Dr. King understood the dangers of privatization, writes Dr. Williams: King saw how school privatization was used to maintain segregation in Georgia....What we are seeing in the name of “reform” today is the same plan with slight modifications: brand schools as low-performing factories of failure, encourage privatization, and leave the vast majority of students in underfunded, highly stigmatized public schools --that will be switched over to an educational products based curricula and testing regime that will no longer allow them to move forward. Ironically, all this will be done int heir name--to help equalize the education field--but it will in fact doom those at the bottom because the tools to really move them forward are not provided--they cannot be accomplished by schools/curricula and testing. We do not have an education problem as much as we have have an access to resources problem beyond schools and this is not going to change. Today more than 50% of our public school students qualify for free-school lunch due to poverty. In spite of all the blame that has been thrown upon schools and teachers--they are only responsible for a small part of student academic success. What matters most is a safe and nurturing home environment and parental involvement--direct or indirect--it is what happens after school that is important and institutional settings are not going to replace involved and loving parents that provide an enriched extra curricular experience to their children. --While it seeks to claim the mantle of the movement and Dr. King’s legacy ~by paying lip service to helping the underserved and global equality~, corporate education reform is rooted in fear, fired by competition and driven by division. It seeks to undermine community rather than build it and, for this reason, it is the ultimate betrayal of the goals and values of the movement. .dianeravitch.net/2015/01/19/yohuru-williams-what-would-dr-king-say-about-the-corporate-assault-on-public-education/
Posted on: Tue, 20 Jan 2015 02:46:37 +0000
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