Thursday, January 5, 2017

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: U.S. schools get a C on Quality Counts Report. Here's why.

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: U.S. schools get a C on Quality Counts Report. Here's why.:

U.S. schools get a C on Quality Counts Report. Here's why.

Massachusetts defends schools from privatization. Ranks #1 in Quality Counts.

Edweek's annual Quality Counts report gives the nation's increasingly two-tier school system, letter grade C, as it almost always does. 30 years of corporate-style school reform under both Democratic and Republican regimes, hasn't moved the needle very much.

My problem with the report is that in reality, there is no national school system or one set of standards for them to be graded on. This will be increasingly so during the Betsy DeVos era. So Edweek creates it's own as well as its own grading metrics.

As you can tell, I'm skeptical. What they've done here, as most of these studies do (without a mention of race or poverty btw) is throw together into one pot, the nations's wealthy schools with those with concentrated poverty, as if they were all one thing that could be graded on the same rubric. If the nation's wealthiest schools were separated out, they would likely get an A grade, using Edweek's indices. Resourced-starved, racially-isolated schools with high concentrations of children living in poverty would likely get an F. Mush them all together and you inevitably wind up with a C.

Here's the indices they use:

• The Chance-for-Success Index uses a cradle-to-career perspective to examine the role of education in promoting positive outcomes throughout an individual’s lifetime.

• The school finance analysis evaluates spending on education and equity in funding Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: U.S. schools get a C on Quality Counts Report. Here's why.:

Educators as Community Protectors – Education Town Hall Forum

Educators as Community Protectors – Education Town Hall Forum:

Educators as Community Protectors

In the wake of the recent election, teachers in the U.S. must cope with threats to immigrants in their classrooms and communities, in addition to their usual responsibilities. In December, the president-elect’s transition team asked the Department of Homeland Security about obtaining immigrant student data, which observers fear is a first step toward deportation. The president-elect has also reiterated plans to rescind executive orders put into place by President Obama, including the 2012 “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” or DACA.

The DACA program allows young people who were brought to the US illegally by their parents to apply for temporary school and work authorization. Hundreds of thousands of youth have used the program to obtain an education. The program may not be in place beyond the coming inauguration day, however. Moreover, observers are concerned that the new administration is attempting to violate the trust of previous applicants, who voluntarily provided information through the DACA program, using their private information against them and their families. This is just one of the threats to family stability and school opportunities that communities around the country will face in the new administration. (See also recent program on Democracy Now.)

In preparation for the change of administration, a youth-led immigrant organization called “United We Dream” asks educators to pledge visible and vocal support for immigrant students.

congress-2014 — from United We Dream website

United We Dream is a nonpartisan network of 100,000 immigrant youth and allies. The network advocates for classrooms and institutions free of racism, bullying, and deportation. They call on teachers, school support staff, and others working with students to help provide safe welcoming learning environments for all students. In particular, educators are asked to commit to action the week of January 9th in advance of the inauguration.

United We Dream offers a variety of support materials. Included are curriculum materials forEducators as Community Protectors – Education Town Hall Forum:

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Noted Education Speaker Comes to Garfield High

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Noted Education Speaker Comes to Garfield High:

Noted Education Speaker Comes to Garfield High

Just wanted to give advance notice of this talk but I will have more to say soon. I greatly admire Ms. Burris and look forward to her talk.

To note, the Work Session on the SAP will also be that day at JSCEE but it is from 4:30-5:15pm with a Work Session on the Budget to follow from 5:15-6:45 pm. It is very disappointing that not a single Board member will have a community on Saturday in order to talk with parents about the SAP and get their input.

PLEASE JOIN US FOR AN EVENING WITH CAROL BURRIS

Closing the Opportunity Gap through Detracking and De-Testing
Wednesday, January 11 - 6:30 – 8 p.m.

Garfield High School Quincy Jones Performing Arts Center

400 23rd Avenue, Seattle 98122

Carol Burris will deliver a keynote address regarding the tremendous benefits of detracking, and how ranking students based on their perceived intellectual abilities creates defacto segregation in our schools.

Wayne Au, Professor of Education at the University of Washington, Bothell, will also be joining us on a panel of local educators and students who will share their stories and insights regarding inclusion and high-stakes testing.
Carol Burris is the Executive Director of the Network for Public Education Foundation and has been a teacher in both middle and high schools. She received her doctorate from Teachers College, Columbia University, and is a former high school principal. In 2010, she was named Educator of the Year by the School Administrators Association of New York State, and in 2013, she was named SAANYS New York State High School Principal of the Year. Dr. Burris co-authored De-tracking for Excellence and Equity (2008) and Opening the Common Core: How to Bring ALL Students to College and Career Readiness (2012), and authored On the Same Track: How Schools Can Join the 21st Century Struggle against Re-segregation (2014).

This event is supported by the Garfield High School PTSA, Seattle Equality Educators (SEE), the Center for Race and Equity and the Seattle Education Association. Seattle Schools Community Forum: Noted Education Speaker Comes to Garfield High:

Director Geary on advanced learning

by Charlie Mas / 1h

Let's start with this disclaimer: I agree with Director Geary. Here's what she said at the Board meeting on January 4, 2017 during a discussion of the CSIPs and, specifically, the description of advanced learning services in those CSIPs: "I’m glad that you brought up the Advanced Learning piece because thinking about this it is an outward-facing document. And facing a decision through the Student

SPS This and That

3by Melissa Westbrook / 4h

At last night's Board meeting, Deputy Superintendent Steve Nielsen alluded that things didn't go well in Olympia. Here's what local activist, Sarajane Siegfriedt, reports at her Facebook page: At 46th Legislators Town Hall meeting, Sen. David

Tom Torlakson Highlights Science Standards - Year 2017 (CA Dept of Education)

Tom Torlakson Highlights Science Standards - Year 2017 (CA Dept of Education):

State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson

Highlights Next Generation Science Standards to

Better Prepare Students for College and Careers

OAKLAND — State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson today saluted the innovative science instruction taking place at Edna Brewer Middle School in the Oakland Unified School District—instruction that will be coming to all of California’s public schools as a result of recent efforts to dramatically enhance and modernize science education.

“As a former science teacher, I couldn’t be more excited by the learning I saw today in Jeri Johnstone’s eighth grade integrated science class,” Torlakson said. “It’s hands-on, interactive, and collaborative. Students and teachers ask lots of questions and work like scientists. These are the kinds of skills needed for success in high school, college and the modern workplace.”

The Oakland Unified School District is one of eight school districts and two charter school management organizations participating in the early implementation of California’s next Generation Science Standards adopted by the State Board of Education (SBE) in 2013.

“I want to thank all the innovative, creative, and dedicated science teachers in California for working to improve science education. It’s a huge effort, but it will be well worth it when we see students who are thinking like scientists and fully engaged in their lessons,” Torlakson said.

Last November, the SBE approved a new California Science Framework to guide teachers, administrators and textbook publishers in teaching the new standards that emphasize scientific practices, thinking and reasoning. The California Department of Education (CDE) is preparing a new online science assessment to reflect the new standards and framework. A pilot test will take place this spring in grades five, eight and in one high school grade.

California’s updated, 21st century science curriculum covers instruction in kindergarten through grade eight. It expands and refines the discussion of climate change and for the first time includes engineering, environmental literacy and strategies to support girls and young women in science.

Edna Brewer Middle School, which serves students in grades six through eight, has been teaching to California’s Next Generation Science Standards for the past four years.

“It’s no exaggeration to say the health of our entire state—our economy, our high-tech companies, our research laboratories, our environment—is dependent on our schools to produce the scientists and technology leaders of the future along with a knowledgeable citizenry,” Torlakson said. “I saw that future today at Edna Brewer Middle School, and I couldn’t be more excited about the direction of science education in California.”

# # # #

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

Tom Torlakson Highlights Science Standards - Year 2017 (CA Dept of Education):

Parents, Education Advocates Plan to Rally in D.C. to Block Betsy DeVos' Appointment as U.S. Education Secretary | Journey For Justice

Campaigns | Journey For Justice:

Parents, Education Advocates Plan to Rally in D.C. to Block Betsy DeVos' Appointment as U.S. Education Secretary

CHICAGO - Today, education activists from across the country announced a protest in Washington, D.C., to block the appointment of Betsy DeVos' appointment as U.S. Education Secretary. The controversial billionaire was chosen by President-Elect Donald Trump to head the post despite her ---record of destruction in Michigan and across the country. Parents from the nominee's home state of Michigan, along with people from across the nation, intend to converge on her confirmation hearing next week.

The Senate HELP Committee announced that following the January 11th hearing, an executive session will be scheduled for a vote on DeVos' nomination for education secretary. For two decades DeVos, along with her husband have funded a charter school lobby that shields operators from oversight and accountability.

Jitu Brown, executive director of Journey for Justice Alliance (J4J), a coalition of scores of parent-led organizations across the U.S., said he has organized a caravan of activists, parents, students and others to demonstrate during DeVos' Senate Help Committee hearing on January 11th. "We have no desire to see a person who has systematically destroyed public education in places like Detroit, carry that same agenda nationally as U.S. Education Secretary," Brown said. "Her polices have hurt black and brown children; disrupted teaching and learning in schools; and, her money has fueled

a bevy of failed school reform experiments in school districts across the country."

The group will demand a meeting with Senate Help Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and encourage members of the Congressional Black Caucus to join them in fighting the appointment by testifying on DeVos' well-documented record.

Brown comments come day after organizers in Detroit held a news conference to denounce DeVos' nomination and call on President-Elect Trump to pick a "nominee that will work in the best interests of all of America's children" rather than an ideologue with deep pockets. "She is the architect of one of the biggest education disasters in the country---so bad even charter proponents acknowledge her failures," the J4J activist noted. "

Journey for Justice (J4J) is an alliance of grassroots community, youth, and parent-led organizations in 21 cities across the country: Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Eupora, MS, Hartford, Los Angeles, Newark, Patterson, Camden, Jersey City and Elizabeth NJ, Minneapolis, New Orleans, New York City, Oakland, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Washington D.C., and Wichita. Its advocate for community-driven alternatives to the privatization of and dismantling of public schools systems.

CAMPAIGN FOR SUSTAINABLE SCHOOL SUCCESS

For decades, schools that serve African American and Latino students have been denied their fair share of education resources. Without libraries, without a full range of college, career and enrichment course offerings, without counselors or supported teachers, students in our urban districts have had little to no opportunity to meet their full potential. Now, corporate education reformers are destroying our public schools altogether, closing them, turning them over to private management, firing our teachers and squeezing education budgets in the name of “reform.” This assault on public education is happening almost exclusively in communities of color. It must stop.

Closures, charters, firing teachers and other “dramatic interventions” haven’t worked in the past, and they aren’t working now.

The Campaign for Sustainable School Success-J4J is organizing to insure that our proposal for Sustainable School Transformation replaces the four interventions for struggling schools in U.S. Department of Education Policy.

THE SUSTAINABLE SUCCESS MODEL REQUIRES SCHOOL DISTRICTS TO:

Undertake a comprehensive needs assessment—done in partnership with parents, educators, students and community members—so that local solutions are tailored to local problems,
Implement research-based instructional and educational reforms,
Address essential social, emotional and physical needs of students, and
Recognize parent, student, and community leadership as key to sustainable student success.

THE 3 PILLARS OF SUSTAINABLE SCHOOL SUCCESS FOCUS ON:

A strong focus on school culture, curriculum and staffing,
Wrap-around supports for every child
Real collaboration with the community, to ensure local ownership and accountability.

CAMPAIGN GOALS:

J4J is organizing to implement our Sustainable School Success model locally in our communities (impacting local and state policy) as well as at the federal level. (Sustainable School Success replacing the current interventions for struggling schools; closing, charter expansion, turnarounds and transformations).
J4J will document the harm these policies have inflicted on impacted communities through Grassroots Voices Listening Projects and build a groundswell of support for a moratorium on all school closings, turnarounds, charter expansions and phase-outs.

J4J is organizing with parents, students and teachers to identify lawmakers to stand with us; we want community driven, sustainable school improvement; not smoke and mirrors.

CHARTER/CONTRACT SCHOOL ACCOUNTABILITY

Journey for Justice believes in strong, high quality neighborhood schools. Parents are not customers, and our children are not products.
We believe that the original intent of charters, as “center for innovation” that share best practices with the public sector has been mutated to an “education for profit” industry. Now the vast majority of charters and contract schools no better or worse than traditional public schools, despite being able to pick the children they want and expel the children they don’t. This is not reform; these are mediocre interventions and we will not sit back while profiteers use public money, our money for private interest.

J4J will work to advance legislation and policy that hold charter and contract school operators accountable to the public. We support legislation that makes charter and contract operators follow the local discipline codes that all public schools must adhere to. In addition, we believe that the money should follow the student; so if a child is removed from one of these schools, the receiving school receives the resources, not the school that kicked the child out.
J4J is in a national community/labor coalition that is developing a campaign strategy to realize the above mentioned goals.

Campaigns | Journey For Justice:

CURMUDGUCATION: A Lesson from China

CURMUDGUCATION: A Lesson from China: "A Lesson from China"
A Lesson from China

We're witnessing another lesson in how free market forces work, and how business interests often run contrary to the public interest. And the lesson is coming from China, of all places.

This is a lesson that started with Google, way back in 2006. That was the year that Google set aside the motto "don't be evil" for the more pragmatic "don't be shut out of the enormous Chinese market," and willingly provided the Chinese with a censored version of Google. The official rationale was something along the lines of "they're censoring us anyway," but it seemed more likely that the rationale was "do you have any idea how much money there is to be made, because, damn, it's a lot."

Google pulled out in 2010, over a Chinese attempt to hack gmail and other pieces of Google. That response (Google actually called it "retaliation") was remarkable, and it didn't last. Google is set to re-enter the Chinese market.

Businesses looking to operate in countries with repressive, censorship-prone laws face a question-- CURMUDGUCATION: A Lesson from China: "A Lesson from China"

In Michigan, a test case for US public schools under Trump? - CSMonitor.com

In Michigan, a test case for US public schools under Trump? - CSMonitor.com:

In Michigan, a test case for US public schools under Trump?
Betsy DeVos, a billionaire philanthropist and prominent Republican fundraiser, has been among the nation’s foremost advocates for school choice. Her home state offers perhaps the best preview of free-market style education policies.

JANUARY 4, 2017 YPSILANTI, MICH.—Last fall, Ben Edmondson, the charismatic new superintendent of the long-struggling public school district in Ypsilanti, Mich., received an unusual visitor. It was a representative from a for-profit charter school management company, offering to buy a district building that had previously been listed for sale.

“The guy comes in and says, ‘We’ll offer you $1 million,’ ” Dr. Edmondson recalls. “ ‘That’s more than what you want.’ ”

Ypsilanti had been losing some 300 kids per year, about half its student population. Most enrolled in area charter schools under Michigan’s Schools of Choice law, which allows K-12 students to use state funding to enroll in other public districts or charter schools. The visiting representative told Edmondson a new charter school in the area could enroll 300 in its first year.

Edmondson declined.

“I will not sell any building here to any organization that doesn’t help make this city better,” he says.

From his embattled vantage point, charter schools have robbed many of Michigan’s public schools of money, students, and vitality, all while showing doubtful evidence of academic achievement and virtually no accountability for the money they spend.

“A charter school’s not going to make [this city] better,” he scoffs. “Are you kidding me?”

But next week, congressional confirmation hearings will begin for a woman who has precisely the opposite vantage point. Betsy DeVos, a billionaire philanthropist and prominent Republican fundraiser, has been among the nation’s foremost advocates for giving parents the broadest possible options for where to educate their kids – whether in charter schools, private schools, or homeschooling. She is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of Education.

Since her selection, analysts and families across the country have been wondering what a DeVos tenure might mean for the nation’s 50 million public school students. Her home state of Michigan offers perhaps the best preview of the free-market style education policies that could soon be getting a wider roll-out across America.

To supporters, the reforms she’s championed have allowed parents to “vote with their feet” and find the school that best meets their children’s needs. Moreover, they say, for-profit management has injected a valuable competitive business ethos.

But to critics, the state is impoverishing traditional public schools for very little gain – if any. The state exercises very little oversight over the $1 billion it gives to charter schools. Right now, Education Trust-Midwest points out in a new report, "not even the governor has the authority to shut down chronically low-performing charter authorizers in Michigan."

The clearest losers, experts say, are the state’s neediest students – the ones other districts or schools don’t want, either because of their academic performance or the cost of meeting special needs. As money flows elsewhere, they are left in schools that lack the attention or funding to make much-needed improvements.

“The result of this, I believe, could be a dramatic reduction of dollars to our poorest schools and a transfer of taxpayer dollars to the free market,” says David Kirkland, a professor of urban education at New York University Steinhardt. “It’s detrimental to our most disadvantaged students.”

Michigan is, in many ways, a test case for how far school choice can be pushed.

It is home to two of the three US cities where a majority of children attend charter schools (Flint and Detroit, with New Orleans as the third).
About 80 percent of charter schools in the state are run by for-profit companies, according to a report by the National Education Policy Center. That’s more than twice the percentage of for-profits found in any other state.
About 10 percent of Michigan’s school-age children attend charter schools, compared with about 5.1 percent nationwide, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Another 13 percent attend a traditional public school in another community, according to MLive.com, under the state’s Schools of Choice program.

“We have the highest percentage of for-profit organizations running charter schools in the country,” says Joshua Cowen, an associate professor of education policy at Michigan State University. “We tend to think of Michigan as a deregulated state.”

DeVos’s influence in shaping Michigan’s educational experiment has been significant.

Strong advocate for school choice

The daughter of a wealthy Michigan businessman (her brother founded military contractor Blackwater), she married Richard DeVos Jr., who would later head Amway, the multibillion home sales company founded by his father. Together, the couple emerged as stalwarts of the state’s conservative establishment. She twice chaired the Michigan GOP; he lost a gubernatorial bid in 2006.

But the DeVoses’ bigger influence has come through lobbying and spending on conservative In Michigan, a test case for US public schools under Trump? - CSMonitor.com:

Are The PISA Education Results Rigged?

Are The PISA Education Results Rigged?:

Are The PISA Education Results Rigged?

The results of the most recent Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) are out, and again reveal students from East Asian countries dominate in maths and sciences. The assessment, run by the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) every three years, tested around 540,000 15-year-old students in 72 countries and economies on science, reading, maths and collaborative problem-solving. In 2015, students from Singapore performed the best, followed by Japan, Estonia, Chinese Taipei, Finland, Macao (China), Canada, Vietnam, Hong Kong (China) and B-S-J-G (China).

Western countries fared far worse, with concerns over declining educational standards seemingly confirmed. The U.S., the world's favorite destination for international university students, saw its scores remain close to the OECD average on each category. The 5,700 15-year-olds who took the test scored 496 in science and 497 in reading, and 470 in math—close to the OECD averages of 493, 493 and 490 respectively.

Some argue this may herald a new era of creative thinking in Asia, and look to replicate an Asian model of learning. Others point to a culture in Asia which values education highly and is driven by “Tiger Moms” who push their children to excel in their studies. In Vietnam, some students are reportedly too busy with school and studying to take meals at home and eat while on motorbikes. Still others argue government investment in educational infrastructure, such as building more schools and attracting the best teachers, yields the greatest results. But before we accept the results at face value, we should delve Are The PISA Education Results Rigged?:

Mastery exam task force report due soon — its findings ‘predetermined’ by John Bestor - Wait What?

Mastery exam task force report due soon — its findings ‘predetermined’ by John Bestor - Wait What?:

Mastery exam task force report due soon — its findings ‘predetermined’ by John Bestor

John Bestor, an educator and education advocate, recently wrote a piece for the CT Mirror educating readers about the farce called the Mastery Exam Tax Force. The following is his commentary piece which you can read and comment on at: http://ctviewpoints.org/2017/01/04/mastery-exam-task-force-report-due-soon-its-findings-predetermined/

Mastery exam task force report due soon — its findings ‘predetermined’

In a few days the Mastery Examination Task Force will be submitting its Final Report and Recommendations to the Connecticut Legislature’s Education Committee which had asked for a study of student assessment practices in our public schools. Having monitored the progress of this task force during its one-and-a-half years of meetings, I contend that their findings were predetermined at or even before the task force began its deliberations.
My reasons for this presumption lie in 1) the composition of committee membership serving on the task force, 2) the choice of topics discussed, and 3) the available evidence that was purposefully withheld from task force consideration.
Just why is the final report and recommendations of the mastery examination task force so important?
For starters, it is a perfect example of much of what is wrong in government today and certainly in how education policy is developed in our state. As the 2015 legislative session drew to a close, the Education Committee of the legislature passed
Mastery exam task force report due soon — its findings ‘predetermined’ by John Bestor - Wait What?:

CURMUDGUCATION: Supremes May Decide How Much Education Is Enough

CURMUDGUCATION: Supremes May Decide How Much Education Is Enough:

Supremes May Decide How Much Education Is Enough

The case of Endrew F. vs. Douglas County School District has finally wended its way to the Supreme Court, and it could have some serious implications for school districts across the country.

Endrew F. is a studentwith autism and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). With the help of an IEP, he attended pre-K through 4th grade in Douglas County Schools out in Colorado (if that sounds familiar, it's because they have been ground zero for some reformy shenanigans, as chronicled in the film Education, Inc.-- but that's unrelated to our story today other than it takes a real bunch of stubborn leaders to get a school district dragged into the highest court in the land like this). Going into fifth grade, Endrew's parents deemed his IEP Not Good Enough, and they placed him in a private school.

Now, the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA-- no, I've never known where the damn E comes from--Correction-- it stands for Education, a word often dropped from some namings, which I should have known) says that if a district can't handle the education of a student with special needs, they have to foot the bill to send the student to some school that can deal. The child has to receive a "free appropriate public education."

The F's, however, apparently chose a Lexus for the child when the district only wanted to pay for a Kia, or maybe a Chevy Cruze. And it is over that business of exactly who is going to pay how much of which bill for Endrew's education that puts the matter in court.

This has, as you might imagine, come up before, and various lower courts have applied a some standards that are both inconsistent and vague. For instance, a couple of years ago, courts in Michigan declared that the state didn't have to get students an education-- just spend money on something called education, whether it worked or not. Here Joseph R. Smith explains the central issue of Endrew in a Denver Post op-ed:

The lower federal courts basically agree that the test should turn on how much the student CURMUDGUCATION: Supremes May Decide How Much Education Is Enough:

The Iceberg Effect Report - The National Superintendents Roundtable

The Iceberg Effect Report - The National Superintendents Roundtable:

The Iceberg Effect Report

School Performance in Context: Indicators of School Inputs and Outputs in Nine Similar Nations is a joint project of the National Superintendents Roundtable and the Horace Mann League. Click below to download the full report and the summary report for free. Scroll down to purchase the full, four-color report and have it mailed to your door.

This report does what has been missing in international assessments like PISA and TIMSS…It provides a broader context to understand how education systems perform…simply an eye-opening reading experience!
— Palsi Sahlberg, Harvard University, author of Finnish Lessons

Click to Download:

The Summary Report

The Full Report (with data)

An Introduction to the Report:

To embed the video on your website, use the following code: <iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”//www.youtube.com/embed/MYYKQweh8Ck” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

Order a Hard-Copy of the Report:

Glossy, full-color. Max units per order: 10

Choose the price bracket in the drop-down menu to the right. The price listed is the unit price. Once re-directed to Paypal, be sure to manually enter the number of copies you wish to order.

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