The American Association of School Administrators -- the professional organization of top officials who run our schools -- has posted its comments on the Obama administration's Race to the Top competition.
Here is the top, very first, #1 aspect of the RTTT that ASSA comments on:
"p. 3 We encourage you to submit comments in advance of the date by which they must be received.”
Pretty innocent request: Get your memos in early if you can. I passed right over it, moved on to the meat of the guidelines. Not the eagle-eyed ASSA, which led its memo with this insightful, reasoned, child-centered, professional response to this outrageous, ham-handed request:
AASA Response:
"The regulations use thirty days as the response period. Why raise the possibility that only early submissions will be read by urging early submission? Why not shorten the comment period? If later submissions are not read or are not being taken into consideration, then the administration will forfeit the future possibility of being believed when claiming that it is actively listening to public comments."
Wowsers. Way to hook your audience. The remainder of the text makes for equally depressing reading. It is somewhat more on topic. But not any more inspiring.