Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Uncle Tom's Cab ..., er, Interest Group: Who is the NAACP trying to protect?

Well, it appears that the Simon Legrees at the teachers unions are having some trouble keeping 'em down on the liberal plantation. Seems there are many blacks don't understand what's expected of them from places like the United Federation of Teachers--one of the nation's largest teachers unions.

In New York, a battle has broken out between many black parents, who want better schools for the children, and the NAACP, which is supposed to, like, be working for their interests. After the NAACP joined the teachers unions in a lawsuit opposing charter schools, many black parents parents protested. Literally.

But black children have been major constituents of charter schools since their creation two decades ago. So when thousands of charter-school parents, students and advocates staged a rally on May 26 in Harlem, it was not so much to denounce the litigation as it was to criticize the involvement of the N.A.A.C.P.

Since then, a war has broken out within the civil rights community in New York and across the country over the lawsuit against the city and the larger questions of how school choice helps or hurts minority students.

... For the N.A.A.C.P. ... the dispute has turned into a public referendum on its mission. After joining the teachers’ union in the lawsuit, which seeks to keep 20 charter schools from opening or expanding in buildings shared with traditional public schools, the national organization has found itself on the defensive, forced to explain whose rights, exactly, it is trying to protect.
Read the rest here.

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