IRA's Richard Long defends the LEARN Act: Susan Ohanian responds
We should demand that our professional organizations explain why political overreaching weighs far heavier in
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Schools Matter: IRA's Richard Long defends the LEARN Act: Susan Ohanian responds
Schools Matter: IRA's Richard Long defends the LEARN Act: Susan Ohanian responds:
The politicos in Washington D. C, the folks who already make a colossal mess of reading instruction with Reading First, are at it again--spelling out all these details about how reading should be taught. Sadly, lobbyist Rich Long's current support of the LEARN Act is just the latest iteration of our professional organizations trying to curry favor with members of Congress. The truth of the matter is that the LEARN act will produce lots of professional development monies and our professional organizations--IRA and NCTE--will never bite the politico hand that feeds them.
We should demand that our professional organizations explain why political overreaching weighs far heavier in
We should demand that our professional organizations explain why political overreaching weighs far heavier in
Bending towards justice. « Fred Klonsky's blog
Bending towards justice. « Fred Klonsky's blog:
Bending towards justice.
The woman appeared on the TV screen at around 10:20 Chicago time to announce the murder of Troy Davis in the name of the people of the state of Georgia.
Without saying a word to Anne, who was sitting next to me on the couch, I reached for the remote and turned the TV off.
We went to bed.
Nothing needed to be said.
This morning I heard Dr. Raphael Warnock of Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church on the car radio. Ebenezer was
This Week In Education: Media: More Misleading Descriptions Of NCLB
This Week In Education: Media: More Misleading Descriptions Of NCLB:
Media: More Misleading Descriptions Of NCLB
There are lots of things to like about the Washington Post's preview of the Obama waiver announcement tomorrow (Obama prepares to revamp ‘No Child Left Behind’), but the basic description of NCLB is misleading and inaccurate, creating the impression that the law has had much more (negative) impact on schools than the facts can support and omitting the benefits of the law that have civil rights groups and others extremely concerned about any changes. Of course, this isn't the first time anyone's mischaracterized the requirements and the impact of the law but it's sad to see yet another example of a newspaper passing along unfounded criticisms of the law without stopping to ask whether they check out. Read below for all the details.
One difference between Playin’ Jazz and Policy Research: Comments on the Third Way “Middle Class” Reply « School Finance 101
One difference between Playin’ Jazz and Policy Research: Comments on the Third Way “Middle Class” Reply « School Finance 101:
One difference between Playin’ Jazz and Policy Research: Comments on the Third Way “Middle Class” Reply
Occasionally on this blog, I slip in some jazz references. I often see commonalities between jazz improvisation and policy analysis. But I think I’ve finally found one thing that is very different.
A lot of jazz teachers will joke around with students about what to do when you’re improvising a solo over chord changes, perhaps to a standard tune, and you happen to land unintentionally on a dissonant note. Somethin’ with a really sour sound! The usual advice is if you hit such a note, play it even louder a few more times! Make it sound intentional. Of course, you eventually want to resolve the dissonance, not end on it. But work it until then.
Well, I’m not sure that this principle applies well to policy research. Here’s why. I just completed a review of a report by Third Way, a think tank I’d never heard of previously. Third Way released a report on what it called “Middle Class” schools, and argued that these schools aren’t making the grade. Methodologically, this report
Dana Goldstein: Getting Artistic with Standardized-Test Answer Sheets - Design - GOOD
Getting Artistic with Standardized-Test Answer Sheets - Design - GOOD:
The Testing Bubble
The seventh-century Chinese emperor Yangdi is usually remembered as a megalomaniac who led his newly united nation into a series of debilitating wars. But Yangdi’s real legacy is his development of the world’s first standardized testing system. The idea was to locate China’s most talented rural scholars and bring them into the nascent empire’s civil service.
The history of education is filled with such earnest, progressive hopes for stan- dardized testing; Napoleon built the French bureaucracy in much the same way, and the SAT, for all its flaws, played an important role in opening up the Ivy League to Jews, Catholics, and public-school students.
The University of California and other elite colleges now acknowledge that the SAT is an incomplete measure of what students know and discriminatory against low-income students of color. But standardized testing is booming in primary and secondary schools. For the past decade, No Child Left Behind has required states to assess children in math and reading every year from third through eighth grades. The Obama administration has
Intel Winners Show What it Takes for Schools to Excel in Math and Science
There is plenty of bad news about how American schools are in crisis and students aren't keeping up with their peers around the globe. But despite the grim data on falling SAT scores and students saying our education system needs to better prepare them for college or the workforce, there are schools that are trailblazing creative, effective approaches to math and science education. Eighteen such models of K-12 innovation and excellence are among the recently announced winners of Intel's Schools of Distinction awards competition.
The schools, which were chosen from a group of 156 applications from 38 states, are a diverse cross-section of public, charter, vocational and independent campuses of different sizes—the smallest school has 58 students and the largest has 4,300. According to Carlos Contreras, Intel's United States education director, each campus
The Seattle Education Association Votes “No Confidence” in School Board Chair Steve Sundquist | Seattle Education
The Seattle Education Association Votes “No Confidence” in School Board Chair Steve Sundquist | Seattle Education:
The Seattle Education Association Votes “No Confidence” in School Board Chair Steve Sundquist
Thumbs down.
Per the resolution:
Whereas incumbent school board member, Steven Sundquist, has routinely voted for motions that a majority of members of the Seattle Education Association oppose, including but not limited to;
Use of the National Council on Teacher Quality survey,
Adoption of a contract with Teach for America (TFA),
Renewal of Maria Goodloe-Johnson’s contract, and
Whereas the SEA has adopted a standing resolution opposing the use of TFA “temps” in Seattle Public
Shanker Blog » Public Servants Versus Private Contractors ... Again
Shanker Blog » Public Servants Versus Private Contractors ... Again:
Public Servants Versus Private Contractors … Again
Has the battle over public sector compensation turned a decisive corner? Have much-maligned government workers won an evidence-based victory?
Reasonable people might think so, thanks in part to a study by the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), a nonpartisan group that keeps close tabs on government operations. According to the findings of the POGO report – findings that they call “shocking” – the “federal government approves service contract billing rates … that pay contractors 1.83 times more than the government pays federal employees in total compensation, and more than 2 times the total compensation paid in the private sector for comparable services.”
More specifically, federal government employees cost less than private contractors in 33 of the 35 occupational classifications reviewed – and non-federal private sector worker compensation was lower than contractor billing
Piloting the Plane on Musical Instruments & using SGPs to Evaluate Teachers « School Finance 101
Piloting the Plane on Musical Instruments & using SGPs to Evaluate Teachers « School Finance 101:
Piloting the Plane on Musical Instruments & using SGPs to Evaluate Teachers
I’ve posted a few blogs recently on the topic of Student Growth Percentile Scores, or SGPs and how many state policymakers have moved to adopt these measures and integrate them into new evaluation systems for teachers. In my first post, I argued that SGPs are simply not designed to make inferences about teacher effectiveness.
The designers of SGP replied to my first post, suggesting that I was conflating the measures with their use by suggesting that these measures can’t and shouldn’t be used to infer teacher effectiveness. And in their response (more below), they explained in greater detail, what was essentially my main point – that SGPs are not designed or intended to infer teacher effectiveness from student achievement growth. They also argued that the
Report: Obama, Arne Duncan revamping No Child Left Behind - Tim Mak - POLITICO.com
Report: Obama, Arne Duncan revamping No Child Left Behind - Tim Mak - POLITICO.com:
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/64125.html#ixzz1YgYzesmy
Report: Obama, Arne Duncan revamping No Child Left Behind
President Barack Obama is planning to scrap key elements of the No Child Left Behind law, a cornerstone of the Bush administration’s education policy, and substitute new rules reflecting his own vision on education, reports the Washington Post.
Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan will detail plans to waive some of No Child Left Behind’s requirements on Friday.
Continue ReadingObama intends to waive the standard that every student be proficient in math and reading by 2014 - failure of which could mean that their schools would face escalating penalties.
In return for scrapping those requirements, however, states must put in place changes that reflect Obama’s own goals on education policy. The states that will seek waivers - the Washington Post says up to 45 of them might - will be expected to expand charter schools, link teacher evaluation to student performance and upgrade academic standards.
Schools, which have been trying to reach No Child Left Behind’s standards for four years, are currently facing the threat of massive teacher layoffs, principal firings and school closures if students don’t achieve the
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/64125.html#ixzz1YgYzesmy
Our Achievement Gap Mania :: Frederick M. Hess
Our Achievement Gap Mania :: Frederick M. Hess:
Our Achievement Gap Mania
by Frederick M. Hess • Sep 22, 2011 at 8:10 am
Cross-posted from Education Week
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ShareYesterday, the quarterly journal National Affairs published my essay "Our Achievement Gap Mania." As I'd suspected it might, the piece seems to have angered a number of educators and reformers who I like and respect. So, I thought I'd try over the next couple days to explain what the fuss is about and why I felt compelled to challenge a well-intentioned, deeply ingrained consensus.
A decade ago, the No Child Left Behind Act ushered in an era of federal educational accountability marked by relentless focus on closing race- and income-based "achievement gaps" in test scores and graduation rates. The language has become instinctive, with a generation of would-be reformers learning to focus on closing achievement gaps. For all the subsequent critiques of NCLB, both deserved and undeserved, this has been universally hailed as an unmitigated good. It is not. It has shortchanged some children. It has undermined public support for reforming schools while ghettoizing school reform. It has narrowed the scope of schooling a
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