CURMUDGUCATION: Essential Reading for Education Activists (and Wonks)

CURMUDGUCATION: Essential Reading for Education Activists (and Wonks):

Essential Reading for Education Activists (and Wonks)

Corporate, privatized, market-driven education reform hasn't worked-- and now there's a book chock full of research to prove it. 

The National Education Policy Center is based at the University of Colorado (Boulder) School of Education. They look kind of like what I always imagined when I thought of an actual think tank-- one that was interested in real inquiry and research, and not just put together to lobby for a particular set of ideas. They've created a network composed of many of the top researchers in the education policy world (just look at this list of fellows) and they are a regular source of actual education policy research (as well as doing solid analyses of other research that is out there, even when it's just "research").

William J. Mathis and Tina M. Trujillo have put together an important (and huge) look at what's been going on in education. Learning from the Federal Market-Based Reforms is a collection of twenty-eight articles from a rather amazing array of top scholars in the field, looking at what has been tried, what hasn't worked, and the research says will work.

The preface, foreword, and introduction lay out the vision pretty clearly and forcefully. In the second paragraph of the preface, Mathis and Trujillo summarize where we are pretty succinctly:

Unfortunately, our review also confirmed that, despite decades of solid research evidence demonstrating the limited and contradictory effects of the market model on school reform, it is still the model that dominates education in this country, particularly in schools that serve low-income families and children of color.

In her foreword, Jeannie Oakes argues that cultural values have dominated the arena while pushing aside actual research-based approaches, and that the dominant value is a sort of behaviorism. Reformsters have "normalized the idea that school quality and equity will improve" as families shop in an unequal "competitive" marketplace. Oakes raises an idea that I confess I hadn't really CURMUDGUCATION: Essential Reading for Education Activists (and Wonks):

This is our story. It must be told - Lily's Blackboard

This is our story. It must be told - Lily's Blackboard:

This is our story. It must be told

President Barack Obama, with first lady Michelle Obama and Ruth Odom Bonner, center, ring the bell opening the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall in Washington, Saturday, Sept. 24, 2016. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

The National Museum of African American History and Culture opened on the National Mall September 24, and it was years in the making. (Well, 600, if you want to get technical.)

The museum—which is the last that will be built on the National Mall—came after decades of work by people who believed that African Americans ‘legacy and contributions should be enshrined in a public space. It began, as many achievements do, as the dream of visionaries with the spirit to “plant trees whose shade they knew they would never sit in.”

 As far back as the early 1900s, activists were pushing for such a museum. President Hoover in 1929 appointed civil rights leaders, including Mary McLeod Bethune, to a commission that would study the idea and raise money for it. But something else happened in 1929 that helped doom the effort (which probably never had much of a chance anyway, given the times): The stock market crashed, and the Great Depression began.

Over the next decades, proposals would emerge in Congress, only to die. Ultimately, historians and private citizens, with the late Rep. Mickey Leland and Rep. John Lewis, helped push the idea across the finish line. They overcame opposition from some who worried that a national museum would take support away from smaller, local African American museums, and others (including Smithsonian leaders) who felt like African-American culture and contributions should be relegated to a wing of an existing museum. And of course, there was the hostility of the late Sen. Jesse Helms to the idea.

President George W. Bush in 2003 signed legislation authorizing the museum.  Then the work to fund raise and build the collection—which includes more than 36,000 artifacts—began in earnest. (The NEA was a contributor.)  The Smithsonian’s 19th museum represents a tremendous opportunity for teaching and learning, and school group tours are available. But you don’t even have to visit the National Mall to make use of it.

The museum was the very first of the Smithsonian’s offerings to have an online presence before it actually opened. Those plentiful resources are perfect for classroom lessons and discussions. You can also take a virtual guided tour.

Of course, much of the museum’s collection touches on our painful history of slavery and discrimination; the triumphs are on display, but so are the horrors and the pain. 

There are shackles, a 19th century slave cabin and other implements of slavery. Graphic descriptions and photos. Wreckage from a slave ship.  The casket that held 14-year-old Emmett Till’s body.

There is also the Greensboro, N.C. Woolworth’s counter where college students staged a sit-in in 1960. The plane used to train the Tuskegee Airmen who flew during World War II. Jesse Owens’ cleats from the 1936 Olympics. The jacket and skirt Marian Anderson wore when she performed on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. And so much more.

“For schoolchildren, touring the Mall’s newest museum will be an educational journey through the historical lens of black life in America,” notes a recent Washington Post article. “It also will mean helping This is our story. It must be told - Lily's Blackboard:

CT Court Ruling - Where is the truth, equity, and justice? The War Report on Public Education with Dr James Miller

The War Report on Public Education with Dr James Miller:

CT Court Ruling - Where is the truth, equity, and justice?

Please join Internet radio host Dr. James Avington Miller Jr. for a special report on the CCJEF vs. Rell court ruling and how this ruling significantly affects children, parents, teachers, communities, and potentially the whole country. Dr. Miller's featured guests will be CT blogger Jonathan Pelto and CT attorney and educational columnist Wendy Lecker.

We will explore the origin of the case, the actual ruling, and the implications of Judge Thomas Moukawsher's outrageous court ruling.

This case, if not overturned, will turn CT into a state that will abolish aide and support to at-risk and special needs children.

This case, if not overturned, that will turn CT into another Detroit with poor districts abandoned and privileged districts enriched.

This case, if not overturned, will demand that teacher pay must be tied t o teacher evaluations and student test scores.

And all this and more will be done from the bench not from the elected legislators . Democracy is NOT at work here in CT.

We must all wake up and fight the over-reach in our schools, our communities and our country. This one case will negativ ely impact students, teachers, families, public education, and our future . It is an important case we must all learn about.

Please read Wendy's column - http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/Wendy-Lecker-Ruling-raises-hope-for-poorest-9212622.php

Please read Jon's many blog posts on this case -http://jonathanpelto.com/2016/09/20/breaking-news-state-supreme-court-says-will-review-school-funding-case/

Here is the actual ruling - https://www.jud.ct.gov/CCJEFvRell.pdf

CT friends - please tune in and learn about the ruling . All our War Report friends, please take note that cases like this are happening all over our country and we the people must wake up and fight off the privatization of everyone and everything. Please listen in and call in on Sunday

Knowledge is power !

RESISTANCE MATTERS
RESISTANCE IS NOT FUTILE
RESISTANCE IS THE HIGHEST FORM OF EXPRESSION OF DEMOCRACY
RESISTANCE IS SURVIVAL


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The War Report on Public Education with Dr James Miller:

Big Education Ape: More about the extremely disappointing CCJEF v. Rell ruling by Wendy Lecker - Wait What? - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/09/more-about-extremely-disappointing.html

The War Report on Public Education with Dr James Avington Miller Jr

http://bbsradio.com/thewarreport

Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION: The Gates Plan for College + The Word Charters Leave Out

CURMUDGUCATION:

Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION

The Gates Plan for College

6by Peter Greene / 1h

Some days I feel kind of Rip Van Winklesque, as if I went to sleep and when I woke up the world had changed. Apparently while I was sleeping, the electorate rose up and elected Bill Gates the Grand Uber Head of Education. "Please," a bunch of you non-sleeping people said. "Redesign our entire education system. Redefine what it means to be an educated person, and redefine how a perso

The Word Charters Leave Out

43by Peter Greene / 4h

The sales pitch, in various versions, pops up every time charter cheerleaders are pushing charters as the Big Solution in education. "We know how to educate poor minority students." The implication, of course, is that public schools don't know how to get the job done. The use of civil rights rhetoric further pushes the idea that charters can rescue non-wealthy, non-white students from a

YESTERDAY

CA: Court Rejects Test-based Teacher Eval

62by Peter Greene / 1d

While astro-turf group Students Matter, a front for the reformster activism of Very Rich Man David Welch, is most famous for concocting and then losing the Vergara case , they have been trying to skin the reformy cat with other knife-like lawsuits as well. With Doe v. Antioch, Welch's group set out to compel thirteen California districts to include Big Standardized Test results in teacher evaluati

SEP 22

Wells Fargo and Making Your Numbers

82by Peter Greene / 2d

As you've probably heard by now, Wells Fargo got caught building its financial strength by a technique known variously as lying, fraud, or just making shit up. Low level employees created a bunch of fake accounts linked to actual humans who had no idea their financial matters were becoming messier by the minute. At the end of the day, 5,300 low-level employees were fired, and nobody who was respon

SEP 21

Grade Inflation?

18by Peter Greene / 3d

Mike Petrilli (Fordham) is concerned about grade inflation. His concern, as expressed in a recent piece at Education Next, is hung on the hook of a recent-ish survey by Learning Heroes , a new group sponsored by the same old folks (Gates Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Helmsley) that has partnered with some other outfits funded by the same people, like Great Schools (funded by Gates, Bloombe

SEP 20

USED, Pay for Success and Stupid Pre-K Plans

61by Peter Greene / 4d

The United States Department of (Privatizing) education is touting another boneheaded idea , this time aimed at preschool and using yet one more unproven approach-- pay for success. What is that, exactly? Here's the explanation from the USED FAQ page : Pay for success (PFS) is an innovative contracting and financing model that aims to test and advance promising and proven interventions while payin

SEP 19

16 Policies for the Next President

8by Peter Greene / 5d

Bellwether Education Partners, a reliably reformy right-tilted thinky tank, recently issued a compendium of policy ideas for the next President. " 16 for 2016 " comes with sixteen writers and sixteen ideas, though it's not entirely clear which candidates it's aimed at-- presumably not Hillary, whose contacts among the right-leaning world of corporate education privatizing are probably be

SEP 18

The Lesson of Detroit

66by Peter Greene / 6d

Last week a group of children in Detroit, Michigan sued the governor , the state board of education, the superintendent of public instruction, the director of technology, management and budget, and the state school reform/redesign officer. The lawsuit runs over 100 pages, but the table of contents provides a pretty clear outline of the argument: 1) Literacy is a fundamental right 2) The state of M

ICYMI: Catching up on your reading (9/18)

4by Peter Greene / 6d

Money and race, money and race. Some weeks it feels as if that's all this is really all about. Remember to link and share and pass on the readings that speak to you. Everyone can amplify the voices they believe should be heard. Will equity without adequacy be enough to help Connecticut's neediest children Wendy Lecker looks at what is being done-- and not done-- to meet Connecticut's obligations t

SEP 17

New Report on the Teacher "Shortage"

79by Peter Greene / 6d

Back in the summer of 2015, we were all making noises about the coming teacher shortage crisis. (I even did a state-by-state rundown .) And it wasn't really new in 2015; lots of folks had called it sooner than that, looking at data 

CURMUDGUCATION:

More about the extremely disappointing CCJEF v. Rell ruling by Wendy Lecker - Wait What?

More about the extremely disappointing CCJEF v. Rell ruling by Wendy Lecker - Wait What?:

More about the extremely disappointing CCJEF v. Rell ruling by Wendy Lecker

The mass media was quick to fixate on the one “positive” element of the recent CCJEF v. Rell school funding lawsuit ruling, missing the many series problems associated with decision.

In her first piece, Problems with the CCJEF Decision – Will equity without adequacy be enough to help Connecticut’s neediest children?, education advocate and Hearst Media Group columnist Wendy Lecker looked at the school finance portion of the judge’s action.  Here, in Demanding more in elementary schools, she looks at some of the education policy elements of the ruling.

This piece first appeared in the Stamford Advocate.  You can read and comment on the original at:  http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/news/article/Wendy-Lecker-Demanding-more-in-elementary-schools-9242568.php

More about the extremely disappointing CCJEF v. Rell ruling by Wendy Lecker

As noted in my previous column, CCJEF trial judge Thomas Moukawsherrefused to order the state to ensure adequate resources in schools, though determining constitutional adequacy was his responsibility. By contrast, the judge freely issued sweeping directives regarding educational policy.

The judge issued far-reaching orders involving elementary and high school education and teacher evaluations. He also aired abhorrent views toward children with disabilities, which several commentators already addressed.

This column addresses his orders regarding elementary education. I will address the others in subsequent columns.

Moukawsher observed that the educational disparities in secondary school begin in elementary school. (He actually acknowledged that they begin before elementary school, but declined to rule that preschool is essential.)

Moukawsher’s “fix” for elementary school was to order the state to define 

More about the extremely disappointing CCJEF v. Rell ruling by Wendy Lecker - Wait What?:

Cheri Kiesecker: What Parents Need to Know About Google Apps for Education | Diane Ravitch's blog

Cheri Kiesecker: What Parents Need to Know About Google Apps for Education | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Cheri Kiesecker: What Parents Need to Know About Google Apps for Education

Cheri Kiesecker is a Colorado parent who pays close attention to technology that invades student privacy.

She left the following warning as a comment:

In response to the question about GAFE. Below are a few links that may be of help.
GAFE, Google, Chromebooks… seem to suffer transparency issues on how they track and use and analyze student data. When parents have asked to see what data points Google collects, how that information is analyzed, who it is shared with, there are no transparent answers.

Many privacy organizations and advocates have concerns and questions about the algorithms used and data collection/ sharing in GAFE.
Google Chromebooks are pre-set to send student data, all user activity, back to Google.

This article explains how ChromeSync feature tracks students. Some schools purposely leave the SYNC feature on. Others, however, turn off Sync before asking students to use Chromebooks. MANY schools and parents are NOT AWARE of the Chrome Sync tracking feature.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/10/internet-companies-confusing-consumers-profit

This blog does a great job explaining GAFE issues in Where The Sidewalk Ends: Wading Through Google’s Terms of Service for Education:

Google defines a narrow set of applications as “core” Apps for Edu services. These services are exempt from having ads displayed alongside user content, and from having their data used for “Ads purposes”. However, apps outside the core services – like YouTube, Blogger, and Picasa – are not covered by the terms of service that restrict ads. The same is true for integrations of third party apps that can be enabled within the Google Apps admin interface, and then accessed by end users. So, when a person in a Google Apps for Edu environment watches a video on YouTube, writes or reads a post on Blogger, or accesses any third party app enabled via Google Apps, their information is no longer covered under the Google Apps for Education terms.

To put it another way: as soon as a person with a Google Apps for Education account strays outside the opaque and narrowly defined “safe zone” everything they do can be collected, stored, and mined.

So, the next time you hear someone say, “Google apps doesn’t use data for advertising” ask them to explain what happens to student data when a student starts in Google apps, and then goes to Blogger, or YouTube, or connects to any third party integration.” read more…

https://funnymonkey.com/2015/where-the-sidewalk-ends-wading-through-googles-terms-of-service

EFF COMPLAINT against GOOGLE

The privacy watchdog group Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a Cheri Kiesecker: What Parents Need to Know About Google Apps for Education | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Oregon Save Our Schools: Secretary of State Releases Flawed Audit of Smarter Balanced Asssessment

Oregon Save Our Schools: Secretary of State Releases Flawed Audit of Smarter Balanced Asssessment:

Secretary of State Releases Flawed Audit of Smarter Balanced Asssessment

On September 14, the Oregon Secretary of State's office released its long awaited audit of the Smarter Balanced Assessment, as required by House Bill 2713. The audit appears to have relied heavily on information provided by the Oregon Department of Education and no serious effort at asking school districts to report their actual expenditures of time and money appears to have been made.

A member of Eugene Citizens Alliance for Public Education (CAPE)  has written a letter to the members of the Oregon House and Senate Education Committees which we share here. We urge you to write letters to these committees in the House and Senate as well as your own state representatives. Watch for more to come from CAPE, Oregon Save Our Schools, and other grassroots organizations regarding concerns with the audit. Find the audit itself here.

The results of the so-called audit of Oregon's standardized tests are bogus.  The ODE's report does not fulfill the purpose of House Bill 2713.

1.  Contrary to the report, the state spent $27,275,803 on Smarter Balanced in July 2014, according to its contract titled "State of Oregon Amendment 1 to Personal/Professional Services Contract #9573 Information Technology System Acquisition Web-Based Computer-Adaptive Testing System".  Yet the audit claims spending less than $11 million.

2. No one can find a district that was asked to record all its own expenditures, such as new or updated computers, increased bandwidth, extra substitute teachers, additional testing coordinators, etc.  Instead, the audit relied on vague generalities.  It should be easy to compare expenditures before and after Smarter Balanced testing began with regard to specifics like hiring substitute teachers, etc.

3. "Boots on the ground" experiences were not taken seriously enough.  The tables for test length are taken straight from SBAC Oregon Save Our Schools: Secretary of State Releases Flawed Audit of Smarter Balanced Asssessment: