Big Education Ape

Saturday, October 17, 2020

Closing University Education Schools: A Bad Omen

Closing University Education Schools: A Bad Omen

The University of South Florida (USF) has announced the end of their education school due to a $36.7 million university budget cut. The change will save $6.8 million over two years. They’re using the coronavirus as the reason at a time when teachers are struggling to teach students safely. This loss is a bad omen for public schools and a professional teaching workforce, not just for the State of Florida but for the country.

How many more teacher education schools will close? Who will become teachers in the future? Will there be any real teachers in the future? If Colleges of Education are not valued in a university the size of USF, will education and professional teachers be valued anywhere?

Every reputable university should have a building dedicated to preparing teachers called the College of Education. Those schools must continually question through peer-reviewed research how schools work for students and how to professionally prepare teachers to serve students. While these schools have sometimes been criticized, they have prepared many teachers well.

USF prepared teachers for six decades, and many express sadness about the school’s closure. They’re wondering why the USF administration quickly chose to close the education school after hearing about the cuts.

Without an undergraduate teacher preparation program, the likelihood of students CONTINUE READING: Closing University Education Schools: A Bad Omen

The week in coveducation: Epic updates, mask mandate, OKCPS teachers surveyed

The week in coveducation: Epic updates, mask mandate, OKCPS teachers surveyed

Next week Oklahoma City Public Schools will be welcoming back pre-K and kindergarten students to in-person classes on an A/B schedule, and the State Board of Education will hold its regular monthly meeting providing a semblance of normalcy.

This past week, however, Oklahoma education news has been dominated by updates in the ever expanding story of Epic Charter Schools.

Seriously, there’s a lot to catch up on. But we’re making it easy with this recap of headlines from reporters around Oklahoma.

State Department of Education demands $11.2 million from Epic Charter Schools

On Monday, Oct. 12, the Oklahoma State Board of Education held a special meeting where they approved a motion to demand Epic Charter Schools One-on-One and Epic Blended return $11,235,919 to the State Department of Education.

As reported by NonDoc this week, the money represents alleged over-expenditures on administrative costs and state dollars used for development expenses in California, as CONTINUE READING: The week in coveducation: Epic updates, mask mandate, OKCPS teachers surveyed

Schott Receives $2.25M Racial Equity Grant from Nellie Mae Education Foundation | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Schott Receives $2.25M Racial Equity Grant from Nellie Mae Education Foundation

The Schott Foundation has a long history of partnership with the Nellie Mae Education Foundation for capacity building for education and racial justice organizing. In this critical moment, we are honored to announce that Schott will receive a $2.25M grant as part of Nellie Mae’s significantly expanded funding to address anti-Black racism in public education.

“We congratulate and thank Nellie Mae for their escalated anti-racism leadership in philanthropy and making a significant contribution to the field that will help so many Black- and Brown-led organizations like Schott resource critical multi-racial, intergenerational, people-powered movements for racial justice,” said Marianna Islam, Schott’s Director of Programs and Advocacy.

Through the Nellie Mae–Schott partnership, Schott will expand its pivotal intermediary work leveraging significant philanthropic investments for education justice organizing efforts from Massachusetts to several states across the New England region. In addition, Schott will provide key parent-, student-, and educator-led grassroots organizations and national alliances with relationship-centered communications, networking and policy advocacy supports.

—30—

The Schott Foundation is a national public fund serving as a bridge between philanthropic partners and advocates to build movements to provide students a fair and substantive opportunity to learn.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Shawna Ellis
se@schottfoundation.org

Schott Receives $2.25M Racial Equity Grant from Nellie Mae Education Foundation | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Compare the town halls: How Biden and Trump will bring educators out of the pandemic - Education Votes

Compare the town halls: How Biden and Trump will bring educators out of the pandemic

By Amanda Menas

On the night that was supposed to be the second presidential debate, Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump appeared at separate events presenting their vastly different visions to voters.

“The words of a president matter,” Biden said of Trump’s actions regarding the coronavirus pandemic during his town hall on ABC. “When a president doesn’t wear a mask, or makes fun of folks like me when I was wearing a mask, for a long time, then people say, ‘Well, you know, it mustn’t be that important.’”

Biden presented his vision of leadership to bring back the American economy, workforce, and middle class out of the recession caused by the pandemic and Donald Trump’s failed response. He pointed to his leadership throughout the spring in calling for school closures and reopening safely by listening to the experts, while Trump lied and hid the facts from the public.

“You can open businesses and schools if in fact you provide them the guidance that they need as well as the money to be able to do it,” said Biden about his school reopening plan if elected. Biden noted that Trump’s administration told the American public that they would provide masks for every student and teacher, and then subsequently walked it back. “We need more teachers in our schools to be able to open and smaller pods. We need ventilation systems changed,” Biden said.

Trump and his education secretary, Betsy DeVos, have failed students, educators, and the American people with their response to the pandemic. Trump even failed to take CONTINUE READING: Compare the town halls: How Biden and Trump will bring educators out of the pandemic - Education Votes

Indiana: ACB Served on the Board of a School That Discriminated Against Gays | Diane Ravitch's blog

Indiana: ACB Served on the Board of a School That Discriminated Against Gays

Steve Hinnefeld, a regular commentator on education in Indiana, regrets that Amy Coney Barrett was not asked about vouchers during her hearings.

He notes that she served on the board of a Catholic school in Indiana that received state voucher funds and that openly discriminated against same-sex families.

Barrett served from 2015-17 on the board of Trinity School at Greenlawn, a South Bend Catholic school, the New York Times reported. Trinity had a policy during Barrett’s time on the board that effectively prohibited same-sex couples from enrolling their children in the school, according to the Times.

That would seem to cast doubt on Barrett’s claim in her confirmation hearing that she had “never discriminated on the basis of sexual preference” and would not do so. It also raises policy questions about whether publicly funded institutions should practice discrimination. READ MORE: Indiana: ACB Served on the Board of a School That Discriminated Against Gays | Diane Ravitch's blog

An Originalist Reading of Public Schools | gadflyonthewallblog

An Originalist Reading of Public Schools

Let’s say you went to a restaurant and ordered a big ol’ meat sandwich only to find nothing but straw between two pieces of bread.

“Waiter!” You say, calling over a server.

“What’s wrong, Sir?”

“There’s no meat in my sandwich.”

“Oh, Sir?” He says smiling, examining your plate. “Here at Scalia’s Bar and Grill we adhere to a strict originalist interpretation of language.”

“What does that have to do with my sandwich?”

“Well, Sir, in Old English ‘meat’ meant any solid food, anything other than drink. As in ‘A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland’ (1775), Samuel Johnson noted, ‘Our guides told us, that the horses could not travel all day without rest or meat.’”

“But that’s not what I ordered!”

“Oh yes it is, Sir. You ordered CONTINUE READING: An Originalist Reading of Public Schools | gadflyonthewallblog

Albert Shanker and Michael Mulgrew: Tough Times Need Tough Leaders | Ed In The Apple

Albert Shanker and Michael Mulgrew: Tough Times Need Tough Leaders

Dr. Aragon: “Now this is the Central Parallel of the American Federation. This district is what you you’d probably call the Southwestern United States. That was before it was destroyed by the war.”

Miles Monroe (played by Woody Allen): “War?”

Aragon: “Yes. According to history, over 100 years ago, a man named Albert Shanker got hold of a nuclear warhead.”–Sleeper (1973).

Well, perhaps a little harsh, Shanker’s reputation was a “take no prisoners” union leader who defended his members, within, a contentious union membership.

A little history: the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) emerged after decades of in-fighting among teacher activists in scores of teacher organizations. The Teachers Guild and the Teacher Unions were bitterly opposed to each other. In 1949 New York State enacted the Feinberg Law, requiring teachers to sign a loyalty oath, over 500 teachers were forced to defend themselves and several hundred teachers were fired. The law was challenged in the courts, all the way to the SCOTUS, who affirmed the law. (See Clarence Taylor, “Reds at the Blackboard,” 2012 here). The Guild and the High School Teachers Association merged into the United Federation of Teachers, a one-day recognition strike in 1960, a negotiated contract in 1961 with the remnants of the Teachers Union CONTINUE READING: Albert Shanker and Michael Mulgrew: Tough Times Need Tough Leaders | Ed In The Apple

CURMUDGUCATION: Today in Teacher Depreciation

Today in Teacher Depreciation

When you're in the work, the general noise from the chorus of teacher devaluators can become a faint background buzz. And then something happens, and you're reminded suddenly, "Oh, yeah. That's a thing."

Happened twice to me on Twitter in the past 24 hours. First, there was the noise surrounding the Trump thing on the teevee last night, including this little punch from Mercedes Schlapp, a senior advisor for the Trump/Pence campaign

This is obviously supposed to be an insult, but I live in western Pennsylvania, right up the road from Pittsburgh, where the international airport includes a whole display/play area devoted to one of Pittsburgh's most beloved sons, Fred Rogers (she spelled his name wrong). Mr. Rogers is a national treasure and one of the few icons who hasn't been outed as some sort of secretly terrible monster.

Why would anybody treat him as an insult punchline? Because they respect strength and cruelty and in Mr. Rogers, they see the twin "weaknesses" of being kind and gentle and of communicating with CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Today in Teacher Depreciation

AN UNQUENCHABLE HUBRIS – Dad Gone Wild

AN UNQUENCHABLE HUBRIS

“The irony of our culture is that people are constantly telling other people to go to hell, but no one tells them to go to heaven.”― Art Buchwald, Too Soon to Say Goodbye

Well, that didn’t take long – 2 half days and one full – to shut a school down due to COVID-19. Robert Churchwell ES will go virtual after 21 staff members and 1 student is forced into quarantine due to a staff member testing positive. In my honest opinion, if I was a staff member at the school, I’d be pissed.

For the next two weeks, schooling may be virtual for students, but each of those 21 staff’s lives will also be virtual, as they’ll be locked in their house waiting to see if they get sick or not. That means no visits to family, no visits to the grocery store, no trips to Target. That means, their family members are also at risk. Yet, we shrug and say, “Hey what do you expect? We knew there would be outbreaks.”

Indications are that Churchwell is not the only school that has a positive result. Per a letter sent home to parents from Belmont-Waverly’s principal,

As you may have heard, we have been notified of one individual who has been diagnosed with COVID-19 and was present at Waverly Belmont ES while potentially infectious. I would like to assure you that we, along with our local health department, immediately began an investigation to determine who may have been in close contact (within six feet for at least 15 minutes) with that individual. All who have been identified as close contacts have been notified and instructed to quarantine at home for 14 days from their last contact with that individual. Quarantined individuals are not allowed to return to school until the quarantine period has elapsed.

There is no indication of how widespread the school quarantine protocols will extend. But we have to ask, how many more schools are also infected? I do find this line from the email a little galling, and at the least downplays the serious health consequences that could possibly arrive through CONTINUE READING: AN UNQUENCHABLE HUBRIS – Dad Gone Wild

“When you find hypocrisy in the daylight, look for power in the shadows” – Los Angeles Education Examiner

“When you find hypocrisy in the daylight, look for power in the shadows”

Senator Whitehouse laid out beautifully on Tuesday the context surrounding Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation hearings in Washington as the pushing and pulling of ‘actors inside the frame of a puppet theater.’ He argues that not only are outside forces controlling these actors in the main show but they are integral to the narrative of it. And some of the evidence for broadening focus beyond the proscenium is when characters in the drama adopt “the practice of claiming … moral standards or beliefs to which [their] own behavior does not conform”: hypocrisy.

Just so has Marilyn Koziatek – or the independent expenditure committee (IEC) from which she proudly accepts endorsement of her West San Fernando Valley campaign for school board in the LAUSD3 board district – swerved from insinuation of responsibility for scandals that occurred before his tenure, to antisemitism to anti-LGBTQ and anti-choice bigotry. Schmerelson’s defeated opponent who has endorsed Koziatek, has even hypocritically alluded to Scott Schmerelson’s former republican registration. Meanwhile, swearing brand new allegiance to a political party is precisely the maneuver employed by her endorsed-candidate, Koziatek. The hypocrisy is not without irony, because Koziatek’s unacknowledged switch is in suspicious temporal proximity to her bid for this non-partisan office. Schmerelson’s, on the other hand, is in sharp ethical contrast since CONTINUE READING: “When you find hypocrisy in the daylight, look for power in the shadows” – Los Angeles Education Examiner