The Rouge Forum blog, complete with notices of great recent publications about schools and society is here.
And here are two samples:
Kim Scipes: The AFL-CIO’s Secret War Against Developing Countries–Solidarity or Sabotage [pdf] (20% discount!)
Don Perl: Book Chapter – ”Heeding Humble Voices” [pdf]
This is also the first call for nominations for election to the Rouge Forum Steering Committee, 2010. Please send nominations to Community Coordinator Adam Renner. Nominations close September 10.
Little Red Schoolhouse:
Richard Brosio at the Rouge Forum Conference 2010: “Marxist Thought: Still Primus Inter Pares For Understanding And Opposing The Capitalist System” [pdf]
Dems Push Through Bribe to Teachers (and cops) to Continue the RaTT: House Democrats today pushed through a $26 billion jobs bill to protect 300,000 teachers and other nonfederal government workers from election-year layoffs. (Don’t ask about the food stamp cuts…)
Ok. About the Food Stamps: Though many in the education community are celebrating last week’s Senate vote for the so-called Edujobs bill, I can’t find any joy in it. In fact, I am shaken and ashamed because, to pay for it, the Senate snatched $11.9 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
Alpert on What the Rich Do When They Lose a School Board Vote–Try to Abolish the Board: “These guys are trying to water down the school board because they didn’t like the way the election turned out,” said John de Beck, a longtime board member. “Himelstein is like the hired gun for the rich. He has no qualifications and he has no training in how to run a school.”
A Note from the Local Valedictorian:
School is not all that it can be. Right now, it is a place for most people to determine that their goal is to get out as soon as possible.
I am now accomplishing that goal. I am graduating. I should look at this as a positive experience, especially being at the top of my class. However, in retrospect, I cannot say that I am any more intelligent than my peers. I can attest that I am only the best at doing what I am told and working the system. Yet, here I stand, and I am supposed to be proud that I have completed this period of indoctrination. I will leave in the fall to go on to the next phase expected of me, in order to receive a paper document that certifies that I am capable of work. But I contest that I am a human being, a thinker, an adventurer – not a worker. A worker is someone who is trapped within repetition – a slave of the system set up before him. But now, I have successfully shown that I was the best slave. I did what I was told to the extreme. While others sat in class and doodled to later become great artists, I sat in class to take notes and become a great test-taker.