Under fire from Republican Rob Astorino, the Westchester County executive running for governor and who has called it the “Cuomo Common Core,” the governor was quick to point out that he has nothing to do with the education department.
“The education system across the board needs serious reform and has for a long time,” he said.
He added: “To the extent this is a moment to bring change to the system—and remember how hard change is, especially for a large system like the education system—I welcome it.”He defended the Common Core standards, likening them to charter schools as a way of improving on the failing status quo.
While people might say the changes are disruptive to the status quo, Cuomo argued that, “by the way, the status quo needs disrupting.”
It's the same tired crap we hear from the education reformers all the time - public education is failing, it's in need of major disruption, that's why drastic reforms like CCSS and school privatization are needed.
As Diane Ravitch and others have pointed out over and over, these talking points are tired and false to boot.
But that doesn't stop Cuomo from parroting them.
One other thing I'd like to point out - he keeps saying he has nothing to do with education policy, but he keeps sticking his nose into education policy, via the APPR law or his Common Core panel.
At what point does a reporter stop being nice and polite about questioning him over this and just point out how full of crap he is when he says he has no say in ed policy in this state?
Warning: the statement 'status quo needs disrupting' has an audience. Its an audience that has felt largely let behind by the old regime of Ed. The audience is not quite suburban moms from Westchester.
ReplyDeleteYou know my opinion of Cuomo, but that attack on the very people he installed was brilliant politics
Yes, but he has to tie himself in knots to pull this off and it's only so long before the contradictions become apparent and he pays a political price.
DeleteSomeday, maybe people will wake up and call out these politicians when they engage in double speak, the way that Governor Cuomo does.
ReplyDeleteClearly, he has no love for the public schools ( based on what he said during the Moskowitz rally), or for the citizens of the state that work in the public schools.
As for your point about reporters: The days of hard hitting journalism appear to be over. Now that much of the media is owned by moguls, I imagine that the employees of these media outlets are following the party line in order to keep getting their paychecks.
Can't argue with anything you wrote there.
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