Wednesday, October 20, 2010

The Answer Sheet - New data on bullying: 17% report regular abuse

New data on bullying: 17% report regular abuse

New data on bullying released today show that 17 percent of American students report being bullied two to three times a month or more within a school semester, with girls and boys having similar rates. The information was gleaned from an anonymous survey of 524,054 U.S. students in grades 3 through 12, and it comes when bullying is in the news because of a series of suicides by young gays who had been bullied. The survey was conducted by Dan Olweus (pronounced Ol-VEY-us), who is considered the founding father of research on bully/victim issues. It is being released by the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program.

City release of teacher ratings would break 2008 deal with union | GothamSchools

City release of teacher ratings would break 2008 deal with union

by Anna Phillips

The city’s decision to release teacher evaluation data this week represents a departure from an agreement officials made with the teachers union two years ago.

In a deal made in 2008 between then-president of the United Federation of Teachers Randi Weingarten and Department of Education Deputy Chancellor Christopher Cerf, the city and union agreed to keep the reports private. The reports assign scores to teachers based on how much they improve their students’ test scores.

“It is the DOEs’ [sic] firm position and expectation that Teacher Data reports will not and should not be disclosed or shared outside of the school community, defined to include administrators, coaches, mentors and other professional colleagues authorized by the teacher in question,” Cerf wrote.

“In the event a FOIL request for such documents is made, we will work with the UFT to craft the best legal

The Answer Sheet - Threats to school reform ... are within school reform

Threats to school reform ... are within school reform

This was written by Mike Rose, who is on the faculty of the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies and is the author of “Possible Lives: The Promise of Public Education in America" and "Why School?: Reclaiming Education for all of Us.” By Mike Rose Here’s an all-too-familiar storyline about reform, from education to agricultural development: The reform has run its course, has not achieved its goals, and the reformers and other analysts speculate in policy briefs or opinion pages about what went wrong. The interesting thing is that the reform’s flaws were usually evident from the beginning. As someone who has lived through several periods of educational reform and has studied schools and taught for a long time, I see characteristics of the current reform movement, as powerful as it is, that could lead to unintended and undesirable consequences. But when reform is going strong it can

Teachers as Performers and Pay-4-Performance Plans* � Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Teachers as Performers and Pay-4-Performance Plans*

by larrycuban

Teaching makes teachers into classroom actors. But their classroom performance is thoroughly divorced from the reform du-jour of “Pay-4-Performance.” These schemes call for teachers to be evaluated and paid, in part, on the basis of their students’ test scores. I want to unpack the idea that “good” teaching is, in part, artistic performance and the ways that “Pay-4-Performance” plans strangle that notion.

First, classroom performance. I begin with the two imperatives facing all teachers whether they teach high school physics, middle school social studies, or kindergarten on Cleveland’s East Side or in Beverly Hills: know your subject (the academic role) and know your students (the emotional role). These competing demands upon teachers require both distance from students (the academic role) and closeness to students (the emotional role).

In teaching first graders to read, 9th grade Algebra or Advanced Placement courses, teachers must convey knowledge and cultivate skills of students. Then they have to judge the degree to which students achieve

Queens Teacher: NYCDOE Wants To Release Teacher Scores To Public

NYCDOE Wants To Release Teacher Scores To Public

by Queens Teacher

The United Federation of Teachers has filed a lawsuit to prevent the Department of Education from releasing internal report cards on more than 12,000 city teachers.

For three years, the DOE has confidentially assigned ratings to teachers, and today the city planned to release that information.

The release of this data would be explosive. These are the supposedly confidential reports that assign each teacher a performance grade and percentile ranking, supposedly based on how much students improve while in their classroom. Almost all elementary and middle school math and English teachers get these scores.

Stand for Children? � Fred Klonsky's blog

Stand for Children?

by preaprez

A few weeks ago I received an inquiry from a blogging friend out west. He wanted to know if there was any sign of a group called Stand for Children in Illinois?

I checked around. There was a web site. Other than that I couldn’t find out much.

Then yesterday…boom.

Progress Illinois, the SEIU connected web site, did an extended story on their site.

Alexander Russo referenced the PI post.

So did the pro-charter Supermen at Education Equality Project in a Tweet.

Schools Matter: Sanity Will Not Be Restored Quietly

Sanity Will Not Be Restored Quietly

by Jim Horn

A couple of vets recently walked across the country as an act of protest against the Oligarchy that now owns Washington, DC. With Oprah, Inc. now behind the March to Restore Sanity and with the big O, himself, scheduled on Comedy Central to pump the cause, it is important that the hundreds of thousands who show up on Oct, 30 show up sane, yes, but loudly making a point that resistance and more resistance will be required to reclaim the democracy, rather than sitting on the sofa with Oprah, smiling.

By David Swanson
Remarks at the Lincoln Memorial, October 20, 2010
http://democrats.com/we-the-plutocracy

It's an honor for me to help welcome Robin Monahan and Laird Monahan to this city, not because I can take any pride in this place, but because we can all take pride in what they've done and

Worthy proposes jail for parents who skip kids' school conferences | detnews.com | The Detroit News

Worthy proposes jail for parents who skip kids' school conferences

Prosecutor wants to punish those who skip kids' school conferences

Christine MacDonald / The Detroit News

Detroit — Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy is pushing for a law that calls for jail time for parents who skip parent-teacher conferences, a plan some call inspired and others consider the nanny state run amok.

Worthy pitched her plan Tuesday to the Detroit City Council and is shopping it to the Wayne County Commission and state Legislature. Drawing a link between parental involvement and youth crime, Worthy wants a sponsor to guide the idea to law.

Her plan would require parents to attend at least one conference per year or face three days in jail. Parents of those excelling in school would be exempt, as would those whose health issues make travel difficult and those "actively engaged" with teachers through e-mail, phone calls or letters.

"We have to find any means necessary to get parents involved," Worthy told the council. "We have to start

From The Detroit News: http://www.detnews.com/article/20101020/METRO/10200350/Worthy-proposes-jail-for-parents-who-skip-kids#ixzz12v4tdfHd

UPR Humanities Occupied � occupy california

UPR Humanities Occupied

by *

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – Humanities Dept. in UPR reoccupied!

Before the warmth of the morning sun came, the students of the Humanities Action Committee (CAH) of the University of Puerto Rico – Rio Piedras campus, blocked passage to the classrooms of the Humanities Department with trash cans, desks, chairs and even plant pots to interrupt administrative labor and give way to humanistic and educational expression against the $800 fee that will be implemented on January 2011.

As the sun came up, and the physical occupation and paralization of the administration was guaranteed, some classes were given outside at Antonia Plaza, meanwhile the cultural activities of the day began with a web of

Labor Relations at the Ohio Education Association, or Don’t Call Your Ex-Boss a Slimebag | Intercepts

Labor Relations at the Ohio Education Association, or Don’t Call Your Ex-Boss a Slimebag

by Mike Antonucci

For a labor union, the Ohio Education Association has had its share of labor unrest with its own employees. Last month’s staff strike is only the latest example. OEA also sued its staff unions in 2005 and settled a $3.75 million class action lawsuit brought by retirees.

Those were big battles, but OEA also knows how to build mountains out of molehills, as evidenced by the years-long lawsuit it brought against former assistant executive director and general counsel Christopher A. Lopez. Lopez resigned his position in 2005, and OEA subsequently sued him for breach of his severance agreement, which stipulated he would not “at any time disparage, defame, or otherwise derogate Employer’s Officers, Executive Committee Members, employees or agents.”

When reformy ideologies clash… � School Finance 101

When reformy ideologies clash…

by schoolfinance101

Summary of Reformy Ideology

Reformy Ideology #1: Teacher quality is the one single factor that has the greatest effect on childrens’ life chances. Get a bad teacher or two in a row, and you’re screwed for life. The “best possible” way to measure teacher quality is by estimating the teacher’s influence on student test scores (value-added). Hiring, retention and dismissal decisions must, that is, MUST be based primarily on this information. This information may be supplemented, but value-added must play the dominant single role.

Reformy Ideology #2: Charter schools are the answer to most of the problems of poor urban school districts. Take and poor, failing urban school district, close its dreadfully failing schools and replace them as quickly as

In wake of Tyler Clementi suicide, Facebook teams with support groups to combat cyberbullying | NJ.com

In wake of Tyler Clementi suicide, Facebook teams with support groups to combat cyberbullying

Published: Wednesday, October 20, 2010, 11:54 AM Updated: Wednesday, October 20, 2010, 11:56 AM

The Star-Ledger Continuous News Desk
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FacebookFacebook is teaming with several organizations to combat cyberbullying after Tyler Clementi's death.

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Less than one month after Rutgers freshman Tyler Clementi committed suicide after his gay sexual encounter was transmitted over the Internet,Facebook is partnering with MTV and the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) to form a “Network of Support” for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender teens, according to a report on Mashable.com.

The network aims to combat cyberbullying by providing gay teens and their parents with information, resources and support on how teens can protect themselves online, block bullies and report harassment, the

City could release individual teacher ratings as soon as today | GothamSchools

City could release individual teacher ratings as soon as today

by Anna Phillips

The debate that begin in Los Angeles over whether it is ethical to release public school teachers’ effectiveness scores has made its way to New York City. The city’s Department of Education may give the ratings, which are based solely on test scores, to reporters today.

According to sources familiar with the discussion, city officials are debating with the teachers union over whether to release the scores with or without teachers’ names attached. The union is also considering whether to sue the city in order to halt the release.

The release would cover all 12,000 city teachers who have value-added reports, which measure a teacher’s

Shanker Blog � More On What "Superman" Left Out

MORE ON WHAT “SUPERMAN” LEFT OUT

by Diane Ravitch

Our guest author today is Diane Ravitch, Research Professor of Education at New York University and an historian of education. In addition, she is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C.. Her latest book is The Death and Life of the Great American School System.

In my recent article for the New York Review of Books about “Waiting for Superman,” I praised the SEED Charter

Yong Zhao � Blog Archive � Cargo Cult Science: McKinsey’s Report on Teacher Recruitment

Cargo Cult Science: McKinsey’s Report on Teacher Recruitment

20 OCTOBER 2010 9 NO COMMENT

The late Nobel Prize winning physicist Richard Feynman once criticized some educational and psychological studies as cargo cult science:

In the South Seas there is a cargo cult of people. During the war they saw airplanes land with lots of good materials, and they want the same thing to happen now. So they’ve arranged to make things like runways, to put fires along the sides of the runways, to make a wooden hut for a man to sit in, with two wooden pieces on his head like headphones and bars of bamboo sticking out like antennas—he’s the controller—and they wait for the airplanes to land. They are doing everything right. The form is perfect. It looks exactly the way it looked before. But it doesn’t work. No airplanes land. So I call these things (some educational and psychological studies) cargo cult science, because they follow all the apparent precepts and forms of scientific investigation, but they are missing something essential, because the planes don’t land (Richard Feynman & Ralph Leighton, 1985, Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman, New York, Norton,

The Answer Sheet - The rich irony in Virginia’s history textbook error

The rich irony in Virginia’s history textbook error

There is rich historic irony in the news that a textbook given to Virginia’s fourth-graders wrongly claims that thousands of African Americans fought for the South during the Civil War: The process by which textbooks are adopted by some states was initiated after Southern states decided they did not want children reading the North’s version of the conflict. As reported in today's Washington Post by my colleague Kevin Sieff, the book “Our Virginia: Past and Present,” used by Virginia students for the first time last month, was written by an author who is not a trained historian and who said she found the information about black Confederate solders on the Internet. The author, Joy Masoff, has penned other works including "Oh Yuck! The Encyclopedia of Everything Nasty" and "Oh Yikes! History’s Grossest Moments." (You can’t make up this stuff.)

An Awkward Moment for School Reformers :: Frederick M. Hess

An Awkward Moment for School Reformers

by Frederick M. Hess • Oct 20, 2010 at 10:50 am
Cross-posted from Education Week

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Yesterday, Gwinnett County, Georgia, claimed the Broad Prize in a classy awards ceremony at New York City's Museum of Modern Art. The event featured New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and NBC anchor Brian Williams talking about the vital role of school reform, and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan naming the winner.

Unmentioned by all, and for good reason, was that Gwinnett is in the middle of a very unreformish attempt to prohibit the Georgia Charter Schools Commission (GCSC) from approving or funding charter schools. Awk-ward....

Gwinnett has been one of several districts suing the state since 2007 over the GCSC's "imposition" of charter schools. This is especially awkward in the case of charters like Ivy Preparatory Academy, an all-girls charter

This Week In Education: Campaign '10: Stand For Children In Illinois

Campaign '10: Stand For Children In Illinois

by Alexander Russo

Stand For Children is joining DFER in finding centrist Dems and Republicans state-level races in places like Illinois where it recently doled out more than half a million dollars to nine candidates (six of them Democrats) according to this Progress Illinois story (A New Player In State Education Politics). The

New Jersey's Christie Seeks to Hire Rhee, Report Says - State EdWatch - Education Week

New Jersey's Christie Seeks to Hire Rhee, Report Says

by Sean Cavanagh

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is courting District of Columbia schools chancellor Michelle Rhee to become his state's commissioner of education, according to a report.

Rhee, who announced that she would resign from her current post last week, has voiced reservations about whether family concerns would allow her to take the New Jersey job, according to a story on the Star-Ledger, a

Government as venture capitalist? | The Education Report

Government as venture capitalist?

By Katy Murphy
Tuesday, October 19th, 2010 at 11:01 pm in school reform.

On the Marketplace radio program this evening, “Freakonomics” co-author Steve Dubner compared the Obama administration’s Race to the Top grant competition to innovations and competitive prizes in the private sector.

After talking about the X Prize (slogan: Revolution Through Competition) and Google’s practice of giving engineers a day each week to try out their own ideas — even though most of them flop — Dubner played a tape of the following statement and asked the host, Kai Ryssdal, to guess who the speaker was:

Well we’re fundamentally trying to change the business we’re in and we’re trying to drive innovation rather than being in this compliance-driven bureaucracy. And the idea

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