"We don't live in a lab."

                --Pedro Colón

I don't know if there's any more succinct a way to put it.

I have argued for years that the state and anti-public education forces have viewed Milwaukee as the Great Test Market. Our students are like New Coke to them, or Daewoo. Voucher Schools--They Keep the Hot Side Hot and the Cool Side Cool! We are the ant under their magnifying glass. The local rag champions them as "reformers" and conservative think tanks and foundations drown them in money as their reward.

Problem is, every market has losers as well as winners. Every school has real students, with real families, and real teachers. And every single one of them is sick and tired of it. The magnifying glass is burning us.

Pack it up, please.

(This was longer, and much more profane. It's been a bad week for me and "reform." With any luck, I'll have a good story for you tomorrow night.)