State of the Blog: Five Year Anniversary!

Five Years

Five years ago, over MLK Weekend, I started this blog. When I mentioned this tonight, my husband said,

"What made you start it then? You were bored, right?"

Actually--wrong.

 I wanted to learn more about blogging and I couldn't figure out how to do it except by creating a blog. I spent several months looking for a topic that I wouldn't get bored of writing about, and one day I was really pissed off about something that happened in the Ann Arbor schools (I don't remember what, and it really doesn't matter, because it was neither the first nor the last time) and it was as if a lightning bolt struck. "I'll never get tired of writing about the schools!" I thought. And most of the time, I haven't--although occasionally I think about writing about other things as well. On the other hand, the schools need writing about (and do not criticize the grammar of this sentence, please). I certainly haven't run out of things to write about related to education, and I didn't anticipate all the drama around education! I do sometimes run out of time to write. Work is very busy and now it's full-time. But then someone comes up to me and says, "What you're doing is a huge community service." (Awwwww....)

So, Happy Anniversary to my blog!

1. If you like the blog, make it worth my while by recruiting more readers.
2. If you like the blog, take the time to write an engaging comment.
3. If you like the blog, recruit another parent, teacher, administrator or taxpayer to protect our public schools and become a schools activist.

State of the State vs. State of the Blog

I couldn't really stand to listen to Gov. Snyder's State of the State address (although I'm glad that Rep. Jeff Irwin invited Jeanice Swift to be his guest, and I did like what she had to say about the speech.)

Looking ahead, there are lots of things I haven't gotten to yet. . . I'm hoping to write more about charter schools (especially for profits). . . more about competition between schools. . . more about ending high-stakes testing. . . more about good things going on in education. As always, if you're interested in contributing to the blog as a researcher or writer, just let me know.

One thing that is still true, and still motivates me, is something that I wrote in my first post on Sunday, January 18, 2009:

Sometimes I find the schools satisfactory, and sometimes not, but in general I have a lot of questions. Questions about why things run the way they do. Questions about whether things could run better. Critiques about the schools. Ideas to improve them.. . . I believe that these are our schools--yes, the taxpayers--and we need to know what is going on. These are our schools--yes, the parents--and we need to be able to make decisions for our kids. These are our schools--yes, the staff--who often don't have a voice in decisions. These are our schools--yes, the students--and what students think also matters.

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