Thanks to Kristen. Challenge: How would you interpret this photo allegorically?
“Massachusetts Republican gubernatorial candidate Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, center left, greets students at the Media and Technology Charter High School as Alan Safran, executive director of the school, center right, looks on during a Healey campaign stop, in Boston, Monday, Oct. 23, 2006. High school junior Codrington Barzey, 16, of Boston, is at far right. Healey has renewed her challenge for a one-on-one debate with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Deval Patrick. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)”
Please share widely!
I’m just cracking up here – LOLing for real – I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anything, well… more true or real as this.
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CAN YOU SEE THE LOOK ON THEIR FACES?!
I think it’s safe to say there are at least two democrats in the room! The guy in blue doesn’t look old enough to vote, alas, but the guy in white looks like he has his mind made up!
MATCH is a top notch program. I’ve spent some time volunteer-teaching “AP chemestry prep” there. MATCH does great work, and there’s no question that they’ve made their mark in helping motivated, dedicated, poorly educated 8th grade Bostonians become motivated, dedicated, well prepared college freshmen. They don’t all go on to Brown University (some do!), but they do go on to four year colleges. During their time at MATCH, students spend 8-12 hours a day at school five days a week, plus weekend time prepping for MCAS, plus summer sessions learning better study skills and habits, plus extra time with one-on-one tutors. I have the utmost respect for anyone who contributes to MATCH, and tremendous admiration for every single student who makes it through their tough program for success.
They’re doing well. The student watching Kerry Healey shake looks like he’s doing all he can to stop burst out laughing. So he knows what’s up – reason enough to support MATCH.
Otto the Bus Driver, that’s who!
Your implication that Otto was a student at Brown is a vicious smear at a fine institution.
He “almost got tenure”.
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They’re young men and what do you expect when an adult, with numerous clicks from cameras & the glare from TV lights, approaches you for some casual small-talk. I’m sure the kids, and their parents, realize they wouldn’t be in that school were it not for a small group of brave legislators in the House, not Senate, that block efforts to bomb charter schools every single year since their creation in 1993.
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Healey deserves credit for being part of an administration that worked with urban democrats (the ones who know what it’s like in an inner-city environment unlike say Wellesley or some other guilt-ridden liberal all-white community who if what happened on a daily basis in Boston would demand the schools be shut down until the problem was resolved)to insure some preservation of public charter schools.
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As a life-long Democrat it’s amazing to me how the Teacher’s Unions have cornered the market on perceived righteousness when it comes to Charter Schools. Will we allow another generation, like the one lost by social liberal engineers to busing, to face mediocrity due to self-righteous spinmeisters.
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“Oh, it’s a funding issue, we support charters, but it’s a funding issue” is the cry of the covert union “crush charters” movement. If someone is objective, examine the funding formula & the debates that have taken place over the last five years in the Legislature, and all you see and read are examples of yearly appeasemnet to teacher’s unions and more stringent requirements placed on charters than other public schools (like you’re SHUT in 5 years if you don’t show progress in line with charter intent)WOW…if other public schools had that Boston, Springfield, Holyoke & many other schools would be SHUT down. Would parents in Winchester tolerate daily beatings,robbings & shootings & stabbings and low test scores, and metal detectors, and gangs, and abuse and bullying, and lower expectations? The rebuttal from the armchair “I can afford to be liberal” commentators is “oh well the families in Winchester are intact and they don’t have the same challenges and all the other psycho-babble that is just an excuse EXPOSED when those “challenged” youth get into charters or other private schools and EXCEL. BTW,quick aside, pretty interesting how some liberals in some tony communities are horrified with 40B moving into their hoods. Those phonies fight Dunkin Donuts never mind public transportation.
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And it’s not just more money. Billions has been pumped in. Charters work. Parents want them. It’s about poor children of all races having choice. Give it to them and buck the demands of the unions to crush them.
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Show some courage!
You’ve come on to the site to attack Deval on charter schools, illegal immigration, on being a defense attorney and for some strange reason on Melanie’s Bill (which I’m pretty sure he supports).
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Anything constructive that you’d like to offer?
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For example, how do you propose we adaquately fund ALL of our schools, if we’re funneling millions into schools that maybe 2% of Massachusetts will ever get to see? I’m all about staying on the education cutting edge and making sure Massachusetts offers the best possible educational system, but I’d like to make sure 98% of Massachusetts gets that right. To properly understand the issue, you need look no further than who is behind the charter school movement in Massachusetts: the Pioneer Institute. It’s an organization that’s heavily in favor of for-profit charters and many of its members have been placed on the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education, a conflict of interest if I’ve ever seen one.
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Charters have a place in the system, but not at the cost of everyone else. Otherwise, they’ll kill the public education system. There needs to be enough funding to warrant more charters and that funding can’t come at the cost of local school systems, which are desperate for money after years of cuts as is.
If we ignore them, maybe they’ll go away. It’s so dull, to come to this site to discuss current events with like-minded individuals, and to have the same boring and easily refutable arguments be lobbed again and again. And again. There are plenty of other places on the internet and the real world for that. Seriously, just don’t even bother: they’re like 2 year olds looking for attention, and if we give it, they’ll just keep acting up.
Then they proceed to parrot talking points first uttered by Howie Carr and other troglodytes of the airwaves. It’s so transparent. Who do they think they’re fooling?
… I support more experimentation in the school system. That doesn’t make me a troll, a troglodyte, a Howie Carr fan, or anything other than what I am, an enthusiastic Deval supporter.
There are people who come to troll and not have reasoned debate.
sniff sniff all my comments are directed at you, sniff sniff
I was not responding to you. Like most Democrats here at BMG, I welcome reasoned debate from resonable Republicans. Obviously, by your snarky tone, you don’t fall into that category.
I come to this site partly because the overall tone agrees with my personal political views, but also partly for reasonable discussion and debate with people who don’t agree with me. LunchBucketGuy’s comment, I think, is off topic and misses the point of the photo, but at least it’s not another one-liner. And some of the more conservative regular posters — Ernie Boch III and Peter Porcupine, for example — are more often cogent than not. So let’s not limit the discussion to like-minded people, just to people who actually want a civil debate.
…please try to make or understand a distinction between the two estimable gentlemen you cited — not like-minded, but civil, and at times, informative — and this seething bomb thrower, with his victimhood-based excuse at the ready. Forgive the one-liner, but if that’s civil debate, then dog food is cuisine.
I didn’t mean to defend that particular comment, so much as raise a note of caution about insisting on like-mindedness — that way lie the Daily Kos and Bill O’Reilly.
Are you of the same academic elite that refuse to hear the cries of the proletariat because, well, sniff, sniff you just know it all? And you’re so much better than the rest of us….would you have stormed the stage at Columbia as well because well, darn it, unless I agree with you I don’t want to hear you because, well, because I’m right and that’s it.
I go to UMASS Dartmouth. That’s about as far removed from the “academic elite” as it gets.
Didn’t Romney promise to remove the trolls west of 128?
I’m not attacking Deval on Melanie’s Law; simply pointing out how a year ago defense lawyers in the legislature were attacked viciously, by folks on this blog bigtime, because they raised constitutional objections to proposed law and were VILIFIED and along comes Deval and defense attorneys are now equated with John Adams and being rightful defenders of the constitution. What happened? Why the change? Can DAVID and others see their hypocrisy and how WRONG they were.
What were those, exactly? Can you hold forth a little on that?
Your rant didn’t go to Peter Porcupine’s Flat Earth blog as I’m sure you intended; it accidentally went to the Blue Mass Group blog instead! Gosh, I’m sure that’s an honest mistake — how embarassing!
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Especially since it exposes you as a frothing-at-the-mouth paranoid troll lunatic. With “life-long Democrats” like you, who needs corporate criminal fascist pedophile chickenhawk Republicans?
What I see is:
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Homeboy in the blue (not so) discreetley checking out the Lt.’s ass.
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White shirt looking constipated since he saw the ass stare and can’t contain his amusement at the irony.
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Guy shaking hands indubitably has a wide knowing grin on his face, for it was he who made all this possible.
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And ofcourse Dr. Healey is just happy that the guys still look.
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The suit…harmless.
The basic problem with charter schools is that they are not treated the same as other choice schools.
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If a student leaves a district to go to another public school, the state sends that child’s state funds along with them.
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If a student leaves a district to go to a charter school, the state forces the town to pay the full tuition.
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Charter schools are an unfunded mandate by the state. The state gets to decide what charters to create where, but the state doesn’t pay the bills.
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I really can’t understand how someone like Citizens for Limited Taxation can support charter schools, because they force increases in local taxes without any accountability to local taxpayers. Towns can’t plan how to efficiently allocate the resources they must raise to pay for public education when the state doesn’t take responsibility for funding charters. And the state has no incentive to consider that, either.
charter schools are fine as a supplemental to district schools as long as they are properly funded, but Healey’s contention that all schools should be charter schools and that our schools should compete (rather than collaberate) is off the mark.
She’s been trying all campaign to get her picture taken with an African-American — any African-American, and it took this long. And even then, only because these unfortunate students had no choice! Then — what bad luck! — she finds out you can’t fool all of the people all of the time!
While the Democrats were having their primary, she should have used the time to conduct a search for a black friend, a la Stephen Colbert.
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…she can rent one. Muffy’s got plenty of money.
According to that SurveyUSA poll, Hispanics favor Healey over Patrick by 59% to 35% (and Ross gets a whopping 6%). Is it just me, or does that all sound a bit odd?. Sampling error, maybe? Or does Healey actually offer something special to the Hispanic community? Hispanics are almost indistinguishable from Conservatives in this poll.
With an overall likely voter pool of 623 voters, they showed 3% of the likely voters as Hispanic, which means 18 or 19 as the total sample of Hispanic voters in the poll. At that size sample the “confidence level” of the result plunges toward 0.
The Hispanic breakdown is the reverse of what it was in the 10/11 poll: 52% Patrick, 26% Healy. Could the small sample cause a swing that wide? I love looking at the details of these polls (Patrick has doubled his support among Republicans in the two weeks!!), but I do have to catch myself from drawing too many conclusions, because of the sample size.
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The Ross vote among Hispanics is 1 voter, for example.
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623 likely voters x 3% = 19 Hispanic voters. If the numbers are correct, 11 are for Healy, 7 for Patrick. In the previous poll, it was 13 for Patrick, 7 for Healy. Hard to beleive that she’s losing support among Republicans, males, etc., but gaining with Hispanics of all parties.
Most of these comments betray an unfamiliarity with the game (or maybe an overly sincere approach). For expert examples of photographic deconstructionism, check out BAGnewsNotes. It’s not about what you know, it’s about what you see. Imagine you did not recognize any of the people in the photograph. Back up and pretend they are all Barbie and Ken dolls. What does this configuration of bodies and expressions imply?
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Why play this game? Because your subconscious brain processes these symbolic relationships and establishes a context for the image before you even realize it. Look at how an advertisement for soap is painstakingly constructed so that the entire frame conveys a love of the product. Now apply this system to politics. Fun!
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I see the benediction of a union, perhaps a marriage or a business deal (or both). Alternatively, this may portray the resolution of a legal conflict. We see an officiator (top right) and two witnesses. The level hand of the officiator indicates acceptance and official recognition of fair play. One of the witnesses (lower right) is clearly not very impressed with the proceedings. The other (top left) has his doubts, as well. The blonde is only happy face in the picture. In fact, she looks like the cat that ate the canary, which might explain the trepidation of the witnesses. We are therefore suspicious of the blonde, because she seems to be consolidating some unfair advantage. The witnesses think, “Damn, I can’t believe my bro bought that line.” The officiator says, “I’m just doing my job.”
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Now, I’m just an amateur, but you get the idea.
I am neither for nor against Charter Schools in the abstract. Most everyone is for smaller class sizes, and smaller schools, at all publicly funded schools. That is the only thing that I have ever seen/read about that has a proven record of achievement. And living in a state that pioneered free public education, as part of the basic civic ideal of citizenship to fulfill the intention of the constitutional founders, broad education of all is a pretty fundamental American creed.
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So when LG Healey blurts out in the debate and say again the next day, “Let’s make all schools charter schools.”, what is she talking about? If it is funding all public schools to reduce them to the size of charter schools, let’s calculate the cost. if it is to siphon off the movitated students to the point where district/public schools are underfunded and underperforming, to demonstrate that they “don’t work” it is a sham.
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For context on her visit to MATCH, bear in mind that the Principal of MATCH is Alan Safran, who served 9 years at the MA Department of Education as Administrator for Public Affairs, Executive Assistant to the Commissioner, Chief of Staff, Deputy Commissioner for Administration and Policy, and Senior Associate Commissioner for Student Achievement. Prior to this, Mr. Safran worked as a lead staff member of the MA Republican State Committee. Small wonder that when KH wanted to show her interest in inner city kids at a Charter School, she chose a friendly setting. Not that Mr. Safran holds a law degree from George Washington University (1987) and a B.A. in Public and International Affairs from Princeton University (1980). He is hardly a neutral educator or a child of the urban plight of his students.
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MATCH has done a great job — but it has 48 volunteer high quality tutors for 210 students, with half the volunteers paid for by AmeriCorps. Has anyone calculated the all in cost of educating a student at a showcase school like MATCH? Does anyone believe it can be replicated for the tens of thousands of Boston school kids, or the 50 million kids in school in the US, at an all in cost we as a society will pay?
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I would love it if any political leader advocated fully funding the cost of converting all large scale public school settings into smaller groupings. If this is the core of Charter Schools, great! But putting it forward as an either/or proposition (either support charter schools, or stay with failed public schools) is always a ploy to undermine public education support and funding. Let those who love charter schools’ features advocate to transform all public schools into smaller, more well staffed, personal attention, schools — and then say they will pay the cost. Sounds fairly conservative to me — do it right, do it so it lasts, and make sure the cost is paid today not borrowed from tomorrow.