Quote Originally Posted by Detroitnerd View Post
This isn't about schools. It isn't about education. It's about politics. It's about privatizing the Detroit Public Schools system and breaking the public unions. I'd bet dollars to donuts that if the schools were privatized and the union were broken, ideologues such as Nolan Finely wouldn't be overly concerned with THOSE schools' students ending up on welfare or in prison. It would be a profitable system, and the union would be a memory, further driving down all our wages and enriching the most powerful.

Nolan's act is a good one, though. Always appears to be talking sense, like any good demagogue.
Until he died I knew someone as knowledgeable as any one anywhere regarding school administration.This person was born and educated in Detroit.He attended Detroit schools, WSU and much later a PHD from UM. He was a universally respected administrator having been a superintendent at several urban districts in Mich and other states.And he mentored many others in education several that went on to the highest level of school admin.You simply can not find anyone to say a bad word about this person.

His last job in which he was still working when he died was director of charter schools at a state Univ. He was a staunch union supporter.I asked him about the idea that charter school teachers were paid less. He told me not true, initially the pay is comparable but with experience public teachers are paid considerably more. But he also told me that there was no reason why charter teachers could not organize...And oh yeah he never bullshitted about charters by and large they perform comparably to public schools i.e. on average there is not much difference in performance.I will take his word over any dogma that I read here because he was as honest and had unwavering credibility and integrity....and he knew his stuff as well as any anywhere.

You may wonder why I write all that.It is because you will not get much support for your position DN. Is there anything grossly exaggerated by this editorial.I read the news DPS is asking for a break on $$ and they have suggested that there may be classrooms with sixty students or more. Surely there is a more productive response than yours....