New York Teachers Already Browbeaten and Bullied Can Now Look Forward to A Fear Based Workplace Too

Newly Crowned NYSED Chief Greets Critics of Her Racially Divisive Fear Based Work Place

With the shadowy appointment of MaryEllen Doubtfire as NYSED's reincarnation of Lil John King, the small people of the Empire State will get a ringside seat to enjoy yet another ed reform recycling project with a big price tag and Cecil B de Mille scale potential for edumayhem.

As a sports fan I can't help but see the similarity between ed reformers and NFL coaches. If you suck wind in Buffalo don't worry-- they can plug you in as an assistant down in Dallas. And for that matter why take an assistant gig when you can stick your chest out and take your cloud of failure to the next stop where you'll get head billing and a fat paycheck if you play your swagger right. Sounds like I'm talking about Rex but I'm not, really. 

Surely, Dragon Empress Tisch and her bridge club of apologists will try to tell us that Commissioner Doubtfire was railroaded in Florida, that she ended up on the short end of a crazy board of ed who, I dunno, hated her for her freedom? Why not? Makes about as much sense as anything else the reformy Regents who snuck her into town in the back of a pickup covered with a tarp at 2:00 a.m. for an early and unannounced vote might offer us as a rationale for this maneuver.  It's been noted by Carol Burris among others, that this secretive and opaque installment is a slap in the face and an in-your-face to the hundreds of thousands of Opt Out parents who've made it crystal clear they are fed up with the Tisch-King High Stakes Test and Punish Paradigm.  

Maybe when you're Pretty Meryl though, you don't even bother cooking up an explanation. After all who are these peasants to complain? Don't they realize she took a million out of the tin box under her bed to hire Regents Fellows? Wouldn't it all be so much simpler if she could throw them all into the deep end -- and boil them? Damned cheeky proles anyway. Perdido St School Blog as usual cites a litany of the failures and follies perpetrated under the Elia regime in Florida where parents glossed her "Evilia." It was about all I could bear to read but I know there's plenty more out there. Oh, Randi Weingrovel thinks she 's swell and Doubtfire thinks Bill Gates is keen too, hope that helps.

The recycling and repackaging of failures is not unique to ed reform or the NFL but we sure seem to be seeing our share of it. Here in Buffaltucky, which I recently learned the clever quipsters in Albany like to call "Beirut on the Lake" it appears we've dodged a recycled bullet in the form of one Jean-Claude Brizard. He's a twice polished turd who failed to turn into a butterfly in Rochester then again in Chicago. He couldn't cut it in Rochester and ended up with a vote of no confidence from the teacher's union along with miserable test scores that dropped on his watch. If you're playing the ed reform game your test scores better not work against you. In Brizard's case they did though he accepted no responsibility for them. How reformy. You can bet if they went up he'd have been on them like Rhee on Miracle Gro. 

Onto Chicago, where it was believed by some that Brizard would flourish under a Rahmbo Emanel controlled school board. Guess again. At one pathetic point Briz was busted trying to pass off  Broad Foundation power point slides as his own mental effluvium. You'll be un-amazed to learn that Brizard is a flunctuate of that august and unaccredited factory for ed reform Superintendents whose trail of failure stretches from Seattle to New Jersey.  

When CTU went on strike, Brizard kind of sat swiveling around in his big leather chair making funny noises while Rahmbo fumed and raged. It was agreed that the Superintendent of Chicago Schools only contribution to the situation was that he'd become a distraction. He resigned by popular demand and was given a big sack of money just to bugger off. (Sound familiar-- James Williams, MaryEllen Doubtfire, Judy Eliot?) And now the geniuses who comprise the Board Majority in Buffalo appear to be grinding their dentures that they couldn't net this two time loser to come in and allow them to destroy BPS a little more. They actually wanted to hire Jean-Claude Brizard but even he won't take the job. Were "It's Not You It's Me" cards sent all members of the Board Majority? Or did they all just get one big "I'm Just Not That Into You" boquet from Sampson's favorite florist?

We've dodged one turd but in Buffalo so far but lord knows how many more are working their way down the ed reform Superintendent's pipeline. WBEN radio today interviewed Larry Quinn to allow him ample time for whining that the threat of Mayoral Control being pushed by some of the other rich guys here in Buffalo -- some who may be richer than Lars no less, ha ha ha -- is hurting his chances of landing the next James Williams or Cami Andersen or Michelle Rhee. Have faith though. If the guy who managed to get rid of Ted Nolan, John Muckler, Pat LaFontaine, Chris Drury, Danny Briere and Stu Barnes can't get his net around a Jean-Claude Brizard, rest assured he'll find a way to get rid of somebody else, whether he means to or not. Let's just hope it's nobody we need.