Wednesday, April 20, 2011

State to Broward school district: We’re watching you - Broward - MiamiHerald.com

State to Broward school district: We’re watching you

Education Commissioner Eric Smith said the state will be monitoring the Broward school district for at least six months to make sure it follows an action plan to address critical problems cited in a recent state Grand Jury report.

BY CARLI TEPROFF

CTEPROFF@MIAMIHERALD.COM

The state Department of Education said it’s keeping its eye on the Broward County school district — and will continue to do so for at least six months.

Following a scathing Grand Jury report that cited problems of waste and mismanagement at the state’s second largest school district, the state requested the district come up with a plan and sent the Inspector General down for an on-site visit.

In a letter dated April 15, Commissioner of Education Eric Smith said a review of the district’s 20-page plan and a report from the Inspector General showed the district had already taken action to address the Feb. 18 report that blasted Broward schools for being inept and corrupt.

“The team reviewed the district supplied action plan and supportive documents

“THE PRACTICAL WISDOM OF TEACHING” :: Save Our Schools March and National Call to Action

“THE PRACTICAL WISDOM OF TEACHING”

by DavidGreene

“I’M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I’M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!”
Howard Beale, Network
Apparently many of us need to say more and say it out loud and in public. I am so fed up; I am even willing to quote Spiro Agnew. “The nattering nabobs of negativism” who influence education policy need to be halted. Teachers teach. Well-trained teachers teach better. Great teachers change lives. Tests don’t. Why then are we so linked to tests (and poorly devised ones at that) as the sole measure of accountability? Several authors have theories. Many (like Diane Ravitch) point out that over the past two decades education policy has fallen into the hands of policy makers bred and influenced by major corporations and the foundations they support. The Gates Foundation (Bill recently called for the end of master degree requirements and pay increases for gaining more knowledge and expertise. Of course, isn’t he a college drop out?) and The Fordham (not University) Institute are two good examples.
They still live by the standard of industrial America developed a full century ago by Frederick W. Taylor. Captains of Industry (Robber Barons) supported Scientific Management, as it was called, in order to make their employees more productive. Sound familiar? Today’s policy makers want to turn teachers into industrial employees churning students out like Ford workers churned out model T’s. Taylor and his followers turned efficiency into the justification for such changes. The industrial leaders of the day believed implementation of

Measuring Michelle Rhee

Blog : Education Next

Measuring Michelle Rhee

By Paul E. Peterson 04/20/2011 0 Comments

Following are my responses to issues raised by Alan Ginsburgconcerning my Education Next article, “The Case Against Rhee: How Persuasive Is It?”

Adjusting for National Trends

Ginsburg: “Crucial to Peterson’s claims is that the DC score improvement should be computed only as the excess above the national average NAEP gain….This criticism makes little sense.”

Reply: Should we adjust for national trends when assessing how well a particular district is doing over a specific period of time? In Ginsburg’s view, the nation is too heterogeneous to be commonly affected by the financial disaster of 2007 or the impact of NCLB, or some other broad, national trend. Generally speaking, trends within districts more often parallel national trends than diverge from

Response by Dr. Alan Ginsburg to Paul Peterson's April 11, 2011 article in Education Next

TheRheeDCRecord - home

Response by Dr. Alan Ginsburg to Paul Peterson's April 11, 2011 article in Education Next and his Washington Times story taking issue with my analysis showing that Rhee's DC gains were no better than those of her two predecessors Vance and Janey. (April 15, 2011)

“In the case against Michelle Rhee,” Paul Peterson presents three alleged flaws in my analysis “ The Rhee DC Record: No Better Than Her Predecessors Vance and Janey.” Two of Peterson’s proposed flaws simply misrepresent my methodology. The third makes the highly questionable adjustment that the DC school system deserves credit only for DC gains above the national average NAEP gain, with Peterson giving credit to some unknown cause for DC gains up to the national average.

First, Peterson claims that my analyses did not adjust for the fact that “Rhee was in office for only two years, while Vance was in office for three and Janey for four.” This is a misrepresentation of my methodology. The analyses (Exhibit IIB and IID below) in the report clearly represent the average annual NAEP score gains. In math, Rhee’s annualized gains fall between Vance and Janey and in reading the annualized gains are about equal between Janey and Rhee.

Second, Peterson also claims that I used the DC NAEP sample that “in 2009 did not include

Mike Konczal on Public Education and Public Options - E.D. Kain - American Times - Forbes

Apr. 20 2011 - 6:09 pm | 0 views | 0 recommendations | 0 comments

Mike Konczal is one of my favorite bloggers. Today he has a really excellent post up working out a “general theory of public options”. He links over to this piece in the South Atlantic Quarterly on the rising cost of tuition:

California, one of the world’s wealthiest places, has seen one of the world’s most astonishing declines in college achievement. The state’s continuation rate, the proportion of students starting college who complete it, fell from 66 percent to 44 percent in just eight years (1996–2004). California’s rank among states in investment in higher education declined during the same period,from fifth to forty-seventh,according to Tom Mortenson, a higher education policy analyst.The state has cut its investment in higher education by close to 50 percent since 1980, forcing

solidaridad: Mayor Villaraigosa's "Stars (M)Aligned" Education [sic] Speech

On LAUSD's urgent need to pressure CNCA to revise the CRES #14 charter *"Parents having decision making power over a budget is not a sustainable model." — Ana F. Ponce (CEO, CNCA Corporation)* [image: Corporate Camino Nuevo Charter's Ana Ponce trying to explain CNCH's 94% remediation rate at the CSU] The EastsiderLA's ...

Mayor Villaraigosa's "Stars (M)Aligned" Education [sic] Speech My longtime compañero the incomparable activist José del Barrio asked me to share and post to the blog. *Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa outlines plans for ramping up education 'reform' in Los Angeles Unified School District during his "State of the City" ...

Daily Kos Action

Thank the Wisconsin volunteers

Thank the volunteers who gathered recall petition signatures against Wisconsin Republicans by filling out the form below and adding a personal note.

You first name, last name, city, state and personal note will be sent to the volunteers. Your email and zip code will not be sent.

Wisconsin Democrats have already filed recall petitions against four Republican state Senators. Today they announced they will submit signatures against a fifth Republican, and expect a sixth by the May 2nd deadline. Before this year only four state legislators had been recalled in Wisconsin history.

You know who made this happen? Thousands of volunteers. They took time off work, family and weekends to knock on doors in the snow (yes, it's still snowing in Wisconsin) gathering over 150,000 signatures in less than two months. No one ever paid them a dime, but they kept the fight going.

Today, I'm asking members of the Daily Kos community to send short thank you notes to the volunteers who gathered recall petition signatures against Wisconsin Republicans. You can write a note by clicking here. I've already been in touch with the recall organizers in Wisconsin and they promised your note will be sent to all of the volunteers.

This isn't like a normal petition that will be read by a low-level congressional staffer. These notes will go directly to volunteers on the ground in Wisconsin.

Can you imagine how good it would feel if thousands of people around the country sent you notes of thanks? Can you imagine how fired up this will make Wisconsin volunteers feel for the recall elections this summer?

Let those on the front lines know you support them. Please, send a short thank you note to the Wisconsin volunteers who gathered recall petition signatures.

Sample note:

"Thank you so, so much for gathering recall petition signatures. Your fight is our fight, because this is happening around the country. Because of you, I believe we're gonna win."

Education Roundup: "Socialist" Kindergartners? | Mother Jones

Education Roundup: "Socialist" Kindergartners?

— By Titania Kumeh

| Wed Apr. 20, 2011 9:00 AM PDT

Photoillustration by Nick Baumann. Sources:Jectre/Flickr, courosa/Flickr, stevendepolo/Flickr

Ah, kindergarten, where you learn that sharing is "socialist" and cooperation is...also "socialist." Mother Jones reporter Tim Murphyexamines GOP presidential contender Tim Pawlenty's controversial education record, which includes selecting an education commissioner for Minnesota who...well, read the rest here.

Speaking of kindergartners, one Texan tyke brought a gun to school. Maybe he thought it was a toy?

In Los Angeles, it's illegal for people under the age of 18 to be on the streets while school is in session. To enforce this policy, Los Angeles Police Department has conducted sweeps around schools, detained students for 45 minutes, and given out $250 curfew tickets before letting them go to class. Guess who's getting cited, Huffington Postreports: "According to LA school police data, none of the more than 13,000 tickets they

The Post-Employee Economy - E.D. Kain - American Times - Forbes

The Post-Employee Economy

by E.D. Kain

Derek Thompson has a post up on the ‘post-employee economy’ that ties in to a lot of what I’ve been writing about in regards to the service class replacing the middle class. He writes:

Fifty years ago, the four most valuable U.S. companies employed an average of 430,000 people with an average market cap of $180 billion. This year, the four largest U.S. companies employ an average 120,000 people with an average market cap of $334 billion. The titans of 2011 have twice the the value of their 1964 counterparts with a quarter of the employees.

This might help us understand why even with a mild economic recovery underway, unemployment remains so high.

He points out that he has excluded one particularly powerful corporation from the top-ten list: Walmart:

You might notice the last chart has only nine companies. That’s because I’ve excluded Walmart, whose chart-busting 2.1 million employees is the equal of the top six companies (Exxon,

Why Are Tuition Costs Rising? - E.D. Kain - American Times - Forbes

Why Are Tuition Costs Rising?

by E.D. Kain

Matt Yglesias makes some excellent points about the incentive structure facing universities. He argues that reinvestment too often goes toward increasing a college’s prestige rather than toward broadening the affordability of the institution. I think this is exactly right. And while I favor a very egalitarian approach to funding our public colleges – it should not cost $10,000 a year to attend state college no matter how you spin it – I do think we’re going to face staggeringly high tuition fees until we reevaluate who ought to be attending college in the first place.

College dropout rates are far too high, and I think one reason for this is that there are few good alternatives to an academic track in our public education system. We should tackle this at the secondary and college level by making vocational training at the high school level much more accessible to non-academic students, and by

DFER’s March 2011 Monthly Report to the FEC « DFER Watch

DFER’S MARCH 2011 MONTHLY REPORT TO THE FEC

Posted by ken libby on April 20, 2011 · Leave a Comment

DFER’s April 2011 monthly report to the FEC is available here. The report covers all activity between 3/1/2011 and 3/31/2011.

The PAC recorded $6,312.50 in receipts during the October reporting period. Joe Williams, DFER’s Executive Director, contributed $4,500. Timothy Mai, listed as an employee of Cornwall Capital, donated $210 3/4/2011. An additional $890 in unitemized contributions were reported. DFER-NYS transferred $712.50 to the federal PAC on 3/18/2011.

DFER recorded $7,326.27 in total federal disbursements during the reporting period. The PAC contributed $5,000 to the Colorado Democratic Party on April 1, 2011. A total of $2,376.27 was spent on operations.

Education Reform Now Advocacy, a 501c4, received $357.89 on 3/14/2011, $89.46 on 3/14/2011, $763.65 on 3/25/2011, and $190.91 on 3/25/2011 ($1,401.91 in total). Devin Boyle, DFER’s Communications

This Week In Education: Thompson: Rushed, Rigid "Broadies" Don't Last Long

Thompson: Rushed, Rigid "Broadies" Don't Last Long

by john thompson

When my district hired a graduate of the Broad Superintendents Academy , it seemed like we had been doubly lucky, hiring an incredibly talented individual who was supported by the Broad team. The superintendent's sincerity was beyond question, and he was gracious even when I defeated him in a buffalo chip throwing contest! But he was in too much of a hurry to implement the Broad playbook and was forced to resign after six months. Chicago's new superintendent, Jean-Claude Brizard, is also from the Broad School. We should ask why Brizard could not get along with the

Rahm Emanuel Plans Big Changes For Chicago Schools

by The Huffington Post News Team

Change is in the air in schools across Chicago. As Rahm Emanuel prepares to officially take over as mayor, sweeping reforms are already occurring. In the past week, the Mayor-elect has appointed a new board of education and top Chicago Public Schools (CPS) officials, and stood by his promise to lengthen school days.

According to the New York Times, the State Senate on Thursday unanimously approved a public school reform bill that may fulfill one of Emanuel's long-time goals: a longer school day. While campaigning, Emanuel lobbied for longer school days and curtailing teachers' right to strike, both of which are addressed in the bill. How teachers will be compensated for the extra time -- and where the money to compensate them will come from in a district that says it's facing an $820 million deficit remains to be seen.

The current teacher contract runs through June 2012, but the Chicago Sun-Times reports that the mayor-elect hopes to get the school day lengthened for this coming school year. At five hours and 45 minutes for elementary schools and six hours for high schools, the Chicago school day is one of the shortest in the country. According

White House Announces Commencement Challenge Finalists - High School Notes (usnews.com)

White House Announces Commencement Challenge Finalists

By JASON KOEBLER

Posted: April 20, 2011

The White House announced the six finalists in the Race to the Top Commencement Challenge earlier today. President Barack Obama will deliver the commencement speech at the winning high school this spring.

Starting tomorrow, the public can rate a short video and essay made by students at each school. After the voting phase ends April 29, the top three will be passed along to Obama, who will then handpick the winner.

The finalists are Bridgeport High School in Bridgeport, Wash.; Wayne Early Middle College High

Detroit ctd. - E.D. Kain - American Times - Forbes

Detroit ctd.

by E.D. Kain

A reader writes:

I did not know of the connection of Bobb with the two foundations. That could be a conflict of interest, but I have only heard of praise associated with the Kellogg Foundation so I am not sure there really is this “evil intent” as you portray. What is/was obvious was that the prior school board was not only inept but also a bunch of thieves. It was the prior school administration that took the Detroit public school system to where it is today. So I have no confidence in restoring their power. Your article also did not inform the readers of the current budget condition of the Detroit Public Schools (even before the 2012 cuts that are coming down from Lansing). I do not know the current budget situation (so it is not a loaded question), but I think you need to frame what is driving Bobb to take such action (which I think he is trying to figure out how to get the budget back in line). I think sending layoffs to everyone is/was over dramatic. I do think that layoff decisions should be based on performance with tenure being the next category (instead of the reverse we have today). Why would we layoff a young gifted teacher and retain a more senior mediocre teacher – I wouldn’t do that in the private sector.

I certainly don’t mean to imply ‘evil intent’. I do think there are conflicts of interest based on opposing ideologies at play. Even if I agreed with the school reforms of the Broad or Kellogg Foundations, I would still question the

Dharun Ravi Charged With 15 Counts In Tyler Clementi Suicide « Student Activism

Dharun Ravi Charged With 15 Counts In Tyler Clementi Suicide

by Angus Johnston

Dharun Ravi, the Rutgers student who bragged on Twitter about broadcasting his dorm roommate’s gay hookup on the internet, was indicted on fifteen charges (PDF) earlier today.

Ravi’s roommate, Tyler Clementi — a first-year student just weeks into his first semester at Rutgers when the spying occurred — committed suicide by jumping off the George Washington Bridge just days after it began.

The first eight counts of the indictment allege that Ravi recorded Clementi and his partner on one occasion, shared that recording with at least one other person, and attempted to do so again later. They further allege that the spying was either “an attempt to intimidate … because of sexual orientation” or was “reasonably believed” to be so.

Additional counts in the indictment allege that Ravi tampered with evidence in the case by deleting a tweet from

Virginia’s largest school district says no to performance pay - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

Virginia’s largest school district says no to performance pay

By Valerie Strauss

It is seriously refreshing to hear that just as soon as Virginia Gov. Robert McDonnell announced a new teacher performance pay pilot program that would tie their pay to student standardized test scores, the state’s largest school system said thanks but no thanks.

Jack Dale, superintendent of Fairfax County public schools, told my colleague Kevin Sieff that the district’s previous experiment with performance pay, in the early 1980s, was a failure and that he would pass on the program and any attached funding that comes with it — even in these financially troubled times.

McDonnell, jumping on a standardized test-based performance pay bandwagon spreading across the country with the backing of the Obama administration, announced a pilot program Tuesday that would distribute a total of $3 million to districts in the state that have one or

People With a Forgiving God More Likely to Cheat On Tests - National - The Atlantic Wire

People With a Forgiving God More Likely to Cheat On Tests

Apparently, people who envision God as harsh and punitive may be less likely to cheat on tests. Those who view God as caring and forgiving are more likely to take a chance that the higher power will let a few copied answers on a math exam slide.

So go the findings, at least, of a new study conducted by administering a easily-cheated computerized math test and theology survey to readily available research guinea-pigs, i.e. college undergraduates. "What matters more than whether you believe in a god is what kind of god you believe in," explained researcher Azim F. Shariff said in a public release.

Presumably, a possible reason for this occurrence has to do with fear of punishment. If one assumes that God

Texas Senate: Pass SB 4, the teacher quality bill | The Education Front Blog | dallasnews.com

Texas Senate: Pass SB 4, the teacher quality bill

By

William McKenzie/ Editorial Columnist

wmckenzie@dallasnews.com | Bio

10:31 AM on Wed., Apr. 20, 2011 | Permalink

SB 4, the teacher quality bill by GOP Sen. Florence Shapiro, is eligible for a vote this week in the Senate. This is a good bill for students and teachers, which is why senators shouldn't hesitate to pass it.

As discussed here before, the bill would require new teachers to go through a three-year provisional period before they earn a full teaching certificate. During that time, their schools could help them identify their strengths and work with them on their weaknesses.

SB 4 also would create a career plan for teachers. Once they identify their goals, they and their principals could work on ways to achieve them, such as becoming a mentor-teacher.

Another plus of SB 4 is that it would require teachers who want to become instructors from early childhood through fourth grade to show that they actually know math, science, social studies or English language arts. They also would have to take a science of reading class. Generalist don't always know how to

Hechinger Report | Q&A with Sandy Kress, key architect of No Child Left Behind

Q&A with Sandy Kress, key architect of No Child Left Behind

by Sarah Butrymowicz

Sandy Kress

It’s that time of the year again when Congress considers reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, known since 2001 as the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. Reauthorization has been stalled for years.

NCLB has been widely praised for its requirement that states and schools break down their test results by subgroups—across racial, socioeconomic and other lines—to highlight achievement gaps. But it’s also garnered lots of criticism for its focus on standardized test-scores and its system of rating schools according to whether they make “adequate yearly progress.”

Sandy Kress—who, as senior advisor to President George W. Bush, was one of the key architects of NCLB—recently wrote in a New York Daily News op-ed that the Obama administration’s proposed changes to the law

Latest News and Comment from Education

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

State to Broward school district: We’re watching you

Education Commissioner Eric Smith said the state will be monitoring the Broward school district for at least six months to make sure it follows an action plan to address critical problems cited in a recent state Grand Jury report.

BY CARLI TEPROFF

Response by Dr. Alan Ginsburg to Paul Peterson's April 11, 2011 article in Education Next and his Washington Times story taking issue with my analysis showing that Rhee's DC gains were no better than those of her two predecessors Vance and Janey. (April 15, 2011)

Mike Konczal on Public Education and Public Options

Thank the Wisconsin volunteers

Education Roundup: "Socialist" Kindergartners?

DFER’S MARCH 2011 MONTHLY REPORT TO THE FEC

White House Announces Commencement Challenge Finalists

Virginia’s largest school district says no to performance pay

By