Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 7/24/15

SPECIAL NITE CAP 

CORPORATE ED REFORM

Smart ALECs or Wise Guys? Either Way, They Pose a Threat to Public Education - California Teachers Association

Smart ALECs or Wise Guys? Either Way, They Pose a Threat to Public Education - California Teachers Association: SMART ALECS OR WISE GUYS? EITHER WAY, THEY POSE A THREAT TO PUBLIC EDUCATIONA syndicate of self-styled rich, smart guys has in mind killing off public education, public pension systems, and public and private unions.CTA and its labor allies are hard at work trying to keep this group, the

by mike simpson / 43min 

Karen Magee: The Value Of Union Membership | WAMC

Karen Magee: The Value Of Union Membership | WAMC: Karen Magee: The Value Of Union MembershipListenListening...4:16Driving on the Thruway recently, I saw a bumper sticker that made me smile.The bumper sticker read:  Labor Unions:  The folks who brought you the weekend, child labor laws, overtime, minimum wage, pension security … and more.The point of that bumper sticker is to remind us that strong

by mike simpson / 2h 

Teachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shooting - The Washington Post

Teachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shooting - The Washington Post: Teachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shootingMany of the nation’s teachers are now among the best prepared to handle mass shootings like the one that occurred in a Louisiana movie theater Thursday night, largely b

by mike simpson / 3h 

Marie Corfield: Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrong

Marie Corfield: Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrong: Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrongIf you've been following the controversy over Franklin Township (Somerset) Board of Education President Ed Potosnak's graduation speech last month, (Franklin Reporterhere; Blue Jersey here, here, here; NJ.com here), you know t

by mike simpson / 3h 

Some charter schools exempt from reporting salaries for Open Georgia site. Why? | Get Schooled

Some charter schools exempt from reporting salaries for Open Georgia site. Why? | Get Schooled: Some charter schools exempt from reporting salaries for Open Georgia site. Why?As an editorial writer, I was charged with looking at instances where state and local officials failed to follow the state’s open record and open meetings laws.While elected officials run on promises of transparency and profe

by mike simpson / 5h 

State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Unveils New Road Map for Education

A Blueprint for Great Schools Version 2.0 - Year 2015 (CA Dept of Education):State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Unveils New Road Map for EducationLOS ANGELES—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson today unveiled a new action plan to guide California's efforts as the state continues to transform its schools over the next four years.A Blueprint for Great Schools Version 2.0 builds o

by mike simpson / 6h 

Noncognitive Schooling: Do Students Need ‘Growth Mindsets’ and Grit to Succeed in the Classroom? - The Atlantic

Noncognitive Schooling: Do Students Need ‘Growth Mindsets’ and Grit to Succeed in the Classroom? - The Atlantic: What Does It Mean to Have ‘Grit’ in the Classroom?By learning how to persevere and change course, students learn how to push themselves.Nestled within the New-Age-y sounding concept of “noncognitive factors” are fairly concrete examples of what parents and educators should and shouldn’t

by mike simpson / 7h 

New-look education commissioner pursues similar agenda | Capital New York

New-look education commissioner pursues similar agenda | Capital New York: New-look education commissioner pursues similar agendaALBANY—New York’s new education commissioner, MaryEllen Elia, and her predecessor, John King, both support the state’s controversial reform agenda, including implementing the Common Core standards, testing students on the more difficult material and evaluating teachers u

by mike simpson / 7h 

The Discipline Gap: Despite the ADA’s Passage 25 Years Ago, Schools Disproportionately Suspend and Punish Special-Needs Children

The Discipline Gap: Despite the ADA’s Passage 25 Years Ago, Schools Disproportionately Suspend and Punish Special-Needs Children - The Atlantic: Why Schools Over-Discipline Children With DisabilitiesDespite the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act 25 years ago, students with disabilities are still punished at disproportionate rates.A quarter-century ago, on July 26, 1990, Congress passed

by mike simpson / 7h 

Mock Trial of Arne Duncan and other Government and Corporate Privatizers.

Mock Trial LIVE STREAM | Education Town Hall Forum: Archives, Announcements, & Extended Discussion on Weekly Broadcasts...: Mock Trial of Arne Duncan and other Government and Corporate Privatizers. (details here)Tune In Tonight at 6 p.m. for LIVE STREAM via We Act RadioMock Trial LIVE STREAM | Education Town Hall Forum: Archives, Announcements, & Extended Discussion on Weekly Broadcasts...

by mike simpson / 7h 

Evaluating teachers: Precise but irrelevant metrics? - The Hechinger Report

Evaluating teachers: Precise but irrelevant metrics? - The Hechinger Report: Evaluating teachers: Precise but irrelevant metrics? I've told this joke before:Two hot-air balloonists get lost, and they’re floating aimlessly. They spot someone down below and call out, “Hello!”The person on the ground replies, “Hello!”“Where are we?” one calls down.Up comes the reply: “You’re in a balloon!”They contin

by mike simpson / 8h 

With A Brooklyn Accent: What Our Children and Grandchildren Deserve: No Compromise With Current Education Policies

With A Brooklyn Accent: What Our Children and Grandchildren Deserve: No Compromise With Current Education Policies: What Our Children and Grandchildren Deserve: No Compromise With Current Education PoliciesEvery post I get from around the country suggests that the attack on teachers, students and public education shows no sign of letting up. Students are being tested more than ever; great teachers

by mike simpson / 8h 

Feds: Administration Can Keep Targeting 'Priority' and ‘Focus’ Schools - NJ Spotlight

Feds: Administration Can Keep Targeting 'Priority' and ‘Focus’ Schools - NJ Spotlight: FEDS: ADMINISTRATION CAN KEEP TARGETING 'PRIORITY' AND ‘FOCUS’ SCHOOLSState DOE revises accountability system for state-run districts, severely challenged schoolsThe Christie administration has won the federal Department of Education’s approval to continue using its accountability system to target “priority” and

by mike simpson / 8h 

Public School Systems Beat Charters with Equitable Services Systemically Provided | janresseger

Public School Systems Beat Charters with Equitable Services Systemically Provided | janresseger: Public School Systems Beat Charters with Equitable Services Systemically ProvidedWhile charter schools in a lot of places are known to use subtle, unnamed selective screens—there are far fewer English language learners, for example, and students with extremely serious disabilities enrolled in charter s

by mike simpson / 9h 

CURMUDGUCATION: Bill Bennett's Baloney

CURMUDGUCATION: Bill Bennett's Baloney: Bill Bennett's BaloneyWilliam Bennett appeared on Campbell Brown's reformster PR site to stick up for the Common Core,but he ignores some inconvenient truths in the process.The first stretcher is in his thesis-title: the GOP is wrong to run away from the Common Core-- because the standards are working. "Working" is a heck of a subjective term here,

by mike simpson / 9h 

The Walmart family is teaching hedge funds how to make money off publicly funded schools | Business Insider

The Walmart family is teaching hedge funds how to make money off publicly funded schools | Business Insider: The Walmart family is teaching hedge funds how to make money off publicly funded schoolsCharter Schools are drawing promoters from a place you might not think of: Walmart.The Walton Family Foundation — the philanthropic group run by the Walmart family — sponsored a symposium at the Harvard

by mike simpson / 10h 

YESTERDAY

How KIPP charter school handles special ed/IEP students | Seattle Education

How KIPP charter school handles special ed/IEP students | Seattle Education: How KIPP charter school handles special ed/IEP studentsLeonie Haimson posted this in 2012 and I have linked to it several times over the last few years.Because I seem to be on a roll about KIPP charter schools, I decided this is an appropriate time to post this on Seattle Ed.“At KIPP, I would wake up sick, every single da

by mike simpson / 22h hide  //  save

Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 7/23/15

SPECIAL NITE CAP CORPORATE ED REFORMPolishing the Apple: Examining Political Spending in New York to Influence Education PolicyCommon Cause – Polishing the Apple: Examining Political Spending in New York to Influence Education Policy: Polishing the Apple: Examining Political Spending in New York to Influence Education PolicyJune 15, 2015READ: Polishing the Apple: Examining Political Spending in Ne

by mike simpson / 23h 

When it comes to facing down Ohio's well-heeled charter school lobbyists, will state lawmakers be leaders -- or lapdogs? Brent Larkin | cleveland.com

When it comes to facing down Ohio's well-heeled charter school lobbyists, will state lawmakers be leaders -- or lapdogs? Brent Larkin | cleveland.com:

When it comes to facing down Ohio's well-heeled charter school lobbyists, will state lawmakers be leaders -- or lapdogs? 

 So atrocious are some charter schools in Ohio that children consigned to those awful places probably can't spell the one word they need to know about their state government.

Let's try to help them:

C-o-r-r-u-p-t.

Where are the Franklin County prosecutor and officials from the U.S. Justice Department when you really need them?

There's a reason why Greg Harris, the respected state director of the charter-friendly education reform group StudentsFirst, claims "most of the charters in Ohio stink."

It's because they do.

And the crime of it all is state government's failure to do much about it.

Gov. John Kasich has some legitimate bragging rights to recite for voters in his campaign for president. What you won't hear him talk about is Ohio's well-deserved national reputation as a place where money matters more than the future of a kid trapped in a dreadful charter school.

In late June, as has happened so many times in the past, the Ohio General Assembly sold out kids in favor of the lousy charter operators who fund legislators' campaigns. And in one of the first major tests of his leadership, new House Speaker Cliff Rosenberger earned an F.

After the Senate gave its unanimous blessing to a bill, supported by Kasich, that would made the taxpayer-funded schools more accountable and transparent, it was widely assumed the House would follow suit. 

At the 11th hour, Rosenberger blinked, offering a pathetic excuse of needing more time to study changes made by the Senate. The House then adjourned for the summer, allowing Rosenberger and his cronies to flee Columbus and probably delaying by at least another school year the passage of a bill designed to benefit children by making charters more accountable.

Ohio has some great charter schools — places that are saving young lives. The good schools tend to support reform. 

The awful ones have figured out how to sprinkle so much money around Statehouse corridors they've purchased immunity from having to care about kids.

In the past 17 years, Ohio's two largest charter school management companies — David Brennan's Akron-based White Hat Management and William Lager's Columbus-based Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow (ECOT) — have funneled more than $6 million to Republican candidates and causes. In the last election cycle, ECOT alone gave more than $400,000.

The payoff? About $1.76 billion in taxpayer money has flowed into charter schools run by Brennan and Lager since 1998.

If Rosenberger has come to appreciate all that generosity, it's because he learned from When it comes to facing down Ohio's well-heeled charter school lobbyists, will state lawmakers be leaders -- or lapdogs? Brent Larkin | cleveland.com:

Smart ALECs or Wise Guys? Either Way, They Pose a Threat to Public Education - California Teachers Association

Smart ALECs or Wise Guys? Either Way, They Pose a Threat to Public Education - California Teachers Association:

SMART ALECS OR WISE GUYS? EITHER WAY, THEY POSE A THREAT TO PUBLIC EDUCATION

A syndicate of self-styled rich, smart guys has in mind killing off public education, public pension systems, and public and private unions.

CTA and its labor allies are hard at work trying to keep this group, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), from gaining a foothold in California. ALEC is an organization funded by corporate entities to formulate anti-union and anti-public education proposals into language that would become state legislation.

Friday is the last day of the group’s annual convention in San Diego. On Thursday, the group heard from Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, an avowed foe of public employee unions. His “plenary breakfast” preceded a panel discussion of “Setting an Effective State Led Education Agenda.” Read that to mean looking for ways to silence our voices, take away educators’ professional rights, privatize our jobs, undermine public education, and break teachers’ unions.

(Photo above) Working women and men, including members of the Sweetwater Education Association, protest at the ALEC annual meeting in San Diego.

A group of educators and other working women and men have been down in San Diego protesting the group’s anti-public education and anti-working people Smart ALECs or Wise Guys? Either Way, They Pose a Threat to Public Education - California Teachers Association:

Pension “Overhaul” Declared Unconstitutional (Actually, pension pillage was declared unconstitutional.) | Reclaim Reform

Pension “Overhaul” Declared Unconstitutional (Actually, pension pillage was declared unconstitutional.) | Reclaim Reform:

Pension “Overhaul” Declared Unconstitutional (Actually, pension pillage was declared unconstitutional.)

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel (D) tried to cut pensions for those greedy, nasty, lazy, and overpaid nurses and other public employees. Demonizing public employees is day-to-day business for Rahm and the rich boys who finance him.

Rahm’s personal friend and venture fund investment cohort, Illinois Gov. Bruce Rahner (R), is still going to try to cut pensions on a state level.

Pension overhaul. Overhaul? Pillage and theft are more accurate terms.

Of course the Illinois Supreme Court has unanimously declared that state employee pension cuts are unconstitutional. That doesn’t seem to matter to these two power mongering sociopaths. However, today yet another judge declared Rahm’s present attempt unconstitutional. Both sets, city and state, of highly paid legal firms will continue to receive big bucks to pursue whatever those two politicos pay them tax dollars to pursue.

What happened today?

“A Cook County judge has thrown out the Emanuel (D) administration’s plan to overhaul two of the city’s four employee pension systems.

Union officials and retired workers applauded the ruling by Judge Rita 

Pension “Overhaul” Declared Unconstitutional (Actually, pension pillage was declared unconstitutional.) | Reclaim Reform:

Karen Magee: The Value Of Union Membership | WAMC

Karen Magee: The Value Of Union Membership | WAMC:

Karen Magee: The Value Of Union Membership

Listen

Listening...

4:16

Driving on the Thruway recently, I saw a bumper sticker that made me smile.

The bumper sticker read:  Labor Unions:  The folks who brought you the weekend, child labor laws, overtime, minimum wage, pension security … and more.

The point of that bumper sticker is to remind us that strong unions helped secure many of the rights we take for granted.  The 40-hour work week, the minimum wage, family leave, health insurance and other cornerstones of the middle class all bear the union label.

Statistics bear out the benefits of union membership.  Where unions are flourishing, workers’ salaries are higher; more workers have health insurance; and more benefit from stable, traditional pension plans.

In addition to the many economic benefits, belonging to a union gives workers a voice on the job.  Collectively, they can bargain for better and safer working conditions, and speak out — without fear of retribution — against unfairness and injustice in the workplace.

In public education, for example, teachers — and teachers unions — have been the leading voice for fair and equitable school funding and against the tyranny of over-testing.

And, of course, we shouldn’t forget that unions, throughout history, have always been at the forefront of social change.  Unions marched with Doctor Martin Luther King in the fight for civil rights in the 1960s.  Today, unions are a leading voice for marriage equality, voting rights and, in the “Fight for 15” — fair wages for fast-food workers and others in our service economy.

Despite all this good, union rights are under attack like never before.

The U.S. Supreme Court recently agreed to hear a case — Friedrichs versus the California Teachers Association — in which some individuals insist they are entitled to the benefits of a unionized workplace without having to pay their fair share for those benefits.

In Friedrichs, the plaintiffs argue that California school districts are violating the First Amendment rights of teachers by agreeing that all teachers who are represented by the union must pay their “fair share” costs.  The plaintiffs say the First Amendment gives them the right not to belong to a union, and not to pay anything to a union they oppose even though, by law, the union must represent them.

This would require the Supreme Court to overturn established law.

For decades, the Court has supported this principle of “fair share.”  It means that since unions are obligated to represent all the workers in a unionized workplace, it’s reasonable that all the workers should share in the costs of union representation, such as collective bargaining and contract administration.

The Court has allowed one exception:  Those who oppose a union’s political speech Karen Magee: The Value Of Union Membership | WAMC:

Teachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shooting - The Washington Post

Teachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shooting - The Washington Post:

Teachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shooting

Many of the nation’s teachers are now among the best prepared to handle mass shootings like the one that occurred in a Louisiana movie theater Thursday night, largely because school systems across the country have been training them in how to handle active-shooter situations. Horrific school shootings, like the one at Sandy Hook Elementary in late 2012, highlighted the need for such training and also showed how teachers have displayed great heroism in the face of grave danger: One teacher died at the Connecticut school while shielding her students from a hail of bullets.

La. Gov. Bobby Jindal and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, are now praising two Jeanerette High School teachers — Ali Viator Martin and Jena Legnon Meaux — who were among those wounded when a man began shooting movigoers in Lafayette, La. One woman jumped on top of the other to shield her from the gunfire, and Martin, wounded, got herself to a fire alarm and pulled it, sending out the call for help.

Jindal, in a news conference, commended the women for their acts of heroism and said that they likely saved many lives.

“A lot of folks in that situation would just be thinking about themselves,” Jindal said. “She had the presence of mind to think, alright, even though she was shot in the leg, she saved other people.”

The president of the local teacher’s union, Cammie Maturin, has started aGoFundMe page for the two women to help them pay for medical bills. Maturin taught with the pair a few years ago at the high school, and said Martin was always going out of her way to help others. She believes the training she and other teachers received helped them stay calm in the midst of the chaos in the movie theater.

“It goes to show you that they didn’t panic and did exactly what was taught,” Maturin said.

Inette Malveaux, who has taught Louisiana history for a decade at Anderson Middle School and is vice president of the teacher’s union, said she has done lockdown drills since she started. When her school goes on lockdown, she instructs students to crouch behind their desks and she then covers windows and locks doors. It becomes like “muscle memory” for teachers, and she believes that’s what kicked in when the teachers in the theater reacted.

“It’s something that we practice for,” she said.

According to the Advocate, a publication in Baton Rouge, Martin is an English teacher and has been with the Iberia Parish School System forTeachers, doing what they were trained to do, likely helped save lives during La. movie theater shooting - The Washington Post:

Marie Corfield: Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrong

Marie Corfield: Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrong:

Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrong

If you've been following the controversy over Franklin Township (Somerset) Board of Education President Ed Potosnak's graduation speech last month, (Franklin Reporterhere; Blue Jersey here, here, here; NJ.com here), you know that last night was the first board meeting after board member Patricia Stanley sent a letter to Ed, an openly gay man, and the rest of the board calling for his resignation because he dared to spend approximately 1:30 out of a seven and a half minute speech talking about how the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage—handed down that same day—affected his life.

Here's the video of his speech:

Last night's meeting was straight out of a Hollywood movie script—almost: Ignorance meets Fearlessness, and in a public showdown with unanimous community support for the protagonist, Fearlessness wins, Ignorance realizes the error of her ways, we have the Kumbaya moment, and everyone goes home happy.

Except there was no realization and no Kumbaya moment. Despite 90 minutes of impassioned statements from supporters both inside and outside of the township, many of whom expressed compassion for Stanley, she doubled down on her 'opinion' that Ed Marie Corfield: Franklin Twp update: No, Ms. Stanley, it's not your opinion. You're just wrong: