I don’t watch 60 Minutes much anymore. And I never watch Katie Couric. Apparently nobody else does either.
Sunday night I was sick with the flu, on the couch with a cup of tea, too weak to change the channel. There was 60 Minutes.
Couric’s puff piece on NY’s Equity Project charter school and the strongman Zeke Vanderhoek who runs it like a dictator illustrates the problem.
She’s no reporter. She asks no follow-up questions. She assumes what is told her is truth. The story was crap.
What the hell was that students clap once, clap twice, stamp your feet and do a work sheet thing she showed twice? Was that suppose to be an example of good teaching?
Where were the Special Needs kids?
What is so great about making $125,000 a year for 80 hours a week? How long can you sustain that. Or is that the point?
Those classes seemed mighty large to me. They would have to be large to be able to pay those salaries without outside funding. What happens to small group work and differentiated instruction? Or is it all “clap, clap, do a worksheet?”
Who the hell is Zeke Vanderhoek?
How does a reporter let Joel Klein say all you need to do to get tenure is breathe when for eight years he could have fired any teacher at will BEFORE they got tenure? It was just a straight up lie.
No matter. Nobody watches Katie Couric. Unless you’re sick with the flu, on the couch with a cup of tea, too weak to switch the channel.
Fred Klonsky 