Latest News and Comment from Education

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Diane in the Evening 11-11-12 Diane Ravitch's blog

Diane Ravitch's blog:



Teachers’ Facebook and Phone Campaign for Obama

Two teachers have started a campaign to take their message to the White House: stop the Race to the Top!
The message of their campaign:
Give all students the same education your girls are getting! Abandon Race to the Top and stop privatizing public schools.
Join them!


EduShyster Credits Stephanie Rivera for SFER Expose

Earlier, I published a post about Students for Education Reform, linking to a post by EduShyster.
SFER is a junior version of Democrats for Education Reform, the group formed by Wall Street hedge fund managers to promote privatization and high-stakes testing.
EduShyster here says that the credit for investigative reporting goes to Stephanie Rivera, a student at Rutgers, who plans to be a teacher and often engages in dialogue with her peers at SFER and TFA. Her website is calledTeacher Under Construction.
EduShyster writes:
Actually all of the credit for “digging” goes to Stephanie Rivera, a student at Rutgers. She posts regular updates 


Why Tony Bennett Lost

Conservative commentators–and Tony Bennett himself–blame Bennett’s loss on his support for the Common Core standards. They say that Bennett lost the votes of some Republicans who oppose the standards as federal over-reach. It’s hard to over-state how Bennett’s loss shocked and bewildered conservatives. He was their super-star.
Before that hardens into conventional wisdom, please consider the different view of this Hoosier:
Bennett and his policies were incredibly detrimental to the education of Hoosier children. Hatchet men were 


Why Tony Bennett Lost

Conservative commentators–and Tony Bennett himself–blame Bennett’s loss on his support for the Common Core standards. They say that Bennett lost the votes of some Republicans who oppose the standards as federal over-reach. It’s hard to over-state how Bennett’s loss shocked and bewildered conservatives. He was their super-star.
Before that hardens into conventional wisdom, please consider the different view of this Hoosier:
Bennett and his policies were incredibly detrimental to the education of Hoosier children. Hatchet men were placed as trustees of universities – not to support strengthened teacher education program, but to demean and demolish programs that are internationally perceived and practiced as excellent. An all out war was waged to de-


Matt Di Carlo Reviews TNTP Study of Rhee Reforms

Matthew Di Carlo of the Albert Shanker Institute always applies a rigorous analysis to any study or report he reviews.
Here he looks at the methodological issues raised by the TNTP review of the DC reforms. Among his concerns: the teachers who responded to the TNTP survey were a non-random sample, and those who responded might be different from those who did not; in addition, the “evaluation” is based on only a single year of data. Di Carlo concludes that the study isn’t very interesting because of its flaws.
When Gary Rubinstein reviewed the same report, he made the sensible point that TFA and TNTP have been 




LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 11-11-12 Diane Ravitch's blog

coopmike48 at Big Education Ape - 2 hours ago
Diane Ravitch's blog: [image: Click on picture to Listen to Diane Ravitch] Don’t Forget the Hurricane Victims by dianerav Robert Pondiscio writes movingly about a school that was destroyed by Hurricane Sandy. PS 333 was a Core Knowledge school, exemplary in many respects. It was unprotected from the ferocity of the storm surge. It had 578 students before the storm. It has 30 or so now, and they have been relocated to a school more than an hour and a half away. The principal is distraught, while the city administration pretends that what matters most is to get back to the routines o... more »