DAVE GROHL OF NIRVANA-FOO FIGHTERS SUPPORTS TEACHERS STAYING REMOTE FOR NOW

Thanks to David Irons for sending me an essay from The Atlantic written by legendary rock star Dave Grohl. Grohl's mother is a retired high school English teacher. In the piece, Dave draws on his mom's wisdom and his own to conclude that learning  for now should continue fully remotely during the pandemic:

I wouldn’t trust the U.S. secretary of percussion to tell me how to play “Smells Like Teen Spirit” if they had never sat behind a drum set, so why should any teacher trust Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos to tell them how to teach, without her ever having sat at the head of a class? (Maybe she should switch to the drums.) Until you have spent countless days in a classroom devoting your time and energy to becoming that lifelong mentor to generations of otherwise disengaged students, you must listen to those who have. Teachers want to teach, not die, and we should support and protect them like the national treasures that they are. For without them, where would we be?

May we show these tireless altruists a little altruism in return. I would for my favorite teacher. Wouldn’t you?

Grohl could add Bill de Blasio, Andrew Cuomo, Joel Klein, Dennis Walcott, Bill Gates, Arne Duncan, and so many others to a long list of education decionmakers who wouldn't know what to do in a classroom but tell teachers what to do.

Having a musician I admire on our side is satisfying to this blogger. South Bronx School and Reality Based Educator are two other NY ed bloggers who I seem to recall, without looking back, mentioned rockers in their posts. I think for SBS there were Rush pieces and RBE I believe used Ian Hunter in blog posts. I like it when the education and rock world intersect.

Last year, when my family took a road trip to Chicago to visit relatives, I lobbied to stop off in Cleveland on the drive home at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I had such a great time. Kids loved the garage where they got to play so they put up with me attempting to explain some of the memorabilia in the exhibits. 

When Grohl writes about his own children in the Atlantic essay, I feel a sort of parental bond along with being grateful for his support for teachers. He explains the limitations of virtual education and includes references to his kids:

Remote learning comes with more than a few of its own complications, especially for working-class and single parents who are dealing with the logistical problem of balancing jobs with children at home. Uneven availability of teaching materials and online access, technical snafus, and a lack of socialization all make for a less-than-ideal learning experience. But most important, remote setups overseen by caretakers, with a teacher on the other end doing their best to educate distracted kids who prefer screens used for games, not math, make it perfectly clear that not everyone with a laptop and a dry-erase board is cut out to be a teacher. That specialized skill is the X factor. I know this because I have three children of my own, and my remote classroom was more Welcome Back, Kotter than Dead Poets Society. Like I tell my children, “You don’t really want daddy helping, unless you want to get an F!” Remote learning is an inconvenient and hopefully temporary solution. But as much as Donald Trump’s conductor-less orchestra would love to see the country prematurely open schools in the name of rosy optics (ask a science teacher what they think about White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany’s comment that “science should not stand in the way”), it would be foolish to do so at the expense of our children, teachers, and schools.

I can so identify with the "distracted kids who prefer screens for games, not math" line.