Gadfly Bites 5/31/19 – Uninspiring

1. In case you missed it, the Senate Education Committee this week heard important testimony on the topic of Ohio’s academic distress paradigm. No offense to Chad, who is quoted in this coverage, but his was pretty low in the ranking of that important testimony. (Gongwer Ohio, 5/29/19) Almost none of the important testimony ended up in this piece, but are we really surprised? (Statehouse News Bureau, 5/30/19) A bit better is this piece from Patrick O’Donnell. Still too much Chad, but at least some of the bigger names get some sunlight too. (Cleveland Plain Dealer, 5/31/19)

2. I was of course being coy in the clip above, so let me spell it out clearly here. The most important testimony heard in committee this week was that of outgoing Youngstown CEO Krish Mohip. If folks have questions about whether the ADC/CEO paradigm has created positive change for the education of Youngstown’s students, then he is the guy to ask. And he had not been heard from in an open forum like this until now. The pieces linked above either glossed over his testimony or omitted mention of him entirely. As you might expect, there was some more thorough coverage of the hearing back in Lorain, whose own CEO was heard from for the second time. You can check out the local angle from the MJ… (Morning Journal, 5/29/19) …or from the Chronicle. But both are also guilty of failing to focus the spotlight on Mohip. What’s new though? (Elyria Chronicle, 5/29/19) So why, you may wonder, is Mohip’s testimony given such short shrift in these pieces? (Yeah, I know it was late, people, but the written remarks were available hours earlier!) I will refer you back to the third sentence in this clip: If folks don’t have questions about whether the ADC/CEO paradigm has created positive change for the education of Youngstown’s students, I reckon they don’t care what any CEO has to say. And of course, the only folks who have questions are those who actually care about that aspect of the situation.

3. But hey, why worry about kids learning when we can instead focus on weird brain stuff to make them behave? (WSYX-TV, Columbus, 5/30/19)

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