Modern School: Suspend Tests, Not Students

Modern School: Suspend Tests, Not Students:

Suspend Tests, Not Students

by Michael Dunn

California plans to suspend some of its standardized testing for certain grade levels while it develops new computerized exams for the Common Core Standards (CCS). The plan is projected to save the state $15 million, according to the Los Angeles Times.

While the temporary suspension of tests will be a welcome respite for the minority of teachers and students affected by the plan, it will do nothing to improve education funding since the implementation of CCS is projected to cost well over $1 billion. Additionally, State Superintendent Tom Torlakson has asked the state Board of Education to use the savings for developing higher-quality tests linked to the CCS, leaving little, if any, of the $15 million for hiring teachers, giving raises, buying classroom supplies or any of the myriad other needs of California’s schools.

The new tests are being touted as something that will foster critical thinking and sophisticated 

Jersey Jazzman: The Selling Out of Camden's Schools: Part I

Jersey Jazzman: The Selling Out of Camden's Schools: Part I:

The Selling Out of Camden's Schools: Part I

by Duke

Now that the state has officially taken control of Camden's schools, what changes are we likely to see? What's in store for the city's children and their schools?

The best place to find an answer may be right down the Delaware River. A charter school made famous in Chester, PA is setting up shop in Camden (all emphases in this post mine):

Officials on Thursday announced a newly approved public charter school in North Camden, scheduled to begin serving up to 300 elementary school students beginning as early as September.

Students at the new Camden Community Charter School — which will soon break ground at what has long been an empty lot near the intersection of 8th and 

The Selling Out of Camden's Schools, Part II

by Duke

This Monday, Governor Chris Christie and Education Commissioner Chris Cerf announced that they were going to disenfranchise the Camden Board of Education and take direct control of the city's schools. One of the most interesting aspects of the story was how little outcry there was from the region's Democratic politicians against a Republican governor taking over Camden's education system.

Here, for example, is Camden Mayor Dana Redd, a prominent member of the South Jersey Democratic machine, standing behind Christie - and next to Cerf - as he makes the announcement:

What's astonishing here is that Mayor Redd was elected on a promise to return local control to the City of Camden - a promise backed up by State Senate President Steve Sweeney. Here's a story from right after her election (all emphases in this post mine):

Redd said she will meet in the coming days with Gov.-elect Chris Christie, who 

The Real Purpose of Parenting | Maria Shriver | Home for Architects of Change

The Real Purpose of Parenting | Maria Shriver | Home for Architects of Change:

 TIPS FOR TRANSFORMATION

The Real Purpose of Parenting

By Dr. Philip B. Dembo

As a child, I remember always thinking, “What was wrong with me?” I was born with scoliosis (curvature of the spine) with my head resting directly on my right shoulder.

Although I felt the love and commitment from my parents, I also experienced what the stress of my curvature had on them.

My parents did everything they could to help me “look” like everyone else, believing that would result in me feeling “like” everyone else.

My difficulty was that my parents premise was incorrect. I did, indeed, feel like everyone else and felt judgment by their agenda for me.

When I first became a parent, I remember thinking, “Oh my God, now I understand why my parents behaved the way they did!”

As a father, I often struggled with finding a way to reconcile “my picture” for my children and their own view of themselves.

I certainly didn't want my children to experience what I went through growing up. My 

We didn’t need a survey to tell us this:

We didn’t need a survey to tell us this

Posted by Valerie Strauss on March 28, 2013 at 8:00 am

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What do parents really want when itcomes to school reform? Gregory Michie, a public school teacher in Chicago and senior research associate at the Center for Policy Studies and Social Justice at Concordia University Chicago, looks into the issue in Chicago, where tensions are high over the newly announced closing of 54 public schools. His latest book is  “We Don’t Need Another Hero: Struggle, Hope, and Possibilty in the Age of High-Stakes Schooling.”

By Gregory Michie

Chicagoans are ready for education reform. That’s the conclusion the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board draws from a new survey about the city’s schools it commissioned with the Joyce Foundation.

Of course, by “education reform,” the Tribune means its preferred version of change, which hews closely to the playbook of business-minded reformers: more testing, more charter 

'Why Do We Teach?' - Bridging Differences - Education Week

'Why Do We Teach?' - Bridging Differences - Education Week:

'Why Do We Teach?'

by Deborah Meier

Today, the blog conversation between Deborah Meier and Eric "Rick" Hanushek concludes.
Dear Rick,
Your last blog post reminded me of a childhood challenge my brother put to me. It went something like this: "Would you rather be rich or famous?" It would betray our childhood friendship to tell you what our answers were. But it has something to do with what we are arguing about.
I was intrigued by your acknowledgement that you are dissatisfied with the kind of people who become teachers. So who are you looking for? Answer? People with the highest test scores from prestigious colleges. But many of those "best" graduates went on to make billions while messing up our economy and getting bonuses (merit pay?) that are clearly undeserved and enormous severance packages when they jumped ship. (I've had students who went to jail for less harmful activity than many bankers engage in routinely.)
Is it possible that there can be something called "too much"? Was it worth the lives of so many Egyptians to 

LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 3-28-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all:

An Insider Reveals What Happens in Cyber Charter Schools

by dianerav

I have written many posts about the scam and sham of cyber charters. They are highly profitable for their owners and investors, but study after study shows that they provide a poor education. Whatever their value for adults, whatever the value of an online course for a rural student, the cyber charters are a pitiful substitute for a real school with real teachers and real students and real human interaction.
Now comes the inside scoop from a teacher in a cyber charter school. It is very thing it’s critics feared and worse. It is all about making money for the corporation. It is bad education. That is, if you care about children or education or the future of our society.

Response to Absurd N.C. Charter Proposal

by dianerav

A reader comments on the post this morning about a Republican proposal to give a new state charter board authority over charter schools, to low charters to hire as many uncertified teachers as they wish, to eliminate criminal background checks for charter staff and operators, etc.:
He writes:
So let’s get this straight…the same GOP who wants tougher standards, tougher evaluation systems for public school teachers, a school grading (rating) system using an A-F model based on standardized test scores, etc

Hype, Spin, and Deception: The Reform Narrative

by dianerav

Have you heard about the latest miracle school? Have you heard about the school that graduate all students regardless of zip codes? Want to learn more about their success?
EduShyster explains it here.

Camden, NJ, School Board Member: I Quit

by dianerav

After Governor Christie announced his intention to take control of the public schools of Camden, this school board member resigned in protest.
The state has controlled three other impoverished urban districts, some for more than 20 years, without improving them. Paterson, for 24 years; Jersey City for 22 years; and Newark for 18 years.
Based solely on performance, one must say that state control in New Jersey is a total abject failure.
If performance matters, then some other state should take over Camden’s public schools, because the NJ Department of Education has an unbroken record of poor performance. It deserves an F.

NY Times Reports Spread of Vouchers, Ignores ALEC, RTTT

by dianerav

A story today in the New York Times gives an overview of the rapid advance of voucher programs, now found in various forms in 17 states.
What is missing from the article is context. The defenders of unlicensed education quoted are the heads of the unions and spokesmen for LLC school boards. The advocates for vouchers are referred to as “nonpartisan,” like the far-right American Federation for Children. AFS was created by the wealthy DeVos family in Michigan and has been pushing the demolition of public education for many years.
Also unmentioned is the power behind the scenes: ALEC, the far-right organization that has drafted model 

North Carolina Republicans Want Unregulated, Unsupervised Charter$

by dianerav

North Carolina Republican State Senators have filed legislation that would remove oversight of charters by the State Education Board and turn it over to a new board hand picked by the governor.
Charter schools would no longer be required to submit applications to local school boards. All meaningful supervision and oversight would be eliminated.
Local school boards would be required to lease available space to charters for $1 a year. Charters would be 

Where Are the Progressives?

by dianerav

Jeff Bryant decries the phony bipartisan consensus surrounding education “reform.”
He wonders where are the progressives.
He compares the bipartisan consensus around education reform to the bipartisan consensus that prevailed before the war in Iraq, when dissenters were marginalized and ignored.
But he sees hope in the growing rebellion against 

Who Dropped $18,000 into Alabama to Endorse Controversial Law?

by dianerav

Somebody put up at least $18,000 to run ad supporting the so-called Alabama Accountability Act.
A newly formed group called the Foundation for Accountability in Education spent the money but won’t disclose the donors, nor are they legally required to.
The act was rushed through by GOP legislators who had been negotiating with Democrats on a different bill. The 

Diane in the Evening 3-27-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

coopmike48 at Big Education Ape - 3 hours ago

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all: Breaking News: A Desperate Message from Memphis by dianerav I received this email from a high school teacher in Memphis. Please read it and understand that we must organize against the destruction of public education in America. This, plus the court approval of vouchers in Indiana yesterday sends an ominous message: the radical reactionaries are determined to destroy public education. We must fight back. We must awaken parents and civic leaders. This comes from Memphis: “Diane, “Public education in Memphis/... more »

“Five ways to get kids to want to read and write” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

“Five ways to get kids to want to read and write” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…:

“Five ways to get kids to want to read and write”

by Larry Ferlazzo

Five ways to get kids to want to read and write is an excerpt from my book, Self-Driven Learning, that was published by the Washington Post this morning.
There wasn’t room for the short introduction to the excerpt that I wrote, so I’ll publish it here instead:
Sir Ken Robinson has said:
“Farmers and gardeners know you cannot make a plant grow….The plant grows itself. What you do is provide the conditions for growth. And great farmers know what the conditions are and bad ones don’t. Great teachers know what the conditions for growth are…”
Unfortunately, we teachers might often feel pressured to believe that the best “conditions for growth” include treating students as “vessels to be filled,” giving and taking away “points,”  or using other types of punishments and rewards (eerily similar to how some “school reformers” want to treat educators themselves).

The War Over Math and Reading | toteachornototeach

The War Over Math and Reading | toteachornototeach:

The War Over Math and Reading

by aristotlethewise

The War Over Math and Reading 

by Dr. Anne Fausto-Sterling
There is a simmering war (of words) about boys, girls, math, reading and why fewer women become scientists or technology experts. Sometimes, as with then-Harvard president Lawrence Summer’s 2005 remark that “there is reasonably strong evidence of taste differences [with regard to becoming engineers] between little girls and little boys that are not easy to attribute to socialization,” the war explodes onto the front pages of the papers and wildly disrupts a major institution. Other times, it softly bubbles along in the arcane pages of scientific journals. Here the battle weapons include difficult to fathom statistics and uncertain claims about educational and social policy. A recent publication by psychologists Gijsbert Stoet and David Geary (Sex Differences in Mathematics and Reading in the open access journal PLOSIone, provides a case in point.
Caveat Lector
All scientists have a point of view. This doesn’t necessarily make their results wrong, or unworthy of notice. But it does mean that readers need to understand interpretive angles as well as the actual data. One of my favorite sociologists, Bruno Latour nailed this in his pioneering book Science in Action. He compared the opening section of scientific papers — the one where the authors gather all the relevant literature and make a case fo

Daily Kos: Charles Blow writes on the historic nature of the marriage equality cases

Daily Kos: Charles Blow writes on the historic nature of the marriage equality cases:

Charles Blow writes on the historic nature of the marriage equality cases

by rss@dailykos.com (teacherken)

in his New York Times column today, titled History in Real Time.  As is usual for Blow, i is a column well worth the read.
He begins by writing

Witnessing a historic moment is such an odd and exhilarating thing. It is hard to register the full scope of it because you are chest deep in it.

He goes on to observe that regardless of how the Justices rule in the cases argued the past two days,

there is no denying that something historic has just happened: an aggrieved group has taken a stand and given voice once again to the American — and indeed Democratic — ideals of justice and fairness and freedom.

He continues with a brief observation about the argumentation (including referencing Justice Ginsburg on "skim milk marriage) and recent pattern of Democratic politicians declaring their support of marriage equality while

Dana Milbank has a good column on DOMA case

by rss@dailykos.com (teacherken)

and well worth reading.
Here's the link
He takes a lot of the statements and questions from Kennedy to show how strongly the swing Justice seems inclined to overturn the portion of DOMA in question - and it is worth remembering that the only part argued was the Federal recognition of same sex marriages, not Section 2 which allows other states not to recognize same sex marriages from places like New England, Iowa, DC, and NY.
WHIle it is conceivable that 5 Justices could vote to overturn the entire law, given Kennedy's propensity to uphold states' rights, it is likely that any opinion he joins will ignore Section 2.
Anyhow, here are a couple of snips from Milbank:
After some Justices had discussed whether the case should be before them,

But Kennedy was having none of it. “It seems to me there’s injury here,” he said.

Then there is this:

And when the lawyer tried to argue that DOMA is justified because “an unelected state judiciary in Hawaii” is about to rule on same-sex marriage, Kennedy responded: “But your statute applies also to states where the voters have decided it.”

And finally this:  

Late in the two-hour argument, Kennedy described what he called a “DOMA problem” — a violation 

On the question of student privacy:

On the question of student privacy

Posted by Valerie Strauss on March 28, 2013 at 4:00 am

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Earlier this month I wrote a post about a lawsuit against the U.S. Education Department that charges the agency with promoting regulations that undercut student privacy and parental consent. The suit was filed some time ago by the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center over 2011 regulations involving the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, also known as FERPA, a law that is supposed to protect the privacy of student education records at all schools that receive federal education funds.

The lawsuit argues that 2011 regulations issued by the department changed FERPA in a way that effectively allows more individuals and both private and public entities to have access to sensitive student records. Third parties already could get student data from school districts and state education agencies under certain conditions under rules finalized in 2008.

The issue has gained attention because of a new $100 million database built in large part with Gates Foundation money that holds detailed files on millions of schoolchildren and 

Five ways to get kids to want to read and write

by Valerie Strauss

How can teachers get students to want to learn? Here is an article about the issue, from veteran educator Larry Ferlazzo, adapted from his new book, Self-Driven Learning: Teaching Strategies For Student Motivation.  Some of the ideas in this excerpt … Continue reading →

Chicago Citizens Say Save Our Public Community Schools

Chicago Citizens Say Save Our Public Community Schools:

Chicago Citizens Say Save Our Public Community Schools

by Server

Chicago Citizens Say Save Our Public Community Schools

Photographs by and Courtesy of Bob George

More Pictures Chicago Citizens Say Save Our Public Community Schools:

Missouri Education Watchdog: Teachers Union Opposes Common Core

Missouri Education Watchdog: Teachers Union Opposes Common Core:

Teachers Union Opposes Common Core

by stlgretchen

A New York state teachers union comes out against Common Core State (sic) standards and has started an online petition.  From  Growing Concerns About Common Core:

“It’s a setup for failure,” said John Pavone of the Rochester Teachers Association. Teachers are worried they will be evaluated based on a curriculum that was rolled out this year.  “They’re going to blame me if the kids can’t pass the test and the kids can’t pass the test. It’s set up in such a way that you can’t pass the test.” 

“Nobody was prepared for these changes,” Moran (a parent) said. “There was no public discussion about it. The parents weren’t prepared for it. Frankly I don’t think the teachers or administration was prepared for it.” 

“It’s going to be a disaster,” said retired Rochester principal Dan Drmacich, a frequent critic 

A Parent Dilemma That Won’t Go Away: Toddlers Using Technology | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

A Parent Dilemma That Won’t Go Away: Toddlers Using Technology | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

A Parent Dilemma That Won’t Go Away: Toddlers Using Technology

by larrycuban

Ads show infants and toddlers finger-swiping smartphones and tablets.

Parents, as usual are caught in the middle. A recent article by Hannah Rosin–a Mom herself–looks into the dilemma facing parents. Called “The Touch-Screen Generation,” Rosin explores the choices that largely educated, middle and upper-middle class parents face when it comes to deciding whether their infants and toddlers should have the devices and, if so, for how long should they be swiping screens each day. (See four minute video in Rosin article).
On the dilemma facing parents and how much time children should be using devices for games, talking, and facing a screen, Rosin opts for parental judgment on a child-by-child basis. She does not see high-tech devices 

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The thing about autocrats...

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The thing about autocrats...:

The thing about autocrats...

by Mike Klonsky

"The time for negotiations is over." -- Rahm Emanuel

A few minutes later, in front of City Hall, janitors, lunch ladies, teachers,  parents, clergy and union officials interlocked arms and sat down in neat rows in the northbound lanes of LaSalle Street. "Save our schools," they chanted. -- WBEZ

Shades of Hosni Mubarak and Dick Cheney.

The one thing autocrats and political bosses world-wide have in common -- they don't give a rat's ass about what the 99% think. Their power comes from a tiny reactionary base of support from corporate billionaires  and they have no tolerance for popular dissent, either from inside or outside their own narrow political machines.

Mubarak

Mubarak, who responded to the Egyptian peoples demands for democratic reform with violence and terror, was ousted after 18 days of demonstrations