Ohio has long been an embarrassment to charter-school supporters nationwide, with its trail of scandal and graft and abysmal student performance.
The friends I knew who tutored were well paid for work that seemed far less grueling than waitressing or late-night newspaper copy editing or all the other side gigs I attempted in my early twenties.
It's a truism to say that my state, Texas, isn't a red state: It's a nonvoting state.
Calling representatives every single day, arranging local community meetings, and marching in the streets every Sunday. It's not the path to glory, but it's absolutely essential to maintaining a democracy under threat.
There's a nastiness to conversations about U.S. education reform, which are characterized by the kind of stark taking-of-sides that's usually reserved for debates over guns or abortion rights.
Campaign widowhood totally suited me, and I soon began to suspect that our setup beat the bill-paying and bickering of an actual marriage.