Mount Virtus

"Happy to come back to Michigan, but I miss the mountains!"

Ben on Social Media

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Home
  • About Ben
  • Mount Virtus?
  • Writer / Editor For Hire
  • What I’m Thankful For
  • Colorado Ballot Reviews
    • Colorado Ballot 2008
    • Colorado Ballot 2010
    • Colorado Ballot 2012
  • Archives
  • Passion and Purpose:
    The Rise & Fall of Al Gansee
  • Mary and Jacob: From the Forgotten Dust
  • The Westfield Gardener
Home Colorado Politics Cesar Chavez Success Revisits Merrifield’s Infernal Email

8/20/2007 By Ben Leave a Comment

Cesar Chavez Success Revisits Merrifield’s Infernal Email

Congrats to Pueblo’s Cesar Chavez Academy (and thanks to Colorado Charters for pointing out the accolades) – one of two charter schools nationwide to be featured as models of excellent education in a U.S. Department of Education documentary video.

This must only make more painful the recent episode of an email sent by state Rep. Mike Merrifield (D-Manitou Springs) to Sen. Sue Windels (D-Arvada), indicating that there is “a special place in hell” for “charterizers” and the like. If one remembers, the specific context of the message was in response to efforts to replicate the highly successful Cesar Chavez Academy model in Colorado Springs. Democrat education committee chairman Merrifield summarily assigned people who wanted to try a proven better program for teaching high-poverty, minority kids a place in the eternal nether regions.

According to Academy principal Lawrence Hernandez, there is a waiting list of roughly 3,000 kids to get into his school of 1,100. While parental demand for success and achievement grows, certain Democrat lawmakers like Merrifield and Windels demonstrate their singular loyalty to their political supporters – the anti-reform roadblock known as the teachers union.

It must feel like salt and vinegar poured into an open wound for Merrifield and Windels to see attention given to the tremendous success of the Pueblo charter school. Yet while they can rest easy at night knowing they have the reins of legislative power, untold thousands of Colorado parents are denied a choice like Cesar Chavez Academy to provide academic opportunity to their kids.

As explained in another recent Colorado Charters post:

Hopefully more public education leaders across America will be more concerned about WHAT works rather than WHO came up with the idea.

Amen to that. Thanks for elected leaders who want to exercise a little common sense in favor of successful models based in parental choice, leaders like Republican Senator Nancy Spence of Centennial:

“For all our efforts to re-examine and reinvent public education on a grand scale — including a blue ribbon panel studying education issues right now — it is looking more and more like one of the best solutions has been right in front of us all along,” Spence said. She denounced attempts by some members of the legislature’s ruling party earlier this year to roll back charter schools.

“I’m still reeling from the latest round of attacks on charters,” Spence said. She added that the General Assembly’s refusal to expand Pueblo’s renowned Cesar Chavez charter program — whose mostly Hispanic and low-income students perennially post impressive achievement scores — was especially ironic.

Very ironic to want to punish those behind one of the nation’s most successful schools with never-ending fire and brimstone. Welcome to a Democrat party with education leaders more beholden to an established system than open to possibilities of what might work for some of the state’s neediest kids.

Filed Under: Colorado Politics, Education, General

Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Inside

  • About Ben
  • Archives
  • Colorado Ballot Reviews
    • Colorado Ballot 2008
    • Colorado Ballot 2010
    • Colorado Ballot 2012
    • Colorado Ballot 2014
  • Mary and Jacob: From the Forgotten Dust
  • Mount Virtus?
  • Passion and Purpose:
    The Rise & Fall of Al Gansee
  • The Westfield Gardener
  • What I’m Thankful For
  • Writer / Editor For Hire

About Me

Ben DeGrow
Grateful and growing Christian, devoted husband and father of 3, public policy analyst, returned to Michigan by way of Colorado, conservative writer, lifelong learner, Detroit Tigers fan.

Recent Posts

  • AI-Enhanced Cyberbullying: The Dark Side of Teen Innovation
  • My Baker’s Dozen of Top 2023 Reads
  • Common Learning Disabilities in Children
  • Tips to Teach Kids to Set and Achieve Goals
  • The Christmas Music Countdown You’ve Been Looking For: 2022 Edition

Colorado News

  • Colorado Senate News
  • Complete Colorado
  • Independence Institute
  • Loveland Politics
  • The Colorado Observer

National News and Politics

  • Drudge Report
  • Hot Air
  • National Review
  • Politico
  • Real Clear Politics
  • Reason
  • The Washington Times
  • TownHall
  • Wall Street Journal
  • Weekly Standard
  • World Magazine

Blogs Extraordinaire

  • American Thinker
  • David Harsanyi’s Blog
  • E!! The True Conservative Story
  • EIA Intercepts
  • Evangelical Outpost
  • Hugh Hewitt
  • Instapundit
  • LaShawn Barber
  • Lileks
  • Little Green Footballs
  • Michelle Malkin
  • NRO's The Corner
  • Power Line
  • Red State

Completing the Blogroll

  • Alarming News
  • Black Five
  • Blogs of War
  • Eduwonk
  • Flypaper
  • Fraters Libertas
  • Historical Conversations
  • IMAO
  • Jay P. Greene
  • Mike Anderson
  • Mullings
  • Professor Bainbridge
  • Right Thinking
  • Right Wing News
  • Right Wing Nuthouse
  • Shot in the Dark
  • Talking Points Memo
  • Virginia Postrel
  • Volokh Conspiracy

Christian Commentary et al.

  • Kevin Pierpont
  • Sharper Iron

Conservative and GOP Sites

  • Backbone America
  • Cal Thomas
  • Colorado Republican Party
  • Colorado Republican Study Committee
  • Dennis Prager
  • Denver Metro Young Republicans
  • Free Republic
  • Heritage Foundation
  • Jefferson County Republican Party
  • Mackinac Center for Public Policy
  • Mark Steyn
  • Michael Medved
  • Rush Limbaugh

Colorado Blogs

  • American Kestrel
  • Bob Agard
  • Colorado Charter Schools
  • Colorado Peak Politics
  • Colorado Pols
  • Colorado Right
  • Conservative Libertarian Outpost
  • Coyote Gulch
  • Ed Is Watching
  • Free Colorado
  • Jeff Crank Show
  • Mark Hillman
  • Patient Power
  • PirateBallerina
  • Protein Wisdom
  • Reagan Girl
  • Rocky Mountain Alliance 1.0 (Archive)
  • Rocky Mountain Alliance 2.0 (Archive)
  • Rossputin
  • Stop the ACLU Blog
  • The Spot (Denver Post)
  • We Stand Firm

Other Sites

  • Technorati
  • Word Press

Rocky Mountain Alliance 2.0

  • Reclaim the Blue
  • The Business Word
  • The Daily Blogster
  • View from a Height

To Contact Me:
bendegrow-at-gmail.com

Copyright © 2025 RSS Feed · WordPress · Log in