MORE FROM HUFFPOST
MORE FROM HUFFPOST
opt-out revolution
This grassroots rebellion is a response to the war on public education being waged by billionaire foundation heads, corporate CEOs, Wall Street hedge funders, and numerous politicians who support the corporate reform agenda and who like campaign contributions that come with it.
If we honestly want to raise student achievement, lower the achievement gap, or the opportunity gap as he calls it and prepare students to meet their future challenges; we need to begin by focusing with great emphasis on birth to 8 years old.
His school will receive a zero for my opting him out, which will lower his school's proficiency standings. On one hand, I feel bad that his school is being punished for my decision. But it is not me who is punishing the school: Our government is punishing them.
WHAT'S HAPPENING
WHAT'S HAPPENING
HuffPost's Third Metric seeks to redefine success beyond money and power. As part of our ongoing series, we speak with New York Times best-selling authors Katty Kay and Claire Shipman about "Womenomics" and "The Confidence Code."
I can't help thinking that they didn't want to go back to the same careers they had before because the reasons they left are still inherent in them. Those careers remain incompatible with a reasonably balanced life.
When women leave the workforce, one of three things happens: They get divorced and often plummet into relative poverty; they find it nigh-impossible to get back in; or they find new jobs post-haste and everything is peachy.
The advice I would give my daughter is not whether or not she should opt-out and then back in when she has children. It's to marry a partner who will fold clothes with her while watching reruns on a Sunday night with nary a complaint.
A decade into working momhood, I'm glad I didn't opt-out. As my career has grown, so has my salary, my influence and my ability to work flexibly.
Having a child is the worst economic decision a woman can make, in part, because workplace discrimination against mothers is the strongest and most open form of gender discrimination.
