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Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Education Activist Groups – Defend-Ed

Education Activist Groups – Defend-Ed:

DEFEND-ED
UNASHAMEDLY PRO-FAMILY AND PRO-TEACHER


EDUCATION ACTIVIST GROUPS


updated Aug 20, 2014
Facebook-Likes.resized
Here’s a collection of Internet-based groups and organizations working to defend education.
Use the contact form if you would like to submit others.


BADASS PARENTS ASSOCIATION:

BADASS TEACHERS ASSOCIATION:

BAT State Groups:

CONVERSATIONED:

DEFEND-ED (NOT AFFILIATED WITH DEFEND-ED.ORG):

EDUCATION OPPORTUNITY NETWORK:

FAIRTEST:

FLORIDA STOP COMMON CORE GROUPS:

LEFT/RIGHT ALLIANCE FOR EDUCATION:

NYS REFUSE THE TESTS:

OPT-OUT ORLANDO:

PARENTS AND TEACHERS AGAINST THE COMMON CORE:

PARENTS AND EDUCATORS AGAINST THE COMMON CORE STANDARDS:

PRINCIPALS WITH PRINCIPLES:

PUBLIC SCHOOLS: SEEKING COMMON GROUND

SPECIAL ED ADVOCATES TO STOP COMMON CORE:

TEACHERS LETTERS TO OBAMA:

TRUTH IN AMERICAN EDUCATION:

TEACHERS LETTERS TO OBAMA:

UNCOMMONLY GOOD EDUCATION:

UNITED OPT OUT

Education Activist Groups – Defend-Ed:

COMMON CORE

Stop Common Core  Groups

Ohio Educators and Parents: www.facebook.com/StopCommonCoreOhio
Washington State:
    1. Seattle:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/SeattleFamiliesUnite/
    2. East King County: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1417569738501639/
    3. South King County: https://www.facebook.com/groups/673409409439800/
    4. Edmonds: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1497611817158075/
    5. Pierce-Thurston County: https://www.facebook.com/groups/PierceThurstonCountyCommonCoreConcernedCitizen 

Facebook Pages:
  1. East Valley School District: https://www.facebook.com/eastvalleycitizensoncommoncore
  2. WA State: https://www.facebook.com/WashingtonUnite
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Through ALS, Educator Vivian Connell's Voice Persists | WUNC

Through ALS, Educator Vivian Connell's Voice Persists | WUNC:

Through ALS, Educator Vivian Connell's Voice Persists



Vivian Connell speaks at the Speak Out 4 Teachers rally in Raleigh, November 2013
CREDIT VIVIAN CONNELL




 When Vivian Connell was in college, she was already a teachers' advocate. She was on CNN in the network's early years to talk about a teacher's wrongful termination at the University of Georgia. But she wanted more people to hear her voice.

When Vivian became a teacher, she amplified it through her students. They advocated for land conservancies and against genocide in Africa. But she still wanted to be louder.
When Vivian decided to go back to school for a law degree, the plan was to become an effective lobbyist for public education. The most powerful people in North Carolina would finally hear her.
And when Vivian Connell was diagnosed with ALS last year, she had to come to terms with the idea that her voice would soon be silent.  
But along the way, she had inspired so many people that they started speaking for her. National education analyst Diane Ravitch told Vivian's story on her blog. Donations started pouring in for her classes. And she had become an advocate for teachers across the state. Her voice was stronger than ever.
Host Frank Stasio talks with Connell about her life and work as a teacher and teachers' advocate.
Connell writes about education and ALS on her blog, finALS.
She is the guest of honor at a benefit for the Public Justice Foundation on April 10 at the Cat's Cradle in Carrboro. It will feature a documentary about REM, one of the bands Connell photographed in college, and songs from the PopUp Chorus.
RELATED PROGRAM: 
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Pearson Priority 1 Alert Cheaters, beware: Test-givers are monitoring social media postings | Education | The News Tribune

Cheaters, beware: Test-givers are monitoring social media postings | Education | The News Tribune:

Cheaters, beware: Test-givers are monitoring social media postings




How far should school testing systems go to ensure students aren’t cheating on state tests?
The Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC), the organization responsible for the state tests Washington students began taking this month, published a memo during last year’s field testing of the new assessments.
It urged educators to be vigilant about possible test “security breaches” on social media.
Last year’s memo suggested that kids be invited to join school Facebook pages or follow school Twitter accounts. It suggested asking students who join school Twitter accounts for their names, and searching the news feeds and photo galleries of students with public Facebook pages for possible leaks.
Educators were asked to search for computer screen images showing test items, or photos taken inside testing rooms — including student testing selfies.
This year, SBAC has softened its guidance somewhat. But it hasn’t totally abandoned social media watchdog efforts.
The organization, which is based at UCLA, said it will have college student clerks and an SBAC communications specialist monitor social media Mondays through Fridays only, from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. They will be looking for hashtags such as #smarterbalanced or #commoncore that might clue them in about relevant postings.
If they spot test questions being posted by students on public accounts, they will contact the state education agency.
State officials are then advised to contact the student’s school. Schools will get in touch with parents and students and deal with the situation according to their disciplinary rules, requesting that students remove test item postings.
SBAC Deputy Director Luci Willits said she’s too new to the organization to know whether the strategy refinement came about as a result of complaints from last year’s field testers.
“That is not our policy now,” she said of the field test security memo.
Test security is important to maintaining the integrity of the test, according to SBAC. If students post test items online, those items may have to be removed from future tests.
“If a student has an open social media account and is posting test questions, they are hurting other students by not allowing them to have an authentic testing experience,” Willits said.
She said that if teachers spot students using cellphones during a test, they should take away the cellphone.
Willits said that about 4 million students nationwide participated in last year’s field tests of the Smarter Balanced assessment. She said there were only about 75 reported instances of security breaches.
This year, she said, the number is lower. But testing is not yet complete for the year.
Washington state testing director Robin Munson said students sign an agreement before they take the SBAC test that pledges them to maintain test security.
She said she has received fewer than five security alerts this year, as testing gets underway in Washington.Cheaters, beware: Test-givers are monitoring social media postings | Education | The News Tribune:
Read more here: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2015/03/31/3711736_cheaters-beware-test-givers-are.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy
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Louisiana Educator: White, the Beneficiary of Extremist Politics now Opposes Such

Louisiana Educator: White, the Beneficiary of Extremist Politics now Opposes Such:

White, the Beneficiary of Extremist Politics now Opposes Such




State Superintendent John White prides himself in using smart sound bites, talking points and misleading rhetoric as a way of selling his views in the education reform battles. In a press conference Monday, White referred to efforts to derail the Common Core State Standards in Louisiana as an "extremist" plan. In this slick quotable quote, White was obviously referring to the growing wave of parental opposition to the incomprehensible CCSS standards and the accompanying imitation PARCC testing. I believe that characterizing concerned and frustrated parents as "extremists" is a tactical mistake this time. It is very similar to the recent statement by U. S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan claiming that some "white suburban moms" were worried that the new testing may reveal that their children were not so brilliant after all. Duncan was forced to backtrack on those statements, and you can be sure that White's attack on concerned parents will only increase their determination to remove Common Core and probably White along with it!

This is not the first time that White has been tripped up by his own fancy New York rhetoric. During the time White was involved in confirmation hearings before the Senate, one of his emails revealed that he was "muddying up the rhetoric" about his failure to properly investigate some of the shaky voucher schools, that were enrolling students even though they had no teachers and inadequate facilities. Later White was found to be covering up some of the glaring flaws in the teacher evaluation system by signing on to the "Seabaugh solution".  Another semantic trick used by White was referring to the loss of teacher tenure, seniority rights, step raises  and the imposition of a sloppy merit pay system as a way of "empowering" teachers. More recently, White wanted to "empower" principals by requiring that they getfewer highly effective evaluations. Educators have learned the hard way that when White uses the term "empower" in reference to educators they had better brace themselves for a not so pleasant assault on their rights and benefits.

White has gotten pretty much gotten his way so far, but the Louisiana Educator: White, the Beneficiary of Extremist Politics now Opposes Such:
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Choosing Reform-Minded Urban Superintendents | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Choosing Reform-Minded Urban Superintendents | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

Choosing Reform-Minded Urban Superintendents








 If I had to choose an urban superintendent between Michelle Rhee in Washington,D.C.(2007-2010) and  John Deasy in Los Angeles Unfied School District (2011-2014), I would choose Christopher Steinhauser, Long Beach (CA) superintendent since 2002. Why? Because Rhee and Deasy were sprinters in a job that requires marathoners like Steinhauser. Both Rhee and Deasy knew that teachers were the linchpin to achieve any degree of success and both ended up alienating the very people they depended upon. Steinhauser and his predecessor, Carl Cohn, who had served a decade earlier built close ties with their teachers over two decades.

Why are there so few long distance runners among urban superintendents? Answer: Sprinters want 180 degree change fast; in doing so, they rarely gain respect and confidence of teachers; marathoners work with teachers steadily from day 1 of their tenure.
Boston’s former superintendent Thomas W. Payzant, Carl Cohn of the Long Beach, Calif., school district, and Laura Schwalm of California’s Garden Grove Unified School District served a decade or longer. To be sure, these long-serving chiefs were beset with problems that went unsolved and criticism that stung but all of them remained quietly and steadily effective. Their teachers, by and large, were supportive of their school chiefs’ efforts even when local teacher unions disagreed with parts of each one’s reform agenda. These superintendents sought incremental changes moving carefully and slowly toward their goals walking hand-in-hand with teachers and their unions.
Sprinter superintendents, however, embrace a reform agenda that assumed what existed in each of their districts when they became school chiefs was awful and had to be dumped. They refused to be identified with the status quo. Out with the old, in with the new. And fast. The “new” and “fast” meant swift fundamental change, especially with teachers and administrators. On the Richter scale of reform, fundamental change translated to major earthquakes of 7.0 and above. No changes that registered as tremors.
So Rhee, appointed by D.C.’s elected mayor, Adrian Fenty, fired both teachers and principals within the early months of her brief tenure in D.C. She pushed through new salary arrangements where experienced and effective teachers would increase their salaries dramatically but would have to give up tenure in exchange. As a former Teach for America alumna, she relied upon recruiting from that pool of new teachers and elevated other alumni to administrativeposts.Her statements about teachers and administrators who had been in the D.C.  schools prior to her arrival were tinged with disrespect for their work in Choosing Reform-Minded Urban Superintendents | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:
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Where the hell are CT's union leaders as AFT National President Randi Weingarten supports parents who opt out - Wait What?

Where the hell are CT's union leaders as AFT National President Randi Weingarten supports parents who opt out - Wait What?:

Where the hell are CT’s union leaders as AFT National President Randi Weingarten supports parents who opt out








According to a breaking story posted by the nation’s leading public education advocate Diane Ravitch,   Randi Weingarten – the national president of the American Federation of Teachers – has announced her strong support for parents who are opting their children out of the unfair, inappropriate and discriminatory Common Core testing.
Diane Ravitch reports that Weingarten announced yesterday that, “if she were a parent of children in the public schools… she would opt out too.”
As Diane Ravitch goes on to explain opting out is,
“A clear, unambiguous message to governors and legislators, to Congress and the Obama administration that testing is out of control.
Testing is not teaching.
Since the passage of NCLB in 2001-02, billions of dollars have been spent on test prep and testing. In the case of the Common Core tests, the results are not reported for 4-6 months, the teacher is not allowed to see what students got right or wrong.
The tests have no diagnostic value. None. They are used solely to rank and rate students, teachers, principals, and schools.
Furthermore, they are designed to fail the majority of students because of the absurd “cut scores” (passing mark)… Most children will “fail” …
We are the most over tested nation in the world.”
Ravitch is absolutely right and the list of teacher unions and teacher union leaders who are supporting parents’ right to opt out of the disastrous Common Core testing scheme continues to grow.
But here in Connecticut the silence from the Connecticut Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers – Connecticut Chapter remains deafening…
Is kowtowing to Governor Dannel Malloy and the Corporate Education Reform Industry worth so much that these some union leaders will refuse to step forward and defend Connecticut’s parents, students and teachers who understand just how bad the Common Core SBAC test is for our children and our schools?
Malloy’s thin skin and vengeance is legendary but there is simply no excuse for the lack of action on the part of the leadership of Connecticut’s two teacher unions.
Last fall, the American Federation of Teachers – Connecticut Chapter endorsed Dannel Malloy without even allowing other candidates to fill out a questionnaire, meet with their political endorsing committee or address their executive committee.
The leadership of the Connecticut Education Association went so far as to overrule their Where the hell are CT's union leaders as AFT National President Randi Weingarten supports parents who opt out - Wait What?:
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Heads Up! HR 5 (Student Success Act) Coming Back As Soon As April 6 | deutsch29

Heads Up! HR 5 (Student Success Act) Coming Back As Soon As April 6 | deutsch29:

Heads Up! HR 5 (Student Success Act) Coming Back As Soon As April 6










 A heads-up for those who celebrated on February 27, 2015, the pulling of HR 5 (Student Success Act) from a vote before Congress:

Word is that it is slated to return– without change– after Easter.
This means as soon as the week of April 6, 2015.
As was true of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), one of the major goals of HR 5 is to cement mandatory standardized testing into grades 3 through 8 by tying it to federal education funding to states.
And like NCLB, student test scores are supposed to be incorporated into grading schools.
Here is the Network for Public Education’s (NPE) distilled criticism of HR 5:
There are four crucial issues [regarding HR 5]:
  • Requires that states test all children in grades 3-8 and once in high school, even though no high performing nation tests all children every year 
  • Makes Title I funds portable, which will decrease funding to the schools in greatest need, and opens the door for vouchers
  • Limits Title II funding to 10% for class size reduction
  • Increases funding for charter schools and encourages the growth and expansion of Charter Management Organizations (CMOs), which will advance the privatization movement
In February,, Obama threatened to veto HR 5, mostly because of the portable money and federal budget capping, it seems:
“Rather than investing more in schools, [the Republican bill] would allow states to divert education funding away from the schools and students who need it the most through the so-called ‘portability’ provision,” said the OMB statement. “The bill’s caps on federal education spending would lock in recent federal budget cuts for the rest of the decade, and the bill would allow funds currently required to be used for education to be used for other purposes, such as spending on sports stadiums or tax cuts for the wealthy.”
The testing Obama is fine with.
Don’t be blindsided by its reintroduction immediately following a major holiday. Contract your congressmen now.
NPE has a form for this purpose here.
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