(Guest Post by Matthew Ladner)
So the Credo Michigan report includes the above conclusion. It’s on page 15.
It looks like Detroit charter school students learn a great deal more per year than the comparison group, which is the exact opposite conclusion that this slanted piece was trying to push by citing this particular study. In fact they called this study “gold standard” (which it isn’t) but then went on to entirely misrepresent the study’s conclusion.
Instead as Jay has ably detailed, the NYT reporter deftly avoided this meta conclusion while discussing the results of a single CMO operating in Detroit.
You would think that one of these days these Alinsky types are going to figure out just how easy it fact check them now that there is this thing called “the internet.”
Jay P. Greene's Blog 
Jay correctly cites the fact that Kate Zernike did a hatchet job on Paul Peterson many years ago. I wrote at some length about her wrongful article in a study published by a wisconsin school choice group. Paul of course was shown to be correct. And just as certainly neither Zernike nor the NYTimes ever corrected its errors.
Well, What Are The Avenues to Correct Journalist Errors?
Jay Greene’s report of the “hatchet job” by the New York Times on Detroit charter schools clearly asserts that it’s “journalistic malpractice”.
Now it’s Matthew Ladner and George Mitchell who elaborate on the misrepresentation and errors.
Are there not any steps to challenge this front-page story, which casts such a dark and untruthful picture on Detroit charter schools? Any codes that govern journalistic ethics? Any NYT Editorial Board to review complaints?
Since this author (Kate Zernike) aims to be educational on this subject, and the subject itself is about education, I would propose that even the Biblical enjoinder against misteaching could be invoked: “Taming the Tongue — Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers and sisters, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. James 3:1”
I am reminded of the UK story where a father took the teaching of Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth”, to court and received a favorable ruling.
The Judge (2007) did not forbid the showing of the film, but provided legal guidelines for continued showings:
– It is understood the film is a political work and promotes only one side of the argument
– If teachers do not make this clear they are in breach of Section 406 of the School Act and guilty of political indoctrination
– Nine inaccuracies have to be specifically drawn to the attention of students when the film is shown.
See “Anti-indoctrination guidelines for schools” http://www.parentsteachingparents.net/2013/12/anti-indoctrination-laws-for-schools/
NYTimes has a public editor to receive complaints. New one starts next month.
About The Public Editor
Elizabeth Spayd will be The Times’s sixth public editor and will start in July, 2016. The public editor’s office also handles questions and comments from readers and investigates matters of journalistic integrity. The public editor works independently, outside of the reporting and editing structure of the newspaper; her opinions are her own.
About Elizabeth Spayd
Ms. Spayd was editor and publisher of The Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) before being named The Times’s public editor in May 2016. In her two years at CJR, she led its transition from a print-centric bimonthly magazine to a digital-first publication. She spent the largest part of her career at The Washington Post in a multitude of reporting and editing positions. In 2006, Ms. Spayd became the managing editor for The Post’s digital operations and in 2008, was named the paper’s managing editor. Her first position at The Washington Post was assistant business editor in 1988. She is a graduate of Colorado State University and holds a B.A. in Journalism.
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