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One Thousand Teachers Rally for Meaningful Education Reform

By Kerri Provost

April 25, 2012

The chants of a thousand teachers could be heard on Wells Street.

Wednesday’s rally at the State Capitol supported education reform, but not in the version of it proposed by Governor Malloy. Speakers called for the inclusion of teachers’ expertise when seeking to make changes to the system.

Roch Girard, president of the Connecticut Federation of School Administrators asked the crowd, “Would you buy an automobile without test driving it?,” a metaphor for some of the changes called for in Senate Bill 24, which have not been tested.

Certain measures within the bill, like the push for charter schools, have not been determined to be more successful in every area of assessment. Charter schools’ average impacts on high school graduation rates, for instance, have not been statistically significant, according to a study released in January of this year.

CEA Executive Director Mary Loftus Levine said that teachers would need to keep the pressure on because “anything can happen” with “this General Assembly.”

About 1000 teachers also showed up to rally against SB 24 on Tuesday.