It’s been a rough couple of weeks for the charter school industry, and it doesn’t look like things are looking up any time soon. In the wake of a devastating segment by John Oliver on the charter school business, and calls from civil rights groups like the NAACP and Black Lives Matter, the public is finally starting to question the […]

Today, I am pleased to announce the addition of our newest Eclectablogger, Dr. Mitchell Robinson, Associate Professor and Chair of the Music Education department at Michigan State University. He has his own blog at MitchellRobinson.net and has guest posted several pieces here at Eclectablog. His fine writing skills are matched by his thoughtfulness on education policy, particularly as it relates […]

Trump’s “policies” would hurt his fans but his words are already battering the most vulnerable Hillary Clinton is done being politically correct and the Trump campaign is demanding a trigger warning. The Democratic nominee has focused this campaign back to the subject of her Alt-Right speech of a few weeks ago — the racism and hatred Trump’s campaign has stoked, […]

There are three things that should never be privatized and profitized. You don’t have to be an expert in public policy to know that when profits are on the line, the needs of those being served will be trumped by the desire to increase profits. The first of these things is healthcare. We’ve seen the tragic outcome of that in […]

Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette, shown here sweeping up horse manure, has led an effort to suppress Democratic turnout in Michigan elections by fighting to uphold a ban on the option to vote a straight-ticket in our elections. The legislation, passed by our GOP-dominated state legislature, was a blatant attempt to harm Democrats’ chances given that one-half of all voters […]

A new report out by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) shows how Big Energy corporations paid huge sums of money in the form of political donations for up-close-and-personal access to America’s Republican Attorneys General. These AGs, whose job is to advocate for and protect the citizens of their state from crime and corruption, are prime targets of lobbyists […]

The following essay was written by Mitchell Robinson and is cross-posted on his most-excellent blog at MitchellRobinson.net. Robinson is associate professor and chair of music education, and coordinator of the music student teaching program at Michigan State University. Follow Mitchell on Twitter at @mrobmsu. His essay is reposted here with permission. Enjoy. A new report from the Justice Department recommends […]

Michigan’s 52nd State House District is a R+1 district that has been held by Democrat Gretchen Driskell for the past two election cycles. It was held briefly between 2010 and 2012 by now-MIA Republican Mark Ouimet. Before that, Democrat Pam Byrnes represented the district for four years, serving for a time as the Speaker Pro Tempore of the House. The […]

Trump’s scapegoating of undocumented immigrants is Mein Kampf-era madness and it’s time we say that On Labor Day, Paul Waldman did something that few people have enough hours in a lifetime to do. He put together a partial list of some of the stories that illustrate “the kind of history of corruption, double-dealing, and fraud that Donald Trump has.” You […]

See update below. Last month, Ingham County Clerk Barb Byrum wrote a piece for Eclectablog about Attorney General Bill Schuette’s crusade to ensure straight-ticket voting is banned forever in Michigan. In her essay, Barb explained how, at its core, Schuette’s effort is little more than an attempt to disenfranchise voters in our state. After a 3-judge panel of the 6th […]

I don’t normally just reprint press releases that I receive but this one is so important and so well-written that I’m going to break that informal rule. I am a firm believer that our country would be in a much better place if we had more women in positions of political power and Emerge Michigan plays an important role in […]