John Thompson: The Gates Foundation Leapt, Now MET Looks
What would have happened if the Gates Foundation's Measures of Effective Teaching (MET) research had been conducted before the "Billionaires Boys Club's" preferences were codified into law in Race to the Top and the Department of Education's NCLB waiver requirements? How would their final report, "Ensuring Fair and Reliable Measures of Effective Teaching," read if its findings were reported before value-added evaluations were imposed on the nation's schools? Even if the same researchers had used the same methodology and made identical findings, how would that evidence have been presented?
Had the Gates Foundation looked at the evidence before foisting test-driven accountability on states, their prime conclusion might have been rephrased as, "our analysis should giveheart pause to those who have invested considerable effort to develop practices and policies to measure and support effective teaching."
It would be too much to ask for scholars to analyze the policy evidence and then echo the old Gilda Radner skitson Saturday Night Live, "Never mind!"
But, surely the Gates Foundation knows that it is improperly spinning the evidence when it asks the concluding
Had the Gates Foundation looked at the evidence before foisting test-driven accountability on states, their prime conclusion might have been rephrased as, "our analysis should give
It would be too much to ask for scholars to analyze the policy evidence and then echo the old Gilda Radner skitson Saturday Night Live, "Never mind!"
But, surely the Gates Foundation knows that it is improperly spinning the evidence when it asks the concluding
19 Year Old Zack Kopplin Challenges Public Funding of Creationist Schools
You may have heard recently about a 19 year old activist who has been shaking things up in Louisiana. Zack Kopplin cares about science, and when creationists attempted to sway the science textbook process in 2010,he got involved. More recently he has been fighting the diversion of public funds to schools that teach creationism. A press release he sent out this week stated the following:
