In cozy Rochester, New York sits Nick Tahou Hots, a restaurant famous for one dish: the Garbage Plate.
From their website:
“We start with a base of any combination of home fries, macaroni salad, baked beans, or french fries topped by your choice of meats and dressed to your liking with spicy mustard, chopped onions, and Nick Tahou’s signature hot sauce. Each plate comes with two thick slices of fresh italian bread and butter.”
You can see the picture, that thing’s a mess.
The first time I really encountered the UFT’s Leo Casey, I thought, “Good Lord, this guy is a garbage plate of logic.”
I wouldn’t mind so much if, like the real garbage plate, UFTcasey just sort of sat there and smelled bad [and only cost about $6.00]. Unfortunately, the UFT version has a website and a well-funded organization behind him.
Leo The Logical Garbage Plate’s latest tendentious mouth-frother is directed toward Jay Greene for cherry-picking research. There’s so much irony in that post that reading it actually pressed my shirt [Haha! Dang, that Casey makes those pseudo-witty puns roll right onto the keys!].
And Casey’s just about completely wrong. Greene set him straight this afternoon.
I’m with Downes on the OLDaily [twice in 24 hours = new World and Olympic record] - I’m not all that interested in this debate, especially Casey’s objections, but we’re tired of cherry-picking in education.
The worst offenses come from school districts - Boards and administration - who not only cherry-pick research indiscriminately, but usually haven’t a damned clue what they’re even touting. I cringe every time I hear “studies show” from a principal or Board member.
Not much can be done about it in the short-term - those principals will keep misusing research until they can at least handle algebra, and organizations like the Church of the UFT will keep sniping until they go broke.
Until we get a crop of education folks who have the capacity to understand research and have a commitment to intellectual honesty, we’ve got to develop a taste for the garbage plate or go hungry.
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