Article on the assault on teacher standards

This excellent article in the Black Commentator covers the big picture view of vouchers, teacher standards, and other alarming information, such as the funding connections between the Walton Family and education. Brief snippet:

The Bush gang is engaged in a massive fraud – a deliberate campaign to plunge the public schools into chaos and disrepute in order to create a larger “market” for education privateers. There is method behind the madness of No Child Left Behind, as administered by Rod Paige and his menagerie of covert and overt voucher contractors. While rich and poor school districts alike struggle to make sense of NCLB-imposed testing and performance criteria, the administration prepares to defund the venerable National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) in favor of the newly-invented, pro-voucher, typically misnamed American Board for Certification of Teacher Excellence (ABCTE). Founded in 2001, ABCTE has tested only 100 people, according to PFAW – which is, in a perverse way, understandable since the rich right-wingers who created the entity fundamentally oppose certification of teachers!

The fraudulent ABCTE is the offspring of the Education Leaders Council (ELC) and – another wild misnomer – the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ). Both owe their existences to the fantastically deep pockets of the Wal-Mart family and Milwaukee’s Bradley Foundation, the parents and principal paymasters of the national voucher network. NCTQ is itself the mutant child of ELC – the result of inbreeding among millionaire Republicans.