El Somnambulo Seeks Your Help…
…in assembling the Third Annual MVP List. This list honors those Delawareans who were (M)ost (V)aluable to the (P)rogressive cause in Delaware in 2011.
In the past, I have generally limited this list to public officials. However, I am open to suggestions from outside the realm of elective public service.
These annual MVP lists have generated a lot of controversy, due both to some of my inclusions and some of my omissions.
At the end of the day, it’s my list, and only my list. (Hey, I’m a listaholic.) However, your input last year impacted both who made the list and the ultimate order of the selections. And, if you ultimately don’t like my list, you can post your own list over here.
Here are the previous lists, with attendant bouquets and beaucoups brickbats:
See how much fun this can be? Here are three things to keep in mind with your submissions: (A) Please explain why your suggestions deserve consideration; (B) These are not lifetime achievement awards, so explain why they deserve consideration for this year’s list; and (C) As you can see from the preceding lists, you don’t have to be a progressive to be included on the MVP list. Virtually no one argued with my selection of Christine O’Donnell as my #1 choice last year, although several disagreed with my inclusion of Tony DeLuca in 2009.
OK, kids, the clock starts NOW, and runs until December 1, when I will put my list together.
To quote Andy Reid, “Time’s yours.”
Tags: Most Valuable Progressives in Delaware; Steve Tanzer; El Somnambulo;
I predict that it is going to be a short list this year. Austerity rules.
Well, if you are restricting it to this year only, Beau Biden – for challenging the banks. The issue he is challenging them over almost doesn’t matter – NOBODY challenges the banks in Delaware. But Beau did. It is only a crumb, and falls in the category of “just doing my job” – but it is so rare it stands out in Delaware. It is almost too good to be true, and sends me searching for alternate explanations that would be more venal.
When’s the Award’s Banquet? And can we expect something more than a warm Coor’s Light and a McDouble? And will speeches be limited to 15 seconds?
Melanie George for shepherding the Civil Unions Bill through the house.
Hmmm, ya got me thinking there. Neither Coors nor Mickey D’s would be there, of course. But, in all likelihood, neither would the honorees.
However, we always try to do a DL event for the Food Bank of Delaware each year. Maybe we could do it in conjunction with the list…
BTW, great choices already. Both Beau Biden and Melanie George have done a lot for the progressive cause this year. Keep ’em coming.
Anybody who wins for being socially progressive but not progressive on economics should get a big asterisk in the record book, and the warm Coors.
Mind you, Beau is only in the running because this year there are no deaths at the hands of police he failed to investigate. He’s still got seven weeks to go.
The last one I know about was a taser kill by Delaware State Police in 2010 (another unsympathetic victim). It has never been reported how many times that trooper pulled the trigger. He’s probably been promoted by now.
I’m going to use modern technologies to figure our which Delaware Democrat said, “We need to cut taxes” the fewest number of times this year.
I think if you’ve said it fewer than ten times, you qualify as a progressive these day.
Anyone who is on record as saying “Current retirees won’t be affected” is automatically disqualified.
and…
Jack Markell is so close for so many reasons. I’m still thinking about it. He did actually raise taxes on the upper incomes (if you count $60K as upper income), but that wasn’t this year.
Occupy Delaware is fighting the good fight and has had some small wins, in terms of free speech and pushing back on the Delaware Way.
As always, Dave Sokola, this year for his sponsorship of the civil unions bill, and teacher hiring reform. Senator Sokola will be running for Senate in his new district.
If you support progressive causes, get out your checkbook and send Dave Sokola a campaign contribution right now. Send one to Mitch Crane while you’re at it.
I think Occupy Delaware needs to be at the very top of the list. Also Tom Neuberger and the Delaware ACLU (temporary injunction allowing tents at Spencer Plaza made permanent today!)
I nominate Lisa Goodman.
She has long been active in Delaware politics, but had usually stayed in the background. As the President and leading voice in Equality Delaware, she helped push through the Civil Unions bill in a surprisingly short time. The LGBT community and straight allies are proud to have her as one of our spokespeople.
i second what Puck said
We may need a Republican division. Sussex Republicans are the gift that keeps on giving.
I agree with the Lisa Goodman nomination, and I like the inclusion of BBiden and DSokola and MGeorge (who also helped lead the successful removal of mandatory minimum sentences, if memory serves).
While it was actually late in 2010, Michael Katz deserves serious kudos for standing up to DeLuca in the selection of senator pro tempore.
Kowalko has done good work on behalf of those facing foreclosure, being suprisingly successful in getting concessions from the banks.
Yes, credit Beau for taking on the banks and for his challenge to the Blue Cross merger/takeover while KWS pretty much stood idly by. However, Beau gets demerits for his dubious defense of the confidentiality of Tony DeLuca’s timesheets.
Agree on Melanie George and Dave Sokola. Don’t forget Helene Keeley, who was the House lead on medical marijuana and several of the foreclosure bills, not to mention the DUI bills that increased treatment for earlier offenders. I’d say that that’s better than just throwing away the key.
Definately Biden, but can we spread the wealth a little?? I see some of the same names from last year
how about – ACLU DE – they have done some HARD charging this year and have taken on some….well institutions – and you all dont know the half of what they’ve done
and Pete Schwartkopff – maybe not the biggest progressive out there but was very supportive of the Civil Unions bill and has done a lot to jeep the caucus together
and also – a favorite in here Eric Bodenweiser – for makin gthe Sussex County Republican party so dishonored and ditry and to cause republicans to flee the party and look for alternatives (like a democrat) he also should get an award for keeping the Progeressives in Sussex on edge, and aware – HE is what we fights against, HE IS the barbarian at the gate that we should fear.
and he is always good for a laugh – Hell, if Christine O’Donnell won last year we could add Bill Colley in with Bodesnweiser
call them the Hateful Twins!
Dave Sokola gets serious demerits for almost derelict chairmanship of the education committee –over the last umpteen years to boot. The lack of oversight of the DDOE this year has been a disaster.
Also, from what I heard, on Monday night, so many of these dear progressive types snuck out the side door rather than taint themselves by interacting with the Occupy Delaware contingent protesting the governor. I know that JJ Johnson and Pete Schwartzkopf came out front and shook hands all around.
“Disaster” how?
I’ll tell you what WOULD be a disaster – nullifying RTTT rules and losing the funding mid-program. Or letting charters spring up willy-nilly no matter how they perform, sucking even more resources away from traditional public schools. Surely that is not the kind of “oversight” you expected of Sokola or anyone else?
Chris Coons already has an award (h/t Nancy).
A warm Coors to Senator Coons.
@Nancy – not to be a dick, but does anything/body please you?
its always critize, cirtize, critize, harshly…………
Maybe those who face constant critizism just for one night would like to avoid it.
I had an interesting meeting in DC the other week with the head of a Federal Agnecy. He had one request of those of us in attendance:
“to critize our organization is fine, but please do so in a constructive way, many of these public servants who I meet with every Monday morning around the conference table, devote their lives to making a difference. and we are willing to listen, but being slammed and insulted on a constant basis is not constructive, and makes it harder to do the job we are asked to do”
its paraphrased some, but you get the idea. This is an agency that has many policies that I have issues with, but his words were heart-felt and struck home.
Maybe a kindler, gentler approach would work wonders.
El Som – the education blogs are a different world. It’s full roar all the time:
“DDOE? You said DDOE? Slo-owly I turned…. Step by step…”
“I’ll tell you what WOULD be a disaster – nullifying RTTT rules and losing the funding mid-program.”
Please explain exactly how this would be anything other than a flat out win for our kids. RTTT has no research base, destabilizes schools, and hurts districts. Be happy to take you on a tour of a PZ school if you want to see how your tax dollars are “helping”
RTTT has been launched for better or worse, and it is now in teacher’s hands to make the most of it. If RTTT money is pulled mid-program, Delaware teachers won’t escape being a national laughing stock along with the whole system. Jay Leno will be making jokes about Delaware teachers. How will that help anybody? In a few years the RTTT money will be gone and you will regret it if you didn’t figure out how to take advantage of it while it was here.
“RTTT has been launched for better or worse, and it is now in teacher’s hands to make the most of it.”
As a teacher, puck, I must unequivocally call you on this BS line. The money is not in our hands and we’ve had minimal input as to how it’s being spent.
What do you want, a sack of cash dumped on your desk? Of course you don’t control the money. What you have is access to the resources that the money paid for. As a taxpayer and a parent I would appreciate our educators making the most of it, instead of spending the whole duration of the program with their hands clapped over their ears and wishing it would go away.
Once the program gets down to the level of actually interacting with humans on the RTTT payroll, that is where teachers should shine.
geezy pete. If folks are unwilling to do the research themselves, I will gladly give details on Sokola’s dereliction as soon as I have finished with the pile in front of me – I am currently analyzing the NCC Comprehensive Plan Update draft which will effect your county land use etc. for the next ten years. The CPU draft is scheduled for the PLUS review later this month and then will rapidly go to the Planning Board and to Council for a vote. If you didn’t like the recent Stoltz shenanigans then you might take a look at the draft yourself -links on the NCC website– we are looking to get much more of the same if we don’t speak up now.
Back to hoisting Sokola up the progressive flagpole: A significant number of issues are apparent where the checking and balancing of the executive branch is sorely lacking in the legis — RTTT is NOT the main issue IMO.
I get it that RTTT is a done deal and we will move forward and make the best of it. When I recently published a notification for the Delaware Leadership Project some anonys accused me of *gasp* supporting RTTT initiatives. [Interestingly, speaking of competing for the privilege of receiving federal education funding, Obama this week declared that he wants underperforming Head Start programs to have to compete for federal dollars now rather than automatically receive them.]
That RTTT isn’t being perfectly implemented in Delaware is only a portion of the criticism. That is not my main complaint. My point is that there’s been a significant amount of mischief in the central education administration that’s been very well documented by the watchdogs at education bloggers’ sites like Children and Educators First, Transparent Christiana and Kilroy’s Delaware.
I have no problem calling out those who should be actively and visibly concerned with the missteps in DDOE. And I admit I am assuming that Sokola and Schooley’s closed lips approach has as much to do with loyalty to the gov and the DEM high party constituency than anything else.
“What do you want, a sack of cash dumped on your desk? Of course you don’t control the money. What you have is access to the resources that the money paid for. As a taxpayer and a parent I would appreciate our educators making the most of it, instead of spending the whole duration of the program with their hands clapped over their ears and wishing it would go away.”
Wow, you really have NO idea, do you?! DO YOU?! And I find your first line there absolutely insulting. I was responding to your comment that RTTT is in “teachers’ hands.” I was calling BS on that and am telling you RIGHT NOW IT IS NOT IN OUR HANDS. Sure, administration and the public will look to blame us like they always do, but I can tell you that thought some of us were involved in our districts’ RTTT plans, we don’t feel we were listed to all that much as to how this money could be used most effectively.
Millions of dollars spent on an organization tied to Rupert Murdoch to come in and tell us how to interpret and analyze data is absurd. You should come sit in on one of those meetings, puck, and tell me if you feel that’s $8 million well spent.
Follow me here. You said it’s “now in the teachers’ hands.” I rebutted your point and then you say that we teachers just want the money dropped on our desk? Sorry, but you obviously failed logic in college. Because that makes no sense.
Millions of dollars spent on an organization tied to Rupert Murdoch to come in and tell us how to interpret and analyze data is absurd.
“Why do we need to learn this? When will we ever need to use it again in our lives?”
“Why do I need to learn this? I already know it!”
Right. Where have we heard that before.
tell me if you feel that’s $8 million well spent.
It’s totally wasted if you resist it.
I don’t think you get the point of the financing. It’s not like that $8 million is available to be put somewhere else where YOU think it’s a better idea, even if that were possible, and even if you are right. If that $8 million program blows up the money is simply lost. So please make the most of it.
The only thing worse than spending $8 million on dubious coaching, is spending $8 million on coaching and not insisting on getting your money’s worth.
I have to say that the phrase “data coach” is probably the biggest PR disaster of RTTT. “Coach” is a patronizing term that immediately gets people’s backs up. I’d rather call them “data assistants.” You should call them that, if it will help. Their job is to make the system work for you and students, not against you.
You know how nowadays bottled water is just tap water from somewhere else? Data coaches are just former teachers from some other district. If something is stupid, tell them so at every meeting. Be a leader.
In five years the data coaches and the $8 million will be ancient history. The teachers who don’t learn the system will be left behind.
You should come sit in on one of those meetings
Empty challenge; you know that is not allowed. If it were I’d be there, and I’d bring my ideas for making it work and getting our money’s worth. I wouldn’t sit by and see it wasted. So I guess it’s up to the people who actually are allowed at the meetings.
Puck:
I hate to sound so patronizing, but you really know little about what you speak. I’m not sure it would be out of bounds for you to sit in on a PLC with a data coach. As a taxpayer, I feel it should be your right. I implore you to do it. You will learn much and not very much at the same time. The data coaching process is extremely complex, yet oh so simple. Some of us HAVE spoken up at these meetings, but have been lightly reprimanded by administration. I don’t need assistance analyzing and interpreting data. I’m tech-savvy and data-savvy enough to know how to do this. What we need is more TIME to do this in MEANINGFUL groups that aren’t LED by a consultant who has little stake in the community in which he or she works.
Here’s what PLCs are: They’re another 90 minutes per week of instruction that our students are losing so that their teachers can be talked down to by individuals who usually have no clue what the hell they’re talking about.
Education is at a crossroads right now. If it weren’t for the kids, I wouldn’t do what I do. I love working with my kids. That’s it. The layers upon layers of administrative bullshit and paperwork (take a look at PD360 if you get a chance) we deal with on a day to day basis — all of which mean LESS time for us to actually PLAN and EXECUTE effective instruction — is disheartening. RTTT is a quagmire. And this is coming from someone who was intimately involved with the strategic plan of his school district.
“In five years the data coaches and the $8 million will be ancient history. The teachers who don’t learn the system will be left behind.”
And those who are left will be properly trained to treat their charges as data points rather than individual students; time spent instructing will be substituted by time spent on data entry.
Yes, I’m sure it will be an improvement. But if it’s not, at least the contractors have the federal government’s money in their pockets, and I’m sure it will trickle down to the former students now entering data into the registers at Wawa’s.
“And those who are left will be properly trained to treat their charges as data points rather than individual students; time spent instructing will be substituted by time spend on data entry.”
Geezer, that is just inflammatory. I have a higher regard for our teachers than that.
And, what data would teachers have to enter that isn’t already being entered?
I will say that school data systems are 10 years behind the private sector, 20 years behind in certain respects. During the 1990s the private sector reengineered a lot of redundant and unnecessary data entry out of their systems, and found ways to automate or streamline the collection of data that was previously entered by hand. They did this specifically to empower their employees so they could spend more time actually doing their jobs and helping customers (and save labor costs, but that’s another story).
And those who are left will be properly trained to treat their charges as data points rather than individual students; time spent instructing will be substituted by time spend on data entry.
How can this be inflammatory? You can predict the behavior of the population by what came before. And what came before were performance tests that saw teachers bending their instruction towards. And still do in certain instances. The point being that it is the flavor of the day that seems to dictate the educational experience rather than education.
Is the truth inflammatory, puck? I suppose it could be, but it’s still the truth. And geezer is dead on. We are treating our students as commodities. As producers and consumers rather than nuanced human beings.
“The point being that it is the flavor of the day that seems to dictate the educational experience rather than education.”
YES! INDEED!
RTTT will not train anybody to treat students like soulless data points. What a ridiculous and ignorant statement.
Flavor Of The Day has always been the norm in education. You can look it up. It’s not going to stop for our generation. There is no golden age to go back to. But we can make sure we are at least on an upward spiral.
No more ridiculous or ignorant than your opposite assertion. OF COURSE they become data-entry points. What part of your beloved program don’t you understand?
Actually I don’t know exactly what it means to treat a student like a data point, but it sounds pretty bad. Maybe someone can explain it to me?
Just to be clear: I don’t know how many things are wrong with public education; I’m sure the total reaches double digits. But few of them are more wasteful than the time, money and employee pay we squander in our ever-increasing efforts to establish exactly where the blame lies, when anyone with a basic knowledge of math can see that no matter what we do, the results always produce a bell curve.
Any method applied to all will produce similar results. Since we’re obsessed with affixing credit/blame, all must compete on the same test, which are keyed to a standardized curriculum.
What we should be doing instead is identifying the kids on the wrong side of the bell curve and finding alternative methods of instruction that produce better results for that subset of kids. That’s what a system that cared about the products — educated kids — would be doing instead of chasing the folly of a standardized model that will nevertheless work on everyone.
Just my opinion.
“Flavor Of The Day has always been the norm in education. You can look it up. It’s not going to stop for our generation. There is no golden age to go back to. But we can make sure we are at least on an upward spiral.”
So damn research, damn efficacy, damn the lavish spending on that which has no proof of working? Have you researched the federal intervention models for “fixing” bad schools?
I have. They are destabilizing and bad for schools….but they feel good…just like your “might as well make the best of it” speech…
that dog don’t hunt when kids futures are on the line. As adults, we must do what works, not what feels good. Supporting RTTT blindly is a betrayal of rational thinking about how education works. The worst part, Jack knows this, but keeps sending our money to consultants…..so sad.
When you fill out a program with the data about whether the child did homework, etc., you cannot represent anything that can’t be translated into data points for the program. This reduces the data to manageable levels and makes it easier for analysis by those who are going to be paid handsomely to analyze it.
You really didn’t realize that?
“identifying the kids on the wrong side of the bell curve and finding alternative methods of instruction that produce better results for that subset of kids”
Um, this is exactly what a PLC is supposed to be for. You really didn’t realize that?
“When you fill out a program with the data about whether the child did homework, etc., you cannot represent anything that can’t be translated into data points for the program.”
I am not sure what you are getting at here. Teachars have been entering data about whether students did their homework or not for hundreds of years. Now we have the ability to turn that raw data into meaningful information, which is a good thing.
Not a great example though, because the RTTT metrics unfortunately leave homework and other classroom events out of the equation. I’m not sure teachers would support putting it in.
“Um, this is exactly what a PLC is supposed to be for. You really didn’t realize that?”
I repeat what I said above: You REALLY have no clue, do you? I think you should probably just step back at this point. I’m really beginning to wonder if you’re someone from DoE or the Markell ed-reform brigade here. Yes, in theory, I suppose this is what should be happening in PLCs. But PLCs are the absolute micro level. There is no macro-level-change happening like geezer says. What geezer says is what we really need. I don’t know if it’s that we don’t have the political will to do such things, but we can not continue to utilize these one-size-fits-all standardized testing models for our students.
Puck,
I don’t know what perspective or agenda you’re trying to represent but you should take a long, hard look at “Geezer’s 12:40 comment and think about it for a while with an unbiased and objective demeanor.It is spot on.And pay attention to Nancy’s 9:32 AM comment about Head-Start competition for funds and be forewarned about the new politics of distraction taking place in “Early Child Care” that has absolutely no basis in proven methodology and in fact threatens the majority of families dependent on subsidized Early Child Care. These families are gainfully employed and/or seeking employment and contribute a large amount to the tax base and spendable income that is injected into our small-business economy. We should first and foremost be committed to allowing them to work by caring for their children in a safe and nurturing environment so that they may continue to be employed and contributors to the state’s revenue stream. This redistribution of funds to “highly-rated” Early Childhood Care programs will/does decimate the financial stability of the hundreds of qualified and quality “day-cares” that currently serve almost all of the low-income families.Denying adequate funding to those providers while throwing disproportionately large amounts of finite monies at the “higher rated” centers is unsustainable just like the RTTT agenda is/will be unsustainable.
John Kowalko
Greetings Mr. Kowalko,
The guessing game about my motivations is comical. I am just a parent. I’m not sure how many non-educators other than myself have actually read the RTTT documents. But I have read many of them.
I did think about Geezer’s 12:40 comment. It’s not the first time I’ve thought about it. And I responded to it, so now I would ask that you give similar consideration to my response to Geezer:
My first comment on this thread was to note that the public opponents of RTTT express deep passion against it using broad emotional arguments, but quickly lose focus when asked to follow the details. This thread bears out my observation, in my opinion. Thundering from a blog is more fun than reading forty-page documents in close type. And getting three friends to come call me clueless does not make it so. I have left more than one question in the comments which was not answered; perhaps you would now like to take a shot at answering them.
I’ll defer to you on the Head Start and early childhood issues, which I don’t know much about at this point.
You have my best wishes and continued support.
Can we please get back to the topic of the thread now?
This is a lively and worthwhile debate. But I think it belongs elsewhere, perhaps the open thread.
I don’t want to discourage people from the thread’s original intent–to suggest nominees for the year-end Most Valuable to the Progressive Cause list.
Would have done that earlier, but I worked today.
“My first comment on this thread was to note that the public opponents of RTTT express deep passion against it using broad emotional arguments, but quickly lose focus when asked to follow the details.”
I’ll gladly “detail you up” on RTTT anytime. Come on over to Transparent Christina, leave some comments and we’ll go from there.
El Som, I nominate John Kowalko.
Kowalko??
Even after he pulled his support for HB 75? (stops Legislators from getting a New State Job)
When did keeping alive the incestuous Delaware Way become a progressive virtue?
Mike Barbieri. He has worked tirelessly to help kids, victims of domestic violence and the less fortunate. And, he does it with no grandstanding!