The American Federation of Teachers followed the National Education Association in passing a resolution sharply critical of Education Secretary Arne Duncan over the weekend. While the NEA resolution called on Duncan to simply resign, though, the AFT resolution took another approach. Diane Ravitch
writes:
... the AFT rebuke seemed like mockery of Duncan, a bureaucrat who demands accountability of everyone but is never held accountable for his own missteps. Of course, his missteps are not mistakes but reflect his contempt for teachers and public schools. In his world-view, everyone lies about how terrible schools are except him.
However:
The obvious hitch: Obama hasn’t shown a single sign that he disagrees with Duncan’s education reform agenda, which is largely focused on using standardized test scores to hold educators accountable (a method that accountability experts say is unreliable) as well as implementing the controversial Common Core State Standards and increasing the number of charter schools.
But it's a nice thought, subjecting Duncan to the kind of twisted "accountability" he likes to impose on others.
The AFT also passed a resolution highly critical of the Common Core's implementation, corporate profiteering, and lack of teacher involvement, while simultaneously voting to continue supporting it in theory. Ravitch:
If the standards are decoupled from the tests, as the AFT hopes, the standards will be a very costly and very toothless tiger. With or without the tests, they will drain every district of desperately needed resources.
Both the AFT and the NEA have made it clear that they're getting extremely fed up with attacks on their members, on education not based on constant testing, and on public education itself. But they're also not yet willing to blow up their relationships with the Obama administration to really launch a war against the administration's all-standardized-testing-all-the-time, corporate profit-heavy model of education.