Whether you agree with them or not, both Diane Ravitch and Carol Burris have had long careers in education. Exactly what experience is required of a woman before she is taken seriously as an advocate versus 'two ladies "playing" with education policy,'. Is educator of the year or assistant Secretary of Education not enough?
Rather than concern myself solely with how highly credentialed these individuals are, in making the statement that
"Here I see two ladies "playing" with education policy, as long as it affects someone else's kids.", I focused on the totality of the circumstances, as found on the internet:
- the apparent flip-flopping of viewpoints on educational trends/issues,
- their ability to ride the surf of any given educational trend in vogue over the years,
- willingness to experiment with its application on our children in public schools,
- market books about it,
- while their progeny were educated in PRIVATE schools, RELIGIOUS schools, and High-Performing Public schools,
- and credible research on cluster grouping appears to have been ignored:
1)
http://www.casenex.com/casenet/pages/virtualLibrary/gridlock/groupmyths.html2)
http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/nrcgt/reports/rbdm9204/rbdm9204.pdf Please don't overlook or trivialize the information in my post (with carefully researched links to sources), and attempt to side-step the discussion into a supposed gender war.
