If you've ever spent much time watching soap operas, you're familiar with this scenario: Two characters with furrowed brows and arms akimbo square off: "That's not true," says one. "Oh yes it is," says the other. "If only Brock were here …" as the camera pans right. Music swells, tension builds … only, when the door opens, the person entering doesn’t look like "Brock."
Oh, he's Brock-like – same telegenic appearance, good style points. But he's clearly not Brock. Then the voiceover: "Now playing the role of Brock is … " and what you realize is that the character you're used to seeing has changed, and the person now playing the part is different.
But as everyone familiar with this knows, the plot remains the same – same settings, same confrontations over fictional creations. The cast change is disconcerting for sure, but you'll get used to it (it's happened before). All is in order.
That's what happened this week in the soap opera called "education reform."
With the resignation of reform firebrand and former Chancellor of the Washington, DC public schools Michelle Rhee from the organization she founded, StudentsFirst, what we witnessed is an alteration of a script already written by very wealthy people who've created an elaborate fiction for how the nation should educate its children.