So this school presents as the Holy Grail of urban education: a high poverty school with high test scores. And the article does a good job of explaining the focus on test preparation and the ways in which the school embraces the testing process.

Is it too much to ask, though, for a little follow-up with kids who went through the school — it seems pretty stable if the principal has been there since 1984 — to see if they’ve succeeded in middle school, in high school? Is the school working to ensure kids understand the concepts underneath the test questions, or is the school just engaging in empty test preparation, such that the kids flame out in middle school?

Wouldn’t be hard to find out.

You’d think that Philly would find a way so that the poor fools who actually try and pay the wage tax would be able to do so easily.

Guess again.

Here’s the page; click to register and it’s a broken link.

Typical.

I read the book. I’m drinking the cool aid. Ran my little 5k today without shoes and realized a bunch of things:

1. Running barefoot you spend a lot more time looking where you’re going and thinking about your landings.

2. Running barefoot eliminates the noise of a Clydesdale class runner plodding along. When I used to run with headphones, my rule was that I had to be able to hear my feet landing, which was definitely cheating because the smack of shoe on pavement was so loud.

3. With super flat feet — a friend once described my feet as pancakes with stubs — running shoes just add another inch for me to roll my ankle over.

4. Running without shoes reminds you how heavy running shoes — even good running shoes — are. My feet felt so much lighter and it made running that much easier.