Lessons from the pandemic’s education pod parents - The Washington Post

Lessons from the pandemic’s education pod parents - The Washington Post

Lessons from the pandemic’s education pod parents

It was only a few weeks ago that we began hearing about “pandemic pods” or “microschools” — which essentially are groups of students whose parents have paid for professional instruction because of the chaos the covid-19 crisis has wrought on America’s schools. And now they are all over the education news.

Some say these pods are a decent solution to a real-time problem, while others say the pods will only fuel the inequity already baked into our educational system because only people with money can participate.

For parents who can afford it, a solution for fall: Bring the teachers to them

This post, written by Kevin Welner, an attorney and professor specializing in educational policy and law, explains why both sides have it partly right, and what we can learn from what he calls the new “pod parents.”

Welner is the director of the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder and co-author of several books on school law, including the 2019 law school casebook “Education and the Law.” He is also author of “NeoVouchers: The Emergence of Tuition Tax Credits for Private Schooling.”

The huge problem with education ‘pandemic pods’ suddenly popping up

By Kevin Welner

Hollywood told us in 1956 that the “pod people” are determined to subdue the entire planet, replacing each person with an alien surrogate devoid of feelings and personality. Those human traits keep individuals from pursuing their best interests, the Pod People explain in “Invasion of the Body CONTINUE READING: Lessons from the pandemic’s education pod parents - The Washington Post

Pandemic Pods and Micro Schooling - LA Progressive

Pandemic Pods and Micro Schooling - LA Progressive

Pandemic Pods and Micro Schooling

Pods, Privatization and Pandemic Wages of Whiteness

The bright-eyed bushy tailed, white Atlanta-area elementary school kids featured frolicking, reading, and doing math problems in suburban “Pods” on a recent CNN morning show were Exhibit A for everything that is wrong with Covid-era education.

Pods are the latest trend in elite learning for privileged, mostly white families who can afford to provide their kids with protected academic enclaves beyond the Covid storm. Decried for their exclusivity, pods simply crystallize the disparities that already exist in hyper-privatized, segregated K-12 American schools. One widely touted K-4 pod run by New York’s elite Hudson Lab school will run parents $125,000 for the academic year, or $68,750 for a five-month commitment.

As districts across the nation pushback against Trump’s fascist demand to reopen, pod learning underscores how the neoliberal crisis of public education has accelerated. Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos have exhibited near sadistic glee in threatening to withhold federal funding from districts that don’t comply. Over the past several months, DeVos has moved even more aggressively to siphon funding from public schools to private religious schools.

Meanwhile, some charter schools unscrupulously double dipped to receive Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funds, from the Small Business Administration, designated for struggling small CONTINUE READING: Pandemic Pods and Micro Schooling - LA Progressive

Black and Brown Students Need Culturally Competent Teachers - LA Progressive

Black and Brown Students Need Culturally Competent Teachers - LA Progressive

Black and Brown Students Need Culturally Competent Teachers

was told by the Greenfield Unified School District that I could not wear a t-shirt with the words “Phenomenally Black” because they said it was the same thing as wearing a “Make America Great Again” shirt. A Black colleague then later told me the administration asked if I was trying to push a Black agenda on campus. And yet when I wore a “Phenomenally Woman” shirt, there was no issue.

I wore the shirt to show my students how to embrace self-love and love for your culture. When I was in high school, I had a college counselor tell me I didn’t need to try because I was going to end up at the community college anyway. This is the Bakersfield education system I grew up in. An education that told Black students they didn’t have a future. I decided to become a teacher so that I could positively impact students like myself and be the person I needed when I was younger.

I know students who were told by educators that Trump is doing the right thing by building the wall. Others were called dumb for chanting “Black Lives Matter” and were forced to stand up for the pledge of allegiance.

My story is the story of many young Black and brown students in California’s Central Valley. I know students who were told by educators that Trump is doing the right thing by building the wall. Others were called dumb for chanting “Black Lives Matter” and were forced to stand up for the pledge of allegiance.

Discrimination and racial insensitivity against Black and brown students are sadly commonplace in Kern County schools, and protests and complaints are condemned.

Before I started teaching at Greenfield Unified, I established a competitive cheer team at Ollivier Middle School. After the district dismissed me, I was told by district leadership that I wasn’t allowed on campus because they “want to keep the campus safe.” The students and their parents felt differently, so we moved practices off school campus. Despite the turmoil we faced when I was not allowed on campus, we still won a CONTINUE READING: Black and Brown Students Need Culturally Competent Teachers - LA Progressive

Timpsila, Medicine for Tech-No-Logic – Wrench in the Gears

Timpsila, Medicine for Tech-No-Logic – Wrench in the Gears

Timpsila, Medicine for Tech-No-Logic

John Trudell, Native American activist and poet, spoke prophetically of a predator energy that mines the “being part of humans.” He called it tech-no-logic. Every January since the early 1970s, the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) power brokers have assembled in Davos to plot out the next steps of their planned tech-no-logic coup. We’ve now reached a tipping point with the introduction of “stakeholder capitalism.” It is a vast program of poverty mining meant to transform the masses into human capital data commodities for financial speculation and ubiquitous surveillance. This emerging investment sector runs on poverty and trauma, two things the response to Covid-19 has manufactured in abundance.

We are experiencing the lead up to WEF’s planned transhumanist future. Covid has paved the way for a reset meant to usher in their Fourth Industrial Revolution. This is a revolution in which artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) sensors, 5G, robotics, and synthetic biology threaten to consume humanity. We’re on the brink of normalizing biocapitalism – humans and nature as batteries for financial markets. Picture derivatives mixed with bioengineered eugenics, deceptively sold to the public under the brand of “green” capitalism. The plan is to channel the concentrated wealth of the world’s largest asset holders through structured deals aligned to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Pull back the curtain and see a program unthinkingly embraced by so many progressives and liberals exposed for what it is – not climate justice and not liberation of the poor and dispossessed, but instead an orgy of mechanistic spirit eating.

“What Is The Fourth Industrial Revolution?”

The next phase of Davos’s mining program involves deploying nano-tech CONTINUE READING: Timpsila, Medicine for Tech-No-Logic – Wrench in the Gears

2020 Medley #17 — All COVID-19, All the Time | Live Long and Prosper

2020 Medley #17 — All COVID-19, All the Time | Live Long and Prosper

2020 Medley #17 — All COVID-19, All the Time

IT’S ALL COVID-19, ALL THE TIME

Is there really anything to write about besides the problem of schools starting during the pandemic…the threat to students and teachers…the lack of preparation and science-based decisions?

The big problem facing public education right now is the fact that states are coercing school staff and students back into in-person classrooms before the pandemic is under control and virtually every education writer has at least one, and often more, opinions about the subject.

Maybe it’s my “bubble” but most of the articles I’ve read (and posted) were on the side of “no in-person school until it’s safe.” The few that were in favor of opening schools in the middle of a pandemic took the side of 1) parents need to go back to work, which only shows up the failure of state and federal governments ability to provide for safe child care and provide support for parents who would have to stay at home to be with their kids, and 2) kids are less affected by COVID-19 so they’ll be ok…with little if any acknowledgment that in order to have kids in school one must also have adults who are at greater risk from the illness.

For me, however, the biggest problem is the same one that the media has faced CONTINUE READING: 

NYC Educator: Not As I Do

NYC Educator: Not As I Do

Not As I Do

It's remarkable to turn on the TV and see people broadcasting from their home computers. More remarkable still is when they speak from isolation demanding we open school buildings. Though it's too risky for them to get off their butts and go to a TV station, though it's too dangerous for the interviewers to be in the same room with these authorities on education, it's okay for over a million kids to visit NYC school buildings. 



 In fact, in New York City, indoor dining is considered too dangerous, so New Yorkers may only eat outside of restaurants. The city, in fact, started a program to enable and expand this. They don't seem to have bothered preparing this much for school next year. We've got an outlandish program that proposes two teachers for every class, one online and one in person. Guess what? The city doesn't have enough teachers to accomplish that. 

We get hopeful letters from the chancellor, saying they care about our health and that of the students. This notwithstanding, it's simply inevitable that there will be new cases of Covid. And while we may have contained it for a while by being extremely careful, this particular experiment will move us precisely in the opposite direction. Eleven Kansas educators just went to a Branson educational retreat, and six came back infected. I'm pretty sure hotels in Branson are cleaner than NYC schools. 

Elsewhere, there are other disturbing developments. While it's comforting to entertain nonsense about how young people are at such low risk, a 7-year-old boy in Georgia with no complicating health issues just died of the virus. Does Mayor de Blasio or Governor Cuomo think that New Yorkers are somehow tougher, and therefore immune? What are they going to say after the first New York kid dies? It's the price of doing business?

I'm bone weary of hearing people say it's all about the kids, while ignoring not only the kids who get sick and die, CONTINUE READING: NYC Educator: Not As I Do

Myths and Facts About the COVID-19 Public Education Relief Being Debated in Congress | janresseger

Myths and Facts About the COVID-19 Public Education Relief Being Debated in Congress | janresseger

Myths and Facts About the COVID-19 Public Education Relief Being Debated in Congress

Congress is debating a new COVID-19 relief bill, and there is much unhappiness, mythology and confusion about what is being proposed to support the nation’s 98,000 public schools, which are being forced to undertake big expenses to reconfigure classrooms and buses for social distancing and to improve ventilation systems.  At the same time school districts are coping with unprecedented state budget cuts which are forcing districts to lay off teachers and other essential staff.

Here is some background.

• The first gambit in the Congressional negotiations over more COVID-19 aid was the HEROES Act, passed on May 15, by the U.S. House of Representatives and sent to the Senate, where the bill languished for two and a half months. The House’s  HEROES Act (if passed by Congress) would provide $90 billion for public education (including higher education) along with $915 billion to shore up state, local, and tribal governments during the COVID-19 fiscal downturn.
• The HEALS Act, proposed piecemeal on July 27th by U.S. Senate Republicans, includes $105 billion for education—$70 billion for K-12 public schools and the rest for higher education.  For Forbes, Sarah Hansen explains the so-called bill’s release: “Senate Republicans on Monday released their plan for the next coronavirus relief package: the Health, Economic Assistance, Liability Protection, and Schools (HEALS) Act. But the legislation didn’t come all at once: instead, it trickled out from a handful of Senators and committees in different outlines and bills, including a few items that predate the Covid-19 crisis.”
• As of yesterday, the terms of the negotiations had shifted. Senate Republicans and the Trump administration were fighting to reserve the $70 billion in their HEALS Act proposal for schools opening with in-person classes. Senate Democrats had reduced their demand for relief for state and local governments to $875 billion and increased their request for combined relief for public schools as well as child care for a total of $430 billion, the amount needed for funding services outlined in a separate bill introduced on June 30 by Senator Patty Murray (D-WA).

Sometimes on the news shows there is considerable confusion about the details of the various CONTINUE READING: Myths and Facts About the COVID-19 Public Education Relief Being Debated in Congress | janresseger

Some District 75 Concerns | JD2718

Some District 75 Concerns | JD2718

Some District 75 Concerns

It is nearly impossible to practice social distancing when most, if not all, of our students require hand over hand prompting with everything from washing their hands, to wiping their bottoms to completing classwork. These children unfortunately won’t wear masks so the classroom is going to be extremely unsafe; yet D75 is telling parents they can come to school 5 days per week. Many of our students are in diapers and paraprofessionals are required to change their diapers in unventilated bathrooms.

Like many community schools, our classrooms are also unventilated but they are much (much!) smaller than any regular DOE classroom.

A very challenging part of our day as D75 educators is when a child is going into crisis; we often get bit, CONTINUE READING: Some District 75 Concerns | JD2718

I Bought HEPA Air Filtration for My Classroom | deutsch29

I Bought HEPA Air Filtration for My Classroom | deutsch29

I Bought HEPA Air Filtration for My Classroom

As part of my effort to control what I can in the face of so much COVID-19 unknown, today I purchased two HEPA (“high efficiency particulate air”) filtration machines for my classroom (I chose Okaysou AirMax8L for its reasonable price and for the square footage a single machine is able to filter multiple times per hour.)

Given the squre footage of my room (roughly 600 sq ft), the two units should be able to filter the entire room four to five times per hour.

My classroom has windows, but they do not open. Besides, the Louisiana climate does not often lend itself to comfortable, non-AC living. (I attended high school in Louisiana without AC, and we often had to move to an abbreviated, 7 a.m. – 1 p.m. school day because of the sweltering afternoon heat and humidity.) Too, even though my classroom has a back door that I could leave open, doing so introduces safety concerns associated with a campus comprised of multiple buildings (and therefore, multiple entrances).

I do have two wall AC units, but these are not equiped with HEPA filtration.

I feel relief because of this purchase. Let me tell you why.

First of all, if it is safer to be outdoors during this pandemic, then quality filtering of indoor indoor air makes sense.

Second, even though my district is mandating that my high school students wear masks in class (exceptions must be approved by administration on a case-by-case basis), and since I am grounded in K12-teacher reality, I anticipate that I will encounter varied student resistance to doing so (i.e., masks under chin; masks over mouth but not nose; full-on mask defiance that requires disciplinary CONTINUE READING: I Bought HEPA Air Filtration for My Classroom | deutsch29

Connecting School Leaders to Available Devices - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

Connecting School Leaders to Available Devices - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

State Superintendent Tony Thurmond and Digital Divide Task Force Connect School Leaders to Available Devices as Learning Resumes

SPI Announces Collaboration with Apple & T-Mobile - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education) - https://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr20/yr20rel65.asp

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and the Closing the Digital Divide Task Force held a special webinar today to connect school districts to available technology during a time when most schools are starting the school year in distance learning and many are experiencing a shortage of computing devices.

The task force, co-chaired by Senator Connie Leyva (D-Chino), also provided an update on one-time funding available immediately to school districts to purchase devices. State law requires that schools have a plan for ensuring access to devices and connectivity for all students whenever distance learning occurs.

“We know that up to 1 million students still need devices for distance learning, and we’re in a race against the clock as most schools plan to begin the next school year virtually,” Thurmond said. “We are proud to have provided this opportunity for all school districts in California to learn about the public-private partnerships available that can help us accelerate our efforts to meet the urgent needs of our most vulnerable students.”

During today’s webinar, panelists provided more details about a landmark collaboration with Apple and T-Mobile to fulfill orders from districts—which could reach 100,000 students during the back to school period and up to 1 million students by the end of 2020—with discounted iPads already equipped with high-speed internet connectivity.

The Governor’s Office also offered additional guidance for school districts regarding the $5.3 billion in one-time funding in the state budget for schools to strengthen distance learning heading into the same year. These funds—a rare opportunity for districts to make short and long-term investments in student technology—can be used immediately for purchasing needed devices.

An archived broadcast of today’s task force meeting can be found on the California Department of Education (CDE) Facebook page.

# # # #

Tony Thurmond — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5602, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

Connecting School Leaders to Available Devices - Year 2020 (CA Dept of Education)

CURMUDGUCATION: GA: Bad Cover-Up Management In Times Of Crisis

CURMUDGUCATION: GA: Bad Cover-Up Management In Times Of Crisis

GA: Bad Cover-Up Management In Times Of Crisis

For years, I worked for an administration whose philosophy about any problematic or controversial issue was, "If we don't talk about it, the public won't notice and this will all blow over in a while."

It was a terrible management philosophy, not just because it was dishonest and unfair, but because it failed. It failed hard. Every. Single. Time.

See? Doesn't everything look better now?

People always found out, and they always got upset about the exact things administration was afraid they'd get upset about. And on top of that, they were upset that administration had been trying to hide problems instead of solve them or share them with the affected parties, which in turn meant that they had zero trust in leadership moving forward. It just always ended poorly, and yet, administration never learned.

We're seeing some of that already with the news out of Georgia, where a couple of photos of unmasked students crowded wall to wall in the hall made Paulding County schools look pretty--well, not good. Buzzfeed (yes, you really have to start taking them seriously as a news outlet) has the whole story so far.

The school's nurse had already quit over the policy. Football players at North Paulding had already tested positive. And the first day of school was a scary mess. The superintendent responded to the CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: GA: Bad Cover-Up Management In Times Of Crisis

A VERY BUSY DAY Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... The latest news and resources in education since 2007

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

A VERY BUSY DAY

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

The latest news and resources in education since 2007

  

“Now Is the Time to Address Education’s ‘Most Pressing Equity Issues'”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 13h

Now Is the Time to Address Education’s ‘Most Pressing Equity Issues’ is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. Two educators call for schools to use this time of crisis to focus on equity issues like desegregation and community involvement. Here are some excerpts:

I’m Becoming More & More Positive About Nearpod & This Tutorial Shows You How To Use It For Interactive Videos

by Larry Ferlazzo / 13h

I’ve spent several hours this week becoming familiar with Nearpod , and I’m liking what I see. And I’m particularly liking that it looks like our district might purchase a license for its use. It really is sort of an all-in-one tool, and they’ve recently added the ability to create interactive videos like those in EdPuzzle. Teacher Sam Kary has a nice YouTube Channel called New EdTech Classroom ,

Guest Post: “All About Me” Activity To Begin The School Year

24by Larry Ferlazzo / 13h

Editor’s Note: I think Donna’s activity is a great one to start the first day of school! Using Kahoot can be fun, though the sentence starters and the idea of using them to write an essay about the class can be used with or without the game site. I’m adding this post to Answers To “What Do You Do On The First Day Of School?” Donna DeTommaso – Kleinert Ed.D. is a retired ESL teacher from the North

Video: “Online Discussions in Google Classroom”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 13h

422737 / Pixabay Many of us are brushing up on tech tools that we might not have tried before the pandemic. I’ve never used Google Classroom for an asynchronous class discussion before, I plan to try it out this year. Here’s a good video explaining it. I’m adding it to A Beginning List Of The Best Resources For Learning About Google Classroom .

Friday’s Seven “Must-Read” Articles On Reopening Schools In The Fall

by Larry Ferlazzo / 13h

kaboompics / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING WHAT SCHOOLS WILL LOOK LIKE IN THE FALL : How Safe Is Your School’s Reopening Plan? Here’s What To Look For is from NPR. Congress’s Ideological Divide Has Stymied Aid for Pandemic-Stricken Schools is from The NY Times. I’m Tired of Hearing That Teachers Are Only Thinking About Ourselves Right Now is from Slate. What will it

Video: Parkland Students Unveil New Ad – “Our Power: Next Time”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 17h

13smok / Pixabay March For Our Lives, the anti-gun violence group begun by Parkland students, are putting this new add on the airwaves (you can read more about it at the Washington Post article, March for Our Lives marches toward November with new campaign ad ). I’m adding it to The Best Resources For Learning About “The March For Our Lives”

How Many Hours Can Our Students Be Expected To Be “Doing School” This Fall?

by Larry Ferlazzo / 20h

OpenClipart-Vectors / Pixabay As we enter a pandemic-shaped school year, one of many questions we teachers will need to deal with is “What are we NOT going to cover this year?” We’re clearly not going to have as much live classroom time with our students, and we need to resist the urge to load-up our students with homework to “make-up” all that lost time. Let’s look at things realistically. Based

Classroom Instruction Resources Of The Week

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

Each week, I publish a post or two containing three or four particularly useful resources on classroom instruction, and you can see them all here. Of course, this is a crazy time for “classroom” instruction…. You might also be 

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007