Martin Austermuhle
Jonetta Rose Barras: “The District government is spending millions to send children to a controversial special education residential facility in Massachusetts that uses electric shock to discipline students.” Wow. Talk about an opening sentence. Rose Barras dedicated her column this week to the 10 District students who have been sent to the facility — the Judge Rotenberg Educational Center in Canton, Ma. — arguing that its unorthodox methods of treatment are reason enough to bring them home. Fortunately, Chancellor Michelle Rhee seems to agree. “It’s nuts on multiple levels,” she said.
Tom Knott: It’s tough to know where to start with this week’s installment of Tom Knott. What starts out as a criticism of the District’s public schools turns into a lesson on the importance of two-parent families and ends as a pessimistic assessment on Chancellor Rhee’s chances at meaningful reform. He writes, “Mrs. Rhee and Mr. Fenty are not likely to have an unqualified success because of the city’s intractable social pathologies.” After reading Knott’s rants and raves over the years, we’ve come to learn that every small nugget of wisdom he has is surrounded by a barrage of sheer verbal insanity. The Washington Times would do well with cutting his columns down to 20 words.
Marc Fisher: According to Fisher, some of the best examples of successful public school systems that the District could learn from are nearby in Fairfax and Montgomery counties. The lessons are quite simple, he notes. “In Washington, the public schools have failed to make the political connection between rich and poor, or between parents and non-parent taxpayers. Unless the District, like its more successful neighbors, provides meaningful alternatives for middle-class, affluent and poor children, the schools will fail to win the political support necessary to improve quality for all.”
