The Independence Institute is producing more Web video content. You've seen the more entertaining side - now here's a 3-minute educational clip by Dr. Paul Prentice about property rights (via The Caldara Blog): Well, somebody had to ask the question to get it going: "What is the relationship of property rights and liberty in general?" Hey, you don't know how long I spent memorizing that line. Method acting - it's called method acting. … [Read more...]
Wow, Those Are Some Bad Teachers
Remember the cash-prize contest to get rid of America's 10 worst teachers unveiled a few days ago? A publicity stunt, to be sure, but it looks like Center for Union Facts already has received some worthy nominations:We’ve received more than three hundred nominations since our “Ten Worst Union-Protected Teachers†contest launched at TeachersUnionExposed.com on Tuesday. Just to give you a hint of what’s been coming our way, here are a few of the entries we’ve received so far (edited for privacy and clarity, of course): * Music teacher. Takes personal cell phone calls and answers e-mail while kids are in the room waiting to be taught. She yells at them if they start to talk because she can’t hear. Doesn’t really teach … [Read more...]
High-Ranking Democrat: Property Tax Hike Not Just for Schools
One year ago today, Gov. Bill Ritter announced his "Children's Amendment," which ended up passing as part of the 2007 School Finance Act - effectively raising property taxes on homes and businesses without a constitutional vote of the people. Now comes the revelation from a high-ranking member of Ritter's own Democratic Party: The money generated from the tax hike isn't just to fund schools. The chairman of the powerful Joint Budget Committee has acknowledged on the record that a sweeping statewide property-tax hike pushed through last year by his fellow Democrats will subsidize new social programs--not just schools, as originally promised. Democrat Bernie Buescher, of Grand Junction, said in a JBC meeting this week that some of the … [Read more...]
$10,000 Apiece Awaits America’s 10 Worst Teachers … What a Deal!
The Center for Union Facts (which brought us such memorable 30-second video gems as this and this) hasn't made a name for itself by being bland, demure, or run-of-the-mill. Therefore, it was hardly surprising to see them unveil the new Teachers Union Exposed website, complete with a sponsored contest that promises "to pay the ten worst union-protected teachers in America $10,000 apiece to get out of the classroom." Of course, $10,000 is a bargain compared to the princely sums sometimes paid to dismiss the worst-offending or poorest-performing tenured teachers. I have many, many friends who currently are teachers - traditional public school, charter school, private school - and I know plenty more who have spent time in the teaching … [Read more...]
Denver’s School Autonomy Push Reaches New York Times Opinion Page
The local story that has grown out of the Bruce Randolph School's quest for autonomy from Denver's red tape and union work rules reached the op-ed pages of the New York Times yesterday. Andrew Rotherham, a center-left Democrat reformer who co-runs Education Sector and famously blogs as Eduwonk, writes in the column:While laws like No Child Left Behind take the rhetorical punches for being a straitjacket on schools, it is actually union contracts that have the greatest effect over what teachers can and cannot do. These contracts can cover everything from big-ticket items like pay and health care coverage to the amount of time that teachers can spend on various activities. Reformers have long argued that this is an impediment to effective … [Read more...]
Random Bits o’ Spitzer
Spent a few minutes surfing the Web, and found this collection of tidbits on New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, the frenzied media's scandal du jour. From the sublime to the ridiculous ... first, Mickey Kaus notes that a Spitzer resignation (unless he's brazen enough to stick it out) would put school choice supporter Lt. Governor David Paterson at the helm of the Empire State. That's good news. And on the lighter side, Scrapple Face's Scott Ott notes the chief clue that tipped off investigators to Spitzer's illicit behavior:A spokesman from the prosecutor’s office said, “Typically, when a Democrat Governor comes to the nation’s capital, he’s got his hat in hand and winds up leaving town with a bunch of money. The fact that Spitzer … [Read more...]
Liberal Activist Judge Threatens to Criminalize Homeschool Parents
Update: Richie D at exvigilare has more Out in California, an activist judge has all but put the kibosh on educational freedom - apparently generating law from whole cloth that says parents who school at home have to be credentialed by the state. At least a higher court will have something to say about it:A "breathtaking" ruling from a California appeals court that could subject the parents of 166,000 students in the state to criminal sanctions will be taken to the state Supreme Court. The announcement comes today from the Pacific Justice Institute, whose president, Brad Dacus, described the impact of the decision as "stunning." "The scope of this decision by the appellate court is breathtaking," he said. "It not only attacks … [Read more...]
The Reports of Common Sense’s Death May Not be Exaggerated After All
Eminent UCLA law professor and blogger extraordinaire Eugene Volokh exposes a case of political correctness run amok, to the point of absurdity. "Harassment by reading"? Oh, it's worse than that. University administrators in Indiana came down hard on an employee reading during breaktime a scholarly book that included "Ku Klux Klan" in the title. (You can learn more about the incident, and the book's clearly anti-Klan theme here.) Here's the key excerpt from a university Affirmative Action Office letter, reprinted on Volokh's site:Upon review of this matter, we conclude that your conduct constitutes racial harassment in that you demonstrated disdain and insensitivity to your co-workers who repeatedly requested that you refrain from … [Read more...]
Barack Obama’s “No, We Can’t” About-Face on School Vouchers
I almost missed this one... From the editors of the New York Sun comes notice that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama may be more cynical and duplicitous than widely given credit for:No sooner had we issued Elizabeth Green's dispatch under the headline "Obama Open to Private School Vouchers" than his campaign was scrambling to undo the potential damage with the Democratic primary electorate. On February 20, his campaign issued a statement headlined, "Response to Misleading Reports Concerning Senator Obama's Position on Vouchers" that said, "Senator Obama has always been a critic of vouchers." The statement went on, "Throughout his career, he has voted against voucher proposals and voiced concern for siphoning off resources from … [Read more...]
Tribute to Buckley Reminder of “Great Task Remaining Before Us”
Over at Pajamas Media, Scott Johnson eulogizes the late William F. Buckley, Jr.. First, probably his most significant accomplishment:When Buckley founded National Review as the voice of the [conservative] movement, he performed two acts of statesmanship that were vital to the movement’s ultimate, if unlikely, success: he reserved exclusive ownership of the magazine to himself so as to prevent the kind of sectarian brawls that had killed other such magazines, and he prohibited John Birchers and other kooky anti-Semitic organizations from the magazine’s precincts. Johnson also observes what is left undone:Until [Buckley] gave up public speaking in 1998, his frequent campus speaking engagements were part missionary work, part … [Read more...]
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