7-9-14 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:

Greg Hinz. Rauner and Quinn and Stroger and Madigan.

- Greg Hinz If you put together a list of Illinois politicians whom Bruce Rauner would be least likely to funnel campaign cash to, Chicago’s Stroger clan and Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan would be right at the top. The late John Stroger and son Todd Stroger pretty much left Cook County government a financial wasteland after their respective terms as president of the county board. Mr. Mad

by Fred Klonsky / 0min

7-8-14 Fred All Week Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.: Bob Scharba’s cartoons.The Evil Leprechaun. Re-fixed. Fred: I’ve featured your suggested “stars” of Illinois pension theft in the cartoon I mentioned to you the other day to you. I wasn’t even aware of what some of these people looked like till I researched this……what a gruesome bunch. Biss is sort of

by mike simpson / 14min 

solidaridad: 'Crenshaw' documents what education reform monsters like Deasy do to schools with black students

solidaridad: 'Crenshaw' documents what education reform monsters like Deasy do to schools with black students:

'Crenshaw' documents what education reform monsters like Deasy do to schools with black students

From Filmmaker Lena Jackson. Please forward widely:

Please join us for the first Los Angeles screening of Crenshaw at the Southern California Library this Thursday, July 10th at 6:30pm. The evening will include a screening of the 20-minute film, plus Q&A with Crenshaw students, teachers, and parents.

The Crenshaw district's own students, teachers, and parents detail the stark consequences of a school superintendent's quick-fix reforms of their public high school in South Los Angeles. This documentary takes the viewer deep inside the lives of those most affected by the callous "reconstitution." As teachers were kicked out, curriculum replaced, and class sizes swelled, community activists and students take to the streets and meeting halls to fight for a say in their school's future.

Southern California Library is located at: 6120 S. Vermont Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90044.

Refreshments provided, please RSVP to Lena Jackson at crenshawfilm [at] gmail [dot] com solidaridad: 'Crenshaw' documents what education reform monsters like Deasy do to schools with black students:

1,000 LCAPs later, let’s hope we learn something | EdSource

1,000 LCAPs later, let’s hope we learn something | EdSource:

1,000 LCAPs later, let’s hope we learn something

July 9, 2014 | By Carrie Hahnel / commentary | No Comments



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SOURCE: EDUCATION TRUST-WEST

Carrie Hahnel

As districts completed their first-ever Local Control and Accountability Plans this spring, the caveat “this is a learning year” became their oft-shared refrain. Now that more than 1,000 district LCAPs have been stamped as “approved” by their boards and sent off to county offices for review, what have we learned?

At The Education Trust–West, we have been collecting hundreds of LCAPs, with support from partner organizations across the state. These plans are now available to the public through the website LCAP Watch. In scrutinizing dozens of  LCAPs, we’ve learned a few things about these first-year plans.

First, we’ve learned that the LCAP often presents an incomplete picture of a district’s plan. While advocates and community members expected a comprehensive plan that would connect a district’s academic plan to its budget, they have repeatedly been frustrated to find a document that falls short of this vision. Often, the LCAP only includes those services supported by Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) dollars, and sometimes only a portion of  funds.

Especially concerning to us, we’ve learned that it is difficult-to-impossible to tell what services have been increased or improved for high-need students.

One district’s parent advisory council, upon reviewing the plan, asked why only some school sites had social workers. The district responded that while each school has social workers, only some of those positions are funded by LCFF. In many other districts, investments in Common Core — technology and instructional materials, in particular — don’t show up in the LCAP, since those costs are covered by the $1.25 billion investment in Common Core the state made in 2013. When districts use the LCAP to document expenditures of a narrow pot of funds rather than treating it as a broad planning tool, it serves to create confusion, not transparency.

Second, we’ve learned that reading these plans requires patience and a fair bit of sleuthing. To understand how goals are connected to actions, the reader has to flip back and forth between two disconnected sections. To truly understand how all LCFF dollars are being spent, the intrepid reader may need to also pore through the district’s budget, board minutes, or other documents. For instance, some 1,000 LCAPs later, let’s hope we learn something | EdSource:

Teacher Tenure | Deborah Meier on Education

Teacher Tenure | Deborah Meier on Education:

Teacher Tenure

Posted on July 9, 2014 by debmeier

debmeier:

My son’s latest blog on the teacher tenure issue

Originally posted on Nicholas Meier:

There was a recent lower court ruling against so-called “Teacher Tenure” here in California. I am really not sure about the extent of the ruling, but the general verdict was that “tenure” was unfair to providing an equal education for all students as called for by the State Constitution.

I believe the reading was faulty for a broad range of reasons. First of all, teachers in California do not actually have tenure, at least not in the sense that professors get tenure.

When a professor has tenure they can be fired only for some gross negligence or breaking of the law. Poor teaching, doing a shoddy job, or poor research cannot lead to loss of position. under most university tenure rules. Of course, it takes much longer (typically 7 years) and a much more difficult process for professors to get that protection.

As a for k-12 teachers in California, my…

View original 761 more words

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Banda asks Duncan to allow SPS Waiver

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Banda asks Duncan to allow SPS Waiver:

Banda asks Duncan to allow SPS Waiver

From Superintendent Banda:

Dear Seattle Public Schools community,

Over the last several years we have made great strides in ensuring our students graduate ready for success in college, career and life. However, much work remains to ensure that each and every student has the academic and community supports they need to be successful learners in school and beyond.

In order to best serve our students and families, Seattle Public Schools is asking the U.S. Department of Education for a Local Educational Agency (LEA) waiver from several provisions in the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), also known as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).

Specifically, we are requesting the flexibility to use 20 percent of our Title 1, Part A funds to provide our students with reading and math interventions and to help fund before and after school programs in our Title 1 schools. In the absence of a waiver, Seattle must set aside $2.1 million for the Public School Choice and Supplemental Educational Services provisions in NCLB, which would prevent us from investing these funds in what we know works best for our students.

Under NCLB, parents with students attending schools that do not meet Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) must be notified of their school’s status, and be offered the choice to attend another school that meets AYP. However NCLB requires that unless 100 percent of students are proficient in reading and mathematics based on the state assessment by 2014, the school will be labeled “failing.” We anticipate that no schools (within the district or state) will meet this requirement. We believe that sending every family a letter notifying them that their school is “failing” is counterproductive to the progress we have been making.

While the state of Washington was denied the waiver in March, Seattle Public Schools satisfies every federal requirement to receive a waiver. In our request to the Department of Education today, we provide a clear rationale and include student achievement data illustrating the progress our students have made while the waiver was in place. Our argument is based on some of the points below:

• Seattle Public Schools has adopted the Washington State accountability system to identify underperforming “Priority” and “Focus” schools to receive supplementary support services for school improvement each year.

• Seattle Public Schools has collaborated with the Seattle Schools Community Forum: Banda asks Duncan to allow SPS Waiver:

At AFT Convention teachers union expected to fire up the base

At AFT Convention teachers union expected to fire up the base:

At AFT convention, teachers union expected to fire up the base

Posted on July 9, 2014 1:36 pm by Vanessa Romo

Randi Weingarten, AFT President

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) kicks off itsannual convention in downtown Los Angeles tomorrow bringing more 3,500 national union delegates to the home ofLA Unified, the second largest school district in the country.

On the agenda: fending off what the union sees as its biggest threats, including billionaire money, an assault on tenure, and the “pervasive fixation on testing over teaching and learning,” according to a union press release.  A proposed hike in union dues is also on the table.

It is less clear whether the delegates will seek a resolution asking for the resignation of Education Secretary Arne Duncan, as its counterpart, the National Education Association, did at its convention last week.

The gathering is attracting political and union heavy weights: AFT President, Randi Weingarten will deliver the keynote address Friday morning, following a speech by Governor Jerry Brown. Other speakers include Mayor Eric Garcetti, and California State School Superintendent Tom Torlakson, a teachers union ally who is facing a November re-election fight against education reformer Marshal Tuck.

AFT is the second largest teachers union in the country, representing 1.5 million teachers, health workers and school-related personnel nationwide.

Alex Caputo-Pearl, the newly installed president of the Los Angeles teachers union (UTLA) will lead a panel on social movement unionism that will include teachers union leaders from Chicago, St. Paul, and Philadelphia.

“It will be about how to take on some of the challenges that unions are facing by building a broader alliance with parents and community all around the quality schools agenda,” Caputo-Pearl told LA School Report.

“Obviously we’ll get to talk about some of the dilemmas we face in Los Angeles, like the billionaire funded Vergara lawsuit, as well as some of the problems with Superintendent John Deasy putting forward an unacceptable offer around pay,” he said.

The union is currently in contract negotiations with the district but appears to be at an impasse. UTLA leaders flatly rejected the district’s recent proposal of a 2 percent raise for 2014-15 plus a retroactive 2 percent bonus for 2013-14, calling it “insulting.”

Meanwhile in a letter to members posted on the convention website, AFT President Weingarten explained why she is recommending a dues hike, taking members’ At AFT Convention teachers union expected to fire up the base:

7-9-14 LA School Report - What's Really Going on Inside LAUSD

LA School Report - What's Really Going on Inside LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District): Morning Read: Overpaid Centinela Valley superintendent firedCentinela Valley school board fires embattled Superintendent Jose Fernandez The Centinela Valley school board Tuesday night voted to fire Superintendent Jose Fernandez, ending a five-month chapter that began with revelations that the leader of th

by mike simpson / 4h 

All Things Education: Not your mother's PE class

All Things Education: Not your mother's PE class:

Not your mother's PE class

My sons are headed to middle school next year. They are disappointed (as am I) that there won't be recess, however, they are excited that they will have PE for a 90-minute block every other day. A few days prior to the end of their fifth grade year, I had been discussing this with a few other parents and some of their older kids in our school district. They told me that my sons' enthusiasm may later be curbed, especially in high school, telling me that the PE class sizes were large, with forty to fifty students, and that it seemed at times like an anything goes kind of environment. Furthermore, they were playing antiquated and obscure games that no one had ever heard of or played before. It could be that those are games just for PE class because they help to highlight or develop a certain skills set rather than because the game is relevant, but in any case, it seems like it's time to re-invent the PE class.

Coincidentally, a few days later, I came across this article about the next generation of physical education classes :

The program at the Prince William County school is part of a national effort to mobilize a generation that has been labeled the most sedentary in the nation’s history. It represents a major shift in physical education to reverse the trend of inertia, with gym teachers working harder to make sure that their classes don’t appeal just to the most athletic students while the rest of the kids in school-issued shorts are left sitting on the sidelines. 

“The country depends on us to do something different than what we have been doing,” said Dolly Lambdin, president of the Society of Health and Physical Educators (SHAPE). “We cared too much about who is the best, who can do the most push-ups, and not nearly enough about what it means to be healthy and physically active for a lifetime.”

“The New PE,” as it’s often called, is a nicer PE. 

Out are dodgeball and other sports that use kids as targets, contests that reward students who are the strongest, and exercise doled out (or withheld) as a form of punishment: Still talking? Four more laps!

In are personal fitness plans, target heart-rate zones, and sports that play to different  All Things Education: Not your mother's PE class:

Russ on Reading: Thinking about Critical Thinking, Common Core and Vergara

Russ on Reading: Thinking about Critical Thinking, Common Core and Vergara:

Thinking about Critical Thinking, Common Core and Vergara

Recent headlines have me thinking about critical thinking.

House Speaker John Boehner Wants to Sue the President

Sarah Palin Says, “Impeach the President.”

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan Praises the Vergara Decision

Reading some of these pronouncements makes me think that the Common Core’s call for instruction in critical thinking has come not a moment too soon. It is probably too late for Boehner, Palin and Duncan, but maybe the future political leaders sitting in Common Cored classrooms today can be saved. Or maybe not.

Here is what the Common Core says about critical thinking:

·         Students are engaged and open-minded—but discerning—readers and listeners. They work diligently to understand precisely what an author or speaker is saying, but they also question an author’s or speaker’s assumptions and premises and assess the veracity of claims and the soundness of reasoning.

·         Students cite specific evidence when offering an oral or written interpretation of a text. They use relevant evidence when supporting their own points in writing and speaking, making their reasoning clear to the Russ on Reading: Thinking about Critical Thinking, Common Core and Vergara:

TO FINALLY FIX PUBLIC EDUCATION- IS TIMELY REGRESSION A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE TO EQUALLY FAILED CONCEPTS OF SOCIAL PROMOTION OR RETENTION? - Perdaily.com

TO FINALLY FIX PUBLIC EDUCATION- IS TIMELY REGRESSION A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE TO EQUALLY FAILED CONCEPTS OF SOCIAL PROMOTION OR RETENTION? - Perdaily.com:



TO FINALLY FIX PUBLIC EDUCATION- IS TIMELY REGRESSION A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE TO EQUALLY FAILED CONCEPTS OF SOCIAL PROMOTION OR RETENTION?

(Mensaje se repite en Español)

Between dishonest social promotion of students without prior and current grade-level standards mastery or the alternative of often degrading retention for another year of what the student didn't get the first time around- and is even less like to get the second- is the much more viable alternative of student regression to a level of educational expectation that the student has the subjective ability to profit from. While the word regression is often exclusively understood in its pejorative sense, a more relevant understand of regression in the context of public education would be to allow a student to be moved back academically as soon as possible to a level where they can actually function irrespective of an arbitrary grade-level designation that has up until now given precedence to appearances and not reality. 

Given the lingering context of still vibrant institutional racism which continues to create disproportional poverty and undervaluation of predominantly poor minority students in our still segregated public schools in complete derogation of the finding in Brown vs. Board of Education in 1954, pretending that these students are capable of being promoted without mastery of prior grade-level standards is a far worse trauma in the long run than would be the early identification and appropriate educational interventions necessary to get these students caught up to their peer groups as soon as possible. For clearly, all evidence shows- and there's plenty of it- that the longer schools wait to identify and deal with a student's subjective baseline of academic ability and knowledge, the less chance the student ever has of getting caught up. 

There's a good news and bad news aspect that we should be aware of if we ever hope to win the war for an objective quantifiable renaissance of excellent public education for all in something more than vacuous edspeak rhetoric:

The bad news about this purposefully self-sustaining culture of a failed public education system in this country at inner city schools like LAUSD is that it is likely that the children who are now being allowed to fail are the children of parents who themselves were also pushed through systems of public education like LAUSD, where there hasn't been any real expectation and subjective approach to breaking the cycle of purposefully failed schools run exclusively for profit and privilege and surely not with any real belief in educational TO FINALLY FIX PUBLIC EDUCATION- IS TIMELY REGRESSION A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE TO EQUALLY FAILED CONCEPTS OF SOCIAL PROMOTION OR RETENTION? - Perdaily.com:

One Compliant County in Florida and its New 724 Tests |:

One Compliant County in Florida and its New 724 Tests

 Beginning this fall, in Collier County Florida as per the state of Florida’s new teacher accountability policy, district teachers/administrators are to create new tests for each and every class it offers (including all electives) to hold all teachers accountable for the value they purportedly add to student learning and achievement over time.

While most often approximately 70% of teachers are excluded from being held accountable via these systems, this is the (band aid) approach meant to fix that.

But in this county, this means district teachers/administrators will be developing and implementing (without psychometric, financial, or really any other support)… 724 new tests to comply with the state policy.

Yes — 724 new tests for not only the teachers in this county, but all of the students being educated in this county as well. Thereafter, “Student scores and learning gains at all grade levels will be evaluated and, in the 2015-16 school year, a teacher’s paycheck will be One Compliant County in Florida and its New 724 Tests |: