Somebody Call the Secretary of the Status Quo Arne Duncan

I  wonder if Secretary Duncan understands the issue of equity? Has he even read the NAACP January resolution on charter schools? The prize is and has always been equity not some race to nowhere that leaves some schools with more funding, more supports, wrap around services, and more segregated than ever before. I salute the leadership of the NAACP for reminding America the prize is not test scores, but equity.
So friends copy and paste this one to every DOE in the nation? The Status Quo is NCLB, and has run the show for over a dozen years now.
The Status Quo in DC has spent over a trillion dollars on new testing and standards all the while ignoring inequity in our schools.
Secretary Status Quo Duncan had his chance to change the status quo, but instead has done everything in his power to maintain and to preserve a system of inequity.
See you in DC March 30-April 2 Mr. Status Quo at Occupy the DC DOE,
Still marching,

Jesse 

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED PEOPLE 4805 MT. HOPE DRIVE • BALTIMORE, MD 21215-3297 • (410) 580-5777

LEON W RUSSELL

Chairman, Resolutions Committee National Board of Directors

BENJAMIN TODD JEALOUS

President & Chief Executive Officer

ROSLYN M. BROCK

Chairman, Board of Directors

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is the nation’s oldest, largest and most widely-recognized grassroots based civil rights organization. Formed in 1909 by a multiracial group of progressive thinkers, the NAACP is a nonprofit organization established with the objective of ensuring the political, educational, social, and economic equality of people of color. For over 102 years, the NAACP has challenged this nation to uphold its promise of equal opportunity toward the goal of eliminating racial prejudice and removing all barriers of racial discrimination through democratic processes.

In a process established by the NAACP Constitution, this resolution was adopted by the delegates to the 101st Annual Convention in Kansas City, Missouri, during the legislative session in July, 2010. It was subsequently ratified by the NAACP National Board of Directors at its meeting on October 15, 2010. This resolution is now the policy of the Association, and is “binding on the Board of Directors, the Executive Committee, the Officers, and all units.”

WHEREAS, charter schools are public schools which were originally designed to explore new approaches to educate students; and

WHEREAS, in some cases, charter schools have become a school model that is used to segregate students; and

WHEREAS, charter schools have too seldom informed the education community regarding innovative instructional strategies that accelerate academic achievement in the general population of students; and

WHEREAS, the Center for Research in Educational Outcomes (CREDO) which examined charter school data in fifteen (15) states and the District of Columbia confirmed that only 17% of the charter school students in the study outperformed their peers, while 46% performed no better and 37% performed worse; and

Charter SchoolsWHEREAS, charter schools operate more autonomously than traditional public schools in the use of funds, adherence to state laws and school policies, selection and removal of students, and the selection and removal of staff, thus creating separate and unequal conditions for success; and

WHEREAS, charter schools draw funding away from already underfunded traditional public schools; and

WHEREAS, the NAACP recognizes that at best, quality charter schools serve only a small percentage of children of color and disadvantaged students for whom the NAACP advocates relative to said population left behind in failing schools; and

WHEREAS, the NAACP recognizes the urgent need to provide quality education for all children, not only those fortunate enough to win lotteries to attend existing quality charter schools; and

WHEREAS, the NAACP is committed to finding broad based, effective solutions for immediate implementation to improve the quality of public education for all children.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the NAACP will strongly advocate for immediate, overarching improvements to the existing public education system; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP rejects the emphasis on charter schools as the vanguard approach for the education of children, instead of focusing attention, funding, and policy advocacy on improving existing, low performing public schools and will work through local, state and federal legislative processes to ensure that all public schools are provided the necessary funding, support and autonomy necessary to educate all students; and

BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, that the NAACP will urge all of its Units to work to support public schools throughout the nation to educate all children to their highest potential.

Roslyn M. Brock Chairman National Board of Directors

Leon Russell Benjamin Todd Jealous Chairman President & CEO Committee on Resolutions

If you are wondering what I was listening to on my walk this morning:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=130J-FdZDtY&feature=related
Still marching Momma, and still listening, and still believing in that dream,
Jesse 

Spread the word Occupy the DC DOE this March 30 to April 2

My Momma loved listening to Dr. Martin Luther King on our little black and white TV. She would have us all down on our knees in prayer every time someone arrested, or did something mean to him.
It was like we knew Dr. king personally, and in some ways I think we all knew him. I grew up in a house with a missing father. Her thinking was there could be no better role model for her only son than Martin.
She brought us a 33 vinyl record album of Dr. King's "I have a dream speech", and we listened to it on Sunday afternoons after church. We listened as we looked through images of that speech in the only Life magazine we ever had in that old apartment.
She told us every once in awhile a man needed to take stand and testify before his brothers and sisters. We only have to do it once in awhile. Now she was sure to let us know Martin did it every single day. The only picture of a black man in our house was of Martin. His picture was right next to the Pope's picture.
She cried for weeks after Martin was assassinated. We all cried, and I still find myself crying some nights.
Like my Momma said every once in awhile a man has to take a stand, and testify. Well this spring I am going to tell it on a mountain at Occupy the DOE in DC. I have carried the hurt of a thousand children, a thousand parents, and a thousand teachers inside of me for over a decade of NCLB. I have walked, talked, blogged, and now I am going to testify and occupy the DOE with my brothers and sisters.

Come one, come all, and if you can't make it to DC then make a sign, grab a friend, and occupy a DOE near you for an hour or two in your state.
Come tell it on a mountain that the people are taking back their public schools.
Still walking, still marching, and ready to occupy the DOE,
Jesse   
 For a peek at the schedule for Occupy the DOE click
http://unitedoptout.com/occupy-the-doe-in-dc-schedule-march-30th-to-april-2nd-2012/

If you are wondering what the walking man was listening to just before he testified at the Connecticut State Department of Education ESEA Waiver hearing:
http://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play?p=blind%20boys%20utube%20go%20tell%20it%20on%20a%20mountain&tnr=21&vid=1442126955610&turl=http%3A%2F%2Fts3.mm.bing.net%2Fvideos%2Fthumbnail.aspx%3Fq%3D1442126955610%26id%3D94f1b0e79849e499b0d795877a685dfd%26bid%3D8pAYjCWjK8TXFg%26bn%3DThumb%26url%3Dhttp%253a%252f%252fwww.youtube.com%252fwatch%253fv%253drgESkVmFnsQ&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DrgESkVmFnsQ&sigr=11a6ca197&newfp=1&tit=Go+Tell+it+on+the+Mountain+-+The+Blind+Boys+of+Alabama
Sometimes a man has to testify, and tell it like it is. A trillion NCLB dollars later all DC has to offer is more of the same old same old. Come tell it on every mountain top that their old NCLB/RTTT Status Quo has to go!

America's children deserve real art teachers in real art classrooms

http://ilraiseyourhand.org/content/line-art-course-you-drawing-sculpture-and-photography-me

The above is a story titled "An On-Line Art Course for You, Drawing, Sculpture and Photography for Me" The story goes on to explain that students are required to take an online art class, because they have no art teachers. An art class is required for graduation. I wonder how many children of our leaders in Congress, the Senate, and the White house are taking online art classes at their schools?

John Adams said: "I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain." Something deep inside me thinks John Adams would object to schools in the 21st century without real art teachers.

The United States Department of Education has spent nearly 1 trillion federal dollars, (a number that many mathematicians call too big to work with) on NCLB reforms over the last 12 years. I find myself wondering how any school could lack the resources to hire real art teachers. Something is rotten with a reform policy that spends 1 trillion dollars on our schools, but the leaves many schools without the resources to hire real art teachers!
Now lets also consider that federal funds only accounts for about 10% of our tax dollars spent on public schools. This means we have spent nearly 10 trillion dollars on NCLB/RTTT reform mandates, but the best some schools can offer students is a mandated online art course.
Am I the only person that wants a forensic audit of every dime spent on a decade of this nonsense?
If we pull back the curtain from the DOE in DC we might just find a good old boys network of thieves laughing all the way to the bank.
The real tragedy is not the lost of money, but the suffering of America's children.
Children are more than test scores, and they deserve real art teachers in real classrooms.
Ready to occupy the DOE,
Jesse

Readers if you are wondering what I am listening to, and visualizing on my walk today it a little Vicent:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dipFMJckZOM
Don Mcleans Vicent
" (Writers: DON MCLEAN, ENRICO NASCIMBENI, ROBERTO VECCHIONI)

Starry, starry night
Paint your palette blue and gray
Look out on a summer's day
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul
Shadows on the hills
Sketch the trees and the daffodils
Catch the breeze and the winter chills
In colors on the snowy linen land

Now I understand what you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
How you tried to set them free
They would not listen, they did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen now

Starry, starry night
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze
Swirling clouds in violet haze
Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue
Colors changing hue
Morning fields of amber grain
Weathered faces lined in pain
Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand

Now I understand what you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free
They would not listen, they did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen now

For they could not love you
But still your love was true
And when no hope was left inside
On that starry, starry night
You took your life as lovers often do
But I could have told you, Vincent
This world was never meant
For one as beautiful as you