Cloaking Inequity

David Leonhardt writes for the New York Times. In today’s newspaper, he writes about the miraculous results of the charter takeover of New Orleans. Leonhardt bought every phony claim made by the charter industry because he did not interview any critics. This is not good journalism.

He did not interview Mercedes Schneider, the Louisiana researcher-teacher who has written many times about New Orleans and who debunked the New Orleans Miracle here. In addition to teaching high school students in English, Schneider has a doctorate in statistics and research methodology. If Leonhardt had interviewed her, she would have explained that the average ACT scores for charter schools in New Orleans are low and stagnant.

He did not interview Professor Andrea Gabor, the Bloomberg Professor of Business Journalism at Baruch College, who debunked the New Orleans miracle in her brilliant new book “After the Education Wars.” If he didn’t have…