oflovefaithhopedream

Once in awhile people ask me how I can continue to call myself an education optimist when the "new normal" is so grim.  They ask, "why do you continue tilting at windmills instead of being pragmatic and accepting the situation?" The answer is simple: acceptance is unnecessary and defeat is not an option.  I challenge the status quo for the sake of students. Today, I want to say Take that, windmill! The University of Wisconsin System just ceded to the demands of students across the State and agreed to cap a tuition increase at no more than 2% for the coming year and eliminate the waiting list for the Wisconsin Higher Education Grant.  This is a stunning reversal, as President Kevin Reilly had been lobbying against students, insisting that no cap was necessary. What happened?  Well, as I have long insisted, the issue is not entirely about a lack of state funding being provided to higher education but how administrators are spending   it.   When the ...

Too many Americans appear willing to accept the hand they're dealt. Most shockingly, many of our political, educational and civic leaders seem to have fallen into the same trap. "The New Normal," they call it. Like Death and Taxes. Etched in stone. Undefined, yet not re-definable. Inevitable. Fortunately, there are those among us willing to demand a new deck of cards -- and a new dealer! We've seen the rise of the Forces For Fairness in states like Wisconsin where there is no disguising the unsubtle, in-your-face, anti-democratic, vitriolic, bought-and-paid-for policies of Governor Scott Walker, the Brothers Fitzgerald, ALEC, the Koch Brothers and their yes men and women (even the few remaining Republican moderates - if they still can be called such - who should know better). In the Badger State, tens of thousands took to the streets of Madison and are now actively participating in recall efforts to change the equation and prevent Wisconsin from being turned i...