Warning Signs of Teen Suicide and Shakespeare | Reclaim Reform

Warning Signs of Teen Suicide and Shakespeare | Reclaim Reform:

Warning Signs of Teen Suicide and Shakespeare

On Shakespeare’s birthday, April 23, 1564, we need to examine just how brilliant his insights are to today’s education.

As a fairly new teacher with a few years of experience in the early 1970s, I was struck by a list of “Ten Warning Signs of Teen Suicidal Behavior” that were put on view in both the offices of our school nurse and our counselors. For the first time, big name universities had researched and published these lists to be distributed in high schools across the nation. These lists and sites are now commonplace, and the number of warning signs vary.

At that time I was completing a teaching a unit on Romeo and Juliet to high school freshmen. I was astonished to see that recent research and list.

I took several of these lists and posted them in my classroom. For one day I had each class search for the signs in Romeo and Juliet which was written and performed in 1599.

Nine of the ten signs from that list were discovered in Shakespeare’s plays. The intense interest of each class, regardless of their ability level placement, was astonishing. They Warning Signs of Teen Suicide and Shakespeare | Reclaim Reform:

NEA’s charter position is okay but a little like closing the doors on an empty barn. No mention of vouchers? | Fred Klonsky

NEA’s charter position is okay but a little like closing the doors on an empty barn. No mention of vouchers? | Fred Klonsky:

NEA’s charter position is okay but a little like closing the doors on an empty barn. No mention of vouchers?

NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia convened an organizational national task force on charter schools to reconsider the union’s statement adopted by the Representative Assembly in Los Angeles 15 years ago.

The wheels of the NEA turn kind of slowly. The past 15 years have seen a lot of battles around charter schools. The NEA board of directors will consider the task force’s document at their next meeting.

I posted a copy of the document last week.

In 2001, the last time the NEA took a national position on charters, there were around 2,100 charter schools operating in 34 states and the District of Columbia. Most were run by parent groups, nonprofit organizations and a few for-profit education companies. About a half million students attended them nationwide.

The landscape has radically changed.

Today, half a million students attend charter school just in California alone.

Between school years 2003–04 and 2013–14, the percentage of all public schools that were public charter schools increased from 3.1 to 6.6 percent, and the total number of public charter schools increased from 3,000 to 6,500. In addition to increasing in number, charter schools have generally increased in enrollment size over the last NEA’s charter position is okay but a little like closing the doors on an empty barn. No mention of vouchers? | Fred Klonsky:

The Case of the Art Thief. Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation and Blackness - SF Public School MomSF Public School Mom

The Case of the Art Thief. Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation and Blackness - SF Public School MomSF Public School Mom:

The Case of the Art Thief. Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation and Blackness

Repost of Forever Queen by @thick_east_african_girl. Original photo by Collier Scheier

This artwork by artist, Gelila Metiti Mesfin, was plagiarized by Chicago artist, Chris Devins, who set up a GoFundMe account to raise money to paint a mural using Mesfin’s work. He even offered to send donors who gave more than $100, a signed limited edition print of “his” mural!?!

The original artist was never asked for her permission. (Devin claimed it was “found art”.) She only learned out about the plagiarism via notification by her followers.

Some people think Black folks are over the top when it comes to our claims of cultural appropriation. Or, they say we’re go over the top when we continually complain that Black people have never gotten enough credit for their inventions, scientific advancements and artistic contributions to American culture (read: rock and roll.)

What these people don’t understand is the long, long history of White folks profiting not only off of Black folks bodies… but their intellectual and creative labor.

Look at Paula Dean, who built an empire selling soul-food. She not only made money selling Black cuisine, she profited off of the culinary expertise of her Black cook, Dora Charles, who was the “queen of Deen’s kitchens” for 20+ years.

Look at the Jack Daniel’s distillery. After years of hiding the truth, the company decided to reveal the real Jack Daniel’s story. Contrary to original accounts, Jack Daniels’s didn’t learn whiskey making from a White preacher, but from an enslaved man, Nearis Green. It turns out enslaved people didn’t just make up the bulk of the whiskey making workforce, the knowledge they brought with them from Africa about the fermentation process was critical in creating the American whiskey industry we know today.

Look to the cultural appropriation of Black women’s hair via Rachel Dolezal, and The Case of the Art Thief. Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation and Blackness - SF Public School MomSF Public School Mom:

California: The Fight for Charter Accountability Is Not Over! | Diane Ravitch's blog

California: The Fight for Charter Accountability Is Not Over! | Diane Ravitch's blog:

California: The Fight for Charter Accountability Is Not Over!

Broad Coalition of Lawmakers, Parents, Educators to Speak Out Monday in Capitol
About 3 Bills Needed to Halt Waste, Fraud and Secrecy in Charter Schools

Media Teleconference on SB 808, AB 1478, AB 1360
Set for Same Time as News Conference: 10 a.m. Monday

SACRAMENTO – In a news conference Monday at the Capitol to demand more public control of taxpayer-funded California charter schools, a broad coalition of state lawmakers, parents, educators and community supporters will speak out about three pending bills that seek to ensure charter school accountability, transparency, and accessibility to all.

Media representatives who can’t attend the 10:00 a.m. news conference in the Capitol can listen to it in a media teleconference, then ask questions on the phone afterwards.

News conference speakers will include state Senator Tony Mendoza, author of SB 808, ensuring that charters could only be authorized by the school district in which they would be located; Assembly Member Reggie Jones-Sawyer, author of AB 1478, requiring charters to comply with the same transparency and accountability laws as traditional public schools; and Assembly Member Rob Bonta, whose AB 1360 would prohibit discriminatory admissions practices and ensure due process in pupil discipline at charter schools.

The three bills are co-sponsored by the California Teachers Association, the California Federation of Teachers and other groups, including, for AB 1360, Alliance for Boys and Men of Color, American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), California School Employees Association (CSEA), Public Advocates and Public Counsel, while CSEA is also backing AB 1478.

Other speakers include CTA Board member Terri Jackson, a teacher in the East Bay; Gemma Abels, a CFT Vice President; Oakland parent Kim Davis, who helped found Parents United for Public Schools; Liz Guillen with Public Advocates group; and Alex Caputo-Pearl, president of United Teachers Los Angeles, who will address how the lack of charter regulations is hurting students in the Los Angeles Unified School District, where the school board has endorsed the three bills.

WHAT: News conference and media teleconference with a broad coalition supporting three pending bills to ensure California charter school accountability, transparency, and accessibility for all students.

WHEN and WHERE: News conference is 10:00 a.m. Monday, April 24, in Room 1190 at the Capitol.

***MEDIA TELECONFERENCE LOGISTICS***

TIME: 10:00 a.m. Monday, April 24

CALL-IN NUMBER: 1-888-299-7212

PASSWORD: 4228984

California: The Fight for Charter Accountability Is Not Over! | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Big Education Ape: California Charter Schools and REAL Local Control - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2017/04/california-charter-schools-and-real.html

Big Education Ape: New Legislative Push for Charter School Accountability | UTLA - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2017/04/new-legislative-push-for-charter-school.html

Turtle Learning: CANCER IS BACK AND THIS TIME IT HURTS RIGHT OFF THE BAT!

Turtle Learning: CANCER IS BACK AND THIS TIME IT HURTS RIGHT OFF THE BAT!:

CANCER IS BACK AND THIS TIME IT HURTS RIGHT OFF THE BAT!

 APRIL IS STILL POETRY MONTH AND LIBRARY MONTH. MANY WONDERFUL THINGS TO CELEBRATE.

   But in the middle of the month I received some bad news about my cancer which has returned to the lining (epithelium) of my stomach.  This time the chemo won't be as bad, they say.  But the doctor also said that I didn't have to take steroids this time. But she wasn't right about that. One of the chemo drugs is different and there should be fewer effects. But most people I spoke with didn't have pain with chemo, and I did.  As with most health issues, everyone is different, and responds differently to medicine. 
   The pain began two weeks before and the first visit to Urgent Care sent me home with laxatives. Two weeks later they hadn't worked.  Meanwhile, and this is what makes me most angry, a blood test had been done when I first went and some doctor (not the UC doctor) asked for a CA-125 count.  It showed 92!!  Well, the month before, my six month check up, the count was 14!!  Yet this outcome didn't ring any bells, set off any alarms, nothing.  Had I not returned because of the severe pain, I would be walking around with the tumors on the lining of my stomach continuing to grow and spread.
  

Not like a baobab  tree that was across the Ruaha River from me in February 2015 when I visited Tanzania and Zanzibar, probably for the last time.  I am heartbroken that my health won't be good enough to fulfill that bucket list I had:  Amsterdam and the art museums, Yucatan and Oaxaca in Mexico, Ireland and Wales, Vietnam and Thailand.  Or a cruise in a very small ship around Europe. Don't forget all the places in Latin America I haven't seen -- Peru, Ecuador, Chile. 

So I thought I would set my sights a bit closer to home and concentrate on that lifelong dream I have had of creating a beautiful, handmade, unique dollhouse.  Please don't laugh.  It has symbolic meaning in my life as I was gifted a beautiful handmade dollhouse for my sixth birthday.  Made by friends of my parents, it had a lift off roof, and a ranch style feeling, a fireplace, doors and windows that opened plus (I am pretty sure) lights that actually worked.  I turned six in 1953 when I was living in Croton-On-Hudson, New York.  The government was continuing its surveillance of my father and consequently my entire family. We suddenly had to move.  We purchased an old truck with a wood station wagon body that was owned by Allen Funt of Candid Camera. You have to be at least my age to know who he was.

More important than my dollhouse were the many books my father lost. He asked a friend to hold them for him in his attic in Croton but at some point the friend got scared and threw them away (possibly burned them all).  I guess my obsession with books and dollhouses goes back to those dreadful days when I was terrified but didn't know why, was told never to open the door to anyone, and lost the most precious gift of my short life.  I have never seen a dollhouse like it since and do not remember the names of the makers.  So sad.  This is the closest I've ever seen - by Turtle Learning: CANCER IS BACK AND THIS TIME IT HURTS RIGHT OFF THE BAT!:

What should we do for children in an abusive situation? - Lily's Blackboard

What should we do for children in an abusive situation? - Lily's Blackboard:

What should we do for children in an abusive situation?

We do all we can to protect our students; it’s part of our commitment to connecting with and nurturing every child. Too many of our students bear the scars of abuse and trauma, unfortunately, and they need us not only to provide environments conducive to learning, but to create safe, compassionate spaces for their healing.

There was a time when child abuse was in the shadows, rarely discussed and only hesitantly acknowledged. Today we’re better at acknowledging the ravages of child abuse and responding to traumatized kids. But there’s a lot more we must do.

April is National Child Abuse Prevention Month, and information is available to help you recognize the signs that a child may be in an abusive situation.

The counselors of NEA are well-trained in safeguarding children, but they on average are responsible for 500 students each. All of us—no matter what our job titles—must constantly be on the lookout for signs that our students are in abusive situations.

When a child is in an abusive situation, what are some steps we can take? 

“NEVER indicate when a student reports abuse that we can ‘fix’ the problem. More importantly, be there for that student if they need to talk.  Do not dig for information. Report abuse the moment you suspect that the student is in an abusive situation, and above all else, do not make the student’s situation personal for you. Maintain your professional stance and boundaries. Be watchful and available to the students in need and know the signs of abuse.”

Check the NEA website for more information on  best practices for supporting and educating students who have experienced abuse.What should we do for children in an abusive situation? - Lily's Blackboard:

Ed Notes Online: Randi and Betsy - Giving Cover to a Monster -

Ed Notes Online: Randi and Betsy - Giving Cover to a Monster -:

Randi and Betsy - Giving Cover to a Monster 

Randi is a committed corporate liberal who has faith in the good intentions of corporate power brokers and profiteers and her ability to get them to do the right thing if only they give her a seat at the table. Here, I'm thinking back to the union's brief flirtation with Bill Gates or Randi's flights to Chicago to support Rahm's Infrastructure Trust or to London to sit in on Pearson board meetings ... If some WaPo ink is all Randi was after, all well and good. But if she's providing some union cover for DeVos in exchange for some credibility with the Trump administration, she's playing a fool's game. .....Mike Klonsky, Mike Klonsky: What Was Gained by Randi’s Visit with Betsy?

Diane Ravitch won't openly criticize Randi but she does offer her platform for others to do so by posting Mike Klonsky's comments. 

Mike Klonsky: What Was Gained by Randi’s Visit with Betsy?

By dianeravitch

April 23, 2017 //

Mike Klonsky says: Nothing.

You cannot turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.

I think Mike is too nice to Randi, who is providing cover for DeVos. But I never see Randi as playing a fool's game. She plays everyone else for fools. Her game is all about positioning -- "you see how reasonable and willing we are to deal - read - sell out my members -- What does Randi have to gain? Some feel a piece of the choice action - if you can't beat them join them. Maybe make a few bucks to cover the loss of union members to right to work.

The union's $62M loan for 50 Broadway helps them morph into real estate. Become an agent of teacher training. They failed at the charter school approach but maybe there are other options out there.

A comment on Diane's blog from a Norwegian Filmmaker
gets us closer to the root.

April 23, 2017 at 9:10 am

And the ruling class are counting on “right to work” as a way to capitalize upon union members’ legitimate discontent with their union leadership and its willingness to compromise for almost 2 decades.

Beware, because this is a perfect storm. These are American unions, not European ones. I fear that is might be Ed Notes Online: Randi and Betsy - Giving Cover to a Monster -:

Critics deride Schools of Hope, say privateers are plotting public education's demise

Activists see conspiracy in plan to help charter schools:

Critics deride Schools of Hope, say privateers are plotting public education's demise

Beth Overholt is gearing up for a showdown on high-stakes testing and charter schools. But first, she has to get across town in mid-day traffic.  Pick up her high school senior – class valedictorian - and head to Atlanta to check out Georgia Tech. Her daughter can’t decide whether to continue at Tech or stay in town and attend Florida State.

Overholt is active in the opt-out movement against the state’s public schools’ testing regimen. Right now though she’s sitting at a red light steaming about something Sen. Aaron Bean said three days earlier in a committee meeting.

Bean, a Fernandina Beach Republican, made a pitch for $200 million to lure charter school operators to set up shop in neighborhoods of schools the state rates “D” or lower.

Bean called one charter operator’s performance “extraordinary.”

“It’s a D school,” Overholt exclaimed. “My kid goes to a D school. Why don’t they get the money?”

Overholt is among a group of parents, educators, and lawmakers who see a plot to undermine public education unfolding in the session’s final two weeks. They say it is being executed by reformers who use a pretense of accountability and innovation to divert public money to set up an alternative privatized education system.

The money Bean requested and included in a House-approved plan called “schools of hope,” would lure private operators of charter schools to provide additional services, such as more hours of instruction and “wrap-around services”  including food and medicine for students served by low-performing schools.

The "Schools of Hope" plan, coupled with a testing bill the Senate is writing, works together, according to critics. The testing bill currently changes what amounts to a passing grade (proficiency) on state tests. Overholt has wrestled with the state testing system for nearly a decade as a member of school and district advisory councils.

She and members of several groups say Florida’s puts too much emphasis on tests to evaluate students, teachers, and schools. They say the current system benefits primarily the testing companies and is part of a tactic to privatize education.

“They play together. Flip the proficiency language. Label a school a failure. Presto! A public school moves in,” said Overholt. “They get the proficiency language and schools of hope passes, public schools will close.”

The fate of the two measures and the future of the state’s education process will be decided in negotiations during the next two weeks.

(This) is why I enjoy the budget conference process,” said Senate President Joe Negron, Friday. “That’s when a lot of these issues get hammered out.”

► Related: Negron says education toughest issue for lawmakers this session

ore:Committee passes bill shortening school testing season

And within the education community, the hammering is building to a crescendo for a May 5 finale.

When a Senate companion to the House’s schools of hope proposal arrived Activists see conspiracy in plan to help charter schools:

Wisconsin prepares education plan under lawsuit threat | Local Education | host.madison.com

Wisconsin prepares education plan under lawsuit threat | Local Education | host.madison.com:

Wisconsin prepares education plan under lawsuit threat

The Wisconsin education department is about to release a far-reaching school performance plan under increasing scrutiny from the Republican-controlled Legislature and threat of a lawsuit over how the plan is being created.

The first draft of the plan, which is required under federal law and affects every public school student in the state, is to be released Friday. It was written by the Department of Public Instruction following months of gathering comments from the public, policy makers and education leaders.

The education department isn’t releasing details of what’s in the plan until the draft is made public.

Every state must complete a plan by Sept. 18 to be in compliance with the Every Student Succeeds Act — the 2015 law going into effect this fall that replaces No Child Left Behind. The plan will set Wisconsin K-12 education policy for years and cover such things as how to measure the performance of schools, students and teachers and what to do about those not meeting the standards.

Because the stakes are so high, the education department is under intense scrutiny, especially from conservative supporters of school choice programs and those who have previously challenged the authority of Wisconsin’s elected state superintendent.

Tony Evers, who as state superintendent oversees the education department that wrote the plan, is highly critical of choice schools. Evers has been backed by Democrats and public school teachers unions and was just easily re-elected to a third term in the officially nonpartisan position.

Evers and leaders from his department have been keeping Republicans in the Legislature updated on the plan’s progress. Two Republican lawmakers, along with a couple Democrats, a representative of Gov. Scott Walker’s office and education leaders from around the state, are also part of an advisory group that’s been offering suggestions. But the final say on what’s in, Wisconsin prepares education plan under lawsuit threat | Local Education | host.madison.com:

Will The First Amendment Save The Kevin Johnson Pie Bandit?

Will The First Amendment Save The Kevin Johnson Pie Bandit?:

Will The First Amendment Save The Kevin Johnson Pie Bandit?

Can pie throwing be considered a protected form of speech? Will Kevin Johnson be asked, for the first time ever, to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about his seamy side, so help him God? Will Michelle Rhee get cross-examined—or even examined?

Getting the answers to those questions will be among the reasons folks who’ve followed the never-ending soap opera of Johnson, the ex-NBA superstar turned disgraced (and now former) mayor of Sacramento, are excited about the upcoming trial of Sean Thompson, the man who hit Johnson with a pie at a fall charity gala, then took a beating from the pied politico. Thompson was charged with counts of assaulting a public official, a felony, and committing assault on school grounds, a misdemeanor. At a hearing last week in Sacramento Superior Court, a judge confirmed that the trial will indeed start on April 19. The court has set aside two weeks, a huge amount of time for a typical assault case. But nobody expects this trial to proceed typically.

The case puts Johnson back in the spotlight for the first time since he left office late last year. His eight-year run as the chief executive of his hometown were a scandal-plagued media circus, but Johnson’s been invisible. He doesn’t even tweet anymore, and the only attention anybody paid to him this year came when he took a part-time job with a major sports agency and when voters for the basketball Hall of Fame again rejected him. The same scandals and sexual-abuse accusations that drove Johnson out of politics and got ESPN to shelve a fawning documentary about his efforts to keep the Sacramento Kings from leaving town likely wounded his bid to gain enshrinement. And there’s a fine chance his darker chapters will be brought up in court.

The facts of this case aren’t in much dispute: Everybody agrees that Johnson’s face collided with Thompson’s coconut cream pie during a fall fundraiser for Johnson’s St. HOPE chain of charter schools, and that Thompson’s head then quickly came in contact with lots and lots of fists, including Johnson’s and others belonging to the mayor’s security detail. Jailhouse photos of Thompson, who was arrested on the scene, show cuts and scrapes all over his face, some needing stitches.

No video evidence of the pieing has ever been made public. But Deadspin has obtained a copy of a video shot by a witness that shows how bizarre the incident seemed to partygoers. The clip starts as members of Johnson’s security detail are on top of Thompson. An offscreen narrator, after saying that from the way the encounter began she initially assumed Thompson and Johnson “were friends,” describes the action she’d just witnessed: “[Thompson] walked up to [Johnson] as if he were to know him and tapped him on the shoulder very lightly, again as if he knew him and were going to say hi, and then pied him in the face and that was it. When the reaction came I was like, ‘Oh, that that’s not a friend!’”

“That was not a good reaction on his part because it’s going to be all over the news tomorrow or tonight,” another witness responds. “He should have just walked away.”

As the camera pans away from the gaggle of folks restraining Thompson, Johnson can be seen walking around in the background wiping what appears to be coconut cream from the side of his head. Michelle Rhee, the school-privatization activist and his wife, is beside him.

Another party-goer shows up on the video and says, “I wanna break in my new cowboy boots on that little mofo!”

Thompson, the little mofo in question, has been estimated to be 5’7”, 130 pounds. During his playing career, Johnson was listed at 6’1”, 190 pounds, but he’s bulked up considerably in retirement.

Deadspin also obtained a copy of a report written up by the Sacramento Police for the DA’s office about the St. HOPE brouhaha. In it, a detective says Johnson, who was not charged for punching Thompson after the pieing, called the police a day later to claim he had “minor whip lash (sic) which he attributed to being struck by [Thompson] with the pie,” and also asserted his “right groin was strained” during the subsequent “struggle to subdue” Thompson.

Johnson called the Sacramento Police Department a day after being pied to say he had whiplash and his groin was pulled.

A Sacramento source with ties to the investigation said Johnson having called the police to say he was injured could help him if civil suits are filed against him for beating up the pie thrower. “The report of him calling in the next day about his ‘injuries’ is hilarious,” says the source. “He’s clearly trying to cover his ass in a civil suit.”

Johnson did not respond to requests for comment left with Independent Sports and Entertainment, the sports agency that recently hired him.

Claire White, the attorney representing Thompson, admits thatWill The First Amendment Save The Kevin Johnson Pie Bandit?:

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CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Day After Earth Edition + Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Day After Earth Edition (4/23):

ICYMI: Day After Earth Edition (4/23)

Your list of worthwhile reads from the week. Enjoy, and pass them on. 

Looking for the Living Among the Dead

A beautiful Easter meditation from Jose Luis Vilson

The Privateer Legislators

A family friend passed this along from Florida. An articulate argument for not privatizing education in Florida, or anywhere else, from Roger Williams.

Chester Finn Jr. Calls for an End to Teacher Tenure

I assume that if you read here, you also follow Diane Ravitch, but it's easy to lose pieces in the midst of the Ravitchian avalanche of posts, and here's one you really don't want to miss, as the education historian points out what's wrong about so many arguments against teacher tenure.

Call This The Empty Chair 

One more panel about teaching without a single teacher in sight.

Where Did All the Black Teachers Go?

A personal essay about one of the most under-addressed issues in education-- why can't schools hold onto teachers of color?

School Choice: The Faustian Bargain 

Russ Walsh looks at what choicers require folks to give up in order to get choice.

Mr Staples, Here's What Happened To Black Teachers

A solid response to that NYT piece from the Schools Matter blog.

Homework Is Wrecking Our Kids

This piece is actually over a year old, but it's still the truth, and still well-worth a read and a share.

Largest Charter Chain in LA Raises Millions To Fight Unionization

Facing a unionizing teacher staff? Charters could take any number of responses, but in LA, the largest charter chains went with "Collect $2.2 from various anonymous friends to keep unions from happening."

As It Always Should Be

Everyone with a little needs a Teacher Tom in their life. Here he is discovering one more beautiufl and joyous thing about his kids.

These Are a  Few of My Favorite Green Things

For Earth Day, another post from my daughter about the small sustainable things we can all do to help. 

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Day After Earth Edition (4/23):

Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION

Big Education Ape: Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2017/04/catch-up-with-curmudgucation_22.html