Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION

CURMUDGUCATION:

Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION

Slate Series Unmasks Cyber School

33by Peter Greene / 1d

Slate, for whatever reason, teamed up this week with Columbia Journalism School's Teacher Project, to take a look at on line education. Much of their work is focused on on line courses as a means of credit recovery-- the quick-and-easy method of letting students replace credits for courses they failed. But the series tells us a great deal about what on line "education" is really like-- and it is n

PA: Report Shows Charter Financial Impact

23by Peter Greene / 1d

Pennsylvania's Legislative Budget and Finance Committee has released a report looking at " Public [sic] Charter Schools Fiscal Impact on School Districts. " The findings of the joint committee underscore what many have already been saying-- charter schools, particularly in a badly regulated state like Pennsylvania, are hurting public schools. The report is 105 pages long, so I'm going to be focusi

MAY 24

DeVos Still Anti-Accountability

33by Peter Greene / 2d

As she's spent time in the public eye this week, Betsy DeVos may have enraged, but she hasn't surprised. She continues to be what we always thought she was-- and that includes her attitude about accountability. She's against it. Here's a critical CNN clip from today's hearings: . @RepKClark to Sec. DeVos: “I am shocked that you cannot come up with one example of discrimination that you would stand

Charters and Open Books

23by Peter Greene / 2d

My school district's board of directors held their regular meeting two days ago and passed a tentative budget for the coming year. I could link you to the newspaper report of the meeting, but it's behind a paywall. So let me just copy out the two important paragraphs: Now that the tentative budget has been approved, members of the general public have an opportunity to review and/or comment on the

MAY 23

Dear Jeb Bush:

100+by Peter Greene / 3d

Today you put in an appearance at Betsy DeVos's American Federation for Children, a group very much in tune with your goals in education. I can see why you and DeVos have always gotten along-- wealthy children of privilege who feel a righteous need to remake your home state according to your own beliefs in competition and battle and a system that sorts people into their proper places. Reporter Mat

Religious Voucher Schools

44by Peter Greene / 3d

Like everyone else in the education universe, I was talking vouchers on line, and in the midst of a conversation, this tweet popped up: @palan57 @PCunningham57 @educationgadfly @shavarjeffries @matt_barnum @Chalkbeat @jasonscrye Peter, what do you have against letting poor families choose religious schools? — Michael Petrilli (@MichaelPetrilli) May 23, 2017 Remember that question, because it's go

MAY 22

Education's Existential Crisis

38by Peter Greene / 4d

No, it's not the possibility that Betsy DeVos's DeVoucher program may gut public education with the goal of replacing it with privatized school by and for the People Who Matter. Nor is it the policy goal held by some that the whole concept of "school" can be replaced with an array of modules geared to different competencies that can be accessed and completed on line at the time and place of the st

MAY 21

NYT: Value Not Added

21by Peter Greene / 6d

Our old friend Kevin Carey popped up in the New York Times this week , using the death of William Sanders as a case to soft-pedal VAM. The article has some interesting points to make about VAM, and it also unintentionally reveals some of the reasons that Value-Added Measuring of teacher performance is a fool's game. Carey is the education policy program director for the New America Foundation . NA

ICYMI: I'm More Grown Up Edition (5/21)

7by Peter Greene / 6d

Yesterday was my birthday, but I wouldn't forget to give you your Sunday reading list. Remember-- if you like it, pass it on. A Tour of Stock Photo Academy The British blog Othmar's Trombone takes us on a tour of Stock Photo Academy, and it's just so special. This is your fun and games reading assignment for the week. My Response to the NYT Google Article A reply from Morna McDermott to the Times'

MAY 20

My 16 Rules

62by Peter Greene / 7d

Today I turn sixty, so it's time form one of those posts. These are the rules. Mind you, they are not a sign of any particular wisdom or smartitude on my part-- I have learned about these rules in the same way a somewhat dim cow learns 

 CURMUDGUCATION:

Jersey Jazzman: The Facts About Charter School Finances in Camden, NJ

Jersey Jazzman: The Facts About Charter School Finances in Camden, NJ:

The Facts About Charter School Finances in Camden, NJ

Here's Part I of my U-Ark series.

Here's Part II.


This post really should be called "U-Ark Screws Up A Charter School Revenue Study, AGAIN: Part III," as it is a follow-up to my last two posts about how the University of Arkansas Department of Education Reform messed up its latest study of charter school revenues. I'm retitling it, however, because I think the facts I present below have significance beyond critiquing U-Ark's report.

As I showed, U-Ark's claim that Camden's charter sector is receiving far less funding than the city's public schools is completely bogus (and this almost certainly applies to the other cities in their study). They double count revenues going to charter schools without attributing them to those schools' students. They don't understand that since the district has the responsibility for transporting charter students, revenues allotted for that purpose shouldn't be attributed to the district.

I'd go on about the many other methodological failures in the study, but Bruce Baker covered them when he reviewed U-Ark's report from 2014. Amazingly, U-Ark cites Baker in their latest report -- but then goes back and makes the same mistakes. Which wouldn't be so bad if the study was being ignored and wasn't influencing policy makers; unfortunately, it appears stakeholders are heeding the study's conclusions.

This, by the way, is a huge problem in education policy journalism right now: reporters will often trumpet a "new study" that knowledgable critics haven't had time to properly vet. Even if it's a piece of junk, it still gets attention; at best, the critics are given a "he said-she said" positioning that leads stakeholders to believe that even if the study has problems, it's probably still making at least a somewhat valid point.

Let's use Camden's charters and the U-Ark study as an example of why this is such a Jersey Jazzman: The Facts About Charter School Finances in Camden, NJ:

Dear Phineas | Bill Ayers

Dear Phineas | Bill Ayers:

Dear Phineas

Dear Phineas:

Your letter finally reached me here in Chicago.

Thank you for writing.

Sounds like your eighth-grade research project is generating a lot of important thinking and insights.

People often confuse pacifism with non-violent direct action or civil disobedience.

Pacifism is a philosophy and a guide to living, and there’s much to admire about it. It asks us to look deeply and reverently at all of life, to respect the humanity of each person we encounter, to love everyone including proximate strangers and folks we’ll never know, and to seek balance and peace in relation to one another and all living things and the earth itself. That’s a pretty good start, don’t you think? We look to pacifists like Mahatma Gandhi  with a bit of awe.

But it’s only a start for finding your way through a vast and complicated history, and as a total world view, pacifism has its limits, as does every other belief system (religious or secular) when carried to its orthodox extreme. Gandhi, for example, urged Britain in 1940 to lay down its arms, to stop fighting Hitler, arguing that British resistance would be morally superior if the British people allowed themselves to be overrun by Hitler and yet  maintained their refusal of allegiance to evil. And in 1946—after the Holocaust and the millions of innocent lives thrown into the furnaces of war—he answered a question few pacifists ever want to face: What about the Jews of Europe? Gandhi answered forthrightly: the Jews of Europe Dear Phineas | Bill Ayers:

East Hartford School Community Refutes DeVos - Courant Community

East Hartford School Community Refutes DeVos - Courant Community:

East Hartford School Community Refutes DeVos

The U.S. education secretary's recent recounting of the dismal education experience of a former East Hartford student aroused angry responses from the school community Friday and prompted the governor to schedule a press conference.

"Betsy DeVos is using the East Hartford public school system as a political playground for her own agenda!" parent Tia Woods wrote in an email to The Courant.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy is to hold a press conference on Tuesday at East Hartford High School, in part to respond to comments DeVos delivered Wednesday to a House subcommittee, the governor's office said.

Speaking in support of President Donald Trump's proposed budget, DeVos told of a recent meeting with a young man who labeled East Hartford High School "nothing more than adult day care ... a dangerous day care." Michael — no last name — described a school where misbehaving students made teaching impossible. DeVos said the man's story illustrates the need for expanded access to quality education, particularly for poor and minority students.

Parents of current and former students and East Hartford High graduates, however, responded that Michael's story was not theirs. After receiving her high school diploma in 2003, Juliana Schatz Preston said she graduated from Northeastern University and Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism. The 2003 class president said she is now an Emmy- and Peabody-award winning documentary filmmaker.

"I love my hometown," Preston said, "and this portrayal of our schools feels libelous."

School Superintendent Nathan Quesnel said he has fielded dozens of calls and emails from people outraged about the education secretary's unfair portrayal. Quesnel forwarded a message from a local graduate, Christina Quentel, who wrote that she had just graduated from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, part of Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. Praising her East Hartford teachers, Quentel wrote, "there is no me without you."

DeVos said Michael told of being constantly bullied, afraid to even go to the lavatory, "and the constant fear made him hate school." He limped along, she said, failing his classes but graduating anyway. Quesnel, who was not working in East Hartford schools in 2000, acknowledged continuing challenges in improving students' behavior.

"We're working hard to break the cycle of failure and poverty that oftentimes plagues East Hartford School Community Refutes DeVos - Courant Community:

Betsy DeVos has invested millions in this ‘brain training’ company. So I checked it out. - The Washington Post

Betsy DeVos has invested millions in this ‘brain training’ company. So I checked it out. - The Washington Post:

Betsy DeVos has invested millions in this ‘brain training’ company. So I checked it out.

At a clinic in Florida, I found that Neurocore seems to be promising more than it can deliver.

A TECHNICIAN SNAPPED a stretchy electrode cap onto my head, and I felt a cold pinch as she affixed each sensor to my scalp with a dose of icy gel. Perched on an office chair, with a rainbow of wires spiraling from my head, I followed the tech’s instructions to stare at a small orange object while an EEG recording device measured the electrical activity in various regions of my brain.

I was checking out the Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., branch of Neurocore, a “brain performance” company owned by the family of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. DeVos resigned her Neurocore board seat when she joined the Trump Cabinet, but she and her husband maintain a financial stake of between $5 million and $25 million, according to a financial disclosure statement filed with the Office of Government Ethics. The DeVoses’ private-equity firm, Windquest, identifies Neurocore as part of its “corporate family.” The Windquest website posts Neurocore news and includes links for job seekers to apply to Neurocore openings.

In other words, the family has a lot riding on Neurocore’s claims that it can help you “train your brain to function better” — addressing problems as diverse as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, autism, anxiety, stress, depression, poor sleep, memory loss and migraines. “Unlike medication, which temporarily masks your symptoms, neurofeedback promotes healthy changes in your brain to provide you with a lasting solution,” touts a Neurocore overview video. “. . . We’ve helped thousands of people strengthen their brain to achieve a happy, healthier, more productive life for years to come.” The company currently has nine offices in Michigan and Florida, though there’s been talk of making a national move.

When the DeVos-Neurocore connection made headlines during her confirmation hearings, I was skeptical of the company’s claims. I had come across brain training while working on a book, “Learn Better,” about the science of learning. The field is rife with vague and overblown promises. Last year, the creators of Lumosity paid a $2 million fine to the Federal Trade Commission to settle a complaint that they deceptively advertised that their memory exercises could improve everyday performance and stave off memory loss.

Neurocore hasn’t been subject to any federal complaints, chief executive Mark Murrison told me. But my impression was that the company’s premise runs counter to an immense Betsy DeVos has invested millions in this ‘brain training’ company. So I checked it out. - The Washington Post:

Betsy DeVos' Bad, Bad, Very Bad Week

Betsy DeVos' Bad, Bad, Very Bad Week:

Betsy DeVos' Bad, Bad, Very Bad Week

Betsy DeVos' week went from bad to worse, reminding educators, parents, lawmakers and other public education advocates that she is willing to say anything to eliminate vital education services in pursuit of her and President Trump's number one goal: creating a national private school voucher program. In her defense of vouchers, charter schools, deep budget cuts and the elimination of education services and programs, DeVos painted a picture based on mischaracterizations, half-truths, slights and falsehoods.

Ignores how Indiana voucher program harms students

Via educationvotes.nea.org

DeVos began her week speaking to the American Federation for Children, a national voucher advocacy group she founded, funded and chaired until she was picked by Trump to be secretary of education. DeVos spoke in glowing terms about the state's voucher program, the nation's largest at a cost of $146 million and with more than 34,000 students.

What DeVos didn't mention about the Indiana program (and most other voucher programs):

* Voucher schools get to choose which students they accept.

* Voucher schools have the right to turn away students with disabilities and deny them their rights.

* Fifty-five percent of the students who use vouchers were already attending private schools, belying a central justification for the program, that it was designed to benefit students from low-income families.

* The voucher program has created a $53 million deficit in the state’s education budget.

* Voucher schools receiving taxpayer money are not required to submit annual financial reports, resulting in cases of financial mismanagement and fraud.

* Voucher schools can deny a student based on academic or disciplinary history.

Calls educators, public school advocates "flat-earthers"

Victoria Choi / Via bit.ly

While in Indianapolis, moments after saying "education should not be a partisan issue" and imploring listeners, "Everyone – in both parties – should support equal opportunity in education," DeVos described advocates of public schools as "flat-earthers."

Wittingly or unwittingly burning bridges once again with the millions of women and men who strive everyday to teach and safeguard the 90% of students who attend public schools, DeVos said, "Defenders of our current system have regularly been resistant to any meaningful change. In resisting, these 'flat-earthers' have chilled creativity and stopped American kids from competing at the highest levels."

I wonder how many public school educators feel DeVos' statement contributes to meaningful dialogue?

Compares choosing schools to choosing a phone

Kyle Mahaney

In DeVos' world -- and that of other corporate ed reformers -- schools are interchangeable commodities. Want a new phone or a new education delivery system? Consumers just have to choose among the various options and sales pitches, right?

According to an analogy drawn up by DeVos in Indianapolis, neighborhood public schools are the equivalent of the flip phones of yesteryear. But one of many differences: you can return a defective phone to the manufacturer; parents have no such options when their child's voucher school shutters without notice in the middle of the school year. Or what about the virtual school that doesn't track student participation online? Or the voucher school that hires non-certificated teachers?

Said DeVos, "10 years ago, I was really attached to my flip phone. It was cutting edge technology, and it worked great. Today, I like my current smartphone – a lot – but I refuse to think there could never be a future improvement or a better model. We should embrace the  Betsy DeVos' Bad, Bad, Very Bad Week:

Screw U – Have You Heard

Screw U – Have You Heard:

Screw U Screw U Screw U Go Screw U

Betsy DeVos’ top advisor led a for-profit university that defrauded students and hoovered up federal student aid. Now Robert Eitel is tasked with *right-sizing* the Department of Education. What could possibly go wrong?

Jennifer Berkshire: This week Betsy DeVos announced that she was tasking one of her top advisors, Robert Eitel, formerly of Bridgepoint Education, Inc., with overseeing the *right sizing* of the Department of Education. Bridgepoint has something of, um, an interesting backstory that I’d like you to walk us through. Start in 2005 when the company purchased a nun-run Iowa college and blew it up into an online behemoth.

Christopher Crowley: So Bridgepoint Education was started by a group of former University of Phoenix executives who were able to get Wall Street seed money and then used that money to buy a small college in Iowa called the Franciscan University of the Prairies. When Bridgepoint bought the college in 2005, there were around 300 Screw U – Have You Heard:

New Director of Audits and Investigations Division - Year 2017 (CA Dept of Education)

New Director of Audits and Investigations Division - Year 2017 (CA Dept of Education):

State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Appoints Kimberly Tarvin as Director of Audits and Investigations Division

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson announced today the appointment of Kimberly Tarvin as the new Director of the Audits and Investigations Division at the California Department of Education. She began her assignment May 8, 2017.

A Certified Public Accountant, Tarvin brings more than two decades of auditing and management experience to her new role. She spent the past 20 years working for the California Department of Finance’s Office of State Audits and Investigations leading and managing various audit teams and other department-wide projects. At the CDE, Tarvin will oversee internal, external, and investigative audits to ensure compliance with federal and state programs.

“Kimberly is a veteran leader whose auditing experience and expertise is second to none,” Torlakson said. “I am delighted to welcome her to the California Department of Education.”

A Sacramento native, Tarvin holds a bachelor’s degree in accountancy from Sacramento State. She began her state government career in 1992 in the Audit Division at the California Department of Housing and Community Development and moved to the Department of Finance in 1996.

Tarvin replaces Kevin Chan, who retired in April.

# # # #

Tom Torlakson — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5602, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

New Director of Audits and Investigations Division - Year 2017 (CA Dept of Education):