CHICAGO, IL – Delegates to the 2000 National Education Association’s Representative Assembly (RA) held at McCormick Place over the July 4th holiday voted to impose a $5 a year increase in each member’s union dues. Sixty percent or $6 million of the additional $10 million raised per year will be used to combat vouchers and other related ballot initiatives. Delegates from several states, including California and Michigan, complained about the battles they face against vouchers.
In his keynote address, NEA President Bob Chase cautioned the 9,200 delegates about the importance of the upcoming elections. “Think about the federal government subsidizing vouchers,” he warned. “Please keep in mind that the next President of the United States could name as many as three Justices to the Supreme Court. If these new Justices join Justice Scalia, Justice Thomas, and Chief Justice Rehnquist to form a new majority, we would see a breach in the wall separating church and state, vouchers declared constitutional, and your union and employee rights eroded.” He went on to attack George Bush’s education policies.

Voucher supporters contend that, while the teacher unions have been successful in stifling their efforts so far, the issue continues to gain steam. Proponents predict they’ll spend a nearly equal amount of money this election year. “It’s going to be a very tough battle,” California entrepreneur and voucher supporter Ron Unz told the Washington Times (7-7-00), “but it does look like they will match the unions dollar for dollar.”

Please remember. sic(k) willie is just an “ignorant slut” for Howie and the (singular) voucher clown at the Voice for the Voucher Scams and the Carpet-buggers for Irresponsible Voucher Scams.

They have no original material.

Just the same old moronic rhetoric.

They know their voucher scam would only leave those who need help the most even further behind.

They know the real problems facing education include funding, poverty, racism and the moronic standard set by our Legislature.

The S.C. Supreme Court has ruled! All that South Carlina’s children are entitled to is a “minimally adequate” education.

So, why do we need vouchers? We don’t.

If sic(k) willie and the voucher clowns were honest they would demand that S.C. raise the standard. But, they’re not honest. Not even close.

They care nothing about the standard or about education.

Instead of demanding that S.C. raise the standard and honor it, all they do is demand that S.C. dump the kids who need help the most.

That’s what voucher do. All sic(k) willie and the voucher clowns are about are politics and money. That makes them voucher pimps.

BIN News Editorial Staff
Flair and Balanced

P.S. Hey, sic(k) one. Remember that vouchers are dead in S.C. Jakie has said so, so, it must be so.

Yet education-college habits favoring discredited whole-language reading methods die hard. In one recent case, a phonics program introduced to the Lewis Lemon public school in Rockford, IL in 2001 worked wonders on the overwhelmingly low-income and minority students’ test scores. The 3rd-graders ranked second of all 35 Rockford elementary schools and higher than the state average in 2003.

In 2004, a new superintendent and curriculum director inexplicably demanded a switch to a whole-language reading program – which is not endorsed by the U.S. Department of Education because the department endorses only programs supported by research – and the successful principal was transferred and demoted. Members of the school’s Parent-Teacher Organization executive board have protested to the school board. (School Reform News, Mar. 2005)

Thousands of high school students in Florida, for instance, still can’t read. “High schools were never designed to teach reading,” said Raymond Gaines, supervisor of secondary education for Seminole County schools. “But because we have a flood of kids who can’t read, we are being forced to refocus.” Officials there have embarked on a costly experiment to determine what reading method works best. (Orlando Sentinel, 1-1-05)

But evidence has been mounting for decades that phonics works best. Pro-phonics experts such as G. Reid Lyon, director of reading research at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (part of the National Institutes of Health), and University of Oregon professors Doug Carnine, Siegfried Englemann and Ed Kame’enui have used that evidence to influence the Bush administration’s push for “scientifically based” reading instruction.”

U.S. 17- and 13-year-olds are reading as poorly as ever, according to the 2004 results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) released in August. The silver lining is that 9-year-olds posted their best scores in more than three decades and the gap between white students and minorities narrowed. The Bush administration claims some credit for these gains, which occurred about a year after the No Child Left Behind law (NCLB) went into effect.

Only half of ACT test-takers have adequate college-level skills in reading comprehension, the ACT testing service reported when releasing its 2005 scores in August. One reason given is that only 56% of the test takers took a college-prep curriculum, even fewer than five years ago.

“Hundreds of thousands are going to have a hard time because of the disconnect between their plans for college and the cold reality of their readiness for college,” said Richard Ferguson, CEO. The ACT is the predominant college entrance exam in about half the states, mostly in the middle part of the country. (Associated Press, 8-17-05)

I like # 95. LOL

Ron

http://www.fitsnews.com/2008/04/27/south-carolinas-ninety-five-theses/

-FITS

Grow a set FITS and offer up some real solutions other than the one drum beat of vouchers….

Don’t private schools and home schoolers consistently outperform public schools in SC? They could have legitimately dropped in score, but still be far outstripping public schools. Please, if you know where to find the public/private breakdown, let us all know.