Fawned over by the would-be glitterati, Matt Damon\u2019s speech to the Save Our Schools rally in DC received wide accolades as a clear-headed, common-sense speech that spoke to Everyteacher.<\/p>\n
There are transcripts all over the internet, but here is a summary followed by a question from the TV audience.<\/p>\n
First Mr. Damon tells us to what great lengths he has gone so he can share his message in person.<\/p>\n
Next, he tells us he went to public schools and had great teachers and great parenting.<\/p>\n
He then claims that his most highly valued qualities \u2013\u201cmy imagination, my love of acting, my passion for writing,\u2026\u201d \u2013 that have brought him so much professional success could never be tested in school.<\/p>\n
He recalls taking only one standardized test which prompted his mother, herself a former teacher, to tell the principal, \u201cMy kid ain\u2019t taking that. It\u2019s stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n
His speech degenerates into a diatribe against standard testing and how this \u201chas been a horrible decade for teachers.\u201d\u00a0 He says his important message to the rally is that \u201cI appreciate more and more the teachers that I had growing up.\u201d\u00a0 Wow! Really!<\/p>\n
He concludes by reminding the unappreciated teachers that there are millions like him who support their efforts.\u00a0 \u201cWe love you,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Good for you Matt.\u00a0 We love you, too.<\/p>\n
But now, if we could, let\u2019s hear some sentiments that one might overhear from State Inmate No. 23-84746 who watched the speech on CSPAN.\u00a0 Mr. 84746 may have been the elected spokesman for one of the 25,000 member dropout class of 2008 here in North Carolina.\u00a0 [Mr. 84746\u2019s comments have been translated into Standard English by the author.]<\/p>\n
It is very modest for the rich and famous Mr. Damon to extoll his K-12 teachers and credit them for his success.\u00a0 He omits mentioning his years of toil and talent that went into finally producing his success and for which he doesn\u2019t take any credit, whatsoever.\u00a0 It was all his teachers, man, and he loves them.\u00a0 And he hates those standard tests.<\/p>\n
Now what am I supposed to think.\u00a0 I\u2019m not allowed to credit my teachers for never teaching me to read because they were required to give me a standardized test? Is that their excuse.\u00a0 \u201cI sorry, 23.\u00a0 You failed your standard reading and math tests in 3rd<\/sup> grade along with 55% of your minority male classmates in the state because I had to give you the test.\u201d\u00a0 Is that what my teacher gets to say?<\/p>\n Well Ms. Teacher, why didn\u2019t you catch me up in the 4th <\/sup>grade? Because you wanted me to automatically learn my math facts without having to resort to a few drills? Mr. Damon claims he wouldn\u2019t be where he is today if his teachers had resorted to \u201cdesperately drilling\u201d him.\u00a0 Well maybe with some drilling, I would not be where I am today \u2013 and will\u00a0remain for the next 30 even with good behavior.<\/p>\n Ms. Teacher, my group of\u00a0low-income males sees the same 55% of failures from third grade who then drop out of high school seven or eight years later because we never learned to read or to do the math.\u00a0 You had K, 1, 2, and 3 to get me ready for the 3rd<\/sup> grade tests.\u00a0 Then you had another half decade to catch me up.<\/p>\n What were you doing all those years? Oh, I see. Like Mr. Damon says you were \u201cencouraging creativity and original ideas,\u201d teaching us to \u201cknow who we were, seeing our strengths and helping us realize our talents.\u201d Right on.\u00a0 I sure do appreciate that.<\/p>\n But surely you must wonder why \u201cencouraging creativity\u201d and avoiding \u201cdesperate drilling\u201d does not bring success to me and my brothers? Who told you that \u201cencouraging creativity\u201d and avoiding \u201cdesperate drilling\u201d was the right thing to do?\u00a0 Who was supposed to train you to teach me and my 25,000 annual non-reading dropout friends how to read?<\/p>\n So do we congratulate, in turn, your teacher, Ms. Teacher? Is Mr. Damon a wealthy star because of the education schools who trained you in \u201cencouraging creativity and original ideas,\u201d who trained you to teach us to \u201cknow who we were, seeing our strengths and helping us realize our talents\u201d? If he says so, it must be so.<\/p>\n But Ms. Teacher, why didn\u2019t they train you to teach me to read? You saw my 3rd<\/sup> grade test results. You knew I could not read or do math. Why did you not then teach me?<\/p>\n If I could read, my time might pass more quickly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fawned over by the would-be glitterati, Matt Damon\u2019s speech to the Save Our Schools rally in DC received wide accolades as a clear-headed, common-sense speech that spoke to Everyteacher. There are transcripts all over the internet, but here is a summary followed by a question from the TV audience. First Mr. Damon tells us to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-gallery","hentry","category-education-k-12","category-learning-and-education","post_format-post-format-gallery"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bakeramitchelljr.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}