I confess. I didn’t watch Betsy DeVos testify. I didn’t want to. No one pays me to blog every day, so I have some discretion in how I use my time. What I did instead, which was very taxing, was to watch preview DVDs on the PBS special
Education International, which represents teachers unions around the world, issued a bulletin about disturbing developments in Liberia, which threaten freedom of research about the performance of corporate outsourced schools. EI wrote in a letter I received: “As you would be aware, just over 12 months ago, in an unprecedented move, the Government of Liberia announced its intention to out-source i
Looking for innovation? Check out your public schools, where the entire district can collaborate to develop new ideas and sustain them, and where districts can exchange and incubate good ideas and practices. On June 5, the Southold Independent School District honored high school students engaged in broadcast journalism. Representatives of schools from across Long Island gathered for the inaugural
Boy wonder Billionaire Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Dr. Priscilla Chan are placing their bets on technology to teach children better than humans. https://www.insidephilanthropy.com/home/2017/6/6/chan-zuckerbergs-
Charter schools were supposed to “save poor children from low-performing public schools.” But some of them are low-performing schools , worse than the public schools the children leave. The State Charter School Conmission is
New York State Allies for Public Education represents more than 50 parent and teacher organizations. It has led the Opt Out movement, in which 20% of the eligible children have refused the state tests year after year, including 50% on Long Island. Their members regularly attend legislative hearings in Albany and meet with legislators. They attend meetings of the Board of Regents. They follow the
Audrey Watters blogs about technology. This post was recommended by a reader. This is a speech posted on her blog that she delivered at an ed-tech conference in Mexico. Here is a brief excerpt: “When I hear the phrase “the new normal,” I cannot help but think of the ways in which those same words were used in the US to describe the economy during and since the financial crisis of 2007–2008 and su
A voucher is a voucher is a voucher. It means shifting public tax money to private schools. The Democrat-controlled Nevada Legislature rejected Education Savings Accounts vouchers, which would have allowed every family to have a debit card for education. It was hailed by conservatives as the best universal voucher program in the nation. But it will not be funded. However, the Democrats did alloca
Alan Singer writes here about the global ambitions and activities of Pearson, the giant British corporation that seeks to dominate education. He writes: “Powerful forces are at work shaping global education in both the North Atlantic core capitalist nations and regions historically referred to as the Third World. Neoliberal business philosophies and practices promoted by corporations and their pa
Today, Mr. and Mrs. Peter Greene welcomed Walter and William into the world. Congratulations to the family! Thank you for giving these two beautiful gifts to this troubled world to bring you and all who know them great joy!
Bill Moyers’ website reports: Showmanship –> On returning from his first foreign trip, Donald Trump touted the $110 billion weapons deal he’d cut with the Saudi government. But Bruce Riedel, director of the Brookings Intelligence Project, writes that “there is no deal. It’s fake news.” According to Riedel, “there are a bunch of letters of interest or intent, but not contracts. Many are offers tha
CNN reported that Realty Winner, the woman accused of leaking a top-secret document about Russian interference in the 2016 election, called Trump the “orange fascist” on a social media account. Now we know why she leaked that document and why she will never be pardoned. Ten years in jail.
A woman working for an NSA contractor heard a podcast by The Intercept in which Glenn Greenwald and others expressed skepticism about Russian hacking of the 2016 election. According to news reports, she copied top-secret evidence and sent it to The Intercept to prove that Russians hacked into election software before the 2016 election. “On March 22, The Intercept hosted a podcast online looking a
This is an important article about the Silicon Valley billionaires who want to remake America’s schools, although none has any deep knowledge of children or cognition or the multiple social issues that affect children and families. Being tech entrepreneurs, most of them think there is a technological fix for every problem. The article focuses on several billionaires and what they aim to achieve.
Jan Resseger read Gordon Lafer’s new book, “The One Percent Solution: How Corporations Are Remaking America One State at a Time,” and she understood the pattern on the rug. “Gordon Lafer explains that in the November 2010 election, “Eleven state governments switched from Democratic or divided control to unified Republican control of the governorship and both houses of the legislature. Since these
Well, she didn’t exactly use that term, but I did. Bailey reviews a study that calls for more “rigor” in preschool and the New York Times’ shameless endorsent of this finding. What if someone did a study and concluded that leeches are the best curative and every hospital should order a supply? Just because someone does a “study” doesn’t mean that it is just or reasonable. Suppose a study found th
This is a very brief video about Teach for America. It demonstrates the saying that a picture is worth a thousand words. It needs to be updated: a one minute video is worth a 10,000 word essay of the video is well done. Salute the arrival of a brilliant new film production company. It won’t make anyone rich because it gives away its product for free. It is the BadAss Teachers Association and Stev
I wrote an article for the New York Review of Books about the proposed Trump-DeVos budget. The whole world needs to know what Trump and DeVos want to do to limit access to college and to undermine public education.
