Monday, July 14, 2014

Another teachers union ding for Arne Duncan - Allie Grasgreen - POLITICO.com

Another teachers union ding for Arne Duncan - Allie Grasgreen - POLITICO.com:

Another teachers union ding for Arne Duncan

The resolution calls for Duncan to enact an 'improvement plan.' | AP Photo

By ALLIE GRASGREEN | 7/13/14 5:50 PM EDT

The American Federation of Teachers approved a resolution this afternoon calling for Education Secretary Arne Duncan to resign if he does not improve under a plan to be implemented by President Barack Obama.

The “improvement plan” would include the requirement that Duncan enact the funding and equity recommendations of the Equity Commission’s “Each and Every Child” report; change the No Child Left Behind and Race To The Top “test-and-punish” accountability system to a “support-and-improve” model; and “promote rather than question” teachers and school staff.

Latest on POLITICO

Education Department spokeswoman Dorie Nolt said in an email to POLITICO that Duncan is “hopeful” that he and AFT can “continue to work together.” Nolt added, “the transformation that educators and policymakers are leading to prepare all students for college and careers is incredibly difficult, and too often the adults fight about how to best help the kids.”

(Sign up for POLITICO’s Morning Education tip sheet)

AFT President Randi Weingarten said in a statement sent to POLITICO that the amendment “is basically saying, ‘Enough is enough.’ Teachers are evaluated and their future livelihoods are linked to that. And when they fall short, they should have a chance to improve. And that’s what this special order represents.”

The plan was laid out in an amendment tacked onto a resolution codifying AFT’s “Commitment to Fighting Back and Fighting Forward” on labor and education issues.

The AFT member who introduced the amendment cited Duncan’s response to Hurricane Katrina and the Vergara v. California case, and said Duncan’s programs “blackmailed” cash-strapped

NYC Educator: Cuomo Is Awful, but Astorino Is No Better

NYC Educator: Cuomo Is Awful, but Astorino Is No Better:

Cuomo Is Awful, but Astorino Is No Better

It's sad that New Yorkers have such miserable choices in our two-party system. Lately I've been encountering a sea of "anybody but Cuomo" tweets and anti-Cuomo tweeters, but they seem to regard Rob Astorino as an alternative. In his favor, he publicly opposes Common Core, and is unequivocal about it. But there are issues.

Execrable though Cuomo is, he at least has to pose as a Democrat from time to time. That's not enough to make me support him, but it means he has to think twice before he goes after, say, the Triborough Amendment that keeps our contracts in force until we negotiate new ones. This is particularly important to UFT members who've just gone 6 years without a contract. Imagine what Mike Bloomberg would have done if he'd had carte blanche to impose whatever he felt like. Doubtless we'd be working for 8 bucks an hour with no health benefits and he'd have pulled our pensions to pay for a better penthouse for Cathie Black.

Astorino has no such compunctions. He's not only criticized Cuomo for failing to attack the Triborough amendment, but he's also written an op-ed in the NY Post expressing opposition:

Consider the situation now in Westchester: All eight public unions are now working without a contract — one of them in its fourth year. But wages aren’t frozen at previous contract levels. Workers still get the longevity and step increases built into the old contract — hikes NYC Educator: Cuomo Is Awful, but Astorino Is No Better:

Louisiana Educator: 100% Error Rate on Student Transfers

Louisiana Educator: 100% Error Rate on Student Transfers:

100% Error Rate on Student Transfers

New Orleans Recovery District Found to Have a 100% Error Rate on Certain Transfer Data

Why is it important for student transfer data to be accurate? Because a school can falsely identify some of their dropouts as transfers and thereby boost their graduation rate. It seems that the New Orleans Recovery District has the highest rateof such "errors" in the state: 100%!

Here is how it works: The graduation rate (the percentage of students who start the 9th grade and graduate 4 years later) for each high school in the state is calculated each year and the percentage of students graduating helps determine the school performance score and also the letter grade assigned to a school. If some students who actually dropped out of school between 9th and 12th grades are misclassified as transfers, they do not count against a school in calculating the graduation rate. I personally do not agree with blaming schools for student dropouts and most of the other stuff that goes into calculating the school performance score. But I also don't believe that schools should be allowed to cheat on such statistics to improve their school letter grades.

How long has this misclassification trick been used? In a report issued by the LDOE several years ago titled: Louisiana's Louisiana Educator: 100% Error Rate on Student Transfers:

Common Core: A House that Doesn’t Make Sense | Missouri Education Watchdog

Common Core: A House that Doesn’t Make Sense | Missouri Education Watchdog:

Common Core: A House that Doesn’t Make Sense

The Common Core Core-ites constantly ask those opposed to show them a standard “they don’t like”. Taken out of context, it might be difficult to take umbrage to specific standards, but taken as a whole, it is easier to determine if they make sense or not. This is a tactic to divert the main issue that the CCSSI circumvented the political process of state and federal statutes, but let’s play the Core-ite game and talk about why the standards should be discarded because of their content and/or lack of content.

Think of the Common Core State Standards Initiative as if you are looking for a new house in which to live:

You drive up to it and think, “this looks like a great house”. The landscaping is pristine and it’s in a great neighborhood.
The real estate agent lets you in and you notice the ceilings are a bit too low but you can work with them. Just don’t invite tall people to visit.
The dining room is more like a sitting room as only a small table and a few chairs will fit in there, but formal dining is so out of date anyway, who needs a large dining room?
The rooms are small and you could take out a wall to expand, but uh oh….that looks like a load bearing wall. Maybe those small rooms should be renamed “cozy”. You can work with this.
The kitchen is a bit out of date but you can take care of it later. This would necessitate complete renovation.
The granite countertops in the bathrooms are nice and new cabinets can be Common Core: A House that Doesn’t Make Sense | Missouri Education Watchdog:

Shanker Blog » A New Idea For Test-Based Accountability In DC: Actual Test Scores

Shanker Blog » A New Idea For Test-Based Accountability In DC: Actual Test Scores:

A New Idea For Test-Based Accountability In DC: Actual Test Scores

Posted by Matthew Di Carlo on July 14, 2014

The Washington Post reports on an issue that we have discussed here on many occasions: The incompleteness of the testing results released annually by the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS), or, more accurately, the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE), which is responsible for testing in DC schools.

Here’s the quick backstory: For the past 7-8 years or so, DCPS/OSSE have not released a single test score for the state assessment (the DC-CAS). Instead, they have released only the percentage of students whose scores meet the designated cutoff points for the NCLB-style categories of below basic, basic, proficient and advanced. I will not reiterate all of the problems with these cutpoint-based rates and how they serve to distort the underlying data, except to say that they are by themselves among the worst ways to present these data, and there is absolutely no reason why states and districts should not release both rates and average scale scores.

The Post reports, however, that one organization — the Broader, Bolder Approach to Education — was able to obtain the actual scale score data (by subgroup and grade) for 2010-2013, and that this group published a memo-stylereport alleging that DCPS’ public presentation of their testing results over the past few years has been misleading. I had a mixed reaction to this report and the accompanying story.

On the one hand, I give a lot of credit to Broader, Bolder for doing this – for acknowledging the importance of the scale scores, for going to the trouble of requesting them, and then for publishing them in full. By so doing, this Shanker Blog » A New Idea For Test-Based Accountability In DC: Actual Test Scores:

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: WEEKEND QUOTABLES:

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

Tells AFT delegates, "We will go forward together."

Rev. Wm. Barber II, president of NC's NAACP chapter

“If they’ve got to fight us this hard, we’ve got to be some bad somebodies,” Barber said eliciting a standing ovation from the crowd. -- Teacher union convention opens with fiery speech

Salim Muwakkil

Chronic poverty is criminogenic; the links are thick and reinforced by rigorous scholarship. In Chicago's communities, rates of violent crime correlate to poverty rates in ways that make that point irrefutable. There is little dispute that if violence prevention is the goal, reducing poverty is the most effective tactic. -- Chicago Tribune

Alex Caputo-Pearl, new UTLA pres.

The new L.A. union leader framed his remarks around defining “social movement unionism,” which he said is “explicit about fighting for racial and social justice. It’s Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: WEEKEND QUOTABLES:

Delegates at AFT’s Convention Denounce Arne Duncan | janresseger

Delegates at AFT’s Convention Denounce Arne Duncan | janresseger:

Delegates at AFT’s Convention Denounce Arne Duncan

Posted on July 14, 2014 by janresseger

In the second such action in two weeks, yesterday the delegates of a national teachers union at its national convention passed a resolution repudiating U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

Yesterday the American Federation of Teachers, meeting in Los Angeles, formally disdained the policies of Secretary Duncan. On July 4, the National Education Association passed an even stronger resolution demanding that Duncan resign. The NEA and the AFT represent over 4 million school teachers across the United States. The AFT”s resolution—ironically commenting on Duncan’s relentless focus on evaluating teachers by econometric formulas and holding them accountable—demands that President Barack Obama hold Duncan himself accountable, put him on an improvement plan and—if he can’t improve—fire him.

Because teachers unions are democratic institutions, the drafting, debating, and voting on such resolutions—whatever their actually wording—is important because such actions move and shape the national conversation about education policy. Such strong resolutions coming from both of our largest teachers unions put pressure on the leaders of NEA and AFT, leaders who have tried to work with a Democratic administration in Washington, despite that this administration’s policies have been anti-teacher.

Despair, demoralization and rage among school teachers—growing from the lack of respect Delegates at AFT’s Convention Denounce Arne Duncan | janresseger:

Sunday, July 13, 2014

7-13-14 Jersey Jazzman

Jersey Jazzman:

Karen Lewis, Ras Baraka, and "Worried" White People

Fellow white people, heed my advice, please:Relax.Take a stroll. Enjoy a decaf macchiato. Do some yoga, And stop reading the newspaper, which these days seems to be full of pieces by some more of our fellow worried white people -- in this case, the very reformy and very white Tom Moran -- designed to make us very, very... concerned:Now Newark has a new mayor, Ras Baraka, a charismatic politician,

29 by Duke / 2h

7-12-14 Jersey Jazzman NJ Ed News Round-up Jammin' All Week

Jersey Jazzman:Jersey Jazzman Jammin' All WeekNew Report on the Consequences of Inadequately Funded SchoolsYesterday, the Education Law Center released a report they commissioned from yours truly about the consequences of inadequately funding school districts."Shortchanging New Jersey Students: How Inadequate Funding Has Led to Reduced Staff and Growing Disparities in the State’s Public Schoo

by mike simpson / 8h

American Federation of Teachers: “Remediating” Duncan and Retaining the “Corrupted” Common Core | deutsch29

American Federation of Teachers: “Remediating” Duncan and Retaining the “Corrupted” Common Core | deutsch29:

American Federation of Teachers: “Remediating” Duncan and Retaining the “Corrupted” Common Core

July 13, 2014

I’m wondering what of substance was accomplished thus far at the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) national convention in Los Angeles July 11-14, 2014.

On July 13, 2014, AFT was supposed to consider asking for U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s resignation. The National Education Association (NEA) passed a resolution on July 4, 2014, asking Duncan to resign. However, as education historian Diane Ravitch points out, Duncan is only following the orders of President Obama:

I can personally vouch for the fact that Duncan is doing exactly what Obama wants. In the fall of 2009, I had a private meeting with Secretary Duncan, just the two of us, no staff. It was very pleasant. He was charming, pleasant, and took notes. I asked him, “Why are you traveling the country to sell Race to the Top accompanied by Reverend Al Sharpton and Newt Gingrich? Why Gingrich?” His answer: “because the President asked me to.”

Thus, asking Duncan to resign– while a refreshing thought– is no solution. Obama would just fill the slot with another yes-man.

It sure would be nice if a national union would aggressively confront the pro-privatization education agenda emanating from the Oval Office.

But no. AFT decided upon a watered-down version of the NEA resolution: AFT resolved to ask Obama to put Duncan on a remediation plan:

The American Federation of Teachers approved a resolution this afternoon calling for Education Secretary Arne Duncan to resign if he does not improve under a plan to be implemented by President Barack Obama.
The “improvement plan” would include the requirement that Duncan enact the funding and equity recommendations of the Equity Commission’s “Each and Every Child” report; change the No Child Left Behind and Race To The Top
American Federation of Teachers: “Remediating” Duncan and Retaining the “Corrupted” Common Core | deutsch29:

Gates Funding Mainstream Education Reporting | Truth in American Education

Gates Funding Mainstream Education Reporting | Truth in American Education:

Gates Funding Mainstream Education Reporting

Filed in Common Core State Standards by Shane Vander Hart on July 14, 2014 • 0 Comments

NBC News’ Education coverage is bought and paid for by Bill Gates.
Photo credit: World Economic Forum (CC-By-SA 2.0)

A friend shared with me this NBC News article on my Facebook wall. It discussed the #CanISee conference that was held in Austin, TX last month. It was titled “Meet America’s Most Hardcore Common Core Moms.”

While I think most would consider that as a compliment, I’m not sure that the article’s author, Nona Willis Aronowitz, intended it that way. After calling the conservative element of the Stop Common Core movement as a “small, but vocal faction on the right.” She said the repeals in Republican states of Indiana (no mention of rebrand), Oklahoma and South Carolina being due to “pressure from small groups of local activists.”

Do you really think politicians will do anything they don’t want to do if they perceive the group pressuring them is small?

She cites a “recent” Gallup poll that is almost a year old. More than 33% of the population know about the Common Core. Why not mention the poll that was taken last month that shows support for the Common Core plummeting with parents of school-aged kids? Parents are learning more about the Common Core, and the more they learn the less they like it.

She then wrote this:

Austin’s #CanISee conference —as in, “Can I see what my children are learning?”— is a who’s-who of the far-right movement that some peg as fringe, but nevertheless gets results….
For the mostly female, mostly older, all-white crowd, Common Core is more than an attack on states’ rights; it’s an affront to Christian, conservative values. These mothers and
Gates Funding Mainstream Education Reporting | Truth in American Education:

L.A. teachers union leader Caputo-Pearl links activism to strike - Los Angeles Times

L.A. teachers union leader Caputo-Pearl links activism to strike - Los Angeles Times:

L.A. teachers union leader Caputo-Pearl links activism to strike

L.A. teachers union leader Alex Caputo-Pearl has told members to get ready for a possible strike. Chicago teachers union leader Karen Lewis sits to his right at the weekend convention. (Howard Blume)

The new leader of the Los Angeles teachers union signaled a more militant stance toward the school district, including the possibility of a strike, at a national teachers union convention held downtown this weekend.

Alex Caputo-Pearl, who took office July 1, characterized a work stoppage as a potentially effective part of broader social action to benefit students as well as their instructors.

Ruling on teacher job security is an attack on students, unions say

Stephen Ceasar, Howard Blume

His remarks drew cheers at the weekend convention of the American Federation of Teachers; in an interview, L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy also sought to reach teachers, urging them to agree to terms similar to those achieved by other employee unions in the nation’s second-largest school system.

Caputo-Pearl, 45, spoke at a Saturday-night panel with other teachers union leaders, including Michael Mulgrew from New York City and Karen Lewis from Chicago. Lewis, who sat to the right of Caputo-Pearl, led Chicago teachers on a 2012 strike, an experience for which she was celebrated at the convention.

The new L.A. union leader framed his remarks around defining “social movement unionism,” which he said is “explicit about fighting for racial and social justice. It’s explicit in fighting against privatization. It’s explicit in taking people on who need to be taken on, including a lot of Democrats.”

He added: “It’s a unionism that is willing to strike. It’s a unionism that is willing to build to a strike and strike if that’s what we need to do.”

Caputo-Pearl added that he’d already advised members by letter to begin putting aside savings for a possible strike. He also announced a major internal reorganization within United Teachers Los Angeles and signaled his intention to seek higher member dues to make the union a more effective political force.

UTLA is seeking a 17.6% raise over “multiple years.”

Teachers have not received a raise for seven years, several of which included temporary pay cuts and layoffs.

Deasy and L.A. Unified have settled with most other unions; the terms typically include a 2% bonus and raises that would increase pay by about 6.6% over three years. The first 2% L.A. teachers union leader Caputo-Pearl links activism to strike - Los Angeles Times:

The Myth of Military Might | Bill Ayers

The Myth of Military Might | Bill Ayers:

The Myth of Military Might

A pervasive and widely promoted theory that runs loose throughout the land is that being a military powerhouse makes the US (and people everywhere) safe, protects freedoms, and is a force for peace in a threatening, dangerous, and hostile world. It’s not true, but it has a huge and sticky hold on our imaginations.
When some random politician tells antiwar protestors picketing his town hall meeting that it’s “because of the sacrifices our troops are making in [take your pick: Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, the Middle East, Europe, Panama, or wherever’s next] that you have the freedom to stand there and speak out,” he is tapping into that seemingly bottomless cliché. When a TV talking head or pundit says that it’s a misfortune that US economic strength rides on a resource—oil—that “happens to come from a nasty neighborhood,” but a “blessing” that we have the power to police that part of the world, he’s doing the same thing. And when Americans across the political spectrum express public gratitude and support for “our fighting men and women overseas,” even while refusing to send their own children into war or harboring serious private doubts about the wisdom, purpose, and execution of whatever US invasion and occupation is currently in play, they are similarly situated in that open field of received wisdom, stuttering and unexamined truisms, and diminishing options.
Questioning this sentimental dogma in these instances might mean, for example, insisting that the most honest and straight-forward way to support US military men and women would be to demand their immediate return home, and to insist that they be provided with excellent medical and psychological care, good jobs, affordable housing, and the best available educational opportunities. Speaking up in the face of that wooly politician might mean challenging him to draw a straight line between free speech and the specific invasion he’s The Myth of Military Might | Bill Ayers:

7-13-14 @ THE CHALK FACE

@ THE CHALK FACE:

About the radio show

Join Drs. Shaun Johnson and Tim Slekar

LIVE Sundays at 6PM EST and Wednesdays at 7PM EST

on Blog Talk Radio for progressive, pro-public education talk radio.

Call in to speak live with Tim and Shaun during the show, (805) 727-7111.

You can also listen to our Monday "Sunday-Replay" at 7PM EST, and re-broadcasts of the archives every Tuesday and Thursday at 7PM EST.

Visit the @ the Chalk Face radio main page for more information on the show and syndication.

American Federation of Teachers: “Remediating” Duncan and Retaining the “Corrupted” Common Core

I’m wondering what of substance was accomplished thus far at the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) national convention in Los Angeles July 11-14, 2014. On July 13, 2014, AFT was supposed to consider asking for U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s resignation. The National Education Association (NEA) passed a resolution on July 4, 2014, asking Duncan […]

12 by deutsch29 / 1h

Sacramento Journalist Seth Sandronsky Reviews A Chronicle of Echoes

BOOK REVIEW/Seth Sandronsky Education Reformers’ Playbook Want names of and motives for public school reformers? Read A Chronicle of Echoes: Who’s Who in the Implosion of American Public Education by Mercedes K. Schneider. The author has skin in this game. She is a public school teacher against the corporate conquest of community-based public education. Schneider opens […]

1 by deutsch29 / 48min

All Week 7-12-14 @ THE CHALK FACE

@ THE CHALK FACE : All Week @ THE CHALK FACE Does anyone else struggle with movement in the classroom?This from the Answer Sheet: In the following post, Angela Hanscom, a pediatric occupational therapist and the founder of TimberNook, a nature-based development program designed to foster creativity and independent play outdoors in New England, suggests yet another reason more children are being di

by mike simpson / 8h

Sacramento Journalist Seth Sandronsky Reviews A Chronicle of Echoes | deutsch29

Sacramento Journalist Seth Sandronsky Reviews A Chronicle of Echoes | deutsch29:

Sacramento Journalist Seth Sandronsky ReviewsA Chronicle of Echoes

July 13, 2014

BOOK REVIEW/Seth Sandronsky

Education Reformers’ Playbook

Want names of and motives for public school reformers? Read A Chronicle of Echoes: Who’s Who in the Implosion of American Public Education by Mercedes K. Schneider.

The author has skin in this game. She is a public school teacher against the corporate conquest of community-based public education. Schneider opens with a chapter on Joel Klein, former head of New York City’s Department of Education, now on the payroll of Rupert Murdoch, a billionaire media owner. In an era of growing income inequality, such corporatists and reformers are two sides of the same coin, according to Schneider.

Her evidence for this assertion is compelling. The implications are chilling.

Klein is not a former teacher. On his watch, the Big Apple’s public schools fell prey to reforms that benefit private interests, a trend that runs a red line throughout Schneider’s whistleblowing book.

She follows the pattern of reformers’ high-minded words and profit-driven deeds doggedly. Not trained as an investigative journalist, Schneider shines bright lights on the acquisitive structure of the deception and misrepresentation that is today’s reform of public education.

What accounts for the reformers’ success is not actual facts but copious greenbacks from wealthy interests. Schneider tracks these dollars that buy political influence, with 88 pages of Endnotes.

Call this class war. And according to billionaire investor Warren Buffet, his class is winning. Funding this conflict are venture philanthropists Bill and Melinda Gates, Eli and Edythe Broad, and the Walton Family foundation. They fund Democratic and Sacramento Journalist Seth Sandronsky Reviews A Chronicle of Echoes | deutsch29:

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Monday, July 14, 2014