What Does a “Safe Return” to School Look Like? Ask Teacher Unions. - In These Times

What Does a “Safe Return” to School Look Like? Ask Teacher Unions. - In These Times

What Does a “Safe Return” to School Look Like? Ask Teacher Unions.

Powerful elites are willing to sacrifice the lives and futures of millions to feed their own profits. Teachers are fighting back.

Demands for stu­dents and edu­ca­tors to return to in-per­son school­ing dur­ing the pan­dem­ic are com­ing from Democ­rats and Repub­li­cans, both claim­ing the return is nec­es­sary not just to pro­vide high-qual­i­ty edu­ca­tion, but to save the econ­o­my and get par­ents back to work. The nar­ra­tive con­scious­ly exploits the needs of par­ents who may not have health­care and who rely on pub­lic schools to care for and edu­cate their chil­dren while they work. It pits par­ents, stu­dents, teach­ers and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers against one anoth­er, using (or ignor­ing) sci­en­tif­ic data to suit the polit­i­cal pur­pose of mon­eyed inter­ests — the bipar­ti­san project of destroy­ing pub­lic schools. 

When Edu­ca­tion Sec­re­tary Bet­sy DeVos tweets that par­ents ​“need real options for edu­ca­tion this fall” and #School­ChoiceNow — with­out pro­vid­ing the equip­ment, con­di­tions or funds need­ed to make schools safe — the real mes­sage is clear. The Right is using the push to reopen as a way to inten­si­fy the pri­va­ti­za­tion and mar­ke­ti­za­tion of edu­ca­tion, boost prof­its in the edu­ca­tion­al tech­nol­o­gy sec­tor and erode trust in pub­lic schools. 

In response, teach­ers’ labor activism — wide­spread and robust in recent years — con­tin­ues to emerge. Teach­ers orga­niz­ing on social media have cam­paigned for var­i­ous sci­en­tif­ic stan­dards to trig­ger reopen­ing; #14DaysNoNewCases, for exam­ple, demands that cam­pus­es only reopen after going two weeks with­out Covid-19 infec­tions. The Demand Safe Schools Coali­tion wants class sizes lim­it­ed to 10 to 15 stu­dents, ven­ti­la­tion that meets guide­lines from the Cen­ters for Dis­ease Con­trol and Pre­ven­tion, clean and social­ly dis­tant school trans­porta­tion, sup­plies of per­son­al pro­tec­tive equip­ment and ample Covid-19 test­ing. Activists in dozens of cities ral­lied August 3 for these and oth­er demands, resist­ing hasty, under­fund­ed and unsafe reopen­ings that impose harm, espe­cial­ly on low-income stu­dents of col­or. The cam­paign #Only­When­ItsSafe advo­cates reopen­ing only if it is ​“equi­table and healthy for every­one,” in the words of Boston Teach­ers Union Pres­i­dent Jes­si­ca Tang. 

For many teach­ers union activists advo­cat­ing for social jus­tice, an ​“equi­table” school is one that can address the full range of human CONTINUE READING: What Does a “Safe Return” to School Look Like? Ask Teacher Unions. - In These Times

Online Charter Schools No Solution in a Pandemic - LA Progressive

Online Charter Schools No Solution in a Pandemic - LA Progressive

Online Charter Schools No Solution in a Pandemic

Instead of going to school every morning, what if school could come to you?” an ad asks enticingly, promising students “online personalized learning” tailored to their specific needs. It’s one of hundreds of active Facebook ads run by K12 Inc., the largest for-profit virtual charter school provider in the United States. As public schools rose to the challenge of educating students online during the pandemic, corporations like K12 Inc., whose stock price has been climbing since mid-March, were licking their chops at the prospect of moving kids online permanently. Though virtual charter schools perform dismally academically and are plagued by scandal, the goal is for them to replace traditional brick-and-mortar public schools in an effort to privatize education. While this would harm students, it would most egregiously damage Black and Latino children, who’ve already been disproportionately impacted by the coronavirus, due to structural inequities such as lack of access to computers and internet service, as well as inconsistent health care and crowded housing.

K12 Inc. was founded in 2000 by investment banker Ron Packard, “junk bond king” Michael Milken, and Bill Bennett, the U.S. secretary of education under President Ronald Reagan, who was also the company’s first board chairman. Betsy DeVos was an early investor in K12 who held shares in the company until she became education secretary in 2017. The idea behind virtual charter schools was promising: to serve a varied group of students who might benefit from the flexibility of learning online, from those who struggled academically, to others with health challenges, to athletes and performers, as Mary Gifford, a senior vice president for K12, explained in a 2016 article in Education Week. But the venture quickly fell into corruption by putting profits over performance and using taxpayer dollars as its personal piggy bank, as a 2017 report by the American Federation of Teachers detailed.

Coronavirus and racism combined with online charters would create a plague of injustice that will never be wiped out.

Like brick-and-mortar charter schools, virtual charters are publicly funded but privately managed, raking in more than $1 billion taxpayer dollars each year while functioning with minimal oversight. Most are for-profit entities in a market dominated by K12 and its chief competitor, the Pearson-operated Connections Academy. Full-time virtual schools served about 300,000 students nationwide in 2017-18, according to the National Education Policy Center.

Darcy Bedortha, who taught at the K12-operated Insight School of Oregon and wrote about it in Education Week, described a toxic environment where students logged into class erratically and staff meetings focused more on recruiting students than helping those who already attended and were struggling. Teachers were CONTINUE READING: Online Charter Schools No Solution in a Pandemic - LA Progressive

NYC Public School Parents: Today's "Talk out of School" on PreK reopening and how to improve online learning

NYC Public School Parents: Today's "Talk out of School" on PreK reopening and how to improve online learning

Today's "Talk out of School" on PreK reopening and how to improve online learning

This morning, on my “Talk out of School” podcast, I spoke to Alice Mulligan, director of a preschool in Brooklyn and head of CBOs for Equity, whose school reopened last week.  She described the changes and renovations she had to make to ensure proper safety precautions, without help or reimbursement from the DOE. 

Alice almost had to cancel the interview when right before the broadcast, one of her students developed a runny nose.  As she explained, she hurriedly put on PPE and waited outside for the parents to come to pick up and take the child home.  Luckily, Alice was able to return to her office right before 10 AM to speak on the show. Just one of the many unpredictable events that educators will have to deal with during this unpredictable year.

Then I interviewed Tom Liam Lynch, director of education policy for the Center for NYC affairs and editor in chief  of InsideSchools, who explained their new project, InsideSchools plus, an online community site for parents to share information about their schools and express their concerns.   

Tom also helped develop the iLearn learning platform when he worked for DOE several years ago.  iLearn was used during this past summer school with  inconsistent results. Tom explained how he believes remote learning could be strengthened from the version that was implemented over the summer and last year, that is, if teachers are properly supported. He has also developed a free online course for parents to let them know how to help their children succeed with learning remotely. 

As I made clear during our discussion, I’m not a fan of online learning, and strongly believe that at its best, learning is a collective, social endeavor and that most students need the steady in-person support of their teachers to thrive. And yet given the fact that most students will be relegated to remote instruction for much of their time, even if they opted into in-person learning, it is important to try to improve upon the method by analyzing the failures of the past 

NYC Public School Parents: Today's "Talk out of School" on PreK reopening and how to improve online learning

NANCY BAILEY: Betsy DeVos and the Separation of Church and State During Covid-19

Betsy DeVos and the Separation of Church and State During Covid-19

Betsy DeVos and the Separation of Church and State During Covid-19

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, who is supposed to represent public schools, recently visited a Catholic school in Grand Rapids. She used this school to irresponsibly drive home the idea that it’s safe to have in-person classes. She said All schools in MI need an in-person option. Sacred Heart shows that it can be done. Then she thanked the teachers and staff for putting students’ needs first. She ended her tweet with #SchoolChoiceNow.

DeVos might have thought to drive east to visit Detroit schools. She could have stopped on her way to see how the children in Flint were doing. The truth is 86 percent of Michigan’s school districts have some face-to-face options, but balancing how to safely deal with an unprecedented virus takes careful thought and study. It isn’t simply an either-or situation.

DeVos has made it a point to visit many private and parochial schools since she became education secretary, even though her primary obligation is to public schools. She positively highlights the schools she visits, always sending the message that they’re better than public schools.

In this effort to end public education, she has boldly ignored the Separation of Church and State. The ACLU notes:

The First Amendment contains two explicit provisions concerning religion. The CONTINUE READING: Betsy DeVos and the Separation of Church and State During Covid-19

All the Options for Schooling Are Bad—But We Have to Choose Safety - In These Times

All the Options for Schooling Are Bad—But We Have to Choose Safety - In These Times

All the Options for Schooling Are Bad—But We Have to Choose Safety

On parents’ impossible decision

I am among the mil­lions of par­ents around the coun­try (and more around the world) won­der­ing whether to send our chil­dren back to school. The mere ques­tion evokes con­flict­ing thoughts that usu­al­ly end in con­fu­sion and exas­per­a­tion. It’s a big deci­sion, one that most par­ents feel ill-equipped to make.

Let’s be real: This nov­el coro­n­avirus still stumps world-renowned epi­demi­ol­o­gists. How can par­ents ade­quate­ly ascer­tain what’s best? My kids have tear­ful­ly inti­mat­ed on more occa­sions than I care to acknowl­edge that they want to go back — to actu­al­ly leave the house, learn from their teach­ers in per­son, spend time with friends beyond a lap­top screen. My hus­band and I want that, too. If only it were that simple. 

By August 30 at least 36 states had report­ed pos­i­tive cas­es at col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties, adding more than 8,700 cas­es to America’s total. My heart sinks think­ing of that now-infa­mous pho­to of Geor­gia high school stu­dents — a state where I once lived — mask­less and crammed togeth­er in a nar­row hall­way, no social dis­tanc­ing in sight. Pre­dictably, nine stu­dents and staff test­ed pos­i­tive for Covid and the school tem­porar­i­ly closed. It’s not quite a ring­ing endorse­ment for return. 

And those were teenagers. The­o­ret­i­cal­ly, they have the capac­i­ty to grasp the con­se­quences of a pub­lic health cri­sis. My ram­bunc­tious 8- and 6‑year-old sons? Not so much. Before the pan­dem­ic, we were still work­ing on the whole ​“wash your hands” thing. I am not opti­mistic they could keep a mask on for an entire school day. 

The sto­ry of lit­tle Kimo­ra Lynum — ​“Kim­mie” as her fam­i­ly affec­tion­ate­ly called her — adds to my nev­er-end­ing anx­i­ety. The 9‑year-old Flori­da girl loved to play video games and dance to YouTube and Tik­Tok videos, just like my boys. After a sud­den onset of a high fever and severe stom­ach pains in CONTINUE READING: All the Options for Schooling Are Bad—But We Have to Choose Safety - In These Times

Principals, I Am Not Your Magical Negro - Philly's 7th Ward

Principals, I Am Not Your Magical Negro - Philly's 7th Ward

PRINCIPALS, I AM NOT YOUR MAGICAL NEGRO

For many schools, having a Black man in their buildings often means having a disciplinarian in their school to supervise Black students, particularly Black male students. Sometimes, schools specifically hire Black men to dole out discipline and other times schools make Black men the de-facto disciplinarian. I’ve seen this happen to Black men in schools. It happened to me.

Once folks caught wind that students listened to me and that I was a competent classroom manager, I became a go to person for discipline matters. I was asked to speak to students on the spot when they defied a teacher, I was asked to step inside a classroom and address students if a teacher saw me walking by, I was “asked” to house misbehaving students in my classroom, assigned students who other teachers “couldn’t handle,” and I was often left alone for lunch duty. My supervisors didn’t ask me to help build the staff’s competence by coaching struggling teachers or leading professional development. They ignored that my classroom management was grounded in love and building an effective and mutual learning community.

Non-Black teachers and administrators alike referred students to me for what they described as needing “guidance” and they were usually Black male students – many of whom I didn’t even teach. I love(d) working and building CONTINUE READING: Principals, I Am Not Your Magical Negro - Philly's 7th Ward

Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools (The Tale of the Troubling Textbook) - Part One | Blue Cereal Education

Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools (The Tale of the Troubling Textbook) - Part One | Blue Cereal Education

Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools (The Tale of the Troubling Textbook) - Part One

It's An Elephant, Dammit!

I’ve been researching and drafting what I hope will be the next “Have To” History book. The focus is on the tricky balance between “free exercise” and “establishment” in relation to public education – how to allow students (and to a lesser extent, educators) to express their sincerely held beliefs while still protecting the supposed neutrality of the system towards all things supernatural. It’s fascinating stuff (well, to me, at least), but I confess I’m having trouble with potential titles.

I was initially thinking “Have To” History: A Hall of Separation, but my wife assures me no one will know what I’m talking about (and she’s probably right). I’ve tried variations which are a bit more specific – “Have To” History: A Wall of Separation – Balancing Free Exercise and Non-Establishment in Public Education Throughout American History, for example. Unfortunately, paragraph-long book titles went out of fashion nearly a century ago. Plus, I’m not sure it would fit on the cover.

One of the most challenging aspects so far is deciding what to include. The Supreme Court has tackled a variety of issues involving the separation of church and state in CONTINUE READING: Mozert v. Hawkins County Public Schools (The Tale of the Troubling Textbook) - Part One | Blue Cereal Education

New CDC Guidance for Reopening Schools Creates Color-Coded Risk Scale | US News -

 New CDC Guidance for Reopening Schools Creates Color-Coded Risk Scale |  US News

New CDC Guidance for Reopening Schools Creates Color-Coded Risk Scale

One early analysis of the CDC guidance suggests nearly 90% of people in the U.S. live in counties that fall into the two highest of five risk categories for reopening schools.

THE CENTERS FOR DISEASE Control and Prevention issued new guidance Wednesday for schools seeking to open for in-person learning, using various community infection rates and school safety thresholds to create a five-tiered color-coded risk scale.

[ 

SEE: 

The Latest News on the Coronavirus Outbreak ]

The guidance, which state education chiefs, school district superintendents, principals, teachers and others have been clamoring for since the spring, comes more than a month after millions of children, mostly across the South, returned to schools – some in districts with positive rates upward of 20% and without requirements for students and staff to wear masks.

According to at least one early analysis of the CDC guidance, nearly 90% of people in the U.S. live in counties that fall into the two highest risk categories for reopening schools. The release of the guidance, which recommends aggressive thresholds, reignited a wave of criticism over the lack of federal guidance and left many wondering how many schools would have decided not to reopen for in-person learning if officials had this guidance earlier

"There is no easy answer or single indicator," the CDC guidance states. "Many variables must be considered."

CDC recommends the use of three indicators, including two measures of community burden – the number of new cases per 100,000 persons within the last 14 days and the percentage of tests that are positive during the last 14 days – as well as one self-assessed measure of schools' ability to adhere to various mitigation strategies.

Those strategies could be things like the correct use of masks, social distancing, hand hygiene, cleaning and disinfection and contact tracing in collaboration with local health departments.

[ 

READ: 

Parents and Teachers Favor Slow Return to In-Person Learning ]

"These key mitigation strategies should be implemented to the largest extent possible," the CDC guidance states. "When mitigation strategies are consistently and correctly used, the risk of spread within the school environment and the surrounding community is decreased."

The guidance also emphasizes that local officials take additional factors into consideration, such as the extent to which mitigation strategies are adhered to in the broader community.

If a school districts falls into the "medium," "higher" or "highest" risk of transmission categories, it CONTINUE READING:  New CDC Guidance for Reopening Schools Creates Color-Coded Risk Scale |  US News

Private and Charter Schools Received Six Times as Much COVID Funding As Public Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Private and Charter Schools Received Six Times as Much COVID Funding As Public Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Private and Charter Schools Received Six Times as Much COVID Funding As Public Schools

A new study of the federal CARES act funding found that private and charter schools received SIX TIMES the amount of funding as public schools from the federal coronavirus program. This may actually, as the report states, be an underestimate.

Mellissa Chang wrote:

A new analysis of Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans by Good Jobs First points to an imbalance in CARES Act funding between public schools on the one hand and private and charter schools on the other.

GJF’s Covid Stimulus Watch has identified at least 6,600 charter and private schools that received an estimated $5.7 billion in PPP loans, which have been made available to private companies and non-profit organizations but not public entities. This data is now available on Covid Stimulus Watch through the facility ownership search category.

PPP loan disclosures from the Small Business Administration (SBA) were reported in dollar ranges, not exact values. Covid Stimulus Watch uses the midpoint of each range to estimate loan amounts. Data released by the SBA includes NAICS industry codes for each entity; CONTINUE READING: Private and Charter Schools Received Six Times as Much COVID Funding As Public Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Teacher Tom: What Are We Going to Do?

 Teacher Tom: What Are We Going to Do?

What Are We Going to Do?

A couple days ago, I had a conversation with the father of a six-year-old, a first grader who is gamely trying to engage in online first grade for two hours a day. He told me she is struggling: restless and distracted. She is zoned out much of the time. When those two hours are over, she is irritable and exhausted, taking herself to bed for a long nap. He is in despair because her school has just let them know that starting this week online school will become "full time." He said, "I don't know what we're going to do."

A mother of one of my former preschool students says she is "in grief" about the school year. He is bored, frustrated, and moody. "He is in a vacuum, no classmates, teachers, movement, or human-being-ness to take in and give off." As a corrective, she's started trying to do her own work in the room with him, where he asks her questions, shows off, and generally reaches out to her for the human connection he needs. She's a single mother and a small business owner, who has to get her work done, so even as she can't blame him, she can't help but get annoyed at the constant distractions. This is the most loving, devoted mother I know. This is a bright, enthusiastic, kid who always loved school. 

She writes, "The teacher's speakered-sounding, too-loud voice is reading math problems while you are supposed to CONTINUE READING:  Teacher Tom: What Are We Going to Do?

CURMUDGUCATION: Is Betsy DeVos Flip-Flopping?

CURMUDGUCATION: Is Betsy DeVos Flip-Flopping?

Is Betsy DeVos Flip-Flopping?

Betsy DeVos visited a private school in Grand Rapids that is currently open for face-to-face school, and she observed that not re-opening school buildings is a "tragedy."

This seems like a radical shift of direction for the secretary of education. For one thing, one of her mantras has been that we should fund students, not institutions or, presumably, the buildings in which those institutions are housed. DeVos has also been a huge advocate of computer-run education, insisting that the modern miracles of technology should set students free from traditional school-in-a-building.

But with the advent of the pandemic, DeVos seemingly shifted gears, going so far as to threaten public schools with funding loss if they don't open up right away. And here she was in Grand Rapids, praising a private school that opened up and sadly castigating public schools that haven't. 

So did Betsy DeVos suddenly change her mind? 

That seems unlikely; DeVos is nothing if not singleminded and focuses. Tales of her career in education reform do not include any sudden epiphanies that lead to a new shift or focus. So how to explain this sudden apparent 180 degree flip. Let me offer a couple of theories.

One theory is that she is simply following Trump's lead, and Trump on education (as with some other policy areas) is best understood as the cranky old grampaw who thinks the world would be a lot better if everything was the way (he thinks) it was Back In His Day. Though DeVos was not a Trump fan back in 2016, she has become a solid team player for her boss, one of the few who has never, CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Is Betsy DeVos Flip-Flopping?

Florida Teacher: The State Lied to Me | Diane Ravitch's blog

Florida Teacher: The State Lied to Me | Diane Ravitch's blog

Florida Teacher: The State Lied to Me

A Florida teacher posted this comment. It raises the question of whether it is fair to attract people to become teachers with promises that are later canceled by a nasty, brutish legislature. The legislature passed a law called “the Best and Brightest” that awarded bonuses to new teachers based on the SAT scores they recorded years earlier. It constantly thinks about how to attract new teachers but does nothing to retain the experienced teachers it has. What this teacher describes is the perfidious work of Jeb Bush and his cronies:

I was never a money person. If I was I would never have become a teacher. I honestly believed that we were paid what they could afford to pay us. Seems stupid now but I was a kid. I was a fool. Twenty years ago I signed up to be a teacher. I wanted to be a teacher. I went to college for it. I knew I would never be able to support a family. It was ok, I wasn’t interested in having one. When I first became a teacher, I was shown a “step” system of pay. I saw that every year you’d make a little more. When you finally reached 20 or 25 years in the system the pay took huge leaps higher. Some years as much as a $10,000 increase if you can believe it. I thought I’d be rewarded for loyalty.

That “step” system has long been abandoned. Now we CONTINUE READING: Florida Teacher: The State Lied to Me | Diane Ravitch's blog

How Centrist Democrats Paved the Way for Betsy DeVos – Have You Heard

 How Centrist Democrats Paved the Way for Betsy DeVos – Have You Heard

How Centrist Democrats Paved the Way for Betsy DeVos

A consensus between Republicans and centrist Democrats around charter schools has been at the very center of education policy for the past three decades. Guest David Menefee-Libey joins us to talk about the formation of the charter school “treaty,” why it unraveled and what happens next. 

Complete transcript of the episode is here. The financial support of listeners like you keeps this podcast going. Subscribe on Patreon or donate on PayPal.

Jennifer and Jack’s forthcoming book A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door: The Dismantling of Public Education and the Future of School, is now available for preorder!

Have You Heard · #97 How Centrist Democrats Paved the Way for Betsy DeVos

 How Centrist Democrats Paved the Way for Betsy DeVos – Have You Heard

NYC Educator: Day One

 NYC Educator: Day One

Day One

I've spent hours, days, weeks and months dreading September. There were so many issues. As chapter leader, I don't feel like I've had a day off since June. How in the hell were we going to open the schools?

No one really knew. De Blasio's ridiculous plan fell apart, as anyone who gave it a cursory examination could have predicted. I remain amazed that he and Carranza could have stood behind such a senseless plan for a moment, let alone many months.

We have to be really careful selecting the next mayor. Full disclosure--I worked for and contributed to Bill de Blasio. I attended his inauguration. We're gonna need a mayor who will rid Tweed of Bloomberg's ghost. We're gonna need a mayor who will not continue to ignore the miserable state of our school facilities. 

We can't go through this again. Once is more than enough.

Then there's COVID, of course. My school is on the list of the dreaded 55. As far as I, or anyone in my school administration can tell, the only reported COVID case comes from a person who self-reported before the 8th and hasn't been in the building since March. It's entirely believable to me that the DOE could screw up something like that, because incompetence is their CONTINUE READING:  NYC Educator: Day One

Education Matters: Set up to fail

Education Matters: Set up to fail

Set Up to Fail

 I was so mad I was on the brink of tears. Yesterday I could use a curriculum that I had for years and where not perfect, gave me lots of material to work with, then like a light switch turning off, it was gone. The district didn't even think teachers were worthy of a heads up. I felt set up to fail, and sadly, I am not the only one, and the district's only response seemed to be, cry me a river.

In the last few days, I have read about on Facebook or heard from several how they too felt set up to fail.

No books or the right materials.

No access to a printer, or a working one anyways.

12 hours of work over the weekend and still not caught up.

They spent their planning calling parents of students who hadn't shown up or shown much interest if they did.

Crazy big Duval homeroom classes.

Crazy big brick and mortar ones too.

Way too much to do, and not nearly enough time to do. No slack is given, expectations higher than ever.

Then there is that pesky pandemic too. It's almost like the district office is unaware. You would think they CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: Set up to fail