Jerry Bracey, Rest in Peace

Brilliant. Blunt. Independent. Truth. Integrity. Iconoclast. Irascible. Uncompromising.

Our colleague and friend Jerry Bracey passed away in his sleep during the night of October 20, 2009 at the age of 69. I am quite sorry that Jerry’s dominant presence as an eloquent and reliable education truth-teller will no longer grace the educational landscape.


I first met Jerry via telephone ( in mid-1980s) while I was headmaster of a Christian elementary school in Wichita, Kansas. I had a statistics question and somehow saw his name associated with the Aurora Public Schools in Coloraodo. I called him and we discussed my thought and he couldn't have been nicer. I followed him later in Education Week and PDK where his first "Bracey Report" captivated me. I was so pleased to find someone that could explain statistics in a meaningful way and make the reading interesting. His bad-apple awards were great fun! I had the pleasure to dine with him in 2002 in Dodge City, Kansas prior to a one day "truth" report he gave to the district's 40 administrators.

The Education and the Public Interest Center (http://epicpolicy.org) at the University of Colorado at Boulder partners with the Education Policy Research Unit (EPRU) at Arizona State University have created a memorial fund that will, if fully funded, provide a doctoral fellowship in Jerry’s name. The thinking is that the "Bracey Memorial Fellowship," would be awarded to a doctoral student with a research-based, hard-nosed commitment to further truth, equity, and social justice.

If interested, visit http://www.cufund.org/giving-opportunities/fund-description/?id=5127 Don’t click the “in memorial of” option since you probably don’t have the info requested about his next of kin (his wife, Iris). Instead, just write “In memory of Jerry Bracey” in the box. You may also mail checks, made out to "CU Foundation" with "EPIC - Jerry Bracey" in the memo line, directly to the School’s Development Officer, Margot Neufeld, at:
University of Colorado at BoulderSchool of EducationMargot Neufeld249 UCB, room 116Boulder, CO 80309 The Foundation has no fees for memorial gifts -- all the money goes to the gift's purpose (student support in Jerry’s name).

3Rs 3Ts 3i

I know you’ve heard of the 3Rs, reading, writing, and arithmetic. Now I bring you several other strings of three. What do you think of the following:

3Rs: Reading, Riting, Rithmetic (reading, writing, arithmetic)
Traditional

3Is: Inquiry, Involvement, Independent Study
Accessed October 22, 2009 from http://speedchange.blogspot.com/2009/05/great-schools-1-changing-everything.html

3Rs: Relationships, Relevance, Rigor coined by Willard Daggett (http://www.leadered.com/aboutdaggett.html)
Accessed October 22, 2009 from http://preilly.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/the-three-rs/

3Ts: technology, talents, tolerance
Florida, Richard. (2002). The Rise of the Creative Class.

3Rs: Relating, Representing, Reasoning
from Robert Carkhuff's 3 Rs
Accessed October 22, 2009 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_three_Rs

3Ts: tools, technique, task
Accessed October 22, 2009 from http://deangroom.wordpress.com/2009/01/24/the-3rs-are-now-the-3ts/

3Rs: Responsibility, Relationships, Respect
Accessed October 22, 2009 from http://www.theother3rs.org/

i3: Investing in Innovation Fund is part of the US Dept of Education’s historic $5 billion investment in school reform through ARRA funds. Accessed November 3, 2009 from http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2009/10/10062009a.html

How do these terms fit in with 21st Century teaching and learning?