “Equity” is. The Madison Metropolitan School District is poised to scuttle its advanced honors courses in order to make the racial numbers work. Either not enough black and brown kids are doing advanced course work or too many white kids are.
“Officials called [scrapping honors classes] a pathway to becoming an anti-racist institution.”
Punishing achievement
A most-excellent report from our favorite Madison morning daily newspaper asks, “Can honors be equitable? Madison school district revisits controversial change.”
Progressivism is like rust — it never sleeps. Course work for the gifted and talented is damned as “gate-keeping knowledge in a really limited and white-washed manner,” says school board member Savion Castro, a young man with no real life accomplishments but an overweening sense of superiority informed by his own assumed victimhood.
He and a likely majority of four of the seven members instead contemplate doling out honors from within standard classes. Tellingly, WI State Journal news reporter Olivia Herken adds, “District officials did not answer questions about what students have to do to earn honors credit in standard classes.” Guesswork replaces homework!
Young scholars will have to surmount the chaos of those “standard classes,” school discipline having been outlawed to avoid the heartbreak of disparate outcomes. The newspaper quotes a student whose name suggests Indian/Asian heritage to say she benefitted from being in classes “where everyone took their work seriously.” What a little white-washer, she!
“They don't even seem to recognize the oxymoron of saying, "it will make honors more equitable.” — Madison private school educator Patrick O’Loughlin.
Want real diversity? Vote GOP!
We turn now to The Capital Times, which endorsed Woke social justice warriors like Savion Castro and Ali Muldrow and cheered the expulsion of police from our troubled high schools. Dane County’s Progressive Voice is up today with an op ed claiming that Republican Tim Michels’ “voucher scheme would undermine education system.” Let’s hope!
“Voucher funding takes state aid away from public schools and gives it to private schools instead,” the piece claims. See me after school, Mr. Op Ed Writer. Voucher funding follows the student fleeing from dysfunctional schooling. Progressives are all in on diversity except when it comes to diversity of thought.
“Nowhere is the need to turn things upside down more pressing than in education,” Michels says. “I trust parents.”
Wisconsin taxpayers have doubled their support of K-12 education since 1970, yet student performance continues to decline. The most recent state test results show math and English language proficiency at less than 40% — a record low. … As Department of Public Instruction superintendent, [Tony Evers] actually declared it would be “morally wrong” to give parents more educational choices.
— Tim Michels for Governor.
Blaska’s Bottom Line: We sense an incipient parent rebellion. It may occur to Madison parents that Woke progressives are the ones undermining education, not those villainous Republicans!
54 responses to “Madison public schools make case for vouchers”
“…not enough black and brown kids are doing advanced coarse work ”
Are they doing advanced soft work instead?
Why not lift more students up rather than take opportunities away from high-achieving kids?
Because it’s literally the Deliberate Dumbing Down of America, that Charlotte Iserbyt wrote about in the closing months of the 20th century, in action. Iserbyt’s prediction appears to be coming true.
lower standards, dumbing down, indoctrination…some, but not all of public education’s objectives
Indoctrination into what exactly.
you must be dumber than you look. Indoctrination in liberalism, socialism, white-guilt, rim licking, and the list goes on.
“you must be dumber than you look.”
Bravo Indigo November Golf Oscar!
Actually, far FAR dumber!
The Gotch
“rim licking”? you are a sick MAGA douchbag who knows nothing. The list goes on? What list? I look dumb? Why? You want to blow crap out your butt like crotch with no facts. Suck off fool.
“your life must really suck”
In the running for Understatement Of The Year!
Old, uneducated, White Y-Chromosomal Unit is everything Lefty hates, yet it still sticks with them like stink on $#!t!
#PitablyPathetic!
The Gotch
https://i.snipboard.io/uN3X0m.jpg
Blow me
typical libtard retort..your life must really suck
Your wish is our command…
Consider yourself blown up. 😉
After 50 years since graduating JMM HS and seeing all the studies and money spent on raising the black and brown ( minority) test scores ( and lower the drop out rate) MMSD has found the answer. Just lower the standards so low that every student can pass and graduate. For years employers and universities have been having to lower standards in hiring and admission. I always wondered how the English skills are from the students that are taught in Spanish at Allis Elementary school? Maybe they should be taught Mandarin Chinese for the next decade.
Good luck trying to find that information. The only thing Madison progressives are better at than hatching harebrained schemes to brainwash kids is hiding the statistics that prove how damaging those schemes are for the kids they’re supposedly meant to help.
Brainwash how, why, and with what reason?
It all started to go to $hit with LBJ’s (not so) “great society.” The numbers in all categories speak for themself. Test scores, nuclear families, teen age pregnancies, crime, a-holes like Richard “Leaker”…………
“After 50 years since graduating JMM HS…” (bolds mine)
The Gotch (Class of ’73) didn’t catch that before, Bob; GO SPARTANS!!!
The Gotch
Lefty’s Brave New World: Trickle Up Stupidity
LaLaLoopyLoonyLeftyLand vernacular: Equity = more More MORE high quality/quantity Free $#!t I don’t have to work for.
The Gotch
And for any student that does NOT receive actual honors credit, there will be a special Honors Participation Trophy and a Certificate of Non-Acheivement
“And for any student that does NOT receive actual honors credit, there will be a special Honors Participation Trophy and a Certificate of Non-Acheivement”
WhattsamattahU…No Hug???
THE HORROR!
The Gotch
Gotta love that Participation Trophy. Makes recipients feel extra special and lets those handing them out give themselves that well earned pat on the back for a job well done. Problem is that good old Participation Trophy means absolutely nothing in the real world. My Daughter living in Germany applied and was chosen for a job in her field(UX Writer) this Spring. She just started the job this past Monday. They gave her 6 weeks maternity leave prior to having her baby and another 8 weeks after the baby (the maternity leave in European Countries is amazing). The point I’m making is she graduated from LaFollette in 2007. Even back then the only way to learn without chaous was if your grades were good enough to take Honors Classes. That job she applied for had over 1000 applications. A shelf full of Participation Trophies won’t get you anywhere. Once again elections matter, even School Board Elections. Has Madison learned their lesson? David Blaska you sound more hopeful than I do and you should know. Then again maybe you were trying to be funny. I’m usually the last one in the room to get the punch line. On a side note take a drive down Pflaum Rd past Sennett Middle and check out the fancy playground equipment on the front lawn. Someone’s giving themselves a pat on the back for that one.
Maybe “playground participation” will be the next credit course.
https://thunderwoodcollege.com/
Just printed my diploma
The Gotch’ll see your Thunderwood College and raise you a many-splendoured Gotchie** which features an accompanying…um…Companion Trophy**
**H/T to the Creative Genius of Steve Witherspoon!
The Gotch
“District officials did not answer questions about what students have to do to earn honors credit in standard classes.” Of course they didn’t. How could they without making even bigger fools of themselves? And did the local media press them for answers? Does it ever?
The parochial schools did not close for the pandemic. What was the mortality rate?
Surely MMSD could ask an administrator to make a few phone calls to Madison hospitals to find out.
Will be good to know during the next pandemic.
Making those phone calls would only reveal how idiotic (not to say sadistic) Madison’s school lockdowns were, so they will never be made. And even if they were, the truth wouldn’t make the slightest dent in the carapace of self-righteous disdain that protects local progressives.
What most of you are dancing around is the shift in the motivation of those in the teaching profession.
Over one hundred years ago my grandmother, as job prospects were limited for women, attended a college in the “Normal School” system to receive her teaching degree. Upon graduation she secured a job in the former “Indian Territories” that had recently (1907) become the state of Oklahoma. She firmly believed that giving her kids the best education possible was their greatest chance at success in the world out side of the reservation. Each and every child had the potential to rise above their present situation and secure a brighter future.
” Wokeness” is all about setting new rules for you all to live by, and change society in the process. Critical to this plan is the cultivation of new generations to ENFORCE those rules. The Education Dept.s of universities today, in the 2000’s, have become the Sociology Dept.s of the 60’s and 70’s, a haven for “social justice warriors” intent on “making the world better”. What you are seeing is the means to that end.
The elimination of honors programs?
Grandma’s approach to her tribal students was on an individual basis. With the proper education some would find success as ranchers, business owners, professionals, or perhaps enter politics and participate in government. The cultivation of leadership qualities was important.
Today, leadership qualities are not important. What IS important is that black students receive their “black education”, white students a “white education”, and other non-white students the education that corresponds with their degree of “victimhood”. The all-knowing woke will anoint leaders as they see fit, resulting in your present situation in Madison. (Any “anointed” who don’t toe the line will be squashed like bugs) Where as my grandmother developed the “individual”, the focus is now on the “group”. All that is required of students now is compliance with the “Party Right-Think”, and to vote correctly.
“What most of you are dancing around is the shift in the motivation of those in the teaching profession.”
There’s a regrettably rapidly dwindling number of teachers in the fashion of your Grandmother.
The Gotch has a number of MMSD teacher pals; to a one, they’ll eviscerate the Administration in private for their stunning lack of “support,” but won’t risk making waves publicly. One of those retiring EARLY is particularly galling.
She loved (past tense) teaching for well over three (3) decades. She was raised by educators; mother was a teacher, father started out teaching and rose through the ranks and became a much-beloved Principal. It’s all she ever wanted to talk about…until the last ~ five (5) or so years
Why’s she (though by no means alone!) quitting? She’s had her fill of being called c**t, b!tch, ‘Ho, slut, etc. by feral, foul-mouthed, thug-in-training, t’weens of a certain demographic.
And “District” won’t allow her, et al, to intervene/comfort/hug students that get smacked/bullied by these same ill-kempt, menacing PsOS.
The BEP is a bad BAD f*cking joke; many a Blaska post addresses that for anyone not up to speed…
The question MMSD specifically, and despicable Lefty generally, steadfastly refuses to ask: WHERE_ARE_THE_PARENT(S)?
You can make the argument that some parents show up at schools, but often as not, it’s to redress some perceived or manufactured tribal DIS, or some such other form of ANTI-SOCIAL/CRIMINAL MAYHEM.
Consequences? Surely you jest!
For a general, FAR more damning indictment, take a few minutes and read Mary Hudson’s Public Education’s DIRTY SECRET.
The Gotch
To you and I the exit of true educators from the profession is indeed tragic. But to the woke it is seen as a good and necessary thing.
The wokies wish to re-write history to fit their narrative. They seek to divide/unite citizens using a gossamer spiderweb of “intersectionality”, (for instance both the rap/hiphop and the Latino cultures have rather strict definitions of “man” and “woman”, and are unlikely to sign on to the whole “trans/gender fluid thing, yet both are the victims of oppression from the “white privileged”). Wokies seek to normalize the most UN-normal of human sexual proclivities, and introduce the children to them. The list goes on ……
True educators, intent on producing successful, confident, and competent students, are an obstacle to woke progress.
PARENTS?
Many will gladly sacrifice their children at the “alter of wokeness”. Many gave up all parenting skills 3 generations ago, relying, instead on government. Some, like your friends “go along to get along” and don’t make waves. The few who are truly horrified at the blatant racism, overt sexuality, lawlessness, and apparent lack of actual learning in the classroom (and speak up) are “domestic terrorists” who must be shut down.
Wokeness is all proposals,with no solutions for the inevitable results. It is jumping off a cliff and telling yourself that you will deal with the impact “when the time comes”.
I wonder what would happen if the MMSD decided that fat out of shape kids should be not only playing on sports teams but be starters for those teams?
After all, why should we stop at race?
As a formally fat and out of shape kid myself, I can honestly say that I did not deserve to be on any sports team in jr. high or high school.
And why not? The Packers have already done this with their wide receivers. Catching the ball is “white supremacy”. A display of anguish after the ball careens off your chest is the real test of performance. Love the diversity being displayed by A Aron and company this season.
Wow…Rogers really dumped on Packer fans. “Angry and Bitter” and love to be that way. Like pigs wallowing in shit? HOLY BEAR SCAT!!!
Stupid is as stupid does.
Cleary wrote, “Stupid is as stupid does.”
I’m not sure I understand the basis for this comment, mainly because it’s so brief and lacks any real stated or implied context. By chance was it supposed to be a reply to something else in this thread?
Steve,
What I meant by this comment is that those in the board of education, those in the administration, those in positions of being teachers and those who are parents who in favor of this truly stupid idea, are themselves stupid.
I wonder if Tony and Mandela are in favor of this?
Tony was the head of the DPI for many a year. I wonder how he feels about this?
And did you know that “Aw shucks I’m just the average guy”, Mandela Barns went to a private Christian school from K-8? More specifically Holy Redeemer Christian Academy. Despite being educated for the 1st 8 years of his schooling in a private school, he is still against school choice. https://empowerwisconsin.org/barnes-private-school-past-conflicts-with-his-political-present/
This also is completely different from the impression he leaves in one of his campaign commercials when he states that his mom was a teacher and his father was a 3rd shift auto worker.
He also neglects to say that his mother served the school on an “interim basis” in an administrative role assisting middle school-aged girls.
Oh, and while I’m on the subject of Tony and Mandela, each of them have stated that they have a plan to turn things around in Wisconsin.
What specific plans do they have? Why have they not already implemented those plans? They have had two years to do so, but things have just gotten worse and worse.
Thanks for the clarification.
Seems the only one in favor of the Dumbing Down of education is the Blogge Idiot.
We’re shocked…SHOCKED says no one!
Anywho, with a laughably limited vocabulary and offensively homophobic vulgarity, it’s perfectly clear that it wants others to be on the same (heh!) intellectual plane as itself; uneducated misery LUVs company!
The Gotch
The next step is to quit administering academic achievement tests to elementary and middle school kids since they are doing so badly… “testing is racist”. That way the “evidence” of a poor education goes away.
Normwegian wrote, “The next step is to quit administering academic achievement tests to elementary and middle school kids since they are doing so badly… “testing is racist”. That way the “evidence” of a poor education goes away.”
Yup. The “Deliberate Dumbing Down of America”, that Charlotte Iserbyt wrote about more than twenty years ago, in action.
Remember if all people are dumb as a box-o-rocks, like how out poor intellectually deprived friend Richard Lesiak presents himself, then they’re much easier to manipulate and control as propaganda indoctrinated sheeple.
Remember this nonsense from a few years ago…
https://stevewitherspoonhome.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/white-culture-in-the-usa.jpg
Try as they might, the Smithsonian (after getting their everLUVin’ over-sized @$$e$ blown out of the water) will never Live_That_Down!
“poor intellectually deprived friend 0000000 000000 presents himself”
If there’s a better example of Dunning Kruger Effect than the Blogge Idiot, it’s yet to be seen!
The Gotch
richard lesiak wrote, “A better example is ROJO saying in an interview that he believes there are litterboxes in schools for children to use.”
That sounds like a Democratic Party propaganda narrative that’s a twisted extrapolation of some cherry picked statement, so how about you provide evidence to support your claim and that evidence must include the context of the statement – a complete video would be the best evidence.
Come on Richard, where’s your supporting evidence?
Did you get sucked in by another unsupportable false Democratic Party propaganda narrative and parrot it like a good sheeple?
Have some integrity, be a man, support your claim or you will be labeled a POS trolling Unapologetic Liar again. The choices and consequences are yours.
NOTE TO DAVID BLASKA
I just noticed that Richard Lesiak has intentionally linked his name to Cornelius_Gotchberg’s Gravatar page. Just click on the “richard lesiak” name on his comment and see where it takes you. This is a more than interesting method of internet trolling that doesn’t require any regular typing, it’s signature significant of a internet stalker trying to provoke confrontation. This is a trolling* pattern I’ve seen before and based on the pattern I’ve seen before it’s my guess that richard lesiak is also the POS that created the false Cornelius_Gotchberg Facebook page and used some of Blaska’s photos on that page.
*TROLLING: verb Posting inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community with the deliberate intent of provoking readers into an emotional response or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion, often for their own amusement.
Lesiak will be banned until he ceases.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot???
Thanks Steve! Just when you thought the Blogge Idiot couldn’t get any more pitiably pathetic!
The Gotch
The Blogge Idiot highfreakin’lariously insists on stumbling/bumbling/mumbling certifiably embarrassing gibberish on a site where EVERYONE knows he’s generationally imbecilic?
Priceless!!!
The Gotch