Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 9/1/15 #FightForDyett

SPECIAL NITE CAP 

CORPORATE ED REFORM

Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contract | Bright Light Small City

Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contract | Bright Light Small City: Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contractBackground: In early August, several Minneapolis teachers contacted me about an early literacy training session they had been to. What happened there shocked and offended many of them. I am happy

by mike simpson / 11min 

Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonight

Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonight: Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonightOn the 16th day of the Dyett High School hunger strike, protestors and supporters will join the strikers for a candlelight vigil.The 12 hunger strikers and the Coalition to Revitalize Dyett will gather outside of the Tribune Tower, 435 N. Michigan Ave., by the DuSable bust at 7:30 p.m. tonight, join

by mike simpson / 1h 

Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American men | Educate All Students: Larry Miller's Blog

Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American men | Educate All Students: Larry Miller's Blog: Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American menSunday August 30: Chuck Todd, the host of Meet the Press, questioned Walker about Wisconsin having a higher incarceration rate of African-American m

by mike simpson / 1h 

The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues - The Washington Post

The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues - The Washington Post: The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issuesHere is a new post from pediatric occupational therapist Angela Hanscom, author of a number of popular posts on this blog, including “Why so many kids can’t sit still in school today,” as well as “The right — and surprisingly wrong — ways t

by mike simpson / 2h 

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures | Hmong Innovating Politics

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures | Hmong Innovating Politics: 8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures1.  4 out of the 7 closed schools have re-openedIn January 2013, Sacramento City Unified School District and former Superintendent Jonathan Raymond proposed the closure of twelve (12) neighborhood elementary schools. Of those twelve

by mike simpson / 2h 

Common Core SBAC testing – Big Cost, No Value - Wait What?

Common Core SBAC testing – Big Cost, No Value - Wait What?: Common Core SBAC testing – Big Cost, No ValueOver the past two years Connecticut taxpayers have dropped $32 million on the Common Core SBAC tests and another $12.4 million for implementation of the Common Core.  The Connecticut state budget allocates another $43.1 million for the Common Core and Common Core SBAC tests for this year and ne

by mike simpson / 3h 

Standardized testing cripples educational goals - The Daily Athenaeum: Opinion

Standardized testing cripples educational goals - The Daily Athenaeum: Opinion: Standardized testing cripples educational goals At the end of every year in high school, a week was dedicated to the longest, most mind-numbing standardized test imaginable. We were taken to the gymnasium, spaced three feet apart and tested on our skills in reading, mathematics, history and science.Since my younger sis

by mike simpson / 3h 

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mind

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mind: Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mindhttp://imgur.com/IDzwas5Rahm finally meets with Dyett hunger strikers. But makes no commitments. Strike continues into Day 16. The Sun-Times  reporter Stefano Esposito keeps referring to last night's public response at Rahm's budget hearing, as a "gripe se

by mike simpson / 5h 

WV MetroNews – Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiency

WV MetroNews – Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiency: Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiencyWELCH, W.Va. — The partners involved in Reconnecting McDowell will next focus their efforts on addressing school absenteeism and ensuring all students reach reading proficiency by the 3rd grade as part of a larger education and

by mike simpson / 6h 

A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public Education · Change.org

Petition · Citizens who care about public, Teachers, students, parents, and teacher educators: A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public Education · Change.org: A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public EducationreClaiming the Conversation on EducationTeachers, students, parents, and teacher educators!For decades politicians, corporate titans, businesspeople, and some compliant educators have bombarded

by mike simpson / 7h 

Can Digital Games Improve Our Schools? - Living in Dialogue

Can Digital Games Improve Our Schools? - Living in Dialogue: Can Digital Games Improve Our Schools?By John Thompson.With The Game Believes in You, Greg Toppo joins the ranks of great authors like Anya Kamenetz and James Paul Gee, who articulate a new, dynamic, creative, and holistic path to 21st– century schools. Like Kamenetz, Toppo shows how assessments embedded in computer games could inform au

by mike simpson / 7h 

Thompson: Fact Checking the New Orleans Reformers' Spin This Week In Education:

This Week In Education: Thompson: Fact Checking the New Orleans Reformers' Spin: Thompson: Fact Checking the New Orleans Reformers' SpinWhen I first read the Education Research Alliance (ERA) report on the effectiveness of the competition-driven New Orleans model of reform, it was clear that true believers in "relinquishment" and market-driven reform would be disappointed by its findings

by mike simpson / 7h 

CURMUDGUCATION: Minneapolis Terrible Reading Choices

CURMUDGUCATION: Minneapolis Terrible Reading Choices: Minneapolis Terrible Reading ChoicesImagine that you are a Native American teacher, working with six year old students, and you come back to start the school year, only to discover that the district would like you to teach your students that Christopher Columbus "discovered" America, as if your own ancestors had never even existed. Or

by mike simpson / 7h 

With eye on local control, Newark officials push to speed up state evaluation process | NJ.com

With eye on local control, Newark officials push to speed up state evaluation process | NJ.com: With eye on local control, Newark officials push to speed up state evaluation processNEWARK — City school officials are throwing their support behind a measure aims to speed up a evaluation process that could prove critical in determining just how soon Newark's schools could emerge from two decades of s

by mike simpson / 7h 

The Fight Over Dyett High School | #FightForDyett | WTTW

The Fight Over Dyett High School | Chicago Tonight | WTTW: The Fight Over Dyett High SchoolThough Chicago Public Schools decided to phase out a low-performing, under-enrolled school in the city's Bronzeville neighborhood, it has agreed to reopen the school in the 2016-2017 school year.The district has opened a request for proposals for the school to be reinvented, but a coalition of activists have

by mike simpson / 8h 

Teaching English at Mission High School (Kristina Rizga) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Teaching English at Mission High School (Kristina Rizga) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice: Teaching English at Mission High School (Kristina Rizga)This is the second post (see here) drawn from journalist Kristina Rizga’s account of teaching and learning at San Francisco Unified School District’s Mission High School. Rizga is a journalist who spent four years observing and inte

by mike simpson / 8h 

Dyett hunger strikers begin third week without food - #FightForDyett

Dyett hunger strikers begin third week without food - Chicago Tribune: Dyett hunger strikers begin third week without food Dyett hunger strikers begin third week without food, call on Mayor Emanuel to move meeting to an earlier date. Aug. 31, 2015. (WGN-TV)Dyett hunger strikers begin third week without food - Chicago Tribune:

by mike simpson / 8h 

Louisiana Educator: The Great Predatory Charter School Ripoff

Louisiana Educator: The Great Predatory Charter School Ripoff: The Great Predatory Charter School RipoffLafayette group Exposes Charter Enrollment ViolationThis story in the Lafayette advertiser helps to demonstrate for us what a predatory charter school does. But the Advertiser story only describes the tip of the iceberg of charter school profiteering.Thank you to the public school advocates of t

by mike simpson / 8h 

CURMUDGUCATION: 4 Bad Business Practices for Education

CURMUDGUCATION: 4 Bad Business Practices for Education: 4 Bad Business Practices for Education"Schools should run like a business" is one of the modern reformster mantras, and schools are so obviously NOT businesses that we can end up overlooking the other problem with this idea-- that reformsters often mean to incorporate practices that aren't even good business practices.If you have fr

by mike simpson / 8h 

Children Don’t Have Constitutional Right to Switch Schools, Appeals Court Rules - WSJ

Children Don’t Have Constitutional Right to Switch Schools, Appeals Court Rules - WSJ: Children Don’t Have Constitutional Right to Switch Schools, Appeals Court RulesParents aren’t guaranteed public-school choice in Arkansas caseAspen School District students head to their buses after the first day of class in Aspen, Colo., last Wednesday. PHOTO: JEREMY WALLACE/ASSOCIATED PRESSPublic-school parent

by mike simpson / 8h 

I’m a Teacher. What’s your Superpower?! - Lily's Blackboard

I’m a Teacher. What’s your Superpower?! - Lily's Blackboard: I’m a Teacher. What’s your Superpower?!I love seeing bumper stickers in praise of teachers.• Teachers Rule.• Those who can, TEACH. Those who cannot, pass laws about teaching.• Teachers have class.• Teachers make all other occupations possible.• You can’t scare me, I’m a teacher.• And one of my favorites, a quote from Frederick Douglass,

by mike simpson / 9h 

CURMUDGUCATION: If You Want To Help Chester Uplands...

CURMUDGUCATION: If You Want To Help Chester Uplands...: If You Want To Help Chester Uplands...If you have not been following the story, know that Chester Uplands School District in Pennsylvania is currently so broke that its teachers and staff are working without pay. You can read up on it here,here and here.Thanks to a commenter on this blog, I can point you to three places where you can help.PSE

by mike simpson / 9h 

NY State ed commissioner clarifies position on standardized tests | WBFO

State ed commissioner clarifies position on standardized tests | WBFO: State ed commissioner clarifies position on standardized testsState Education Commissioner Mary Ellen Elia says she won’t prevent parents who want their children to skip the state’s standardized tests from doing so.ListenListening...3:07The commissioner detailed her views on the controversial Opt Out movement in an interview wi

by mike simpson / 9h 

How the Billionaire Kingpins of School Privatization Got Stopped in Their Own Back Yard | Alternet

How the Billionaire Kingpins of School Privatization Got Stopped in Their Own Back Yard | Alternet: How the Billionaire Kingpins of School Privatization Got Stopped in Their Own Back YardA unique coalition in Little Rock, Arkansas is pushing back hard on a Walton Family-funded attempt at a charter takeover.The debate over public schools in Arkansas has been, for decades, ongoing and often fraught.

by mike simpson / 9h 

YESTERDAY

Mr. “Rebrand,” Mike Huckabee, Now Common Core “Killer” | deutsch29

Mr. “Rebrand,” Mike Huckabee, Now Common Core “Killer” | deutsch29: Mr. “Rebrand,” Mike Huckabee, Now Common Core “Killer”On Monday, August 31, 2015, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee sent the following anti-Common Core appeal in an email to potential Republican supporters:Sign my petition if you agree we must KILL Common Core and ABOLISH the Department of Education. Education is a family fun

by mike simpson / 18h 

Ready to Strike for the Schools Seattle’s Students Deserves! | I AM AN EDUCATOR

Ready to Strike for the Schools Seattle’s Students Deserves! | I AM AN EDUCATOR: Ready to Strike for the Schools Seattle’s Students Deserves!Today, I went to the Strike Captain meeting of the Seattle Education Association (SEA, the union that represents Seattle’s teachers and educational support staff) and I can tell you that our educators are fired up and prepared to strike, if necessary, to win

by mike simpson / 20h 

#FightforDyett | Bill Ayers

#FightforDyett | Bill Ayers: #FightforDyett Hannah Arendt describes a freedom involving “participation in public affairs, or admission to the public realm” (Arendt, H. 1963. On Revolution, New York: Penguin, p. 32). The hunger strikers at Dyett HS—fighting for public education in Chicago—are creating the public space right now, tonight. She acknowledges that freedom involves the establishment of c

by mike simpson / 22h 

CURMUDGUCATION: Middle Way

CURMUDGUCATION: Middle Way: Middle WayIn the midst of the back and forth over her comments about New Orleans' Myth of School Makeovers, Andrea Gabor dropped this quote from  Howard Fuller: “I do believe things are better for a large number of kids than before Katrina. But I don’t want to be put in the position of saying: pre-Katrina was all bad, post-Katrina is all good. When we set it up that way

by mike simpson / 22h 

Anthony Cody - Challenging the Gates Foundation - Living in Dialogue

Anthony Cody - Challenging the Gates Foundation - Living in Dialogue: Anthony Cody - Challenging the Gates FoundationAnthony Cody - Challenging the Gates Foundation - Living in Dialogue:

by mike simpson / 22h hide  //  save

Report: Low-income, black, disabled students miss school more often | EdSource

Report: Low-income, black, disabled students miss school more often | EdSource: Report: Low-income, black, disabled students miss school more oftenCalifornia’s low-income, black and disabled students are more likely to miss school frequently, which can be linked to future achievement gaps and dropout rates, according to a report released Monday.The national report by Attendance Works found that ch

by mike simpson / 23h 

Teacher Shortage: Who Will Teach the Children?| Uppity Wisconsin

| Uppity Wisconsin: Teacher Shortage: Who Will Teach the Children?Senator Kathleen Vinehout"Actions have consequences"“Please sound the alarm,” Superintendent Mary Baier wrote to me. “We are not able to find people to fill positions in Wisconsin.” She needed a special education teacher and only one applicant had applied to her rural Plum City district.When the school bells ring across Wi

by mike simpson / 23h 

Special Nite Cap: Catch Up on Today's Post 8/30/15 #FightForDyett

SPECIAL NITE CAP CORPORATE ED REFORMLast-minute challenger emerges to take on DPS board chair in November | ChalkbeatLast-minute challenger emerges to take on DPS board chair in November | Chalkbeat: Last-minute challenger emerges to take on DPS board chair in NovemberSpeth For StudentsThe field for November’s Denver school board election is all set — and it includes a final-hour challenger for bo

1 by mike simpson / 1d 

Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contract | Bright Light Small City

Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contract | Bright Light Small City:

Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contract

Background: In early August, several Minneapolis teachers contacted me about an early literacy training session they had been to. What happened there shocked and offended many of them. I am happy to help tell their stories, which I decided to do in a series of blog posts. The stories initially centered on two teachers–one white (Mandy Perna), one a teacher of color (Shana Dickson)–and their reactions to the religiously tinged, “Common Core” ready, and all-around offensive training they attended, put on by the Utah-based company, Reading Horizons. Now, the posts have expanded to include the community’s response.

The teachers’ decision to share their experiences has led to an outpouring of support for them, and against the Minneapolis Public Schools’s (MPS) decision to do business with Reading Horizons (via a $1.2 million contract). This is largely due to the  “Little Books”–deemed extremely offensive by many–that Reading Horizons produced for MPS’s K-2 classroom teachers. Please refer to previous posts for further details and pictures.

Since the blog posts hit on August 25, MPS has apologized for the books and said the offending Community members demand the Minneapolis Public Schools cancel Reading Horizons contract | Bright Light Small City:

Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonight #FightForDyett

Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonight:

Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonight

On the 16th day of the Dyett High School hunger strike, protestors and supporters will join the strikers for a candlelight vigil.

The 12 hunger strikers and the Coalition to Revitalize Dyett will gather outside of the Tribune Tower, 435 N. Michigan Ave., by the DuSable bust at 7:30 p.m. tonight, joined by the Chicago Light Brigade.

The strikers do not want Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to reopen Dyett, 555 E. 51st St., as a contract school. The group has proposed its own plan for a “Dyett Global Leadership and Green Technology High School.”

Hunger strikers are asking the community to join in to “pray and build power behind the demand that [Mayor] Rahm Emanuel take action.”

Yesterday, Emanuel and Forrest Claypool, CEO of Chicago Public Schools (CPS), met with the hunger strikers, yesterday evening, after a public meeting on the Westside. Although a resolution was not reached and questions were left unanswered, the meeting was cordial.

Tomorrow, Sept. 2, two of the hunger strikers, Jitu Brown and April Stogner, will travel to Washington, D.C. to spread their fight for Dyett to the nation’s capital.

Other activists such as John Jackson, the Schott Foundation president, and Randi Weingarten, the American Federation of Teachers president, will join Brown and Stogner. They will deliver a letter to U.S. Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, to urge him to sway Emanuel’s decision on the future of Dyett.

According to a press release, the group will gather at the U.S. Department of Education at 2:30 p.m. to continue their fight outside of their South Side community.

The hunger strikers’ mission to save Dyett has received national attention as it has gained momentum over the past two weeks.

Media outlets such as The Washington Post and The Huffington Post are covering the strikers’ stories and following the progression of the strike. According to Hashtag Scout, the hashtag #FightForDyett has been tweeted over 5,000 times per day.

Dyett hunger strikers will continue to consume only liquids until their demands are heard and their proposed RFP process is considered.

Until that happens, the strikers anxiously await the CPS hearing regarding Dyett on Sept.15.

a.matyus@hpherald.com

Hunger Strikers to hold candlelight vigil tonight:

Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American men | Educate All Students: Larry Miller's Blog

Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American men | Educate All Students: Larry Miller's Blog:

Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American men

Sunday August 30: Chuck Todd, the host of Meet the Press, questioned Walker about Wisconsin having a higher incarceration rate of African-American men than anywhere in the country and ranking last in the country in the overall well-being of black children. Walker then blamed Milwaukee Public schools. See Milwaukee Journal report at: http://tinyurl.com/qbsxpwn

Milwaukee is the 2nd poorest city in America and the most segregated. For the last 13 years Scott Walker has been directly in a position to reverse poverty and segregation in Milwaukee. Instead both have gotten worse.

As Milwaukee County Executive, starting in 2002, Scott Walker cut jobs, health care, recreation and transportation serving Milwaukee’s African American community. As Governor one of his first acts was to refuse Federal high speed rail funding that would have given Milwaukee’s Black community significant access to suburban and rural jobs. His economic development Scott Walker blames Milwaukee Public Schools for Wisconsin’s incarceration rate of African American men | Educate All Students: Larry Miller's Blog:

Report: Wisconsin to spend $258M on school vouchers next school year

The state will spend $258 million the 2016-17 school year on private school vouchers, a new estimate shows.
At the same time, the amount of state aid sent to public schools will be reduced by $83 million to offset the voucher spending, for a net cost to the state of $175 million, according to an analysis drafted by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau in response to a request from Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling, D-La Crosse, who opposes school vouchers.

9/1/15 Molly Beck Wisconsin State Journal
The state will spend $258 million in the 2016-17 school year on private school vouchers, a new estimate shows.
At the same time, the amount of state aid sent to public schools will be reduced by $83 million to offset the voucher spending, for a net cost to the state of $175 million, according to an analysis drafted by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau in response to a request from Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling, D-La Crosse, who opposes vouchers.

The amount spent each year on vouchers will have increased by 77 percent next school year over 2011 levels, according to the estimate, as lawmakers have expanded the number of vouchers available to students and where they can be used.

The amount of money spent has risen from $146 million in the 2011-12 school year to $236 million this school year.
The state spent $5.2 billion on public schools in 424 school districts last school year, according to the LFB, when it spent $213 million on vouchers used in 159 private schools.

Over the six school years, $1.2 billion will be spent on school vouchers and about $30.6 billion will be sent to public schools during the same time, according to LFB and Department of Public Instruction data.
The number of students using school vouchers to attend private schools grew from 22,439 during the 2011-12 school year to 29,609 last school year, according to the DPI. At the same time, 870,650 students attended public schools last year — which is about the same number that did in the 2011-12 school year. Enrollment grew to 873,531 in the 2013-14 school year before decreasing last school year.

Gov. Scott Walker and Republican lawmakers have created new voucher programs in Racine and statewide to join the program in Milwaukee, created in 1990 as the country’s first.

Milwaukee and Racine school districts have been allowed to raise property taxes to offset their reductions in state aid.

Starting this school year, each voucher used outside of Milwaukee will be paid for using aid set aside for school districts. The districts won’t be able to raise taxes to make up the money, 

Report: Wisconsin to spend $258M on school vouchers next school year

The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues - The Washington Post

The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues - The Washington Post:

The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues

Here is a new post from pediatric occupational therapist Angela Hanscom, author of a number of popular posts on this blog, including “Why so many kids can’t sit still in school today,” as well as “The right — and surprisingly wrong — ways to get kids to sit still in class” and “How schools ruined recess.” Hanscom is the founder of TimberNook, a nature-based development program designed to foster creativity and independent play outdoors in New England.

By Angela Hanscom

I still recall the days of preschool for my oldest daughter. I remember wanting to desperately enrich her life in any way possible – to give her an edge before she even got to formal schooling. I put her in a preschool that was academic in nature – the focus on pre-reading, writing, and math skills. At home, I bought her special puzzles, set up organized play dates with children her age, read to her every night, signed her up for music lessons, put her in dance, and drove her to local museums. My friends and I even did “enrichment classes” with our kids to practice sorting, coloring, counting, numbers, letters, and yes….even to practice sitting! We thought this would help prepare them for kindergarten.

[Why so many kids can’t sit still in school today]

Like many other American parents, I had an obsession: academic success for my child. Only, I was going about it completely wrong. Yes, my daughter would later go on to test above average with her academic skills, but she was missing important life skills. Skills that should have been in place and nurtured during the preschool years. My wake-up call was when the preschool teacher came up to me and said, “Your daughter is doing well academically. In fact, I’d say she exceeds expectations in these areas. But she is having trouble with basic social skills like sharing and taking turns.” Not only that, but my daughter was also having trouble controlling her emotions, developed anxiety and sensory issues, and had trouble simply playing by herself!

Little did I know at the time, but my daughter was far from being the only onestruggling with social and sensory issues at such a young age. This was becoming a growing epidemic. A few years ago, I interviewed a highly respected director of a progressive preschool. She had been teaching preschoolers for about 40 years and had seen major changes in the social and The decline of play in preschoolers — and the rise in sensory issues - The Washington Post:

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures | Hmong Innovating Politics

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures | Hmong Innovating Politics:

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures

1.  4 out of the 7 closed schools have re-opened

In January 2013, Sacramento City Unified School District and former Superintendent Jonathan Raymond proposed the closure of twelve (12) neighborhood elementary schools. Of those twelve, five (5) were quietly taken off the closure list prior to the final vote on the ‘wrong-sizing’ proposal. In February 2013, only a month after announcing the proposal, seven(7) neighborhood schools were closed in a controversial 4-3 vote.

It has been more than two years since the seven neighborhood schools were closed. In that time, 4 out of the 7 campuses have re-opened either as a charter school or a community center.

2.  Joseph Bonnheim re-opened as a Community Charter School

The first school site to re-open was Joseph Bonnheim Elementary. Immediately following the closures, parents, teachers and community members came together to save their neighborhood school. It became clear that the only way for the campus to remain a open would be to establish a community charter school. This small but incredibly passionate coalition of community leaders and parents raised money, passed around petitions and developed an organic proposal to re-open the school as a dependent charter. Finally, in 2014, the New Joseph Bonnheim (NJB) Community Charter opened its doors to a new cohort of students. NJB remains the only public school in Northern California with a special emphasis on agriculture. A week ago, NJB celebrated its second year and we’re thrilled to see students back at Bonnheim.

• Parents want to convert closed Sacramento campus into charter school. Sacramento Bee. June 18, 2014
• Start of school symbolizes Sacramento parents’ perseverance. KCRA. September 8, 2014

3.  La Familia finds new home at Maple Elementary

For over 40 years, La Familia Counseling Center has been a fixture in the South Sacramento community and a hub for Sacramento’s Latino community. In recent years, the expanding number of staff and the growing need for services among Sacramento’s diverse populations made LFCC’s location on Fruitridge Road feel a bit cramped. In July 2015, LFCC was approved to lease Maple Elementary School as their new headquarters. By moving their main office to Maple Elementary, LFCC is now better situated to expand its world-class services to the Maple and South Sacramento community.

• Sac City school approves venture with La Familia, community collaborative at former school sites. Sacramento Bee. July 17, 2015

READ MORE @ 8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures | Hmong Innovating Politics:

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mind

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mind:

Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mind

http://imgur.com/IDzwas5

Rahm finally meets with Dyett hunger strikers. But makes no commitments. Strike continues into Day 16. 

The Sun-Times  reporter Stefano Esposito keeps referring to last night's public response at Rahm's budget hearing, as a "gripe session". Strange, but not a surprising view of democracy.



The mayor says his current public meetings are "to discuss the City's current budget outlook and solicit savings, reform and revenue ideas from residents to assist in the preparation of the 2016 budget." But in reality, as David Vitale once told me, such meetings are really about "reining in" dissident community voices.



Well, that sure as hell didn't work yesterday. With the creditors and Moody'sbreathing down his neck and with Dyett hunger strikers now into a health and life-threatening 16 days without solid food, those voices were not about to be reined in. The budget meeting at Malcolm X College, was turned into a demand for Rahm to stop stonewalling the Dyett school process they themselves launched months ago, Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Rahm's budget hearing not exactly what he had in mind:

WV MetroNews – Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiency

WV MetroNews – Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiency:

Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiency

WELCH, W.Va. — The partners involved in Reconnecting McDowell will next focus their efforts on addressing school absenteeism and ensuring all students reach reading proficiency by the 3rd grade as part of a larger education and economic revitalization effort in McDowell County.

“What we’ve asked the partners to do is to focus on two things which are state priorities, which are national priorities, that we know will really flip the switch in terms of outcomes for kids,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

On Tuesday, she spoke with MetroNews from a day-long Reconnecting McDowell quarterly meeting in Welch that drew more than 100 program partners.

Gayle Manchin, chair of Reconnecting McDowell and a member of the West Virginia Board of Education, was also there.

“Children can’t learn if they’re not in school and, if children can’t learn to read by 3rd grade, they cannot read to learn during the rest of their school experience,” Manchin said.

According to Weingarten, 89 percent of students who reach reading proficiency by the 3rd grade go on to graduate from high school.

Reconnecting McDowell, a comprehensive, long-term effort aimed at improving McDowell County’s economy through education, launched in 2011 in a West Virginia county that consistently ranks at or near the bottom when it comes to health, income and education.

Since then, those involved have been working to address McDowell WV MetroNews – Reconnecting McDowell turns attention to absenteeism & reading proficiency:

A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public Education · Change.org

Petition · Citizens who care about public, Teachers, students, parents, and teacher educators: A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public Education · Change.org:

A Manifesto for a Revolution in Public Education

reClaiming the Conversation on Education

Teachers, students, parents, and teacher educators!

For decades politicians, corporate titans, businesspeople, and some compliant educators have bombarded us with half-truths that our public schools are terrible, that our children underperform, and that our teachers, teacher unions, and teacher educators are ruining our economy and the minds of our kids.

These self-styled “reformers” have sensationalized selected scores on standardized tests to manufacture a narrative of catastrophe, and have used that narrative to distract us from the real crises of poverty, racism, and growing inequality facing our public schools.

For over a decade these “reformers” have proclaimed that the solution to the purported crisis in education lies in more high stakes testing, more surveillance, more number crunching, more school closings, more charter schools, and more cutbacks in school resources and academic and extra-curricular opportunities for students, particularly students of color. As our public schools become skeletons of what they once were, they are forced to spend their last dollars on the data systems, test guides, and tests meant to help implement the “reforms” but that do little more than line the coffers of corporations, like Pearson, Inc. and Microsoft, Inc.

Under the avalanche of these “reforms,” any attention to creating citizens for a democracy has vanished. Gone is any focus on the emotional health of students or on their artistic, creative and physical development. Gone is a vibrant commitment to PUBLIC education and to equal educational opportunity.

For more than a decade we have heard our nation’s leaders, such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush, Michael Bloomberg, Bill Gates and Arne Duncan, repeat the mantra that all children deserve equal educational opportunities.  And for more than a decade we have watched as children who attend public schools receive a subsistence level education full of test preparation, and militaristic discipline, while,hypocritically, the sons and daughters of these “reformers” and the children of the well-to-do and the well-connected receive opportunities that look nothing like the ones foisted on the rest of the nation’s students. As the children of many of these “reformers” feast at the banquet of educational opportunities afforded them, the rest of the nation’s youth and their teachers are left with the withering skeleton of public education and are expected to be quiet as the corporate jackals pick the last bit of profit from the bones.

ENOUGH! We will no longer stand idly by as public education is dismantled by hypocrites, plutocrats, merchandisers and collaborators.

We reject the entire education “reform” agenda, its self-serving narrative of crisis, its ruinous reduction of education to cramming for an exam, its vocabulary of the marketplace that renders our teachers and children as numbers on a bottom line, its flawed science of value-added metrics hawked by those who never stepped foot in a classroom, its propaganda that poverty, institutional racism, white supremacy, and family situations can be overcome by a lone teacher armed with the right “tool-kit,” and its concealment of the income gap by the so-called “achievement gap.” We denounce in particular the emphasis on performance standards, with its fanatical faith in tests and algorithms, its blindness to all the other aspects of education, and its pernicious focus on equal outcomes rather than equal opportunities.

We aspire to something nobler and more just.

Teachers, students, parents and teacher educators!

We aspire to EQUAL EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITY for all our children. We therefore insist on standards that govern equality of educational opportunity, standards that ensure the nation’s children can, if they wish, receive the same educational opportunities as do the children of our nation’s rich and powerful.  If we are still a democracy, if we still believe in the PUBLIC, if we still believe in equal opportunity, then it is time we demand the following:

Our demands

1.      We demand that every child have equal educational opportunities. By this we mean that every child in pre-K through 12th grade should be provided with the conditions that make possible real study and human growth, conditions made available at the nation’s independent schools to the children of so many education “reformers” and of the well-to-do and well-connected.

2.      We demand that all students have the small classrooms that Jeb Bush experienced at Phillips Andover where the average class size is thirteen students and the overall student teacher ratio is 5 to 1, that his son experienced at Gulliver Preparatory School whose average class size is also thirteen, and that ex NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg’s daughters experienced at Manhattan’s Spence School, where the average high school class size is 13 students, and the overall student teacher ratio is 7 to 1.

3.      We demand that all students have access to schools with well-stocked libraries, quiet places for contemplation, study abroad opportunities, programs in music and art, regular field trips, a range of sports, healthy food in the cafeteria, well-staffed college counseling departments, athletic and art facilities, and a wide selection of foreign languages, vocational opportunities, AP courses, and numerous extra-curricular activities. All of these are offered at independent schools, such as Sidwell Friends, attended by Barack Obama’s children, Deerfield Academy, attended by Governor Andrew Cuomo’s daughters, Maumee Valley Country Day School in Ohio, where Michelle Rheewent, Manhattan’s Trinity School, attended by Rudolph Giuliani’s daughter, the Madeira School attended by Campbell Brown, and Phillips Exeter Academy, where Chester Finn was a student. In these schools children write all the time, because writing is easier to develop when teachers have between sixty and 70 students, as opposed to the 150 students most public school English teachers have. Such conditions have been available to the sons and daughters of education “reformers,” such as Bill Gates, Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush, Rahm Emanuel, and all those hedge fund billionaires so heavily invested in charter schools.

4.      We demand equal educational opportunities for teachers such that teachers have opportunities to create their own curriculum, as do the teachers at Manhattan’s Dalton School, attended by the sons of New York State Regent, Merryl Tisch, and at Seattle’s Lakeside School, attended by Bill Gates, and at Chicago’s Lab School attended by Arne Duncan, and at the Panahou School, Obama’s alma mater in Hawaii.  None of these schools adhere to the Common Core. At such schools, teachers have considerable freedom to choose curricular materials, to structure learning based on their particular students’ needs, to follow their own intellectual, and artistic passions, and to benefit from funding for seminars, learning fellowships and sabbaticals. At such schools teachers are evaluated, not by student test scores or value-added measures, but according to qualitative criteria developed by their colleagues, their professional organizations, and themselves.

5.      We demand that rather than performance standards that focus on test scores and assume punishment is the best way to change people, states adopt opportunity-to-study standards, with metrics and consequences.  Such opportunity-to-study standards assess the conditions that make study possible. We emphasize study rather than learning, only because the concept of learning has been so corrupted as to mean nothing more than “performance” on high stakes tests. The conditions that promote and offer opportunities for study include the curriculum, the extra-curriculum, the available resources, the setting, and the infra-structure. Such conditions and opportunities can be assessed by opportunity-to-study standards.

6.      We demand a halt to charter schools, which present the veneer of small independent schools, but in fact offer a mediocre test prep program, military discipline, and few, if any, of the numerous opportunities for study available to the children of the wealthy backers of those charter schools.  If charters, such as the KIPP schools and Success Academy, are so great, how come “reformers,” politicians, and corporate backers don’t enroll their own children in them?

7.      We demand that at the community, district, state and national levels, education summits be held to delineate in detail suchopportunity-to-study standards, determine the cost, and establish time lines for these standards to be implemented. Furthermore, we demand that primarily educators, parents and students be included in these summits and that media and computer moguls, hedge fund managers, CEOs, and others who know little about teaching or curriculum be barred from participating.

These are the demands we make. Only when we achieve true equality of educational opportunity, only when those who spout this term are held to it, only then will we begin to see real educational change in this country. Only then will we have done a true service to our young and to the nation’s future.

Signed,

reClaiming the Conversation on Education Steering Committee:

Arnie Dodge, Chair/Associate Professor, Department of Educational Leadership and Administration, LIU-Post*

Lisa N. Edstrom, Parent and Educator

Julie Gorlewski, Associate Professor, State University of New York at New Paltz*

David A. Gorlewski, Chairperson, Educational Administration, State University of New York at New Paltz*

Andrew T. Kemp, Ed.D.

Steve London, University Wide Officer, PSC/CUNY*

Barbara Madeloni, MTA President*

Janet L. Miller, Professor

Wayne A. Reed, Assistant Professor of Education, Brooklyn College, CUNY*

Paula M. Salvio, Professor of Education

Jessica Siegel, Assistant Professor of Education, Journalism and English, Brooklyn College, CUNY*

Ruth Powers Silverberg, Associate Professor of Education, College of Staten Island, CUNY*

Laura Stolbova, Educator.

Debbie Sonu, Teacher Educator.

Janine Sopp,  Parent, Change the Stakes and NYC Opt Out*

Daiyu Suzuki, Co-founder, Edu4.  Doctoral candidate, Teachers College at Columbia University

Peter M. Taubman, Professor of Secondary Education, Brooklyn College, CUNY*

Barbara Winslow, Professor Emerita, Brooklyn College; Founder and Director, Shirley Chisholm Project of Brooklyn Women's Activism*

* Note: Affiliation for identification purposes only. The views may not express those of the institution.

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