When three of Chicago's most prominent education reform leaders met for lunch at a Thai restaurant six years ago to discuss the just-announced $500 million Annenberg Challenge, their main goal was to figure out how to ensure that any Annenberg money awarded to Chicago "didn't go down the drain," said William Ayers, a professor of education at the University of Illinois in Chicago. Ayers, who was at that lunch table in late 1993, helped write the successful Chicago grant application. [Source...]
The Annenberg Challenge was "announced in December 1993 at the White House, Ambassador Walter H. Annenberg's $500 million "Challenge to the Nation" became the largest public/private endeavor in U.S. history dedicated to improving public schools." [Source]
Half a billion dollars, folks, of government grant money. But the socialist wealth redistributors, like Meeks, plan to go to the suburbs and attempt to steal their classroom space and their tax dollars for their own use.
The only difference between this and a full blown communist revolution is that Meeks and Company will (a) not use weapons to achieve their goal and (b) the use of buses will be anything but "green," and we all know that good communists would never do anything to harm the planet.
The Annenberg Challenge web site has the audacity to make this claim:
Chicago Annenberg Challenge contributed groundbreaking research to the field of education concerning how to improve schools. By offering support through professional development and technical assistance, teaching and learning improved, the quality and quantity of professional development increased, and the community became more knowledgeable and better equipped to create successful school reform. [Source]
That's an incredible piece of fluff, hyperbole to the max. HAVE WE SEEN real improvement in the Chicago schools? We have not. If we had, would Meeks be pursuing his desperate boycott gimmick to highlight the fact that Chicago's public schools are woefully failing?
Anger is building in the suburban communities. An angry reader of the Daily Herald wrote on August 23, "Get off your duffs and stand up and make yourself heard by saying 'NO' to Sen. Meeks and his group of church leaders. Keep our higher tax dollars where they belong... in our own suburbs for our own children and let the tax dollars that Chicagoans pay go toward their own children's education." [Source]
Where is "leader" Jesse Jackson in all of this? Nowhere, really, but then Jackson has become marginalized of late. The Chicago Tribune noted this recently:
The boycott is the brainchild of the Rev. James Meeks, a former Jackson protege and state senator who straddles the worlds of politics and church-based activism just as Jackson once did. Jackson has mostly steered clear of the boycott, an issue that has divided Chicago's African-American community, with some arguing that the stay-out-of-school message is confusing and unwise. [Source]
The angry reader, quoted above, has a point. Meeks and his follower claim that the suburbs should open their classrooms to kids from the city based on the fact that suburban communities (some, not all) spend more per student than CPS does. Okay, so let's follow that logic all the through. Some cities spend more per person on some services than do others, so should people from Rockford, for example, be bused into Chicago to enjoy services here that you and I pay for with our tax money? What about states? States fund different things at different levels. And so on.
People in Wilmette generally spend more per child on clothing, automobiles, ice cream, comic books, and a myriad of other things. Should we bus inner city Chicago kids to Wilmette to claim their "fair share" of those things, too?
To follow the Meeks philosophy to its ultimate conclusion would result in chaotic reshuffling of people to gain access to services paid for by others. It would require a lot of buses burning a lot of fossil fuel.
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James Meeks: No Annenberg Challenge
So, Illinois Senator James Meeks, a radical priest from Chicago's south side, continues with his boycott threat against the Chicago Public Schools. They plan to bus students from poor areas of Chicago out to wealthier suburban school districts and register the students there. (State law allows this but, ironically, we still can't get school vouchers for our students.) Meeks and other religious leaders say it is unfair that schools are not doled money equally. But that's not the point of this post.
Rather, my point here is to highlight the hypocrisy of the Left and the supporters of the Meeks Boycott. Barack Obama, a product of the corrupt Chicago-Cook County Democrat Political Machine, joined forces with the Annenberg Challenge several years ago in a proclaimed effort to "fix" the Chicago Public Schools. They got $500 Million with which to accomplish that stated goal. They have not succeeded.
Meeks is not asking his friend Barack Obama for any of that money. Obama hasn't offered any of it. What actually happened with the half billion dollars remains a mystery, compounded by the secrecy surrounding it and the fact that the Annenberg Challenge (run out of the University of Illinois-Chicago) was co-founded by an Obama buddy and unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers.
When three of Chicago's most prominent education reform leaders met for lunch at a Thai restaurant six years ago to discuss the just-announced $500 million Annenberg Challenge, their main goal was to figure out how to ensure that any Annenberg money awarded to Chicago "didn't go down the drain," said William Ayers, a professor of education at the University of Illinois in Chicago. Ayers, who was at that lunch table in late 1993, helped write the successful Chicago grant application. [Source...]
The Annenberg Challenge was "announced in December 1993 at the White House, Ambassador Walter H. Annenberg's $500 million "Challenge to the Nation" became the largest public/private endeavor in U.S. history dedicated to improving public schools." [Source]
Half a billion dollars, folks, of government grant money. But the socialist wealth redistributors, like Meeks, plan to go to the suburbs and attempt to steal their classroom space and their tax dollars for their own use.
The only difference between this and a full blown communist revolution is that Meeks and Company will (a) not use weapons to achieve their goal and (b) the use of buses will be anything but "green," and we all know that good communists would never do anything to harm the planet.
The Annenberg Challenge web site has the audacity to make this claim:
Chicago Annenberg Challenge contributed groundbreaking research to the field of education concerning how to improve schools. By offering support through professional development and technical assistance, teaching and learning improved, the quality and quantity of professional development increased, and the community became more knowledgeable and better equipped to create successful school reform. [Source]
That's an incredible piece of fluff, hyperbole to the max. HAVE WE SEEN real improvement in the Chicago schools? We have not. If we had, would Meeks be pursuing his desperate boycott gimmick to highlight the fact that Chicago's public schools are woefully failing?
Anger is building in the suburban communities. An angry reader of the Daily Herald wrote on August 23, "Get off your duffs and stand up and make yourself heard by saying 'NO' to Sen. Meeks and his group of church leaders. Keep our higher tax dollars where they belong... in our own suburbs for our own children and let the tax dollars that Chicagoans pay go toward their own children's education." [Source]
Where is "leader" Jesse Jackson in all of this? Nowhere, really, but then Jackson has become marginalized of late. The Chicago Tribune noted this recently:
The boycott is the brainchild of the Rev. James Meeks, a former Jackson protege and state senator who straddles the worlds of politics and church-based activism just as Jackson once did. Jackson has mostly steered clear of the boycott, an issue that has divided Chicago's African-American community, with some arguing that the stay-out-of-school message is confusing and unwise. [Source]
The angry reader, quoted above, has a point. Meeks and his follower claim that the suburbs should open their classrooms to kids from the city based on the fact that suburban communities (some, not all) spend more per student than CPS does. Okay, so let's follow that logic all the through. Some cities spend more per person on some services than do others, so should people from Rockford, for example, be bused into Chicago to enjoy services here that you and I pay for with our tax money? What about states? States fund different things at different levels. And so on.
People in Wilmette generally spend more per child on clothing, automobiles, ice cream, comic books, and a myriad of other things. Should we bus inner city Chicago kids to Wilmette to claim their "fair share" of those things, too?
To follow the Meeks philosophy to its ultimate conclusion would result in chaotic reshuffling of people to gain access to services paid for by others. It would require a lot of buses burning a lot of fossil fuel.
When three of Chicago's most prominent education reform leaders met for lunch at a Thai restaurant six years ago to discuss the just-announced $500 million Annenberg Challenge, their main goal was to figure out how to ensure that any Annenberg money awarded to Chicago "didn't go down the drain," said William Ayers, a professor of education at the University of Illinois in Chicago. Ayers, who was at that lunch table in late 1993, helped write the successful Chicago grant application. [Source...]
The Annenberg Challenge was "announced in December 1993 at the White House, Ambassador Walter H. Annenberg's $500 million "Challenge to the Nation" became the largest public/private endeavor in U.S. history dedicated to improving public schools." [Source]
Half a billion dollars, folks, of government grant money. But the socialist wealth redistributors, like Meeks, plan to go to the suburbs and attempt to steal their classroom space and their tax dollars for their own use.
The only difference between this and a full blown communist revolution is that Meeks and Company will (a) not use weapons to achieve their goal and (b) the use of buses will be anything but "green," and we all know that good communists would never do anything to harm the planet.
The Annenberg Challenge web site has the audacity to make this claim:
Chicago Annenberg Challenge contributed groundbreaking research to the field of education concerning how to improve schools. By offering support through professional development and technical assistance, teaching and learning improved, the quality and quantity of professional development increased, and the community became more knowledgeable and better equipped to create successful school reform. [Source]
That's an incredible piece of fluff, hyperbole to the max. HAVE WE SEEN real improvement in the Chicago schools? We have not. If we had, would Meeks be pursuing his desperate boycott gimmick to highlight the fact that Chicago's public schools are woefully failing?
Anger is building in the suburban communities. An angry reader of the Daily Herald wrote on August 23, "Get off your duffs and stand up and make yourself heard by saying 'NO' to Sen. Meeks and his group of church leaders. Keep our higher tax dollars where they belong... in our own suburbs for our own children and let the tax dollars that Chicagoans pay go toward their own children's education." [Source]
Where is "leader" Jesse Jackson in all of this? Nowhere, really, but then Jackson has become marginalized of late. The Chicago Tribune noted this recently:
The boycott is the brainchild of the Rev. James Meeks, a former Jackson protege and state senator who straddles the worlds of politics and church-based activism just as Jackson once did. Jackson has mostly steered clear of the boycott, an issue that has divided Chicago's African-American community, with some arguing that the stay-out-of-school message is confusing and unwise. [Source]
The angry reader, quoted above, has a point. Meeks and his follower claim that the suburbs should open their classrooms to kids from the city based on the fact that suburban communities (some, not all) spend more per student than CPS does. Okay, so let's follow that logic all the through. Some cities spend more per person on some services than do others, so should people from Rockford, for example, be bused into Chicago to enjoy services here that you and I pay for with our tax money? What about states? States fund different things at different levels. And so on.
People in Wilmette generally spend more per child on clothing, automobiles, ice cream, comic books, and a myriad of other things. Should we bus inner city Chicago kids to Wilmette to claim their "fair share" of those things, too?
To follow the Meeks philosophy to its ultimate conclusion would result in chaotic reshuffling of people to gain access to services paid for by others. It would require a lot of buses burning a lot of fossil fuel.
