Even I agree with that wholeheartedly. I’m sure will agree with the whole book as you read it. Much more spending on inner city kids, spending more and targeting spending at the same time. I read the whole thing one month ago and agree with it.

Mr. Little, who never met a dollar you didn’t like:

None of the above require spendiing more money; that has been proven time and again.  It does require however, people of your mindset to reassess a few things.  I haven’t read the above book, however I am quite sure the above quote at least does not suggest what you do in your brief but entirely predictable footnote.

And we both know it isn’t just about spending is it Mr. Little? Isn’t it really about who gets to spend the money, who gets control?

Nobody, certainly, who disagrees with what you stand for.  Nobody with the temerity to attend church (although you will most gladly accept their coerced tax dollars, while telling them to keep their noses out of your business unless they are trained “educators”).  Nobody who wants to start his own school without your or your colleagues involved. 

After all, who invented spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic, grammar, logic, historiography, biology, physics, rhetoric, geometry, and all the rest of it?  Who thought of educating the poor, the downtrodden, and the marginalized? In fact, who was it who placed humanity upon the earth, in need of education?

Surely, Mr. Little it was you!  How else can one rightly understand your furious claims to propriety ownership of learning on behalf of the ignorant and huddle masses?

It’s control you want, Mr. Little.  Not education—control.

If only you could find some way to patent your inventions

A little over the top there Charles but I hope you read the whole book some day. Few know more about education in the USA than LDH. Later in the book you will see that she calls for more spending, more targeted spending on the education of the poor and a shift of money from overserviced rich districts to poor ones.

She also tells us how to get better teachers in the schools. Demand higher initial education, higher levels and longer stints of teacher education and experience that matters. All things I have tried to tell you Charles but your hands are over your ears because your mind is made up.

You haven’t gone religious on me have you Charles? That goes nowhere. I’m not just an athiest I’m an anti-theist.

Linda Darling-Hammond is actually advocating for a form of a decentralization system, like Ravitch is now advocating for. Both bring valid points on the equity issue. Equity, is a loose word, often taking on different meanings for the many parts of the education structure and the political affiliations that are associated with the various parts.
Hammond, is showing the way.

” Where Ravitch’s new book looks at the tenets of No Child Left Behind—in which she once believed—and uses data and personal experience to show how egregiously it failed, Darling-Hammond looks at why and how the country can build a truly equitably public education system”

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/education-secretary-duncan/why-obama-duncan-should-read-l.html

Gulag politics or spending for the future - our choice, is another article speaking about the present day education system, using words taken out of Hammond’s book, to present another side of the public education system, that many within the structure of the public education system, do not like to talk about, how funding increases in one area, will decrease in another area, and this takes place often and children become the victims.

Allow me to return if I may to Darling-Hammond.  She notes that the money states spend prison costs are eating into funds they would otherwise spend on early childhood education,

an investment that has been found to dramatically increase graduation rates and reduce participation in juvenile and adult crime.

We squander our human capital, first by not educating, and then by paying to incarcerate, many of those locked up lacking the education and skills to contribute to our economy. 

The implications of these social choices for our national well-being are enormous.  Dropouts cost the country at least $200 billion a year in lost ages and taxes, costs for social services, and crime.  With only three potential workers for every one person on Social Security in 2020 (as compared to 20 workers for every retiree in 1950), having one-thrid on the nonproductive side of the equation will undermine the social compact on which the nation depends.”
http://www.educationnews.org/mobile/blogs/25293.html

Here is an article, well-balanced, reviewing the many topics of the Flat-World and Education.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/1/24/829576/-An-important-book-about-educational-equity-and-our-national-future

Doug, it is not about just targeted spending.The book is calling for change, wholesale change. The same change that SQE has always advocated for,
and it is not all about increasing money, and hoping for the best, keeping your fingers cross. The two books, Ravitch’s and Hammond - are a beginning of what public schools should be, all parts working co-operatively based on children’s needs, to meet their learning needs, and where equity/quality would exist.

Nancy, I was with you 100% until the last paragraph when you say LDH advoctes for the same thing as SQE. They are polar opposites. They could not be farther apart. LDH is correct BTW.

“You haven’t gone religious on me have you Charles? That goes nowhere. I’m not just an athiest I’m an anti-theist”

Mr. Little, it was you who introduced the subject of religion while condemning folk who want out of your world, as relgious zealots or social elitists or educational ignoramuses.

As for “gone religious on me”; you’re not suggesting that if I were “religious” that I would allow the harmless untruths guiding my private life would in any way influence my views on education?  Are you?

After all, I would never be so crass as to think you’re anti-theism would in any way influence your objectivity or judgement.

Because we all know the religous views of Sanger, Kinsey and Dewey, the patron saints of modern public education, had nothing whatever to do with their publicly expressed thoughts or doctrines of education.

Right?

Sigh.  I will end the “suspense” for you Mr. Little and confess to being a follower of the One who rose from the dead on the third day.  And not a bad teacher at that.

What place for me and parents like me, in your Brave New World?

Doug, Charles was referring to families, where education of the children began there. And certainly not a reference to religion or beliefs. If you read any history, on how mankind formed communities, much like other animals who gathered together not only for protection, but also to helped in the rearing of their young, to teach them the skills needed to survive. Yes, even other animals teach their young skills. Just watch a mother cat, showing her young, how to cover their waste, or stalk a mouse. Parents were the first teachers, and still are.

Nor did public education started in a vacuum. Educating children in Canada and United States started a lot earlier, before teachers’ union, before governments, and before Canada and United States became countries. The small emerging communities, always had one that became the teacher for the children, to know the math, reading, writing skills essential for survival and needed for adulthood back in the days of the 1600s and 1700s.

My ancestor,  was one of those teachers who was fairly educated and affluent, who began the one-room school house in the early 1700s, just down from the family homestead, on his land grant, for the settler’s children in the surrounding area. Throughout the next two hundred years, one-room school houses popped up, and were started by the settlers for their children, and even in some place, they their own version of adult school. All done without government, or costly fees.

Canada and United States, were the pioneers of public education, and in both countries there is a rich history, of communities working together for common goals. One of the goals was to teach their children was education of the ABCs and the vital skills needed to run a homestead.

That said, Doug, to introduce atheism and anti-theist, is wrong. Dead wrong, where you are mocking, belittling other people’s believes, value systems, to score points that only you would see. Most people would see it as being rude, and perhaps a person who is incapable of listening to any other facets of issues, except your own.

Nor would I be bragging to other teachers, and other professionals, that you are atheism and anti-theist. After I look it up, even if your mother was alive, she would be saying, you got some explaining to do, boy, or in other words to that effect.

Nancy, I am a history teacher. You want to make me scream. Could you possibly make your point in fewer words

Who is mocking? People believe what they want to believe. I happen to believe that religion is composed of myths people needed in our deep past to explain things. Others believe what they believe.

It is obvious Doug, you are either weak in certain section of mankind’s history, or you think most people know nothing about the past or care to know. You walk right into that one, by going after Charles beliefs, instead of discussing his topic and valid points.

As for your beliefs, I have news for you, everyone has values and beliefs. Everyone, including the guys who take care of their car, better than they take care of their family. The trick is, people should be respectful of other people’s beliefs and values they hold dear, no matter how crazy they sound to the other people.

The problem with people who claim they are anti-theist, they go one step further than an atheist, they want rules and regulations put in, to stop the harmful behaviour of others who believe in other things, that are not in keeping with your current state of beliefs and values.

Of course anti-theists want laws to stop the abuse of people by the religious. Just look at what the failure to act by the Pope has meant.
I don’t need history lectures Nancy, I have forgotten more history than you know.

Who went after Chuck. Chuck started to mention stuff that looked religious to me. I asked if that is where he was going. I don’t care what people believe so long as they don’t try to impose it on the state or others, abortion, crusades, inquisition, witch hunts, pogroms, Holocaust, history if full of religious nuts imposing their will on others who believe differently.

The point of this thread is LDH’s book. If people are going to find favourite parts, they should read it all.

Doug, you are advocating to prevent the freedom of speech, freedom to express spiritual beliefs, and the freedom to practice those beliefs, without having others policing your thoughts
. 
Equally history is full of hungry-mad people, just for the sake of power. They too imposed their will upon the people. As you are trying to impose new rules and regulation, to oppressed the people of religion, by the state.

Imagine that, I thought there was a criminal code and other laws that was put in place to handle the type of abuses that occurs throughout society, and not necessarily with people who have religious convictions and have broken the law.
We don’t need more laws, but the people need more freedom, information and knowledge to make better decisions for themselves. A more open society, is a more tolerant society. A more tolerant society, is a more democratic society. The more democratic the society is, the more open and accountable our institutions and government will become.

My core belief is that their should never be funding for religious schools. We are stuck with the RC system for a while in Ontario but it will be worse to compound it.

NL did away with them too, but you might be surprise, what Catholics can do. We can get our kids transfer to a former Catholic school, that is outside their zone. It would have been the route I would have gone, if I chosen to make the long drive each morning, 1 hour one way.to a school,  I was seriously thinking of putting her in.
 
Plus all schools have religion class, starting from grade 1 to grade 9, and even in the elementary classes prayers are said in some schools. For parents who do not want they kids exposed to religion class, or other touchy subjects, they are allowed to withdraw, to go home or take alternative class.  I rarely hear anyone complain about it, and parents here do have some choice in, what is increasingly an education system that is far less responsive to parents and their children needs.

At least here, religion class is discussing and exploring the religions of the world, teaches kids tolerance of other peoples’ spiritual beliefs. God knows, we need more tolerance and acceptance of one another.
Doug, I too learned tolerance, since I was the only Catholic, among the Mennonites, Lutherans, a few Protestants, and a couple of Anglicans thrown in the mixture. Try explaining to the kids, why Catholics say the Our Father differently from every one else
.
There should be more religion in school, not less. It teaches morals and tolerance.

It will be a great day when their is no religion in the world. Look at Ireland, the middle east, india/Pakistan, Indonesia, OMG it just causes trouble everywhere. Osama Bin Laden the Pope and other religious fanatics justify abuse. Religion is the codification of second class treatment of women. No female priests is a powerful message to young girls that they are second best.

Religion = war, male domination, intolerence, abuse, persecution, attacks on science.

Mr. Little,

Equally, I do not care what you believe as long as you don’t try to impose it on all of society through compulsory state education that makes it very difficult for folk to opt out unless they have considerable financial means or are forced to resort to home schooling.  And as long as you do not ridicule non-professional “educators” as smoke blowing ignoramuses, and as long as you do not suggest, as you often have, here, that only political parties agreeing with your philosophies should be allowed to influence education.

For an historian, you have a short memory.  It was in fact you who first broached the subject of religion in these pages, when you stated your postulates as to why people widthdraw from public education.  One is that they are religious zealots of some kind; another that they are elitists.  A third is that they lack sufficient education to understand what education is really all about, and they are making a mistake by not trusting professionals like yourself.

So it is ironic, that having put religion on the table you find it necessary to inquire as to why I should mention the subject? 

Moreover, with respect to the moral issues you mention above, which you do not want “imposed” in the schools, you are in fact telling people that your views (clearly you have views or why would you broach these topics) are to be accepted as public truths, while the rest of us keep quiet in the interests of peace, and of not being labelled right wing nutbars and homophobes by you and your colleagues.

Some educator you are, who sees your profession as a way to reinforce just what the correct views are to be held on this, that and the other thing.  For which you require control over politics, taxes and the schools.

It is in fact, all about control, and ideology.

You’re not an elitist?

By the way, do you happen to remember what were the religious views of Dewey, Sanger and Kinsey?  And how it came to be that their philosophies have come to dominate “educational” philosophy in this country?

Finally, back for a moment to the book in question, and your contention that teachers need to be better initially educated and that teacher education needs to be longer.  Not under the current regime it does not.  Twice nothing is still nothing.

On one side we have your opinion, on the other LDH. I’m going with her.

SQE is has another Ally in the just released report from OISE which supports testing and measuring ALL students.

So another disconnect on the part of the teacher unions and their parent groups. No surprise there!

Who is OISE?
Regardless I’m on their side…

LOL, read the whole report Chuck, highest level of satisfaction in the public school system in many years, since the disasterous Harris/Eves period.

I’m sure you also noted;

Very little support for Afro-centred school

Strong support for increased funding and spending on education at all levels

Very little support for faith-based schools.

OISE Report

Support for ECE 55% oppose 31% No opinion 14%

Support faith based schools 4-7%

Support for all private 17-27%

25% use tutors but to give kids advantage mainly, not to catch up for deficiencies.

Large majority willing to pay more tax if it goes to education.

Even those who support testing don’t think it makes any difference.

Little support, means nothing without the numbers Doug. Please insert them, it makes a big differences in supporting your points. .

Here is one, on governance.
School Governance
􀀀 􀁳 The public remains divided on the issue of whether the provincial government’s centralization
of authority over schools has gone too far; however, only 40% now think the province has too
much control over local schools.
􀀀 􀁳 A majority think the public has too little influence over how schools are run; however, support
for a greater public role has diminished over the past decade. However, personal willingness to
serve on a local school council is higher than five years ago.
􀀀 􀁳 The public remains divided over who should have the greatest influence over local curricu-
lum. A majority select local options, but there is no consensus regarding whether school boards, local teachers, or parents should have the most influence.

Now note the language, only 40 %..........
40 percent is a large percentage, thinking that the province has too much authority over the schools.

As for surveys, there is great problems in getting people to respond to them. It is noted at the back, the problems that they are experiencing.

I have observed in my province, school surveys are often sent home, with children telling their parents that they must fill it out. A command, rather than a request.

“iv Response rates to telephone surveys have been dropping for at least a decade as caller-ID and voice-mail options are increasingly used by subscribers to filter calls. Most polls appearing in the media no longer state response rates. The response rate to the OISE Surveys are likely considerably higher than for most published polls because we are willing to extend the survey over several months in order to allow multiple call backs to non-respondents. In the current OISE survey, of those we tried to reach 1001 completed interviews, 926 refused, and 180 either never committed either way or were never reached.

Most published polls – including this one – provide the number of respondents and the sampling error. For the current OISE Survey the sample size is 1001, and the sampling error is +/-4%. Sampling error is the difference between a sample result and the result that would have been obtained if every eligible person in the population had been interviewed. That difference is due to the “luck of the draw” in picking a sample. (Strictly speaking, it means the difference should be no larger than 4%, 95% of the time.) What is usually not stated in most published polls is that this is the error that might be expected if nearly everyone called had responded – that is, if the response rate was near 100%. No survey obtains this, and so all surveys are subject to non-sampling error as well as sampling error.”

Doug, do not insert meaning, where that is not what has been stated.

In the case of private tutoring services, it states:

“Seeking Services Outside the School System: The Case of Tutoring
In 2009, and in two previous surveys (2004 and 2007), we asked parents of public school students
whether they had purchased supplementary tutoring services for their child(ren) in the past three
years. In each survey about a quarter of the public school parents reported doing so. There is no discernible, recent increase in demand for private tutoring services. Parents purchase tutoring services as a supplement to public schooling rather than to compensate for perceived failings of that system (see Table 1.7). In 2009 parents who purchased tutoring, and those who did not, awarded similar grades to both their community schools and also to the schools the eldest child attended. (In 2007 parents who hired tutors were less likely than those who didn’t to give community schools an A or B.)”

25 percent, is good size, for the sample size of 1001.  If a larger sample size was obtain, the percentage would increase, because the number of individuals would have more variety, coming from a wider diverse population. Hence it is a trend, that board officials should worry about.

I’m pretty sure some of those OISE types got us into the mess we know find ourselves in and are spinning as much as the politicos and Doug Little.

You’re right Nancy.

I’d like Mark Holmes to chime in on the OISE report.

Cherry pick all you want Doug. We’ll do the same.

You’re the guy fishing for attention and looking to provoke. May we interest you in partnering perhaps with that other provocateur Ann Coulter?

Ann Coulter is a racist who fosters hate by using hate speech. I’ll pass on that one.

Support for funding cut=15% keep up or increase 85%
Satisfaction with local school 55% not satisfied 31%
Support for teachers = 67%
local school 63%

Want more funding for education 62%
Willing to pay more tax = 68%
Willing to pay more parents = 75%
non-parents = 65%

Support for all private funding 27%
Support faith-based 4-7%

ECE expansion yes 55% no 31% no opinion 14%

To help kids:
More spec ed teachers 80%
small classes = 73%
testing = 47%

Very much in line with what I see at Vector Polling

“On one side we have your opinion, on the other LDH. I’m going with her.”

Mr. Little,

“My opinion”?  I am asking you questions, including questions with historical answers; answers that are relevant to points you’ve made or vocabulary/ideas you’ve put on the table.  You either don’t know the answers, which means you are a bad historian; or you don’t like the implications they have for your position, which makes you a demagogue and not the scholar you purport to be.

A real historian, or a real scholar of any training or integrity, would not make the puerile statements you are rattling off here about religion.

Not all religions are the same.  Nor are their practitioners. Your comments are slanderous, bigoted and ignorant. They make you look like the “teacher bashers” you decry for daring to have a contrary point of view to what is done in “education”, with one exception and that is your persistent refusal to deal reality.

Doug, would not mind a opinion, other than basing it on surveys and polls, and drawing conclusions. I went back on the OISE site, to get a study, one of many conducted by organizations such as OISE, on private tutoring. This study was conducted in 2002, and it does blow away a lot of your assumptions why people purchased private tutor services.
It is one of the many studies, that have confirm, what parents have already known, that for the most part, is an option - the only option that parents may have.
Just scroll down, to the PDF file, called School Choice by Default?
http://www.oise.utoronto.ca/OISE-Survey/specialTopics/tutoringPurchase.html

Here is a site, the BC Teachers’ Federation, on:
Privatization of Education Bibliography

It shows the increasing presence of privatization occurring in the public education system. And Doug, the other day, your meaning of privatization is much different from other teachers, if an education bibliography is evidence.

http://bctf.ca/IssuesInEducation.aspx?id=5926#2

So now that we’ve established the motives of Doug Little(which were hardly a secret to most of us), and understand how important it is to cherry-pick that which jives with his spin, I find these points in the report interesting:

- low confidence ratings persist for schools and even more for education policy

- increased funding is backed up by the willingness of a majority to pay more taxes for education. (Nope. not by me and not by most of Ontario if this becomes and election issue or if Dalton tries to do with this what he’s doing with hydro add-ons.) I’m thinking they interviewed the same folks as make up that Person for Education group and the NDP because this sounds eerily like their agenda)

- where early childhood learning is concerned it’s “viewed as less likely to improve student achievement than an increase in the number of spec. ed. teachers and lower class sizes.”

- “offered full-day or split day most choose the latter.”
(maybe the gov’t should have checked with OISE first before going head-long into an initiative that’s going to fade out eventually)

I wouldn’t be so glib about this report Doug it’s not the gem you wish it to be.

This report vindicates every word I have said on this and other boards as being the voice of the majority except for testing which you can see they don’t think does very much. Support here and in the USA for testing is falling as people see you get nothing for it.

Totally vindicated, Oh ya!!!

Doug, it is a survey, not a report. It is a snapshot in time. Just like a political poll, asking who would you vote, if an election was held today.

One cannot use surveys and such, as proof, on top of making general statements, on survey data.
This survey does represent a majority of anything. A majority is an overwhelmingly majority. The breakdown does not indicate it.

However, Doug it does indicate an upward movement in some areas, but as the authors of the survey suggested, this is due to the increase funding, and not other factors.
This is one major problem with the education systems, they often make policy decisions on the thinnest evidence, and than introduce a school program, without setting up a extensive method, the structure,  to assess, if the program is working.

It is what I am afraid will happen to the ELP program. It will be introduced,and the teachers will be screaming it is not working, for various reasons, but the higher muck-abouts will not be listening, and yes this includes the top brass of the union.

That is where you are wrong Nancy, they ask some questions over and over and you can see only slight changes over time.

People are always willing to pay more taxes for education

People always want smaller classes and more teachers

There is always a good majority that is satisfied with public education

There is always support for increased funding

There is little support for private education

There is even less support for faith based private schooling

People like their teachers nd their schools

This is new, people don’t like choice in Afro-centred schools

People do like the ELP

Sadly people still support testing but don’t think it will do any good.

Doug…...
“Cross-Sectional Surveys
Cross-sectional surveys are used to gather information on a population at a single point in time. An example of a cross sectional survey would be a questionaire that collects data on how parents feel about Internet filtering, as of March of 1999. A different cross-sectional survey questionnaire might try to determine the relationship between two factors, like religiousness of parents and views on Internet filtering.”

The link following, is about survey methods, Simple, easy to understand language.
This survey is a snapshot in time, because the survey does not used the same people every two years.
Those surveys would be called:
Longitudinal Surveys
Longitudinal surveys gather data over a period of time. The researcher may then analyze changes in the population and attempt to describe and/or explain them. The three main types of longitudinal surveys are trend studies, cohort studies, and panel studies.

http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/~palmquis/courses/survey.html

On the OISE survey:
“The OISE Survey is the longest-running public opinion survey on education carried out in Canada. This is the 17th OISE Survey conducted by Hart and Livingstone since 1978.”

And Doug, when you think a person is wrong, check first, becoming saying the person is wrong. I do try to insert what I believe to be true. In this case, I know a survey, when I see one, and it is snapshot in time. Just like the CRTs are, a snapshot in time, where knowledge is the base, and the measurements are the reading, writing and numeracy skills. At least Ontario is up front about it, because there is other provinces who still will not admit, that it is the reading, writing and numeracy skills are the ones being measured.

And Doug, do not jump to conclusions that I do not like surveys, Surveys are useful instruments, and often form the basis for further research. If you explore the OISE site, they have done this to. Further exploration on private tutoring is one example. Interesting read, but I cannot find the follow up studies regarding this question. They are either keeping them under wraps, or perhaps they are well hidden on the site. It has been my experience on some sites, what is published is what you see. But how many studies are not published, that does not fit in with their current goals?
I would not be surprised at all, that private tutoring has increased well over 50 %. I based this on, the waiting lists and profit margins of private tutoring. Ergo, the studies may be for their eyes only.

Nancy, As usual you post is WAY too long and reads like a stream on consciousness. If I don’t deal with every aspect of it Chuckles will accuse me of ducking and if I do the next three days are needed.

The beauty of the OISE/UT survey, we can all read Nancy and are well aware of it, asks maybe 80% of the questions over and over so you can see trends. Others are new for example Afro-centred or ELP.

It does tend to show, now and over time that the progressive view (small clsses, funding, ELP, positive view of schools-teachers) is a majoriterian view and that the Neo-con view (private schools, faith based, low funding, big classes, teachers are rotten, lazy so andd sos) is a minority view except for testing and here it is weak and getting weaker. It is not a snapshot. That is the point. Look at the trends.

Doug, do you actually go on the links I have provided, or you don’t bother, in case you learn something.
All I have provided is information on the types of surveys, There is nothing to argue about with this type of information. Just like 2 + 2 = 4, the survey information provides the prior knowledge needed to understand any type of polls, surveys, easily. Than one can disagree or agree with the conclusions.
And Doug, this is one of the reasons why science courses in high school should be upfront and center, so the general population can use prior knowledge, and determine for themselves if a poll or a research paper, is kosher. One of the tools to know is basic knowledge in the scientific methods. Now I said basic knowledge, without the need to become rocket scientists. It promotes understanding.

Nancy, I have tried to say over and over, your posts are too long and usually your links take too much time. I have looked at a few but usually not. If you want reders to give your posts any attention don’t burden them with a thesis every time. People are quite aware left, right and centre of 3/4 of the information in these posts. They are about 75% too long. You also talk down to people.

Doug, I was taught by the very same public education system, in Ontario. The very same system, where in my school we were taught to write, by supporting your thoughts with evidence. We were taught, to opine, one must know all facets of an issue, to gain understanding, and only than one can make an opinion.

Of course, we were taught the basics of writing first and for most, before we learn how to write effectively.

Perhaps, if our schools produced better readers and writers, our politicians and others would be thinking twice, maybe 5 times, before they present such lame reasons for policies.

the guy’s here to provoke Nancy and lure unsuspecting victims to the “little” dark side. Not working evidently judging by the time the fellow’s spending spinning elsewhere…or trying to spin so unsuccessfully.

The truth in Ontario is that the public system isn’t the only choice on the landscape of education choice any more.

That parents and now teachers are on to just how valuable they are in making their own choices the Doug’s of this province are a dying breed that need to come up for air and ideas at places like this to feed their need for confrontation and to borrow ideas for their own purposes.

Doug is also banking that parents and communities are filled with people who don’t know how to decode surveys.

OISE is just as political an opportunist as any other and able to use it to its advantage with which ever party is in power.

Doug (8:34pm)

I can counter each and every item you list with the opposite finding by including the whole of the survey finding listed in the highlights of the survey.

Given that I can do that tells me that it straddles both sides of the fence nicely because we all know that the Liberals will not be in power so there’s some cushion for OISE when Hudak’s at the helm.

Or is it the NDP will be sucking up to after the public sector freeze announcement? Quite the decision to make.

Providing analysis, either directly or via links to others, is a useful way of adding value to the claims being made.  Shotgunning out opinions, no matter how often or how passionately done, doesn’t add much weight to the claims being made.

I’ve asked one of the more prolific posters here to provide background to the claims being made, alas with only limited success.

On the isssue of “what the polls say…” polls can and, routinely are, commissioned by folks hoping to garner support for whetever it is they’re promoting.  Unless and until we know who the sponsors of a poll are it’d be just about impossible to give any weight to them.

I know you don’t like to find out that:

Most people want more money for ed.

Most want higher taxes for it

Smaller classes

ELP

Like local school

Like the teachers

Find testing doesn’t do much

Don’t like Afro-centred schools

Don’t support choice, religious or secular.

But that is just the way it is and all the polling confirms it.

You really need to read Diane Ravitch’s new book if you have not by now. She utterly destroys testing, charters so-called accountability etc.

What I don’t like is someone who keeps repeating the same claims repeatedly and fails, again repeatedly, to provide sources to support the claims being made.  Rote repetition may be a useful teaching mechanism in high school, however beyond high school it fails miserably.

Tailoring one’s arguments to the audience being addressed is never a bad thing.

John get off your duff and read the oise/ut survey that vindicates everything I have ever said on here. Read Diane Ravitch and Linda Darling-Hammonds new books. Don’t expect to be spoon fed. Do some esearch. You will find out that the wornderful world of education research will demonstrate that almost all of your most cherished beliefs about education are, in fact wrong.

Blah Blah Blah, all you’re doing is cherrypicking reports that support your preconceptions.  I daresay folks who advocate alternatives will match you study for study.

As to me needing to be “spoonfed”, all I’m doing is pointing out dubious or non-compelling claims.  If you can’t support what you say with substance that isn’t my problem.

John,

The OISE report has been running for many years. The methodology is clear the questions are clear. You find one single poll or report anywhere that says that a majority of Ontarians want public support for private schools, just one. Same with all of the other questions. You confuse your opinion and that of a few others you may associate with, as a majority opinion. It is not a majority opinion. You are part of a small minority on almost all questions except testing and it is wearing out as people see they get nothing for it.

You think the studies cancel out? Find even one on your side.

Ahhh…there’s the rub!

I dfon’t see things through a us versus them, reactionaryy/progressive.,educated/non-educated, good/bad lense and I don’t have much respect for those who do.

I find they’re mostly about perpetuating their narrow view of how things are and intolerant of anyone who doesn’t see things as simply as they do.

Moving past high school requires , and allows, one to understand that things are very rarely so cut and dried,  as some claim.  Folks who fall back on the same old aren’t credible.

That’s when the quality of one’s arguments becomes a useful barometer of one’s knowledge of the issue being discussed.

Oh, I think your thinking is pretty consistent, always far to the right. “Moving beyond highschool” wwhat is that? I taught at York U.

Thinking people usually have an ideology.

Teaching a couple of courses at a university isn’t quite the same thing as being a member of the faculty at a university, right?

As to “thinking people having an ideology” I know of very few of them who are so locked into it that they dismiss any and all other viewpoints.

Anyway, this has used up all my interest.

Class dismissed.

I know it is hard for you to find out that all of your most cherished myths about education are either unpopular or unworkable or untrue John but we all face disappointments in life. You can handle it.

class is definitely dismissed.