Re: Eagle Forum on education

[Mike Kluznik <mkluznik@HOTMAIL.COM>]

The new attorney general (Brent?) Ashcroft from Missouri opposes providing
government benefits to individuals who do not hold a high school diploma.
Isn't it ironic that his party has also been the prime mover in high-stakes
testing.  Sure, let's deny a diploma and then deny access to certain
government programs to people without diplomas.  Let 'em eat cake.
MK


> From: Monty Neill <monty@FAIRTEST.ORG>
> Reply-To: Assessment Reform Network Mailing List <ARN-L@LISTS.CUA.EDU>
> To: ARN-L@LISTS.CUA.EDU
> Subject: Eagle Forum on education
> Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2001 12:20:54 -0500
>
> I sent this last week, don't think it arrived to anyone (I have no
> record of it arriving via ARN), but my email system (shore.net) did not
> send it, so I am sending it again. Monty
>
> For those beginning (again) to follow political maneuvering in
> Washington, here is the following from Phyllis Schlafly in the Eagle
> Forum, which had opposed national testing plans (I have no idea where
> they will be in Bush's scheme to mandate state testing programs in
> grades 3-8 in exchange for federal money). Monty Neill
>
>                                What's At Stake In
>                              Education Committee
>                                  Chairmanship?
>                                                        Dec. 27, 2000
>
>                    As members of Congress are jockeying for
> chairmanships in the
>                    107th Congress, the committees that handle big money
> seem to
>                    get all the headlines, but the Education chairmanship
> may
>                    ultimately have the most influence on policy. Public
> opinion
>                    surveys indicate that education is America's biggest
> issue, and the
>                    new chairman will decide quo vadis -- at our current
> crossroads,
>                    which way will Congress go?
>
>                    School choice may be the most visible education
> controversy, but
>                    it's not the one that the chairman will be able to
> resolve because
>                    that is primarily a state and local issue. The
> chairman will have a
>                    big impact, however, on whether we continue to
> implement Bill
>                    Clinton's two controversial 1994 laws, Goals 2000 and
>                    School-to-Work, or instead call a halt to the mission
> and
>                    curriculum changes those laws initiated.
>
>                    "School-to-Work" (STW) is bureaucratic jargon for
> imposing a new
>                    paradigm on public schools that de-emphasizes
> traditional
>                    academic studies and replaces them with
> vocational-technical
>                    (Vo-Tech) courses for all students. There's nothing
> wrong with
>                    vocational education; that's always been an option
> for high school
>                    students.
>
>                    But School-to-Work is not an option; it's a federal
> law,
>                    quintessentially Clintonian. States that accept STW
> funds, and all
>                    states have accepted them, are subject to STW
> regulations.
>
>                    School-to-Work is the mainspring of the Clinton
> Administration's
>                    audacious plan to impose German/Japanese style
> national
>                    economic planning to parallel the 1994 Clinton health
> care plan to
>                    take over the entire health industry, one-seventh of
> our economy.
>                    Indeed, the same schemers were the principal
> architects of both
>                    plans: Hillary Clinton and Ira Magaziner.
>
>                    The writings of Clinton's economic adviser, Robert
> Reich, show that
>                    he is a frank admirer of the German model, which
> exercises
>                    government control over the economy by controlling
> access to the
>                    workforce through the schools. School-to-Work was
> easily sold to
>                    big corporations which envy the privileged
> corporate-government
>                    relationship their peers enjoy in Germany and Japan.
>
>                    The STW paradigm is marketed to public schools all
> over the
>                    country by Marc Tucker's National Center for
> Education and the
>                    Economy, whose letterhead boasts the names of Hillary
> Clinton,
>                    Ira Magaziner and David Rockefeller Jr. The STW
> paradigm is
>                    packaged for Governors by offering them federal
> funds, a route to
>                    bypass state legislatures and school boards, and
> attractive
>                    "partnerships" with corporations.
>
>                    One marketing outreach aimed at Governors is a
> 501(c)(3)
>                    organization called CDS International (initials not
> explained on its
>                    letterhead). CDS brags that it has organized STW
> programs for
>                    representatives of public schools, government,
> industry and labor in
>                    more than 20 states.
>
>                    CDS's brochure explains that STW's goal is to move
> American
>                    children into "The German Dual System of Vocational
> Training"
>                    under which Germany transfers nearly 70 percent of
> its students at
>                    age 16 from full-time secondary school to spending
> most of their
>                    time as apprentices in the workplace. National
> training standards
>                    have been established for each occupation in Germany,
> and
>                    company training is governed by federal law.
>
>                    The German system requires the student to spend 3-4
> days a
>                    week in the workforce under an employer's mentorship,
> and only
>                    1-2 days a week in traditional education learning
> mathematics,
>                    science, social studies and languages. CDS states,
> "The dual
>                    system regulations and examinations are products of
> close
>                    cooperation among schools, government, employers
> (operating
>                    through their associations), and workers (represented
> by their
>                    unions)."
>
>                    The STW paradigm involves establishing the mindset
> that the
>                    mission of the schools is to serve the workforce and
> the global
>                    economy, rather than to give all American children
> the basic
>                    knowledge and skills that can enable them to be all
> they can be.
>                    This is why the 1994 STW law dictates that the
> Secretaries of
>                    Education and Labor "shall jointly provide for, and
> shall exercise
>                    final authority over the administration of this Act,"
> and why the
>                    House committee that wrote this law is called the
> Education and
>                    the Workforce Committee.
>
>                    Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), one Congressman now running
> for
>                    chairman of the House Education and the Workforce
> Committee,
>                    has made it clear which side of the STW controversy
> he is on. In a
>                    December 7 letter circulating on Capitol Hill, he
> comes out strongly
>                    against proposals to separate education and the
> workforce into two
>                    committees.
>
>                    Boehner's letter states in bold italics that "it is
> simply impossible
>                    to consider workforce and education issues
> separately. . . . The
>                    two are becoming even more indistinguishable as
> lifelong learning
>                    becomes absolutely necessary in the New Economy."
>
>                    The new school-corporate partnership is tantalizing
> to Big
>                    Government Republicans who spend taxpayers' money and
> solicit
>                    corporate political donations. Boehner's letter
> reminds us that "a
>                    structure that allows education and workforce issues
> together also
>                    allows us to add employers to our coalition efforts."
>
>                    To have any chance of seizing the initiative on the
> education issue,
>                    the Republican Congress will have to elect a House
> Education
>                    committee chairman who understands and opposes
> Clinton-style
>                    School-to- Work.
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> To unsubscribe from the ARN-L list, send command SIGNOFF ARN-L
> to LISTSERV@LISTS.CUA.EDU.

_________________________________________________________________
Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from the ARN-L list, send command SIGNOFF ARN-L
to LISTSERV@LISTS.CUA.EDU.