Author Archives: rmberkman

About rmberkman

This blog is the sole musings of one Robert M. Berkman, an educator who has taught math, science and technology for the past 30 years in New York. You can react to all his posts by emailing him at rants@bltm.com.

…a feeling of inferiority… stop privatizing education…

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Charter Schools & Dog Whistle Politics in New York

I’ve lived through my share of the outrageous when it comes to political pandering, having grown up in the days of Lyndon Johnson’s “Daisy” campaign advertisement, right up through Reagan’s “Cadillac Queen” to Bush the Elder’s take-down of presidential candidate … Continue reading

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Torah, Talmud and the Common Core: Oy Veh!

There’s an old joke that if you put two Jews in a room to debate a question, they’ll inevitably emerge with three opinions. This comes about from the fact that Judaism is based on an ancient text written in an … Continue reading

Posted in Common Core State Standards, Computation, Go Math!, Junk | 1 Comment

Charter Schools and the Politics of Urban-Racial-Class Warfare

It was once said that “all politics is local,” and when it comes to education, it should best be construed as hyper-local: a parent who sends his/her kid to the neighborhood public school does not gives a rat’s arm over … Continue reading

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What kind of parents does Success Academy want? Well, me for one!

There’s an old joke about a man who goes to synagogue week after week, beseeching God to let him win the lottery. Weeks go by, years go by, decades go by, and the man dutifully asks for one thing only: … Continue reading

Posted in charter schools, Junk, stacking the deck | 1 Comment

It’s all in how you ask it…

This little factoid came across my feed this afternoon from the billionaire funded ChartSchools Work, which tweets under the transparently misleading name @Fam4ExcSchools. Their biases are painfully obvious, so it’s no wonder the responses they get to their tweets are … Continue reading

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Moron the Bad: Go Math! can’t even get the “standards” correct.

I’ll admit that I’m no fan of the Common Core State Standards, which is besides the fact that Bill”ionaire” Gates basically funded the whole endeavor , they are just badly written AND to make things worse, the “new and improved” textbooks … Continue reading

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Why does every slob with a billion dollars…?

Why does every slob with a billion dollars to his name think he knows more about education than a teacher? Just because the teacher spent all those years studying the art and practice of teaching, just because that teacher was willing to … Continue reading

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Don’t Cry For Me, Andrew Cuomo!

It won’t be easy But you’ll get it through When I try to explain how I much That I need your legislation After all that I’ve done You’ll gladly believe me All you see Is the politician you once knew … Continue reading

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Give me your ESL, your handicapped, your learning disabled, your discipline problems, yearning to learn….

According to this fine post on Diane Ravitch’s blog, what we suspected about the charter school movement has been true all along: you can’t compare country clubs with the  county park, even when the country club claims that it does not … Continue reading

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