Momma Bears Swat the Fakes and High Five the Real Edu Bloggers!

Maybe you have heard their slick, expensive radio spots? They claim they are Tennessee moms.  Hmmm... Why, then, is Haslam's former campaign manager the Executive Director?  LOL!  We have a hunch they were paid voice-over actors reading a script written by their professional PR department.  

Take a look at the rest of the TN Success team and you'll notice that not a single person on their "team" (aka. paid grassroots staff) is actually a real honest-to-goodness parent of a child currently in public schools.  But, hey, at least they didn't forget to include which sports teams they root for because that is what really matters, right?  (Maybe with politicians, at least.)  Here are their biographies as shown on their website:

Momma Bears is proud of our growing parent network across the state of Tennessee.  Our connections with public school activists continue to grow.  And we are always on the look out for more parent groups, teacher groups and parent and teacher bloggers.  They just keep popping up.  We will gladly keep passing great information along.

We can tell you it is wonderful mental therapy to blog and organize activism for your kids, especially when sometimes you just don't know what to do to fight big government money and power.  Blogging and networking help express the many wrong turns we see reform taking in our children's classrooms.  It is even more exciting to read about what parents and teachers DO want in our classrooms. (Hint- it is not more testing or common core.)

We are proud to share a great blog roll and website list of all the authentic parent and teacher groups in TN.  But first, before we share, we feel we must point out the latest AstroTurf attempt at a parent group in Tennessee.

Say "hellno" to plastic networking, just in time for Tennessee's 2015 legislative session:  http://tnsuccess.org/

Yes, Tennessee Success is another bought & paid for mouth piece for the 1%, corporate interests, and Governor Haslam (just like SCORE, StudentsFirst, and Stand For Children).  Tennessee Success is conveniently registered as a 501c4 nonprofit, which means they can give politicians thousands of dollars (and, thereby, influence their vote).  Yep, another check writing pass-through for the governor and corporate interests.  This is dark money being used to influence the public education system in TN.  This organization specifically exists to push charter schools (aka: "choice"), vouchers, testing, and common core in our state. 

Hey Governor, our children's classrooms could use some of that dark money for copy paper.  Kleenex is really low with flu season, too.  But, I suspect they don't want that cash to really raise more than enough to pay for a reading or math specialist, another ELL teacher, or a desperately needed raise for teachers in TN?  No, instead, it will buy radio ads to convince Tennesseans that the Governor's next four years of education policy will be the same as his first.  Disgusting.

So don't be fooled by another Haslam money funnel. Support these real grassroots parent and teacher groups we are about to list for you.  Read & share these blogs.  Because they ARE making a difference and our voices ARE being heard.  Proof: the Governor had to buy his own "team" to combat our advocacy!  Keep it up, parents & teachers!!!

These parents and teachers have the Momma Bear "stamp of approval" as the real deal telling the stories inside the classrooms of public education:

List of GREAT blogs, websites, & facebook groups in TN:

• Dad Gone Wild (a TN Dad's blog about education matters)
• East Nashville Unites (Nashville activists fighting the ASD & charter takeover of their neighborhood schools)
• Mama Thoughts (a Nashville Mom who blogs about the ASD charter takeover of her neighborhood school)
• Nancy E. Bailey (Retired teacher, author, & expert on all things educational.  We LOVE her blog!)
• Rocky Top Politics (sometimes has tidbits regarding education that you won't find in the media)
• Schools Matter (excellent, insightful, well-researched blog by Dr. Jim Horn)
• Screams from the Porch - (witty Knoxville blogger with political insight)
• SPEAK (Knoxville activists who are really making an impact in their school district)
• Stop TN Testing Madness and on Facebook (find allies + answers in fighting standardized testing)
• Teachers Advocating for Children (Facebook group for teachers who support public education)
• Tennessee Against Common Core (fighting against Common Core)
• Tennessee Parents (blog that shares anonymous voices of real TN teachers & parents with elected officials)
• The Dyslexia Spot (a must-read for parents with Dyslexic children)

• TN BadAss Teachers (for teachers who bravely stand up for children and public education)
• TN Education Matters (a great legal blog about education matters in TN)
• TN Education Report (education politics and policy in TN)
• TREE - Tennesseeans Reclaiming Educational Excellence (rooted in fighting for strong, equitable public education and is committed to growing child-centered education policy)
• United Opt Out Tennessee (the info to know to refuse standardized testing for your kids)

Do a search for your city/county on Facebook. There are many parent groups discussing reform and specifics going on at the local level. Some groups are private, some public. There are so many, we can't list them all here.

List of GREAT national blogs, websites, & Facebook groups:

• Cloaking Inequity (blog by Julian Vasquez Heilig, an award-winning researcher, teacher, and professor in California)
• Curmudgucation (witty, insightful blog by Peter Greene, a teacher in Pennsylvania who must not sleep because he writes so much awesome stuff)
• Diane Ravitch (Do we seriously even need to tell you who she is?  She relentlessly shares education news from across the U.S. on her blog.  It is like an encyclopedia of reform-crap.).
• Education Talk New Orleans (because TN's ASD is modeled after Louisiana's Recovery School District)
• Edushyster (Oh, her sarcasm is absurdly wonderful!)
• Gary Rubenstein (a teacher and incredible researcher who writes about TN sometimes)
• Mercedes Schneider (Superpower blogger and teacher in Louisiana) 
• National BATs (50,000+ Badass teachers fighting for public education)
• Network for Public Education (a collaboration of superheroes for public education)
• Parents Across America (Parents fighting for public education)
• The War Report on Public Education (blog & online radio show that focuses on the rising public resistance movement against the corporate war on public education)

• United Opt Out (The encyclopedia of fighting Standardized Tests)
• What is Common Core?  (3 Amazing Moms in Utah)

PS - Momma Bears has not received a penny from our blogs.  In fact, we intentionally did not include ads on our website.  We specifically went the cheapskate route with our website (a FREE Weebly site).  Please don't send us any money.  We don't want it or need it.  Your priceless advocacy is all we really want.  Keep it up, Momma Bears!

UPDATE 1/30/15:  Be sure to read our next about how this brand new "astroturf" organization, Tennesseeans For Student Success, bought itself a commercial spot for the 2015 Super Bowl.  Because nothing says "grassroots movement" than the most expensive commercial spot on public television, right?  Click HERE to read it.