Chicago Teacher Slams Silence In NYT

NYT golden boy Will Okun (a Chicago teacher) has moved from prize-winning NYT blogger to full-on op-ed writer with today's NYT opinion piece on the silence thing:  "Boy, are our legislators busy. I teach in an overcrowded classroom with Xeroxed books, no computers and limited supplies in a city where the black male graduation rate hovers significantly below 50 percent. And they give us silence? An existing Illinois law already allowed teachers to start with a moment of silence but did not require it." Go, Will, go!

Comments

[m]

Great piece by Will Okun.

As an atheist who chose CPS in part because it is secular, I think the new law is pretty ridiculous, and I hope it is roundly ignored by most CPS principals, just like they roundly ignore other legislation. As I understand it, Illinois has a law in place that mandates daily physical education, but I’d like to know which schools are actually providing daily PE? Or even something more than weekly PE? In a city full of overweight kids, what do we need more, additional physical activity, or additional sitting around in complete inactivity during a moment of “reflection”? Where are our priorities?

[Deborah]

I can't believe our legislators actually passed this insane law. There is way more important issues at hand to vote on! Chicago has the shortest day in the country and we want to waste time on silence! I agree with the previous comment. Hopefully the principals will ignore this, just as some elementary schools ignore teaching Health/Comprehensive Health Education. Our school does have weekly gym class. Illinois is the only state to reqire gym, however there's a special waiver to not follow the mandate. Heck, there's not enough time in the day for gym, art, health, lunch, prep time for teachers or even bathroom breaks!

[Deborah]

I can't believe our legislators actually passed this insane law. There is way more important issues at hand to vote on! Chicago has the shortest day in the country and we want to waste time on silence! I agree with the previous comment. Hopefully the principals will ignore this, just as some elementary schools ignore teaching Health/Comprehensive Health Education. Our school does have weekly gym class. Illinois is the only state to reqire gym, however there's a special waiver to not follow the mandate. Heck, there's not enough time in the day for gym, art, health, lunch, prep time for teachers or even bathroom breaks!

[SmashedFace]

Wil,
Thank you for bringing logic, strong points to this discussion.

[Darla]

Hey everybody! Let's all give our moment of silence to that nazi "teacher leader" snot-nosed teacher basher at Wells. Maybe will that will shut up him and his radio.
Anybody else want to donate?