CA 2016 National Blue Ribbon Public Schools - Year 2016 (CA Dept of Education)

CA 2016 National Blue Ribbon Public Schools - Year 2016 (CA Dept of Education):

State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Congratulates
California Schools Recognized as 2016
National Blue Ribbon Schools

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson today congratulated 29 California public schools that have been chosen as 2016 National Blue Ribbon Schools. This coveted award honors public and private elementary, middle, and high schools where students achieve very high learning standards or are making notable improvements in closing the achievement gap.

“This recognition for California is a testament to the hard work of our educators, administrators, and communities to prepare our students for both 21st century careers and college,” Torlakson said. “We are making progress, but we must keep our momentum going because we have much work to do.”

The California winners are among 279 public (traditional, charter, choice, and magnet) schools and 50 private schools announced this morning by U.S. Secretary of Education John B. King Jr. In its 34-year history, the National Blue Ribbon Schools Program has presented this award to fewer than 8,500 schools.

All schools are recognized in one of two performance categories, based on all student scores, subgroup student scores, and graduation rates:

• Exemplary High Performing Schools are among their state’s highest performing schools as measured by state assessments or national tests.
• Exemplary Achievement Gap Closing Schools are among their state’s highest performing schools in closing achievement gaps between a school’s student groups and all students over the past five years.

Public schools are nominated by top education officials in each state, the Department of Defense Education Activity, and the Bureau of Indian Education. The Council for American Private Education (CAPE) nominates private schools.

National Blue Ribbon Schools will be honored at a national awards ceremony on November 7-8, 2016, in Washington, D.C., where each winner will receive a plaque and flag. Blue Ribbon winners may fly this flag at their schools as a widely recognized symbol of exemplary teaching and learning.

More information about the National Blue Ribbon Schools Program can be found on the U.S. Department of Education Web site .

California's National Blue Ribbon Public Schools for 2016

County	District	School
Alameda	Oakland USD	Hillcrest Elementary
Alameda	Oakland USD	Thornhill Elementary
Contra Costa	Mt. Diablo USD	Strandwood Elementary
Fresno	Fresno USD	Edison Computech
Los Angeles	Hawthorne	Hawthorne Math And Science Academy
Los Angeles	Los Angeles USD	Kipp Los Angeles College Preparatory
Los Angeles	Los Angeles USD	Wonderland Avenue Elementary
Los Angeles	Palos Verdes Peninsula	Point Vicente Elementary
Los Angeles	Santa Monica-Malibu	Edison Elementary
Los Angeles	West Covina USD	San Jose Charter Academy
Marin	San Rafael City Elementary	Sun Valley Elementary
Orange	Garden Grove	A. J. Cook Elementary
Orange	Los Alamitos	Francis Hopkinson Elementary
Orange	Tustin USD	Tustin Memorial Elementary
Placer	Rocklin USD	Rocklin Academy
San Bernardino	San Bernardino City	Richardson Prep Hi
San Bernardino	Victor Valley Union High	University Preparatory
San Diego	Chula Vista Elementary	Arroyo Vista Charter
San Diego	Poway USD	Creekside Elementary
San Diego	San Diego USD	La Jolla Elementary
San Diego	San Marcos USD	Paloma Elementary
San Francisco	San Francisco USD	Lafayette Elementary
San Mateo	Menlo Park City	Laurel Elementary
Santa Barbara	Los Olivos Elementary	Los Olivos Elementary
Santa Clara	Evergreen Elementary	Evergreen Elementary
Sonoma	Santa Rosa High	Santa Rosa Accelerated Charter
Ventura	Conejo Valley USD	Environmental Academy of Research Technology and Earth Sciences
Ventura	Conejo Valley USD	Westlake High
Ventura	Simi Valley USD	Vista Elementary

# # # #

Tom Torlakson — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5206, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

Last Reviewed: Wednesday, September 28, 2016

 CA 2016 National Blue Ribbon Public Schools - Year 2016 (CA Dept of Education):

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson Thanks Governor for Signing Student Suicide Prevention Bill

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson today thanked Governor Jerry Brown for signing legislation requiring schools that serve students from grades 7 to 12 to adopt suicide prevention policies.

Torlakson supported AB 2246 by Assembly Member Patrick O’Donnell, D-Long Beach and Chair of the Assembly Education Committee. The bill, signed on Monday, September 26, requires the California Department of Education (CDE) to develop and maintain a model suicide prevention policy.

“With this change, we can better identify students in need, get them help, and keep them safe,” Torlakson said. “One of my top priorities is serving the needs of the whole child, including their mental health needs. This bill is a big step forward in our ongoing efforts to help our students.”

“As classroom teacher, I know from experience that educators often serve as the first line of defense when a student is suffering from depression or suicidal thoughts,” said Assembly Member O’Donnell. “AB 2246 will provide parents, teachers, and schools with the tools they need to help save the lives of at-risk youth.”

Torlakson is a longtime supporter of expanding mental health services and preventing suicides. When Torlakson served in the California State Senate in 2004, he was state co-chair of the campaign for Proposition 63, a measure that increased income taxes on the wealthy to fund mental health programs.

As State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Torlakson convened a Student Mental Health Policy Workgroup. The group of 40 experts has conducted 20 free trainings in suicide prevention across the state for more than 500 teachers.

Earlier this year, CDE released the Healthy Kids Survey, which describes how students feel about school and how they rank their school environment.

The survey showed schools need to focus more attention on better meeting the needs of youth. For example, two indicators of depression risk showed little change since the last survey two years ago.

Nearly one-fourth of seventh graders and around one-third of ninth and eleventh graders reported feelings of chronic sadness or hopelessness. And, almost 20 percent of high school students had seriously contemplated suicide.

Torlakson in 2014 released a letter encouraging school districts to adopt suicide prevention policies. Under the new law, each district will be required to adopt suicide policies beginning with the 2017-18 school year.

In 2014, there were nearly 2,300 suicide attempts by students 15 to 19 years old in California.

http://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr16/yr16rel67.asp

Tom Torlakson — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5206, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: SmallTalk Salutes Sen. Warren for standing up to charter lobby

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: SmallTalk Salutes Sen. Warren for standing up to charter lobby:

SmallTalk Salutes Sen. Warren for standing up to charter lobby

“Education is about creating opportunity for all our children, not about leaving many behind.” -- Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

A SmallTalk Salute goes out to Sen. Elizabeth Warren who's taken some time out from kicking Donald Trump's behind to stand strong against her state's powerful charter school lobby.

This from the Washington Post:

There is a pitched battle underway in Massachusetts over charter schools, with proponents pouring money into an initiative on the November ballot that would raise the state cap on their growth and opponents arguing that charters are draining resources from traditional public schools. Now critics have gotten a big boost: Sen. Elizabeth Warren said she was going to vote against Question 2

There are now nearly 80 charter schools in Massachusetts, where no more than 120 charter schools are currently allowed to operate. Question 2 would allow 12 new or expanded charter schools to open every year anywhere in the state.  a move that supporters say will give more parents choices about where to send their children to school and help close the achievement gap.

Sen. Warren 

Jennifer Berkshire, who posts at Edushyster, interviews political scientist Maurice Cunningham who says the campaign to lift the cap on charter schools in Massachusetts is driven by GOP operatives and a handful of wealthy Republican families.

There are a handful of wealthy families that are funding this. They largely give to Republicans and they represent the financial industry, basically. They’re out of Bain, Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: SmallTalk Salutes Sen. Warren for standing up to charter lobby:

An education reform civil war in the Black community? – Cloaking Inequity

An education reform civil war in the Black community? – Cloaking Inequity:

An education reform civil war in the Black community?

I have begun thinking about the education reform dispute as a civil war in the Black community.

Incidentally, at my uncle funeral in Saginaw Michigan this past weekend, I met a fourth cousin who told me that our great great great grandfather fought in the US Civil War for the Union Army in the 110th colored. I learned he was captured at Fort Henderson in Athens, Alabama by General Nathan Bedford Forrest and was a POW until his escape 8 months later. Probably one of the most, most profound things that has happened to me this year.

Returning to the civil war that is occurring in 2016. I spoke at a Journey for Justice Alliance conference at SUNY Old Westbury on Monday before the first presidential debates. I discussed my perspective on the education reform civil war in the Black community. A draft of my remarks is below the video.

We want policymakers to notice that there is something happening in urban communities. On the one side are charter operators, billionaire foundations, and their acolytes who are supporting the private control of public money for education that was envisioned by the economist Milton Freidman in the 1950s. On the other side are parents and communities who are demanding high-quality, properly resourced, democratically controlled, neighborhood public schools.

The dispute even has national civil rights organizations at odds. The National Urban League, United Negro College Fund, NCLR and other civil rights organizations have typically aligned themselves with market-based school choice proponents. On the other side, the NAACP delegates have voted on three national resolutions critical of charter schools over the past six years— the most recent resolution is awaiting a vote by the NAACP National Board. Black Lives Matters coalition, our nation’s newest national civil rights movement composed of more than 50 organizations, also released a platform of policy demands critical of charter schools and school privatization this past summer.

Recently, both sides of the education reform civil war have focused on communicating to policymakers and the public that they are representing the interests of urban communities that have been historically underserved on purpose by our nation. Market-based choice proponents underscored the dispute this past week when charter school owners and their supporters released a letter saying they represent the interests of tens of thousands of Black students and bemoaning the NAACP’s most recent resolution criticizing charter schools.

Today, in response to the market-based reformers, we, the supporters of high-quality, properly resourced, democratically controlled, neighborhood public schools are holding events at the first presidential debate in New York to focus on the release of the Journey for Justice Alliance (J4J)’s national public education platform. As a founding board member, I am honored that these events are co-sponsored An education reform civil war in the Black community? – Cloaking Inequity:

How a school garden can transform a school community - Lily's Blackboard

How a school garden can transform a school community - Lily's Blackboard:

How a school garden can transform a school community

Nancy Burke wanted to expose her students at Haverhill High School to the simple pleasures of gardening—the texture of dirt between your fingers, the pure fun of digging holes, the hope that builds when seeds are newly planted and the excitement that comes when seedlings begin to grow. 

“I wanted them to be able to get outside in a hands-on outdoor learning environment,” Nancy says. With a grant from an NEA program and help from students and others in the Haverhill, Mass. community, that’s exactly what she did.

Nancy’s been an instructional paraeducator at Haverhill High for 18 years, working in the multi-support and life skills programs with students who have disabilities. She received an $800 grant in 2013 from the Massachusetts Teacher Association and the NEA to build garden beds in an interior school courtyard.

The Farm to School Initiative got its start when NEA’s Education Support Professional Quality department decided to pilot a program that complemented First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move initiative, which includes community gardens.NEA partnered with the National Farm to School Network to make it happen.

The NEA program is aimed at addressing student obesity rates through student engagement in school gardens, and using their engagement to teach them about preparing healthy, nutritious dishes for themselves and others.

“Education Support Professionals are key to meeting students’ basic needs,” says Roxanne Dove, director of ESPQ. “In addition to food preparation, the relationships ESPs have with the students they care for can be so valuable in motivating students to lead healthy, active lives.”

The fully handicapped-accessible garden has wheelchair ramps and raised beds, and was built by student volunteers.

Not only is Nancy’s program still going strong at Haverhill; the school cafeteria is now using the garden’s tomatoes, peppers and other produce in meals.

This year—just in time for National Farm to School Month in October—all of Nancy’s students are going to theTopsfield Fair to see their produce on display, courtesy of Whitsons Culinary Group.

Nancy’s efforts have earned her recognition and lots of praise, including a 2015 Bammy award, presented by theAcademy of Education Arts and Sciences to recognize the extraordinary work of educators across all disciplines. She’s even in a how-to video on starting a school garden.

But for Nancy, the biggest thrill is bearing witness to how much her students learn from the garden. She’s dedicated to seeing accessible gardens sprout up (I couldn’t help myself) across the nation. The gardens have obvious benefits for students. But what’s more, they can bring together the entire school community.

“Teenagers now volunteer in our classroom and read, sing songs or help with lessons,” Nancy says. “It’s wonderful for my students to be with their peers and be accepted for who they are.”How a school garden can transform a school community - Lily's Blackboard:

CURMUDGUCATION: Outsourcing College

CURMUDGUCATION: Outsourcing College:

Outsourcing College

The Education Management Corporation is based right up the road from me in Pittsburgh, PA. They're a for-profit education provider whose best-known outlet is the Art Institute chain. (They should not be confused with the Education Credit Management Corporation, an outfit that is also in the for-profit college biz, having bought up the pieces of the Corinthian empire.)

They've had their problems. You know a company has been struggling when its website proudly announces front and center that it has struck a deal with thirty-nine states, the District of Columbia, and the Department of Justice to end the many, many, many state and federal suits, investigations,  and charges against it for fraud and bad recruiting practices.

Mock my hair all you want. It cost more than your house.

Now this morning's Politico includes other shenanigans-flavored news:

The latest downsizing move by one of the nation's largest for-profit college chains — the cash-strapped Education Management Corporation — may be selling off campuses to a company in India.

The company in question appears to be Ritman Balved Education Foundation, a non-profit that runs the relatively huge Amity International Schoolchain. Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey (one of the thirty-nine attorney generals involved with EDMC's other shenanigans) describes the sale as a "plan to outsource the remainder of its teach-out obligations to an unlicensed foreign entity."

Amity is part of a rising trend in India of private universities, a trend that attracted attention from the Wall Street Journal in 2007. That story notes that India was having trouble adjusting to the rise of private businesses in education, and that while Indian law required schools of higher learning to be non-profit, they were still plenty expensive and CURMUDGUCATION: Outsourcing College:

Top Utah Republicans join corporate education reform groups to attack anti-Common Core school board candidates - Wait What?

Top Utah Republicans join corporate education reform groups to attack anti-Common Core school board candidates - Wait What?:

Top Utah Republicans join corporate education reform groups to attack anti-Common Core school board candidates

In May 2016 Utah’s Republican Governor, Gary Herbert, called on the Utah Board of Education to, “move past Common Core standards and get rid of mandatory SAGE testing for high school students.”

Governor Herbert wrote,

“I am asking the State Board of Education to consider implementing uniquely Utah standards, moving beyond the Common Core to a system that is tailored specifically to the needs of our state.”

The Utah Governor’s strong action in opposition to the Common Core standards and its related Common Core testing scheme won him praise from conservatives and educators, but some of the state’s top Republicans are now joining the Utah business community and the state’s corporate education reform allies to try and keep pro-Common Core incumbents on the Utah Board of Education.

Following the loss of some pro-Common Core incumbents during the state’s summer primary, corporate education reform allies are now raising money to defend the remaining pro-Common Core, pro-corporate education reform candidates on the Utah School Board.

Earlier this month, Utah Policy.com, a Utah based political blog reported,

“Get ready for partisan, big money, races for the Utah State School Board…

[…]

[T]the primary race this year caught some GOP leaders off guard, as several well-liked (at least on Capitol Hill) incumbents were beaten June 28.

And now a “last ditch” effort is being made to save a few of the other 

Top Utah Republicans join corporate education reform groups to attack anti-Common Core school board candidates - Wait What?:

Black and White – EduShyster

Black and White – EduShyster:

Black and White

I talk to Yawu Miller of Boston’s Bay State Banner about the red-hot debate over charter school expansion in Massachusetts—and what *thought leaders* are getting wrong…

EduShyster: In a few weeks, Massachusetts voters will give a thumbs up or a thumbs down to raising the *cap* on charter schools. The issue has attracted a frenzy of*reporting* from outside of the state, much of it, shall we say, somewhat muddled. Since Boston is at the very center of the scrum, I thought I’d bring in someone who knows a thing or two about the place. Yawu: what are people missing about this story? Besides the fact that Boston is not a state, that is.

Yawu Miller: What I’ve noticed in the debate in Boston is that people are not against charter schools. They think that there is a place for them. They think that charter schools work well for some people, maybe for their own children. But they don’t want to see the kind of expansion that’s being proposed now. They think there’s a threat to the district school system if that happens. You hear a lot of people saying *I’m not anti-charter. I’m against this ballot question.* I think the funding issue has caused a lot of people who pay attention to the schools to come out strongly against this.

EduShyster: Let’s talk politics. This week Elizabeth Warren came out in opposition to Question 2. The issue is being characterized outside of Massachusetts as *one of the most important tests of social justice and economic mobility of any election in America this fall.* But support among officials in Boston in particular seems, um, thin. Am I right?

Miller: In Boston, most elected officials are quiet about it. There are a few other elected officials in other parts of the state, and Congressman Stephen Lynch.  When the Boston City Council voted on a No on Question 2 resolution, 11 councilors voted to oppose it, two councilors abstained, saying that they didn’t want to take sides. One of the leading voices against Question 2 in Boston has been City Councillor Tito Jackson, who, by the way, is on the board of the Renaissance Charter School. Mayor Walsh, the other leading voice against Question 2, served on the board of the Conservatory Lab Charter School. The rallies that Great Schools Massachusetts has had, and they haven’t had any for a while, were led by Governor Charlie Baker and Lieutenant Governor Karen Polito, both republicans. The rallies seemed like they were all charter parents and it was notable that they were all during the school day and there were children there who presumably got time off from school. I think for at least some Black and White – EduShyster:

Seattle Schools Community Forum: ESSA: NCLB Lite (Plus Lots for Charters)

Seattle Schools Community Forum: ESSA: NCLB Lite (Plus Lots for Charters):

ESSA: NCLB Lite (Plus Lots for Charters)

I've been saving up articles on ESSA (Every Child Succeeds Act, the next No Child Left Behind).   Congress may have given more power back to the states but there appear to be some truly troubling issues around increased data collection, opting out, and what "indicators" they will be collecting on each and every child.
From the wonderful Deutsch29 blog from Mercedes Schneider:

• ESSA requires the 95 percent of testing for the states even as it says, “Don’t pin your state opt-out policies on us for our federal policy. 

• My second concern involve data collection and especially security. Pages 79 and 80 state that no data is to be collected except that which is “explicitly authorized under this Act.” However, as the February 02, 2016, Congressional Oversight Committee Hearing of US Department of Education (USDOE) Chief Information Officer (CIO) Danny Harris demonstrated, not only was the federal government able to hack into the USDOE data system; acting US secretary John King bent over backwards in defending Harris’ questionable conflicts of interest and shoddy upkeep over the course of years with securing said data.  USDOE has failed for years to secure the data it has, which includes to date 139 million unique social security numbers.

• As was true for NCLB, ESSA is very friendly to charters. In Title IV, ESSA seeks to open and expand “high-quality” charter schools (page 194). The problem is the USDOE’s history of failing to properly account for its own spending on charter schools. Indeed, in November 2015, USDOE awarded a recommended $71 million to Ohio for its charter schools despite the fact that Ohio admitted to tampering with the numbers on the USDOE application.

She sums up:  I would like ESSA a whole lot better if USDOE would flip the intensity of its 95-percent testing grip in Title I with its nonchalance both about charter spending related to Title IV and keeping the likes of incompetent CIO Danny Harris in annual bonuses.
  
This from Education Post (a Gates-funded group):

A little-noticed provision in the new Every Student Succeeds Act(ESSA) allows states to set aside funding to help schools create new programs for underserved students and to expand choices for students and parents.

The provision allows states to use up to 3 percent of their federal Title I funding to help districts create innovative new programs for underserved students. States opting into this program for what’s known as Direct Student Services (DSS) can develop a grant process to award the funds.

That 3 percent means as much as $425 million can be available annually for school districts to develop new, innovative ways to provide students in struggling schools a range of additional academic opportunities not available right now.

From EdScoop,  How Schools Can Track Kids' Progress Under ESSA Using Seattle Schools Community Forum: ESSA: NCLB Lite (Plus Lots for Charters):

[Letter from Detroit] | Held Back, by Alexandria Neason | Harper's Magazine

[Letter from Detroit] | Held Back, by Alexandria Neason | Harper's Magazine:

Held Back

Battling for the fate of a school district

Three days had passed before I saw a police officer in Detroit. I’d covered miles of the city, by foot and by car. Twice I was advised not to bother calling the police in an emergency; they wouldn’t come. I only ever found them in one place: armed officers from the city’s police department and from Detroit Public Schools’ own security force were manning a gray metal detector at the door to Martin Luther King Jr. Senior High School, on East Lafayette Street. They were in position for a public meeting that night, in May, asking that everyone empty their pockets and bags. A line had formed: on the agenda was the presentation of a new financial plan for the city’s fraught public-school system, put forth by Steven Rhodes, a retired judge who had presided over Detroit’s bankruptcy and now serves as the fifth state-appointed emergency manager the district has seen in seven years.

Burton International Academy. All photographs with drawings from Detroit by Mischelle Moy

When Rhodes came to office, this past March, the Detroit public-school system was contending with an operating debt of more than $500 million, and the Citizens Research Council of Michigan had estimated that the total debt topped $3.5 billion. For years, money intended for students has instead been paying off old loans, and academic achievement has consistently ranked among the worst in American cities. At many school buildings, much-needed repairs to walls and leaky roofs have gone unaddressed; in the worst cases, mice could be seen scampering across unheated classrooms. For thirteen of the past seventeen years, the state has controlled the city’s school district, and with the more recent addition of all-powerful emergency managers, Detroiters have had to pin their frustrations and hopes on a rotating cast of emissaries. At the meeting, Rhodes — who has adopted the title “transition manager” — would present his recommendations to the community.

In King’s atrium, district officials had set up a table piled with thick, stapled copies of the new forty-five-day financial and operating plan. Dozens of people streamed in — parents, pastors, and youth organizers, many of them public-school alumni. They picked up copies and greeted one another in the hallway. Some looked anxious, others moved like boxers gearing up for a rematch. Alongside them were teachers and school counselors who had left classrooms, coaching, and after-school club duties to be at the meeting. Several King students were there, too, chatting about the banalities of high-school life. As everyone entered the auditorium, they passed representatives of King’s Army Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps, who were dressed in uniform.

First, some good news: Deborah Jenkins, King’s principal, gave a careful speech touting the school’s recent accomplishments. Last year, she said, her thin eyebrows raised, King was an exception to the district’s overall poor performance: one hundred percent of the graduating class had committed to college or the military, and the marching band had been invited to perform at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Greeting applause, Jenkins smiled. Then she shifted course. “Any individual not modeling the way for our [Letter from Detroit] | Held Back, by Alexandria Neason | Harper's Magazine:

John Thompson: Let's Hope NOVA's Hopeful View of The School of the Future Is Right | Huffington Post

Let's Hope NOVA's Hopeful View of The School of the Future Is Right | Huffington Post - Linkis.com:

Let’s Hope NOVA’s Hopeful View of The School of the Future Is Right

NOVA’s The School of the Future is an excellent and intriguing contribution to the Public Broadcast System’s back-to-school special reports. The first third of the report hit the right balance between state of the art cognitive science, the long-established body of research on neuroscience which can inform educational practice, and the facts of life in public schools. Pamela Cantor, director ofTurnaround for Children, drew on our understanding of neuroplasticity and the damage done by chronic stress to explain why children need schools where they feel safe. Her organization has done great work towards creating positive learning environments where children are praised and benefit from collaborative practices such as “turn and talk,” that build on their strengths.

NOVA then synthesized the long-admired work of Carol Dweck on the “growth mindset” with the more recent research of Angela Duckworth on the “psychology of effort.” The role of tests, that have no stakes attached, and other science-based learning practices, were explored by Mark McDaniel and Roddy Roediger. (During my last year in the classroom teaching GED to TANF recipients and prison inmates, I incorporated several of their recommendations into my classes, and they seemed to be helpful.) Todd Rose argued for real personalized learning, as opposed to the faux “personalized” learning which strips the human dimension from instruction.

As usual, Sal Kahn emphasized the positive potential of digital learning. Fortunately, NOVA also voiced questions as to whether the technology will be scaled up constructively but, inexplicably, it did not address the single biggest reason why its potential may not be realized. If the brutal, test-driven, charter-driven culture of competition persists, the incentives are to misuse so-called “personalized” learning as a “drill and kill” tool to “juke the stats,” or make accountability metrics look better. 

My complaint with NOVA’s synthesis on the future of learning is that it failed to mention dangerous prospects of charter schools, and other true believers in data, who want to grade students on their “grit,” and/or use lessons learned through Let's Hope NOVA's Hopeful View of The School of the Future Is Right | Huffington Post - Linkis.com:

Why California’s charter school sector is called ‘the Wild West’ - The Washington Post

Why California’s charter school sector is called ‘the Wild West’ - The Washington Post:

Why California’s charter school sector is called ‘the Wild West’

This is the second of four posts on the state of the charter school sector in California.

The charter school sector has grown over the last few decades amid a debate about their virtues and drawbacks — and even whether the publicly funded schools are actually public. Some charters do a great job, but even some advocates (though not all) are finally admitting that too many states allowed charters to open and operate without sufficient oversight.

Ohio and Utah have vied for the distinction of having the most troubled charter sector though Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale recently issued a report this year and declared his state’s charter school law the “worst” in the nation.  It’s a race to the bottom.

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[Why charter schools get public education advocates so angry]

California deserves special attention as, in many ways, the charter Wild West. It has more charter schools and charter school students than any other state in the nation. One billionaire even came up with a secret plan to “charterize” half of the Los Angeles Unified School District. Among the problems:

* A report released recently (by the ACLU SoCal and Public Advocates, a nonprofit law firm and advocacy group) found that more than 20 percent of all California charter schools have enrollment policies that violate state and federal law.

* In some places, charter schools open without mentioning their existence to the traditional school district in which they reside, prompting lawsuits by the districts. The Grossmont Union High School District, for example, sued to shut down two charters operating in Grossmont under agreements signed by another school district. The San Diego Union-Tribune quoted Scott Patterson, Grossman’s deputy superintendent of business services as saying, “It’s been described as the Wild West out there.”

*A Mercury News investigation published in April revealed how the state’s online charter schools run by Virginia-based K12 Inc., the largest for-profit charter operator in the country, have “a dismal record of academic achievement” but have won more than $310 million in state funding over the past Why California’s charter school sector is called ‘the Wild West’ - The Washington Post:

* One charter school principal doubled as a National Basketball Association scout, traveling first class to basketball games around the country — and charged his travel expenses to his charter school.

* One charter school closed in 2014 after state auditors found a number of issues, including indications that administrators funneled millions of dollars in state funds to the schools’ operator and her family and friends. As the Los Angeles Times reported, some of the allegations Why California’s charter school sector is called ‘the Wild West’ - The Washington Post: