Why is Bill Ayers Considered an Education Expert?

Bill the bomber is coming to Purdue

This week, Bill Ayers is coming to my Alma Mater, Purdue University, to give a lecture on education reform.

Bill Ayers is not only terrorist. He's also an education expert

Bill Ayers, who is most well known for his role as a domestic terrorist, seems to have a reputation of being an education "expert".

What is it though that makes Bill Ayers an education expert, and why does he get so many speaking engagements like the one this Thursday at Purdue University?

I've seen many times in the media Bill Ayers being described as a "prominent" scholor, an "expert" in the field of education. He is called a "Distinguished Professor" at the University of Illinois according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Ayers_presidential_election_controversy).

Surely to be held in such high regard academically, this man must have had a long career in education just like my parents, who each taught in public schools for over 30 years.

Bill Ayers, I've read many times, should be as well regarded for his expertise in education as he is known for his bomb making skills.

What do Education "Experts" do?

Over the years of my parent's teaching careers, I've heard stories of education 'experts' coming into their schools to try to teach the teachers how to teach better. The well meaning expert is usually a person with great university credentials, and who is well versed in all of the latest fads in the theories of education.

The expert then basically tells the teachers, who have much more experience in teaching children than the 'expert' does, that the teachers are teaching wrong and that the state says that the teachers need to teach children based on the new methodology that the expert is presenting.

The "new and better" teaching techniques that the expert pushes upon the teachers who are required by the state to adopt them, are of course considered by the state to be better than the way the teachers were previously teaching because the 'experts' told them so.

These experts, compared to the teachers they try to 'fix', have little practical understanding of how to educate children because they are academics, not teachers by trade.

Bill Ayers' Teaching Career

Bill Ayers, I understand, is one of those types of experts. Mr. Ayers has little of a career as far as actually teaching children goes, yet he is regarded as an 'education expert'.

The biography on his blog (http://billayers.wordpress.com/biographyhistory/) gives little mention to any role he had as a teacher of children, which is the area of his presumed expertise.

Wikipedia mentions very little regarding Bill Ayers' role as a teacher (the kind that actually works in a classroom with kids):

He began his career in primary education while an undergraduate, teaching at the Children’s Community School (CCS), a project founded by a group of students and based on the Summerhill method of education. After leaving the underground, he earned an M.Ed from Bank Street College in Early Childhood Education (1984), an M.Ed from Teachers College, Columbia University in Early Childhood Education (1987) and an Ed. D from Teachers College, Columbia University in Curriculum and Instruction (1987).(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Ayers)

Although Bill seems to have little experience as an educator (of children), some will maintain that he is an education expert. But why? Because he spent a lot of time racking up credentials in university, away from a class room full of kids?

Going on academic credentials alone though, I still don't know why Bill Ayers is regarded as an education expert.

Surely there are other academic experts out there who have spent as little time with children in a classroom, have spent as much time in university, and have as many big ideas published in as many books. But they aren't lauded as often or as much as Ayers is on his purported expertise.

And I know why.

Even though he was/is a terrorist - It made Bill Ayers a celebrity. And most recently, it has been suggested that it was Sarah Palin who gave a boost to Ayers' celebrity status. twitter.com/lorens210/status/4295117825

Ayers would receive little attention as an expert on education had his level of celebrity (for being a terrorist) been increased due to the attacks by the republicans during the 2008 presidential campaign.

He gained fame based on his controversial past. And though unrelated to education, his notoriety has transmutated into high standing among his peers in the academic study of education

What fools. Education needs no celebrities.