Bloomberg LP to Acquire Major Snake Oil Company

July 28, 2008 (GBN News): Bloomberg LP, the company owned by NY City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, announced today that it has agreed to acquire the country’s largest snake oil company, Python Snake Oil. The actual takeover will not be in effect until January 1, 2010, when Mayor Bloomberg will leave office and resume full time control of his company. At that time, Joel Klein, whose tenure as Schools Chancellor will almost certainly end with the Mayor’s, will take over as CEO of what will be known as the Snake Oil Division of Bloomberg LP.

In a statement to the press, a company spokesperson touted the acquisition as “a marriage made in heaven” between the world’s premier snake oil company and the world’s best snake oil salesmen, Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein. After the announcement, Python Snake Oil stock doubled in value within hours. Noted financial analyst J. Fredrick Muggs, Dean of Manhattan University School of Business, told GBN News that despite the current bear market, “Investors obviously believe that if the Mayor and Chancellor can sell a bunch of flat test scores as significant progress, they can sell anything, even snake oil, in massive quantities.”

Sources at Bloomberg LP told GBN News that speculation within the company is that the profits from the new snake oil division will be used to fund the development of a number of charter schools in New York City. There was no direct comment on this from either Mr. Bloomberg or Mr.Klein, though a source at the DOE told GBN News that the Chancellor was sporting a “particularly venomous look” today.

GBN News To Acquire NY Times

July 18, 2008 (GBN News): In a surprise move, GBN News announced today that an agreement was reached yesterday for the upstart news service to acquire one of the nation’s oldest and most venerated newspapers, the New York Times. GBN News, which despite its brief existence has gained a reputation for being the gold standard in education reporting, will be taking over the Times as of next Monday.

It is unclear just what effects this takeover will have on the Times reporting, or their staff. GBN News is a shoestring operation, run off a single computer in a small house in Bellerose, NY, while the Times has hundreds of employees and numerous facilities all over the world. Whether the newly merged news organizations will be headquartered in the Bellerose facility or the Times building in Manhattan has not been announced.

Also unclear is just how such a small news organization with virtually no assets was able to take over such a renowned industry giant. However, GBN news was recently awarded an exclusive no-bid contract as the sole distributor of NY City Department of Education press releases. Given the size of the DOE public relations budget, industry experts speculate that this contract alone could have financed GBN’s takeover of the Times.

Secret Papers Reveal Klein Power Grab

July 12, 2008 (GBN News): Secret papers obtained by GBN News reveal a plan, masterminded by Schools Chancellor Joel Klein, to put Mayor Michael Bloomberg in the White House notwithstanding the Mayor’s declared intent not to run. The plan entails a massive last minute stealth write-in campaign, financed by the Fund for Public Schools, which is chaired by Mr. Klein.

Furthermore, the papers portray a far different relationship between the Mayor and Chancellor than publicly revealed; in fact, they show the Chancellor as the Mayor’s “Dick Cheney”, running the government from behind the scenes. Moreover, the plan reportedly goes beyond simply getting the Mayor elected, and lays out plans for government “reforms” that could amount to the functional equivalent of a “coup d’etat”.

Once Mr. Bloomberg is inaugurated, Mr. Klein plans to move quickly to secure a no-bid contract for the NYC Leadership Academy to install its graduates into all key civilian and military leadership positions, thus giving the Chancellor unprecedented control of the government. While publicly the Leadership Academy’s purpose has been to train principals to run NYC public schools, in actuality the Academy has been quietly training managers to become a sort of “shadow government”, ready to step immediately into positions heading up a number of government agencies.

Sources at the DOE have confirmed to GBN News the authenticity of these papers, and also indicated that there was some initial controversy at the DOE as to whether Leadership Academy graduates would be qualified to take over such sensitive positions as Secretary of State and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. However, Mr. Klein insisted that if individuals with limited or no educational experience could become NYC principals with nothing but Leadership Academy training, certainly they could run government agencies since the principles of business management apply to all leadership positions.

Mr. Klein has also reportedly expanded the DOE “Truth Squad” to manage the information flow so that this secret plan will not be revealed before it can be implemented. In fact, it is surprising, given the “truth squad’s” effectiveness, that GBN News has been allowed to report the existence of this plan at all. But while GBN News will of course endeavor to continue reporting details as we learn them, readers should anticipate that our coverage of this story could be impeded by DOE operatives at any [rest of paragraph deleted by order of the DOE].

In other news, Chancellor Klein had an embarrassing moment today when he was briefly detained and questioned by school security officers during a visit to PS 445 in Brooklyn. According to sources at the school, a sixth grader had reported being accosted in the hallway by a “creepy guy who kept asking me about my test scores and then tried to take away my cell phone.” Security officers immediately pulled Mr. Klein aside and questioned him, before realizing who he was. One of the officers defended the action, saying, “How were we to know he was the Chancellor? The kid said it was a ‘creepy guy’, and we just stopped the first creepy guy we could find.”

Press Release: NY City Department of Education

(Editors’ note: The New York City Department of Education, due to its commitment to saving administrative costs and freeing up money for the classroom, has contracted to name GBN News as the sole distributor of DOE press releases. The DOE has concluded that its press releases can be distributed at lesser cost, while achieving wider readership, with this exclusive no-bid contract. Following is the first GBN-distributed press release.)

The Department of Education is pleased to announce an exciting new development in data management, which will vastly improve the delivery of services to the school children of NY City, and will result in the maximization of educational output throughout the system. To achieve this, the DOE, in partnership with Microsoft and Blackwater USA, will be engaging in a $500 million expansion of the ARIS computer system.

Phase One of the upgraded system, to be completed by September, 2008, will enable the DOE to deliver personalized instruction and monitor student and teacher performance in “real time” through the installation of ARIS terminals at every desk in every classroom in the city. Phase Two, slated to be rolled out in January 2009, will feature terminals in every child’s home, to monitor homework production and test preparation and insure maximum “time on task”. Finally, Phase Three, to be implemented in time for the 2009-2010 school year, will see the installation of ARIS terminals in every teacher’s home, to assist and monitor teachers in maximizing their OSP (Out of School Productivity).

Due in large part to the upgrade of the ARIS computer system, student test scores for the 2009-2010 school year rose an average of 63%. This should once and for all silence those defenders of the status quo who have opposed our data-driven reforms.

(Editors’ Note: Please disregard that last paragraph. To save distribution costs, the DOE gave it to us in advance. It was not supposed to be released until June, 2010. We apologize for the error.)

GBN News Breaks Education Equity Conspiracy

June 15, 2008 (GBN News): Speculation has been running rampant over the mysterious “anonymous” source of funding for the “Education Equity Project” currently being championed by Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and the Rev. Al Sharpton. Few details have been revealed about this project and how it intends to reduce the “achievement gap” in education, but the alliance between Mr. Klein and Mr. Sharpton has raised more than a few eyebrows.

GBN News has now learned exclusively that the project is backed by a secret slush fund, being raised and disbursed by a shadowy group comprised of experienced operatives including former Tajik strongman and current head of school security Emomali Rakhmon, and Watergate veteran Donald Segretti. A source at the NY City Department of Education, known to GBN News only as “Deep Strep Throat”, claims to have first hand knowledge of this slush fund, and has revealed some of the details of its use on condition of anonymity.

According to this source, the Education Equity Project is merely the public face of a vast clandestine conspiracy which aims at nothing less than the subversion the entire national educational and political process. Utilizing a series of dirty tricks ranging from spreading disinformation about Presidential candidates to setting off stink bombs at teachers union headquarters, the ultimate goal is to so discredit both major party candidates that the parties will seek to turn at the last minute to the only political figures not tainted by the dirty tricks: Mayor Bloomberg for President and Reverend Sharpton for Vice President. Whichever party nominates this ticket will thus be assured of victory in November. Joel Klein is then to be named “Education Czar”, whose vast powers will be guaranteed by Mr. Rakhmon’s legions of school security officers.

While some may feel this scenario is a bit far fetched, at least one observer of the educational and political scene defended the credibility of the story. J. Fredrick Runson, head of the Manhattan University Political Science Department, told GBN News, “Nobody would have believed Alvarez and Marsal, ARIS, the cell phone ban, incessant reorganizations, or the flouting of the CFE ruling either. If they can do that stuff, there’s no limit to what they can do. And with the truth about their ‘reforms’ coming out more and more in the press, they’re getting desperate.”

Gitmo Ruling May Free Rubber Room Teachers

June 12, 2008 (GBN News): Attorneys for the hundreds of NY City teachers being held in Reassignment Centers known as “rubber rooms” say that, due to yesterday’s US Supreme Court ruling, those teachers may be able to challenge their detentions in court. In a 5-4 decision, the Court ruled that the rights of hundreds of terrorism suspects being held indefinitely and without charges at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base have been violated.

Like those detainees, many of the rubber room teachers are also being held without being informed of the charges against them, and some have been waiting longer than many Gitmo detainees for their hearings. Their attorneys are prepared to argue that if the Supreme Court decision applies to foreign terrorism suspects, it should certainly apply to NY City teachers.

While President Bush is said to have reluctantly agreed to comply with the ruling, Mayor Bloomberg may have other ideas. “It was the State Legislature that gave me total control of the schools,” the Mayor told GBN News. “Mayoral control means Mayoral control, thank you very much, whatever the Supreme Court says.” Mr. Bloomberg went on to say, “We view these teachers as ‘enemy combatants’, and our children deserve better than to have them undermine our school reforms.”

Despite the Mayor’s comments, teachers languishing in rubber rooms throughout the city may well be encouraged by a statement from the majority ruling, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy. “The laws and Constitution, “ he wrote, “are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.” As one attorney said to GBN News, “Maybe the laws will even survive a Mayor and Chancellor who have been determined from day one to flaunt them.”

Bloomberg to Serve Third Term

June 4, 2008 (GBN News): Amid speculation that Mayor Bloomberg is seeking a way to remain in office past 2009 despite term limits, GBN News has learned that Mr. Bloomberg has indeed settled on a course of action that would allow him to continue as Mayor. A source at City Hall, speaking to GBN News on condition of anonymity, said that the Mayor intends to declare, on election night, that he has been re-elected, and he will then simply stay in office.

“What’s to stop him?” said the source. “As soon as Hillary Clinton lost the Democratic nomination, she gave a speech saying she won. Michael Bloomberg’s got a lot more money than she does. Why can’t he take it a step further and have a bunch of PR people convince everyone that he’s actually still Mayor?”

J. Fredrick Runson, head of the Manhattan University Political Science Department and a long time observer of the NY City political scene, told GBN News that the idea may not be so far fetched. “After all,” said Professor Runson, “he’s been pretty much above the law all along. He ignores the City Council, defies State class size mandates, gives out no-bid contracts. All he needs is a reputable paper like the NY Times to buy into the idea like they bought into his school reforms. It won’t take much more than that to get the public to accept it.”

New Revelations in DOE “Tell-All” Book

May 29, 2008 (GBN News): It may not be quite the bombshell that Scott McLellan's book is proving to be, but a new “tell-all” book about the inner workings of the NY City Department of Education is causing more than a little consternation at the DOE. GBN News has obtained an advance copy of, “What Hit Us: Inside the DOE’s Culture of Deception”, written under the pseudonym, “A. Source”. The author is a former DOE spokesperson, and the book could be so potentially damaging, it could pose a serious threat to the chances for renewal of mayoral control in NY City.

Among the revelations in the book:


*The obfuscation and lack of transparency in the DOE budget process arose out of Joel Klein’s ambition to be named CIA Director. The budget process was his way of demonstrating to the next President that he can keep a secret.

*The Mayor and Chancellor saw the “war on cell phones” as an integral front in the war on terror. They viewed cell phones as part of an Al-Qaida plot to distract children in school by sending incessant text messages asking children if they want beef or fish for dinner. The hiring of Emomali Rakhmon to head up DOE school security arose out of this concern. In the DOE’s haste to address the issue, Mr. Rakhmon was not fully vetted for the position. He was hired solely on the basis of his strict cell phone policy as dictator of Tajikistan and his willingness to use any and all means to enforce it. The zeal with which Mr. Rakhmon approached his job resulted in an embarrassing moment for the Chancellor, when his own Blackberry was confiscated by school security.

*Jim Leibman’s famous “run from parents” after a City Council hearing last December was not as spontaneous as it appeared. Liebman actually trained for his run for months.

*The failure of the DOE to comply with State physical education requirements was actually part of a cost saving measure recommended by the consulting firm Alvarez and Marsal. With the space no longer needed for gym, school gyms could be used as classroom space. By combining classes into the gyms and increasing class size to as many as 150 students, the DOE would save money by excessing numerous teachers, who would become part of the Absent Teacher reserve (ATR).

*Alvarez and Marsal also recommended that the DOE set up a secret disaster plan for the event of a major hurricane. Under the plan, as soon as a hurricane warning is declared, all ATR’s would be sent to schools in flood prone areas for the duration of the storm. After the storm, the flooded schools would be closed down, and the ATR’s would remain permanently assigned to those schools.


A DOE spokesperson declined to comment on the book, telling GBN News, “You’ll just have to wait for my own book to come out.”

The End of Mayoral Control

May 19, 2008 (GBN News): Mayor Michael Bloomberg today engaged in his second run-in with the press in the past week, this time involving a GBN News reporter. At a City Hall news conference this morning, GBN News attempted to ask the Mayor a question about the impending sunset of Mayoral control of the City schools in 2009.

“Regarding the expiration of Mayoral control …,” the questioner began. However, before the reporter could finish, Mr. Bloomberg cut him off. “That is not appropriate, sir”, the Mayor interjected. “Next time you have a question, you want to insinuate that I’m out of control, you can take it elsewhere.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” the reporter responded. “I didn’t mean -”. The Mayor again interrupted: “We’ve finished it. ‘Control’ is a word that has an implication. You’re questioning the Mayor’s control. Some nerve. Next question.”

Just as the next questioner asked the Mayor when he plans to begin his anger management classes, a sudden power outage hit City Hall and the Mayor unfortunately was unable to respond.

“Schoolhouse Walk” Program to Raise Millions for Education

May 7, 2007 (GBN News): The Madison Avenue “Gallery Walk”, an event which is expected to raise money for arts education in the NY City schools through an art gallery tour and silent auction, has generated such interest among wealthy New Yorkers that Schools Chancellor Joel Klein is already planning to expand the concept. This summer, the Department of Education will sponsor “Schoolhouse Walk”, a program which will feature tours of NY City schools and a silent auction through which individuals can buy the rights to those schools.

“It’s similar to the ‘Adopt-a-Highway’ program,” the Chancellor told GBN News, “But instead of just being responsible for litter pickup, they’ll actually run the entire school.” Mr. Klein went on to say, “You don’t have to be a billionaire like Eli Broad or Bill Gates to be an educational expert. We are committed to giving people of lesser means a chance as well. So for a mere 10 or 20 million, anyone can try their hand at educational reform. It’s a win-win situation for the schoolchildren of our city. Not only will this pump badly needed dollars into the schools, but with so many new leaders running the schools, it can’t help but shake up the status quo and improve test scores.”

Sources at the DOE told GBN News that Mr. Klein believes that by offering an “ownership stake” in the schools to people who by and large send their children to private schools, they can generate greater interest in public schools among the wealthy without the burden of their children actually attending them. “The Mayor and Chancellor,” one DOE staffer said on condition of anonymity, “see this as the epitome of parent involvement.”

Education Blogs Fear Censorship Threat

May 5, 2008 (GBN News): What some say is an attempt to censor the “Charter-Free PS 15” blog, which opposes the Department of Education attempt to put a charter school into PS 15 in Red Hook, may be just the tip of the iceberg. GBN News has learned exclusively that someone identifying himself as “Emomali Rakhmon” has sent the following email to a number of NY City parent and teacher blogs (Mr. Rakhmon, former dictator of Tajikistan, was named head of DOE School Security last year, and many people feel he has brought his heavy handed methods with him):

“It has come to attention of me that your critical blog of DOE is making difficulty for Supreme Great Leader Joel Klein and Even More Supreme Great Leader Michael Bloomberg to carrying out great and exalted reforms. Therefore I am asking nicely that you refrain from blogging such criticisms until such time as Mayoral Control is voted for permanency. Surely you know that Chancellor and Mayor are above such petty criticism as you put in your blog. The concerns of parents and teachers are of little matter to such high and mighty leaders, and should you persist in trying to defend status quo be assured that we will crush your blogs like so many bugs. This is asking you nicely, next time we will not be so nice. We have place we call ‘Little Gitmo’ but be assured it is not so little. Some people call it ‘Rubber Room’. Believe me, you would not want to be there.”

It was not immediately clear if the author of the emails was indeed Mr. Rakhmon or someone else purporting to be the Tajik strongman. But education bloggers reached by GBN News say they have reason for concern tonight, and are fearful that they may have to take their blogs underground.

New DOE Plan to Reduce Class Size

May 2, 2008 (GBN News): Striking back at critics who say that the NY City Department of Education has failed to lower class size, the DOE announced today a new class size reduction plan. The plan is said to reduce class size by diverting students into what will be called the “Absent Student Reserve”.

According to the DOE, from now on students whose schools are closed or are taken over by small schools or charter schools will be considered “ASR’s” and will no longer automatically be placed within the school system. Instead, these students will be responsible for finding a place for themselves in what the DOE terms an “open market system”. Students will have to apply for open classroom slots, and each principal will decide which students to accept.

Schools Chancellor Joel Klein, at a City Hall press conference, told reporters, “This will go a long way towards lowering class size, since principals will no longer be forced to accept a child into a school with limited space just because that child may feel ‘entitled’ to an education. Children will have to show some initiative, just like the real world they’ll encounter later on in life.”

Under the new system, ASR’s will have one year to find a new school to attend, or they will be permanently dropped from the system. Asked how these children will be able to make a living if they cannot get an education, Mr. Klein responded, “Well, there’s always Wal-Mart.”

DOE ANNOUNCES BAN ON COMMON SENSE

April 23, 2008 (GBN News): Fresh on the heels of an appellate court ruling upholding the City Department of Education ban on possession of cell phones in schools, Mayor Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein announced today that effective immediately, the DOE will now prohibit the use and possession of common sense in the schools. In announcing the new ban, the Mayor contended that common sense is “overrated”, and can actually interfere with children’s education.

“Defenders of the status quo always say we should use common sense,” the Chancellor added. “But if they had their way we never could have reformed the schools the way we did. We’d have less testing, smaller classes, more school buildings, fewer consultants and no-bid contracts, parents would be sticking their noses into school business. Who’d even want to send their kids to charter schools if all that happened? Why, I probably wouldn’t even be here because people might actually insist that the Chancellor have some education experience.”

The common sense ban drew immediate criticism from parent groups and City Council members. “What sort of message does this send to children whose parents are actually trying to instill some common sense in them?” one parent demanded. When asked for comment, the Mayor said simply, “Nothing in the ruling says parents can’t use common sense at home or on the way to and from school. It just can’t come into the school building.”

Despite the criticism, the practical effects of the new ban may not be as dramatic as some might fear. As one DOE staffer told GBN News on condition of anonymity, “Actually, there’s been no common sense in the school system since Bloomberg and Klein took over. So really, I wouldn’t expect much to change.”

Bloomberg Expands Congestion Pricing Plan to Schools

April 4, 2008 (GBN News): With his congestion pricing plan facing an uncertain future in the State Legislature, Mayor Bloomberg today introduced a proposal to tie the embattled traffic plan to a new scheme which he said would also satisfy critics who have been demanding a reduction of congestion in the city’s public school classrooms. Under the Mayor’s plan, students who enter classrooms in the city’s most overcrowded schools will be charged a daily fee of $8. This will give students an incentive to attend less crowded private schools in order to avoid the extra charge, and thus reduce class size in the public schools. Revenue raised through this fee, Mr. Bloomberg said, will benefit the city’s public school children through the development of four additional interim assessments per year as well as a $16 million upgrade to the Education Department’s ARIS computer system.

A source at the DOE told GBN News that the Mayor feels many of the critics of his traffic plan are what he terms “the very same malcontents” who persistently criticize overcrowding in the city schools. Mr. Bloomberg is said to have concluded that if he can mollify these detractors by reducing class size through classroom congestion pricing, they will in return drop their objections to the Mayor’s traffic plan.

The new proposal came under immediate attack from Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum, who called the plan a “mockery of the concept of free public education.” Mayor Bloomberg responded by saying, “The education is still free. We’re just charging them to get into the classroom.”

DOE Busts School Pizza Party

March 17, 2008 (GBN News): School security officers today broke up what NY City Department Of Education officials termed an “illegal pizza ring” and confiscated 160 pizza pies from a group of stunned elementary school students in Brooklyn. The raid on PS 445 was part of a renewed effort by the DOE to enforce a little known Chancellor’s regulation that bans serving any food not approved by the DOE’s “Chief Nutrition Officer”.

The children were gathered in the cafeteria for the school’s annual “Pizza Day”, a tradition which brings in hundreds of dollars for the PTA. According to furious parents who witnessed the scene, the students had barely begun sinking their teeth into their pizza when dozens of school security agents burst into the room, confiscated the pizza boxes, and even snatched slices of pizza right out of the children’s hands. The Principal tried to reason with the officers, and was immediately arrested for “interfering with police business”.

When reached for comment, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein defended the regulations and the response. “We have a Chief Nutrition Officer for good reason,” he told GBN News. “If a food interferes with children’s learning, it should be banned in school. Parents and teachers should be thanking those brave security agents, not complaining about them.”

GBN News was unable to reach the DOE Chief Nutrition Officer directly for comment as to how children’s learning can be affected by eating pizza. However, the Department of Education's Office of School Food and Nutritional Services responded with the following statement: “Pizza can give children gas, which hinders their concentration on tests and lowers test scores. Also, the grease gets on their fingers and can cause the pencil to slip out of their hands.”

Spitzer Named to DOE Post

March 12, 2008 (GBN News): In yet another stunning development, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced today that he is naming Eliot Spitzer to be Deputy Chancellor of the NY City schools, effective upon his official resignation as Governor on Monday. Mr. Bloomberg said that he expected Mr. Spitzer to bring his strong sense of personal and financial ethics to the Department, which has come under what the Mayor termed “frequent and unfair criticism” for lack of transparency and accountability. The Mayor made only an oblique reference to the scandal that caused the Governor’s resignation when he referred to Mr. Spitzer’s “vast experience with the world’s two oldest professions.”

A DOE official told GBN News, on condition of anonymity, that the Mayor feels that despite the recent scandal, Mr. Spitzer brings with him the ability to push through additional major changes to the DOE. “Klein may be a bulldozer, but Spitzer is a self described ‘steamroller’”, the official said. “The Mayor and Chancellor seem to think that, with so little time left before the end of their terms and possibly of Mayoral control as well, now is the time to move ahead with further reorganization. They figure that if Spitzer and the DOE can do to the 'defenders of the status quo' what he did to the women from the Emperor’s Club VIP, there will be no going back to the previous system.”

Whatever the effect on the educational system, many political observers agree that the DOE should be a safe place for Mr. Spitzer to re-establish his good name. It is an agency in which Mr. Spitzer is unlikely to get into further trouble, since it is free of the oversights that most government entities must answer to.

In other education news, a source at Bloomberg LP told GBN News that rumors of merger talks between the company, owned by Mayor Bloomberg, and the NY City Department of Education are “totally false”. “There’s no reason for talks,” the source said. “He’s just going to buy the Department outright.”

DOE "Creates" New Arts Position

March 7, 2008 (GBN News): The NY City Department of Education, as part of its effort to expand arts education in the schools, announced today the creation of a new administrative position, a “Chief Creativity Officer”. The $1.9 million a year position will be filled by billionaire philanthropist Smellington Worthington III.

At a Tweed Courthouse news conference, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein told reporters, “The advent of this new position should demonstrate once and for all the importance we place on arts education. Mr. Worthington has a great deal of experience not only as a patron of the arts, but as one with a passion for educational reform, which has long been a hobby of his.”

The Chancellor went on to outline some of the ways in which the DOE plans to increase the role of the arts in the curriculum. Foremost among them will be the integration of the arts into standardized testing. “At a time of tight budgets, it is essential that we avoid waste and duplication. Therefore, we have devised an innovative way not only to teach the arts, but to test it in tandem with academic subjects so that we can assess it efficiently and maintain accountability.”

Mr. Klein explained that the DOE is partnering with McGraw Hill to modify its standardized tests to include the four major creative arts. Students will now be expected to be more creative in their answers. For example a question on an ELA test might require that a student sing the answer instead of filling in a bubble. Such a question would be graded not only on the basis of accuracy, but on tonality and artistic impression. Or, a math question requiring an answer in graph form would expect the graph to meet certain artistic standards such as color coordination and straightness of lines, and might require the student to draw a background picture for embellishment.

The Chancellor, anticipating critics who will undoubtedly contend that such a program is not practical, said, “If you can measure it, it can be successful. We expect every student will graduate with enough proficiency in the arts to compete on American Idol. And if they get voted off, the teachers and the principals will be held accountable – and we will vote them off as well.”

DOE Plans Billion Dollar ARIS Upgrade

February 27, 2008 (GBN News): The NY City Department of Education announced today a billion dollar expansion of its ARIS computer system. The plan calls for an ARIS terminal in every classroom within the next five years. At a Tweed Courthouse news conference, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein told reporters that the money spent on this system will “pay for itself many times over in creating new efficiencies in the delivery of educational services.”

Critics immediately questioned the appropriateness of such an expensive upgrade at a time of already devastating budget cuts at the school level. However, a high level DOE official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told GBN News that once the new system is on line, it will enable the Chancellor to implement what the source called “his final reorganization plan”.

According to the DOE source, the computer upgrade will save huge personnel costs by rendering teachers “obsolete”. The Chancellor is said to feel that ARIS is “every bit as capable of doing test prep [as a human being] at a fraction of the cost.” While teachers cannot, by union contract, be terminated en masse, the plan reportedly calls for a “phase-out” of teachers over a 5 year period through a combination of attrition, retrenchment as ATR’s, and disciplinary assignment to “rubber rooms”. Students, however, will not be left without a human classroom management component. School Security personnel will monitor children’s behavior through their ARIS computer screens to insure classroom safety by making sure that no cell phones are present.

The DOE official told GBN News that some staffers had questioned whether a computer that has reportedly had numerous problems at the school level can be relied on to exclusively teach a million school children in the system. Some aides warned that if the system went down, the children would potentially be left with no education at all. The Chancellor reportedly bristled at these comments. “There are always glitches in any new system,” he was said to have told his staff. “But the alternative would be to go back to the way it was before our reforms. And you all know what that was like. Why, if you people had jobs at all, you’d never be making the salaries you’re getting now. So get with the program!”

DOE to Teachers: We’re Watching You

January 21, 2007 (GBN News): A report in the NY Times reveals that the NY City Department of Education is quietly gathering data to rate individual teachers based on their students’ performance on standardized tests. This is sure to generate controversy in the educational community, and concerns are already being raised that such data will be used to make decisions on teacher pay and tenure. However, GBN News has learned that the DOE initiative to evaluate teachers is going far beyond just test scores.

According to sources at the DOE, the Department is using a technique called “microtargeting” to amass detailed information on NYC teachers. The technique is one that Mayor Bloomberg is using nationwide to accumulate data on potential voters in advance of a possible run for President. Such information ranges from individual demographics, to people’s political preferences, to whether they purchase foods containing trans fats. The DOE sources suggest that the Department is developing a profiling system that would rate teachers, not just on their effectiveness, but on their potential to accommodate to the school reforms that the Mayor and Chancellor Joel Klein have instituted.

One high level DOE official, who spoke to GBN News on condition of anonymity, said that this initiative is just a logical extension of the Mayor’s reliance on - some would say obsession with - data. “He’s made billions using methods like this,” the source said. “Of course he’d want to apply it to education, which he considers just as ‘cutthroat’ as the business world or politics. The Mayor and Chancellor see teachers as the biggest impediment to their reforms. Naturally, they’d want to weed out the biggest potential critics as well as those who are merely ineffective.”

The source said that the DOE will be using the data to look into a number of variables which will assist them in evaluating teachers. “Do they complain in public on education blogs? Are they active in the UFT? Are they of good moral fiber? Do they eat enough fiber? No piece of data is too trivial for the Mayor and Chancellor. And by the way, wait till you see what they’re coming up with about the kids and the parents. Talk about defenders of the status quo.”

Just how teachers, politicians and parents will respond to this new initiative has yet to be seen. Still, this DOE official contends that the plan should go a long way towards discrediting the charge that the DOE is only interested in test scores.


Ed. Note: Being GBN News, the above story is parody. But ask yourself, as you read it: Can't you envision the DOE actually doing something like this? After all, the Times article is astonishingly and chillingly real.

All You Need is Data

January 16, 2008 (GBN News): Middle School 422 in Brooklyn received an “A” on its recent Progress Report, outperforming every other school in its cohort and earning the Principal a large bonus. However, in what could prove to be a major embarrassment for the Department of Education, it seems that outside of its test scores in the DOE’s ARIS computer system, there is no evidence of the school’s existence.

This unusual situation came to light only when Schools Chancellor Joel Klein traveled to Brooklyn for a media event recognizing the school’s high level of achievement. With journalists in tow, the Chancellor and his entourage arrived at the school’s purported address, only to find an empty lot. Certain that this was simply a case of mistaken address, the Chancellor used his Blackberry to contact his office. Staff at the Department’s Tweed headquarters confirmed the address in the computer, but inquiries in the neighborhood turned up nobody who had ever seen or heard of MS 422.

A DOE spokesperson later told GBN News that upon further investigation, it appears that the school never actually existed. “The data all looked great on paper,” the spokesperson said. “The test scores were through the roof, the surveys were very positive. There’s just no school there. Who knew?”

In a press conference at Tweed, Chancellor Klein assured reporters that the Principal “is absolutely accountable” for the situation. “The naysayers and defenders of the status quo keep telling us that there are children who are uneducable,” he said. “But this Principal started with literally nothing, and look at the test scores that were achieved. It proves that we can educate anybody – even nobody. That bonus was well earned.”

In other news, Mayor Michael Bloomberg denied that his aides could have said that he is considering whether to buy the US Presidency. “Since when does anyone else know what I’m thinking?’ the Mayor asked. “Everyone knows I only consult with people after I’ve made a decision.”