Why Olympia's a One-Party Town

This op-ed was an interesting take on education in Washington state by Lynne Varner of the Times.

Her premise? There are fewer and fewer Republicans on the Eastside because Eastsiders care about education and don't like what state Republicans have to say. From her piece:

"Esser's predecessor, Chris Vance, advises Republicans to fall in love with public education. Drop divisive buzzwords like "government schools" and start talking about teachers' pay, accountability and the value of standardized testing.

"The mistake the GOP has made is that when you attack the teachers union, it comes across as attacking teachers and there is no one more popular than a teacher," Vance says."

I can't quite agree with the last statement because there's this strange thing of "love the teacher, hate the union". I have seen the teachers' union blamed for everything you can think of (the current one was a post at another blog about the reason for the lack of unity over Denny/Sealth is that they would need fewer teachers and they don't want teachers to lose their jobs. Naturally, this person is uninformed that they would still continue to operate as two separate schools with full staffs so no, there would not be fewer teachers.) I think the teachers' union only wishes it were as powerful as some think they are.

Comments

Anonymous said…
That is interesting. I voted for Dino Rossi last time around but I had planned on questioning his public education funding plans if he takes office and the issue has become so important to me that I'll most likely not support him if I don't like what he says. It's embarassing that the state ranks so low in so many categories and I'm shocked little has been done about it even with a democrat as governor over the last several years.
1/16/08, 11:21 AM
Anonymous said…
I suppose that the truth of the last 30 years -- incessant success by unaccountable corporate scumbags and their lackeys in the Republican Party trying to turn the USA into a 3rd world backwater with the filthy rich 1/2 a percent and the filthy poor everyone else

I suppose that those truths might be sinking in, so it is time for the liars of the right to change their lies!
1/18/08, 8:42 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tuesday Open Thread

The speaker list is up for the Board meeting tomorrow; not as packed as I thought with just four people on the waitlist. The majority of the speakers are speaking on high school boundaries (with several wanting to talk about Ballard High). There are only three of us speaking about the Green Dot resolution asking the City to not grant the zoning departures that Green Dot has requested.  It's me, long-time watchdog, Chris Jackins, and the head of the Washington State Charter Schools Association, Patrick D'Amelio.  (I knew Mr. D'Amelio when he headed the Alliance for Education and Big Brothers and Big Sisters; he's a stand-up guy.)
Read more

Breaking It Down: Where the District Might Close Schools

Update 2: an absolutely fabulous interactive map made by parent Beth Day (@thebethocracy on Twitter - she covers Board meetings and is fun to read).   end of update    Update 1: Mea culpa, I did indeed get Decatur and Thornton Creek mixed up. Thanks to all for the correction. end of update   I suspect some who read this post will be irate. Why do this? Because the district seems very hellbent on this effort with no oversight skid marks from the Board.    To clearly state - I do not believe that closing 20 schools is a good idea. I think they hit on 20 because they thought it might bring in the most savings. But the jury is still out on the savings because the district has not shown its work nor its data. I suspect closing schools and THEN leasing/renting them is the big plan but that means the district really has to keep the buildings up.   But this district, with its happy talk about "well-resourced schools" is NOT acknowledging the pain and yes, grief, that is to come fro
Read more

MEETING CANCELED - Hey Kids, A Meeting with Three(!) Seattle Schools Board Directors

 Update 2: So I have seen a message from President Liza Rankin on why she, Director Evan Briggs, and Director Michelle Sarju backed out of this meeting.  In a nutshell: - She says there was no organization to the meeting which is just not true. They had a moderator lined up and naturally the board members could have set parameters for what to discuss, length of meeting, etc. All that was fleshed out. - She also claimed that if the meeting was PTA sponsored, they needed to have liability insurance to use the school space. Hello? PTAs use school space all the time and know they have to have this insurance.  - She seems to be worried about the Open Public Meetings law. Look, if she has a meeting in a school building on a non-personnel topic, it should be an open meeting. It appears that Rankin is trying, over and over, to narrow the window of access that parents have to Board members. She even says in her message - "...with decisions made in public." Hmmm - She also says that th
Read more