Latest News and Comment from Education

Saturday, September 7, 2013

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 9-7-13

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit:

4LAKIDS - SOME OF THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT





CALIFORNIA ACCELERATES SHIFT TO COMMON CORE TESTING: Deasy, “a bit greedy”, balks
CALIFORNIA ACCELERATES SHIFT IN STUDENT TESTING:  The plan to hasten use of computerized exams would upend LAUSD effort to use scores to evaluate teachers. By Howard Blume, Los Angeles Times, http://lat.ms/1580bwT L.A. Unified's Deasy sounding a bit greedy on new tests   Commentary by By Karin Klein,

LAUSD HIRING PROFESSIONAL INVESTIGATORS FOR ABUSE CASES + Educator Gives Glimpse Inside "Teacher Jail"
By Patrick Healy, KNBC News | NBC Southern California http://bit.ly/13s0BwZ var nbcLP={};nbcLP.aRandomNumber=Math.floor(Math.random()*10000);nbcLP.currentPageLoc=encodeURIComponent(window.location.href);nbcLP.currentSiteLoc=encodeURIComponent(window.location.host);nbcLP.defaultWidth=652;nbcLP.defaultHeight=367;nbcLP.cmsID="222765541";nbcLP.vidPid="vZZtuuvuuXyA";nbcLP.vidSec="news";
LAUSD STUDENT RECOVERY DAY 2013: Attendance counselors, volunteers and administrators visit the homes of of habitually truant kids
PSA counselors meet with the parents of a student who has been truant from Grant High School Friday September 6, 2013. Friday was Student Recovery Day, when teams of attendance counselors and administrators knock on the doors of chronically truant kids. They try to get to the root of whatever problem is keeping them out of the classroom and resolve it so the kids can get back on track.(Andy
Lausd Hit By Unfair Labor Practice Complaints By 12 Teachers
Huffington Post from Los Angeles Daily News  |  By Barbara Jones | http://huff.to/15DkleT 9/6/2013 1:35 pm EDT  ::  The teachers union filed unfair labor practice complaints Thursday against Los Angeles Unified, claiming the district improperly reassigned 12 teachers from their posts at two schools because of their union activity on campus. The complaints filed by United Teachers Los
13 School Workers, Librarians Indicted In Textbook Theft Ring
Prosecutors say the districts – Los Angeles, Inglewood, Lynwood and Bellflower Unifieds, including the Mayor’s Partnership and Green Dot – so lacked any organized tracking system that they cannot say with any certainty how many books were stolen By Richard Winton. Los Angeles Times | http://lat.ms/19sHkMN <
FUNDING “EDUCATION REFORM”: The Big Three Foundations
By Jonathan Pelto | Public School $hakedown | http://bit.ly/17fdtqS The Gates Foundation, The Walton Foundation and the Broad Foundation could easily be called the un-holy triad of the education reform complex. While exact numbers are hard to pin down, since 2008 the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has spent at least $2 billion, the Walton Foundation at least three-quarters of

SEP 04

Utla: Lausd, Deasy Violated Teachers’ Rights To Participate In Union Activity
PERB Filing United Teachers Los Angeles Media Advisory |  http://bit.ly/1akRsLZ 6:43 PM - 4 Sep 13  ::  UTLA will hold a news conference at 1p.m., Thursday, September 5th, at UTLA, 3303 Wilshire Blvd, LA, 90010 — to discuss the filing of two unfair labor practice charges against LAUSD. In violation of the Educational Employment Relations Act, the District and Superintendent Deasy retaliated
Save the Dates: DIANE RAVITCH “REIGN OF ERROR” BOOK TOUR IN L.A.
The Network for Public Education |  http://bit.ly/1dRY2uX   REIGN    OF ERROR The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools Diane Ravitch Join Diane Ravitch for a discussion about her new book, Reign of Error on select dates throughout the United States. Reign of Error is shaping up to be the biggest education release of the year. It

SEP 03

GUESSES AND HYPE GIVE WAY TO DATA IN STUDY OF EDUCATION + smf’s 2¢
By GINA KOLATA . The New York Times | http://nyti.ms/17y4cuO Tuesday, September 3, 2013 :: What works in science and math education? Until recently, there had been few solid answers — just guesses and hunches, marketing hype and extrapolations from small pilot studies. But now, a little-known office in the Education Department is starting to get some real data, using a method that has
Beyond the Headlines: THE N.Y. TIMES TAKES A DEEPER LOOK AT MATH & SCIENCE
Posted on September 3, 2013 by LA School Report | http://bit.ly/UXHVhZ If you’re not an online subscriber to the New York Times, you might want to max-out your free monthly quota (of ten stories) today. [ smf: I just ordered the entire issue on my Kindle: 99¢ ] The Science Times section, entitled “Learning What Works,” focuses exclusively on education with a look “beyond the alarming headlines
POLL FINDS CALIFORNIANS REMAIN UNHAPPY ABOUT PUBLIC SCHOOLS +smf’s 2¢
All politics being local - “our” local schools fare better than “their” public schools About 13% said they felt public schools have gotten better in the past year, about double the percentage in last year’s poll By Larry Gordon – LA Times | http://lat.ms/1dMl4mW Students in Santa Ana start the school year. (Cheryl A. Guerrero / Los Angeles Times / August 27, 2013) By
State Board Of Ed Considers Key Questions Surrounding Local Control Funding Formula Regulations
By Tom Chorneau | SI&A Cabinet Report – News & Resources http://bit.ly/18AYxkM Tuesday, September 03, 2013  ::  This week school administrators anxious over the lack of regulations governing use of more than $2 billion in new state formula funding should get some new insight over how much interim guidance the state board intends to provide. Gov. Jerry Brown and legislative leaders adopted a
LAUSD's $1-BILLION iPAD-FOR-EVERY-STUDENT PROJECT COULD NEED A FURTHER OUTLAY FOR KEYBOARDS
By Howard Blume, Los Angeles Times | http://lat.ms/1760Gan Students in Karen Finkel's class at Broadacres Elementary School in Carson explore their new iPads, provided by the Los Angeles Unified School District. District officials are acknowledging an additional looming cost in the $1-billion effort to provide iPads to every student: keyboards. (Bob Chamberlin / Los Angeles Times / August 27,
A Look At The Unpleasantness In Syria From Almost-All-The-Way Across The Pond
Subject: Alerts to Threats in 2013 Europe from John Cleese by email from the 4LAKids Internationals desk << John Cleese Sept 3, 2013  ::  The English are feeling the pinch in relation to recent events in Syria and have therefore raised their security level from "Miffed" to “Peeved." Soon, though, security levels may be raised yet again to “Irritated" or even "A Bit Cross."  The English have

SEP 01

Judge Delays Release Of Los Angeles Teacher Ratings
By Teresa Watanabe, Los Angeles Times | http://lat.ms/131czO3 August 27, 2013, 4:59 p.m.  ::  The performance ratings of individual teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District will be kept confidential until a legal battle over them is resolved, a judge decided Tuesday. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge James C. Chalfant ruled earlier this month that the ratings must be released
MLK’s DREAM @ 50: Other Voices/Another Take
Audio+Video from BBC Radio 4 Voices: Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. ,Congressman John Lewis: last surviving member of the big six leaders of the American Civil Rights Movement, who spoke at the March on Washington on 28 August 1963; Dr Maya Angelou: American author and poet, Northern coordinator for Dr King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference; Professor Muhammad Yunus: Nobel peace

AUG 31

School Support Staff Must Back New Charter Schools Under Bill
LAURA OLSON , Associated Press/ AP California StaTe News Wire | http://bit.ly/1a8IAJw Aug 30, 9:06 PM EDT  ::  SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- Legislation that cleared the state Assembly on Friday could make it harder to create charter schools in California by requiring supporters to seek consent from at least some lower-level unionized school employees. Under AB917, at least 50 percent of teachers