Interesting comments in todays Denver Post. HILKER: JIHAD IN JEFFCO IS ABOUT SOME-MORE THAN EDUCATION Laurel Trasky, right, a late Denver Public Schools teacher, shows her support for a remember of Jeffco Board of Education members Ken Witt, John Newkirk We Jefferson County residents never suspicion we would be feet soldiers on a front lines in a “key” choosing battleground. we didn’t even enlist. But a domestic gurus have announced that we are as purple as those towering majesties of song. We are an electoral weathervane, most like a Iowa and New Hampshire primaries. Thus, we now find that a “Jihad in Jeffco” is not only about merely laying a grounds for a remember of Republican members of a propagandize board. It is about Democrats gripping control of a statehouse — and even Congress. Apparently, struggle leads to voter angst and so a aloft audience of those boring folks who gaunt to a left. A story in this really journal remarkable that Big Labor, a CIO-AFL, is throwing large bucks and manpower into a common county perplexing to get a possibilities elected. The strategy: Manufacture a debate and afterwards gain on it. No consternation a National Education Association, a teachers union, dispatched a crew of 44 staffers from 18 states to Jefferson County in Jul to “talk to educators about concerns and issues.” A doubt here and opposite a republic is this: Who is going to run a open schools: a open or a teachers unions? But a irony of a conditions is thick. Education remodel indeed is a bipartisan issue. At a forefront of pulling for change — accountability, a revamp of clergyman reign laws and origination of compensate systems formed on opening — have been Democrats dauntless adequate to go opposite on a union. They embody a boss himself and his secretary of education. They instituted a Race to a Top, that encourages creation and burden formed on inhabitant testing. Also critical to a remodel means have been such organizations as Democrats for Education Reform, Teach for America and magnanimous preparation activists such as Michelle Rhee. Many deep-pocketed liberals have saved many groups and reform-minded possibilities in their campaigns opposite a country. Likewise, a keystone square of remodel legislation in Colorado, Senate Bill 191, was pushed by by Sen. Michael Johnston and a handful of his associate Dems who defied extreme antithesis from other members of their possess party, as good as a NEA and a state affiliate. The law links clergyman evaluations to a exam scores of their students and allows underperforming teachers to be dismissed. Most Democratic officeholders and possibilities are not on house with reforms like this given a celebration receives outrageous financial support from labor unions, generally a NEA and a affiliates. Dem “rebels” have taken a mount that improving preparation is some-more critical than orderly labor’s money. Big Labor’s stipulation of fight here is not only about electing possibilities auspicious to a means or environment a theatre for recapturing one propagandize board. It wants to send a summary to governors, legislators and propagandize reformers opposite a nation: “Don’t disaster with us!” Perhaps it can even get adequate support during a state Capitol to pass new laws to cut a heart out of SB 191. The initial casualties in this conflict will expected be a 20 percent (or more) of a kids in Jeffco and opposite Colorado who underperform in a classroom. But as usual, it isn’t about a children. Dick Hilker (dhilker529@aol) of Arvada is a late suburban journal editor and columnist. He writes twice a month for The Denver Post.
Posted on: Fri, 17 Oct 2014 16:13:17 +0000
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