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Sunday, December 20, 2020

Kelsey Sends Grinchy Voucher Christmas Card – Tennessee Education Report

Kelsey Sends Grinchy Voucher Christmas Card – Tennessee Education Report
KELSEY SENDS GRINCHY VOUCHER CHRISTMAS CARD




Tennessee’s “Mr. Voucher” State Senator Brian Kelsey sent Christmas greeting cards with a grinchy message about his non-stop work to privatize Tennessee’s public schools. Apparently, even the “Season of Giving” is one where Kelsey spends his time thinking about how to send taxpayer money to public school privatizers.

Here’s that fun card:

Of course, public school advocates are fighting back, asking the Supreme Court not to hear Kelsey’s appeal. It seems Kelsey’s just mad because after doing all that work to help Gov. Bill Lee pass a voucher scheme, the Tennessee courts have repeatedly held the law to be unconstitutional.

Parents Fight Back

Here’s a press release from the group Public Funds for Public Schools:

Parents of students in the Nashville and Memphis public schools, who are plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging a state law imposing a private school voucher program on their counties, have told the Tennessee Supreme Court there is no basis to review lower court rulings striking down the voucher program as unconstitutional.

In 2019, the Tennessee legislature passed, by a one vote margin, a law to divert funding from the already under-resourced public schools in Shelby (Memphis) and Davidson (Nashville) Counties to private schools through an “education savings CONTINUE READING: Kelsey Sends Grinchy Voucher Christmas Card – Tennessee Education Report



Arizona Charters Hit Jackpot with Federal Paycheck Protection Program | Diane Ravitch's blog

Arizona Charters Hit Jackpot with Federal Paycheck Protection Program | Diane Ravitch's blog
Arizona Charters Hit Jackpot with Federal Paycheck Protection Program



The federal CARES Act included the Paycheck Protection Program to help struggling small businesses and nonprofits survive the pandemic. Lobbyists for the charter industry slipped in a provision enabling charter schools to apply for PPP funding, even though they experienced no financial losses. Charter schools got a share of the $13.2 billion allotted to the nation’s early 100,000 public schools. The average public school received about $135,000 to meet the expenses of the pandemic. On the advice of their lobbyists, some 1200 charters also sought and won PPP funding. Thus charters drew funding from two sources; public schools were not eligible for PPP funding. Charters that applied for PPP funding won six times as much federal money as public schools.

The Arizona Republic reported that the Primavera online charter school in Arizona won a sizable “loan” (1% interest, forgivable), at the same time that its owner took CONTINUE READING: Arizona Charters Hit Jackpot with Federal Paycheck Protection Program | Diane Ravitch's blog

CURMUDGUCATION: Pennsylvania's Teacher Problem

CURMUDGUCATION: Pennsylvania's Teacher Problem
Pennsylvania's Teacher Problem



We already know that the teaching profession is primarily composed of white women (average age 43). But sometimes, when you break data down in particular ways, it becomes even more striking.

Research for Action is a Philly-based group that has done some great work over the years, and they've done some research about the TOC/SOC balance in PA that are featured both in this article from Sojourner Ahebee and a "supplemental" Twitter thread (and you can read the research here).

Some of the PA data is just striking. First, PA is an outlier when it comes to the gap between students and teachers of color. Nationally, the share of SOC is 2.5 times the share of TOC, but in PA the SOC share is 6 times greater (only NE, NH and Indiana have a bigger gap). I'm not totally shocked and surprised by that; PA suffers from a fairly severe urban vs. rural divide, and the rural parts of the state are pretty white. 

But when RFA starts breaking down by districts, it gets even starker. There are 500 school districts in PA (which is its own problem) and 184 of those districts employ zero teachers of color. Only about twenty-five districts in the entire state have staffs that are more than 5% TOC. Here's a map from Research for Action, breaking it down district by district: CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Pennsylvania's Teacher Problem

Los Angeles: Billionaire-funded Group Complains about Remote Learning Pact | Diane Ravitch's blog

Los Angeles: Billionaire-funded Group Complains about Remote Learning Pact | Diane Ravitch's blog
Los Angeles: Billionaire-funded Group Complains about Remote Learning Pact



In Los Angeles, the UTLA reached an agreement with the LAUSD and superintendent to extend remote learning as COVID surges and every ICU bed is filled in the city. The billionaire-funded “Parent Revolution” complained (billionaires are parents although they have no children in LA public schools).

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-12-18/la-teachers-increase-live-online-classes-students

With children mired in distance learning and many struggling academically, Los Angeles teachers will take on more live online interaction with students next semester, under an agreement announced Friday. Also under the deal, school nurses will conduct campus-based coronavirus tests.

The pact between the teachers union and the Los Angeles Unified School District was essential for the nation’s second-largest school system; the agreement’s predecessor would have expired Dec. 31. And, based on current infection rates, a return to campus in January is almost impossible under state health guidelines. 

“This progress in online instruction reflects the shared learning of all who work in schools about the need to maximize the interaction between teachers and students and their families,” Los Angeles schools Supt. Austin CONTINUE READING: Los Angeles: Billionaire-funded Group Complains about Remote Learning Pact | Diane Ravitch's blog

NANCY BAILEY: The Attack on Dr. Jill Biden is Cloaked Hatred of Teachers and Public Education

The Attack on Dr. Jill Biden is Cloaked Hatred of Teachers and Public Education
The Attack on Dr. Jill Biden is Cloaked Hatred of Teachers and Public Education




Much has been written about the offensiveness of the Wall Street Journal’s Epstein opinion piece on Dr. Jill Biden. It lacks respect for Dr. Biden, a veteran teacher, deeply committed to her profession and community college students, but it’s also meant to ridicule teaching and public education.

First, it’s never wise to criticize intellectual pursuit, to deride a person for bettering themselves, for improving their knowledge and understanding of the world. This is especially true of teachers who prepare students for their futures.

Belittling University Education Schools

Dr. Biden’s criticism indirectly attacks the University of Delaware and their education school, a public university. Tucker Carlson said, Dr. Jill has an education degree from some school in Delaware, and you’re supposed to find that highly impressive. 

Colleges of Education could always improve, but for years nonprofits like Relay Graduate School of Education, and more, have been jockeying to replace them.

By disparaging teachers’ main producers, our public universities, and these schools are in danger of closing; they promote a privatization agenda cast by corporate CONTINUE READING: The Attack on Dr. Jill Biden is Cloaked Hatred of Teachers and Public Education

Personal Reflections On My 2020 Professional Experiences | Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

Personal Reflections On My 2020 Professional Experiences | Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...
PERSONAL REFLECTIONS ON MY 2020 PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCES




I thought some readers might find it interesting, and I thought it would be a useful reflection exercise for me, if I reflected on my work around education over the past twelve months AND my hopes and concerns for 2021 (those 2021 thoughts will appear in a future post)

I’ve already done a more “big picture” review in my annual Washington Post piece, The positively worst and best education news of 2020 — as viewed by a teacher, and expect equally “big picture” predictions in a column that should be published there this week.

On a personal level, my family and I have weathered 2020 well, and we expect to do the same next year. I’ll save that commentary for the annual New Year’s letter we send out 🙂

REFLECTIONS ON 2020

The year began pretty smoothly.  Classes were going well and, then, in late February I read something about some schools in Asia  closing down physically and moving to remote instruction because of some kind of virus.

No way that could that happen here, I figured, but I thought some readers around the world might find it helpful if I began to collect distance learning resources.

Then, in early March, I was still thinking it was unlikely to affect us in Sacramento, but I also figured it couldn’t CONTINUE READING: Personal Reflections On My 2020 Professional Experiences | Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

Missouri Grants First Charter Outside Two Biggest Districts | Diane Ravitch's blog

Missouri Grants First Charter Outside Two Biggest Districts | Diane Ravitch's blog
Missouri Grants First Charter Outside Two Biggest Districts




Up until now, the only districts with charters in Missouri were St. Louis and Kansas City, the state’s two biggest districts. But the state board just granted a charter for a new school in the Normandy district, one of the state’s poorest and lowest performing.

The state board of education approved the charter with six votes in favor, one against, and one abstention.

Normandy lost its state accreditation in 2012, triggering a student transfer law that bled it of funding and students. The state school board bumped the district up to provisional accreditation in 2017. Academics have improved in recent years but the district still struggles. Less than half of third-graders passed state math and reading assessments in 2019. Its high school graduation rate in May was 69%.

Because of the district’s obstacles, state board member Pamela Westbrooks-Hodge, who previously served on Normandy’s governing board, voted against the charter.

“You can’t morally advance options and choice for one group by taking away the rights and choice of another,” CONTINUE READING: Missouri Grants First Charter Outside Two Biggest Districts | Diane Ravitch's blog

Democracy and Education | tultican

Democracy and Education | tultican
Democracy and Education




By Thomas Ultican 12/19/2020

Democracy and free universal public education are foundational American ideologies. They have engendered world renowned success for our experiment in government “by the people”. Two new books – Schoolhouse Burning by Derek Black and A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door by Jack Schneider and Jennifer Berkshire – demonstrate that these principles which were integral to the American experiment are shockingly under serious attack by wealthy elites.

After his father Fred died in 1967, Charles Koch took a disparate set of assets – a cattle ranch, a minority share in an oil refinery and a gas gathering business – and stitched them together. Today it is the second largest privately held corporation in the world. In the excellent 2019 book, Kochland, Christopher Leonard states, “Koch would eventually build one of the largest lobbying and political influence machines in US history.”

Both the introduction to A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door and the “Through History’s Eyes” chapter of Schoolhouse Burning mention the same quote from Charles Koch. In 2018, the Koch network held its annual three day gathering near Palm Springs, California. It was a 700-person confab of some of the richest people in America. Black wrote,

“Charles Koch told the audience that ‘we’ve made more progress in the last five years than I had in the last 50…. The capabilities we have now can take us to a whole new level…. We want to increase the effectiveness of the network … by an order of magnitude. If we do that, we can change CONTINUE READING: Democracy and Education | tultican


Gingerbread houses and teacher unions. – Fred Klonsky

Gingerbread houses and teacher unions. – Fred Klonsky
GINGERBREAD HOUSES AND TEACHER UNIONS



When I see gingerbread houses this time of year I think about the teacher two doors down the hall who made making them an assignment each year as homework.

I imagine it was mostly done by parents – moms most likely. But they were great and festive. And a shared family thing. They filled the library display case. 

Pretzel log roofs. Jellies in the windows. Candied dripping icicles. Some small modest dwellings. Others quite like mansions.

And I remember when the teacher was diagnosed with cancer which made it physically impossible to take her class to PE or Music or recess. But she wanted to continue to teach and all she needed was assistance. 

Naturally, the district resisted. They pressured her to  CONTINUE READING: 
Gingerbread houses and teacher unions. – Fred Klonsky


Will Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) Change the Political Power Structure in New York City? Should We Use RCV in State and Congressional Elections? | Ed In The Apple

Will Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) Change the Political Power Structure in New York City? Should We Use RCV in State and Congressional Elections? | Ed In The Apple
Will Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) Change the Political Power Structure in New York City? Should We Use RCV in State and Congressional Elections?



The ballots in New York City elections commonly ask voters to vote on “ballot proposals” as  well as candidates, in 2019, an off year, no one was running for citywide or state office, the ballot contained four proposals, one of the proposals changed the method of voting in city elections: Ranked Choice Voting.

What is Ranked Choice Voting? How does it Work?

  Ranked-choice, or instant-runoff voting, allows voters to choose multiple candidates and rank them by order of preference. In New York City, primary and special-election voters will have the choice to rank up to five … You don’t have to rank all five – in fact, you can just choose one candidate. But the option is there for you to voice your support for multiple candidates. For the voter, that’s basically all they have to think about when going to the ballot box – which candidates to choose and how to rank them.

Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) replaces run-offs for citywide elections. If a candidate did not reach 40% of the vote in a primary or general election for Mayor, Comptroller or Public Advocate the two leading candidates formerly would contest in a run-off election.

Run-offs were not required in City Council elections, three, four, five or more CONTINUE READING: Will Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) Change the Political Power Structure in New York City? Should We Use RCV in State and Congressional Elections? | Ed In The Apple

A VERY BUSY DAY Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... The latest news and resources in education since 2007

 Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007


Personal Reflections On My 2020 Professional Experiences
photosforyou / Pixabay I thought some readers might find it interesting, and I thought it would be a useful reflection exercise for me, if I reflected on my work around education over the past twelve months AND my hopes and concerns for 2021 (those 2021 thoughts will appear in a future post) I’ve already done a more “big picture” review in my annual Washington Post piece, The positively worst and
Most Popular Posts Of The Week
I’m making a change in the content of the regular feature. In addition to sharing the top five posts that have received the most “hits” in the preceding seven days (though they may have originally been published on an earlier date), I will also include the top five posts that have actually appeared in the past week. Often, these are different posts. You might also be interested in IT’S THE THIRTE
Ed Tech Digest
Nine years ago, in another somewhat futile attempt to reduce the backlog of resources I want to share, I began this occasional “” post where I share three or four links I think are particularly useful and related to…ed tech, including some Web 2.0 apps. You might also be interested in THE BEST ED TECH RESOURCES OF 2020 – PART TWO , as well as checking out all my edtech resources . Here are this w
Three New Short Christmas Videos That Are Great For ELLs
Couleur / Pixabay Here are four new additions to one my most popular posts, The Best Christmas Videos For English Language Learners – Help Me Find More (students can watch them and then talk and write about what they saw):
Around The Web In ESL/EFL/ELL
BiljaST / Pixabay Six years ago I began this regular feature where I share a few posts and resources from around the Web related to ESL/EFL or to language in general that have caught my attention. You might also be interested in THE BEST RESOURCES, ARTICLES & BLOG POSTS FOR TEACHERS OF ELLS IN 2019 – PART ONE and THE BEST RESOURCES, ARTICLES & BLOG POSTS FOR TEACHERS OF ELLS IN 2019 – PART TWO. A
This Week’s “Round-Up” Of Useful Posts & Articles On Ed Policy Issues
Here are some recent useful posts and articles on educational policy issues (You might also be interested in THE BEST ARTICLES, VIDEOS & POSTS ON EDUCATION POLICY IN 2019 – PART TWO ): Two outsiders emerge as top contenders for Biden’s education secretary is from The Washington Post. New York City Will Change Many Selective Schools to Address Segregation is from The NY Times. Classrooms of the Fu
Excellent Video To Use When Teaching About Taking Responsibility For Mistakes
I do what has turned out to do a fairly effective lesson on taking responsibility, and use various articles and video clips (see The Best Resources For Helping Students (& The Rest Of Us) Learn The Concept Of Not Blaming Others ). Today, Army General Gustave Perna, the chief operating officer of Operation 

 Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007