Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

by folkbum

I've been holding on to an announcement for a little while, but I am finally allowed to go public with it. This will mean some changes (mostly my posting less and less) here at the blog, as well as some ramification across other aspects of my life, for those of you who know me in the "real" world, too.

In short, I'm starting a new job that will eat up pretty much all my time.

Remember a few weeks ago, when Alan Borsuk noted that 57 new schools had filed applications with the state Department of Public Instruction to join the Milwaukee Parental Choice (voucher) Program? One of them was me.

Some colleagues and I have been planning this for a while now, the William Jefferson Clinton Academy of Activism and Social Justice. The website isn't up and running just yet--that's one of the many things I'm behind on--but it will be soon. Then you'll be able to learn about our plan and curriculum. Some highlights:

• The school will be grades 9-12.
• As the name implies, the focus will be on activism and social justice. Students will learn all the many ways they have been victimized and held down by the powers that be.
• Much of the work will be project-based, i.e., writing not just essays but letters to the editor and manifestos, science projects that prove global warming and the moral superiority of fluorescent light bulbs, Michael Moore-style flimmaking, spread-the-wealth mathematics, etc.
• The school will not be religious--if we can convert them all to atheism, that's even better--but there will be daily devotional readings drawn from the writings of Chomsky, Mao, Alinsky, Ayers, and Lenin.
• We've already established a partnership with ACORN to register all of our students, even the ones who aren't 18, to vote.
• The uniforms--yes, I believe in uniforms!--will feature a very attractive brown shirt. Different color armbands will help us identify students by grade level.
• Free condom machines in every bathroom.

I wish I had time to go through the whole list of great things we have planned--guest lecturers like Ward Churchill, the early-morning tire-slashing field trip scheduled for election day--but I just don't right now.

So as posting from me begins to taper off this spring, please understand that it's not that I'm no longer committed to the ideals and goals I have been for the last six(!) years of blogging. I still am, absolutely. It's just that now I'm going to have a much more direct pipeline of taxpayers' money to be promoting them with. Thanks for a great ride, y'all!