Are Our High School Students Dumb? Are Our High Schools Disastrous?
I received a letter from John Ogozolak, a teacher in upstate New York, where the economy has long been in serious trouble, with a paucity of jobs and economic opportunity. I decided to share it, because like him, I too have wondered what message we give our high school students. The politicians and the media constantly tell them how dumb they are, how lazy and shiftless, yet they are our future. W
TAMSA: The Hero Moms of Texas
The heroes of the movement to reduce standardized testing in Texas is a group called TAMSA. The unwieldy title is Texans Advocating for Meaningful Student Assessment. They are better known as Moms Ahainst Drunk Testing. They realized that Pearson had a lock on the Texas legislature as that body passed more and more testing requirements. The legislature cut $5 Billion from the schools’ budget yet
Teach Plus Corrects Errors in Last Week’s Report About Testing Time
Last week, the Gates-funded group Teach Plus put out a report saying that state testing didn’t take up all that much time, despite the loud complaints of parents and teachers. The howls of outrage on the Education Week site caused the researchers at Teach Plus to take another look, and they discovered they were wrong. Reporter Catherine Gewertz follows the story here. She begins: Remember that stu
A Balanced, Sane Explanation of the Issues in the Vergara Case
Ben Spielberg here explains the issues in the Vergara case, the litigation attempting to eliminate due process and seniority for teachers in Los Angles, and likely, for California. This is a big case for those trying to destroy unions and any rights for teachers. Ben’s analysis is the best I have seen to date. He includes recommendations for improving the laws.
What School Grades Measure Best: Family Income
A reader forwarded this excellent article that appeared in the Denver Post. The author Robert Zubrin scanned the state’s tables ranking schools based in large part on test scores. And this was his amazing discovery: “So, does this testing data, acquired at great expense in both money and class time, tell us which schools are doing their job and which are performing poorly? Not at all. Rather, wh
Carol Burris: How the NY Regents Fooled the Public on Common Core
Carol Burris explains here how the New York Board of Regents hoaxed the public into thinking they had agreed to major changes when they actually changed nothing. She writes: “The press was led to believe the Regents pulled back the passing scores on the Common Core English Language Arts and math exams for the Class of 2017 from 75 and 80 to a score of 65 on both exams. The State Education Depart
What Do a Law Professor and a Kindergarten Teacher Have in Common?
Ty Alpert is a law professor at The University of California in Berkeley, one of the nation’s most prestigious law schools. He is running for school board in Berkeley. As he thought about the challenges of teaching today, he realized that his child’s kindergarten teacher was teaching some of the same skills he was teaching: “Brook Pessin-Whedbee teaches five-year-olds at Rosa Parks. I teach law st
League of Women Voters in Florida Studying Charter Schools
When I lectured at the University of Florida, I met Sue Legg of the League of Women Voters. She informed me that the League has undertaken a county-by-county study of charter schools across the state. Florida has nearly 600 charters, including for-profit charter chains and non-profit charter chains. (Vice-President Biden’s brother Frank runs one of the for-profit chains.) These schools draw money
Whitehurst of Brookings Supports Vouchers for Pre-K, Doubts Need for It
Grover (Russ) Whitehurst,who served as director of the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences during the administration of George W. Bush, testified before a Congressional committee in opposition to federal support for universal pre-kindergarten, except as a voucher for families to use for the setting of their choice. Whitehurst is now at the Brookings Institution, once con
EduShyster: A Soap Opera in Boston: As the School Turns
It is hard to be sure who first had the idea that the way to improve schools was to fire the staff and start all over again. When No Child Left Behind was written, it set an impossible goal of 100% proficiency, then set out a series of escalating sanctions for schools that were unable to do the impossible. The ultimate sanction–based on no research, experience, or wisdom–was to close the school.
LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 2-11-14 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all
Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all: Teacher: Why “Stupid Bubble Tests” Are MeaninglessIn this post, which arrived a few days ago as a comment, Ron Lapekas, a retired teacher, explains why standardized tests have no value or validity for many students: “I am a retired teacher. I always thought the SBT’s (Stupid Bubble Tests) had little value for my East Los Angeles 99