March 20, 2012
The NYT had a bad case of he said/she said reporting this morning in an article that reported on a panel’s recommendations for improving the nation’s education system. The article noted the panel’s recommendation for increased the choice of schools available for parents to select among. It then cited comments from Randi Weingarten, the President of the American Federation of Teachers, saying:
“school choice options like vouchers and charters, which use public funds but are run by a third party, have not proved to be sustainable or to improve schools.”
This is not just something that Ms. Weingarten says, it also happens to be true. Extensive research has found that the vast majority of charter schools do not result in better performance by standardized test measures than the public schools, and a substantial portion do markedly worse.
The NYT should have pointed out that Ms. Weingarten’s assertion was true and not left it to readers to try to decide between competing claims. The NYT’s reporters have the time to investigate these claims, its readers do not.
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