To follow up on my Taunting Michelle Rhee post yesterday, I note that Whitney Tilson reminded his email readers today that
Michelle Rhee was of course aware of the risk of increased cheating and took strong steps to make sure it didn't happen, including hiring an outside firm, Caveon.? In addition, she's strongly supported that independent investigation of issues raised by the USA Today story.? Finally, it's nonsense that she's ducked this issue.
Tilson directs his readers to a number of post-scandal interviews Rhee gave, including one with Ben Smith at Politico, Jay Matthews at the Washington Post, Tavis Smiley at PBS, and Kojo Nnamdi at NPR.
Though this deflates much of the Michael Winerip complaint, it still doesn't explain why Rhee wouldn't talk to the USA Today team that broke the story or speak out more forcefully now about a subject that is of growing importance to the accountability arm of the school reform movement.
--Peter Meyer, Bernard Lee Schwartz Policy Fellow
