By RP Staff, on Thu May 26, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET Former New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein penned a lengthy and thought-provoking essay that appears in this month’s Atlantic magazine entitled “The Failure of American Schools.” In it, he reveals a number of disturbing trends and endemic problems that plague the nation’s public schools system.
Klein offers, however, a signal of hope that comes from the work being done currently by contributing RP, Eva Moskowitz, in her Harlem Success Academy:
 Eva Moskowitz is Founder and CEO of the Harlem Success Network At the individual school level, the differences can be breathtaking. One charter school in New York City, Harlem Success Academy 1, has students who are demographically almost identical to those attending nearby community and charter schools, yet it gets entirely different results. Harlem Success has 88 percent of its students proficient in reading and 95 percent in math; six other nearby schools have an average of 31 percent proficient in reading and 39 percent in math. And according to the most-recent scores on New York State fourth-grade science tests, Success had more than 90 percent of its students at the highest (advanced) level, while the city had only 43 percent at advanced, and Success’s black students outperformed white students at more than 700 schools across the state. In fact, Success now performs at the same level as the gifted-and-talented schools in New York City—all of which have demanding admissions requirements, while Success randomly selects its students, mostly poor and minority, by lottery.
These school-level differences ultimately reflect the effectiveness of a child’s particular teachers. Eric Hanushek, an economist at Stanford, has shown that, while some teachers get a year and a half’s worth of learning into a year, others get in only half a year’s worth of learning with essentially the same students. Imagine the cumulative impact of the best teachers over 13 years of elementary and secondary education. Indeed, even if California raised its performance to Texas’s level, Detroit to Boston’s, the neighborhood schools in Harlem to Harlem Success’s—that is to say, if our least effective teachers performed at the level of our most effective—the impact would be seismic.
Click here to read the full article.
By RP Staff, on Wed May 25, 2011 at 5:00 PM ET We hope we added a little levity to help you get through your Wednesday.
Tomorrow, we’ll get a bit more serious as we highlight some national attention one of our contributing RPs is getting for her work in the private sector since leaving office. She proves that sometimes recovering politicians can be more successful in developing sound public policy than active politicians.
We’ll also have plenty of Weekly Web Gems — the best of civil discourse on the Internet.
See you Thursday!
By Zack Adams, RP Staff, on Wed May 25, 2011 at 3:00 PM ET
President Obama’s trip to Ireland in 12 parts. [picture]
You really learn how many people just do not get satire when you look at the reactions to The Onion’s article: “Planned Parenthood Opens $8 Billion Abortionplex.” You have to imagine these people don’t get out much. [Facebook]
A very cool (and unexpected) exchange between an iPhone app user and the creator of the app. [XSellize]
Haters gonna hate. [picture]
He’s always watching. [newspaper]
Ah, yes, elevator humor. [comic]
By Stephanie Doctrow, RP Staff, on Wed May 25, 2011 at 1:30 PM ET NPR’s news blog posts a horrifying first-person account of being in Joplin, Missouri during the deadly tornado. As of Monday night, 116 people were killed in the storm. [NPR]
The New York Times profiles GLBT teens as they come out to their friends and family. [NY Times]
Even though the United States is on its way out of the economic recession, Americans still aren’t taking vacations. According to CNN, relaxing is just not in our DNA. [CNN]
In other economic news, small businesses still aren’t hiring full-time staffs as rapidly as they were before the recession. [Newsweek]
Luckily for us, we weren’t wiped off the face of the planet on Saturday. In celebration of surviving The Rapture, check out this photo gallery of Hollywood depictions of the apocalypse. [Time]
By Jonathan Miller, on Wed May 25, 2011 at 12:00 PM ET A number of friends remarked that I showed a lot of chutzpah in my inaugural Huffington Post piece last week — by coming out of the political closet to endorse gay marriage.
You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
My second piece, published by HuffPo this morning, takes on the Lamestream Media, the Big Science Establishment, and nearly one thousand years of international conspiracy.
Yes, I prove conclusively that the Earth is flat. Here’s an excerpt:
It’s finally happening. Thanks to the courage of such TRUTH pioneers as Glenn Beck, Alex Jones, and Harold Camping (So what if his Rapture prediction was a little off?), the iniquitous conspiracy between Big Science and the Lamestream Media is finally beginning to crumble.
The first sign was cable news’ wall-to-wall coverage of 2009’s “Climategate.” We know that public exposure of a handful of snarky emails exchanged by British climatologists proved once and for all that all of the so-called “peer-reviewed findings” and “scientific consensus” that the Earth is warming as a result of human activity were a cruel hoax. And the liberal media refused to conspire (finally!) with Big Science’s attempted whitewash: There was scant coverage of the four “independent” investigations which, all-too-conveniently and coincidentally, cleared the scientists of misconduct and reconfirmed the global warming fallacy.
That’s why it’s high time for real, TRUTH-loving Americans to employ the same logic and observational methods used by climate change deniers to debunk a far more pernicious fantasy perpetuated for centuries by Big Science: The “theory” that the Earth is round, that it spins wildly on its own axis, and that it hurtles madly through “outer space.”
Click here to check out the piece that will make global…I mean international…history.
By Robert Kahne, RP Staff, on Wed May 25, 2011 at 10:00 AM ET
The reigning NL MVP, Joey Votto, has a new Sportscenter advertisement. Apparently, it took forever to film. Also, the Reds are a terrible skid. I am laughing at them. [The Big Lead]
Here is a great story about Jeremy Affeldt, a relief pitcher for the San Francisco Giants, and his passion for ending human trafficking. [xlog]
There is a lot of negativity in baseball at this moment. The Red’s ace, Edinson Volquez, was sent to the minors, and didn’t take it so well. The Mets owner had some nasty stuff to say about his own team, and the A’s closer is complaining about management. Deadspin has the rundown. [deadspin]
This is an interesting article about the relationship between alcohol and baseball. In a sport which plays games in Busch Stadium, Coors Field, and Miller Park, do you think things are going to change anytime soon? [Pocono Record]
You might have heard the awful tale of Bryan Snow by now. Mr. Snow, a Giants fan, was beaten almost to death in Los Angeles on opening day during a game between the Giants and Dodgers. Now, Mr. Snow’s family is suing the Los Angeles Dodgers over the lack of security which they allege led to Mr. Snow’s condition. [Seattle Times]
Speaking of Mr. Snow, one of the saddest things about this story is that Mr. Snow has two small children. Barry Bonds, the former Giants superstar and current convict, has put up the money to send the two children to college. [MSNBC]
By Jeff Smith, on Wed May 25, 2011 at 8:30 AM ET 
Lies can have unpredictable trajectories.
Sometimes, a stupid lie that seems inconsequential at the time – in my case about a campaign postcard – can lead to betrayal, the end of a friendship, and a prison term. Other times, a stupid, inconsequential lie can lead to the blossoming of a long and meaningful friendship.
***
During my first Senate session in early 2007, I drove to Louisville for the weekend to visit my ex-girlfriend, who served as press secretary for Kentucky gubernatorial candidate Bruce Lunsford. It was the weekend before the Democratic primary, and on Sunday afternoon before I headed back to St. Louis, we stopped at a restaurant which we soon realized shared a patio with an adjacent restaurant hosting a campaign BBQ for one of her gubernatorial campaign opponents, Kentucky House Speaker Jody Richards.
Lis, whose jet-black hair, pale skin, haute couture dress, and staccato delivery screamed New York City, hid her head in her hand. “Oh my God,” she said, “they’re totally gonna recognize me and think I’m tracking them. Ohmigod, this is so embarrassing. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
Although most people in St. Louis politics viewed me as a Type A politician, who sprinted door-to-door and whose campaign aides who worked 16 hours a day seven days a week, I tended to take a much more relaxed view of campaigns than Lis did. A year earlier, she had famously called my campaign manager and berated him for failing to blind-copy a group of reporters on a routine press advisory. I’d watched the call from his side in the office; he stood there, mouth agape and crumpling like a boxer taking gut punches, for 60 seconds while the office listened to her tear into him, the phone a safe distance from his ear.
Knowing her aversion to even the smallest gaffes, I mischievously decided, as was my wont, to antagonize her. “Hey, I’m gonna go meet Jody,” I said, rising from the table. As a politician, a political scientist, and a huge geek, I liked meeting and analyzing politicians. The only thing better than meeting and analyzing them was to do it undercover.
Lis trembled and turned ashen. “Do NOT do that. Ohmigod I will fucking KILL you if you do that! Let’s just get the check and get out of here.”
***
 Former KY House Speaker Jody Richards I rose from my seat and approached Richards. “Hey, Mr. Speaker, how’s it goin’?”
He clasped my outstretched hand and pumped it furiously. “Hey there, young fella, how ya doin’?”
“I’m great. How’s the campaign going?”
“Well, pretty dern good!” He gestured to the patio, where an embarrassingly small group of supporters had gathered for the BBQ. “Look at all these folks! I’d say things are pretty dern good! What’s yer name, young fella?”
“John,” I lied.
He reached out and pumped my hand some more. “It’s great to see ya, John. Where ya from?”
“Oh, right down Bardstown,” I replied, gesturing vaguely to my left, praying he wouldn’t pursue that line of inquiry any further. I needed a distraction, fast. “So, tell me about your platform.”
Read the rest of…
Jeff Smith: When “John” Met John Y.
By RP Staff, on Tue May 24, 2011 at 5:00 PM ET Who doesn’t need a laugh on a Wednesday?
Tomorrow, The Recovering Politician will be here to deliver the humor.
We begin at 8:30 with contributing RP Jeff Smith‘s latest piece on how a small lie led to both hilarity and a meaningful friendship.
Then the RP will engage around lunchtime with his latest Huffington Post submission, which should make you chuckle. (We hope it was intended to do so…)
So see you on Hump Day. We will make sure it will be memorable.
By Robert Kahne, RP Staff, on Tue May 24, 2011 at 3:00 PM ET
Super 8, the film directed by JJ Abrams and produced by Steven Spielberg, has been marketed heavily for the past year. Now, the first critics have been allowed to screen it. They were allowed to tweet their thoughts. /Film has a good rundown of what everybody thought. [/Film]
At the Cannes Film Festival last week, director Lars Von Trier really stepped in it. In a strange diatribe, he said that he “understood Hitler” and claimed he was a Nazi. He was banned from Cannes, but Kirsten Dunst, who stars in his new film Melancholia, still managed to win best actress at the festival. Von Trier has apologized a few times, with varying success. [Guardian]
A trailer for my most anticipated film of 2011 was released this weekend, attached to Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. To be honest, this trailer was my favorite part of the movie. [Film Junk]
Since about 2009, film industry watchers have been wondering when, or if, the emblematic film about the 2008 financial crisis will be made. HBO has put together a star-studded cast to enact Ross Sorkin’s Too Big To Fail. Could this be it? One reviewer doesn’t seem to think so. [IFC.com]
James Cameron made 3-D into what it is today with his film Avatar. It seems like he enjoys the format more than almost anyone, and he is converting one of his older films into 3-D. Its the one about the ship that sinks with Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet…I forget the name. [The Movie Blog]
By RP Staff, on Tue May 24, 2011 at 1:30 PM ET Amongst all of the other disasters, wars, famines and plagues of locusts going on this week, Tiger Woods fell out of the Top Tenprofessional golfers list for the first time since 1997. Here’s a quick reminder of why he was there so long. [ Greatest Shots (2005-2009)]
Will Tiger ever come back to dominate the field, terrifying his competitors, crushing his rivals and making Phil Mickelson squeal? Kevin Maguire (among many other golf pundits) thinks not. [ESPN]
Novak Djokovic continued his winning streak yesterday at the French Open, breezing past Thiemo de Bakker 6-2, 6-1, 6-3. He has now won 38 straight matches this season. He would need five more wins to beat John McEnroe’s Open era record of 42. Can the gentle Serb beat Nadal at Roland Garros and Mac’s record? [LA Times]
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