Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 4/2/15 #‎Chuy2015‬

Special Nite Cap - Catch Up on Today's Post 4/2/15

Special Nite Cap 

CORPORATE ED REFORM

 

Click here to go to Jesus "Chuy" Garcia for Mayor of Chicago Website

#‎Chuy2015‬ ‪#‎imwithchuy‬

#DUMPRAHM

Schools Matter: PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat

Schools Matter: PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat: PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat“The education industry represents, in our opinion, the final frontier of a number of sectors once under public control... represents the largest market opportunity... the K-12 market is the Big Enchilada.” — Montgomery Securities prospectus quoted i

3 by mike simpson / 2h 

Eleven Atlanta Educators Have Been Convicted for Cheating Conspiracy, Revealing the Dangers of Standardized Testing — The Atlantic

Eleven Atlanta Educators Have Been Convicted for Cheating Conspiracy, Revealing the Dangers of Standardized Testing — The Atlantic: When Teachers CheatRampant conspiracies to alter kids' scores, including the one that resulted in the recent conviction of 11 Atlanta educators, attest to the dangers of high-stakes testing.The social scientist Donald T. Campbell offered an insightful analysis of Amer

12 by mike simpson / 3h 

PAA Action News: ESEA Action Special Issue!

PAA Action News: ESEA Action Special Issue!: PAA Action NewsApr. 2, 2015 Welcome to PAA Action News, the information and action newsletter of Parents Across America.PAA Action AlertJoin national ESEA testingoutreach day Wednesday April 8The Testing Resistance and Reform Spring network, of which PAA is a member,  is calling for a day of action for ESEA and testing next Wednesday, April 8.On that da

1 by mike simpson / 3h 

Smartest public high schools in the US - Business Insider

Smartest public high schools in the US - Business Insider: The 50 smartest public high schools in the USSome people believe that the best high-school educations come from private schools, but that couldn't be further from the truth.Public schools can provide first-class global educations that prepare students for college and successful careers.The experts at college data website Niche put together

1 by mike simpson / 4h 

Four Things I Want to Say to Novice Teachers - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher

Four Things I Want to Say to Novice Teachers - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher: Four Things I Want to Say to Novice Teachers During the brouhaha over Nancie Atwell's remarks on CNN, my friend and 40-year teaching veteran Claudia Swisher remarked that when she'd first read Atwell's books, she questioned whether the techniques Atwell developed would work in traditional public scho

1 by mike simpson / 4h 

The Network For Public Education | 2015 National Conference – Chicago

The Network For Public Education | 2015 National Conference – Chicago: 2015 National Conference – ChicagoThe Countdown to Chicago Has Begun!If you haven’t registered for the 2nd Annual NPE Conference in Chicago, April 25-26, there is still time! You can register for the conference on our Eventbrite page, and you can also get adiscounted room at the nearby Downtown Marriott Residence Inn.The theme

2 by mike simpson / 5h 

The Lost Purpose of School Reform by Diane Ravitch | NYRblog

The Lost Purpose of School Reform by Diane Ravitch | NYRblog | The New York Review of Books: The Lost Purpose of School ReformDiane RavitchBruce Davidson/Magnum PhotosOne-room schoolhouse near Selma, Alabama, 1965Fifty years ago, Congress passed a federal education law to help poor children get a good public education: the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of 1965. Revised many times,

5 by mike simpson / 5h 

Merryl Tisch Suggests Firing A Lot of Black and Hispanic Teachers | Daniel Katz, Ph.D.

Merryl Tisch Suggests Firing A Lot of Black and Hispanic Teachers | Daniel Katz, Ph.D.: Merryl Tisch Suggests Firing A Lot of Black and Hispanic TeachersNew York Regents Chancellor Dr. Merryl Tisch has been downplaying the potential negative consequences of sweeping changes to teacher tenure and evaluation in the new state budget.  On April 1st, she commented that the new system does not specifica

1 by mike simpson / 5h 

Did Comcast Ghostwrite Rahm Emanuel’s Letter to the FCC? | The Nation

Did Comcast Ghostwrite Rahm Emanuel’s Letter to the FCC? | The Nation: Did Comcast Ghostwrite Rahm Emanuel’s Letter to the FCC?The Chicago mayor’s office confirmed that Comcast advised Emanuel on how to support a proposed merger with Time Warner—but it is refusing to make the communication public.On August 26th of last year, David L. Cohen, a Comcast Executive Vice President, joyously announced th

1 by mike simpson / 5h 

Parent Horror Story from BASIS: Charter school chain “bullying” Black parents? | Cloaking Inequity

Parent Horror Story from BASIS: Charter school chain “bullying” Black parents? | Cloaking Inequity: Parent Horror Story from BASIS: Charter school chain “bullying” Black parents?Everywhere you look there are wonderful stories and elegant arguments about why charters are GREAT for kids… especially poor Latina/os and Blacks. Today Cloaking Inequity has an exclusive— another horror story from a chart

1 by mike simpson / 5h 

Why Has Michelle Rhee "Disappeared"?

Big Education Ape: FBI Capitol sting shines light on Latino caucus - UPDATE on Scandal involving Failed DC Chancellor Michelle Rhee and Calderon - The Sacramento Bee: Education reformer Rhee to leave advocacy group she founded(Reuters) - Education reform advocate Michelle Rhee is stepping down from the nonprofit advocacy group she founded, saying she will focus on her family and the political care

1 by mike simpson / 6h 

Resistance To Standardized Testing Not Going Away

Resistance To Standardized Testing Not Going Away: Resistance To Standardized Testing Not Going AwayParents Can Opt Out - United Opt Out NationalClick Here to go to United Opt Out National: Click Here to go to the Website- United Opt Out TeamClick Here to go to the Website FairTestDoes populist outrage matter anymore? Anyone following the growing resistance to unpopular standardized testing in the

1 by mike simpson / 7h 

What is Title I Portability? - Freedom Outpost

What is Title I Portability? - Freedom Outpost: What is Title I Portability? Education Daily February. 25, 2015, quotes Secretary Duncan."Duncan: 'Hard to fathom' compromise with GOP on Title I portability."What a crock!Let's shine a little light on this. This was the same portability when the Senate Democrats were in power. Their version of the Reauthorization of ESEA in 2013 was called

1 by mike simpson / 7h 

Before Book Deal, Andrew Cuomo Backed Bills That Helped News Corporation

Before Book Deal, Andrew Cuomo Backed Bills That Helped News Corporation: Before Book Deal, Andrew Cuomo Backed Bills That Helped News CorporationNew York Gov. Andrew Cuomo likes to portray himself as a crusader against corruption in Albany, the state's capital, taking a hardline position against allowing state lawmakers to collect outside income that may be connected to pending legislation. He ha

1 by mike simpson / 8h 

Blue Jersey:: Camden's Public School Parents Deserve Vote and Voice in School Closures

Blue Jersey:: Camden's Public School Parents Deserve Vote and Voice in School Closures: Camden's Public School Parents Deserve Vote and Voice in School ClosuresCamden heating up. Promoted by Rosi. Cross-posted from the Local Knowledge Blog.How many signatures would it take to stop a school closure? How many parents coming to meetings would it take to stop a school closure? How many parental votes

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Teacher Education under attack since 2011: Our Response! | BustED Pencils

Teacher Education under attack since 2011: Our Response! | BustED Pencils: Teacher Education under attack since 2011: Our Response!In 2011 I posted the blog below and ticked off some of my teacher education colleagues.  I received messages and notes and voice mails that proclaimed that speaking out in ways that are not “civil” does nothing but hurt our movement.Well check it out and judge for your

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Can't Blame the Teachers for Getting Us Into This Mess | Marc Joseph

Can't Blame the Teachers for Getting Us Into This Mess | Marc Joseph: Can't Blame the Teachers for Getting Us Into This MessIn today's America, why would anyone ever want to become a teacher? The budgets for our classrooms dwindle each year, and teachers continue to take money out of their own pockets to provide their students with supplies. The schools are getting older, and fewer new schools are

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Cuomo: Education reforms are transformative, pro-teacher - Yahoo Finance

Cuomo: Education reforms are transformative, pro-teacher - Yahoo Finance: Cuomo: Education reforms are transformative, pro-teacherDespite fight with unions, Gov. Cuomo calls education reforms transformative, pro-teacherALBANY, N.Y. (AP) -- Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Wednesday touted the contentious educational reforms he fought to include in the state budget as transformative and said that when combined

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Ohio Governor John Kasich & Others Are Either Lying or Misinformed About Who Wrote Common Core | PJ Lifestyle

Ohio Governor John Kasich & Others Are Either Lying or Misinformed About Who Wrote Common Core | PJ Lifestyle: Actually, No, Governors & Classroom Teachers Did NOT Write the Common Core StandardsOhio Governor John Kasich and other defenders are either lying or misinformed.Ohio Governor Kasich appeared on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace in January and made a claim about the origins of th

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Andrew Young Shares His Thoughts and Civil Rights Experiences

Andrew Young Shares His Thoughts and Civil Rights Experiences: Andrew Young Shares His Thoughts and Civil Rights ExperiencesAndrew Young, Jr., former ambassador, civil rights activist, and mayor of Atlanta, spoke to the members of Sacramento’s IndiviZible on March 25 in Oak Park. Young was a close associate of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.(OBSERVER photo by Robert Maryland) OAK PARK — Civil rights i

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

How and why convicted Atlanta teachers cheated on standardized tests - The Washington Post

How and why convicted Atlanta teachers cheated on standardized tests - The Washington Post:How and why convicted Atlanta teachers cheated on standardized testsThen-Atlanta superintendent of public schools Beverly Hall smiles after she was named the 2009 Superintendent of the Year at the American Association of School Administrators’ National Conference on Education in San Francisco. Hall died in M

1 by mike simpson / 9h 

Can ethnic studies classes at Sacramento high schools curb gang violence? Sacramento News & Review

Sacramento News & Review - Can ethnic studies classes at Sacramento high schools curb gang violence? - Bites - Opinions - April 2, 2015: Can ethnic studies classes at Sacramento high schools curb gang violence? One of Sacramento’s best assets is its diversity. The metro area is consistently recognized as one of the most ethnically diverse in the nation. Last year, the UCLA Civil Rights Project

1 by mike simpson / 10h 

Control of L.A. school funds at risk in dispute over teacher evaluations - LA Times

Control of L.A. school funds at risk in dispute over teacher evaluations - LA Times: Control of L.A. school funds at risk in dispute over teacher evaluationsThe state of Washington lost its waiver last year over teacher evaluation issues. Some states and districts have concluded the waiver is not worth the trouble.The waiver “has impeded progress towards working more collaboratively to move our sc

1 by mike simpson / 10h 

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, While Leading In Re-election Runoff Poll, Blocks Release Of Emails To Top Donor ‪#‎Chuy2015‬

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, While Leading In Re-election Runoff Poll, Blocks Release Of Emails To Top Donor: Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, While Leading In Re-election Runoff Poll, Blocks Release Of Emails To Top Donor Heading into the final days of campaigning for re-election, incumbent Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has faced intensifying criticism for being too close to the city’s financial elite. Pr

by mike simpson / 10h 

Pearson is exploiting our children by using them to verify the validity of the SBAC | Seattle Education

Pearson is exploiting our children by using them to verify the validity of the SBAC | Seattle Education: Pearson is exploiting our children by using them to verify the validity of the SBACThe Wall of ShameThe state and school district are spending millions of dollars to buy the copyrighted tests, texts and teaching materials, purchasing computers and setting up the technology to administer the SBA

1 by mike simpson / 10h 

Want to be a Teacher? Don't Join TFA | EdCircuit

Want to be a Teacher? Don't Join TFA | EdCircuit: My Take: Want to be a Teacher? Don’t Join TFA From September 2008 through June 2012, I mentored Teach For America corps members for Fordham University in the Bronx, NY. As a result of my direct work with them in their schools and some basic research, it is clear to me that what the public is told does not match what goes on behind TFA scenes.This j

1 by mike simpson / 10h 

Write Congress to demand less testing, an end to high stakes. | FairTest

Write Congress to demand less testing, an end to high stakes. | FairTest: Write Congress to demand less testing, an end to high stakes.If you want less testing and more learning, tell your US Senatorstoday.This is a critical moment for the fight against test misuse and overuse in our nation's public schools. Congress is currently debating whether to reduce federal testing mandates from annually in

1 by mike simpson / 11h 

Democracy is For Some People | educarenow

Democracy is For Some People | educarenow: Democracy is For Some People ” None of us is free until all of us are free.”  Martin Luther KingLet me start by being very clear.I am a patriot. I am a believer in the stated ideological foundations of the United States of America.I am a believer, for instance, in the ideal of democracy.NOUNa system of government by the whole population or all the eligibl

1 by mike simpson / 11h 

Stumping for Chuy, AFT's Weingarten says Garcia won't make 'scorched earth' decisions #‎Chuy2015‬

Stumping for Chuy, AFT's Weingarten says Garcia won't make 'scorched earth' decisions | Chicago: Stumping for Chuy, AFT's Weingarten says Garcia won't make 'scorched earth' decisionsRandi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, spoke to the City Club of Chicago on Wednesday, April 1, 2015. | Brian Jackson/For The Chicago Sun-Times Jesus “Chuy” Garcia won’t treat the community

1 by mike simpson / 11h 

Teaching is an Affair of The Heart by John Thompson | M. Shannon Hernandez

Teaching is an Affair of The Heart by John Thompson | M. Shannon Hernandez:Teaching is an Affair of The Heart by John Thompson I am honored to feature educator John Thompson on the blog today. He and I met via Twitter, and he is a huge advocate of student-centered reform. More than that, he too believes that more compassion, love, and gratitude in the classroom will make a huge difference in schoo

by mike simpson / 11h 

YESTERDAY

Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 4/1/15 #‎Chuy2015‬

Special Nite Cap - Catch Up on Today's Post 4/1/15Special Nite Cap CORPORATE ED REFORM Click here to go to Jesus "Chuy" Garcia for Mayor of Chicago Website#‎Chuy2015‬ ‪#‎imwithchuy‬#DUMPRAHMCuomo and Mulgrew « Movement of Rank and File EducatorsCuomo and Mulgrew « Movement of Rank and File Educators: Cuomo and MulgrewApril 1, 2015 — 2 Comments“The hedge-fund billionaires and Governor Cuo

3 by mike simpson / 22h 

2015 National Conference – Chicago

The Countdown to Chicago Has Begun!

The Network For Public Education | 2015 National Conference – Chicago 

http://bit.ly/1FQFcQM

Schools Matter: PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat

Schools Matter: PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat:

PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat

“The education industry represents, in our opinion, the final frontier of a number of sectors once under public control... represents the largest market opportunity... the K-12 market is the Big Enchilada.” — Montgomery Securities prospectus quoted in Jonathan Kozol’s The Big Enchilada

Most of the time the charter school industry's corporate leadership is able to craft their messaging so as to distract the populace from the real purposes undergirding their project. Occasionally, someone in their sector goes off script and tells the truth about what chartering is all about. Usually it's those in the sphere of finance capital—gleefully celebrating how lucrative the charter school industry has been for them. The Forbes piece, Charter School Gravy Train Runs Express To Fat City , is an excellent example of this. Sometimes individuals in the neoliberal corporate education reform camp spill the proverbial beans. Industry proselytizers like Andy Smarick and Paul Vallas have been candidly honest about charters discriminating against Students with Disabilities (SWD), and charters eschewing veteran teachers, respectively. Revelations of the dark secrets behind the charter industry's insatiable drive for profits also shine cleansing light on a current local issue—namely the attempts of charter industry profiteer Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez, and his California Charter Schools Association's (CCSA) campaign to capture the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Board of Education seat for District 5. One of Rodriguez's fellow CCSA profiteers inadvertently provided incontrovertible evidence of why the school privatization camp spent over three quarters of a million dollars in the primary election alone.

A Twitter follow from a name I recognized as a marginal player in the corporate education reform camp sparked curiosity. A moment spent checking their LinkedIn profile yielded a veritable gold mine of information unequivocally proving the charter industry's, and particularly CCSA's, drive for profits comes at the expense of children and community. The prose from their profile says it all:

Co-Founder/VP - School Services & Products
California Charter Schools Association
July 2003 – July 2007 (4 years 1 month)
Launched and operated association services and products division providing financial, insurance, special education, and other member services that broke-even the first year and generated 30% profit margins in subsequent years--with 20-30% lead generation and 20-50% close ratios.

Profit margins, lead generation, and close ratios… refreshing honesty from an industry that claims it "puts kids first."

Like the hedge fund managers discussed in the Forbes piece above, platitudes about helping kids are quickly subsumed by talk of plentiful profits, revenues, and business opportunities when charter school executives talk among themselves. This focus on profits drives Ref Rodriguez's CCSA charter school industry trade association to eliminate any political opposition, and also explains their unhinged viciousness and ruthlessness towards the Honorable Bennett Kayser, our sitting LAUSD Board Schools Matter: PROFITS! Why Ref Rodriguez and his CCSA covet the LAUSD Board Seat:

Eleven Atlanta Educators Have Been Convicted for Cheating Conspiracy, Revealing the Dangers of Standardized Testing — The Atlantic

Eleven Atlanta Educators Have Been Convicted for Cheating Conspiracy, Revealing the Dangers of Standardized Testing — The Atlantic:

When Teachers Cheat

Rampant conspiracies to alter kids' scores, including the one that resulted in the recent conviction of 11 Atlanta educators, attest to the dangers of high-stakes testing.

The social scientist Donald T. Campbell offered an insightful analysis of American education in his 1976 paper, "Assessing the Impact of Planned Social Change." One quote in particular stands out—a finding known as "Campbell's Law" that has been used to explain the impact that high-stakes testing is having on the nation's schools:

The more any quantitative social indicator (or even some qualitative indicator) is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.

Yesterday the conviction of 11 former educators in Atlanta on charges related to their involvement in a conspiracy to alter student test scores is an example of this Campbell's Law in action. And this wasn't an isolated scandal.

Perhaps these things happen because of negligence. Maybe the teacher is just a rogue offender—an educator attempting to boost test scores for self-serving reasons. It could be the result of intimidation from top-down management, too.Regardless, the growing prevalence in recent years of dishonest practices such as these suggests that something is amiss within America's schools. This new era of School Accountability 2.0 is contingent on the data gleaned from incessant standardized testing like the new Common Core exams—a recipe that doesn't bode well for classroom ethics. School districts are increasingly tying teacher pay to performance, and there's no consensus on the best way to measure student proficiency, so the high test scores are starting to look a lot like money. What emerges is bad news: a carrot-and-stick approach to a sector of the workforcethat many consider to be underpaid.

"They have made their bed and they're going to have to lie in it, and it starts today."

For many, justice was served yesterday when the educators were convicted on charges of racketeering for their role in the high-profile conspiracy, dating back to 2005, to inflate the scores on their students' standardized tests. The group was presumably motivated by the ever-increasing pressure from policymakers to fulfill federal and local performance expectations, which determined their eligibility for perks such as bonuses and even their employment status.

Yesterday's verdict marked the end to a years-long legal process—notorious proceedings that muddied Atlanta's one-time reputation for its apparent success in spearheading one of the nation's most impressive school reformations in recent history. The Atlanta school district's now-deceased superintendent, Beverly Hall, was even recognized as the National Superintendent of the Year in 2009—just months before the Atlanta Journal-Constitution started publishing aseries of stories that raised questions about anomalies in student test scores. A few years later, that reporting evolved into a large-scale investigation into the data titled "Cheating Our Children," eventually expanding their probe to "test integrity nationwide."

After the verdict was read yesterday, the defendants appealed the judge, Jerry Baxter, asking that he refrain from immediately sending the teachers to jail. But they failed to sway Baxter, who responded, "they have made their bed and they're going to have to lie in it, and it starts today." In a statement issued yesterday, the Atlanta Board of Education described the verdict as a closure to "a sad and tragic chapter for Atlanta Public Schools." The board touted the district's new superintendent, Meria Carstarphen, for implementing reforms "to make sure something like this never happens again."

"Challenges remain, for sure," the statement says, "but we are making progress every day and there is great reason to be optimistic."

The Journal-Constitution's findings prompted a two-year-long state investigation into the issue, which concluded that nearly 180 educators, including roughly three dozen principals, had engaged in wrongdoing as part of efforts to manipulate kids' performance metrics and exaggerate achievement levels at at least 44 schools. Then, in 2013, a grand jury indicted 35 educators,including Hall, on various charges including racketeering and theft. Most of them pleaded guilty to lesser charges, but a dozen of them opted to go to trial, which lasted roughly half a year and saw more than 100 witnesses taking the stand, their testimonies totaling thousands of pages. (Two defendants, including Hall, died before they could stand trial.) One former elementary school teacher, Dessa Curb, was acquitted of all charges; the rest of them, however, now face Eleven Atlanta Educators Have Been Convicted for Cheating Conspiracy, Revealing the Dangers of Standardized Testing — The Atlantic:

PAA Action News: ESEA Action Special Issue!

PAA Action News: ESEA Action Special Issue!:

PAA Action News

Apr. 2, 2015

Welcome to PAA Action News, the information and action newsletter of Parents Across America.

PAA Action Alert

Join national ESEA testing outreach day Wednesday April 8 The Testing Resistance and Reform Spring network, of which PAA is a member,  is calling for a day of action for ESEA and testing next Wednesday, April 8. On that day we are asking you to call your Senators and, if you tweet, send out and retweet others' Twitter messages beginning at 1 pm ET, 10 am PT. We'll share some suggested tweets and an official hashtag early next week. Why should you get involved in ESEA? As we've been telling you over and over in this newsletter (!) reauthorization of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA- formerly No Child Left Behind or NCLB) is moving towards a possible end point very soon. So many of our readers - active parents, teachers and others - are so deep in the trenches with local fights that it's hard to have the time or energy to take on federal education laws. You may be opting out of spring tests, speaking out for better funding, advocating for lower class size and more learning time, or challenging charter school expansion, high-stakes testing, and student data sharing in your district or state. But ESEA affects all of these things. Fixing ESEA will make a difference in your local fights. And the opportunity to change ESEA only comes around once every few years.    Let's take testing as a prime example. The test mania that we hate so much really took hold after the George W. Bush administration turned ESEA into NCLB and changed the grade span testing mandate to an annual testing requirement. We can't fix everything in ESEA - though we've been trying! - but we do have a chance to decrease the amount of and the stakes placed on standardized testing by supporting Option 1 of the Senate ESEA proposal.  We still think that the best way to be heard is to visit your Senators and Congressional representatives in their home offices while they are home for spring break, now through April 10. If at all possible, it would be even better to visit on April 8,    our national day of action for ESEA and testing.  You can call the local offices and make an appointment. If you can't get in to see the actual legislator, you can still make a major impression by meeting with his/her legislative aide, talking to any aide, or even just physically showing up at the office and leaving a written or verbal message (see below). Find their home office contact info at senate.gov and house.gov. What to say??? Legislators have a lot of issues to deal with. What really sticks in their minds are personal stories that illustrate the issues you care about. You know what those stories are - they are the experiences that made you reach out to PAA! For background, you can stick to the first point listed below, which relates to testing. Then if you want to share the other three points, and others that you care about, go for it!   We strongly support the Option 1 proposal for grade span testing. While this won't end the current misuse and overuse of standardized tests, it can help ease the testing mania gripping our nation. We believe that the existing NAEP test - expanded nationwide - can provide the necessary accountability check and balance on carefully designed local assessments. We further ask for your support for enhanced local control in deciding how to evaluate teachers and schools: we oppose the use of standardized test scores as major determinants of teacher or school evaluation. We believe in supporting the public schools in our communities. Research shows that these schools generally outperform charter schools while serving a larger proportion of special needs students. We oppose programs that take scarce funds away from our neighborhood schools in favor of expanding charter schools or providing voucher funds for private schools which are not accountable to the community and have not proven to be better alternatives. With more than half of all public school children now living in poverty, we believe that federal funding must grow to meet the students' growing needs and growing demands on our schools. You can also share: PAA's position paper, Testing and ESEA, a copy of PAA's one-page ESEA position paper, "What Parents Value and how Congress should act," PAA's 1-page chart on the Senate bill for Senators, and our 1-page chart on HR 5 for Congressional reps.   Finally, if you haven't already used this handy FairTest form on grade-span testing, do it now!

Mark your calendars!

Save the date! New PAA webinar on charter school accountability PAA is co-hosting another webinar on Tuesday, May 5, at 8 pm ET, with the Center for Popular Democracy. We'll be talking about CPD's recent survey on charter school accountability. The study, done with In the Public Interest, found that voters want greater oversight for charter schools and more assurance that charters won't hurt other public schools by drawing students away. We'll also talk about another new CPD report, this one on charter school fraud in California. The study found that: California's charter oversight system's deficiencies suggest that the $81,400,000 in fraud, waste and abuse by charter operators that has been uncovered to date is likely just the tip of the iceberg. Based on conservative estimates, California stands to lose more than $100 million to charter school fraud in 2015. The vast majority of this fraud perpetrated by charter officials will go undetected because California lacks the oversight necessary to identify the fraud We'll have the registration information for you in our next newsletter.  Join fellow PAAers at the NPE conference!  Several PAAers will be in Chicago for the April 24-26 Network for Public Education (NPE) conference and we're planning to get together for a little socializing and some PAA talk before the start of the conference, on Friday the 24th at about 4 pm, somewhere convenient to the conference venue. Even if you aren't an official PAA chapter or affiliate leader, or if you're thinking about starting a PAA chapter and have some questions, we'd love to see you! Please contact Julie for details and to RSVP: JulieW@parentsacrossamerica.org  You can still register for the NPE conference   We're looking forward to seeing lots of friends at the NPE conference. PAA will offer a workshop on the Impact of Race, Cultural Bias, and Poverty on Educational Opportunity. Register here for the conference if you have not already done so.  Looking way ahead.... PAA annual conference in DC We have set tentative dates for our annual conference in DC - July 20-24, 2015. Pencil us in!   PAA Action News: ESEA Action Special Issue!:

Smartest public high schools in the US - Business Insider

Smartest public high schools in the US - Business Insider:

The 50 smartest public high schools in the US

Some people believe that the best high-school educations come from private schools, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

Public schools can provide first-class global educations that prepare students for college and successful careers.

The experts at college data website Niche put together a list of the smartest public high schools in the US based primarily on state-assessment proficiency, the colleges that students go on to, AP enrollment and exam pass rates, graduation rates, and composite ACT and SAT scores.

Because there isn't a good 1-to-1 ratio for ACT to SAT score comparison, the SAT composite scores are expressed here as a range. You can read more about Niche's methodology here.

Read more Which are the 50 smartest public high schools in the US: http://www.businessinsider.com/smartest-public-schools-in-the-us-2015-4?op=1#ixzz3WC7FoVA7

Read: America’s Richest School Districts

America’s Richest School Districts

The average income of Americans differs by state, county, city and ZIP code, obviously. At each level, the amount residents earn every year impacts available government services, health and overall quality of life. This is especially true when education is examined by school district.

Read: America’s Richest School Districts

Read: America’s Poorest School Districts 

24/7 Wall St. analyzed Census data from 2006 through 2010 for each of the more than 10,000 unified school districts in the United States. Wealth appears to have an outsized effect on education at the local level. Residents that live in wealthy school districts have among the best schools in the nation based on graduation rates, test scores and independent ratings of academic success. Children who attend these schools are more likely to earn a college degree than the national average. To illustrate the influence wealth and poverty have on educational attainment, 24/7 Wall St. examined the wealthiest and poorest school districts in the country.

Nearly all of the wealthiest school districts are within a short distance of one of the richest cities in the country. Other than one suburb of Portland, Ore., all of the wealthiest school districts are commuter towns of New York City, located in either Fairfield County, Conn., or Westchester County, N.Y. The poorest districts are rural communities scattered all over the country, from Ohio and Kentucky to Texas and Mississippi.

Read more: America’s Richest School Districts - 24/7 Wall St. http://247wallst.com/special-report/2012/06/06/americas-richest-school-districts/#ixzz3WC7sTCmV
Follow us: @247wallst on Twitter | 247wallst on Facebook

Four Things I Want to Say to Novice Teachers - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher

Four Things I Want to Say to Novice Teachers - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher:

Four Things I Want to Say to Novice Teachers

 During the brouhaha over Nancie Atwell's remarks on CNN, my friend and 40-year teaching veteran Claudia Swisher remarked that when she'd first read Atwell's books, she questioned whether the techniques Atwell developed would work in traditional public schools. After fully absorbing Atwell's ideas, however, she began incorporating them--and found them not only useful, but transformative.

I hope this is what happens with all the novice teachers who are up in arms at being told that public schools no longer welcome the creativity and vitality of new classroom practitioners. If Atwell's honest comments left you angry, go deeper into the rich instructional ideas in her books. Turn your irritation into a learning experience.

If I were leading an organization of pre-service teachers, here's what I would tell them:     

 Welcome to a Changed Profession. Nobody is "discouraging" you from becoming a teacher.In fact, we want you to become career teachers--not tried-it-and-ran temps--so we're honoring you, by telling you the truth. Which is: this is not your mother's profession. Things have changed, even in the years since you graduated high school.

We warmly welcome your new ideas, energy and enthusiasm. But sticking with teaching these days will require more than grit and a tool bag of instructional strategies.  In order to re-shape teaching and learning, to become the innovative, dedicated, future-focused professional teacher in your personal vision, you need to see the big picture: What is the conventional wisdom around the future of public education in America? Is that conventional wisdom the truth? Plan on changing your mind a dozen times in your first year of independent practice. 

Beware of Media Oversell. Media campaigns are just that: what the public has been fed, by people whose job it is to promote certain programs and initiatives. I #loveteaching, too--but I've been paying careful attention to the evolution of public school teaching for more than forty years. We can't paper over the recent influx of top-down mandates--endless standardized everything, loss of teacher control over curriculum and instruction, evaluation by test data--with clever hashtags or faux outrage (like that directed at Nancie Atwell).  I genuinely love teaching too much to hand it over, lock, stock and whiteboard, to hired guns who are shaping MY work according to the dictates of funders.

Scrutinize the glossy websites of non-profit educational organizations. Analyze books and articles written by hot young (non-teacher) authors. Ask yourself: What ideas are they selling? Who will benefit? Another way of expressing this necessity of evaluating media soundbites around K-12 education (first popularized by Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner, in their seminal,