Peg with Pen: Littleton Public Schools, Colorado: Will You Stand on the Right Side of History?

Peg with Pen: Littleton Public Schools, Colorado: Will You Stand on the Right Side of History?:

Littleton Public Schools, Colorado: Will You Stand on the Right Side of History?

Last Thursday night I addressed the Littleton School Board. See video here. Here are my comments.

My name is Peggy Robertson. My son, Sam, is a sophomore at Littleton High School. I am a teacher in the Aurora Public School District and I am also one of the founders of United Opt Out National, an activist group which works hard to end the privatization of public schools. I want to thank all of you tonight for doing your civic duty to support public schools and to support  children, teachers, and the communities within the Littleton School District.

Tonight I want to talk about the truth. I want to talk about what is really happening in our public schools today and I am going to ask that everyone here consider this truth, and consider our civic duty, our moral obligation, to expose this truth and educate the Littleton school community.

The truth is this. The truth is that our public schools are using high stakes testing to punish students, school communities and now, under SB191, the testing will punish teachers. The testing creates an environment that is fear-based, shaming, and demands teaching to the test.  In Aurora, where I work as  a literacy coach at an elementary school, I have had only 4 weeks of the year which were uninterrupted by testing.   The tests consume our year and create a system which develops compliant test takers. These tests deny our children authentic learning experiences. They deny our teachers the ability to teach.

I would ask that the school board and the administrators take a lead in exposing this testing profit machine for what it is.  It is a system that profits corporations on the backs of children and teachers. The common core standards and the national tests are a cash cow for the corporations. The profit of the testing industry has increased 57% in the last three years.  Under SB191, this system will demand teaching to the test like never before. These high stakes testing mandates  reward  only the very privileged – yet even these rewards are hallow – as these test scores simply point to zipcode. 

Littleton Public Schools has done quite well under this high stakes testing regime. Children from affluent neighborhoods often do well on these high stakes tests.  It doesn't mean that these children are smarter than other children, it simply means Peg with Pen: Littleton Public Schools, Colorado: Will You Stand on the Right Side of History?:

Hello Superintendents - Common Core SBAC Test “Mandate” is not like Connecticut’s truancy laws. - Wait What?

Hello Superintendents - Common Core SBAC Test “Mandate” is not like Connecticut’s truancy laws. - Wait What?:

Hello Superintendents – Common Core SBAC Test “Mandate” is not like Connecticut’s truancy 

 Reading the misleading letters that Connecticut parents are still receiving from some local school superintendents it remains clear that Governor Dannel Malloy’s administration more than a handful of local school superintendents need to take a deep breath and actually read Connecticut’s State Statues…and then consider those statutes in the context of their moral and ethical responsibility to Connecticut’s students and their parents.

Parents throughout Connecticut, and across the nation, continue to inform local school officials that they are opting their children out of the Common Core Testing program because they understandably refuse to have their child take the unfair, inappropriate and discriminatory tests.

But rather than handle the situation in a professional, dignified and respectful fashion some local school superintendents, using memos provided by Malloy Department of Education, continue to mislead and harass parents into believing that they do not have the fundamental, inalienable and constitutionally protected right to determine what is best for their children.

A typical example of the arrogance of these education autocrats can be found in the recent letter authored by New Haven’s Superintendent of Schools Garth Harries who writes,

“…please understand that federal and state laws require that all public school students be tested, so New Haven Schools has no degree of freedom in this matter.”

As if he has no choice but to “follow orders,” Superintendent Harries adds,

“…the state law also does not allow parents to exempt their children from taking the state assessment.”

A little honesty on the part of Connecticut’s State Department of Education and these local school officials would make a huge difference in this debate about a parent’s right to refuse to have their children participate in the Common Core SBAC Testing Scheme.

If superintendents would take their blinders off for a moment they’d realize the following:

Their authority to try and force a child to take the SBAC test, or punish a child who does not, is not like the authority they have to deal with the issue of truancy, which is clearly and concisely laid out in state law.

When it comes to the so-called “mandate” that children must take the Common Core SBAC Test, Connecticut State Statue 10-14n. reads,

Mastery examination. (a) As used in this section, “mastery examination” means an examination or examinations, approved by the State Board of Education, that measure essential and grade-appropriate skills in reading, writing, mathematics or science.

10-14n (b) (1) For the school year commencing July 1, 2013, and each school year thereafter, each student enrolled in grades three to eight, inclusive, and grade ten or eleven in any public school shall, annually, take a mastery examination in reading, writing and mathematics.

Putting aside the fact that the Common Core Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) Test is not a true mastery exam because it does not measure “grade-appropriate Hello Superintendents - Common Core SBAC Test “Mandate” is not like Connecticut’s truancy laws. - Wait What?:

Bill Would Limit Use of Student Data - NYTimes.com

Bill Would Limit Use of Student Data - NYTimes.com:

Bill Would Limit Use of Student Data

Speaker John A. Boehner, right, administering the oath of office to Representative Jared S. Polis in January. Mr. Polis, a Colorado Democrat, is co-sponsor of the Student Digital Privacy and Parental Rights Act. Credit Pablo Martinez Monsivais/Associated Press

 Is the digital revolution in the classroom giving the education technology industry carte blanche to exploit student data?

That was the question some teacher and parents groups have posed in their public responses to the news last week that Pearson, the education publisher, had been covertly monitoring social media sites to identify students who might have disclosed questions from its assessment tests.

In an effort to ease parent and teacher concerns, two congressmen are planning to introduce a bill on Monday that would place limits on how education technology companies can use information about kindergarten through 12th-grade students.

Called the Student Digital Privacy and Parental Rights Act, the bill would prohibit companies that operate school services — like online homework portals, digital grade books for teachers or student email programs — from knowingly using or disclosing students’ personal information to tailor advertisements to them. It would also bar them from collecting or using student data to create marketing profiles.

In phone interviews, Representative Jared S. Polis, a Colorado Democrat, and Representative Luke Messer, an Indiana Republican, the bill’s sponsors, said they hoped to increase trust in education technology companies.

“This is a first step in providing a framework that can address the concerns of parents and educators and, at the same time, allow the promise of education technology to transform our schools,” Mr. Polis said.

But the bill is likely to be opposed by education privacy advocates who seek stronger consent mechanisms for students and parents — as well as by industry groups that favor self-regulation.

“All this bill does is add additional legal hurdles for innovating educational services,” an executive at a technology trade group wrote to associates on Friday in a private email that was forwarded to a reporter with the stipulation that the writer of the email not be named.

As school districts across the country turn to powerful new digital education tools, efforts to increase teacher and parent buy-in have been multiplying. Industry executives say that so-called adaptive learning products seem particularly promising. These are apps and sites that can collect and analyze a wealth of student information with the idea of tailoring lessons on the spot to the abilities of each child.

“The world of big data has hit the classroom,” Mr. Messer said. “We want to preserve the positive benefits the technology can bring to student outcomes.”

Some parents have started warning, however, that school districts lack the resources to monitor how technology vendors use and secure their children’s records. These parents say they’re troubled by the risk of everything from data breaches and identity theft to the possibility of companies sharing sensitive details like students’ grades, disciplinary actions or health data with college or job recruiters.

Although there is a federal education privacy law that requires schools to maintain control over students’ educational records, critics say it has not kept pace with the practices of educational technology companies.

“As a parent, I’m concerned that there are vast amounts of academic, physical and behavioral information being acquired on children that could have negative implications for our children’s future,” said Anna Shah-Bomba, a mother of an elementary school student and a college student in Poughkeepsie, N.Y.

Last year, for instance, ConnectEDU — a career planning site with listings on the academic, personal and career details of millions of students — sought to sell its databases as part of a bankruptcy proceeding.

After federal regulators intervened, the acquiring companies notified the site’s account holders that they could choose to have their information deleted.

Partly in response to such incidents, President Obama in January announced a proposal for a new student digital privacy law.

“We’re saying that data collected on students in the classroom should only be used for educational purposes,” Mr. Obama said in a speech at the time.

The Messer-Polis bill incorporates that principle. In addition to prohibiting Bill Would Limit Use of Student Data - NYTimes.com:

Teachers, Parents Challenge Deal’s School Takeover Plan Ahead of House Committee Vote

Teachers, Parents Challenge Deal’s School Takeover Plan Ahead of House Committee Vote | Atlanta Progressive News:

TEACHERS, PARENTS CHALLENGE DEAL’S SCHOOL TAKEOVER PLAN AHEAD OF HOUSE COMMITTEE VOTE

(APN) ATLANTA — The House Education Committee will soon decide whether to advance Gov. Nathan Deal’s controversial proposal to allow the state to take over and privatize struggling schools.

At a hearing on Wednesday March 18, 2015, State Representatives and members of the public expressed both deep concern and some enthusiasm over the proposal, which, as Atlanta Progressive News previously reported, calls for the creation of a statewide Opportunity School District (OSD).

http://atlantaprogressivenews.com/2015/02/18/6288/

The OSD would take the place of local school boards in managing “failing” schools.  The Governor would have the power to appoint the OSD superintendent.

“I’m concerned with what kind of experience will be needed for that so-called Superintendent who answers only to the Governor,” State Rep. Tommy Benton (R-Jefferson) said during the hearing.

“We get all bent out of shape when the federal government tells us what to do, and now we’re trying to do that to the local systems,” Rep. Benton said.

Benton has received over three hundred emails from constituents who oppose the OSD plan, saying it represented “one more poke in the eye for public education,” he said.

The OSD is based on a model pioneered in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and touted by an education reform movement comprised largely of wealthy foundations, venture capitalists, charter schools, and education technology companies.

A constitutional amendment would be required in order to make the OSD a reality in Georgia.  To that end, SR 287 proposes to put the question to voters on the 2016 ballot.

Currently the ballot language reads: Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended to allow the state to intervene in chronically failing public schools in order to improve student performance?

But the ballot language is incredibly simplistic compared to that of SB 133, the enabling legislation that actually outlines how the OSD would work.

At the hearing, State Rep. Christian Coomer (R-Cartersville) and Erin Hames, Gov. Deal’s Deputy Chief of Staff, gave an overview of the current version of SB 133.

Under the plan, schools would be eligible for takeover if they scored an F rating three years in a row.  The Georgia Department of Education currently uses a rating system called the College and Career Ready Performance Index (CCRPI), which launched as a pilot in 2013 and has undergone changes since then.

However, the CCRPI uses number, not letter grades.  It also uses stars to indicate a school’s “climate.”  The legislation does not specify what number grade, or number of stars, constitutes an F when determining whether a school qualifies for OSD takeover.

According to the Governor’s office, 139 Georgia schools are failing and eligible for takeover.

SB 133 stipulates that the OSD would take over no more than 20 schools per year and would have no more than 100 schools under its jurisdiction at one time.

Schools would remain in the OSD for a minimum of five years and a maximum of ten years, unless they managed to Teachers, Parents Challenge Deal’s School Takeover Plan Ahead of House Committee Vote | Atlanta Progressive News:

Teach for America – What a Stupid Idea! (Or is it?) - Badass Teachers Association

Badass Teachers Association:

Teach for America – What a Stupid Idea! (Or is it?)

By:  Steven Singer

Originally posted on his blog  https://gadflyonthewallblog.wordpress.com/2015/03/14/teach-for-america-what-a-stupid-idea-or-is-it/

Welcome to the Hall of Stupid Ideas!

I’ll be your guide through this section of the museum.

Moving past the hall of phrenology, past the flat earth wing and the newly renovated rotunda of climate change denial, we come to one of my favorite displays – Teach for America or TFA.

This really is a very dumb idea.

Imagine, if you will, a country besieged by an education crisis! In this case, a shortage of teachers.

To meet the needs of this deficiency, we hire a slew of poorly trained college grads to fill-in the gaps.

Sounds nice, doesn’t it?

Young go-getters ready to take a stand and help the country by devoting themselves to our little children.

Yet it’s just so much bullshit.

You see the problem is real. We DO need more teachers – especially at our poorest schools. However, the same people who are promoting TFA are the ones who caused this shortage in the first place.

As public school budgets are slashed at both the state and federal level, local districts are forced to furlough more-and-more educators. Students are stuffed into larger classes and forced to do without the arts, foreign languages, technology courses, anything that isn’t on our federally mandated standardized tests.

So there IS a real shortage of teachers in the classroom, but there is NO shortage of unemployed teachers.

More than 300,000 teachers are out of work. These are people with at least a bachelors degree in education – many of whom have even more experience in the classroom actually teaching kids.

You might think that we could just allocate funding and hire them! Right!?

Wouldn’t that be better?

We could fill our public schools with dedicated education professionals instead of lightly trained temps.

Because this is what Teach for America is providing. TFA recruits get 5 weeks training and only have to sign on for a two-year commitment.

So those advocating for TFA insist it’s somehow better to give a child an instructor who has a few weeks training versus someone with a 4-or-5-year degree and who has real life experience on the job!

It’s staggering isn’t it?

Now this would never fly in most neighborhoods. Imagine trying to convince the rich that their children would be best served by this kind of scheme. They’d riot!

But this scam is almost exclusively perpetrated in poor neighborhoods because that’s where our state and federal governments cut funding. In rich neighborhoods, they can just raise local property taxes to give their children all the best that money can buy. In poor neighborhoods, this isn’t an option. They rely on state and federal tax dollars to give their kids a fair start in life so they can equally compete in the job market.

Well, the joke’s on you, poor people!

Rich folks are selling you substandard teachers and pretending like it’s philanthropy!

You’d think this scheme would be laughed out of existence but many national news sources praise it to the sky! They even make excuses when research proves how ineffective the whole scheme is!

Take this report from March 2015 concluding that students taught by Badass Teachers Association:

Great teacher = great results? Wrong | Jack Marwood | Comment is free | The Guardian

Great teacher = great results? Wrong | Jack Marwood | Comment is free | The Guardian:

Great teacher = great results? Wrong

‘Some children find school and learning easy and some don’t, often for reasons out of their, and our, control.’ Photograph: Jeff Morgan/Alamy

Sir Michael Barber, once a chief education adviser to Tony Blair, introduced one of the enduring modern myths about education when he quoted an unnamed South Korean policymaker in 2007, who said: “The quality of an education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers.” This great teacher myth is often presented as a simple equation: great teaching gets great results. It’s a view that is widely held, tremendously appealing and completely wrong.

It sounds plausible. After all, children spend a lot of time at school and, collectively, we spend a great deal of money on education. By the time they are 16, children have been at school for 10,000 hours, the figure often said to be the minimum necessary to master a skill, and we spend around 5% of our GDP on education. Surely teachers must be the biggest factor in ensuring that all this effort is worthwhile?

David Cameron spoke “as a parent, not just a politician” when he recently introduced yet another plan to “deliver the best teachers” to “make Britain the best place in the world to learn”. “The best teachers” has become a common refrain in the ongoing narrative about schools, and it is very clear that many parents, pundits and politicians assume that the prime driver of attainment in schools is teachers themselves. So embedded is this idea, in fact, that when we hear that teaching is in crisis it is often assumed that this is because we don’t have enough good quality teachers. And often, we hear that by removing the bad teachers from the system, we will see improvements in future.

There is a huge problem with this view. Just how do you know who are bad teachers? For the past 40 years, a movement now known as “school effectiveness research” has promoted the idea that good teachers get good outcomes for children. Those who believe this also believe that, by removing bad teachers from our schools and replacing them with better ones, the crisis will be averted.

The key issue with this line of thinking is that teachers aren’t actually directly responsible for the learning in schools. Because, when it comes down to it, children are the ones who actually have to do the learning. Unfortunately, much to the frustration of every teacher – and parent – in the land, children don’t always do what they are told, or learn what we attempt to teach them. What’s more, children are by definition immature, and they don’t always know what is best for them. To further complicate matters, some children find school and learning easy and some don’t, often for reasons out of their, and our, control.

While teachers have to take responsibility for providing the very best circumstances in which to learn, any parent will know that children have their own ideas regardless of what we have to say about the matter. Children, sadly, are not all passively waiting to be filled up with facts and knowledge like empty vessels. The resistance of some children is legendary. Others overwhelm us with their eagerness to learn. But trying to teach anyone anything is tricky unless they actually want to learn, and are in a position to do so. What’s more, learning is hard work; it requires effort, repetition, practice, mental and physical exertion.

All this adds up to a picture of complexity ill served by the great teacher = great results myth. As is well known in the world of educational research, the variation in outcomes within any school is much, much larger than the variation between schools. In the same school, with the same teachers, some children learn a lot and others not so much, because while teachers teach, children are ultimately Great teacher = great results? Wrong | Jack Marwood | Comment is free | The Guardian:

Big Education Ape: What If Education Reform Got It All Wrong in the First Place? - Pacific Standard http://bit.ly/1x6Cfdn

List of Student Protests Against the PARCC | Teacher Under Construction

List of Student Protests Against the PARCC | Teacher Under Construction:

List of Student Protests Against the PARCC

This entry was posted on March 22, 2015, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. Leave a comment

About 11 student protests against the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) exam have sparked in 5 different states across the country. These states include: California, Colorado, Illinois, New Mexico, and Rhode Island.

Students protesting at the K-12 level is nothing new. Students across the country recognize the power in their voice, and that they have every right to fight for more than what they are given.

As I am only 2 months away from graduating and entering the field, these young people give me hope (as they always do). These collective acts of courage deserve to be recognize, especially when future educators like myself are constantly encouraged not to go into the field. Too often we are told that we just have to “ride the wave of reforms out,” or that “this is just the way things are.”

Students have a lot to teach us. Students like the ones protesting the PARCC teach us that we cannot sit back hopelessly and accept oppressive reforms.

People always ask me how I can stay optimistic, or how I can want to still go into teaching when I see “what’s happening to it.” My answer? Students like the ones cited below.

——–

CALIFORNIA

• Students from Valencia High School protest PARCC Exam.

COLORADO

• March 7: Fort Collins students protest PARCC outside state Capitol

• March 15: Poudre High School students protest PARCC

ILLINOIS

• March 6: Normal Community High School students protest PARCC

NEW MEXICO

• Feb 23: 250 Sante Fe High School students walk out in protest of PARCC Exam
• Feb 27: 60 Sante Fe Students Protest PARCC Exam Outside of State Capitol
• March 2: Hundreds of Las Cruces students protest PARCC Exam
• March 2: Sorroco High School students protest PARCC

• March 3: Hundreds of Albuquerque Students Walk Out in Protest of PARCC 

• March 4:List of Student Protests Against the PARCC | Teacher Under Construction:

Parents Can Opt Out - United Opt Out National

Click Here to go to United Opt Out National: 

Click Here to go to the Website- United Opt Out Team

Click Here to go to the Website FairTest

Privatization of public resources and services - #‎Chuy2015‬ ‪#‎imwithchuy‬

Privatization of public resources and services - Jesus "Chuy" Garcia for Mayor of Chicago:

Privatization of public resources and services

Toward Fiscal Sustainability: A New Approach in Prudent Fiscal Management of Chicago

 The city's primary responsibility is to ensure that the public has equitable access to its services and assets, and my responsibility as Mayor will be to protect these for future generations. Therefore, I am generally opposed to the privatization of public assets and resources.

The City of Chicago has embarked on the dangerous path of giving away its revenue generating assets to private interests, and is consequently losing revenue and control of its public infrastructure systems. However, there is a difference between government relinquishing control of its assets and partnering with private firms with the capacity to produce public goods.

In some instances, it makes sense for City government to partner with private industries to produce public infrastructure (e.g. contracting road improvements, sewer installations, etc.) provided that we establish a diligent protocol to approve only those contracts that ensure proven efficiency, quality, and cost effectiveness and that prioritize contracts with the least negative impact on surrounding communities. But it is not in the best interest of the public to turn over the provision of social goods and services to private interests. Doing so often decreases the opportunity for appropriate scrutiny over vital details such as spending, service quality and hiring.

If a private entity can profit from providing a service, then the city should be able to improve its capacity to do the same. But, in cases where privatization is our last resort, I will establish strong oversight that ensures that any costs savings claimed by privatization are demonstrable for the term of the contract, and do not come at the expense of service quality for city residents or employees’ ability to earn a living wage. Any leases or contracts that deprive the city of long term control of and benefit from its assets, as exemplified by the parking meter deal, will not be approved. All contracts will be limited to twenty years or less and subject to City oversight. I will improve the efficiency and effectiveness of city service delivery, establishing opportunities for checks and balances, including public input, City Council scrutiny and independent impact analyses.Privatization of public resources and services - Jesus "Chuy" Garcia for Mayor of Chicago:

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

‪#‎Chuy2015‬ ‪#‎imwithchuy‬

Too much sugar? Too much TV? Too much testing? BustED Pencils Online Radio

BustED Pencils Online Radio by Busted Pencils | BlogTalkRadio:

BustED Pencils Trending News: Pearson and Spygate.

Too much sugar? Too much TV? Too much testing? Live from Next Door Brewing

Literally join Jed and Tim at 5:00 pm CST  live from Next Door Brewing Company as we talk public school activism with parents, teachers, and citizens prior to Too much sugar? Too much TV? Too much testing?  We want YOU to come and talk to US.

Madison public school activists will hold a panel discussion at 5:30 CST

at Next Door Brewing Compnay on 2439 Atwood Ave, Madison, Wisconsin 53704.  

UPCOMING BROADCASTS

Too much sugar? Too much TV? Too much testing? Live from Next Door Brewing

Literally join Jed and Tim at 5:00 pm live from Next Door Brewing Company as we talk public school activism with parents, teachers, and citizens prior to Too much sugar? Too much TV? Too much testing? We want YOU to come and talk to US. Madison public school activists will hold a panel discussion at 5:30 at Next Door Brewing Compnay on 2439 Atwood Ave, Madison, Wisconsin 53704.

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Pearson Spying Part 2. Talking to Anthony Cody about TRACX

After a stimulating conversation with Bob Braun last night about his breaking news story that proved that Pearson was spying on New Jersey students wilth the collaboration of the New Jersey Department of Education,, Jed and Tim continue... more

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BustED Pencils Trending News: Pearson and Spygate.

Posted on March 18, 2015 by Tim Slekar

What a week for the giant test publishing company—Pearson.  As was first reported on Bob Braun’s Ledger on Friday March 13th, it was confirmed that Pearson was spying on New Jersey students taking the common core aligned PARCC test. BustED Pencils talked to Bob on Sunday, March 15th for a detailed discussion of the “authorized” (by the… Read more »

BustED Pencils Trending News: Pearson and Spygate.