what I NEVER meant to say....

We have an epidemic here...The newspapers have it. The community members who consistently speak at our school board meetings have it. Our key school administrators have it. Matter of fact, most everyone who merits the attention of the news industry has it.

I am considering catching it.

It is called the I SPEAK FOR EVERYONE syndrome.

It goes like this: Someone wants to make a strong statement about the success of our schools under NCLB; they buy into the test-mill approach to beefing up academic progress and the general "how can you expect improvement without placing a high-powered weapon at someone's head" method of compliance and progress evaluation.

...and they proceed to inform you.

The "truth" is delivered like this: "As president of ( insert: the local PTO, the Business Coalition, the Military alliance, etc.) I speak for the entire community ( or the parents, or the nation) in support of the progress we have made in our schools. They go on to quote rising test scores, or describe expanding AP programs or accelerated math policies...and blah, blah, blah...

...you read and hear it a lot.

The problem is: they DON'T speak for me. Neither do they speak for my children, their peers, or their teachers. They hardly speak for my neighbors or my community when according to my own unofficial tabulations, and Kappan's formal survey, over 50% of parents and various community-members don't even know what NCLB is about yet, ( and why on earth would they NEED to understand it, since they are already "spoken for," ) let alone understand the insidiousness of the resulting changes in our community schools.

The "universal speaker's virus," it occurs to me, opened with the file containing various financial opportunities created for entrepreneurial and political development in the master NCLB file. Suddenly, and the HIGH STAKES moniker applies here, it is not just children and our future we are talking about here, it is MONEY and POWER and INFLUENCE.

...such esteemed potentials require the creation of imaginary support.

For instance, when my children are in tears over nightly continued editions of the torturous county-inspired curricular demands to do more worksheets and reading and prepare for the next onslaught of testing ( which is the core of their classroom experiences and the pacing guides that define them, ) can it be that the businessman who eloquently spoke at the last board of education about the success and progress in our schools be the representative of our voice? Is the pain really worth the dollars and influence he will cash in on? Does he really "speak for us?"

Well, let me see...how much money, since he is proposing a partnership, would make my childrens torment acceptable...

And the president of the PTO, or the CAC, or various other "representative voices" in my community...they do get their names in the paper a lot. Okay, how much notoriety would equal the value of the sleep and laughter and pursuit of enjoyable activities lost in this treadmill approach to academic progress. I am at a loss for what they might owe the children and me...power? popularity?

Certainly I have a right to speak for everyone too. And I have to say, speaking for everyone, that I don't appreciate the way my children's ( or their teacher's ) lives are being ravaged by the rapid changes and delivery of the imposed, harmful, academically lacking, destructive forces mandated by this act. As a matter of fact, and I speak for everyone again, I want to have our lives and our volition back.

I want my children to stop hurting...and I want it owing no one a penny.

The problem is, and I am speaking for us all again, the microphone has (coincidentally) been disconnected.