Something stinks about the takeover of HISD [Opinion] - HoustonChronicle.com

Something stinks about the takeover of HISD [Opinion] - HoustonChronicle.com

Something stinks about the takeover of HISD [Opinion]

Residents of this community are increasingly frustrated with the upheaval in the Houston Independent School District. As Houstonians who work directly with the educators, parents and students in the district, we don’t blame them. But something doesn’t add up in the state’s decision to take over HISD.

Houston schools have been on an improvement track for years — the district recently earned a B grade from the state — just two points away from an A. After years of struggle among legislators, administrators and educators to figure out how best to serve our kids, HISD should be celebrating our progress. But instead of cheering parents, educators and students, who came together and turned around the city’s schools, the state slapped our community in the face by announcing this punitive takeover of the entire district.

A byzantine Texas law enables the state to trigger a district takeover — all 283 Houston public schools — if just one school chronically underperforms. So instead of investing in that one school — Wheatley High School, in this case — and providing it the attention and resources it needs, Austin bureaucrats chose to scapegoat and punish the entire city. Given that Houston students just scored second in math and third in reading within their national peer group, HISD seems like it should be a model rather than a takeover target.

This political power grab is the epitome of overreaching, but it also reflects an insidious, ongoing effort to deny black and brown communities the educational opportunities their kids deserve. It represents a classist, old-school view of public education that rewards the privileged few and ignores the difficult work that must be done to ensure schools are safe and welcoming and meet the needs of all kids, regardless of geography or demography.

What’s also incredibly disappointing is that this takeover comes on the heels of a democratic election, in which the community elected new school board members. If this untenable takeover proceeds, duly elected trustees won’t get a chance to take their seats, defying the will of the people and denying a voice for those elected to represent the needs of students.

Gov. Greg Abbott and Education Commissioner Mike Morath aren’t actually looking out for Houston’s kids. They want to privatize Texas’ largest school district through a charter scheme. If that happens, this plan will funnel money out of our traditional public schools and into for-profit alternatives. This recent election vote reflected the community’s mandate that Houston public schools continue to invest in evidence-based wraparound services, including health care, before- and after-school programs, and enhanced social and emotional services.

Now is not the time to quit on Houston. Now is not the time to let Austin bureaucrats disrupt the educational progress this community has fought for and won. Now is the time to say we will not let this happen to our community and our students.

Capo is president of the Houston Federation of Teachers and Texas AFT, Dixon is pastor of the Community of Faith Church in Houston and a vice president of the Houston Branch of the NAACP, and Mojica is president of LULAC Education Council #402.

Something stinks about the takeover of HISD [Opinion] - HoustonChronicle.com

Report: Michigan’s takeover of Detroit schools was ‘a costly mistake’

Report: Michigan’s takeover of Detroit schools was ‘a costly mistake’

Report: Michigan’s takeover of Detroit schools was ‘a costly mistake’

The state was supposed to solve intractable problems that elected school officials in Detroit could not.

It made things worse, according to a newly released report on the 15 years during which the Detroit school district was largely controlled by state-appointed officials.

The study, which was commissioned by the current school board, found a pattern of “startling mismanagement” in academic and financial matters whose consequences continue to weigh on the district’s future.

While some had hoped that the report would eventually lead to a lawsuit against the state, that seems unlikely. Instead, it provides a 172-page confirmation of what many Detroiters have argued for years: that installing state officials in place of the elected school board wasn’t enough to make the district’s problems disappear.

“The legacy of emergency management coupled with the continuing effect of inequitable school funding, will inevitably cause the District to hit a ceiling and impede its current progress toward a complete turnaround of traditional public education in Detroit,” the seven board members wrote in a statement in response to the report.

As state officials closed dozens of schools, they failed to adequately maintain the properties — “a costly mistake,” the report found, “as many of the vacant buildings CONTINUE READING: Report: Michigan’s takeover of Detroit schools was ‘a costly mistake’

Michael Bloomberg Says He May Run for President: Why He Won’t Be my Choice | janresseger

Michael Bloomberg Says He May Run for President: Why He Won’t Be my Choice | janresseger

Michael Bloomberg Says He May Run for President: Why He Won’t Be my Choice

New York City’s former three-term mayor, Michael Bloomberg, a multi-billionaire businessman, is exploring whether to join other Democrats running for President in 2020. It is said that he would be a Democratic centrist, and we know that he has contributed positively to the national conversation promoting gun control and an aggressive response to climate change.  But, as usual in this political season, his record on public education has been neglected by the press.

Michael Bloomberg does have a long education record. Bloomberg served as New York City’s mayor from January of 2002 until December of 2013. In 2002, to accommodate his education agenda, Bloomberg got the state legislature to create mayoral governance of NYC’s public schools. In this role, Michael Bloomberg and his appointed schools chancellor, Joel Klein were among the fathers of what has become a national wave of corporate, accountability-based school reform. Bloomberg is a businessman, and Joel Klein was a very successful attorney. Neither had any experience as an educator. They took aggressive steps to run the NYC school district, with 1.1 million students, like a business. Their innovations included district-wide school choice, rapid expansion of charter schools, co-location of a bunch of small charter and traditional schools into what used to be comprehensive high schools, the phase out and closure of low-scoring schools, evaluation of schools by high stakes standardized test scores, the assignment of letter grades to schools based on their test scores, and a sort of merit pay bonus plan for teachers.

In her 2018 book, After the Education Wars, Andrea Gabor, the New York business journalist and journalism professor, comments on Bloomberg’s educational experiment: “The Bloomberg administration embraced the full panoply of education-reform remedies. It worshiped at the altar of standardized tests and all manner of quantitative analysis. The Bloomberg administration also had a penchant for reorganizations that seemed to create more disruption than continuous improvement among its 1.1 million students and 1,800 schools.” ( After the Education Wars, p. 75)

Gabor describes Bloomberg’s expansion of charter schools: “Harlem, in particular, has become the center of an unintentional educational experiment—one that has been replicated in CONTINUE READING: Michael Bloomberg Says He May Run for President: Why He Won’t Be my Choice | janresseger

Vulture Voucher Bill Latest in Mike Turzai’s Quest to Please Betsy DeVos in PA | gadflyonthewallblog

Vulture Voucher Bill Latest in Mike Turzai’s Quest to Please Betsy DeVos in PA | gadflyonthewallblog

Vulture Voucher Bill Latest in Mike Turzai’s Quest to Please Betsy DeVos in PA

The best way to help a struggling public school is to cannibalize it.

At least that’s what Betsy DeVos thinks – and so does her Pennsylvania puppet Mike Turzai.

The Republican Speaker of the state House is expected to propose a school voucher bill Monday that will treat Harrisburg Schools as nothing more than carrion fit for plunder by school privatization vultures.

Sure the district is in state receivership after decades of neglect and bad decisions by the elected school board.

But instead of helping the school and its students get back on their feet, Turzai proposes siphoning away as much as $8.5 million in state funding set aside for the school’s aide. Alternatively, that money would go to help offset some of the cost of sending Harrisburg students to private or parochial schools if they so desire.

However in lieu of any safeguards to make sure these children fleeing from the public system receive the same quality of services required by state law, Turzai’s bill goes out of its way to protect the vultures!

Under House Bill 1800, private or parochial schools won’t be held as accountable for how they spend the money they plunder from Harrisburg nor will it force them to CONTINUE READING: Vulture Voucher Bill Latest in Mike Turzai’s Quest to Please Betsy DeVos in PA | gadflyonthewallblog

Education Through Friendship: One Man’s Story (Part 1) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Education Through Friendship: One Man’s Story (Part 1) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Education Through Friendship: One Man’s Story (Part 1)

I have been writing this blog for over a decade. It has focused nearly always on how state and district policies–most of which aim to reform practices– are formed and what happens to them as they trickle down into classrooms. In other words, I have described and analyzed the institution of schooling both past and present and how policies, if at all, shape classroom lessons and student learning. I have been a historian of “schooling” more than a historian of “education.” In analyzing formal schooling I have not fully captured how the young are educated.

Readers know that schooling is not the same as education; it is only one part–albeit an important one–to becoming a full human being who keeps learning throughout life. Consider that of the 6,000 hours that children and youth are awake each year, about 1,000 (or less than 20 percent) are spent in age-graded public schools.

There is, however, an array of informal institutions that also educate. They are the furniture of daily life that are in the background and taken for granted. Family, workplace, congregations, libraries, museums, neighborhoods, clubs, television, social media–I could go on but readers know what I mean–educate both children and adults. Each of these has their own “grammar of instruction” but without attendance being taken, individual desks to sit at, homework, report cards, and lesson plans.

I have been thinking of the distinction between formal schooling and informal education for a long time. As a historian of education, I have been an institutionalist, that is, I have concentrated on formal school organizations, professionals and non-professionals involved in governance, curriculum, and instruction.

There are other historians, however, who have described and analyzed how children and adults learn from other American social, cultural, religious, CONTINUE READING: Education Through Friendship: One Man’s Story (Part 1) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Los Angeles: UTLA Endorses Bernie Sanders | Diane Ravitch's blog

Los Angeles: UTLA Endorses Bernie Sanders | Diane Ravitch's blog

Los Angeles: UTLA Endorses Bernie Sanders

Tonight, the United Teachers of Los Angeles endorsed Senator Bernie Sanders for the Democratic nomination for president.

LOS ANGELES — United Teachers Los Angeles, the second-largest teachers’ local in the country, is proud to endorse Senator Bernie Sanders for US President in the 2020 Primary Election, making UTLA the first teachers’ union in the country to endorse a presidential candidate.

Tonight, the UTLA House of Representatives – the elected leadership body of the 34,000-member union — voted 80% in favor of endorsing Sen. Sanders, capping the most comprehensive member engagement process that UTLA has ever conducted for a political candidate.

Thursday’s House vote followed a six-week discussion at school sites. Following that member engagement, on Wednesday at nine regional meetings, more than 500 elected site representatives voted 72.5% yes to the presidential endorsement of Sen. Bernie Sanders. Wednesday’s vote was opened up to allow any member who attended to vote alongside elected chapter leaders.

UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearl said: “Why now, and why Bernie? Because we want him to win in the primary election and because we need an unapologetic, longstanding ally of progressive policies to make public education a priority in the White House. Sanders is the first viable major candidate in 25 years in the Democratic Party to stand up against privatization, the charter billionaires, and high-stakes testing and to stand up for a massive redistribution of wealth to schools and social CONTINUE READING: Los Angeles: UTLA Endorses Bernie Sanders | Diane Ravitch's blog

Charter School Industry’s Data Plan Goes Bust

Charter School Industry’s Data Plan Goes Bust

Charter School Industry’s Data Plan Goes Bust

I think that it is incredibly ironic…that the same people who have resisted charter school transparency are now the ones demanding [public schools] to be transparent.”– LAUSD Board Member Jackie Goldberg

The School Performance Framework (SPF) should have been killed off the moment it was revealed that Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Board Member Nick Melvoin had colluded with the charter school industry to craft the resolution that lead to its creation. Instead, Melvoin pushed on, spending public funds to create a biased framework and populating focus groups with people from his own personal mailing lists. That all came to an end last Tuesday when the LAUSD Board voted 7-1 to “suspend implementation of the SPF and any launching or utilization of the SPF—including any use of stars, scores, or any other rating system—in or on any District platforms”. Melvoin was the sole dissenting vote.

The vote to suspend the SPF caps months of effort by parents and other LAUSD stakeholders to expose the charter school industry’s plan to use the SPF to take control of public facilities for the benefit of their publicly funded private schools. Melvoin’s Speak Up, a group initially created to promote his election that pretends to be a CONTINUE READING: Charter School Industry’s Data Plan Goes Bust

Louisiana Educator: Poverty vs District School Performance

Louisiana Educator: Poverty vs District School Performance

Poverty vs District School Performance

This ranking lists all Louisiana school systems and certain individual schools in order of increasing poverty. The table includes the district performance scores and the letter grade as assigned by the LA Department of Education for 2019. 

(Click on the image to magnify)

It is noteworthy that the districts and schools with the smallest percentage of high poverty students achieved the highest district and/or school performance scores and the highest letter grades. Conversely, the three school districts with the greatest student poverty received the lowest performance scores and the lowest letter grades in the state.

The highest scoring schools in the state are the school for math/science/arts and the LSU lab school. These are selective admissions schools but they also have the lowest percentages of high poverty students in the state.

The Zachary Community school district, which has the highest district performance score, has only 3 percentage points higher poverty than the wealthiest school system . The school systems in Louisiana that rank in the top 10% according to wealth, with the exception of Livingston Parish, all  received "A" grades from the LDOE.

A few good words about the Zachary Community school system
The Zachary school system is celebrating its 15th year in a row as the highest performing school system in the state based on standardized test scores. Zachary administrators and teachers certainly deserve much credit. My wife and I both taught in the Zachary school system many years ago,  long before school systems were ranked by student test scores. It was an excellent school system even then. Like all other school systems, Zachary teachers spend a lot of time preparing students for the almighty annual state tests. But in my opinion, that is not what makes CONTINUE READING: Louisiana Educator: Poverty vs District School Performance

The problem with K.J.’s comeback • SN&R Extra

The problem with K.J.’s comeback • SN&R Extra

The problem with K.J.’s comeback
Sacramento didn’t author Kevin Johnson’s political downfall. Will the city support the accused molester’s makeover as a celebrity restaurant owner?

Dear Sacramento,

Did you forgive or forget? Or did you never believe the girls at all?

It’s a late Friday morning inside Fixins Soul Kitchen, and Oak Park’s buzziest new restaurant is steady with early lunch traffic. Scan the crowd: Natty 20-somethings quaff pre-noon beers at the bar because they can; a tentative book club pokes in and settles on the patio; posses of friends and coworkers scarf down waffle stacks, brittle bacon, scrambled egg piles and deep-brined chicken slabs.

The 11 a.m. indicators are that Fixins is a hit—and a solid addition to the neighborhood’s fitful renaissance or sharp-elbowed gentrification, depending on whom you ask.

As for the man who owns this spot, this building, this block—his famous face hasn’t been this visible in a long while:

Kevin Johnson.

You remember K.J., Sacramento. He slunk out of office and out of the spotlight three years ago, amid resurgent allegations that he molested girls. You already knew these stories when you elected the former NBA great to be your mayor—twice. Johnson’s questionable behavior around young women became such an open secret that City Hall publicly reminded its elected officials to stop giving unsolicited hugs in 2013.

And yet Sacramento remained K.J.’s city, seemingly turning a blind eye to Johnson’s underage accusers so that it could bask in the shadow of its celebrity mayor. Until the national media told the rest of the country what you already knew, and a national audience recoiled.

But now he’s back.

For the first time since he dribbled out the clock on his political career, the retired professional athlete, one-time education reformer and ex-politician is fashioning his fourth reinvention—as the head of a budding restaurant empire. Johnson already has ownership stakes in three dining locations and says he plans to expand that portfolio beyond his native Oak Park.

Yet his latest chapter coincides with growing alarm about pervasive sexual harassment within the restaurant industry, where CONTINUE READING: The problem with K.J.’s comeback • SN&R Extra

NC teacher: Education is political - EducationNC

NC teacher: Education is political - EducationNC

Education is political

On a recent Sunday morning, I woke up to see tremendous chatter on social media concerning the budget impasse in the North Carolina General Assembly. The discussion included the lack of educator raises, the failure to expand Medicaid, unacceptable working conditions, and a shortage of support staff. This discussion quickly evolved into the formation of a new social media group discussing the possibility of a large scale collective action or strike of North Carolina educators.

This kind of discussion is not new to me. I’ve been a sixth grade social studies and language arts teacher for 18 years, working my whole career in a diverse community confronted with significant economic struggle. I love my community, and they have always inspired me to advocate for my students and their families. Recently, I decided to take an Inquiry to Action class through the Western Region Education Service Alliance (WRESA) to earn continuing licensure credits and build my activist skills. Here, a small group of educators studied educator activism in both theory and practice.  Each week we discussed a different education-related activist tool, theory, and issue. The culminating project was to take our “inquiry” and put it into “action” in some way.

The group decided to focus on “making the invisible visible.” In other words, we seek to deepen critical consciousness — the notion that we go through life oblivious to the world around us on the largest scale. A famous example of this precept is the analogy of the fish in water. If you asked a fish what water is, the fish wouldn’t understand the question because it has a fish brain.

Joking aside, it is because the fish is completely immersed in the water and always has been. The fish just doesn’t notice because it is so “normal” and so ubiquitous. In human life, this would be like the systematic racism that we all live within. Or, it may be ideas that are simply taken as “common sense.” For educators, we may struggle to apprehend fundamental truths about our own environments. I believe that public educators swim in a sea of politics which is all too often invisible — so that is the concept I choose to render more visible. 

Most North Carolina local school boards have policies which hold that employees may not engage in political activities during the school day. However, because public schools are supported by public monies which are controlled by politicians, the very act of teaching, while not partisan, is an inherently political activity. In fact, North Carolina’s evaluation instrument for educators insists upon educators taking part in political activities. Standard 1 (Teachers Demonstrate Leadership) states, “Teachers advocate for schools and students. Teachers advocate for positive change in policies and practices affecting student learning.” What is advocating for policies if not political?  

To test just how visible this idea of “education as political” might be, I created a few info graphics and shared them with my virtual colleagues on social media. I also shared a  CONTINUE READING: NC teacher: Education is political - EducationNC

Oakland School Board meeting turns chaotic after protesters take over, forcing board to leave | abc7news.com

Oakland School Board meeting turns chaotic after protesters take over, forcing board to leave | abc7news.com

Oakland School Board meeting turns chaotic after protesters take over, forcing board to leave

OAKLAND, Calif. (KGO) -- Wednesday's Oakland School Board meeting turned into chaos after protesters upset about school closures disrupted things and then took over the meeting forcing the board to leave.

"Out with the school board, in with democracy," said one speaker.

It took only minutes for protesters to derail the Oakland Unified School Board Meeting.

Many parents and teachers are upset about the closure and consolidation of several schools due to declining enrollment.

Board president Jody London tried to keep order telling speakers they were out of order from the agenda.

Then this happened- the entire room, turned its back on the school board, chanting: "no school closures, Oakland is not for sale."

At the Oct. 23 meeting protesters clashed with police inside the meeting room after protesters jumped over a barricade separating them from the school board, arrests were made.

"No apology, no one accepted responsibility," said one speaker.

Parent Saru Jayaraman says she was injured that night, she wants the district to stop spending money on its police force.

"That money could be spent to save schools and keep them open," said Jayaraman.

Minutes later she confronted District Spokesman John Sasaki, demanding an apology.

"Shame on you, shame on you, you have no heart," said Jayaraman.

Board members were forced to leave the auditorium and continue their meeting in an upstairs room, no public allowed- only by a video camera,

Kids then took their places at the meeting.

"We were hoping to have a meeting in the great room, face to face, but that didn't happen," said OUSD spokesman John Sasaki.

Report a correction or typo

Oakland School Board meeting turns chaotic after protesters take over, forcing board to leave | abc7news.com

The Implications of Sacramento City Unified's Ongoing Budgetary Challenges for Local and State Policy | Policy Analysis for California Education

The Implications of Sacramento City Unified's Ongoing Budgetary Challenges for Local and State Policy | Policy Analysis for California Education

The Implications of Sacramento City Unified's Ongoing Budgetary Challenges for Local and State Policy

Authors: 

Carrie Hahnel, Hannah Melnicoe

Year of publication: 

November 2019

Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD), California’s thirteenth largest school district, faces a looming deficit and must make significant budget adjustments to avoid state intervention. This case study explores how the district reached this point, how its finances compare with other districts in Sacramento County, and what the implications are for students, particularly those with the greatest needs. It finds that:

• Many of SCUSD’s troubles can be linked to broader issues affecting districts across the state, including declining enrollment, increasing special education costs, and increasing pension payments.
• The district’s instability, past budgeting practices, and tense labor-management relations have created a rocky foundation upon which the district must address its current budget situation.
• As compared with neighboring districts, SCUSD spends far more on health care and a smaller share of its budget on salaries for pupil support personnel, teachers, classified instructional staff, and office staff. Many stakeholders agree that the greatest fiscal challenge in SCUSD is the high cost of health care.

These challenges are making it harder to retain talented staff and teachers, limiting opportunities for the highest-need students, widening inequities, and reducing public commitment to public education. Our study of SCUSD offers considerations for policymakers and lessons that may apply to other districts facing a similarly troubling combination of statewide cost pressures, tense labor-management relations, and high health care costs. These lessons learned include:

1. Unaffordable teacher benefits, however well intentioned, will impact district budgets if not addressed.
2. Tense labor-management relations jeopardize financial stability and public confidence.
3. Additional county or state authority to take corrective action may be needed to address the root causes of fiscal distress.
4. Districts face real and unavoidable cost increases, and although money alone cannot address all the root causes of financial distress, more funding is an important part of the solution.

SCUSD’s fiscal crisis cannot be solved overnight. Even with major fixes now, the district will be paying off liabilities for decades to come. What leaders in SCUSD can do now is stabilize the situation, steer a course toward future sustainability and success, and restore public confidence.

This report is part of a two-case series looking at the implications of district budgetary challenges in Marin County and Sacramento City Unified School District.

 Download infographic

 Download report

The Implications of Sacramento City Unified's Ongoing Budgetary Challenges for Local and State Policy | Policy Analysis for California Education

CURMUDGUCATION: Pearson In Your Pants

CURMUDGUCATION: Pearson In Your Pants

Pearson In Your Pants

Pearson, the edu-product giant that hopes to eat the world, just announced a new product.

It's part of the overall Pearson vision-- and nobody does large-scale vision like Pearson. They see everything happening in a "digital ocean." They have ideas about an "assessment renaissance" so huge that it took me five posts to write about it (here's the shorter version). And just this summer, they announced their intention to go "digital first." That is, not exactly phasing out textbooks entirely, but focusing on the digital; instead of offering digitized versions of print textbooks, they'll now work the other way around. Fun fact: "62% of Pearson revenue now comes from digital or digitally enabled products and services that make lifelong education possible."

It's very much in tune with their website slogan, "Learning Without Limits." That seems like a big reach, but again, Pearson has a big vision. What other textbook publishing company would offer two categories on its K-12 page: Products & Services, and Thought Leadership.
So this week's announcement is in tune with all of that.

Meet Aida Calculus. It's an app you can put on your phone, only that makes it sound too pedestrian, like one more version of Candy Crush. Hey, Pearson! Can we have some overly florid martket-speak here?

Aida is a first in the education industry and an important milestone in the use of artificial CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Pearson In Your Pants

Students forced to advocate for themselves on impact of climate change

Students forced to advocate for themselves on impact of climate change

Students take their future into their own hands on climate change activism
Why aren’t schools helping them?

When high school senior Destiny Watford learned that state officials had approved a building permit for a giant incinerator that would burn 4,000 tons of trash every day and emit more than a thousand pounds of lead and mercury every year, less than a mile away from her school in Baltimore, she took action. The plan reeked of environmental racism , which occurs when communities of color are burdened with a lop-sided amount of environmental threats, including toxic waste sites, polluting industries, and other sources of pollution.

Watford mobilized her impoverished neighborhood of Curtis Bay, canvassing the area for four years. Her efforts led the state to revoke the permit in 2016. That was a real civics lesson she will never forget.

“The decisions that affect the land that we live on are made behind closed doors,” Watford told Essence magazine. She added that communities are left in the dark “until a development’s built — or until they are dying of lung cancer.”

Students should be fully informed of climate issues, particular those that directly impact them. What good is a curriculum if it’s not relevant? As adults drop the ball, as politicians erode environmental protections, and signs of climate change are too evident to deny, students are forced to speak out against practices that directly impact their environment and contribute to the mounting climate CONTINUE READING: Students forced to advocate for themselves on impact of climate change

Too few parents talking to kids about race and identity, report finds

Too few parents talking to kids about race and identity, report finds

Too few parents talk to their kids about race and identity, report finds
Ten percent of parents discuss race often with their children

Too few parents and teachers are talking about race, gender and other identity traits with children often enough, which means they are missing out on critical opportunities to teach children to become tolerant of differences from an early age. That’s one of the main findings of a new report by Sesame Workshop, which surveyed 6,070 parents of children ages 3 to 12 and 1,046 teachers from preschool to fifth grade. Experts say this trend can have serious implications, because when adults don’t talk to kids about these topics, kids learn that identity is a taboo topic. They may also start to believe the stereotypes and biases they’re presented with in everyday life.

“Young kids do notice skin tone, they do notice race groups,” said Christia Spears Brown, a professor and associate chair of development and social psychology at the University of Kentucky, who has researched and written about identity development. “We also live in a segregated society…We know kids notice that and if parents don’t help them have an explanation that navigates the bias, kids will just absorb it as its just real meaningful difference.”

The authors of the Sesame Workshop “Identity Matters” report surveyed 6,070 parents of children. Here are some of their main findings:

• Only 10 percent of parents discuss race often with their children.
• A parent’s race impacts how often these conversations are happening. Twenty-two percent of black parents discuss race often with their children, compared to 6 percent of white parents.
• Nearly 35 percent of all parents surveyed said they never talk to their children about social class.
• Fifty-seven percent of all parents said they rarely or never talk about gender with their kids. These conversations are less likely to happen with younger children. Less than a third of parents of 3- to 5-year-old kids discuss race and ethnicity sometimes or often.

If parents aren’t having conversations about identity with their CONTINUE READING: Too few parents talking to kids about race and identity, report finds