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#1 Top Rated PostJan 9th, 2013 
Chris Spence, the Toronto District School Board’s director of education, is an interesting study. One on one, he gives a polished, measured interview that would warm the cockles of any PR consultant. But as an orator, he can bring a room full of teachers to its feet with a “let’s go out there and educate the hell out of those kids” pep talk worthy of (and indeed born in) a pro football locker room. I find it a very odd spectacle, but hey, the more enthusiastic teachers are, the better.
One of the central contradictions in his messaging, in my view, is between demanding tough-love accountability from students and not driving them away by penalizing lack of follow-through. I suppose this is widespread among modern educators, but in Spence’s case both seem central to his overall educational philosophy. I asked him recently what he thought of so-called “no-zero policies,” for example, and by the time he finished answering he had twisted himself into two separate pretzels.
So it must be somewhat discombobulating for this big, burly, popular, accountability guy to find himself branded, quite rightly, a plagiarist. The Toronto Star outed him today, noting that he “has admitted to and apologized for plagiarizing several passages in an article he wrote for the Star about the importance of extracurricular activities.”
the rest
Chris Spence apologizes for Toronto Star plagiarism: Is it enough? | Full Comment | National Post
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Without school sports, everyone loses - thestar.com