The Amazing Activism of the Grassroots Network of NPE Action | Diane Ravitch's blog

The Amazing Activism of the Grassroots Network of NPE Action | Diane Ravitch's blog

The Amazing Activism of the Grassroots Network of NPE Action

NPE Action is fortunate to have the leadership and energy of Marla Kilfoyle, former national director of BATS.

She has developed connections with dozens of organizations fighting to protect and improve public schools.

Read her latest report here.

The report includes a call to action to protect student privacy. The deadline for taking action is December 8. Please open the link and join thousands of allies in speaking out against unwanted invasion of student privacy.

The NPE Grassroots Education Network is a network of over 145 grassroots organizations nationwide who have joined together to preserve, promote, improve, and strengthen our public schools. If you know of a group that would like to join this powerful network, please go here to sign on. 

If you have any questions about the NPE Grassroots Education Network please contact Marla Kilfoyle, NPE Grassroots Education Network Liaison at marlakilfoyle@networkforpubliceducation.org

Notes from Marla

CALL TO ACTION FOR ALL ORGANIZATIONS!

Dear NPE Grassroots Education Network – this is a specific call to action that needs to be completed BEFORE December 8th.  The Network for Public Education is sending a letter to the FTC as part of a formal public comment process in which the Commission has asked for input about the potential change in the regulations for COPPA, the Children’s Online Protection Act, originally passed by Congress in 1998. 

 We are urging the FTC NOT to weaken this important privacy law through regulation, as the law wisely provides for parent consent before the online collection of personal data directly from children younger than 13.  Instead, the FTC appears intent on allowing schools and/or teachers to consent on the part of parents when collecting student personal data directly from children. 

 Please read our (brief) letter and if you would like to sign it on behalf of your organization, please enter your contact info and that of your organization on this google form.

 The deadline for signing onto our letter is Dec. 8, as all comments are due to be submitted to the FTC no later than Dec. 9.  You are also encouraged to add your own comments online. You can do so at this link. 

 For more background on this issue, you can check out the blog post and comments submitted by the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy.

There is also pertinent information about how you can register for the national conference of the Network for Public Education Action in Philadelphia  in 2020.

You will enjoy meeting your friends and allies there.

Registration is open for the NPE Action 6th National Conference to be held in Philadelphia, March 28-29. Seats are limited this year to 500, so DO NOT delay your registration. Go hereto register and book your hotel! Please do not delay, reserve your seat today!  

And there is much, much more from our allies across the nation:

Public Schools Week will be held from February 24th-28th. Start planning NOW by doing the following:

• Begin to ask your Governor, state and federal lawmakers, Mayor, City Council, or Board of Education to adopt a resolution in support of Public Education. Begin to do this now. You can adopt, edit, or modify this resolution from The School Superintendents Association. If you get a resolution please send it to Marla Kilfoyle at marlakilfoyle@networkforpubliceducation.org and we will forward it along.
• National organizations please cut a three-minute video that encourages your members to participate in Public Schools Week. Here are the instructions for the video. To see sample videos please go here.  
• Please share and ask your members to take the pledge in support of Public Schools week. You can do that here.
• Please consider hosting an event. Starting planning NOW and register your event here  
• To learn more about Public Schools Week, messaging for 2020 and the #PublicSchoolProud campaign please go here and the toolkit has all kinds of amazing things you can do to support the week on social media.

The Amazing Activism of the Grassroots Network of NPE Action | Diane Ravitch's blog

CURMUDGUCATION: Noblesse Oblige And the End of Public Education

CURMUDGUCATION: Noblesse Oblige And the End of Public Education

Noblesse Oblige And the End of Public Education

Maybe you don't usually get around to reading David Dawkins, the Forbes staff member whose beat is billionaires. But back in October he ran an interview that should send a familiar chill through those of us who follow the great education disruption debates.

Dawkins talked to Josef Stadler, the head of Ultra High Net Worst at UBS (the big Swiss bank, about why folks don't trust billionaires these days, and why they probably shouldn't. It's a conversation that echoes much of Anand Giridharadas in Winners Take All, but Stadler offers one further observation about the future.

In “the future”—Stadler pauses—“it is likely that those who benefit most—the entrepreneurs—will substitute public institutions when it comes to the big questions of our lifetime. [Only] they have the money. The public side …” by that he means governments, “will no longer have the money” needed.

Stadler predicts a future where the needs of society are met by the generosity of the brightest, best and richest “entrepreneurs” and business “leaders” of the age—the likes of Buffett, Gates, Branson and Soros.

“We’re going to see the return of something that went away at the end of the 19th century,” he pauses, “the reemergence of a benevolent aristocracy, supporting the people because the public is running out of money.”

We have, of course, seen the beginnings of this in education, most notably with Bill Gates attempt to single-handedly fund a redesign of US education. We see it also in the choice movement-- hand public education over to entrepreneurs and under the magical sway of market forces, they will CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Noblesse Oblige And the End of Public Education

CURMUDGUCATION: Patriot Act: No More Batman - http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2019/12/patriot-act-no-more-batman.html

Jennifer Hall Lee: Why I Volunteer at My Local Public School | Diane Ravitch's blog

Jennifer Hall Lee: Why I Volunteer at My Local Public School | Diane Ravitch's blog

Jennifer Hall Lee: Why I Volunteer at My Local Public School

Jennifer Hall Lee lives in Pasadena, California. Her child is now enrolled in the high school, but Lee continues to volunteer and raise money for the middle school, where she is needed. In a note to me, she said that 45% of the students in Pasadena are attending private schools, charter schools, or home schooled. The public schools are suffering because of this splintering of civic energy.

She explained why she cares about the middle school:

The annual fund committee raises money throughout the year to help Eliot pay for teacher salaries, supplies, programs, technology and more–all of which keeps Eliot an arts magnet school. Annual funds, once the staple of private schools, are now necessary for many public CONTINUE READING: Jennifer Hall Lee: Why I Volunteer at My Local Public School | Diane Ravitch's blog

A Harlem School That Former Students Say Is Run Like ‘A Cult’ Faces New Scrutiny | HuffPost

A Harlem School That Former Students Say Is Run Like ‘A Cult’ Faces New Scrutiny | HuffPost

A Harlem School That Former Students Say Is Run Like ‘A Cult’ Faces New Scrutiny
A HuffPost investigation has uncovered more disturbing allegations out of a New York City private school. Now, the New York City Department of Education says it’s investigating.

NEW YORK — Five years ago when Kaiya showed up for the first day of senior year at Atlah High School in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City, she had barely made it in the building before an administrator told her to leave. She was told she had been expelled from the school. 

But not because she had done anything wrong. 

t turns out, she had merely offended the school’s leaders ― overseen by Superintendent James Manning, who is also the pastor of the church affiliated with the school ― by spending her summer break on a vacation with family, when school was out, instead of attending the graduation ceremony for the students a year above her.

And now, they were ready to ruin her life over it.  

A HuffPost investigation published in April revealed that Atlah World Missionary Church ― designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center ― runs a K-12 private school where kids have been psychologically abused and systematically taught to fear LGBTQ people. The story was based on interviews with 27 people connected to the church and school, many of them former students with similar stories to Kaiya who said the institution was run like “a cult.” 

HuffPost has spoken with nine more former students, former congregants and relatives of current church members. They have corroborated details of HuffPost’s initial report and contributed their own similar stories. They describe a pastor who harshly punishes students and promotes estrangement within families, at the same time running a private school that falsely bills itself as a high-tech, cutting-edge success. 

On Sunday, seven months after HuffPost first asked the New York City Department of Education about these allegations, the agency told HuffPost it is investigating it. The agency is responsible for making sure private schools within its geographic district provide instruction that is “substantially equivalent” to that offered in public schools. 
“Every student deserves a safe, high-quality education. We are investigating these CONTINUE READEING: A Harlem School That Former Students Say Is Run Like ‘A Cult’ Faces New Scrutiny | HuffPost

Stop Ignoring the Innovation That Happens in Traditional Public Schools - Education Week

Stop Ignoring the Innovation That Happens in Traditional Public Schools - Education Week

Stop Ignoring the Innovation That Happens in Traditional Public Schools

Schools across the United States are leading change from within. Why don't we know more about them?

When students at Childersburg Middle School head to the library, there's far more to do than read a book. Two summers ago, their teachers divided the space into a cozy reading area and the "GRID," a hands-on engineering lab where students work in groups and learn through the process of design. Back in their regular classrooms, teachers guide projects that build on that learning, and that continues online at home.

Though Childersburg sounds like an independent school with lots of freedom and funding, it is actually a traditional public school in rural Alabama. What's going on there is showing how teachers and students in a variety of district public schools are embracing innovation. But we've only just recently learned about Childersburg through the Canopy project, a new effort by the Clayton Christensen Institute to identify promising practices in schools across the United States that have, to date, largely escaped notice.

As program officers at three national education foundations, we know that educators everywhere are making big changes in teaching and learning. But the education community—funders like us, along with state and federal decision-makers, district and school leaders, researchers, and advocates—has not had a ready source of detailed information about innovators outside established networks or major urban centers. As a result, only a few schools gain widespread attention, and models that are relevant to educators working in a variety of contexts remain under the radar.

"As program officers at three national education foundations, we know that educators everywhere are making big changes in teaching and learning."

That inspired our support of Canopy, which invites local educators and education experts to nominate their peers for inclusion in a detailed registry of innovation. Canopy has introduced us to schools like Stilwell High School in Oklahoma, where students combine academics with internships and career-readiness coursework, and Barrington Middle School in Rhode Island, where teachers serve as mentors and students design and complete collaborative projects. This group of 235 schools, nearly three-quarters of which had never before appeared on well-known lists or databases, is helping CONTINUE READING: Stop Ignoring the Innovation That Happens in Traditional Public Schools - Education Week

“Almost all of the diversity of our youths was in a single school district,” says Pete Buttigieg. “I was slow to realize.” – Fred Klonsky

“Almost all of the diversity of our youths was in a single school district,” says Pete Buttigieg. “I was slow to realize.” – Fred Klonsky

“ALMOST ALL OF THE DIVERSITY OF OUR YOUTHS WAS IN A SINGLE SCHOOL DISTRICT,” SAYS PETE BUTTIGIEG. “I WAS SLOW TO REALIZE.”

Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg told Reverend William Barber that he didn’t notice South Bend’s public schools were segregated.

Buttigieg is the mayor of South Bend.

“I have to confess that I was slow to realize — I worked for years under the illusion that our schools in my city were integrated… But what I slowly realized… if you looked at the county, almost all of the diversity of our youths was in a single school district,” Buttigieg said in an interview with Rev. William Barber III.

Yes. “All the diversity of our youths was in a single school district,” is a weird formulation.

But that he didn’t realize that integration was an illusion in his city?

Buttigieg is either a liar or suffers from too common a white blindspot.

In Indiana, more than 70 percent of black students attend a non-white majority school,

In 2015, several South Bend schools showed concentrated black enrollment, inconsistent with county racial realities.

So, when did Mayor Buttigieg notice?

As the data shows, the segregation of South Bend schools have a long history and is CONTINUE EDUCATION: “Almost all of the diversity of our youths was in a single school district,” says Pete Buttigieg. “I was slow to realize.” – Fred Klonsky

With A Brooklyn Accent: Coming To Terms With Our History of White Supremacist Violence

With A Brooklyn Accent: Coming To Terms With Our History of White Supremacist Violence

Coming To Terms With Our History of White Supremacist Violence

If you know our history, our present reality shouldn't surprise you. Nearly 4 decades after slavery ended, the nation was the site of the creation of a system of color caste, reinforced by acts terror and intimidation that ranged from night riding and lynching to pogroms and massacres. Most of this white supremacist violence never made it into our history books, but it is painstakingly being reconstructed and commemorated today by survivors, civil rights leaders, and courageous race scholars. When the full story is told, the resurgence of white supremacist violence in the US today will seem less like an aberration that a re-emergence of powerful forces which were never fully accounted for, and whose victims were never recognized. To repeat the famous adage- those who don't know their history are destined to repeat it. The battle against white supremacy has to be fought on many fronts, one of which is the building of monuments to its victims and the creation of new historical narratives



With A Brooklyn Accent: Coming To Terms With Our History of White Supremacist Violence

Help Send Have You Heard on the Road in 2020 – Have You Heard

Help Send Have You Heard on the Road in 2020 – Have You Heard

Help Send Have You Heard on the Road in 2020

Education will play a major role in key 2020 election contests and yet the media keeps missing the story, or worse, getting it wrong. Have You Heard wants to do something about that. We have an ambitious list of destinations we want to travel to in the months ahead. With your help we can hit the road and shine a light on stories like these:

• According to the New York Times African-American voters feel betrayed by the Democrats’ pivot away from charter schools. But in southern states like Georgia, where school privatization comes freighted with the legacy of school segregation, the issue looks just a little more complicated…
• Will Betsy DeVos cost Donald Trump Michigan and the election? We’re headed back to Michigan to explore how DeVos’ deep unpopularity and her extreme agenda could tip the balance in a state that Trump won by just 10,000 votes in 2016.
• The public schools in Mayor Pete’s hometown of South Bend, Indiana are hemorrhaging students to charters and voucher schools. Have You Heard heads to the Heartland for an up-close look at the messy politics of school choice.
• Your city/state here! Got an idea for an episode that’s relevant to our education 2020 theme? Email us or Tweet your ideas to @HaveYouHeardPod.

Here are some of the ways you can support us:

1. Become a patron of Have You Heard on Patreon. Or if you’re already a Patreon supporter, consider increasing your monthly donation. (Note: Patreon subscribers get access to extras like our extended play segment *In the Weeds* and episode-specific reading lists.)

2. Make a one-time donation via PayPal.

3. Make a tax deductible donation. Make your check payable to:

Public Education Communications Project

23 Woodward Ave.

Gloucester, MA 01930.

Thanks for your support!

Jennifer and Jack

Help Send Have You Heard on the Road in 2020 – Have You Heard

Boston: Falling Enrollment Forces Charter Chain to Retrench | Diane Ravitch's blog

Boston: Falling Enrollment Forces Charter Chain to Retrench | Diane Ravitch's blog

Boston: Falling Enrollment Forces Charter Chain to Retrench

The celebrated Boston charter City on a Hill is closing one of its schools and imposing budget cuts at another due to falling enrollments.

Once a shining star in the Boston charter school world, City on a Hill Charter School is facing a massive financial crisis, prompting trustees on Monday to enact a series of dramatic budget cuts: It will lay off 23 teachers, administrators, and other staffers at its Roxbury and New Bedford campuses and will close the New Bedford campus in June.

“This is a really difficult decision and we don’t take it lightly,” said Cara Stillings-Candal, chair of the trustees in an interview following their Monday morning board meeting. “We wouldn’t have made these decisions if it wasn’t in the best interest of families and students.”

The sweeping budget cuts represent the latest turbulent turn for the nearly 25-year-old charter school, which has been struggling with high leadership turnover, lackluster academic performance, and financial woes. Earlier this year, state officials placed the New Bedford campus on probation, and a year earlier teachers at all three sites unionized, a rarity for independent charter schools, which place a premium on operational autonomy.

The severity of this fall’s financial crisis emerged after CONTINUE READING: Boston: Falling Enrollment Forces Charter Chain to Retrench | Diane Ravitch's blog

CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Voucher Bill Still A Threat

CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Voucher Bill Still A Threat

PA: Voucher Bill Still A Threat

Pennsylvania House Speaker and Betsy DeVos fanboy Mike Turzai has suffered a momentary setback in his drive to use Harrisburg schools as a launching pad for a PA voucher program, but he reportedly has not given up.

HB 1800 targets the ailing school district at a point where it has only recently been placed in financial receivership under the control of a state-appointed overseer. One might think that the legislature might take a minute or two to see if their Plan A is going to work, but Turzai smells an opportunity, and he's willing to be the guy who runs into the operating room five minutes after the start of a critical operation and hollers, "She's gonna die anyway-- let me have some of those organs."

The PA Auditor General has weighed in, pointing out that the bill would "bleed out" the district. This is particularly true because the bill would actually award vouchers to students who live in the Harrisburg district, but have never actually attended public school. For those families, the vouchers would be a tasty little windfall. For the district, the vouchers would mean that the district would lose a mountain of money before their enrollment dropped by a single student.

The bill has plenty of other lousy features. It CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Voucher Bill Still A Threat

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Thanks and Best Wishes

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Thanks and Best Wishes

Thanks and Best Wishes

“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”

A.A. Milne (Winnie-the-Pooh)

“What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.”

T.S. Eliot

“Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment, full effort is full victory.” 

Gandhi

"Thank you for listening. Thank you for abiding me. And now, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages, I bid you goodbye and take my leave."

Frank Deford

Seattle Schools Community Forum: People To Thank - https://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2019/12/people-to-thank.html

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Last Resources - https://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2019/12/last-resources.html

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Thanks and Best Wishes

Dividing Fractions Directly and Other Things We Can't Unknow | The Jose Vilson

Dividing Fractions Directly and Other Things We Can't Unknow | The Jose Vilson

DIVIDING FRACTIONS DIRECTLY AND OTHER THINGS WE CAN’T UNKNOW

“Last year, we learned to keep-flip-change …”

She sees my face wince, but proceeds anyways.

“The way that goes is you keep the original fraction, change the division to multiplication, and then flip the second fraction.”

“OK, but why does it work?”

Shrug.

“Who else learned it this way?”

About three-fourths of the room raises their hand. (The other fourth still seemed to struggle with dividing fractions. More later.)

“OK, out of those of you who learned it this way, why does this work?”

I get a few “because the teacher said so”‘s, “because it just works,” “because I did well on the test” and just kept shaking my head gently while listening. Sure, the easy thing to do at that moment would have been to punch down (metaphorically, people) and tell them that their last teacher was wrong for unveiling a trick without giving them the magic behind it. The harder conversation was sitting right CONTINUE READING: Dividing Fractions Directly and Other Things We Can't Unknow | The Jose Vilson