Education

Liquid pouring into an invisible glass

Politics This Week with John DePetro: The Defining Problem (and Opportunity) of RI

By Justin Katz | January 25, 2023 |

John DePetro and Justin Katz find evidence of the missing ingredient in RI politics everywhere.

A toy school bus

The underlying problem in education is depressingly difficult to repair.

By Justin Katz | January 10, 2023 |

Perhaps my favorite moment in all of music ever comes in the last movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.  The music is a bouncy march, and in the libretto, the singers are proclaiming an intent to take paradise by storm, like “a victor.”  The mood changes suddenly, however, and I’ve always thought it a deliberate statement…

Machine Elements by Fernand Leger

Politics This Week with John DePetro: RI as Narrative Machine

By Justin Katz | January 9, 2023 |

John DePetro and Justin Katz pick apart the false image the establishment presents of the Ocean State.

A shadowy man on the phone

Keep the RI Foundation off the pedestal.

By Justin Katz | December 22, 2022 |

At the moment, it appears to be simply talk, but this is a concerning idea for Democrat Rhode Island Senate President Dominick Ruggerio to float: Ruggerio floated an outside-the-box idea for the state takeover of Providence schools: He wants to work with the Rhode Island Foundation, the state’s largest philanthropic organization, to see if it…

A water drop and ripples

Has anybody seen coverage of this Nicole Solas’s lawsuit?

By Justin Katz | December 22, 2022 |

As readers have surely observed, I’m doing an end-of-year cleanout of my bookmarked links.  Oddly, after a news search on Google and Bing, I’m not seeing any local coverage of this story, reported in the Washington Examiner in August, at all.  Is that correct? Nicole Solas and the Goldwater Institute filed the lawsuit against the South Kingstown…

Monkey statues in see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil poses

Politics This Week with John DePetro: Tricky Positions for Top Pols

By Justin Katz | December 19, 2022 |

John DePetro and Justin Katz discuss the contribution of politicians and the media to the most pressing issues of the day.

A chart of RI students by school type compared with comparable other states.

Elorza is right to avoid Providence schools for his son.

By Justin Katz | December 17, 2022 |

A peculiar aspect of the mental abuse promulgated by progressives in Rhode Island (and the labor union activists who control them and the state) is the predicament in which they forbid honest discussion about issues like school reform, thus condemning students to substandard education, while casting aspersions at those who seek better for their own…

A sheep at a blackboard with 1984 math

Politics This Week with John DePetro: Herding the Insiders

By Justin Katz | December 12, 2022 |

John DePetro and Justin Katz discuss several ways insider Democrats (especially McKee) are finding themselves herded by their constituencies.

A toy school bus

Something’s puzzling about Rhode Island’s SAT scores.

By Justin Katz | October 31, 2022 |

Why are Rhode Island parents so lackadaisical about the poor value they’re getting from the state’s government schools?  As Dan McGowan reports, SAT scores are down from where they were before the pandemic, and they were already low compared with those of neighboring states: Math (minimum score of 530 out of 800): 25.3 percent English…

Whistling past the graveyard

Please, Rhode Islanders, start paying attention to the evidence.

By Justin Katz | October 26, 2022 |

If you’re thigh deep in the muck of Rhode Island politics, as I am, you may find something about the local society inexplicable.  The game is so locked up, in Rhode Island, that it isn’t clear whether anything can shake the stranglehold of insiders and special interests.  Consider two recent stories. On the National Education…