Friday, April 5, 2013

UPDATE: Whoa there…Let’s try telling the truth… + The Dan to Dannel transformation on the most important education lawsuit in Connecticut history - Wait, What?

The Dan to Dannel transformation on the most important education lawsuit in Connecticut history - Wait, What?:

Whoa there…Let’s try telling the truth…

by jonpelto

The CTMirror has a “must read” follow up story about Governor Malloy’s “request” to interview and select a finalist for the position of President of the Connecticut Board of Regents.

In the article, the CTMirror reports that, “The governor’s spokesman, Andrew Doba, said the interviews aren’t unusual. He noted that the University of Connecticut trustees in late 2010 allowed then-Governor-elect Malloy to interview finalists for the president’s post that went to Susan Herbst.”

File that one under somewhere between “misleading spin” and “out-right lie.”

In fact, in 2010, Governor Rell and Governor-elect Malloy met with Susan Herbst, as did dozens of other individuals, PRIOR to the UConn Board of Education’s vote.

Then, according to press reports, including the Associated Press’ national story, “UConn’s Board of Trustees unanimously selected Susan Herbst at a special meeting

The Dan to Dannel transformation on the most important education lawsuit in Connecticut history

by jonpelto

Wait, What? readers know about the pending lawsuit known as CCJEF vs. Rell. It is the case in which Connecticut’s Supreme Court ruled that Connecticut’s children have a constitutionally guaranteed right to a quality education.

They also know that in what can only be described as a truly outrageous move, Governor Dannel Malloy and Attorney General George Jepsen are trying to stop this education lawsuit from being heard and resolved.

Despite having promised their support for the lawsuit, they are now not only trying to get the case dismissed, but are asking the court to prevent the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding [CCJEF], a broad coalition of towns, schools, parents and public school advocates, from even serving as the plaintiffs in the case.

They are taking this unholy action despite the fact that the Connecticut Supreme Court

The Intersection Between the Common Core and School Culture | LFA: Join The Conversation - Public School Insights

The Intersection Between the Common Core and School Culture | LFA: Join The Conversation - Public School Insights:

The Intersection Between the Common Core and School Culture

by National Association of Elementary School Principals

By Gail Connelly, Executive Director of the National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP)

Communications scholar Marshall McLuhan once said, "We don't know who discovered water, but we know it wasn't the fish." Water shapes a fish's existence so profoundly — and, swimming right in the middle of it, the fish can't grasp how water impacts them. In education, a school's "water" is its culture, that complicated combination of shared values, norms, beliefs, and expectations. It manifests in actions as simple as the way a principal recognizes staff accomplishments, and as complex as the processes staff members use to mediate conflict or the ideas that shape student motivation.
School culture is hard to characterize and cultivate, but it's arguably the defining factor in school change. Shifting culture could prove to be the trickiest — but most essential — piece of today's most pressing education challenge: implementing the Common Core State Standards.
Schools in most states across the country spent the last school year dipping a toe into the Common Core,

“your very existence is an act of rebellion” – @ the chalk face

“your very existence is an act of rebellion” – @ the chalk face:

“your very existence is an act of rebellion”

by Barbara Madeloni

We’ve been clanging the warning bells in higher education for years, maybe this story about computer scoring of essays as a way to improve students’ writing will get the attention of our colleagues in the academy. Like all of the data driven, computer based instruction that is being sold to us/imposed on us, this is dangerous in so many ways. We know that this eliminates jobs while increasing profits for corporations. But we need to speak, as well, to how these technologies change what it means to know, changes how we make meaning and the possibilities we can imagine and create. There is a petition on line to refuse these computer scoring systems for essays, and I support that. But we shouldn’t refuse them until they are ‘valid.’ We should refuse them flat out. We should refuse them because we hold to our relationships as the context for our meaning making. The system we are up against-corporate-technocratic-dehumanizing-is so powerful. We fight with our humanity. We win when we talk to each each other, share our stories with each other, refuse their narrative.
Here is Washington, DC–Occupying the DOE–sharing our stories, our outrage, our songs and our love.

MORNING UPDATE LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 4-5-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all:

Click on picture to Listen to Diane Ravitch

Anthony Cody: Can We Trust Bill Gates?

by dianerav

Anthony Cody read Bill Gates’ article in the Washington Post, in which he said it is time to reduce the emphasis on high-stakes testing.
Anthony wondered if Gates means it.
Anthony writes:
“No one in America has done more to promote the raising of stakes for test scores in education than Bill Gates….You can read his words…, but his actions have spoken so much more loudly, that I cannot even make sense out of what he is attempting to say now. So let’s focus first on what Bill Gates has wrought.”

A Brilliant Analysis of the Failed, Punitive Ideas Called “Reform”

by dianerav

Believe it or not, the Chicago Tribune published one of the best articles I have read about the disaster that is called education “reform,” but in fact is education destruction.
I say, believe it or not, because the Tribune has been one of the nation’s loudest cheerleaders for the policies that this column decries.
Robert C. Koehler is a syndicated columnist, not an education specialist, but he sees clearly the damage that the education destruction movement–NCLB and Race to the Top–is doing to students and our society.
His column is titled “The Warping of Public Education.”
He writes:
“…high-stakes testing, in tandem with “zero tolerance,” militarized security and sadistic underfunding, has

Atlanta’s Lessons for Reformers

by dianerav

This smart blogger read all the investigators’ reports from the Atlanta cheating scandal.
He or she realized that Atlanta was doing everything that reformers say is important.
The educators there were focusing on test scores above all else.
The teachers who got higher scores got bonuses and those who did not, got humiliated.
Incentivizing the workforce, yes?
The teachers had no tenure, so whistleblowers had no job protection and were easily fired.
The blogger writes: “So what rank-and-yank, cash incentives, all that leadership, and high expectations got

“I Cannot Live Without…”

by dianerav

Thomas Jefferson famously said in a letter to John Adams in 1815, “I cannot live without books.” (Ever the worker bee, he added, “but fewer will suffice where amusement, and not use, is the only future object.”)
Neither can I. Yes, yes, I know we are supposed to read everything online, download books, and so forth, but I have a problem with that. When I use my Kindle, I turn the page and find that I have turned 40 or 80 pages, and I can’t get back to the place I left off.
But it’s more than the bother of learning a new technology that is a problem for me.
I like the feel of books in my hands. I like to mark the books I own. I underline phrases and sentences. I put

Indiana’s Zombie Schools

by dianerav

Back in the early 1990s, when the charter school idea first began to spread, there was a simple way of explaining the concept. The charter schools would be accountable for results. If they didn’t get the results, they would close. Period. The deal was called “accountability in exchange for results.” Advocates said it was impossible to close a public school that didn’t get results, but it would be easy to close a charter school.
This is not the way things are working out.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel recently announced the closing of 54 public schools in Chicago. Mayor Bloomberg has closed well over 100 public schools. Parents, students, and teachers have objected loudly, but they are routinely

The Missing Jeb Bush Link

by dianerav

Yesterday, I published a post about how critics were raising questions about Jeb Bush’s financial ties to certain corporations.
I linked to an article in the Tampa Tribune. However, the link was dead. The article had disappeared.
A reader found it. Not on the Tampa Tribune website but here, where it has been preserved for readers. A testament to a free society.

Louisiana: Trust Me with Your Child’s Privacy Rights

by dianerav

Crazy Crawfish has a devastating critique of Louisiana’s plan to turn over confidential student data to inBloom, the company created by Gates and Rupert Murdoch to assemble a vast database for vendors.
Superintendent John White sent out a letter to county superintendents, trying to assure them that there is nothing unususl or invidious about outsourcing private student data to a national database.
Crazy Crawfish used to work in the state department of education. He gives a line by line of John White’s little white lies.

Florida House Passes Corporation Enrichment Bill

by dianerav

The education industry won another battle in Florida, defeating solid opposition from every parent organization in the state.
The Florida House of Representatives passed a “parent trigger” bill, allowing unsuspecting parents to turn their public school over to one of the charter corporations that have–shall we say– undue influence in the legislature.
This is a big win for Jeb Bush, Michelle Rhee, and so-called Parent Revolution, funded by the Waltons, the Gates, the Broads. Parents like us. Regular folks.
The only consolation in this sordid affair is that parents are not stupid. The parent trigger was passed in

California Father | @califather Califather all spiffed up and ready to stream Occupy the DoE! #edchat #soschat #uoodc13

coopmike48 at Big Education Ape - 4 hours ago

California Father | Educating Sullivan: [image: California Father] califather on livestream.com. Broadcast Live Free - ON DEMAND - ABOUT OCCUPY THE DEPT OF ED - HOW TO CHA

Special Diane in DC 4-4-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

coopmike48 at Big Education Ape - 36 minutes ago

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all: *Diane Ravitch* 3h *In DC with Ceresta Smith of Florida and Karran Harper Royal of Néw Orleans *pic.twitter.com/VlEamGq441 More: Texas Legislature Turns Down Vouchers by dianerav Read here for first summary. Will post again when new stories available. Breaking News: Vouchers Fail in Texas! by dianerav Wayne Slater, senior political writer for the Dallas Morning News, tweeted this: @WayneSlater Put a fork in school vouchers in Texas — ban on taxpayer money for private schools passes overwhelming in conservative ... more »

Even in Victory, Trujillo Misrepresents Opposition to Parent Trigger | Scathing Purple Musings

Even in Victory, Trujillo Misrepresents Opposition to Parent Trigger | Scathing Purple Musings:

Even in Victory, Trujillo Misrepresents Opposition to Parent Trigger

by Bob Sikes

The most surprising news from yesterday’s passage of Parent Trigger (HB 867) in the that they Florida House was that there were seven republican votes against it in the final 68-51 tally. What wasn’t surprising was that bill sponsor, Carlos Trujillo, continued with his dubious rhetoric. From Palm Beach Post reporter John Kennedy:

A “parent-trigger” bill pushed by former Gov. Jeb Bush was among several classroom measures Thursday that cleared the Florida House over opposition from Democrats who warned against the expanding role of for-profit schools and online companies.
The trigger bill, recast after failing last year in the Senate, was approved 68-51 by the House following free-swinging debate.
Democrats accused Republicans of looking to help companies seeking taxpayer dollars by taking over failing Florida schools. GOP members fired back, accusing opponents of merely being toadies for the teachers’ union, which is fighting the measure (CS/HB 867).
“I’m glad everybody has read the union’s talking points,” Rep. Carlos Trujillo, R-Miami, the bill’s

Reading between the lines: Florida’s retention program is not worth replicating | Get Schooled

Reading between the lines: Florida’s retention program is not worth replicating | Get Schooled:

Reading between the lines: Florida’s retention program is not worth replicating

by Maureen Downey

Paul Thomas, a Furman University associate professor of education, writes about range of education issues, including the push in South Carolina to follow Florida’s retention policy. This is his second appearance on the Get Schooled blog, but you can read more of his stuff at his “becoming radical” blog.
Thomas sent me this opinion column on the issue of retention. Retention is still one of education’s most hotly debate topics. State policy says Georgia students in grades 3, 5 and 8 should repeat the year when they fail certain standardized tests. But it seldom happens.
The AJC found that districts promote the vast majority of students even if they fail the retest or blow it off altogether.
Here is an excerpt of the 2008 AJC story:

The AJC obtained state databases — with students’ names removed — that contained spring CRCT scores, summer retest scores and students’ grade level the following fall for 2006 and 2007.

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Talk on the street

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Talk on the street:

Talk on the street

by Mike Klonsky

Congressmen Danny Davis and Bobby Rush lead walking tour to dramatize the daily trip students will have to make to their receiving school. Safety is a major concern of parents around the proposed closings.

LOOK OUT KID, THEY KEEP IT ALL HID...

A cabbie who works 125 Clark St. tells me that in addition to the latest round of closures, CPS plans to open 14 new high schools next year, of which 12 will be charters. One is actually called "Social Justice" (not to be confused with the real Greater Lawndale High School for Social Justice on 31st and Kostner). The other two schools are an IB school and a school for the medical professions.

Cabbie's comment: "The madness has yet a new tentacle."

NUMBERS DON'T ADD UP

EdWeek blogger Marilyn Rhames is not a mathematician. But she can add. And when she does, the number

Why Was Atlanta's Beverly Hall Indicted For Racketeering While Michelle Rhee Won't Be? | Black Agenda Report

Why Was Atlanta's Beverly Hall Indicted For Racketeering While Michelle Rhee Won't Be? | Black Agenda Report:

Why Was Atlanta's Beverly Hall Indicted For Racketeering While Michelle Rhee Won't Be?

Wed, 04/03/2013 - 10:27 — Bruce A. Dixon

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By BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon

Atlanta's black former school superintendent and 34 other black teachers and administrators have been indicted for “racketeering” in a cheating scandal. Why aren't others like former DC Schools chancellor Michelle Rhee and her team indicted? Should we be rallying the racial wagons around Dr. Hall and the other 34? No way.