Edison

A round table discussion with reporters planned by Schools Chancellor Joel Klein, scheduled for noon today at the Tweed Courthouse, was just cancelled. A spokeswoman for the DOE didn't have an explanation.

I'm not sure if this has anything to do with it, but Betsy Gotbaum's people were really looking forward to the event, and had even sent reporters a press release suggesting few questions.

Here they are:

1. "Isn't it true that the majority of the gains in 4th grade reading and math scores, so widely touted by this Administration, happened between 2002 and 2003, before the DOE instituted its changes?

2. "Isn't it true that the DOE awarded corporate restructuring firm Alvarez & Marsal (A&M) a $15.8 million no-bid contract after A&M "restructured" St. Louis' schools and left the city struggling to pay off $30 million A&M borrowed for operating costs?

3. "Isn't it true that ten different deputy chancellors have come and gone through the DOE over the past five years, including three deputy chancellors for teaching and learning?

4. "Isn't it true that DOE has hired the former head of Edison to oversee the privatization of New York City schools, despite the fact that two independent studies have shown that the privatization by Edison and other companies in Philadelphia produced no significant gains in student achievement to justify the additional $100 million cost?"

-- Azi Paybarah

Recently, I met a man at a bar who asked me what I did.  read more »

My little brother says there were a couple things about the Sopranos finale that lifted it into greatness. 1, The characterization of Tony's power. Tony could on the one hand manipulate his men into thinking that he wanted rival boss Phil dead, then visit Phil in the hospital and squeeze his hand and urge him to get well. "So for the first time he's able to compartmentalize his ruthless mob leadership. That is so nuanced," my little brother says. 2, The line that Phil gives to his blonde maid as he brings her toward the Wire Factory to shtup her: "We need to get something straight between us." Exults my little brother: "It's the greatest line of the season. I've never encountered it in 39 years of barroom humor."

He also notes that while Howard Stern was crazy for the show, his dental hygienist and her boyfriend, who live in Edison, hated it. For the same reason my wife hated it and I wasn't crazy about it: because it falsely resolved intense conflicts with harmony, not violence.

My little brother says that even this speaks to the show's excellence. "Curb Your Enthusiasm is really smart but it has a tiny market. Sopranos is the number one show on all cable. It's done that with great writing and nuance, and managed to tow along all the guys crying out for violence."

(P.S. The blatant nepotism of this entry is, I gather, a tradition of blogging. C.f., Instapundit promoting his documentarian wife.)

Just as downtown Manhattan was re-invented after the Great Fire of 1835, when hundreds of buildings  read more »

Trinity Hopes to Buy City StreetTo Build Office Tower and Park  read more »

When Chris Whittle, the charter-school mogul at the helm of Edison Schools Inc., put his legendary E  read more »

It's no longer any secret that Bill and Hillary Clinton,whatever ideals they may have held in their  read more »

On the afternoon of March 16, at a hurriedly called meeting of the City Council's Education Committe  read more »

Truth tends to win out in the end, and the ambitiousentrepreneurs of New York's Silicon Alley, who j  read more »