Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Packed house at Wishbone to honor ISAT boycotters

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Packed house at Wishbone to honor ISAT boycotters:

Packed house at Wishbone to honor ISAT boycotters

Parents 4 Teachers

 Jambalaya...We dined at Wishbone last night, along with hundreds of others who came out to honor and support ISAT-boycotting teachers and parents. Great people, food and music.


Question for anti-taxers... Why isn't Rahm's pension "reform" bill considered a massive 29% TAX on public workers and the elderly? Also, the accompanying increase in property taxes will hit retirees and others on fixed income, doubly hard. Finally, we already know that relying on property taxes, rather than a more progressive state income tax, to fund our schools is part of the problem -- not the solution. Asking the wealthy and the state's corporations to pay their fair share would help solve the problem. But Boss Madigan won't do it.

Hammerin' Hank

Earlier this week, the Illinois House and Senate approved Emanuel’s plan to raise property taxes by $250 million and employee contributions by 29% over five years to shore up 

4-10-14 Wait What?

Wait What?:

Corporate Education Reform Industry pours money into Malloy campaign operation

Governor Dannel “Dan” Malloy is the most anti-teacher, anti-public education Democratic governor in the nation…And to see how appreciative the corporate education reform industry is, one need only look at Malloy’s campaign fundraising program which has already raised more than $100,000 from the anti-public education industry. As a participant in Connecticut’s public financing system, candidate […]

by jonpelto / 1min 

“When we buy something, we should get what we pay for”

Ann Policelli Cronin is a consultant in English education for school districts and university schools of education. She has taught middle and high school English, was a district-level administrator for English, taught university courses in English education, and was assistant director of the Connecticut Writing Project. She was Connecticut Outstanding English Teacher of the Year […] The post “When

7 by jonpelto / 1h hide  //  save

Yet another example that the Common Core isn’t all it claims to be

Teacher and CT News Junkie columnist Barth Keck has written another insightful commentary piece about the Common Core.  The article is entitled, “Common Core Appears to Miss the Boat on Common Technology. “ Keck writes, …public schools are gearing up for the Common Core, national principles designed to “establish clear, consistent guidelines for what every student […] The post Yet another example

10 by jonpelto / 3h 

4-9-14 Wait What?

Wait What?: Hartford Courant story highlights bizarre effort to privatize Clark Elementary School.A Hartford Courant article entitled, Hartford School Board Asks Education Commissioner To ‘Impose’ Turnaround Plan reveals some of the contradictions and bizarre actions taken by the Malloy administration, Hartford Mayor Pedro Segarra, senior Hartford board of education officials, and corporate educat

by mike simpson / 8h 

4-10-14 The Answer Sheet

The Answer Sheet:

What does Jeb Bush call public schools? (Hint: not ‘public schools’)

Jeb Bush, as much as anybody, is the pioneer of  corporate-influenced school reform. When he was governor of Florida from 1999-2007, he introduced many of the changes in education policy that have become common across the country — including high-stakes standardized testing —  and since then he has been a leading voice in spreading his […]

by Valerie Strauss / 1h hide  //  save

The problem with evidence-based education policy: the evidence

Education policy-makers like to talk about “evidence-based” this and “evidence-based” that — but there are big questions about just how good the “evidence” actually is — and whether the people who are making big decisions in the world of education actually look at the research that we do know is solid. Looking at this issue […]

5 by Valerie Strauss / 5h 

4-9-14 The Answer Sheet

The Answer Sheet: It just keeps getting worseJust when you think this story can’t get any more awful, it does. Andrea Rediske’s effort to help families of children with severe disabilities has taken yet another frustrating turn. I’ve written several posts about Rediske’s long struggle with the Florida Department of Education over a requirement that her blind and severely brain-damaged son, Ethan,

by mike simpson / 8h 

4-10-14 Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement"

Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement":

Good Recommendations On Who To Follow On Twitter For Parent Engagement Issues

Resourceful folks to follow on twitter: #Opp4All @Joe_Mazza @CommSchools pic.twitter.com/huaDTjC9Ph — L.A. Ed Partnership (@PartnerwithLAEP) April 9, 2014

2 by Larry Ferlazzo / 8h hide  //  save

The “Tooth Fairy” Parent Engagement Strategy

RT @Joe_Mazza: Edus who "get it"- @ChrisWejr's letter to tooth fairy for kid who lost a tooth at school #ptchat pic.twitter.com/HnsEEcTRcv — Larry Ferlazzo (@Larryferlazzo) April 9, 2014 I’d lay odds that the parents of that child are now going to be more open to family engagement activities after receiving this note…

5 by Larry Ferlazzo / 8h 

A Thorough Obituary Of inBloom

A couple of days ago I wrote inBloom Is On Its Deathbed & No Tears Are Shed about the parent-opposed data-gathering fiasco known as inBloom. The Hechinger Report has since written a much more thorough obituary of inBloom, The fate of big data after inBloom. I’m adding it to The Best Posts On The inBloom Data Fiasco .

2 by Larry Ferlazzo / 8h 

Department of Education Releases New Parent and Community Engagement Framework

Today, the Department of Education released what they call a new “Parent and Community Engagement Framework.” To tell you the truth, I’m not really sure what that means, but it can’t hurt for them to place a more public emphasis on parent engagement. You can read about it at the Department’s blog post; get a good overview of it at Education Week; and actually access it here. Of the documents they’

6 by Larry Ferlazzo / 8h 

National Family Engagement Conference Began Today

Five hundred people are attending the National Family Engagement Conference in Cincinnati, which began today. You can read a pretty good overview of it at Education Week. Here are a few selected tweets that came out of the conference this afternoon: RT @Joe_Mazza: Anne Henderson starts by identifying new research on impact of stdnt learning tied 2 family engagement pic.twitter.com/KarxxBunVX — La

2 by Larry Ferlazzo / 8h 

4-8-14 Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement"

Engaging Parents In School… | Going Beyond Parent "Involvement": inBloom Is On Its Deathbed & No Tears Are ShedinBloom, the ill-conceived, Gates-funded effort to collect just about every piece of data on just about every K-12 student in America (and opposed by parents across the United States), lost its only remaining customer last month when New York State withdrew from it. Here’s a

by mike simpson / 4h 

Charles M. Blow: "We Should Be In a Rage"

Charles M. Blow: "We Should Be In a Rage":

Charles M. Blow: "We Should Be In a Rage"

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Voter apathy is a civic abdication. There is no other way to describe it.

That is how he begins this column for Thursday's New York Times.

Trust me, please.   This is a column that needs to be read in its entirety, that is not possible to easily summarize or from which one can draw the appropriate extracts.

Blow reminds us of the difference between a Presidentialy election and an off-year like 2010.  He puts it bluntly:

There is an astounding paradox in it: too many of those with the least economic and cultural power don’t fully avail themselves of their political power. A vote is the great equalizer, but only when it is cast.

The strategy here is simple: Break the spirit. Muddy the waters. Make voting feel onerous and outcomes ambiguous. And make it feel like a natural outgrowth of tedium and bickering, and not a well-funded, well-designed effort. Make us subsist on personality politics rather than principled ones.

The greatest trick up the sleeves of the moneyed and powerful is their diabolical ability to render themselves invisible and undetectable, to recede and operate behind a front, one relatable and common. Our politics are overrun with characters acting at the behest of shadows.

Except we now have the advantage of knowing who the shadows are, people such as the Brothers Koch.

This is powerful writing, but it is not close to being the heart of the column.

After telling us that " too many people shrug or sleep when they should seethe" Blow hits the 

Welcoming Mike Klonsky to Bridging Differences - Bridging Differences - Education Week

Welcoming Mike Klonsky to Bridging Differences - Bridging Differences - Education Week:

Welcoming Mike Klonsky to Bridging Differences

By Deborah Meier on April 10, 2014 10:07 AM

Today, Deborah Meier bids farewell—for now—to Democracy Prep's Robert Pondiscio and introduces her next co-blogger, Mike Klonsky. The blog will take a short break and then return with Mr. Klonsky's first post on Tuesday, April 22.

Dear Robert,

I'll be keeping a little book about topics to argue over when we resume our conversation in the fall.  I find myself setting certain articles aside, even now, to pass on to you when we are no longer blogging.

By the way, as an educator my focus was always specifically on my colleagues and the kids in front of me, not the future of the world.  Just their specific future.  I figured I was paid to be the best advocate for their present and future as I could be—in the role I played.

But if I had chosen to be a librarian, or a lawyer, or a housing expert, or environmental activist, I'd have done the same.  Although none by themselves are an answer to the changes that need to be made to give today's children (and my grandchildren and someday great-grandchildren) what they deserve, need, and which we owe them!

And also, I'll send you stuff in coming months—but you are wrong!  Just plain wrong. The standards are a curriculum and imply a pedagogy, too.  The way they recommend teaching reading places a particular emphasis on a particular approach (close-textual reading, etc).   If I disagree?  It covers particular events, genres, historical events, scientific principles—out of many more that could be chosen.  And it asks the questions in ways that require a particular pedagogy to answer correctly. 

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 4-10-14

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit:

Science Teacher’S Suspension Spurs Petition Drive

Cortines School's Greg Schiller was removed by L.A. Unified after two students' Science Fair projects were deemed to resemble weapons. By Howard Blume | LA Times | http://lat.ms/1gNU4zb Also see: IN TEACHER JAIL: by Gerald and Esther Schiller in 4LAKidsNews | “Our son is in jail. But there are no bars or armed guards, or wardens. And he does go home to his wife each afternoon. Our son is

by smf / 8h 

Career Tech & Ag Ed: LEG PANEL REJECTS LOCAL CONTROL OVER SPECIALIZED ED PROGRAMS

by Kimberly Beltran  SI&A Cabinet Report :: The Essential Resource for Superintendents and the Cabinet http://bit.ly/1i2WuP9   April 9, 2014 (Calif.)  ::   The Brown administration asserts that agriculture education and career technical training for high school students will receive greater focus – and continued funding – if state money for these programs is rolled into the governor’s

by smf / 8h 

The Reed Case: L.A. UNIFIED SETTLES LAWSUIT OVER LAYOFFS

The agreement will provide $60 million in raises, services and staff at 37 campuses, but doesn't address whether seniority should be the basis of layoffs. By Howard Blume, LA Times | http://lat.ms/1endsbU A student passes by a mural of President Obama at Markham Middle School. The lawsuit was launched after layoffs in 2009 at Markham, Gompers and Liechty middle schools. (Christina

by smf / 8h hide  //  save

YESTERDAY’S LAUSD BOARD MEETING: The headlines say it all + smf’s 2¢

LAUSD outlines plan to spend $837 million on disadvantaged students Los Angeles Times :: April 8, 2014, 8:35 p.m.. Disadvantaged students in L.A. Unified stand to benefit from a multimillion-dollar infusion for more tutoring, counselors, English language coaches, nurses, librarians and other support under a budget plan presented Tuesday ... Los Angeles Unified's draft

by smf / 8h 

L.A. Times editorialist: “WHY MY FAMILY IS OPTING OUT OF THE COMMON CORE TESTING” + smf’s 2¢

  By Karin Klein, LA Times editorial writer | http://lat.ms/1qjzUnV Students at Sage Hill School, a private school in Newport Beach, take the PSAT. (Los Angeles Times /April 8, 2014) April 8, 2014, 11:47 a.m.  ::  Sixteen consecutive years of the state's standardized testing are now under my belt, all of them spent covering the accountability program as a journalist, as well as having one or

by smf / 9h 

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 4-8-14

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: In Teacher Jailby Gerald and Esther Schiller, from an email circulating widely Our son is in jail. But there are no bars or armed guards, or wardens. And he does go home to his wife each afternoon. Our son is in “teacher jail.” For those who may be unaware of this bizarre institution, “teacher jail”   is the name applied (with no affection) to what the

by mike simpson / 8h 

4-10-14 With A Brooklyn Accent Go BATs

With A Brooklyn Accent:

Common Core Disregards the Lessons of American History.

As a historian, I am acutely aware that debate over the powers of the federal government have been a continuing theme in American History. The US Constitution tried to create a balance between local and federal power and because of this, major interventions of the federal government into sphere of public policy- whether you agree with them or not- usually came as a result of grass roots movements

by Mark Naison / 1h 

4-6-14 With A Brooklyn Accent Go BATs

With A Brooklyn Accent: Under Pressure: Does Test Stress at School Added to Economic Stress at Home Constitute a Toxic Combination?During the last decade, America's public school students have seen a steady increase in the amount of testing they have to endure. As a result of state policies and federal mandates, schools have transformed curricula from Pre-K up to raise scores on standardized tests

by mike simpson / 8h