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Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Afternoon Update Education Week: From the Wires

Education Week: From the Wires

FROM THE WIRES

APS Considers Lawsuit Against State
School districts around New Mexico are increasingly earnest about the idea of suing the state for "sufficient" education funding, especially in the face of more potential budget cuts.
October 26, 2010
Pa. School Nixes Biden Rally for Dem. Candidate
October 26, 2010
Melba teacher receives Milken Educator award
October 26, 2010
Study: Scholarship athletes still pay for school
October 26, 2010
$81K in Legal Fees Awarded in Lesbian Prom Case
October 26, 2010
Putin: Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago essential
October 26, 2010
Publisher to correct Va. textbook error
October 26, 2010
Ga. high school graduation rate hits all-time high
October 26, 2010
It's Elementary: K-6 Ideas Could Keep Students From Dropping Out of School Later
Two Alabama schools make the prestigious list of "torchbearer schools," a program created in 2004 to recognize Alabama schools that are high poverty, but also high performing.
October 26, 2010
Phila. Teaching Town Hall Features Tony Danza
October 26, 2010
Feds Investigate Treatment of Minorities in Toledo Schools
October 26, 2010
R.I. Ed. Officials Talk 2-Tiered Diploma System
October 26, 2010
Police: Hartford woman gave son weapons for school
October 26, 2010
Governor Candidates Debate School Funding
October 26, 2010
AG: NE Pa. school official took more than believed
October 26, 2010
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Interview with Diane Ravitch | LearnCentral

Interview with Diane Ravitch | LearnCentral
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California Student Travels to Kansas to Battle Prop. 23 - The Bay Citizen

California Student Travels to Kansas to Battle Prop. 23 - The Bay Citizen

California Student Travels to Kansas to Battle Prop. 23

A student activist from California is going to great lengths in his fight against Prop. 23 — all the way to Kansas. Joel Francis, a senior at California State University, Los Angeles, visited the headquarters of Koch Industries in Witchia, Kan., Tuesday at noon to attempt to meet the company's CEO, Charles Koch. The Marine Corps veteran was rebuffed at the front door by security guards, but did manage to leave a phone message with Koch’s assistant reiterating his desire to debate the billionaire about California's Proposition 23. Given that Koch hasn’t responded yet, “I highly doubt he’ll actually return a call,” Francis said on a conference call with reporters. Francis first challenged Koch to a debate in a YouTube video released last week, as The Bay Citizen reported. “If
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Virginia Text Will Be Revised; Black Confederates, Brown Bear To Be Removed The Two-Way : NPR

The Two-Way : NPR

The Virginia history textbook that sparked outrage by claiming that thousands of blacks fought on the side of the Confederacy during the Civil War will be amended, its publisher says.

Until the new books are available, the publisher, Five Ponds Press, is reportedly offering white stickers to cover up the sentence, which reads: "Thousands of Southern blacks fought in the Confederate ranks, including two black battalions under the command of Stonewall Jackson."

The passage was included in the book Our Virginia: Past and Present. Its author, Joy Masoff, said that she had first found the references to black Confederate soldiers on the Internet.

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Union mobilizes teachers to find and report errors in ratings | GothamSchools

Union mobilizes teachers to find and report errors in ratings | GothamSchools

Union mobilizes teachers to find and report errors in ratings

by Maura Walz

In the next stage of its effort to block the release of thousands of teacher data reports, the city teachers union is mobilizing educators to scrutinize their reports for errors — even setting up a dedicated phone line to monitor concerns.

Last week, the city announced that it would release a list of teachers’ names and their effectiveness ratings to reporters who had submitted freedom of information requests. The union has sued to stop the release, and the city agreed to postpone publicizing teachers’ names until a hearing is held in court next month.

The union asserts that the ratings should not be made public in part because they are non-finalized and often

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Klein sent a letter to principal NYC Public School Parents

NYC Public School Parents
by Leonie Haimson

Klein sent a letter to principals, reprinted onGotham Schools, about the unreliable and invalid teacher data reports, as even his own consultants have said. The letter contains five big lies.

One: that he's doing this for parents, and really cares what we think:

“On one hand, for too long, parents have been left out of the equation…”

Yes, by his administration consistently ignoring their top priorities, like reducing class size, year after

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Duncan, Rendell promote teaching, ed. funding | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Duncan, Rendell promote teaching, ed. funding | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Duncan, Rendell promote teaching, ed. funding

by thenotebook on Oct 26 2010

by Patrick Gailey

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan traveled to Philadelphia yesterday as a part of the U.S. Department of Education’s TEACH campaign. Secretary Duncan spent the morning discussing this campaign, which aims to recruit the next generation of teachers, with a panel at Temple University. This"Temple University Town Hall" marks the first event for the TEACH campaign, which was launched in September.

In the afternoon Duncan joined Governor Edward Rendell at the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce for a public conversation about the state of education in Pennsylvania. Governor Rendell highlighted increases in school funding, especially for early childhood, under his administration. He linked this spending to the gains that Pennsylvania has made in raising test scores and closing disparities. He also expressed concerns about loss of federal stimulus funding coupled with two candidates for governor who oppose tax increases and what effect these factors will have on the improvements Pennsylvania and

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Katie Makkai - Pretty

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Ripple Effects of CalWORKS Veto - Year 2010 (CA Dept of Education)

Ripple Effects of CalWORKS Veto - Year 2010 (CA Dept of Education)

State Schools Chief Jack O'Connell Details Worsening Ripple
Effects of Governor's Veto of CalWORKS Stage 3 Program

OAKLAND — State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell held a news conference today with parents at risk of losing their jobs, to criticize Governor Schwarzenegger's line-item veto of funding for child care services to help struggling parents who have successfully left welfare and are gainfully employed. O'Connell noted that the Governor's veto earlier this month of $256 million for CalWORKS Stage 3 program funding will have far-reaching effects that stretch beyond the loss of child care for struggling families.

"We stand at the cusp of a disaster," O'Connell said. "The Governor's veto has set the stage for a cascading set of circumstances that will disrupt struggling parents' employment, eliminate jobs of child care workers, force the closure of child care businesses, cause loss of early learning opportunities for kids, and worsen California's economic downturn."

During the news conference at the Bright Future Early Learning Center in Oakland, O'Connell reported results of a survey conducted by the California Department of Education (CDE) on the number of children in the Bay Area who will lose safe, quality child care as a result of the Governor's veto of the CalWORKS Stage 3 funding:

  • Alameda County — 1,759 children;
  • Contra Costa County — 1,539 children;
  • San Francisco County — 1,068 children; and
  • Santa Clara County — 2,688 children.

O'Connell chastised the Governor and his staff for telling panicked families who will lose child care services at the end of this month that there are plenty of other state-funded child care programs available. In fact, more than 187,000 children are already on long waiting lists for child care services. The Governor's veto added 54,000 more names to the waiting list — a nearly 30 percent increase. Each month, an additional 1,500 names will be added to the list of those children who would have moved into Stage 3 from Stage 2. Under CalWORKS, a family usually progresses from Stage 1 to Stage 3 as their employment situation stabilizes and working parents need help to cover the prohibitively high cost of child care in order to go to work and remain off public aid.

"The Governor's veto is turning out to be a job reduction act at a time when California's unemployment rate is at a near-record high 12.4 percent," O'Connell noted.

"He gave working families just three weeks notice before child care services are cut off, forcing parents to choose between safe, quality care for their children, and losing their jobs or seeing a reduction of hours and salary. The veto is also forcing child care businesses to lay off child care providers, and in some cases, close their doors."

California's subsidized child care system generates more than 130,000 related jobs, according to a study released by the Berkeley Center on Health, Economic & Family Security entitled, Cutting Child Care Out from Under Californians. As a result of the Governor's veto, many of these jobs will be gone and the places where they work will be closed down. This will put more people on the unemployment rolls, and deprive young children of early learning opportunities at these child care facilities.

For the Berkeley report, please visit Cutting Child Care Out from Under Californians (Outside Source; PDF; 445KB; 16pp.). For information on the benefit of early learning opportunities, go to Preschool for All - State of Education.

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“Building Stronger Relationships Between Families, Schools and Communities” | Engaging Parents In School...

“Building Stronger Relationships Between Families, Schools and Communities” | Engaging Parents In School...
“Building Stronger Relationships Between Families, Schools and Communities” Building Stronger Relationships Between Families, Schools and Communities is the title of a post at the National Education Association’s Priority Schools blog. The post includes a video where “Kim Oliver Burnim, a National Board Certified Teacher ...
Parents Get a Deal In Chicago I’ve previously written about a long-term parent sit-in at a school in Chicago where they were demanding a library be created. It looks like the parents got what they wanted for the school, and are just waiting for the school board to approve the ...
Schools, And Parent Engagement, Don’t Seem To Be Rahm Emanuel’s Strong Suit Rahm Emanuel gave an interview with the Chicago Tribune on Monday and spoke a lot about his plans for schools. They were all pretty bad, including his idea about parent engagement: *The city could reward schools with greater parental involvement by ...
“Digital Parent Engagement” Lorna Costantini has developed an excellent presentation on how schools can use technology to connect with parents. Check-out her Digital Parent Engagement – k12Online Conference 2010 presentation. This is how she describes it: *This video shares ...
Not A Good Message Via Comic Strip (Or Any Other Medium) Family Tree is a comic strip drawn by Signe Wilkinson which is often funny and insightful (coincidentally, thirty years ago she and I met several times in Philadelphia when I was an intern at the nonprofit where her husband worked). Her comic strip ...
What A Terrible Video About Parents & Schools With A Terrible Message Parent Revolution, the charter school affiliated group behind the faulty and ill-conceived “parent trigger” mechanism in California the facilitates charter school takeovers of schools, has produced an awful video to publicize this “trigger.” It ...
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Videos of NJEA conference are authentic, James O'Keefe spokesman says | NJ.com

Videos of NJEA conference are authentic, James O'Keefe spokesman says | NJ.com

Videos of NJEA conference are authentic, James O'Keefe spokesman says

Published: Tuesday, October 26, 2010, 1:55 PM Updated: Tuesday, October 26, 2010, 1:55 PM
The Star-Ledger Continuous News Desk The Star-Ledger Continuous News Desk


TRENTON — A series of videos produced by conservative activist James O'Keefe showing members of the New Jersey Education Association using racial slurs and chanting about kicking Gov. Chris Christie "in the toolbox" are compiled of authentic footage, according to a spokesman for O'Keefe.

The videos, apparently shot at the NJEA leadership conference at the East Brunswick Hilton, were taken by concerned citizens who struck up natural conversations with conference attendees, said Shane Corey, a spokesman for The Project Veritas, O'Keefe's organization.

The videos show people identified as teachers talking about how difficult it is to fire a tenured teacher, and laughing about playing arcade games "on their

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Turnaround Schools, Teacher Seniority, and Union-bashing* � Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Turnaround Schools, Teacher Seniority, and Union-bashing* � Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Turnaround Schools, Teacher Seniority, and Union-bashing*

by larrycuban

School reform is steady work. In September 2008, Markham Middle School (Watts, Los Angeles)–near the bottom of the state’s list of failing schools–got a new principal and a hardworking, young staff. Under the umbrella of the Mayor’s initiative to improve schools and using one of the federally-endorsed turnaround models, the Markham staff began its work.

Then six months later, Los Angeles Unified (LAUSD) budget cuts required pink slips to be sent to about ten percent of LAUSD teaching staff. However, district policy required that those last hired had to receive those reduction-in-force notices first thus decimating Markham’s high energy, fired up young staff including the principal. Even though half of Markham’s staff was eventually rehired (including the principal), still the fire fueling the turnaround was doused. Especially so, after the middle school had to fill remaining vacancies with veteran teachers let go elsewhere in the district according to the seniority provision in the contract. Markham made

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ASCD Inservice: What's Fair and Meaningful for Grading Students with Disabilities?

ASCD Inservice: What's Fair and Meaningful for Grading Students with Disabilities?

What's Fair and Meaningful for Grading Students with Disabilities?

Guskey_t120x148Jung_l120x148Grading students with disabilities can present a Sophie's Choice for educators:

Failing students with disabilities who have shown tremendous effort and progress clearly seems unfair. Giving passing marks to students who have not met prescribed performance standards also seems wrong.

In fact, as Thomas Guskey and Lee Ann Jung write in "Grading Exceptional Learners," when students receive inflated grades based on material that is not appropriate to their skill level, they actually lose motivation (Ring & Reetz, 2000).

How can educators create fair and meaningful grades for students with disabilities, those receiving intensive intervention in an RTI model, or even students struggling because they are English language learners?

At ASCD's Teaching and Learning Conference, Gusky and Jung demonstrate a five-step model (PDF) for grading and

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Public Conduct Hearing Tomorrow at Berkeley � Student Activism

Public Conduct Hearing Tomorrow at Berkeley � Student Activism

Public Conduct Hearing Tomorrow at Berkeley

by Angus Johnston

Nearly a year after an occupation of Berkeley’s Wheeler Hall ended in more than forty arrests, the university still hasn’t resolved campus judicial charges against many of the participants. (Berkeley’s student conduct policies are, as has been noted before, a mess.)

Tomorrow marks a milestone in this process — the first public hearing for one of the students brought up on

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New Interview Out of McGill � Student Activism

New Interview Out of McGill � Student Activism

New Interview Out of McGill

by Angus Johnston

The student newspaper at McGill University has run an article on the conference I keynoted last Friday, and they’ve included partial transcripts of interviews that their reporters did with myself and two other speakers.

I’ve often found that student reporters ask me more cogent question than “professionals,” and the McGill Daily’s Eric Andrew-Gee was no exception. He’s planning on putting up the whole interview soon, and I’ll let you know when it posts, but for now you can check out his questions — and my answers — on organizing tactics,

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Make it better in schools right now | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Make it better in schools right now | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Make it better in schools right now

by Frank Murphy

“I’m afraid my whole life is going to be like this. People will always be calling me names.” -Jordan, 8th grader, inConfessions of an Urban Principal: October

Asher Brown recently committed suicide. He was 13 years old. He shot himself in the head with his stepfather’s gun. According to media reports, he was relentlessly bullied and tormented by other students in his school.

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UC Student Conduct and Terrorism � occupy california

UC Student Conduct and Terrorism � occupy california

UC Student Conduct and Terrorism

by *

from reclaimUC:

Last December, Governor Schwarzenegger invoked a rhetoric of terrorism to describe protests that had taken place on UC Berkeley campus:

California will not tolerate any type of terrorism against any leaders including educators. The attack on Chancellor Birgeneau’s home is a criminal act and those who participated will be prosecuted under the fullest extent of the law. Debate is the foundation of democracy and I encourage protestors to find peaceful and productive ways to express their opinions.

At the time, Schwarzenegger’s hyperbolic language, along with that of UC Berkeley administrators, was widely ridiculed. But now the University of California Office of the President (UCOP) is looking to insert specific language about “terrorism” into the guidelines that determine how the Codes of Student Conduct on individual UC campuses are written. The proposal is to incorporate this language into the section on hate crimes.

The following was circulated in an email from Jerlena Griffin-Desta, director of student services at the Student Affairs Office of the President. These changes may be included in the discussion at the November Regents’

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