Archives for November 2008

I bet this will be my most viewed blog.The big news here is that Gates, as many people already knew, will be moving away from its focus on the creation of small schools. It will be interesting to see what happens to the small school movement, particularly those districts that are in the middle or early stages of development. Here is an excerpt from Liz Green's piece from Gotham … [Read more...] about News Flash: Gates Foundation Announces New Focus in Education

My colleague said to me that "the arts are a core subject in NCLB and that alerting policy makers of this can have a powerful positive affect."It's true, NCLB does include arts education as one of the 10 core subjects.In reality that's a policy fantasy. "Follow the money," said another colleague. Or, "the only accountability is financial accountability," said a senior education … [Read more...] about The New Math: NCLB plus Big Budget Cuts equals??

I thought about it yesterday, what music did I want to listen to, as I was sitting on the train thinking about the election. This morning, I turned to Aaron Copland and his Appalachian Spring, created in 1944 for Martha Graham, with an original set by Noguchi.It seemed just right for the moment. Our composer from Brooklyn, a gay man who was a true progressive democrat, who … [Read more...] about My Soundtrack for this Obama/American moment

I used to love the old fashioned voting booth, where you pushed down a little thingamabob to your candidate's name, and then when done, you would move the handle from one side to the other, which required a bit of muscle, and then you heard a thump, the sound of the machine registering your vote.And then, someone from the polling place would move the handle back to reset it, … [Read more...] about The Art of Voting in Maplewood New Jersey