We’re Having the Wrong Conversation About the Future Of Schools

We’re Having the Wrong Conversation About the Future Of Schools

We’re Having the Wrong Conversation About the Future Of Schools
Despite the rhetoric, modern movements to reform schools have had a devastating effect on education

As a full-time teacher, I don’t have a lot of time to look up from the dailiness of the job to consider something as nebulous as the “future” of education. When I do, I feel a vague unease that too many non-teachers seem to have a lot of time to do this kind of thinking.

One thing in my favor is that education reform seems to take the same basic forms, year after year. There’s the standards and accountability movement and the ongoing attempts to give it “teeth.” Then there are the tech giants peddling autonomy and self-direction in lieu of soul-crushing activities like reading The Outsiders and using protractors. And though the latter reformers are often critics of the former, the two have a lot in common.

Both represent billion-dollar industries. Both frequently co-opt a rhetoric of liberation, autonomy, and empowerment. Both can barely disguise a deep disdain for teachers and schools, especially of the “sage on the stage” variety. And both are almost exclusively headed up by white men.

These are the kind of people setting a bold agenda for the future of education.

Admittedly, us unruly American educators would have a hard time coming up with anything coherent enough to compete with the brave visions set forth by the leaders of these two industries. The very fact that such an all-encompassing solution is needed testifies to their dominance in framing the narrative around American schools. Mired in the day-to-day challenges and complexities of actually caring for and educating children, many teachers exhibit a complete failure of imagination when it comes to sweeping monolithic initiatives with pithy acronyms, eye-catching logos, and font pairings that are straight fire.

But we do need to change. Beyond the usual Alice Cooper-type critiques, we teachers have been especially complicit in the widespread marginalizing, neuroticizing, and criminalizing of our most vulnerable students. Yes, we need to stop boring future white rockstars and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. This is already well known. But, CONTINUE READING: We’re Having the Wrong Conversation About the Future Of Schools

We've Got Issues: How can you find out more about the issues you care about? | Eclectablog

We've Got Issues: How can you find out more about the issues you care about? | Eclectablog

We’ve Got Issues: How can you find out more about the issues you care about?

I’ve got issues. We all do.

For me, it’s all about public education. It’s what I’ve dedicated my professional life to, and I have pretty strong feelings about supporting public schools, teachers, and students, and protecting the institution of public education from attacks by persons like Michigan’s own Betsy DeVos.

Your issue may be affordable health care. Or making sure we all have clean drinking water. Or defending the rights of our friends in the LGBTQ community. Or making our government more transparent and responsive to the needs of our citizens, instead of bowing to pressures from special interest groups.

If you’re like me you’re always on the lookout for information about the things you care about–and may become frustrated at times with the lack of any sort of coverage on your issue from the mainstream media. Especially if you’re a Progressive.

And that’s where Eclectablog comes in!

Because we care about Progressive issues–and so do you! And Progressive issues tend to be the stuff that most of us actually care about. The things that impact our kids, our families, our friends, and our communities. Like well-supported schools, and health care, and clean water, and civil rights…for everyone.

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We've Got Issues: How can you find out more about the issues you care about? | Eclectablog

Even if you can’t make a financial contribution, there’s another way to support the work we do in shining a light on your issues: keep sharing our posts on your social media networks! The more eyes we get on these posts means more potential support for all of the issues we care about–including your’s!

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Author: Mitchell RobinsonMitchell Robinson is associate professor and chair of music education at Michigan State University. His research is focused on music education and education policy. Follow him on Facebook HERE and Twitter at @mrobmsu. His own blog is at MitchellRobinson.net.

We've Got Issues: How can you find out more about the issues you care about? | Eclectablog

The Los Angeles Times’ History of Putting Kids Last

The Los Angeles Times’ History of Putting Kids Last

The Los Angeles Times’ History of Putting Kids Last

Heather Repenning is moderate in her approach, but her lack of experience in education shows; during an interview, she had nothing insightful or original to say about the issues facing L.A. Unified.”

– Los Angeles Times Editorial Board

During my first run for the LAUSD School Board, I was interviewed by the Los Angeles Times (LAT) Editorial Board as they considered who they would endorse. Unfortunately, this discussion devolved into an argument over my support of the opt-out movement for standardized testing. I had explained that one of the reasons that my wife and I had decided to exercise our rights under the state education code and exempt our children from taking these tests was the unnecessary stress it imposed on students. A member of the Editorial Board accused me of hypocrisy as I had also allowed my children to choose to take AP tests. She was unswayed by my argument that since the payoff for undergoing the stress of taking an AP test was possibly receiving college credits, the stress of taking that test was an acceptable cost. To her, stress was a necessary part of life and she did not see a reason why children should  be protected from it.

To no one’s surprise, the LAT endorsed Tamar Galatzan, who was supported by the charter industry, in that election. Fresh on the heels of multiple scandals that wasted taxpayer money and exposed Superintendent John Deasy’s incompetence, the Times pushed for this incumbent who, in their own words, was “such a reflexively pro-Deasy vote that she neglected to ask key questions about problematic proposals. That includes the proposal to spend half a billion dollars on iPads for every student, which she continued to support for far too long.” Contradicting this statement, they lauded her as “the board member most likely to take independent positions”. As an example, they cited her opposition to parent centers.

In that same cycle, the LAT endorsed Ref Rodriguez, even afterquestions had arisen over fundraising that had occurred during the early stages of his campaign. Rodriguez had been one of the founders of the PUC chain of charter schools and was also a candidate CONTINUE READING: The Los Angeles Times’ History of Putting Kids Last

Varnett charter school parents eligible for restitution after founders’ convictions - Houston Chronicle

Varnett charter school parents eligible for restitution after founders’ convictions - Houston Chronicle

Varnett charter school parents eligible for restitution after founders’ convictions

More than 4,000 parents whose children attended the Houston-based Varnett charter school network between 2007 and 2014 could receive restitution payments totaling more than $600,000 nearly a year after the district’s founders were convicted of siphoning millions from the schools, federal officials announced Tuesday.

Parents could be eligible for $110.02 per child for every year they attended one of the district’s three campuses. For example, if a family sent three children to the school for three years, it could be eligible for $990.06.

The money came from selling assets once owned by Marian Annette Cluff and her husband, Alsie Cluff Jr., who also have been ordered to pay $1.89 million to the charter school district, $1.83 million to the Internal Revenue Service, $100,000 to a Philadelphia-based insurance company and nearly $14,800 to two employees. Both Cluffs were sentenced in June 2018 and are in federal custody. Marian Cluff is serving 10 years for conspiracy to commit tax evasion and mail fraud; Alsie Cluff was sentenced to three years on a conspiracy to commit tax evasion conviction.

Ryan Patrick, U.S. Attorney of the Southern District of Texas, said Tuesday that the Cluffs billed parents for routine expenses — such as field trips and fundraisers — even though those functions already had been funded by the school. Instead of spending the money on students, the two used the extra funds to pay for lavish vacations aboard a private jet, furnish a 7,000-square-foot home in South Houston, purchase designer jewelry and fund upkeep on a ranch.

“What the Cluffs did was use this set of charter schools as pass-throughs for their own financial gain,” Patrick said.

ON HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM: The most popular schools for students transferring out of HISD

The Cluffs founded the Varnett school network, which has grown to serve about 1,600 elementary students across three campuses, in 1984. They paid themselves exorbitant salaries, Marian Cluff for working as the schools’ superintendent and Alsie Cluff for managing business operations. Alsie Cluff also made millions from contracts and other deals with the schools. The couple reported about $12 million in income from Varnett during an eight-year period.

In addition to giving themselves higher-than average salaries, the Cluffs skimmed money parents paid under the guise of CONTINUE READING: Varnett charter school parents eligible for restitution after founders’ convictions - Houston Chronicle

More affluent neighborhoods are creating their own school districts - Vox

More affluent neighborhoods are creating their own school districts - Vox

More affluent neighborhoods are creating their own school districts
The legally sanctioned fencing-out of low-income students of color.

In the past two decades, 128 communities have had a simple idea: to make their own school district.

For many of them, the underlying purpose was to draw a legal fence between their community and a poorer one. Because a large chunk of public education is funded using local property taxes, making your own district with your affluent neighbors means that you’re able to hoard resources — and not share tax dollars with poorer communities of color.

In 2017, I wrote about how a surprising number of these efforts have succeeded.

Since then, 11 more communities have seceded from their districts, according to a report from EdBuild. Another 16 communities are currently in the process of trying to secede. And two states — Indiana and North Carolina — have made it easier for these communities to form their own districts.

“It’s a disturbing trend. We’re seeing legislators making this overtly permissible,” said EdBuild CEO Rebecca Sibilia.

To be clear, school secession isn’t a viral trend yet. Most of the new divisions are in Maine, where Republican Gov. Paul LePage successfully pushed the legislature to lift penalties on communities that left regionalized districts. And some of the seceding districts are doing so for legitimate reasons such as “shifting enrollments and geography,” as EdBuild notes.

But school secession is one of the more brazen examples of affluent communities using their political clout to fence out everyone else. And as leading school segregation writer Nikole Hannah-Jones wrote in 2017, “School secessions, at least in the South, trace their roots to the arsenal of tools that white communities deployed to resist the desegregation mandate of the Brown ruling.”

One high-profile secession case was blocked last year, but many others went through

Advocates who oppose this behavior got a big win in 2018 when a federal court blocked an Alabama community from leaving its district.

In 2017, I wrote about a community called Gardendale, which took initial steps to leave the CONTINUE READING: More affluent neighborhoods are creating their own school districts - Vox

Shorting pension payments and teacher salary caps. – Fred Klonsky

Shorting pension payments and teacher salary caps. – Fred Klonsky

SHORTING PENSION PAYMENTS AND TEACHER SALARY CAPS

Senator Andy Manar.

When the Democratic legislature and Bruce Rauner finally agreed on a full year state budget in his third year in office they included a salary cap of 3% on teachers.

The cap was hidden in the bill – not by the Republicans and Bruce Rauner – by Democratic Party legislative leaders.

The budget, including the salary cap, was passed with full support of the Democrats.

The Democrats, when pressed, explained that they needed something to get Republicans on board to pass a budget.

Naturally, what came to mind was capping teacher salaries.

The Senate has now voted to repeal the 3% teacher salary cap. It is stalled in the Democratic Party controlled House.

What are they waiting for? They have no excuses now.

Meanwhile Democratic Party governor JB Pritzker continues to support a three year pension payment holiday.

He wants to reduce the state’s pension payments by over $800,000 a year for at least the next three years and extend the pension debt payment ramp by 7 years.

He has the support of powerful Democratic Senator Andy Manar.

Manar has recently been parading around as a friend of teachers because he sponsored CONTINUE READING: Shorting pension payments and teacher salary caps. – Fred Klonsky

LeBron James’ I Promise Public School Supports Rising Achievement Among Akron, OH’s Poorest Children | janresseger

LeBron James’ I Promise Public School Supports Rising Achievement Among Akron, OH’s Poorest Children | janresseger

LeBron James’ I Promise Public School Supports Rising Achievement Among Akron, OH’s Poorest Children

LeBron James understands that 90 percent of American children and adolescents are enrolled in public schools. He knows that if you want to support the education of America’s poorest children, you’ll have to do it by improving the experiences of students and teachers in the public schools in our nation’s poorest neighborhoods. Erica Green’s NY Times report on LeBron James’ school in Akron, Ohio, his hometown, is inspiring and measured.  It isn’t the story of some kind of one-year, impossible school turnaround, the kind we’ve been led to expect by federal laws and programs like No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top.  Instead it is the bottom-up story of someone who himself experienced educational failure as a young child, figuring out a way to give back.

Now a star in the NBA, LeBron James missed 83 days of school in the fourth grade. He understands that school improvement requires a lot of support. He knows that expectations for improved academic prowess must be incremental, the timeline for measuring improvement reasonable, and acknowledgement for even small successes consistent. Green describes Nataylia Henry, “a fourth-grader (who) missed more than 50 days of school last year because she said she would rather sleep than face bullies at school. This year, her overall attendance rate is 80 percent.” While some school reformers would call a school a failure if this student’s attendance didn’t increase more rapidly, this school celebrates the student’s improvement.

LeBron James’ I Promise School is an Akron City Schools public school; James chose not to underwrite a charter school: “The school’s $2 million budget is funded by the district, roughly the same amount per pupil that it spends in other schools. But Mr. James’s foundation has provided about $600,000 in financial support for additional teaching staff to help reduce class sizes, and an additional hour of after-school programming and tutors.”

James’ vision was for a school to serve young students facing the kind of challenges he faced as a kid. The school is selective: To qualify for the lottery, a student must have been among the school district’s lowest scorers on standardized tests.  Nevertheless, the children are making what District officials view as good progress on the Measures of Academic Progress or MAP CONTINUE READING: LeBron James’ I Promise Public School Supports Rising Achievement Among Akron, OH’s Poorest Children | janresseger

Revealing Podcast About Success Academy — Part One | Gary Rubinstein's Blog

Revealing Podcast About Success Academy — Part One | Gary Rubinstein's Blog

Revealing Podcast About Success Academy — Part One

Of all the charter school networks in the country, there is none that is more controversial or more secretive than Success Academy.  If ‘success’ is defined as high 3-8 state test scores, then Success Academy has earned its name.  But critics charge that this ‘success’ comes at the expense of other, more important measures of success.

This past November, a seven part podcast was published by a production company called startup.  Soon after it was released, there were some excerpts of some of the most negative parts of the podcast printed on some blogs, but generally it seems to have came and went.

I was very interested in this podcast for a lot of reasons.  I’ve been following Success Academy for years and have been piecing together evidence about all the different wrongdoings that this network engages in.  Over the years I’ve probably written twenty different blog posts with my findings.  I was also interested because last summer I was interviewed by one of the producers of this podcast while they were gathering material.  Besides an hour or two of interviews, I also had several follow-up emails with this producer where he asked me to clarify certain arguments.  I was curious to see how balanced the eventual product would be.

The podcast runs about seven hours and I listened to it a few months ago for the first time.  What I found was a bizarre mix of about six hours of puff piece and one hour of devastating expose.  Throughout the episodes the producers generally gave Success Academy the benefit of the doubt any time they could — until eventually even they couldn’t CONTINUE READING: Revealing Podcast About Success Academy — Part One | Gary Rubinstein's Blog

Schools Matter: A charter school story

Schools Matter: A charter school story

A charter school story

I want to apologize to Schools Matter readers for my infrequent contributions. I thought once I graduated from law school and passed the most difficult bar examination in the country on my first attempt, that I'd have more time to write. Instead, in addition to my long-time day job, I now have an internship once a week at an education law firm, and I am teaching on Thursday nights at my law school. In a word — I'm swamped. However, I managed to piece together this twitter thread on Monday, that I thought was worth reposting here.

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Robert D. Skeels, JD @rdsathene

1/10 Researching for a case and came across a personal injury settlement between a charter school corporation in the Central Valley and multiple student plaintiffs for some $6-million+. The amount is on the low side considering the… #EdReform #SchoolChoice #EdChat @DianeRavitch

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3:14 PM - Apr 15, 2019

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See Robert D. Skeels, JD 's other Tweets

Researching for a case and came across a personal injury settlement between a charter school corporation in the Central Valley and multiple student plaintiffs for some $6-million+. The amount is on the low side considering the horrific injuries some of the students suffered.

It was the typical charter school money-making scam. They had a former employee form an unregistered and uninsured transportation company. The charter's Vice Principle provided one of their family's vehicles to that company. They paid themselves $6K a month from public money to operate a vehicle that had several defective seatbelts. Moreover, they consistently exceeded the vehicle's passenger capacity. Students had to share seats and some had to ride on the floor.

Struck by another vehicle traveling at high speed, the charter corporation's vehicle rolled multiple times and ejected several of the unrestrained students. The injuries were as bad as you could imagine them to be.

This was the inevitable result of putting public money into private hands. Because charter school corporations are privately managed with de minimis oversight, transparency, and accountability, they find ways to channel public revenue streams into  CONTINUE READING: Schools Matter: A charter school story

Howard Fuller’s Segregated School Vision: Will the Walton Family Pay for It? | deutsch29

Howard Fuller’s Segregated School Vision: Will the Walton Family Pay for It? | deutsch29

Howard Fuller’s Segregated School Vision: Will the Walton Family Pay for It?

Since 2010, Arizona State University (ASU) and Global Silicon Valley (GSV) have held an annual summit, described on the ASU GSV site as “the industry catalyst for elevating dialogue and driving action around raising learning and career outcomes through scaled innovation.”

In 2019, it seems that one of the scaling goals is to increase the number of segregated schools. ASU GSV offered a panel, entitled, “No Struggle, No Progress: An Argument for a Return to Black Schools”:

No Struggle, No Progress An Argument for a Return to Black Schools

speaking:

• Jeanne Allen
• Howard Fuller
• Lloyd Knight
• Candice Burns

Description

As racial separation in U.S. schools becomes more pronounced in many places and hate crimes against minorities increase in schools and communities, many education advocates and Black leaders say racial integration is the solution. Challenge your assumptions with this dynamic group of black education reform leaders who have worked to restore quality options for black and brown students.  Join civil rights and ed-reform advocate Howard Fuller to kick off this dynamic panel with leaders of successful urban schools.

This session will start with a firestarter from GSV Lifetime Achievement Winner Howard Fuller followed by the panel.

Moderator: Jeanne Allen, Founder & CEO, The Center for Education Reform

Panelists: Candice Burns, Chief Communications Officer, Friendship Public Charter School; Howard Fuller, Director, Institute for the  CONTINUE READING: Howard Fuller’s Segregated School Vision: Will the Walton Family Pay for It? | deutsch29

Um, who are Melinda and Bill Gates trying to kid? - The Washington Post

Um, who are Melinda and Bill Gates trying to kid? - The Washington Post

Um, who are Melinda and Bill Gates trying to kid?

What are Melinda and Bill Gates talking about?

In recent public statements, one or both of them have said things about their powerful role in education philanthropy that strains credulity.

Through their Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the two have poured far more money into education projects than any other individuals in the world, at least $2 billion over the past few decades. They have used their fortune to leverage public money to support pet projects and worked with the Obama administration to implement standardized-test-based policies.

Yet, in a new interview in the New York Times, Melinda Gates said she and her husband do not — repeat, do not — have “outsize influence” in public education. When reporter David Marchese said “certainly you have more influence than, say, a group of parents,” Gates replied: “Not necessarily.”

That prompted a “jaw-dropping” tweet from author and journalist Anand Giridharadas, whose latest book is “Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World.” He wrote:

Jaw-dropping.@melindagates says she and her husband, spending vast sums on education, don’t have “outsize influence.” She also doubts that two billionaires seeking to transform education have any more power than a “group of parents.” True privilege is denying you have it.

View image on Twitter

Anand Giridharadas

✔@AnandWrites

Jaw-dropping.@melindagates says she and her husband, spending vast sums on education, don’t have “outsize influence.”

She also doubts that two billionaires seeking to transform education have any more power than a “group of parents.”

True privilege is denying you have it.

2,259

6:02 PM - Apr 15, 2019

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Now, let’s go back two months, when the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s annual letter was published and addressed nine things the couple said surprised them along their philanthropic journey.

This was Surprise #8: “Textbooks are becoming obsolete.”

The two then discuss the issue, not actually proving that textbooks are becoming obsolete — possibly because they aren’t — but instead talking up the virtues of online education. Why would the founder of Microsoft want to tout online education?

The Gates Foundation began its first big effort in this world nearly 20 years ago with what it said was a $650 million investment to break large failing high schools into small schools, on the theory that small schools worked better than large ones. Some do, of course, and some don’t, but in any case, Bill Gates declared in 2009 it hadn’t worked the way he had hoped (with some experts saying the Gateses had ignored fundamental CONTINUE READING: Um, who are Melinda and Bill Gates trying to kid? - The Washington Post