Tuesday, March 9, 2010

The Educated Guess � What’s next for ‘parent trigger’?

What’s next for ‘parent trigger’?

In legislation passed in January to strengthen the state’s Race to the Top application, the Legislature included landmark reforms that potentially could give parents a lot more control over their children’s education.

This week, three parent advocate groups sent letters to the powers that be in Sacramento asking the right question, So what now?
If the “parent trigger” and open enrollment – the two measures contained in SBX5-4 – are to avoid protracted litigation, the process for implementing them must be well-defined. So far, there is no process, only broad concepts. The bill lacked details.

The three groups – the state PTA, Public Advocates and PICO California – are calling for the Department of Education to create a working group to draft guidelines and to propose a bill resolving confusion if necessary. That’s a good idea.
Under the parent trigger, if the majority of parents at a low-performing school sign a petition, the school board will be required to adopt a restructuring strategy that could include inviting in a charter school. The bill limits the parent trigger to the first 75 schools that are petitioned. It will apply to 1,700 schools that have failed to meet their targets under the federal No Child Left Behind law for at least four years —a large universe.

Schools Matter: Diane Ravitch Pt. 2: Democracy Now Interview

Accent Advocate - Day of Action unifies

Day of Action unifies

Fight for education spreads statewide

By Holly Pablo, editor-in-chief

Published: Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Updated: Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Erik Verduzco / The Advocate

Strength in numbers — UC Berkeley students Rocio Hernandez (front left) and Maria Jimenez (front right) march down Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley as part of a statewide rally for education Thursday. The group of more than 1,000 protesters traveled five miles from Cal to Frank Ogawa Plaza in Oakland, chanting for an end to California’s budget cuts.

Thousands of students, parents and educators across the state rallied for equal access to education in a historic Day of Action protest Thursday that they say is just the beginning of a much-needed social movement.

In the Bay Area, rallies were held throughout the day at various schools and city halls, with UC Berkeley, Frank Ogawa Plaza in Oakland and San Francisco’s Civic Center Plaza as the main gathering points.

Demonstrators from all sectors of public education — pre-kindergarten through 12th grade, community colleges, California State University and University of California — assembled throughout the state as early as 7 a.m.

California, a powerful state with one of the largest economies in the world, was once considered the flagship of education, Sen. Leland Yee told The Advocate at San Francisco’s Civic Center Plaza rally on Thursday.

Today, an unprecedented state budget deficit of more than $20 billion has dwindled school funding to a ranking of 48th in the nation, Yee said.

Students are facing rising tuition costs, larger class size maxes, reductions in core support services and even fewer course sections to choose from at a time when demand for classes is higher than ever.

Over the past two years, more than $17 billion was cut from education funding, according to the California Teachers Association, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s recent proposal for 2010-11 looks to

Senate Education Committee Holds First ESEA Hearing - Politics K-12 - Education Week

Senate Education Committee Holds First ESEA Hearing

By Alyson Klein on March 9, 2010 9:45 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

Last week, the House Education and Labor Committee kicked off its hearings on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. And today, it was the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee's turn.

As in the House, there was virtually no discussion of any of the major ESEA proposals the Obama administration has put forward so far, including tying Title I money to rigorous common academic standards and replacing adequate yearly progress with a new mechanism for gauging college-and-career readiness.

There may be more concrete reaction next week. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is scheduled to testify next Wednesday in both the House and Senate on the Obama administration's ESEA proposals. In fact, the House Committee hearing is actually called "The Obama Administration's Elementary and Secondary Education Act Reauthorization Blueprint," according to a notice sent to committee members. (I'm guessing that means the administration's blueprint, or at least part of it, could be out by that point.)

Remainders: State test scores to be investigated for inflation | GothamSchools

Remainders: State test scores to be investigated for inflation

from GothamSchools by Maura Walz

Private and parochial schools want the same reimbursement from the MTA’s payroll tax public schools get.
After several requests, the state will allow a Harvard test expert to study whether score inflation is real.
First Lady Michelle Obama will speak at the commencement ceremony for a D.C.-area turnaround school.
The group developing common standards wants teachers to weigh in on their draft.
Jay Mathews says RttT is “like throwing money out of the fifth floor Post newsroom window.”
Kim Gittleson’s new analysis finds charter schools in city buildings spend less than their district neighbors.
A teacher has to dig and dig to get access to his new teacher data report.
Today was the first “Trayless Tuesday,” the DOE’s attempt to make lunchrooms environmentally friendly.
And a teacher chronicles each day of school, in comic form. (Via Miss Eyre)

NAACP Calls for Segregationist Board Chair of Wake County to Step Down Schools Matter

Schools Matter:

NAACP Calls for Segregationist Board Chair of Wake County to Step Down

From WRAL:

Raleigh, N.C. — Benjamin Todd Jealous, president and CEO of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, joined the state chapter on Tuesday in calling for the resignation of Wake County School Board Chairman Ron Margiotta after comments he made during a heated public hearing on March 2.
Margiotta could be heard saying, “Here come the animals out of their cages," during the meeting on the school system’s long-standing policy of assigning students to ensure schools had no more than 40 percent of students receiving free or reduced-price lunches.. . .

And for a well-written and emotional account of

Debating RTT4HE � The Quick and the Ed

Debating RTT4HE

Ashley Thorne of the National Association of Scholars has written a response / rebuttal to my new Chronicle column, which argues that cash-strapped colleges and universities would benefit from a “Race to the Top” for higher education. She’s friendly about it and agrees with some of my points, but in the end we have very different ideas about the appropriate scope of higher education.

On the particulars, Thorne seems to share many of my views about the need to improve preparation, reduce remediation, facilitate credit transfer, help people learn and graduate and get good jobs and so on. But underlying her critique is a strong thread of conviction that too many people are going to college. And I just don’t believe this to be true. For decades now we’ve been investing huge amounts of time and money in growing the supply of college graduates. And for decades the job market has responded by increasing the wage premium for college graduation. If there was an oversupply of college graduates, we might expect employers to have taken the recent recession as an opportunity to shed these more expensive employees. Instead, the opposite has occurred–people with college degrees have weathered the storm the best while people without postsecondary credentials have taken the biggest hit.

For NAS, the too-many-graduates thesis goes hand in hand with the idea that

Pancake Breakfast to Raise Funds for Cordova Community Food Locker — The Rancho Cordova Post

Pancake Breakfast to Raise Funds for Cordova Community Food Locker

by GEOFFREY SAKALA on MARCH 9, 2010 · 0 COMMENTS

in LIFESTYLE

The Lincoln Village Neighborhood Association and Head Start Youth and Family Resource Center are hosting a pancake breakfast to raise money for the Rancho Cordova Food Locker. The 6th annual event to be held on Saturday, March 13th will be at AM Winn elementary school located at 3351 Explorer Drive, Sacramento, CA 95827.

The pancake breakfast will run from 8:30 a.m. until 10:30 a.m. at AM Winn Elementary school in the Lincoln Village neighborhood and will feature a pancake breakfast with eggs, bacon, fruit, juice, and coffee. Tickets for the event will cost $5 for an individual or $10 for a family.

The generosity of community member, Tony Garcia has allowed the proceeds of the event to be donated to the Cordova Community Food Locker.

For more information you may call (916) 228-5727.

Worth hearing and reading The Educated Guess

The Educated Guess

Worth hearing and reading

Posted in Achievement Gap, Charters, Teacher Development

A few noteworthy articles and announcements that have come to my attention:

KQED Forum to explore college issues

Tune in KQED radio’s Forum at 9 a.m. Wednesday for a two-hour exploration of issues faced by first-generation college students and their families. Host Michael Krasny will broadcast live from Downtown College Prep in San Jose, the first charter school in Santa Clara County and a 10-year successful partnership between the school and San Jose Unified. The largely Hispanic school recruits students who aspire to college but have not done well in middle school and prepares them for a four-year college.
Panelists will include Michael Kirst, Stanford emeritus education professor, writerand an authority on the transition between high school and colllege, Downtown College Prep founder and executive director Jennifer Andaluz, principal Michael DeSouza, counselors from James Lick High in East San Jose and from Santa Clara University, as well as graduates of the charter school.
(Read more and comment on this post)

Five Big Ideas for Data Rigor….Without Mortis � The Quick and the Ed

Five Big Ideas for Data Rigor….Without Mortis

Part IV of this week’s Five Principles for Smarter Data Systems series–a guest post from Dr. Heather Weiss, Founder and Director of the Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP):

Education Sector’s five design principles powerfully reframe the conversation about how, when and where to use data to support student learning so that it will not die in vast data warehouses, but will live to guide the daily actions of teachers, families, afterschool and summer programs, tutors, and ultimately of students themselves as they assume responsibility for their own learning. While the principles are not now widely implemented, they are not just pie in the sky either—real communities, districts and schools are working on them and there is much to be learned from their efforts.

We are documenting early lessons from them in a set of papers about cradle to career data pathways soon to be available at the HFRP site. Our documentation shows that data systems incorporating the five design principles and accompanied by strong tools and outreach for families, afterschool programs and others can increase the chances of effective family engagement as families understand that the pathway to college begins in early childhood and that they, along with teachers and others, can help students stay on track through K-12 with the aid of data in the accessible form of GPS performance navigation system-type tools. At the cradle end we are finding early childhood programs providing regular developmental feedback and related ways families can support learning thereby creating the demand for actionable performance data when children start school.

In The Arena: Teacher Union Head Weingarten Vs. School Reformer Rhee - THE DAILY RIFF - Be Smarter. About Education.

In The Arena: Teacher Union Head Weingarten Vs. School Reformer Rhee

March 9, 2010 11:19 AM

Newsweek Riffs About Education:
The Randi Weingarten Vs. Michelle Rhee Saga
"It has an almost gladiatorial aspect to it." - Chester Finn, Jr.

Newsweek dedicates its cover this week to "The Key to Saving American Education." One article that was particularly skewering was a recap of the jostling and positioning of Randi Weingarten, American Federation of Teachers (AFT) union head vs. high-profile DC school reformer, Michelle Rhee. Link to articles here. An excerpt:

" . . .Weingarten and Rhee are the two principal actors on the most important stage in the ongoing drama of school reform in America. Almost three years ago, Rhee was brought in to fix what was arguably the worst school system in America. The public schools in the nation's capital were notorious for high costs and low performance. Rhee has taken direct aim at the holy grail of the teachers' union: the common practice of giving public-school teachers lifetime tenure under rules that make firing a teacher, no matter how incompetent, very difficult, expensive, and time-consuming. Rhee attempted to abolish tenure in exchange for offering merit pay--teachers who agreed to be judged by their performance could make up to $130,000 a year. But Rhee's offer was never even put to a vote by the union. Rhee ran directly into Weingarten, whose union represents the bulk of teachers in big cities across America.

Weingarten, a media-savvy and clever lawyer, can see that the days are fast ending when the teachers' union can count on the support of the Democratic Party and the passivity of the education establishment to protect teachers with near impunity. But she is putting up a spirited rear-guard action to preserve the long-established job security of her union members. The two women have been locked in negotiations for a new union contract in D.C. for more than two years. The battle is being closely watched at the White House, where President Obama has backed his reform-minded

EducationNews.org - A Global Leading News Source - Children Count Too

Children Count Too

2010-03-09 12:11:00EducationNews.org

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Children Count Too is a new campaign about the importance of counting infants and young children in the 2010 Census.

Children Count Too

Children Count Too is a new campaign about the importance of counting infants and young children in the 2010 Census.
Learn about our March 9th kick-off event.
Get Dora the Explorer fact sheets and buttons in English and Spanish
Watch AND Listen to Dora the Explorer public service announcements.

Schools Matter: Bonus Bobb (Broad Alum) Sued by Detroit School Board for Illegal Payments From Broad Foundation

Bonus Bobb (Broad Alum) Sued by Detroit School Board for Illegal Payments From Broad Foundation

If the brainwashing during Broad training academy doesn't work, maybe an extra hundred grand a year will keep Mr. Bobb focused on the privatization task at hand. From the Detroit News:

MARISA SCHULTZ
The Detroit News
The Detroit Public School Board unanimously voted Monday night to file a second lawsuit against Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb, saying $145,000 in private foundation support he receives under his new contract is unlawful.
"It's a conflict of interest," said DPS board member LaMar Lemmons.
Bobb's supplemental income from private foundations increased from $84,000 last year to $145,000 this year, under a one-year contract extension signed by the governor and state superintendent this month. The only philanthropic donor publicly identified is the Broad Foundation, whose support of charter schools has stirred controversy among some members of the DPS community.
"This is more than putting the fox in charge of the hen house, it's serving up the hens to be eaten by this guy," said George Washington, an attorney representing the teachers and community activist groups who have spearheaded the lawsuit and who urged the board Monday to join them.
The contract, Washington says, violates state ethics laws that prohibit public officials from accepting gifts that could influence the way they perform their duties.