The major civil rights organizations, with few exceptions, have been gutless weasels and completely disgraced themselves in siding with the unions against meaningful reforms of a public school system that systematically, all over the country, gives black and Latino students the very worst teachers and schools, thereby trapping black and Latino communities in multi-generational cycles of poverty, violence and despair.  In light of this sorry history, this week's press release criticizing Obama's education reform initiatives isn't a surprise…but it sure is pathetic…  It's one thing for unions to throw poor and minority kids under the bus – heck, it's their fiduciary obligation to look out for the best interests of their members – but for civil rights organizations to do so?!?!

Seven leading civil rights groups, including the NAACP and the National Urban League, called on U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan today to dismantle core pieces of his education agenda, arguing that his emphases on expanding charter schools, closing low-performing schools, and using competitive rather than formula funding are detrimental to low-income and minority children.

The groups, which today released their own education policy framework and created the National Opportunity to Learn campaign, want Duncan to make big changes to his draft proposal for reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

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Civil Rights Groups Call for New Federal Education Agenda

By Michele McNeil on July 26, 2010 10:00 AM | 12 Comments | 1 TrackBack

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2010/07/civil_rights_groups_call_for_n.html