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11/15/07 - A Mississippi Reader Says Bruce Springsteen Is Bad But Bill Maher Is Worse

From: Elizabeth La Brash (e-mail her)

Re: Jared Taylor's Column: Race/IQ Explanation Gap At "Achievement Gap Summit"

Early in his career Jack O'Connell, California's State Superintendent of Public Instruction, taught in the Santa Barbara area. 

O'Connell was then elected to the state assembly where he served for 12 years followed by eight more years in the state senate where he chaired the education subcommittee.

He's a politician—not an educator.

Because O'Connell is quietly campaigning for the governor's office in 2010 when both he and Arnold Schwarzenegger will be termed out of their current positions, he likes to avoid problems like those posed by the California school system—not deal with them.

The purpose of the "Achievement Gap" conference was not to address the real problems in performance.

If it were, the attendees would be discussing IQ differences among children whose parents cannot read or write in their native languages, let alone English.

Children whose parents are not well educated generally do not perform well in school. 

Since these topics are off the table, the conference's goal was not to find ways to better educate children with special needs—but to get publicity for Jack O'Connell.

La Brash lived in Santa Barbara for nearly 30 years and is a long-time O'Connell observer.