Latest News and Comment from Education

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Daily Kos: Lest we forget: January 8, 2011

Daily Kos: Lest we forget: January 8, 2011:

Lest we forget: January 8, 2011

was a day of horror in Tucson Arizona. A deranged young man opened fire.

The dead on the scene included Federal District Chief Judge John Roll; Community Outreach Director for the Congresswoman whose event was attacked Gabe Zimmerman; Dorothy Morris, age 76; Phyllis Schneck, 79; Dorwan Stoddard, 76. Later, 9-year old Christina-Taylor Green died at the hospital. She was born September 11, 2001, granddaughter of former Baseball Manager Dallas Green.

Surviving, but seriously wounded, was the target of the attack, Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, who was holding a public event outside a local Safeway. She might well have died had not an intern from her office, Daniel Hernandez, applied pressure to her wound to keep her from bleeding out.

I will not mention the name of the shooter. This is a day to remember, to honor those who were lost.

Gabby will be at the anniversary event, along with her husband Mark Kelly.

Please, in the midst of all else that may fill this day for you, take a moment and remember the horror of that day, and what hope we may still derive from the courage of Daniel Hernandez and the others who responded, for the tenacity of Gabby Giffords, but most of all, for the loss of 6 innocent lives in yet another moment of madness that despoils this nation.

JD Alexander’s Revenge the Latest Example of Florida Republican’s Attempt to Eliminate Opponents | Scathing Purple Musings

JD Alexander’s Revenge the Latest Example of Florida Republican’s Attempt to Eliminate Opponents | Scathing Purple Musings:

JD Alexander’s Revenge the Latest Example of Florida Republican’s Attempt to Eliminate Opponents

JD Alexander told Board of Governors student member Michael Long “his conduct on the board had been “highly inappropriate” and darkly hinted the young man had jeopardized his future career.” The New College sophomoredared to call out Alexander on his abuse of power in threatening to withhold funding if he didn’t get his way on an independent USF Polytech. Looks as if Alexander is following through on his threat:

The idea to remove as a member of the Florida Board of Governors the president of the Florida Student Association is up again, with a joint resolution filed by today by Sen. Bill Montford.

The bill would instead have the member simply be a student body of a state university. A similar

Schooling in the Ownership Society: Romney and Bain Capital knee-deep in corporate-style reform.

Schooling in the Ownership Society: Romney and Bain Capital knee-deep in corporate-style reform.:

Romney and Bain Capital knee-deep in corporate-style reform.

Romney with Wm Bain, Jr.
One of the few good things that came out of last night's Republican debate was the further exposure of Mitt Romney as founder of the notorious Bain Capital investment firm. In his 2010 book The Buyout of America: How Private Equity Is Destroying Jobs and Killing the American Economy, Josh Kosman described Bain Capital as "notorious for its failure to plow profits back into its businesses."

But what wasn't mentioned was Bain's connection to the world of corporate-

NYC Public School Parents: A NYC teacher's observations on how the Danielson rubrics are being used

NYC Public School Parents: A NYC teacher's observations on how the Danielson rubrics are being used:

A NYC teacher's observations on how the Danielson rubrics are being used


One thing that the DOE and the UFT seem to have agreed upon is that the instructional framework developed by consultant Charlotte Danielson are potential useful and constructive, though they disagree about how these rubrics are being used to evaluate teachers currently in NYC schools. Below are the observations of one teacher about how the Danielson rubric is being applied in his school.
I'm an English teacher at a NYC high school. There are several major problems with the way the Charlotte Danielson rubrics are being used and misused. Here are some that I have observed at our school.

We have an AP who is unqualified to do these observations. Hitherto, he has overseen

Sunday lists. « Fred Klonsky

Sunday lists. « Fred Klonsky:

Sunday lists.

Photo: NYCore. State of the Union Conference.

Friday night’s meeting at Crane High School didn’t ago according to plan. At least not according to Rahm’s plan. Small Talk has a report.

Are some teachers just baseball players with low batting averages? Larry Ferlazzo weighs in on the


Sunday lists.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 8 minutes ago
Photo: NYCore. State of the Union Conference. Friday night’s meeting at Crane High School didn’t ago according to plan. At least not according to Rahm’s plan. Small Talk has a report. Are some teachers just baseball players with low batting averages? Larry Ferlazzo weighs in on the Harvard/Columbia study of teacher effectiveness. Back in July, [...]

The $4700 teacher. Some comments on the $2.5 million study.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 14 hours ago
When the NY Times wrote a story yesterday on the 20 year study by some Harvard and Columbia University economists on the worth of a value-added teacher here were some comments to the Times: I teach 12th grade. My student score high on college entrance exams. I wish I would take credit, but I know [...]

Saturday coffee.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 20 hours ago
Saturday’s coffee was at a small inn about twenty minutes east of Madison, Wisconsin. Anne and I decided to get away for a few days before I head back to work on Monday. When we made these plans we expected it would be a snowy weekend. But we arrived yesterday afternoon to 55 degree temperatures [...]

The guy closes libraries. What a schmuck.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 1 day ago
Fresh from his video appearance promoting yahoo Kyle Olson and Islamophobe Juan William’s Anti-public Schools Week, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel went back to work and closed down Chicago’s libraries. Or at least closed them on Mondays. Remember, it was just a month or so ago he got into it with the Chicago Teachers Union over [...]

A big new study: “All else being equal.” Well, that’s the rub, isn’t it?

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 1 day ago
Anne and I were at Peet’s this morning before heading off for a little get away to the land of Recall Scott Walker. “What are you laughing at?” asked Anne. “There’s a big new study of teacher value added that is reported on the front page of the New York Times,” I said. “And you’re laughing [...]

Would I announce my bargaining position before bargaining? No. But that’s me.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 2 days ago
There was some concern about the way I reported Senate President John Cullerton’s statement yesterday. On the video I posted, Cullerton said plainly that the state employee unions, our leadership included, had expressed a willingness to negotiate adjustments in the pension benefits of union members. I wan’t shocked by Cullerton’s statement because our union leadership [...]

Van Roekel’s date with Kopp and Duncan not going over too well.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 2 days ago
Matt Damon is a friend of education, but no friend of Wendy Kopp. When the 10,000 delegates to last summer’s NEA RA passed a critical New Business Item about Teach For America and another one sharply critical of Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, few of us thought that meant for IEA President Dennis Van Roekel [...]

The sanctimonious hypocrisy of Rick Santorum.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
Mother Jones has an interesting story on the very sanctimonious hypocrite from Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum. Of course, Santorum has no more chance of being President than I do. But he’s typical of who passes for critics of public schools these days. Santorum is a homophobic (Google Santorum), self-described Christian who claims to home school his [...]

Will Rahm now appear at the right-wing “American Exceptionalism” rally in Deerfield?

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
Now that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has agreed to be the main spokesman on a video for Kyle Olson and Juan Williams and their National School Choice Week, I think it is fair to ask if he will also be appearing at their only scheduled Chicago event: An American Exceptionalism rally in Deefield on January [...]

Look who is behind the Emanuel, Williams, Olson video.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
In a earlier post I showed the latest video by the not-so-strange bedfellows of Juan Williams (formerly of NPR until his racist Islamophobia got him fired), right-wing guru of the Michigan-based Education Action Group Kyle Olson and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Leave it to intrepid researcher Mike Klonsky at Small Talk to follow the money. [...]

Adjust pension benefits? Cullerton says the unions have “indicated a willingness to do so.”

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
As I discussed earlier, Senate President John Cullerton has chosen a different path in going after state employee pension benefits than his cohorts in the House leadership. Cullerton believes that a frontal assault will only waste time and money in years of court battles. Following the old notion that you catch more flies with honey [...]

Anti-public school allies: Kyle Olson, Juan Williams and Rahm Emanuel.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
Are you ready for the latest trio of anti-public school allies? The head of the anti-union Michigan-based Education Action Group, Kyle Olson, features a new video on his blog this week. It is a promo of a new fake-umentary infomericial by Juan Williams promoting charter schools. You remember that Juan Williams was fired from National [...]

Ben Velderman stalking me is okay but filing a FOIA request about Sears tax breaks is illegal.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
Last Spring Ben Velderman, the creepy guy pictured above, filed an Illinois FOIA request for all my work emails. After school district lawyers redacted the names of students and other innocent by-standers, hundreds of emails were delivered to Ben. Then this Fall Ben Velderman’s boss, Kyle Olson of the Education Action Group, having promised to [...]

Changing the narrative. And where are the administrators?

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 3 days ago
Administrators pensions are in TRS too. But they leave the heavy lifting to teachers. As usual. A Twitter follower comments on the last post: change the narrative to make this about children, and teachers’ pensions will be safe I understand what she means. She’s is concerned that talking about teacher compensation needs to include something [...]

Defending our pensions will need union leadership with spine. Uh oh.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 4 days ago
GOP House Leader Tom Cross and Democratic state chairman and Speaker Mike Madigan. Separated at birth. An old Chicago joke: Chicago has two seasons. Winter and road construction. A bad joke: Illinois has two seasons. The General Assembly is in session so teacher pensions are threatened. And the General Assembly is not in session so [...]

John Wilson tells the future.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 4 days ago
Until last year John Wilson was the Executive Director of the National Education Association. On his EdWeek blog called Unleashed, he makes predictions for the coming year. I thought number five was interesting: 5. The National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers will begin merger talks as they realize it is in the [...]

Listen to the kids.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 4 days ago
My pal Matt Farmer has something to say about the value of the arts. And the kids have something to say to the rest of us: Stop driving them crazy!

Ravitch weighs in on the NEA TFA controversy.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 4 days ago
DVR and Kopp. Maybe not such an odd couple after all. Education historian and leading critic of corporate education reform, Diane Ravitch, has weighed in on the controversial marriage (or maybe it was just a coffee date) of NEA President Dennis Van Roekel and Teach For America’s Wendy Kopp. Prominent teacher-activists responded immediately to the USA [...]

Kyle Olson needs a sick day. But that would require him getting a job.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 4 days ago
Kyle Olson, of the Michigan-based Education Action Group, has teamed up with New Jersey’s Governor Chris Christie to attack teachers’ sick days. Sick days? Apparently going after the children’s book Click Clack Moo, Cows that Type as being Bolshevik propaganda didn’t get much traction. Briefly, here is Olson’s premise: As part of the hated collective [...]

Yes we can.

Fred Klonsky at Fred Klonsky - 5 days ago
I want to talk about Obama voting this morning. It sort of started back last July at the NEA convention. IEA President Dennis Van Roekel, in his infinite wisdom, decided we should endorse the guy two years ahead of the election. No discussion on the convention floor. Two speakers for and against at the IEA [...]



City of Sacramento finds Occupy defendants guilty without trial : Indybay #ows

City of Sacramento finds Occupy defendants guilty without trial : Indybay:


City of Sacramento finds Occupy defendants guilty without trial
by Dan Bacher
Saturday Jan 7th, 2012 10:57 PM



There is no doubt that Mayor Kevin Johnson, the Sacramento City Council, the City Manager and the Sacramento Police Department only represent Wall Street and the 1 percent, not the 99 percent. Their illegal campaign of repression against Occupy Sacramento demonstrates that they regard the First Amendment, Bill of Rights and U.S. Constitution with complete and utter contempt.


Photo: Arms linked in solidarity, peacefully assembling. Photo by Occupy Sacramento.

arms_linked_in_solidarity.jpg
arms_linked_in_solidarity...


City of Sacramento finds Occupy defendants guilty without trial


by Dan Bacher


In the latest episode in the wave of police repression by the City of Sacramento against the Occupy Movement, Occupy Sacramento lawyers say that the City is using a "grudge vendetta" to find defendants guilty without trial, violating due process rights that are guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.


Lawyers for Occupy defendants – who had criminal charges dismissed in December – on January 5 made public a new, unconstitutional scheme by the City of Sacramento to penalize

Michelle Rhee: Education reform gaining momentum in Tennessee » Knoxville News Sentinel

Michelle Rhee: Education reform gaining momentum in Tennessee » Knoxville News Sentinel:

Michelle Rhee: Education reform gaining momentum in Tennessee

Pay the best teachers for performance

By Michelle Rhee Special to the News Sentinel Michelle Rhee is the CEO and founder of StudentsFirst, a grassroots bipartisan movement working to transform the nation's schools. She splits her time

Sunday, January 8, 2012

As a public school parent, I'm keeping an especially close eye on the efforts being made here to transform our education system. And, as a parent and someone who thinks about education policy daily for a living, I am so encouraged by the steps taken so far.

When Tennessee won the Obama administration's Race to the Top Grant — setting it apart from other states for its deep commitment to transformational change in education — the rest of the nation stood up and took notice. But Tennesseans, led by Gov. Bill Haslam, went beyond what was expected and enacted a broad swath of reforms in the last legislative session that will vastly improve our schools.

I'm often asked how Tennessee has managed to set itself so far apart from the pack,