Latest News and Comment from Education

Monday, June 27, 2011

Video: Local Teacher Gets Inked as Reward for Test Score Gains - The Bay Citizen

Video: Local Teacher Gets Inked as Reward for Test Score Gains - The Bay Citizen

Video: Local Teacher Gets Inked as Reward for Test Score Gains

With the current emphasis on test scores, it's no surprise that teachers are finding more unique ways to motivate students. But even for San Francisco, Stanley Richard's offering seems a bit extreme. Starting a few years ago, the science teacher at City Arts and Technology High School, a charter school in San Francisco was, like his colleagues, under pressure to raise some flat scores on a number of school-wide metrics. As Paul Koh, who just ended his time as the school's vice principal, remembered it, the teachers came together in 2008 to think of innovative but cost-effective ways to incentivize test-taking at the project-based learning school. One person offered the idea of dollar-off coupons at the corner store for good test behavior. As you'll see in the video below, Richards came

Culture and the Achievement Gap

Culture and the Achievement Gap

This Week In Education: Update: Stop Pretending Charters Are All Like KIPP

This Week In Education: Update: Stop Pretending Charters Are All Like KIPP

How standardized testing is being expanded - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

How standardized testing is being expanded - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

How standardized testing is being expanded

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This was written by Lisa Guisbond, a policy analyst for the nonprofitNational Center for Fair & Open Testing, known as FairTest. The report, Flawed Massachusetts Teacher Evaluation Proposal Risks Further Damage to Teaching and Learning, is available here.

By Lisa Guisbond

Parents, teachers, and students: Raise your hands if you think what our schools need is more new tests and a greater emphasis on testing. If not, listen up, because this is exactly what our students and teachers face because of the reactions of Massachusetts, Maryland, Virgina, Ne

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: High concept moviemaking?: BAD TEACHER IS A F-ing COMEDY! + BAD TEACHER MOVIE BOASTS BAD TASTE

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: High concept moviemaking?: BAD TEACHER IS A F-ing COMEDY! + BAD TEACHER MOVIE BOASTS BAD TASTE

High concept moviemaking?: BAD TEACHER IS A F-ing COMEDY! + BAD TEACHER MOVIE BOASTS BAD TASTE

By smf for 4LAKids News A few years back the most obvious box-office generating film title of all time came out: “Snakes on a Plane”. The title told you everything you needed to know. You didn't expect a chick flick. You didn't expect engaging witty dialogue. You didn't expect Freudian introspection or Kierkegaardian angst in the Swedish countryside. You expected snakes. On a plane. Now we

I wasn’t there, but I was CONNECTED | Connected Principals

I wasn’t there, but I was CONNECTED | Connected Principals

Jersey Jazzman: Charter School Fail

Jersey Jazzman: Charter School Fail

U.S. Teachers’ Hours Among World’s Longest « Larry Miller's Blog

U.S. Teachers’ Hours Among World’s Longest « Larry Miller's Blog

U.S. Teachers’ Hours Among World’s Longest

June 25, 2011 Wall Street Journal

By Phil Izzo

1,097: Average number of hours U.S. teachers spend per year on instruction.

Students across the U.S. are enjoying or getting ready for summer vacation, but teachers may be looking forward to the break even more. American teachers are the most productive among major developed countries, according to Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development data from 2008 — the most recent available.

Among 27 member nations tracked by the OECD, U.S. primary-school educators spent 1,097 hours a year teaching despite only spending 36 weeks a year in the classroom — among the lowest among the countries

Governor and Democratic Leaders Announce Budget Deal that Relies on Cuts, Rising Revenues, and a Trigger « State of Emergency

Governor and Democratic Leaders Announce Budget Deal that Relies on Cuts, Rising Revenues, and a Trigger « State of Emergency

Save Our Schools NJ: reform our broken charter school law now! « Parents Across America

Save Our Schools NJ: reform our broken charter school law now! « Parents Across America

Save Our Schools NJ: reform our broken charter school law now!

From SOS New Jersey, an affiliate of Parents Across America, working to reform their state’s charter school laws. These principles should be followed in any state. Reform New Jersey’s Broken Charter School Law Save Our Schools NJ is working with lawmakers to reform three significant problems with the existing charter school law Local communities have [...]

In the UK, teachers are walking out over pensions. I’m just sayin’. « Fred Klonsky's blog

In the UK, teachers are walking out over pensions. I’m just sayin’. « Fred Klonsky's blog

In the UK, teachers are walking out over pensions. I’m just sayin’.

I’m just sayin’ is all.

Two of the countries biggest teaching unions announced the results of a strike ballot, which will lead to the first teachers’ walkout in three decades.

Hundreds of thousands of members will stage walkouts across the summer and will throw schools into chaos.

Both the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), and the National Union of Teachers (NUT), asked nearly 300,000 members if they wanted to take action, which thousands did.

Government officials now fear any proposed action could cause schools to send classes home or close altogether leading to fears children will be turned away

Sac City School Board to Evaluate Superintendent Tuesday - Rosemont, CA Patch

Sac City School Board to Evaluate Superintendent Tuesday - Rosemont, CA Patch

Sac City School Board to Evaluate Superintendent Tuesday

The school board will meet on Monday and Tuesday.

&nbps;0 Comments

Jonathan Raymond, superintendent of schools in Rosemont and across the Sacramento City Unified School District, is about to get a report card of his own.

The district's board of education will evaluate Raymond's performance in a closed-session meeting Tuesday morning at the district's 47th Avenue headquarters.

The board will also meet Monday evening to discuss the costs of its agreements with two labor unions and to ask them to take three furlough days next school year. The board will also discuss its strategic plan.

Monday's open meeting is scheduled to begin at 5 p.m. at the Serna Center, 5735 47th Ave. Tuesday's closed meeting will begin at 8:30 a.m.

What grade would you give Superintendent Jonathan Raymond? Tell us in the comments.

Charter school advocates demand UFT apology but get debate | GothamSchools

Charter school advocates demand UFT apology but get debate | GothamSchools

Charter school advocates demand UFT apology but get debate

Charter school parents and advocates protest outside UFT headquarters today.

Charter school parents and teachers took their fight against the UFT and NAACP’s school closure and co-location lawsuit to the headquarters of the main group that filed it.

About 250 people gathered this morning outside the United Federation of Teachers’ Lower Manhattan offices to demand that the union drop the lawsuit, which would stop 16 charter schools from opening, moving, or expanding. They emphasized that some charter schools are set to start their school years in as few as six weeks but don’t yet know where or if they will be opening.

The protest was the first that specifically targeted the teachers union since the lawsuit was filed May 18. Last month, a much larger group of protesters rallied outside the Harlem headquarters of the NAACP, which joined the UFT in the suit.

Protesters chanted a series of slogans for nearly an hour, at one point shouting “UFT: Apologize” for more than

Schools Matter: "What Research Says About the Effect of Teachers" EWA

Schools Matter: "What Research Says About the Effect of Teachers" EWA

"What Research Says About the Effect of Teachers" EWA

Everyone should look closely at this new report from the Education Writers Association:

"What Research Says About the Effect of Teachers"

By Stephen Sawchuk


There key points based on solid research of the evidence:

"Are teachers the mostimportant factor affecting student achievement? It can be said:
Research has shownthat the variation in student achievement is predominantly a product ofindividual and family background characteristics. Of the school factors thathave been isolated for study, teachers are probably the most importantdeterminants of how students will perform on standardized tests."
"Are value-addedestimations reliable or stable?
It can be said:
Value-added modelsappear to pick up some differences in teacher quality, but they can beinfluenced by a number of factors, such as the statistical controls selected.They may also be affected by the characteristics of schools and peers. Theimpact of unmeasured factors in schools, such as principals and choice ofcurriculum, is less clear."
"What are thedifferences in achievement between students who have effective or ineffective teachersfor several years in a row?
It can be said:
Some teachers producestronger achievement gains among their students than others do. However,estimates of

Martha Woodall — 'What Happens When Charter Schools Fail' : NPR

Martha Woodall — 'What Happens When Charter Schools Fail' : NPR

What Happens When Charter Schools Fail?

Charter schools are taxpayer-funded schools that are overseen by their own independent boards. Because of their independence, they are allowed to do things that traditional public schools cannot do. School administrators can experiment with things like the length of the school day and the makeup of each school's curriculum.
With that freedom, charter schools have become academic beacons for parents looking to find the best and safest schooling options for their children. But the system's lack of oversight has also created problems. In recent years, there have been investigations in states, including California, Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania, which found charter school CEOs taking money from their own schools, putting unqualified relatives on their payrolls and engaging in other questionable activities.
On Monday's Fresh Air, Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Martha Woodall details her ongoing investigation into Philadelphia's charter school system, where 19 of the 74 charter schools operating in the city are under investigation for fraud, financial mismanagement and conflicts of

Helping Black Men Raise Failing Grades

In this week's "Can I Just Tell You?" commentary, guest host Tony Cox reflects on teaching black young men as a communications professor at California State University. He remains convinced that education is an effective weapon to fight the poverty and hardship that many of these young men face.

DC Boasts US' Largest Exhibit On Blacks In Civil War

The African-American Civil War Museum in Washington has been going through a major revamping as 2011 marks the 150th anniversary of the north and south's bitter battle between 1861-1865. To learn about the museum's grand re-opening, which is scheduled for July, and the history of African-Americans in the Civil War, guest host Tony Cox speaks with the museum's founding director Frank Smith