Wednesday, June 5, 2019

Children are more than test scores: Facebook Community Standards and the 2019 True Teacher Education Activist

Children are more than test scores: Facebook Community Standards and the 2019 True Teacher Education Activist

Facebook Community Standards and the 2019 True Teacher Education Activist
I decided, to write a Facebook post about the June 10, 2019 the New Haven Public School Advocates call for people to come attend the Board of Education Meeting to speak up against cutting more teachers. Once again, Facebook has decided a Education Activist Literacy Professor is too much to handle. Perhaps, telling parents and teachers to stand up and fight back against these school budget cuts is just too radical for Facebook.
Maybe using the words fight back, is too much for Facebook. Or maybe I tagged the wrong people. Or maybe a Literacy Professor who not only defends his students and teachers in the school house, but outside is too much for Facebook to handle. Either way this True Teacher can't be silence!
I let my reader decide

So connecticut, it is that time of year again, when public schools in Black, Brown, and Poor Communities when cities announced layoffs, school closings, and cut librarians, special education and reading teachers, social workers, and after school programs. Maybe cut a few more art and CONTINUE READING: Children are more than test scores: Facebook Community Standards and the 2019 True Teacher Education Activist

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Where the 2020 Hopefuls Stand on Public Education - Progressive.org

Where the 2020 Hopefuls Stand on Public Education - Progressive.org

Where the 2020 Hopefuls Stand on Public Education
Broad support for the wave teacher strikes has candidates jostling each other step up on public education.
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In May, Bernie Sanders unveiled his Thurgood Marshall Plan for Public Education, a bold plan that called for a dramatic increase in federal support for public education. Within a week, Joe Biden announced his own plan that, in part, was similar to the Sanders’s plan.
Both called for a tripling of federal aid for impoverished children, known as Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act; both called for a dramatic increase in federal aid to pay for disabilities; and both plans supported big pay hikes for teachers. 
The days when Democratic candidates called for school sanctions, tougher tests, and the evaluation of teachers by test scores appear to be gone, thank goodness. Candidates with neoliberal, pro-reform histories like Cory Booker and Michael Bennett are going nowhere in the polls and are regularly panned on Twitter and Facebook by advocates of public schools. 
Meanwhile, the teacher strikes of the past year have received popular sympathy and support. That support has been noticed by the candidates, who now jostle each other to prove that they are teachers’ true best friend. Support for universal preschool, significant subsidy of public college tuition, and calls for higher teacher pay are positions nearly universally adopted by the candidates.
Teacher strikes and the #RedForEd movement have protested both low salaries as well as insufficient supports of students. Striking teachers in Los Angeles made it clear that the expansion of charter schools has impacted the district’s finances, thus hurting the district’s ability to fund essential services for kids. The teachers’ #RedForEd movement joined the parent-led Arizona Save Our Schools organization to halt the expansion of vouchers in that state. 
This year’s teacher walkout in West Virginia protested the legislature’s plan to establish charter schools and vouchers—a struggle that continues. In addition, Education Secretary Betsy De Vos’s and Donald Trump’s full embrace of the CONTINUE READING: Where the 2020 Hopefuls Stand on Public Education - Progressive.org

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Teachers’ pay: Salaries often can’t cover rent, cost of living

Teachers’ pay: Salaries often can’t cover rent, cost of living

'Can't pay their bills with love': For many teaching jobs, teachers' pay can't cover rent
New teachers can't afford median rent almost anywhere. Our city-by-city analysis validates a theme in teacher strikes. But that's not the full story

In sunny Miami, bilingual elementary teacher Mari Corugedo has 26 years of experience, a master's degree and a passion for helping Spanish-speaking students quickly learn English.

Her annual compensation for those skills: $64,000, plus benefits. That doesn't go far in this popular coastal city, where median rent has shot up to almost $2,000 per month, and the median mortgage is almost $1,300 per month before taxes or insurance, according to the real estate site Zillow. 
"We spend a good 30% to 40% of our income on our mortgage," said Corugedo, 52. "I would have moved out of Miami by now if not for my husband's additional income."
Beginner teachers have an even tougher time affording Miami. Skyrocketing housing prices combined with relatively low educator salaries have made the area one of the nation's priciest cities for starting teachers.
In the first analysis of its kind, USA TODAY examined salaries and housing costs for teachers all over the country. 
New teachers can't afford the median rent almost anywhere in the U.S, the analysis shows — a point often made during recent teacher strikes across the country.
But that's not the full story.
Despite widespread demand for higher salaries, teachers in some regions are actually making ends meet, especially as they approach the middle of their careers. 
In other areas, mid-career teachers are right to say they can't afford to live on their salaries without picking up side hustles or commuting long distances. Some of those places are only affordable for the very highest-paid teachers.

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Hooked on Phonics Redux | radical eyes for equity

Hooked on Phonics Redux | radical eyes for equity

Hooked on Phonics Redux
The commercial reading program Hooked on Phonics, with iconic over-the-top commercials for those of us of a certain generation, had to abandon those ads in 1994:
Under an agreement disclosed this week between the makers of the reading program Hooked on Phonics and the Federal Trade Commission, the manufacturer must abandon its advertising campaign or conduct far more research into the program’s effectiveness–and disclose any evidence of failure.
Anyone paying even slight attention to current media fascination with the “science of reading” and dyslexia may benefit from revisiting the problem with Hooked on Phonics and their outlandish claims:
Orange County-based Gateway Educational Products, maker of Hooked on Phonics, agreed to a settlement that bars the parent company from making unsubstantiated claims about the program’s ability to teach people to read. The settlement, which was signed Aug. 29, was made public Wednesday by the commission.
The FTC had charged that Gateway was making sweeping, unproven promises that the program could teach anyone to read, regardless of their limitations. Gateway admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement, and will pay no penalty, said Christian S. White, acting director of the commission’s bureau of consumer protection.
“They offered a one-size-fits-all solution–you have reading problems, this is the product,” White said. “Gateway’s evidence just doesn’t back up these broad, sweeping claims.”
The claims, according to the commission, included statements that Hooked CONTINUE READING: Hooked on Phonics Redux | radical eyes for equity

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Proposed misassignment systems needs teeth :: K-12 Daily

Proposed misassignment systems needs teeth :: K-12 Daily :: The Essential Resource for Superintendents and the Cabinet

Proposed misassignment systems needs teeth

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(Calif.) A coalition of advocates for low-income families has warned lawmakers that plans working through Sacramento to reduce the number of teachers improperly assigned classroom duties may actually have the opposite effect.
Both the Newsom administration and Assemblyman Reggie Jones-Sawyer, D-Los Angeles, have introduced legislation that would fully utilize a new data collection system so that schools statewide—including charters—are monitored annually for teacher misassignments.
The letter points out that neither proposal includes language that would formally require schools to correct any assignment problems found by the new review process.
The coalition–which includes Public Advocates, a San Francisco-based non-profit law firm, the American Civil Liberties Union of California and Californians Together—sent a letter raising the issue Monday to the chairs of the Legislative Conference Committee.
“Current law states that county superintendents of schools shall notify school administrators of assignments with “no legal authorization” and “advise him or her to correct the assignment within 30 days,’” the coalition said. “The current proposal, however, reduces the county superintendent role to data verification and presents the LEA and the school administrator with no obligation to act, even to review potential misassignments—let alone correct them.”
Ensuring that all students have a properly credentialed instructor was one key settlement agreement made in the landmark Williams lawsuit from 2006. Making sure that local educational agencies comply with the mandate, however, has proved problematic—especially during the teacher shortage that districts have faced in recent years.
Under the Williams settlement, only those schools ranked at the bottom on statewide testing are monitored for teacher assignments every year. Otherwise, schools are looked at on a rotation of every four years.
The governor’s plan, as well as AB 1219, would both require annual evaluation of misassignments, CONTINUE READING: Proposed misassignment systems needs teeth :: K-12 Daily :: The Essential Resource for Superintendents and the Cabinet

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Stop Saving History | Blue Cereal Education

Stop Saving History | Blue Cereal Education

Stop Saving History

Welcome to my podcast. My professional development session. My keynote address. My #edreform movement. My next book.
As I’m sure you’ve noticed, everything sucked before I got here – especially how we teach history. All social studies-related education since time immemorial has been taught badly, usually by caricaturized coaches (whose good names we’ll implicitly besmirch throughout today’s presentation). They recited nothing but long lists of disconnected facts, usually in hours of monotone delivery, and demanded you memorize several hundred miscellaneous dates and the names of all dead white men – mostly warriors, kings, and presidents. When visuals were utilized, they were on transparencies, using the same overhead projectors they presumably received on their fifth birthdays when first chosen to haunt the living in this particular fashion.
They only assigned two things – infinite vocabulary lists or questions at the end of the chapter. On good weeks, though, you’d get a documentary on Friday. It usually involved an actual film projector so it could make that cool ‘rakkikikikikikikikik’ sound the entire time.
But no longer – I am here to save history and history education. I will speak of women, and individuals of color, heretofore unknown in all of publishing or pedagogy. I will tell of the ‘common man’ and hypnotize CONTINUE READING: Stop Saving History | Blue Cereal Education

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Bad News from L.A.: Landlords Win, Students Lose | Diane Ravitch's blog

Bad News from L.A.: Landlords Win, Students Lose | Diane Ravitch's blog

Bad News from L.A.: Landlords Win, Students Lose

Voters in Los Angeles yesterday turned down Measure EE, which would have raised $500 million yearly for schools. The measure required a 2/3 yes vote, but didn’t win a majority. It would have been funded mostly by taxes on commercial properties, and the LA Chamber of Commerce mounted a campaign to defeat it.
It would have funded smaller classes, nurses, social workers, librarians, arts and music.
What a crying shame.
If you care about the kids, you have to do right by them.
Bad News from L.A.: Landlords Win, Students Lose | Diane Ravitch's blog




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Charter Schools at a Turning Point: How to Rein In an Out of Control Education Sector | janresseger

Charter Schools at a Turning Point: How to Rein In an Out of Control Education Sector | janresseger

Charter Schools at a Turning Point: How to Rein In an Out of Control Education Sector
If you read one article about education this week, you should read Jack Schneider’s columnfrom last week’s Washington Post.  If you have already read it, I encourage you to read it again.  Schneider is an education historian at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell.  In last week’s column, Schneider shows how charter schools have failed to fulfill the promises of their promoters.
Schneider’s analysis is fair and balanced as he notes that charters have a mixed record.  While some are excellent schools that serve children well, “On the whole… charters have failed to live up to their promises.”
Schneider adds that the public is growing more aware of the problems charter school growth has caused for the public school districts where the charters have been located: “The charter school movement is in trouble.  In late December, the editorial board of the Chicago Sun-Times observed that the charter movement in the Windy City was ‘in hot water and likely to get hotter.’  Among more than a dozen aspirants for mayor, ‘only a handful’ expressed any support for charter schools, and the last two standing for the… runoff election both said they wanted to halt charter school expansion.  In February, New York City’s elected parent representatives—the Community and Citywide Education Councils—issued a unanimous statement in which they criticized charters for operating ‘free from public oversight’ and for draining ‘substantial’ resources from district schools. A month later, Mayor Bill de Blasio told a parent forum that in the ‘not-too-distant future’ his administration would seek to curtail the marketing efforts of the city’s charters, which currently rely on New York City Department of Education mailing lists. After a six-day strike in January, Los Angeles teachers forced the city’s Board of Education to seek a state moratorium on new L.A. charters, an outcome that reverberated across California and then repeated itself in Oakland.”
“But,” writes Schneider, “much of the movement’s potency was a product of promises, rather CONTINUE READING: Charter Schools at a Turning Point: How to Rein In an Out of Control Education Sector | janresseger

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Teachers quit in Florida, citing 'toxic’ conditions and a 'testing nightmare’ - The Washington Post

Teachers quit in Florida, citing 'toxic’ conditions and a 'testing nightmare’ - The Washington Post

Teachers quit in Florida, citing 'toxic’ conditions and a 'testing nightmare’

Florida has a serious teacher shortage. During this school year, there were more than 2,200 vacancies at one point or another. Why?
In a recent post, Fed Ingram, Miami-Dade County teacher of the year in 2006 and now president of the Florida Education Association cited several reasons, including low pay and little respect from policymakers.
There are, however, other reasons. The words of two teachers who have resigned help explain what is driving some of their compatriots to leave.
On April 30, a teacher in Florida published a post on Facebook explaining why he was giving up teaching after 20 years in private and public schools. Jonathan Carroll, who taught at South Lake High School in Lake County, wrote in part (referring to his wife, Dana):
I am leaving the field of education. I have had so many wonderful memories. But it has become a toxic profession. I think of what I thought I would be doing as teacher. Opening minds, debating history inspiring the next generation to reach higher and learn from the past. But education has become something else. I think of all the things I did not sign up for ... like micromanaging administrators, mental health counseling, blueprints with no freedom or flexibility (even though you can not enforce planning), not being considered an expert in my chosen field even though I have a graduate degree. Students overdosing on drugs and collapsing in my classroom when they get back from the bathroom. Active shooter drills. Teachers being armed. Knowing where it is safe to hide in my classroom. Feeding and clothing my students. Buying my own supplies. Being told I should be thankful I have a job and to get over myself. I am tired of the constant testing. We have testing coordinators at each school. Being told that if a student fails it is my fault not their fault. I am tired. Tired of everyone else knowing better and being chastised if I dare ask questions or challenge leadership. So this May, I am walking away. I am going to stay home for awhile (thank you Dana) and start a new chapter. Honestly, I’ll break even if I become a bankteller with no experience. But the truth is I will not miss what education has become. A soulless industrial education complex where admin cares more about the test scores than their faculty or students. I have loved teaching many of you. But it is time to ride into the sunset. Start enjoying life. And find happiness again.
And there is Shanna Fox, a 20-year veteran public school teacher in Polk County, with 15 of those years in a middle-school English Language Arts classroom. She is a National Board Certified Teacher whose 4-year-old daughter is preparing to enter kindergarten this year at the local public school.
Here is her open letter of resignation:
Stand Up and Fight – An Open Letter of Resignation
There is no business model that can fix education. Students are not products and services that can be quantified. They are living, breathing human beings and their complexity cannot be reduced to cells on a spreadsheet.
Each child comes with their own set of needs, strengths, and abilities. Teachers must be provided the freedom to CONTINUE READING: Teachers quit in Florida, citing 'toxic’ conditions and a 'testing nightmare’ - The Washington Post

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Whatever Happened to the Core Knowledge Program? | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Whatever Happened to the Core Knowledge Program? | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Whatever Happened to the Core Knowledge Program?
No, I do not refer to the Common Core standards.
I mean the Core Knowledge program that unfolded in U.S. schools in the decade following the 1987 publication of University of Virginia Professor E.D. Hirsch, Jr.’s Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know.
The book, the creation of the Core Knowledge Foundation and subsequent publication of curricular sequences across academic subjects taught in elementary schools produced a reform that again brought to the surface the historical struggle over what kind of knowledge and skills are worth teaching and learning in tax-supported public schools.
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Hot embers of previous traditional vs. progressive wars in the early 20th century and then in the 1950s over the importance of phonics vs. whole language in reading, exposure to disciplinary knowledge rather than students creating their own meaning  re-ignited in the last decade of the century after Hirsch’s book and the spread of Core Knowledge programs in schools.

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What Problems Did the Core Knowledge Program Intend To Solve?
According to Hirsch and advocates for Core Knowledge, the current concentration on building skills–“student will be able to do…”–has handicapped children and youth by ignoring the importance of teaching systematically CONTINUE READING: Whatever Happened to the Core Knowledge Program? | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice
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Anthony Cody: My Suggestion for Fordham's Moonshot for Kids - Living in Dialogue

My Suggestion for Fordham's Moonshot for Kids - Living in Dialogue

My Suggestion for Fordham’s Moonshot for Kids

By Anthony Cody.
As reported on Diane Ravitch’s blog, the Fordham Institute and the Center for American Progress are offering a prize for proposals for a “Moonshot for Kids.”  Here is what they want:
By August 1, 2019, submit a brief application through our online portal. We are seeking ideas that would help the U.S. achieve one of the following big goals (your choice):
  • Cut in half the number of fourth graders reading “below basic”
  • Double the number of eighth graders who can write an effective persuasive essay
  • Shrink by 30 percent the average time a student spends in English-language-learner status
  • Double the amount of high-quality feedback the average middle schooler receives on their academic work
  • Ensure that every student receives high-quality college and career advising by ninth grade
  • Double the number of students from low-income families and students of color who graduate from high school with remediation-free scores on the SAT, ACT, or similar exams
  • Double the number of young women who major in STEM fields
Readers should be aware that the Fordham Institute has been working for years to undermine and privatize public schools, and the Center for American Progress has been working, with a slightly more liberal bent, towards the same goal. Nonetheless, I appreciate a challenge to reimagine what might be done, so here is the proposal I submitted to their portal. Please share your ideas as well in the comments below.
I worked in the public schools of Oakland, CA, for 24 years, 18 of them as a middle school teacher of science and Math. I have witnessed firsthand the destructive effect of previous philanthropic efforts in education. There must be a radical change in approach.
The key to successful investment in this arena is leveraging a relatively small amount of money to create a ripple effect that delivers further deeper investment — and not just of funds, but of public trust and engagement.
A coalition of philanthropists would heed the convincing evidence from CONTINUE READING: 
My Suggestion for Fordham's Moonshot for Kids - Living in Dialogue

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Huge Victory for Washington State’s Students: Exit Exam Requirement Struck Down! – I AM AN EDUCATOR

Huge Victory for Washington State’s Students: Exit Exam Requirement Struck Down! – I AM AN EDUCATOR

Huge Victory for Washington State’s Students: Exit Exam Requirement Struck Down!

Cue Pomp and Circumstance because many more Washington State high school seniors will be walking across the stage and handed a diploma!
Beginning with the class of 2020, high school students are no longer required to pass the “Smarter Balance Assessment” high-stakes standardized test to graduate. They will still have to take at least one federally mandated test during high school, but the new state law finally removes this treacherous obstacle for Washington’s students.
Let’s be clear about something: This victory against the cruelty of the “testocracy” would not have been possible without a rebellion from parents, students, educators, and community members who have demanded an end to over-testing and using a single score to judge and punish students. I edited a book, More Than a Score: The New Uprising Against High Stakes Testing, that details the national grassroots movement of student walkouts of high-stakes tests, teacher boycotts, parent opt-outs, that have changed the narrative about the abuses of standardized testing and the authentic assessment alternative.  Requiring exit exams to graduate has nothing to with what expert educators know about best practices for assessing students. In fact, Boston University economics professor Kevin Lang’s 2013 study, “The School to Prison Pipeline Exposed,” links increases in the use of high-stakes standardized high school exit exams to increased incarceration rates. Study after study has reveled that these tests are a better measure of family income than aptitude. These test measure resources and proximity to the dominant culture, negatively impacting English Language Learners, special education students, students of color, and low income students. University of CONTINUE READING: Huge Victory for Washington State’s Students: Exit Exam Requirement Struck Down! – I AM AN EDUCATOR

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Sherman Dorn: Democratic Politics and Charter Schools, Brief Gloss | National Education Policy Center

Sherman Dorn: Democratic Politics and Charter Schools, Brief Gloss | National Education Policy Center

Sherman Dorn: Democratic Politics and Charter Schools, Brief Gloss

Tl;dr version: don’t waste your energy on trying to suss out The Position on National Charter School Politics. But why it doesn’t make much difference is different from the details of charter-school debates. 
Bernie Sanders’s education plan has gotten quite a bit of press since its mid-month release. The bulk of attention was taken up by the single section on school choice, which focused on charter schools.1 Thus far, I think the most interesting response has been on Vox’s The Weeds podcast episode at the end of the week. Are charter school policies designed to advance civil rights or destroy public education? And what do we make of the fact that there are many pro-charter Black community activists at the same time that the NAACP has a resolution calling for a moratorium on charter-school expansion? 
Very briefly, at the level of politics: if you say that all Black parents have the same view of charter schools, I’m going to laugh at you, because you deserve it. The best evidence currently available is that Black Democratic voters are more likely than white Democratic voters to approve of charter schools (in general, as in polling questions), but that means that only a significant minority disapprove of charter schools in surveys (as opposed to a majority), and disapproval or skepticism or what have you has not grown among Black Democratic voters in the same way as it has among white Democratic voters.
The Weeds episode linked above has a reasonably-accurate summary of the research on charter schools:
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