New NEA leader to nation’s educators: Revolt, ignore ‘stupid’ reforms
To call the woman who is about to take the helm of the National Education Association “outspoken” would be something of an understatement. Lily Eskelsen GarcÃa, who will take over next month as president of the largest teachers union in the country (and, for that matter, the largest union of any kind in the country), […]
How Robin Williams joked about school
The late Robin Williams credited his “gestalt high school” in California with sparking his interest in entertainment. Born in Chicago, he grew up in Michigan, where he attended the private Detroit Country Day School. He told interviewers that he was bullied by classmates when he was young because he was overweight, and he played at […]
Robin Williams’ commencement speech in ’96 film ‘Jack’: ‘In the end none of us has very long on this Earth’
In the 1996 film Jack, Robin Williams played a boy who ages four times faster than normal. As his high school valedictorian, he delivers the commencement speech at graduation, telling his classmates to enjoy their lives and to “make your lives spectacular. “In the end none of us has very long on this Earth,” he […]
50 ways schools ‘cheat’ on high-stakes standardized tests
In March 2013, Atlanta Schools superintendent Beverly Hall and 34 other educators and administrators were charged in a 65-count indictment on racketeering charges in what prosecutors say was a conspiracy to cheat on high-stakes standardized tests. Those 35 were just a fraction of the more than 175 principals and teachers found by state investigators in 2011 […]
‘I love when kids are smarter than tests (which is most of the time)’
I love when kids are smarter than tests (which is most of the time). pic.twitter.com/ayJGquJy1D — Jesse Stommel (@Jessifer) August 10, 2014
Why race-based affirmative action in college admissions still matters
Last month I published a defense of race-based affirmative action for African-American students in college admissions by Richard Rothstein, research associate at the Economic Policy Institute, a non-profit created in 1986 to broaden the discussion about economic policy to include the interests of low- and middle-income workers. Here is a new piece by Rothstein, expanding […]
8-10-14 Answer Sheet
Answer Sheet: Arne Duncan’s new ‘top advisers’Throughout the first Obama administration and well into the second, many teachers and principals said they could not get a word in edgewise to Education Secretary Arne Duncan and his advisers, who plowed ahead with education reforms that many educators said blamed teachers for things that weren’t their fault and set up standardized test-based “accounta
