NPE News Briefs ← from The Network for Public Education:
Study: Almost Half of Public School Students Are Now Low-Income | Jordan Weissmann – The Atlantic
A new study reminds us that poverty is the giant backpack dragging down American students. In America, what you earn depends largely on your success in school. Unfortunately, your success in school depends largely on what your parents earn. It’s an intergenerational Catch 22 that’s at the heart of modern poverty. Keep that in mind while looking at the ...read moreThe post Study: Almost Half of Pub
State Board Wants A-F Grades Faster, Asks Legislative Leaders To Intervene | StateImpact Indiana
The State Board of Education wants the Indiana General Assembly in charge of the 2012-13 school letter grades, not the Department of Education. In a letter to Speaker of the House Brian Bosma and Senate President Pro Tem David Long, the board members requested that the state’s legislative services agency run the A-F school ratings, ...read moreThe post State Board Wants A-F Grades Faster, Asks Leg
Some NC teachers plan walkout; others plan walk-in | News 14
RALEIGH – Last month, News 14 Carolina was the first media outlet to report on some teachers planning a walkout for Nov. 4. Now, another group is urging teachers instead to take part in a walk-in. Teachers have been speaking out all year; frustrated over low pay, no raises, the end of teacher tenure and ...read moreThe post Some NC teachers plan walkout; others plan walk-in | News 14 appeared firs
Community plans next steps after losing vote against Noble Charter | catalyst-chicago.org
By: Jenna Frasier / October 18, 2013 Two community groups are trying to figure out their next steps after they lost their battle to block the construction of a new Noble Street Charter School. The City Council’s zoning committee voted 7 to 3 to approve a request to rezone an area across the street from ...read moreThe post Community plans next steps after losing vote against Noble Charter | cataly
YESTERDAY
Moody’s Investor Service Confirms Worry that Privatization is Destroying Urban School Districts | janresseger
In an earlier post, Creating Public School Districts of Last Resort, I described my own concern that public school policies being driven by the federal Race to the Top grants, School Improvement Grants, and No Child Left Behind Waivers—policies that include incentives to close public schools and expand charters—are creating urban public school districts-of-last-resort. Charter ...read moreThe pos
$500 million? No! $3 BILLION! That’s $3BILLION! Comments New York State’s Underfunding of NYC Schools | School Finance 101
New York’s Governor Cuomo has been big on words promising NOT TO FUND New York State schools and squeeze them to the maximum extent possible with layers of cuts and caps. After all – NOT FUNDING SCHOOLS is the most noble of endeavors – that along with declaring death penalties for those underfunded, high need ...read moreThe post $500 million? No! $3 BILLION! That’s $3BILLION! Comments New York St
When Charters Cause Harm (and Leaders Fail to Lead) | Yinzercation
Pittsburgh got some most unwelcome news this week: the state is foisting two charter schools upon us that our school board voted against. This will add millions to the district’s budget deficit just as we are being told we must close more schools in our communities in order to address that deficit. Meanwhile, our legislators ...read moreThe post When Charters Cause Harm (and Leaders Fail to Lead)
Study: Poor children are now the majority in American public schools in South, West | The Washington Post
By Lyndsey Layton, Published: October 16 E-mail the writer A majority of students in public schools throughout the American South and West are low-income for the first time in at least four decades, according to a new study that details a demographic shift with broad implications for the country. The analysis by the Southern Education Foundation, ...read moreThe post Study: Poor children are now t
Lawmakers call for education chief’s resignation | Capital New York
BY JESSICA BAKEMAN 6:15 pm Oct. 17, 2013 ALBANY–Unions and their legislative allies are increasing the pressure on New York State education commissioner John King, with state lawmakers calling for his resignation and a powerful teachers’ union planning public forums to “fill the void” created by the ones the commissioner canceled. King has faced a ...read moreThe post Lawmakers call for education
How allowing NC schools to be ‘graded’ fails our students | NewsObserver.com
By Pamela Grundy The large, orange-red D-minus dominates the web page, leaping out from the white background. I’m looking at a so-called “Report Card” for Shamrock Gardens Elementary School, prepared by a lobbying group known as The Carolina Campaign for Achievement Now, or CarolinaCAN. As everyone who has ever gotten a report card knows, a ...read moreThe post How allowing NC schools to be ‘grade
A Broadie Wreaks Havoc in Montclair, New Jersey | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Starting in 2002, the unaccredited Broad Superintendents “Academy” has produced graduates who supposedly learned the management techniques to turn the nation’s schools around. The Academy consists of six weekends over a ten-month session, where aspiring leaders are immersed in Billionaire Eli Broad’s management philosophy, which apparently means top-down mandates, high-stakes testing, close school
TFA Scores Big Win in Federal Debt Deal | Diane Ravitch’s blog
One of the provisions of No Child Left Behind was a requirement that the neediest children would have “highly qualified teachers.” Most people would interpret that language to mean that poor kids would get teachers who are well-prepared and experienced. But through its political connections on Capitol Hill, Teach for America managed to get a ...read moreThe post TFA Scores Big Win in Federal Debt
What poor children need in school | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS October 18 at 6:00 am Yesterday I wrote a post about how public education’s biggest problem — poverty — keeps getting worse, with the news from a new report that a majority of students in public schools in the American South and West are low-income for the first time in at least four decades. ...read moreThe post What poor children need in school | The Answer Sheet appeared firs
Can You Advise This Parent? | Diane Ravitch’s blog
I received the following comment this morning. I don’t have the answer to everything, and I am not sure what I would do in her place, but this is my advice. Organize the other parents of kindergarten children. Go as a group to the superintendent and tell him this is wrong. Get parents of children ...read moreThe post Can You Advise This Parent? | Diane Ravitch’s blog appeared first on NPE News Bri
New Community-Based Approach to Accountability Featured on PBS-TV EdTalk | Cloaking Inequity
How can we banish No Child Left Behind’s top-down and narrow paradigm? Local control has been a bedrock principle of public schooling in America since its inception. NCLB sent us in the opposite direction of this traditional notion. A return to a traditional locally-based educational policy can be again realized via a multiple measures approach to ...read moreThe post New Community-Based Approach
The Reformy Campaign Finance Machine Goes To Georgia | Jersey Jazzman
Last spring, I happened – by sheer luck – to come across an unannounced, coordinated campaign finance machine, put together to support reformy candidates in school board and state-level races across the country. This machine distributed more than one-quarter million dollars to small, obscure races that had never seen this level of campaign finance before: ...read moreThe post The Reformy Campaign
Hold the Applause, Please! The Budget Deal: Why did schools, teachers, moms, infants, children and others get sacrificed? | Reclaim Reform
Posted on October 17, 2013 by Ken Previti “The legislation would allow teachers participating in alternative-certification programs (for example, TEACH FOR AMERICA) to be considered ‘highly qualified’ for an additional two years, through the 2015-16 school year.” Read the Education Week article HERE. What is this doing in a “clean” budget bill? What else is ...read moreThe post Hold the Applause,
John King’s Uncommon Schools Charters Opt Out of RTTT Which Makes Their Teachers Exempt From King’s Eval System | Ed Notes Online
One more example of the deep corruption ed deform brings. State Education Commissioner John King is overhauling New York’s method of evaluating teachers — but Uncommon Schools don’t have to follow the new state rules, as they have opted out of federal Race to the Top funds… Daily New And by the way, guess which ...read moreThe post John King’s Uncommon Schools Charters Opt Out of RTTT Which Makes
Albuquerque High School Students Speak Out | @ THE CHALK FACE
OCTOBER 18, 2013 BY KRIS NIELSEN 2 COMMENTS Here is a letter that originated with the Cibola High School student body, and is being copied and personalized and distributed by a growing number of New Mexico high schools, accompanied by a petition for Stand4KidsNM. Hey, Hanna Skandera said she wanted to hear more from the ...read moreThe post Albuquerque High School Students Speak Out | @ THE CHALK
Can they be this obsessed with data? | The Answer Sheet
Can they be this obsessed with data? Look at some of the data that U.S. Education Department is requiring organizations that receive Promise Neighborhoods grants to collect and report: via Can they be this obsessed with data?.The post Can they be this obsessed with data? | The Answer Sheet appeared first on NPE News Briefs.