Errol Louis is the Kool-Aid Man

By now we should all know who Errol Louis of NY1 and the Daily News works for. Not for truth, but for
those that distort the truth.

I at one time had thought the Errol was above the fray, that he had integrity and wished to give both sides of the education debate equal time. I will never forget when he had Julie Cavanagh on his NY1 show debating Little Evan Stone of E4E in 2011. I watched and felt that Errol had sifted through the BS of Evan and allowed Julie to give her side.

But lately he has become a shill of the deformers. A badly misinformed shrill. I guess this is par for the course for someone who grew up in New Rochelle, went to a great high school, went to Harvard, Yale, and Brooklyn Law, and mingles with the hipsters in Park Slope. Yes, Errol is just oozing educational cred. Do we dare say that Errol is an elitist?

Errol this past Thursday wrote a column for the Daily News in which he shows just how clueless and ignorant he is when it comes to education.

Errol blabbers forth; Thursday’s sure-to-be raucous education rally, to be held within shouting distance of the Tweed building and City Hall, is a timely reminder of a civic force that many of the city’s progressive leaders seem incapable of understanding...

We here at SBSB believe they understand it. These aren't the parents that are forming these protests, nor is it the communities. These protests are led by inane, self-absorbed, me first, **cough cough** EVA MOSKOWITZ **cough cough**. When we see these parents clamoring for a better education ON THEIR OWN ACCORD, as the people protesting for democracy are doing in Hong Kong, or the students in Colorado clamoring for a real AP social studies curriculum  in Colorado, then we'll talk.

Errol says; Wednesday’s speech by Chancellor Carmen Fariña, centered on an announcement that the Education Department will scrap the old method of assigning letter grades to individual schools, could be a step in the right direction 

We here at SBSB are proud of Errol for not flying off the shrilling from the mountain top like ignorant others over at Mona Davids Parents Union.

...but the administration appears to be dragging its feet on attacking the urgent problem of turning around schools that are badly broken

Broken? How so? Specifics. Real specifics. Yes, the test scores suck, but why? Is it just the teachers or is it the crappy curriculum teachers are forced to deal with? Is it the cycle of poverty and mental health issues that never get addressed that our students have to deal with every day? Is it crime? Is it a lack of funding? Is it a lack of leadership at Tweed and at the schools? Tell us Errol in your own words, using your own investigatory facts, WHY ARE THE SCHOOLS BROKEN??

While Thursday’s rally isn’t pushing specific demands, it’s clear the organizers are warming up for a battle to raise the current limit on charter schools in the city.

That's what it is all about. Not the broken schools, not the teachers, just more and more and more and more charter schools and more and more and more and more halves against the have nots.

But the main thrust of the gathering is to show that there is a large and vocal number of New Yorkers fed up with poorly-performing schools and impatient with the litany of excuses for why we can’t do better.

But Errol just said the rally was all about charter schools, so why is he contradicting himself? Again, is this movement organic? NO!

The chatter from those defenders on social media sites and letters to the editor usually includes talking points about how poverty is the true culprit

Yeah it is. See above, it is one of many. Think about this Errol. Take the teachers Albert Leonard Middle School in New Rochelle and switch them out with teacher from IS 162 on 149th and St Ann's Ave in the Bronx. What do you think will happen? 

But Errol has more to say on this and he feels he must insult teachers; Those old arguments, repeated year after year, have grown stale. Most airline passengers don’t know how to fuel and fly a jet or run an air-traffic control tower. But they do know when plane after plane is dirty and cramped, arriving late at the wrong destination and occasionally crashing.

This isn't fair. My cat can take apart this argument. But what the hell.

Please do not compare what teachers do to fueling a jet plane. Yes, these guys work hard and I am sure there is a learning curve, but really? Now, if we were compared to these guys fueling a plane than I might say, "touché."

But how about this? Does Errol want a pilot or an air traffic controller that has had only 50 hours and five weeks of training when he is jet setting around the USA? Doubt it. Does he want constant turnover of air traffic controllers and pilots? Doubt it as well. 

But his argument that the public does know when a plane is dirty or cramped or late has a lot to do with how an airline is run, yes, the MANAGEMENT! Why not then does Errol and his ilk kvetch about WHO IS RUNNING THE SCHOOLS? And Errol is being quite specious with his last argument. Seriously, how often does a plane land at the wrong destination? And crashes? How many crashes of American commercial jets have there been the last ten years and what is the ratio of mechanical vs pilot errors?

What Errol fails to point out is that the people who fly our planes, design our planes, and guide our planes have training in planes. Also, flying, designing and guiding is evaluated by OBJECTIVE MEASURES, not the whim of some untrained, irrational human being. 

Come on Errol, tell us all how to fly a jet, or guide a jet over LaGuardia, or design one. Yeah, I hear crickets too.

And let's not forget that pilots, air traffic controllers, and flight attendants are all proud union members.

Families for Excellent Schools, the group organizing Thursday’s demonstration, has compiled a number of damning reports 

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We know, and we care. But see above arguments. Again, FES is a front organization for FormelyMichelleRheeFirst. Yet refuses to put into context and show how it came to this statement; 

A school where nine out of 10 kids can’t proficiently read or do math does not simply ‘need improvement,’

A recent Associated Press report notes that the nation’s top 10% of income earners have increased spending on their kids by 35% in recent years — pouring a fortune into private-school tuition, bidding up home prices in districts with high-performing schools and paying so much money for extra help that some SAT tutors now make over $50 an hour.

SAT tutors are only making $50 an hour? I guess the ones making that kind of dough are getting hosed. But I will like to see this AP report. Where is it? But if true, I can guarantee that the parents sending their kids to private schools are doing it to keep the Common Core away from them, to keep them from testing, and for smaller class size. Why isn't Errol advocating for what parents really want? For what Errol wants for his own kids yet won't admit it to others. 

I used to have respect for Errol. I thought he was objective and can see and respect both sides. But he has drank from the Kool-Aid trough for too long and is useless. Nothing more than a shrieking shrill.

One more thing. The problems Errol is whining about are the same problems that permeated the 12 years of the Bloomberg reign. Where was he during those 12 years? Bought off by Bloomberg?