NPE News Briefs ← from The Network for Public Education:
NPE News Briefs ← from The Network for Public Education
Kentucky Withdraws From PARCC Testing Consortium | Curriculum Matters – Education Week
By Catherine Gewertz on January 31, 2014 7:38 AM More news this morning on the assessment-consortium front: Kentucky has pulled out of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, better known as PARCC. Gov. Steven L. Beshear, Education Commissioner Terry Holliday and State Board President Roger L. Marcum sent a letter by email ...read more
The curious case of the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce’s upcoming Education Summit | Twin Cities Daily Planet
By Sarah Lahm Who is sponsoring the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce’s upcoming Education Summit, and why are their names no longer listed on the official promotional piece for the event? The original announcement for the Summit included Target, General Mills, and Thompson Reuters among the handful of groups and businesses sponsoring the Education Summit. However, ...read more
Senate Committee passes bill giving schools boards a say in school closings | NJ.com
Parents and community activists from Newark, Montclair and Camden testified before a state senate committee this morning in favor of a bill that requires local school boards to approve the closing of schools. Sponsored by Sen. Ronald Rice (D-Essex), the bill was prompted by Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson’s school reorganization plan, which will move, consolidate ...read more
Providence superintendent concerned about grad requirement | WPRI 12
By Dan McGowan, WPRI.com ReporterPublished: Friday, January 31, 2014, 5:36 pm PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – The superintendent of Rhode Island’s largest school district said Friday she will advise school officials to automatically begin a high school graduation waiver process for students who have failed to show partial proficiency on the state’s standardized test. Providence Schools ...read more
Di Blasio Administration Shifts Funding from Charter Schools to Pre-School Plan | Diane Ravitch’s blog
During his campaign, Mayor Bill Di Blasio pledged to provide universal pre-kindergarten for all children whose families can’t afford it. He said he would pay for UPK (universal pre-kindergarten) by imposing a modest tax increase on those with incomes over $500,000 a year. But he needs the support of Governor Cuomo and the State Legislature ...read more
Connecticut Teacher: Why I Want to Quit Teaching: UPDATE | Diane Ravitch’s blog
[Note to readers: I abridged this article to comply with copyright limits. Please open the link and read the article in full at the Hartford Courant, which had the good sense to publish it.] Thanks to the punitive actions and policies of the U.S. Department of Education and the states, there is a new genre ...read more
Happy Birthday, Mercedes | EduShyster
In which I sit down with wonder-blogger Mercedes Schneider to talk about her life, her blog and a whole lot more… On a recent trip to Louisiana I got to spend some time with wonder-blogger Mercedes Schneider, whose blog on education reform turned one year old this week. (If you don’t know it, you should). In ...read more
For school choice-loving Democrats to consider | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 31 at 12:22 pm This has been National School Choice Week, complete with thousands of events around the country to promote school choice. It was quite an organizational feat: The Education Department released new guidance on charter school lotteries, legislation was introduced in Congress to expand choice, papers were released, rallies ...read more
College Ready | Curmudgucation
One of the linchpins of proof among CCSS supporters is that Kids These Days are not ready for college. This is generally expressed in scholarly tones as “X% of college freshmen were in need of remediation” (and in more rhetorical tones as “OMGZZ!! The college freshmens are soooooo dumb that they need undumbification classes to ...read more
Some states rebrand controversial Common Core education standards | The Washington Post
By Lyndsey Layton Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) used an executive order to strip the name “Common Core” from the state’s new math and reading standards for public schools. In the Hawkeye State, the same standards are now called “The Iowa Core.” And in Florida, lawmakers want to delete “Common Core” from official documents and ...read more
As the School Turns – The reviews are in: education reform in Massachusetts has jumped the shark | EduShyster
The reviews are in: education reform in Massachusetts has jumped the shark It’s time for yet another episode in our long-running—and fast moving—reality series: As the School Turns. In today’s episode we visit two Boston schools that have been turning, returning and turning again. And we meet the guest stars who will at last usher ...read more
NCLB co-author says he never anticipated federal law would force testing obsession | EdSource Today
By Kathryn Baron Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, visited with EdSource Today staff shortly after announcing his retirement after 40 years in Congress. Credit: Lillian Mongeau, EdSource Rep. George Miller, a leading architect of the No Child Left Behind legislation, says he never anticipated that the landmark education law would ignite the testing obsession that engulfed the ...read more
An Update on New Jersey’s SGPs: Year 2 – Still not valid! | School Finance 101
I have spent much time criticizing New Jersey’s Student Growth Percentile measures over the past few years, both conceptually and statistically. So why stop now. We have been told over and over again by the Commissioner and his minions that New Jersey’s SGPs take fully into account student backgrounds by accounting for each student’s initial ...read more
Text of Maryland superintendents’ document on school reform | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 30 at 11:00 pm Here is the text of a document approved by 22 of Maryland’s 24 local schools superintendents expressing concern about how federal and state officials are forcing school districts to implement specific school reforms. You can read more about the document and why the superintendents, through the Public ...read more
“School Choice” Is Not only About Charters and Vouchers | With A Brooklyn Accent
Where are all the advocates of “school choice” when inner city parents and students organize in defense of their neighborhood schools threatened with closing, as they have done in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and now Newark? Somehow, they only mobilize when inner parents want charters or vouchers. They have no problem with Mayors and Governors ...read more
“Businessmen, Bean-Counters, Buffoons, and Bible-Thumpers” Are “Taking Over Florida Public Education” | Scathing Purple Musings
Author, columnist radio and TV talk show host Stephen L. Goldstein lives in Fort Lauderdale. He has penned a blistering opinion piece for the Sun-Sentinel about those who have seized power over Florida’s education policy: Businessmen, bean-counters, buffoons, and Bible-thumpers have been taking over Florida public education; an ever-increasing gaggle of bozos is exerting more ...read more
NPE News Briefs Podcast: Jennifer Berkshire Interviews Mercedes Schneider
On her recent trip to New Orleans, Jennifer Berkshire met with Mercedes Schneider, who just celebrated the one year anniversary of her blog. Mercedes tells us a little bit about her life and how she is able to produce such a voluminous collection of in-depth analyses of education reform topics. Both Mercedes and Jennifer will be part ...read more
Gates Foundation Cheers the Growing “Momentum” of Common Core | Diane Ravitch’s blog
The Gates Foundation has spent $200 million or so to pay for the Common Core standards. Gates paid for everything because the U.S. Department of Education is prohibited by law from doing anything that might control, direct,or supervise curriculum or instruction. Of course, this did not stop Arne Duncan from shelling out $350 million to ...read more
New York Plans Cradle-to-Grave Data Tracking of Students | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Here is another reason to opt your children out of state testing. The state plans to collect data on every student throughout their lives, on the nutty belief that someone somewhere will figure out from this Big Data “what works.” This massive collection of data reflects the NSA’s conviction that the best way to stop ...read more
Gates Foundation Invests $13 Million in Washington State Charter Schools | PND
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has announced grants totaling more than $13 million to help establish public charter schools in Washington State. Recipients of the grants include the Washington State Charter Schools Association, which was awarded $4.2 million to expand its support for educators looking to open charter schools and outreach efforts in local ...read more
JAN 30
Providence Student Union: The Guinea Pigs Protest! | Diane Ravitch’s blog
The creative Providence Student Union is staging another brilliant protest against high-stakes testing. It’s their lives! PRESS RELEASE CONTACT: Aaron Regunberg | Aaron@ProvidenceStudentUnion.org | (847) 809-6039 “GUINEA PIGS” PROTEST EXPERIMENTATION AT STATE HOUSE – STUDENTS, DRESSED AS LAB ANIMALS, DEMONSTRATE AGAINST HIGH-STAKES TESTING Providence, Rhode Island – January 29, 2014 – High school
Bill to let voucher schools out of ISTEP gutted |Indystar.com
By Eric Weddle A proposal allowing private schools accepting vouchers to use standardized tests other than Indiana’s ISTEP to assess students was quickly abandoned Wednesday night after lawmakers objected to it. Sen. Scott Schneider, R-Indianapolis, attempted to convince members of the Senate Education Committee that loosening rules for these schools would truly give parents an ...read more
Md. superintendents criticize implementation of reforms
BY VALERIE STRAUSS Nearly all of the superintendents of Maryland school districts have signed a statement that criticizes federal and state education officials for forcing them to implement several major reforms, including the Common Core State Standards, on what they say is an unrealistic timetable. The document, signed by 22 of Maryland’s 24 superintendents from ...read more
Utah School Threw Out Students’ Lunches Because They Were In Debt | Alternet
A Utah school’s child nutrition manager threw out the lunches of about 40 elementary school students this week after the kids’ parents fell behind on payment. Some parents at Uintah Elementary in Salt Lake City say they didn’t even realize they were indebted to the school. The school apparently made calls Monday and Tuesday telling ...read more
An AZ Teacher’s Perspective on Her “Value-Added” |VAMboozled
This came to me from a teacher in my home state – Arizona. Read not only what is becoming a too familiar story, but also her perspective about whether she is the only one who is “adding value” (and I use that term very loosely here) to her students’ learning and achievement. She writes: Initially, ...read more
Teachers: The heroes of #snowmageddon | AL.com
By Edward T. Bowser Tuesday night, things weren’t looking too bright for young Eden Robinson, who was set to celebrate her fourth birthday the following day. Like most folks in Birmingham, Eden’s parents Larry and Andrea Robinson were caught in the icy grip of the unexpected snow storm that froze the city solid. But old ...read more
Rhode Island Town Says No to Common Core Testing | Diane Ravitch’s blog
The school committee of Tiverton, Rhode Island, voted 4-1 to delay Common Core testing. The state education department insisted that Rhode Island educators were deeply involved in the creation of the standards. “In its resolution, the committee states that that local school committees, teachers and parents were not involved in the development of the Common ...read more
Mercedes Schneider and Peter Greene Offer Timely Help to Dennis Van Roekel | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Dennis Van Roekel is a supporter of the Common Core standards. He recently said in an article in Education Week that no one has really set out their specific objections to the standards or offered a better alternative. Two teacher-bloggers here offer help to Dennis. I know that Dennis is a dedicated advocate for teachers ...read more
Response to Obama’s Early Childhood Education Plan | @ THE CHALK FACE
BY KRIS NIELSEN President Obama promised us something in his State of the Union address that I think is bad news for our kids. Here is the excerpt, with my reply underneath: Race to the Top, with the help of governors from both parties, has helped states raise expectations and performance. Teachers and principals in ...read more
Principals applaud Fariña, de Blasio as leaders present a “tone shift” | Chalkbeat
It was a night of applause at Brooklyn Tech, as hundreds of the city’s principals assembled to hear from‚ and cheer for, new chancellor Carmen Fariña and Mayor Bill de Blasio. A few principals clapped when Fariña mentioned her new deputy chancellors. Others cheered when she announced new principal training requirements. But no reaction matched ...read more
When Will Ohio Demand Charter Accountability? | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Twenty years ago, when I supported the interesting idea of charter schools, there was a clear and oft-stated purpose for them: Freedom from regulation in exchange for results and accountability. That deal has been repudiated by the charter industry. They want freedom from regulation, freedom from supervision, and freedom from public audits with no accountability. ...read more
21 wealthy donors had decisive impact on charter law in Washington state — analysis |The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 30 at 8:14 am A new analysis of how charter school legislation passed by popular vote in 2012 in the state of Washington — after voters had rejected similar measures three times earlier — concludes that 21 vastly wealthy people, including Bill Gates, and their philanthropic organizations had a disproportionate influence on ...read more
Are the Members and Staff of the NY Board of Regents Effective? | Diane Ravitch’s blog
This statement was written by Katie Zahedi and Bianca Tanis. Katie Zahedi is principal at Linden Avenue Middle School in Red Hook, NY, and serves on the administrative panel for NYSAPE. Bianca Tanis is a public school parent in the Hudson Valley as well as an elementary special education teacher and a co-founder of NYS ...read more
A Veteran Principal Eloquently Denounces Common Core and Race to the Top | Diane Ravitch’s blog
This powerful speech was written and delivered by Frank Sutliff to a crowd of concerned citizens and educators at the Oneonta (New York) Forum on January 18, 2014. Sutliff is a Principal and is also the President of SAANYS (School Administrators Association of New York State). He said: I appreciate the opportunity I have been ...read more
U.S. Education Dept. decides Politico Pro costs too much | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 30 at 4:00 am (By Marvin Joseph/ The Washington Post) The U.S. Education Department wanted to buy an annual subscription to POLITICO Pro to read its education coverage but decided that it was too expensive. According to this solicitation, the department’s Office of Communications and Outreach (OCO) wanted to “purchase a subscription ...read more
Yes, Reformers, We SHOULD Talk About YOUR Kids’ Schools | Jersey Jazzman
Last night was a good night for public education in Newark; the same cannot be said for State Superintendent Cami Anderson: The state-appointed Newark school superintendent stormed out of an angry, tumultuous School Advisory Board (SAB) meeting a few hours ago after a parent, infuriated by Cami Anderson’s treatment of the city’s children, asked “Why don’t ...read more
JAN 29
NPE News Briefs Podcast: Tim Slekar on Teacher Education
As the Dean of the School of Education at Edgewood College in Madison, Wisconsin, Dr. Tim Slekar prepares the next generation of teachers to address the challenges of the schools of the 21st century. He also hosts the popular Sunday night radio show @thechalkface along with Shaun Johnson. In this podcast, Tim Slekar discusses teacher education, the topic ...read more
Students protest NECAPs; ‘We’re not guinea pigs’ | WPRI 12
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) — Dressed as guinea pigs and lab rats, members of Providence’s Student Union converged on the Rhode Island’s State House to protest high-stakes testing. They say tying performance on the NECAP standardized test to a high school diploma is an untested experiment that treats students like test subjects. The NECAP – which ...read more
Scary New Surveillance State Idea: Government Tracking Students from Preschool to Workforce | Alternet
The education sector, long frustrated by transient fads that have failed to uplift decades of sub-par student achievement, thinks it has finally found its knight in shining armor: an omnipresent data archive that will track students from pre-school to graduation, noting every teacher and test score. Then it will tack that trail of data onto ...read more
Deasy: Poverty Has No Causal Role in Low Performance | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Los Angeles Superintendent John Deasy testified in the trial of the lawsuit claiming that teacher tenure violates the civil rights of students. The plaintiffs in the Vergara lawsuit want to eliminate due process so it is easier to fire teachers if their students have low test scores. Most researchers acknowledge that family income and education ...read more
Civil rights hero launches ‘American Child’s Education Bill of Rights’ | The Answer Sheet
Calling modern school reform “catastrophically misguided and ineffective,” civil rights icon James Meredith is launching what he calls the American Child’s Education Bill of Rights, a 12-point declaration of obligations that he says the nation owes every public school child. The 80-year-old Meredith was the first black student to graduate from the University of Mississippi. ...read more
Education Department changes charter school lottery rules | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS The Education Department on Wednesday released new guidance that allows charter schools receiving federal funds to change their student admissions lotteries so that low-income and educationally disadvantaged students can have more weight in an effort to create more integrated schools. Explaining the changes in this post are Richard D. Kahlenberg and Halley ...read more
So, Will Florida Use Tony Bennett’s Tests? | Scathing Purple Musings
Maybe. Jeff Solochek reports that Tony Bennett’s new employer ACT Aspire has launched a website to get Florida to bite on their tests: With negotiations to become Florida’s test provider getting under way, ACT Aspire has taken the unusual step of launching a website to explain its benefits to Floridians. ACT Aspire is one of ...read more
Social Studies isn’t English Language Arts’ Annoying Relative. | @ THE CHALK FACE
BY ANGEL CINTRON JR. More and more, it seems that educational resources support two core courses: English Language Arts and Mathematics. In my opinion, this is a dangerous trend in education, today. At a time when students must prepare to live within global society, education curriculum and instructional resources are ignoring other critical subjects. As a ...read more
Battle heating up against high-stakes tests | catalyst-chicago.org
By: Sarah Karp Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett sent a letter to parents on Wednesday telling them why they should not have their child opt-out of the ISAT and the NWEA/MAP tests, the second time in less than two months she has issued such a letter. In a swift counter-move, parent groups that oppose high-stakes testing ...read more
Obama on education: Rhetoric vs. reality | The Answer Sheet
There’s nothing new about President Obama giving speeches in which he talks about school reform in ways that have little to do with reality (see, for example, here and here), but there was something especially disconnected about the education rhetoric in his 2014 State of the Union speech. He managed to criticize standardized tests in which kids ...read more
21st Century Child Abuse | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Recently I was listening to a classical music station and heard a beautiful piece of music. The announcer said when it ended that Mozart composed it at the age of 9. I couldn’t help thinking, “but what were his test scores?” When I watched the chorus of the Celia Cruz High School sing the National ...read more
NH Teachers Take CC Test, Find Serious Flaws | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Here is a question: Answer in five sentences or less. Who decided all the students of the U.S. should be tested online? Another question: Who benefits? What can we do about it? Opt out. Teachers in Nashua, Néw Hampshire, took an early version of the online Common Core test, Smarter Balanced Assessment, and encountered multiple ...read more
The Problem with Choice | Yinzercation
We Americans love choice. Just look at the cereal aisle in Giant Eagle. You could choose a different box every day of the month and still have more varieties left to try. But public schools are not corn flakes. Here’s the problem with “choice” when we’re talking about public education. When we’re in the cereal ...read more
What It’s Like For States Not Burdened by Common Core | Scathing Purple Musings
Florida wisely dropped the legislature’s bad idea to require Algebra II last year only to have its education commissioner tweak Common Core by putting in Calculus standards, a math domain two levels above the course the state bagged the year before. Only in a state where education policy is dominated by a former governor’s foundations ...read more
School Choice Undermines Urban School Districts | janresseger
by janresseger Proponents of school choice have dubbed this week School Choice Week. In honor of School Choice Week, Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander, the Secretary of Education under the first George Bush and today the top Republican on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, announced a new bill to provide a kind of ...read more
Emanuel defends new charter schools | chicagotribune.com
By John Byrne Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Tuesday dismissed criticism aimed at his hand-picked school board’s decision to approve seven new charter schools after it shuttered 47 neighborhood schools last year, saying they’re two separate issues. The mayor made his first public comments on the matter since the Chicago Board of Education vote last week ...read more
New Jersey: Law Aims to Curb School Closings | Diane Ravitch’s blog
David Sciarra of the Education Law Center in Néw Jersey wrote this description of a legislative proposal that would slow or stop school closings in state-controlled districts such as Newark. The key change is that schools may not be closed without the approval of the local board. Sciarra writes: NJ Parents Push New Bill to ...read more
Malloy Calls For Slowdown Of Teacher Evaluation Program | Courant.com
January 29, 2014 HARTFORD — Faced with growing criticism of the roll-out of new academic standards and other school reforms this year, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy Tuesday called for a significant slowdown of a new teacher evaluation program, a major component of his education strategy. “Since the beginning of the school year, we have heard ...read more
Breaking News: The Hero Parents of Newark | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Last night, the parents of Newark spoke out in unison against the bullying tactics of the Christie administration. As veteran journalist Bob Braun reported, state-appointed superintendent Cami Anderson stormed out of the meeting after a parent accused her of not caring as much about Newark’s children as she does about her own. The parents of ...read more
JAN 28
Obama on education in SOTU — text | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS Here’s the part of President Obama’s 2014 State of the Union address that deals with education, from prepared remarks provided by the White House: Today in America, a teacher spent extra time with a student who needed it, and did her part to lift America’s graduation rate to its highest level in ...read more
A plea to the public for help in tracking down the Malloy Administration’s effort to extend $1 million contract | Wait What?
An out-of-state company of consultants that have already collected $1 million in taxpayer funds wants even more. Wait, What? needs your help in tracking down this travesty of justice. The following link is to the $1 million contract between Commissioner of Education Stefan Pryor and Mass Insight, the out-of-state company brought in help Commissioner Pryor ...read more
How “School Choice” Has Failed Louisiana (Especially New Orleans) Parents | deutsch29
January 28, 2014 Advocates of the privatization of American public education have proclaimed the week of January 26, 2014, as “school choice week.” As such, they are celebrating the creation of their own lucrative bureaucracy, one that is anything but controlled by parents. In short, “school choice” is a misnomer. “School choice” would be better ...read more
Teachers sue over suspensions, claiming Newark district violated their free-speech rights | NJ.com
By Peggy McGlone/The Star-Ledger NEWARK — Five Newark school principals suspended for speaking out against a controversial school reorganization plan filed a federal lawsuit today charging that their constitutional rights to free speech were violated. In addition, one school’s parent-teacher organization president joined the suit, saying the district’s refusal to allow him to enter his ...read mor
The hype and reality of ‘school choice’ | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 28 at 11:00 am In case you missed any of the endless streams of announcements, it’s National School Choice Week, and advocates are staging thousands of events across the country to talk it up. There is even a school choice train making a whistle-stop tour across the country for rallies and other such goings-on to ...read more
Chicago’s newest church-affiliated charter school | Mike Klonsky’s SmallTalk Blog
Sometimes even cynical me can be found gasping at the audacity of Chicago’s charter school hustlers. My latest gasp came after reading about the newest church-affiliated charter approved by the mayor’s hand-picked school board last week, targeted for the Austin neighborhood on Chicago’s west side. It’s called By The Hand Charter School, situated within the ...read more
Lamar Alexander Proposes Sweeping Voucher Legislation | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Lamar Alexander, Republican Senator from Tennessee, will propose voucher legislation today in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute. According to politico.com, “The Tennessee Republican will roll out a school choice bill at the American Enterprise Institute today. It consolidates dozens of federal programs that make up about 41 percent of all federal education spending, ...read more
Reform and Engineering Systems | Curmudgucation
Peter DeWitt ran a column last week on NBC’s Education Nation advertising site leaping off from the question of how to chart a course through the middle of this debate. I feel his pain. Education has become another area in US life where it is no longer enough to believe that the people you disagree ...read more
Math Teacher Explains What Is Wrong with the Common Core | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Roy Turrentine, an experienced teacher of mathematics in Tennessee, explains why the Common Core standards are misdirecting the teaching of his subject. The creators of the CCSS did a disservice to the standards and to American education by refusing the test the standards in real classrooms with real teachers and real students. By failing to ...read more
What We Know (and Ignore) about Standards, Achievement, and Equity | the becoming radical
Calling for, establishing, and implementing high (or higher) standards has been a part of U.S. public education at least since the 1890s when the Committee of Ten called for higher standards for high schools to prepare students for college. The more recent accountability era built on standards (and multiple versions of revised standards) and high-stakes ...read more
Commissioner Pryor and entourage are the biggest threat to Malloy’s Re-election… | Wait What?
Considering Governor Dannel Malloy won the last gubernatorial election with less than 50% of the 1.2 million votes cast and his margin of victory was only 6,404 votes, virtually anything could cost him his re-election dreams. But forget the Republicans and their propensity to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory… Forget Malloy’s tax increases ...read more
Why New York’s Common Core Collapse Continues to Haunt Florida | Scathing Purple Musings
Florida is a year or two behind New York implementing Common Core and its rigid high-stakes tests regime and New York’s rapidly unfolding collapse has gone beyond cautionary tale status. State superintendent John King was told by a legislator last week that the only supporters of Core left are “yourself (King) and the members of ...read more
Mayor de Blasio Defends Preschool and After-School Programs with Determination | janresseger
by janresseger New York’s new mayor, Bill de Blasio made the needs of young children and pre-adolescents the centerpiece of his election campaign last fall. A promotional website describes a well framed “plan to raise taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers to fund universal pre-k for every four year old and after school for every ...read more
Whitehurst: Test More, Not Less | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Grover (Russ) Whitehurst is worried that the public is turning against standardized testing. As George W. Bush’s director of education research, he was and is a true believer in testing. As head of the Brown Center at Brookings, once known as a bastion of liberal thought, Whitehurst wants to see the programs he tended under ...read more
The reform mess – an open letter to NY education officials | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 28 at 6:00 am Here is an open letter to New York state education officials from Richard C. Iannuzzi, president of the New York State United Teachers, and Carol Burris, the award-winning principal of South Side High School in Rockville Centre, NY. Last Saturday, the Board of Directors of the teachers union voted ...read more
Common Core Education Standards Face Bipartisan Backlash | NPR
Supporters of the new Common Core education standards adopted by 45 states say the standards hold American students to much higher expectations, and move curriculum away from a bubble-test culture that encourages test preparation over deeper learning. But there’s growing backlash to Common Core, and conservatives and liberals increasingly are voicing similar concerns: that the ...read more
Peter Greene: Do Choice Schools Need Testing? | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Peter Greene, a teacher in Pennsylvania, has emerged as a favorite blogger of mine. He is on top of the news with sage observations, and he is pithy. In this post, he looks closely at University of Arkansas’ professor Jay Greene’s argument that schools of choice do not need testing. Jay Greene, a professor in ...read more
JAN 27
Obama’s Empty Rhetoric on Education | Stephen Lurie – The Atlantic
As the crescendo of his first Address to a Joint Session of Congress in January 2009, newly elected President Barack Obama decided to share a story of a school. That school was called J.V. Martin Middle School, in Dillon, South Carolina. The President described it as “a place where the ceilings leak, the paint peels ...read more
Why support for Common Core is sinking | The Answer Sheet
BY VALERIE STRAUSS January 27 at 2:45 pm Over the weekend, the Board of Directors of the New York State United Teachers, a union with more than 600,000 members, passed a resolution withdrawing support for the Common Core State Standards “as implemented and interpreted” by the state Education Department and also declaring “no confidence” in the ...read more
Matt Di Carlo: New Data Show High Teacher Attrition in DC | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Matthew Di Carlo of the Shanker Institute reports a new study of teacher attrition in the District of Columbia. The numbers of teachers leaving the district are startling. Whether it is working conditions or policy, the District is not a good place to work. DCPS has an attrition rate of 25%, far above the national ...read more
Call the Governor; tomorrow is Data Privacy Day! | NYC Public School Parents
Tomorrow is National Data Privacy Day. Please take a moment to sign this petition and call Governor Cuomo at (518) 474-8390 with the following message: The Governor needs to publicly oppose the state’s plan to share student data with inBloom Inc. and other vendors. NY is now the worst state in the country when it ...read more
The White Choice | EduShyster
A growing number of choosy choosers are choosing the white choice for their children It’s hard to believe but National School Choice Week is here again. This year’s choicetacular celebration started off with a bang—make that a bell—as students from Newark Prep Charter School, operated by K12 (NYSE: LRN), rang the New York Stock Exchange opening bell, ...read more
@PARCCplace : More bang for the buck? | @ THE CHALK FACE
BY CHRIS CERRONE The PARCC folks and Common Core cheerleaders like to talk about the next generation of standardized testing. Are these new tests worth the $29.50 per student cost? In my state of New York that would triple the cost of the current 3-8 testing program. Of course we will also need to seriously ...read more
Indiana voucher students double to nearly 20,000 | Indystar.com
By Stephanie Wang As the state’s school choice program takes off — quintupling in size over its first three years with a hefty recent expansion — data released Monday show that Indiana is providing vouchers to an increasing number of students who never attended public schools. It leaves some educators wondering whether the state has ...read more
Burris: New York’s Old Standards Better than Common Core | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Carol Burris, principal of South Side High School in Rockville Center, NY, has read the Common Core standards. The 2005 Néw York standards, she concluded, were superior. Parents and educators are outraged. Does State Commussioner John King care? Burris writes: “”Hit the delay button.” That was the message New York’s senators sent to state Education ...read more
Erased Answers on Tests in Philadelphia Lead to a Three-Year Cheating Scandal | NYTimes.com
The first sign that something was wrong appeared more than two years ago when a company grading student tests from Philadelphia noticed that erasures from wrong to right answers showed what investigators delicately called “statistical evidence of improbable results.” Pennsylvania began an investigation, eventually instructing the school district to look into improprieties at 19 schools. ...read mo
Teacher: Indiana Punishes Struggling Schools Instead of Helping Them | Diane Ravitch’s blog
If you saw a person drowning, would you throw him a life preserver or would you tell him to swim harder? Or perhaps withdraw the lifeline that he was clinging to? If you saw a visually impaired person trying to cross a busy street, would you help her or would you tell her she is ...read more
Bad Journalism, Test-Mania, and High Education: “A Flabbergasting Reality” – @ THE CHALK FACE
BY PLTHOMASEDD LEAVE A COMMENT About thirty years after the fabricated “the sky is falling” moment in public education—A Nation at Risk—we may be witnessing a similar dismantling of higher education in the U.S., as John Marcus overstates: On weekend mornings all this winter, anxious high school juniors and seniors will file into school cafeterias ...read more
Debate about Cost of Pre-K Grows in NY | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Elected officials in NY are debating the cost of universal pre-K. It was a central plank in Mayor Bill de Blasio’s campaign. He won in a landslide. He wants to pay for it by a tiny tax increase on incomes over $500,000. This would add about $1,000 a year in new taxes, less than dinner ...read more
New Study: Cami Anderson’s “One Newark” Will Not Create One Newark | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Cami Anderson, appointed by the Christie administration as superintendent of Newark, New Jersey, has a plan called “One Newark.” Newark has been under state control since 1995. Oddly enough, Anderson’s plan is not about “One Newark.” “One Newark” would be a plan to unify the schools, the students, the families, and the community into a ...read more
Misreading Florida | Schools Matter
The headline appears simple enough: Fla. Pushes Longer Day, More Reading in Some Schools Gewertz explains: Two years ago, Florida took a step no other state has taken to improve students’ reading skills: It required its 100 lowest-performing elementary schools to add an extra hour to their school day and to use that time for ...read more
Common Core costs up, instruction time down, Opt Out movement takes hold | Wait What?
When it comes to the implementation of the Common Core and its related Smarter Balanced Assessment (SBAC) testing frenzy, the tide is beginning to turn. As a result of the policies being pushed by Governor Malloy and Education Commissioner Stefan Pryor, massive amounts of school instruction time will give way to even more standardized test ...read more
Will the President Say Something Meaningful in SOTU about Inequality and Public Education? | janresseger
Sean Reardon, the Stanford University sociologist has extensively documented the impact of neighborhood inequality on school achievement. In a report released last fall, Residential Segregation by Income, 1970-2009, with Kendra Bischoff of Cornell University, Reardon describes residential segregation by income across our nation’s 117 largest metropolitan areas (those with populations of 500,000 in
How Come Florida Legislators Aren’t Talking About VAM and Merit Pay? | Scathing Purple Musings
Miami-Dade superintendent Alberto Carvalho made the pitch to the state board of education last week that Florida must pause its multiple accountability systems: Carvalho said the proposal would make it clear which schools and districts were performing well and which were not. “There is a way of creating a transitional accountability system,” he said, “that ...read more
How do we know what/when young kids are ready to learn? | The Answer Sheet
How do we really know when young children are ready to learn specific material? Here to explain is cognitive scientist Daniel Willingham, professor and director of graduate studies in psychology at the University of Virginia and author of “Why Don’t Students Like School?” His latest book is “When Can You Trust The Experts? How to ...read more
A teacher’s experience in a Gulen charter school | Seattle Education
Is it about the money or spreading a political/religious belief? The Gulen charter chain has submitted a proposal to establish a charter school in Washington State called the Coral Academy of Science. You can read more about the school and the Gulen charter chain at Another charter school applicant: Coral Academy of Science… and the Gulen Movement. ...read more
Welner Writes a Message to the President: Are We Serious About Reducing Inequality? | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Kevin Welner, director of the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder, wrote the following: Poverty and the Education Opportunity Gap: Will the SOTU Step Up? Tuesday’s State of the Union address will apparently focus on issues of wealth inequality in the United States. The impact of poverty is extremely ...read more
What privacy protections are there when states share data with the testing consortia or with the feds? | NYC Public School Parents
This year, the issue of student privacy and data sharing has become a huge issue throughout the nation, partly because of the uproar over inBloom Inc., but also as the US Department of Education has pushed states into adopting the Common Core standards and aligned exams, facilitated the widespread disclosure of children’s personal data to ...read more
Holding Arne Duncan to a Higher Standard | Jason Stanford – Huffington Post
America, the elites are very disappointed in you. We’re not keeping up with South Korea and Singapore, they tell us, because you are coddling your mediocre children who are being taught by bottom-of-the-barrel teachers. But have no fear, help is on the way! Pearson, the testing company that has gotten rich by making American students ...read more
JAN 26
Here Comes Efficacy! | Curmudgucation
I’m not sure who injected “rigor” into the education conversation in this country, but there can be no doubt who decided that we will now be talking about “efficacy”– Pearson has made the term the centerpiece of their newest corporate initiative. And they’re put a ton of their corporate information about the efficacy initiative on ...read more
Breaking News: New York Teachers’ Union Votes No-Confidence in State Commissioner John King | Diane Ravitch’s blog
On Saturday morning, the Board of Directors of NYSUT–the New York State United Teachers–voted unanimously for a resolution of “no confidence” in State Commissioner John King. This is tantamount to calling for his removal. The implementation of Common Core testing in New York state was widely recognized as a fiasco. Many legislators, including the leader ...read more
Breaking News: Indiana’s Governor Pence Will Try Again to Strip Glenda Ritz of Authority | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Republicans in Indiana still can’t get over the fact that the voters elected Glenda Ritz as state commissioner of education in 2012 and tossed out their idol, Tony Bennett, who outspent Ritz 10-1. Ritz won more votes than Governor Mike Pence. Ever since the election, Pence has tried to take away the powers of the ...read more
Some states get cold feet as Common Core testing draws near | USA Today
Beginning in March, more than four million students will serve as guinea pigs for the English and math tests for the Common Core, a set of standards adopted by almost every state that map out what students should know and be able to do in each grade. Ultimately, Common Core tests will be used to ...read more
Teacher Blasts Los Angeles’ “Sneak Attack” on Music Program | Diane Ravitch’s blog
This comment came from Barbara Aran, a retired music teacher in Los Angeles: She wrote: This what I planned to say to the LAUSD Board on Tuesday December 17th, but couldn’t get in–this is what I would have said on that day: My name is Barbara Aran. I am a retired LAUSD elementary teacher. Today ...read more
Rick Hess Chides Corporate Reformers for Too Much Reforminess | NYC Educator
Today’s Daily News features reformy Rick writing of regrettable ramifications of uber-reforminess. Unfortunately, and perhaps even deliberately, he misses the point altogether. There’s good reason to regularly test students in reading and math, and to use those results to inform judgments about how well schools and teachers are doing. What reason is that? In fact, ...read more
Indiana HB1320: The ALEC, Bill Gates, Rupert Murdoch Plan for Student Data | Schools Matter
By Doug Martin You would think with many more Hoosiers finding out each and every day about the complete scam known as Indiana school reform, the legislators in Indianapolis would be smart enough to give it a rest. But no, instead of doing damage control on the eve of the release of my book Hoosier ...read more
Some of America’s Richest Financiers Fund Campaign for Tax Credits in New York | Diane Ravitch’s blog
Some of the nation’s wealthiest men are building a campaign chest to promote tax credits for private and religious schools. If the legislature acts on their request, it would transfer $250 million in education funds to nonpublic schools. 5,000 students packed the Westchester County Convention Center in White Plains, New York,last November to cheer the ...read more
What Our “One Newark” Report Means | Jersey Jazzman
Late Thursday, Bruce Baker and I released our analysis of “One Newark,” the plan to restructure schools in the state-run district. I’ll admit the report is a bit heavy on technical language, but that’s as it should be: we wanted to be clear about how we approached the task of evaluating One Newark, and why ...read more