The education theories of former terrorist William Ayers and his fellow travelers cry out for a Monty Python skit. Unfortunately neither side of the Pond is currently producing TV comics brave and smart enough to satirize the kind of dangerous nonsense preached by Ayers and those who support his theories. Yet even a deadpan discussion of any part of the theories can be funny.
As an example, consider this academic's manful struggle to avoid sarcasm while analyzing the argument that it's perfectly possible to abandon all scientific measures when determining what works and doesn't work in the public education field. One can almost hear the question behind Nathan Glazer's painfully polite request for an alternative measure: 'Pig entrails and Ouija boards, anyone?'
The laughter tends to die in your throat when you realize that Glazer is touching on ideas held by an old and close associate of the presumptive Democrat nominee for the office of U.S. President.
Law professor Stephen Diamond's latest post, which links to Glazer's discussion, reminds us of the frightening realities connected with the relationship between William Ayers and Barack Obama when they worked for the CAC.
Before turning to Diamond's latest, republished below, you might want to check out The Real Barack Obama, which has published a great list of resource documents and opinion related to "Annenberg-gate."
(The term refers to attempts to block Steve Diamond and NRO's Stanley Kurtz from accessing documents connected with the CAC.)
I'm glad to see that RBO has also collected in the same post Sol Stern's writings on Ayers's education theories. It's vital to understand that no matter which candidate becomes U.S. President, Mr Ayers and his "social justice" ideas will continue to march onward in the field of public education. Stern's writings, particularly when coupled with Diamond's essays on the topic, are the best introduction to the ideas.
For additional background, go to April 22 in the archives at Diamond's Global Labor and Politics blog and read forward.
Also, Diamond will be a guest again on John Batchelor's radio show this Sunday. He will discuss Annenberg-gate and the work of Ayers and Obama for the CAC. Diamond will appear on the KFI-640 AM portion of the show at 10:20 PM Eastern time. Here is the link to the online streaming for the show. KFI also provides podcasts of the show the day after the broadcast.
Now to Diamond's latest:
Behind the Chicago Annenberg Challenge: Politics and Ideology
The selection of Barack Obama as Chairman of the Board of the Bill Ayers-designed and founded Chicago Annenberg Challenge in early 1995 did not happen in a vacuum.
It happened within the context of a “radical” (Ayers’ word) school reform effort begun in Chicago in the late 1980s. Both Ayers and Obama were active together in that effort through the Alliance for Better Chicago Schools (ABCs).
Here are links to some helpful research reports on the school reform effort as well as two pieces that take two very different views on the question of education reform.
Philanthropy’s Paradox: Chicago School Reform (The Role of Chicago Foundations in Reform, 1987-1990).
This research paper by one participant in the reform describes the important role of Chicago foundations in allying themselves with Saul Alinsky influenced community organizations including Barack Obama’s Developing Communities Project (DCP) during that reform process.
Key in this effort were the Joyce Foundation and the Woods Fund. Joyce provided the DCP with $60,000 during this period. Obama would later join its board. Woods provided more than $27,000 to the DCP during this period. Woods had funded the hiring of Obama by the DCP in 1985. Ken Rolling, one of the Woods Fund’s key program officers, would be hired by Obama and Ayers as the Executive Director of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. Obama would later join the Woods Fund board and Ayers would join and chair the board.
School Reform Chicago Style – How Citizens Organized to Change Public Policy
This pamphlet describes the unusual alliance that came together to push for the legislation that established the Local School Councils as a new power center in Chicago schools in 1988. The LSC’s were to be a watchdog over teachers, principals and school administrators in Chicago. Barack Obama (through the Developing Communities Project) and Bill Ayers (through the Alliance for Better Chicago Schools, which he later chaired) were both active in the push for the establishment of the LSC’s. A chart at the end of this pamphlet indicates Ayers’ and the DCP’s role.
The Shifting Ground of Curriculum Thought and Everyday Practice by William Ayers
This is a fascinating short essay by Bill Ayers published in 1992 just after the Chicago School Reform was put in place and while Ayers was chair of the Alliance for Better Chicago Schools, which had led the charge to put the Reform in place. The following year Ayers would conceive and draft the proposal for the $160 million Chicago Annenberg Challenge and recruit Barack Obama to chair its board.
Ayers writes “in a sense, all education is about power.” His greatest concern is to use politics to shake up what he sees as the “bureaucratization” of the schools by school boards and unions. He celebrates the “upheaval” that the Reform caused in the Chicago schools. He wants schools to tackle the question of how students can be “empowered to attain greater liberation, equity, and social justice through schooling?”
The “Crits” Capture Presidential Power: Top education researchers denounce scientific research. A book review by Nathan Glazer of Education Research in the Public Interest: Social Justice, Action, and Policy edited by Gloria Ladson-Billings and William F. Tate (Teachers’ College Press 2006)
This review serves as an intellectual antidote to the Ayers worldview. Glazer slays the “politically correct” absurdities that appear to have taken hold in America’s Schools of Education. Unfortunately they have begun flowing into the political arena during this year’s presidential campaign. Bill Ayers is the author of one chapter in the book. The co-editor Gloria Ladson-Billings is the inventor of a proposal to make repayment of centuries of “education debt” owed to people of color the top priority of the next President, an idea shared by Ayers and also strongly backed by Barack Obama’s education advisor, Linda Darling-Hammond.
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