Paul Horton: The Chicago Tribune's School Voucher Campaign: The Road to Gatopia III" - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher

Paul Horton: The Chicago Tribune's School Voucher Campaign: The Road to Gatopia III" - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher:

Paul Horton: The Chicago Tribune's School Voucher Campaign: The Road to Gatopia III"

By Anthony Cody on September 21, 2013 7:04 PM

Guest post by Paul Horton.

Most hog farmers in the Midwest say that when you go "whole hog" on something there is no turning back. People who live down wind of hog farms pray for the wind to shift.

Many Midwestern farmers also have a historic hatred of the Chicago Tribune because it has been closely aligned with the interests of that infamous breeding ground of Midwestern plutocrats: Chicago Board of Trade, the late nineteenth and early twentieth century equivalent of Wall Street in the Midwest.

In the last week, the Tribune, not to be satisfied with "yellow caking" support for the Chicago school shutdowns by rolling out an Augean stable's worth of misinformation from the Joyce Foundation, is returning to its former unabashed support of speculative free enterprise when it comes to schools.

In the last week, the Tribune has rolled out three pieces on its editorial pages in support of Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal and vouchers.

On September 8, the Tribune reprinted an op-ed originally published in the Washington Postthat called the Obama Department of Justice and the Obama administration out on prosecuting the disparate racial impact of Louisiana's voucher laws. This piece is hilarious reading that describes the defense of vouchers as the Civil Rights issue of our time that Martin Luther King would have clearly supported. It is almost as though Jindal was channeling King through Michelle Rhee who has recently given such speeches in Birmingham, among other places.

Yesterday (Friday 13th), again on the editorial page, a very long human-interest piece ("In Search of an Education") about a young student looking for a decent education was 

The Two Faces of American Education by Andrew Delbanco | The New York Review of Books

The Two Faces of American Education by Andrew Delbanco | The New York Review of Books:

Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools

by Diane Ravitch

Knopf, 396 pp., $27.95                                                  

Radical: Fighting to Put Students First
by Michelle Rhee
Harper, 286 pp., $27.99                                                  

Diane Ravitch and Michelle Rhee; drawing by James Ferguson

1.

In 1898, the Boston writer and editor Thomas Wentworth Higginson published a memoir entitled Cheerful Yesterdays. One of the memories that cheered him was of lying before the hearth while his mother read aloud. As for “the children of to-day who have no such privilege,” he wrote, one must regard them with “pity.” Here we have the keynote of much that has been written about education before and since: praise for a bygone age when children were well served by their elders, and pity for the ill-served children of today.

When Higginson was a child, public or “common” schools were just emerging, so education remained largely the province of families and churches. Today, when the state of teaching and learning is bemoaned, it is usually the public schools that get the blame. Politicians and pundits hold them accountable for how students perform on standardized tests. Principals are fired and schools closed for poor results. Teachers feel besieged. The American Federation of Teachers has become a popular target for anti-union sentiment. The tide of anger has been rising ever since a national commission released a report in 1983 called “A Nation at Risk,” which opened with these often-quoted lines:

If an unfriendly foreign power had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war. As it stands, we have allowed this to happen to ourselves.

In the thirty years since, the public mood about schools has only darkened, so it is striking that Diane Ravitch, arguably our leading historian of primary and secondary education, strongly dissents. “The public schools,” she says in her new book about education policy, Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools, “are working very well for most students.” She points out that over the last few decades high school drop-out rates have declined. Average test scores have risen, if modestly. Nor is it clear, as often assumed, that American children lag significantly behind their foreign counterparts in science proficiency.

But if Ravitch disputes prevailing assumptions, she does not gloss over the fact that school performance by the large minority of American children who grow up poor or in segregated neighborhoods is disproportionately weak. On the contrary, she thinks that their plight is a national scandal, that today’s school reformers are misguided in their efforts to redress it, and that, along with the persistence of poverty and residential segregation, we should be alarmed by the current reform movement itself.

2.

The public face of that movement is Michelle Rhee. Among young educators who have come lately to prominence, Rhee is the best known. Her closest rivals for celebrity are Wendy Kopp, who, as a Princeton senior in 1990, founded Teach for America (TFA), an organization that deploys graduates from elite colleges to teach in public schools; and Geoffrey Canada, founder of the Harlem Children’s Zone, which oversees several charter schools as well as health and social services for poor children and their families. Canada was the star of the widely praised (and 

The Seattle Rhee-event | Seattle Education

The Seattle Rhee-event | Seattle Education:

The Seattle Rhee-event

Ms. Rhee

Last week someone on one of the list servs that I follow wrote that Michele Rhee was coming to their town and they wanted to do something special during her visit as other cities have done.

I am pleased to say that our warm Seattle welcome for Ms. Rhee was very successful but realized I had not shared our event with others, so for the sake of archiving the event and providing readers with some welcoming party ideas, I post the following:

Students holding up a banner.

A call went out on the Seattle Education blog a week before Ms. Rhee was to speak at the Seattle Town Hall to join in on a warm Seattle welcome for Ms. Rhee.

It was an excellent turn out considering that it was February in Seattle. Needless to say, 

Formal Open Invitation for an Interview and Attendance to Diane Ravitch’s Seattle Book Tour Event | Teachers' Letters to Bill Gates

Formal Open Invitation for an Interview and Attendance to Diane Ravitch’s Seattle Book Tour Event | Teachers' Letters to Bill Gates:

Formal Open Invitation for an Interview and Attendance to Diane Ravitch’s Seattle Book Tour Event

Posted on September 21, 2013by Teachers'LettersToBillGates

Dear Bill and Melinda,

I am writing Re: A formal invitation to listen to Diane Ravitch speak about her new book and to invite you to join me for an interview about Diane’s new book, Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools. This is an exciting dual opportunity as you will be joining me in an interview right after attending her Seattle Reign of Error Book Tour Event [details below].

“Join Diane Ravitch for a discussion about her new book, Reign of Error on select dates throughout the United States.

Reign of Error is shaping up to be the biggest education release of the year. It looks to change the dialogue about education reform in the same way that Diane’s 2010 publication, The Death and Life of the Great American School System brought new attention to the plight of our public schools.

Please check back often as dates and details are subject to change.

The Network for Public Education is pleased to offer our friends an opportunity to pre-order a copy of Diane Ravitch’s new book Reign of Error signed by the author for a contribution of $100 to NPE. For a $200 contribution, Diane will inscribe her latest release with a personal message. Click here for more details.“

Have you had a chance to read her book yet?  Just in case you have not, I am sure two quick studies about education like yourself and Melinda will be able to glean enough information to answer my questions by simply attending and listening to her carefully  at this event.   I would also recommend getting your own copy as soon as possible, but I do realize this is very short notice.  It will soon become one of the most important books ever written about public education as more and more readers find out the truth about corporate reform.

Even though you may be fearful of the truth in Diane’s book — and rightfully so — I would be grateful if you could attend my interview, as Katie and I have some serious questions for you about the role you play in public education.  The date, time, and location of the interview and book tour information can be found below. Please join me:

At the University of Washington, Kane Hall.

On Thursday, September 26th, 2013.

Diane Ravitch speaks at 7:00 pm, your interview to follow – subsequent to any audience Q & A. 

The interview will be with me, Susan DuFresne, Integrated Kindergarten Teacher and Co-Author of Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates.  Upon arrival at Kane Hall please ask for me.  I would be happy to meet you and escort you to a seat in the hall.  It will likely be well attended and crowded, but I’ll make sure we find a seat for you and Melinda.

The interview is scheduled to last approximately 30 minutes and will take the form of a private video-taped question-and-answer session.  I will share this interview with the public here on Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates shortly after our interview.

Please contact Susan DuFresne at the phone number provided on the letter I am sending to you and Melinda at the Gates Foundation.  You may also contact me here in response to confirm your attendance at the interview should my invitation somehow get lost in the large amount of mail you must receive.  If you have a disability and require any special arrangements to assist you at the interview, please let me know.

A map showing the location of the interview venue is included in this link and in my invitation that I am mailing.

After all, public education is one of few areas where you have determined you will make a difference when you “take on the really tough problems.”  Thank you for your interest in public education.   Let’s talk about those really tough problems and the “difference” you are making with your reforms in our interview.

Please consider joining me for this important interview and attendance as a guest to Diane Ravitch’s new book tour here in Seattle this upcoming week.  I look forward to hearing back from you and the opportunity for this interview.

Yours sincerely,

Susan DuFresne, Integrated Kindergarten Teacher and Co-Author of Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates

P.S.  I am terribly sorry, but Katie Lapham has come down with a terrible cold and will not be able to attend the event in Seattle.  She sends her apologies and looks forward to chatting with you soon.   We can get together with you for that lunch we’ve been talking about another day.  FYI:  I would have extended this invitation much sooner, but I recently relocated to a new school where I am administering your WaKIDS Teaching Strategies Gold Assessment Tool program. [We'll talk more about that later.  Let's just say, that is the one part of my move that I am not happy about.]  Moving has taken on a life of its own, as I have been working through every week day, every weekend – to get my classroom, my lessons, and collaborate with our new team as we get ready for our priority – the children we teach each day.

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GMO OMG

GMO OMG:

 

About the Film

GMO OMG director and concerned father Jeremy Seifert is in search of answers. How do GMOs affect our children, the health of our planet, and our freedom of choice? And perhaps the ultimate question, which Seifert tests himself: is it even possible to reject the food system currently in place, or have we lost something we can’t gain back? These and other questions take Seifert on a journey from his family’s table to Haiti, Paris, Norway, and the lobby of agra-giant Monsanto, from which he is unceremoniously ejected. Along the way we gain insight into a question that is of growing concern to citizens the world over: what's on your plate?

- See more at: http://www.gmofilm.com/#sthash.olZBMWPy.dpuf

Test state's students with tools of past or future? - SFGate

Test state's students with tools of past or future? - SFGate:

Test state's students with tools of past or future?

Michael Kirst

Updated 4:36 pm, Friday, September 20, 2013

Reaction to Opposition of AB 484 - Year 2013 (CA Dept of Education)

California faces a big question about standardized testing this year that comes down to this: a choice between the past and the future.

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, the state Board of Educationand the state Legislature all chose the future - embodied in Assembly Bill 484, which would bring online new tests to measure student readiness for the rigors of careers and college starting next school year.

But officials in Washington appear to be of two minds. On the one hand, they support California's move to embrace the new, more challenging Common Core standards in mathematics and English language arts, and the computer-based assessments that go with them.

But making the transition means setting aside the past and shelving the old pencil-and-paper multiple-choice exams that have driven instruction in California for more than a decade.

Federal officials have signaled that suspending the old exams could put California technically and temporarily out of compliance with the mandates of No Child Left Behind. That has made for some interesting headlines, but the truth is, it's not 

9-21-13 Saturday Special Corporate Reform School Girls News Breakout

Saturday Special Corporate Reform School Girls News Breakout

TODAY

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