Education

March4Schools at the State Capitol March 4

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by David Safier A number of groups have banded together, headed by the Arizona Education Association, to put together what they hope will be the largest mobilization for education in the state's history. It's Wednesday, March 4, 4pm at the Arizona State Capitol: 1700 West Washington, Phoenix. If you want to be even more involved, there … Read more

Private vs. public schools in D.C.: a draw

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by David Safier Here's the money quote from a N.Y. Times article about the Democratic push to limit or end vouchers in D.C. Last year, a Congressionally mandated review of the program by Department of Education researchers concluded that there were no significant differences between the test scores of students who received a voucher and … Read more

Summing up the Safier vs. Ladner comments smackdown

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by David Safier

Over the past few weeks, Dr. Matthew Ladner of the Goldwater Institute and I have engaged in a spirited back-and-forth in the comments sections of two posts: An interesting number and More Fool's Gold: Ed tax credits save us money. For my money, I won both arguments. I'm sure Ladner disagrees and, of course, he's welcome to put his opinions in the comments. As always, he'll get all the unedited space he wants.

The reason I picked a fight with G.I. in the first place is because I want to make it clear they have a purely political agenda. Their "research" is given far more credibility than it deserves, both by themselves and by the press who treats G.I. as a reasonable source of information. What they call "research" is often a travesty, a cynical misuse of scholarship to help conservatives get elected, then help them pass conservative legislation. Most of the rest is just smoke and mirrors.

Follow the link below to read my discussion of the two comment threads.

AZ Charter school advocates, take note

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by David Safier I consider myself an advocate of charter schools, but not the way they're set up here in Arizona, where it's too easy to get a charter and slip by without any accountability, and too rare for bad charters to be shut down. So I'm pleased to see there is a national movement … Read more

Parents and retirees who CARE

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by David Safier Dave Perry, publisher and editor of The Explorer, wrote a very good article on CARE — Concerned Area Residents for Education — a group recently formed by northwest Tucson parents and retirees as a response to the K-12 budget cuts. The group is scrupulously nonpartisan and independent of other organizations, and very … Read more