Are Teacher Evaluations Education ‘Reform’s’ Biggest Bust?
Would you like your job performance judged by a five-year-old? That’s a relevant question for public school teachers in Hawaii, where the state’s new teacher evaluation system attributes ten percent of their job performance rating on what children as young as 5 years old think. Although ten percent may not seem like a whole lot, in a metric based evaluation system where harsh judgments of “effecti
APR 10
4/10/2014 – America’s Biggest Failures
April 10, 2014 Subscribe THIS WEEK: Poverty Saps Instructional Time … Why Let Kids Make Rules … Chicago Charter Schools Are No Better … Do E-Books Harm Reading Comprehension … For-Profit College Capture Washington, DC TOP STORY Testing Season Reveals America’s Biggest Failures By Jeff Bryant “It’s testing season in America, and regardless of how the students do, it’s clear who is already flunki
Test Season Reveals America’s Biggest Failures
It’s testing season in America, and regardless of how the students do, it’s clear who is already flunking the exams. Last week in New York, new standardized tests began rolling out across the state, and tens of thousands of families said “no dice.” According to local news sources, over 33,000 students skipped the tests – a figure “that will probably rise.” At one Brooklyn school, so many parents o
APR 02
4/2/2014 – A ‘Fair Shot’ Agenda For Education
April 2, 2014 Subscribe THIS WEEK: The Public School Brand … Common Core Lost Opportunity … Charter Schools And Inequity … Obama’s Boldest Civil Rights Reform … Who Is ‘College Material’? TOP STORY Time For A ‘Fair Shot’ Agenda For Education By Jeff Bryant “There’s an issue rife with populist discontent that Democrats have left out of the Fair Shot agenda: K-12 education … If Democrats want to
Time For A ‘Fair Shot’ Agenda For Education
“Democrats Scramble to Stave Off Midterm Disaster” was the headline in The New York Times article this week reporting on “the problem” the party has with turning out its base in the upcoming midterm election. As the reporter explained, “Young voters have abandoned the midterm electorate at more than twice the rate of seniors. Hispanics, who favored Mr. Obama by a margin of 44 percentage points, ha
MAR 26
3/26/2014 – When ‘Reform’ Perpetuates Racial Inequity
March 26, 2014 Subscribe THIS WEEK: Demographics Affect Teacher Retention … Education Inequality Is Racial … Taxpayers Fund Creationism … Charter Pay Stays Secret … Community Colleges In Crisis TOP STORY How ‘Education Reform’ Perpetuates Racial Disparity By Jeff Bryant “America was shocked, shocked, by new data from the U.S. Department of Education last week showing that a child’s education de