There seems to be two camps in education. One is happy that Louis C.K. spoke out about Common Core and testing. They have posted and re-posted on Facebook his stint on David Letterman.
The other side is not happy about the attention celebrities get if the topic is education. They believe the celebs only distract from the serious educational issues we all rant about on blogs and in books and wherever.
First and foremost, I like, respect, and admire educators and parents on both sides of this issue. And it’s difficult to work so hard to make yourself heard and see Louis C.K. do a couple of Tweets and a 10 minute interview and get instant attention.
But I cannot be anything but happy when any celebrity supports public schools and public school teachers and brings attention to problems surrounding high-stakes testing and Common Core State Standards. It makes me feel like someone…some educator or parent perhaps…got their points across to that person. And, like it or not, we live in a celebrity world.
Why, I am pleased to hear Louis C.K. even has students in public school!
I love it when celebs are on the side of the educators and parents, because too many of them aren’t! Most of them don’t have their kids in public schools and don’t have a clue as to what is happening in them. They don’t read the blogs and they sure don’t see it on the news. They are up there in their 1-2% salary clouds and their children go to selective private schools.
Yet, the uninformed, who maybe didn’t care about public schools, heard Louis C.K. say the other night, in a sarcastic manner, that his kids’ public school would get burned down if the students didn’t do well on the test. Perhaps America sat up and noticed. I can only hope!
How many people also wondered when they heard him talk about the Common Core math test question?
Being able to use sarcasm and humor in such a fashion draws attention to problems in a way a teacher and parent cannot do. Jon Stewart, Matt Damon, Louis C.K., I say bring them all onboard!
It is true, certainly, that the attention can be skewed to focus on the celebrity instead of the issue. For example, the first video seen here is Matt Damon the advocate whose message about schools is heard, and the second seen here is about Matt Damon. I think the first video is stronger for teachers and their message. The second was most likely seen by more people and still made good points, but it was about Matt Damon.
Still, if a teacher had spoken to that reporter it would have been ignored, or the teacher would have been made to look like a clod. When Matt Damon did it, the incident got noteworthy attention. Here’s an actor everyone likes, who took time out to support his mom who is an educator—one of us. Any set-up like that pushes the fight to save public schools forward!
My only complaint is that we don’t have more celebrities jumping on the public school bandwagon!
Where are they?
Where’s Susan Sarandon? Sean Penn? Even if they never had their kids in public schools—don’t they see the importance of public schools to a democracy?
In the end, I don’t think it matters who is credited for raising their voice to save public schools and teachers. Any spokesperson that America will be willing to hear is good enough for me.
Listening Kim Kardashian? I mentioned her in jest on another blog and was ignored. But really, I checked and she is school shopping for her child.
O.K. Go ahead and scoff perhaps…just remember…how many fans does she have? If you could corral all those folks to support public schools and teachers how wonderful would that be?
Look! We are in danger of losing our public schools and our professional public school teachers. I don’t think any of us can be picky about who raises their voice to save them. The really important thing is that they do.
In the meantime, Thank you Nancy for doing your part to keep us educated and up to date on What IS Going on with Public Education! I’ve asked in my own school district why the Teachers do not inform the parents as to what is happening.. I wish the schools would have assemblies, talks, hey even pot luck dinners to inform parents, to show us how we all as a community can make changes. I have seen several speeches by High school students on youtube speaking out on what is happening to their education, right here in TN even! and these speeches have gone viral. As high school students have pep rallies, we need to have community rallies. We are all in this together, Teachers, parents and students..
I appreciate that, Kara.
I find the lack of all those things you mention outrageous! It makes me really wonder what’s going on! Thank you for your comment.
Nancy, I have had numerous teachers tell me I will never get my child’s weekly study assignments before they are given out in class? Why is that. How can an ‘informed’ parent stay ahead??
I wonder why that is, unless they are pressed for time. Maybe they don’t have them ready before they give them to the students. Teachers have so much on their plates these days. Or maybe they have been instructed not to do this. There is so much wacky stuff and mandates going on these days with testing etc.
But you sound like you have a pressing reason to get them, so I’d ask for a conference with these teachers and find out what the deal is. I’d let them know why you need them and maybe they can give you some general clues to what they are planning so you can get ahead of the game.
Thank you, Paul.
“Where’s Susan Sarandon? Sean Penn? Even if they never had their kids in public schools—don’t they see the importance of public schools to a democracy?”
I suspect it’s really a simple, straightforward answer: Have any of us gone to visit them?
Have they heard our arguments, stated concisely, directly, well thought out, and put into the form of persuasive talking points?
And, do we have a gargantuan propaganda budget the way that the Privatizers do? And do we have all of corporate America on our side, offering everything from free ads to an entire week long show every September, restating their mendacious propaganda?
The last item is a longer term and slightly more complex one. But there is NO REASON we can’t make an outreach to the well known progressives in Hollywood, on Broadway and elsewhere!
Bingo, F. Clifton White! I am shaking hands with you! I think the problems with public schools are under the radar screen for most celebs. The venture philanthropists know how to corral the message for their side. We need to reach out. How is the question.
Howdy F. Clifton.. I’d say that the even more straight forward answer is: Not to rely on someone else to solve our problems.. They don’t call it T.V. programming for nothing. We are all guilty of expecting and assuming that someone else, especially actors, leaders, (paid shills) can solve our problems.. Every night millions of us tune in to see how make believe characters solve worldly problems. And, many actors who live in the real world, like Nancy has pointed out, have taken advantage of this and used it to definitely wake up the public. WE the People need to get our potato butts off the couch, stop watching “programming” and take control of our own lives. When I first started realizing something was wrong with public education through the difficulties I suddenly saw my boys having, I started investigating. It was through everyday experiences and common folk that I actually started learning about the changes in the system. I personally do not believe we need gargantuan propaganda budgets to get our message out. I, and I know many other parents have real problems to share that many of us will relate to. I also believe we can state our experiences and arguments concisely, directly and well thought out, because we are appealing to other parents who know exactly what we are going through, we don’t need talking points, we just need to come together and share. But first we need to hold our Education boards accountable. Yes, blame it on the potato butt, BUT, too many of us come home tired at night, and we gather all the energy we can muster just to help our kid with homework. If we want change for the better, we need to shut our T.V. programming off, and demand to talk to our teachers, principals, superintendents, our governors who sign on to Fed funding, and so on. WE can do this!!! One voice can start this, may it be an actor, or even a caring educator like our Nancy here… we need to get together as a community. we need our teachers to talk to us and tell us what they are going through and how we can make a difference. We need our parents to tell each other what struggles they are going through, we need our kids to know that we wont give up. We are the ones we are waiting for….
I agree with so much of this, Kara. Parents really are the pulse of the ed. system. Interesting isn’t it, that all the choice talk and charters are supposed to be for the parents, yet they lose their voice in the process.