Thurmond Swears in Linda Darling-Hammond to SB. - Year 2019 (CA Dept of Education)

Thurmond Swears in Linda Darling-Hammond to SB. - Year 2019 (CA Dept of Education)

Thurmond Swears in Linda Darling-Hammond to SB.

SACRAMENTO—Linda Darling-Hammond, Governor Gavin Newsom’s choice to lead the California State Board of Education, was sworn into office today by State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, who serves as the Board’s Executive Secretary.

“Linda Darling-Hammond is one of the most respected education leaders in the nation, and we are so fortunate that she calls California home. Her appointment to the State Board of Education shows the caliber of focus the Governor has on raising the stakes in public education in California. We have work to do, and with Linda Darling-Hammond at the helm, I am confident that we will move the needle forward to work toward improving the public education system in an equitable way for all of our six million students,” Thurmond said.

Darling-Hammond is one of the nation’s leading scholars on education policy and practice. Immediately following her swearing in, Darling-Hammond was elected Board President by fellow members. She succeeds former Board President Michael W. Kirst, Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr.’s longtime policy advisor, who declined to seek reappointment. Veteran educator Ilene Straus was re-elected vice president.

Darling-Hammond is president of the Learning Policy Institute, a premier non-partisan research organization based in Palo Alto that works to advance evidence-based policies that support empowering and equitable learning for each and every child.

She is Stanford University’s Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus. At Stanford, she founded the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education and served as faculty sponsor for the Stanford Teacher Education Program, which she helped to redesign. Until her appointment to the State Board of Education, Darling-Hammond chaired the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, and she is credited with raising the efficiency and effectiveness of the agency during her tenure.

“As California enters this new era under a new governor, we are at a significant juncture in education,” said Darling-Hammond. “The state has made substantial progress in recent years and has a considerable distance still to travel to provide equitable and empowering education for all of its children. I look forward to working with Governor Newsom, the Board, and our many partners to ensure that all California students have access to high-quality learning opportunities from their earliest years and can graduate ready for college, career, and citizenship.”

The author of more than 600 articles and books on education, Darling-Hammond consistently ranks number one or number two in Education Week’s annual survey of the most influential scholars in the national education policy arena. In 2008, she led President Barack Obama’s education policy transition team. She is founding director of the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, whose 1996 report, What Matters Most: Teaching for America’s Future, was named among the most influential education reports of that decade.

Among her award-winning books are The Right to Learn, Teaching as the Learning Profession, Preparing Teachers for a Changing World, and The Flat World and Education. She received an Ed.D. from Temple University (with highest distinction) and a B.A. from Yale University (magna cum laude).

Established first in 1852, then by amendment to the California Constitution in 1884, the 11-member State Board of Education is California’s K–12 policy-making body for academic standards, curriculum, instructional materials, assessments, and accountability.

# # # #

Tony Thurmond — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5602, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

Last Reviewed: Thursday, March 14, 2019

Thurmond Swears in Linda Darling-Hammond to SB. - Year 2019 (CA Dept of Education)

California: Who Chose the Members of the Charter Task Force? | Diane Ravitch's blog

California: Who Chose the Members of the Charter Task Force? | Diane Ravitch's blog

California: Who Chose the Members of the Charter Task Force?

The task force appointed to reform California’s weak charter school law has 11 members; six of them have ties to the charter industry. Two of the 11 are part of the California Charter School Association, the official lobbying group, which spends $20 million a year to prevent any accountability for charters. How likely is this task force to propose meaningful reforms to stop charter schools from draining resources from the public schools that enroll most of the state’s children? How likely is it to propose meaningful reforms that take away endless appeals by failing charters? How likely is it to prevent small school districts from opening charter schools in districts that do not want them or need them? How likely is it to propose reforms that prevent entrepreneurs and grifters from opening their own charter schools? How likely is it to oust charter chains (the Walmarts of education), storefront charters where teachers meet students only once every three weeks, or charters operated by foreign entities?

Well, we won’t know until we see the final report, will we?

I promised Tony Thurmond that I would suspend judgment until I see the final report, and I will.

Nonetheless it is worrisome to see that somehow the charter industry managed to gain six of the 11 seats on a task force that will make recommendations to reform the industry.

I assumed that Thurmond was responsible for the composition of the task force

I may have been wrong, but honestly I don’t know who made those decisions.

I received an email from a reader in California whose credentials are impeccable, who has a direct tie inside the Governor’s office. This person told me that the committee was selected by Governor Gavin Newsom, not by Tony Thurmond. This made sense because Thurmond CONTINUE READING: California: Who Chose the Members of the Charter Task Force? | Diane Ravitch's blog

Privatization Is Fundamentally An Attack on Democracy. The Teachers Strikes Show Why.

Privatization Is Fundamentally An Attack on Democracy. The Teachers Strikes Show Why.

Privatization Is Fundamentally An Attack on Democracy. The Teachers Strikes Show Why.

Charter schools are anti-democratic by nature. (Ray Chavez/MediaNews Group/The Mercury News via Getty Images)  

One key feature of the Trump era is a renewed public focus on the issue of democracy.

Last year’s congressional elections had the highest midterm voter turnout since 1966. Americans across the country have poured into the streets and packed the halls of Congress to protest President Trump’s power grabs. Over one million people convicted of felonies have regained the right to vote in Florida, thanks to a successful statewide ballot measure. New York City residents pushed their elected officials to all but force the world’s richest person, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, to walk away from $3 billion in tax breaks. 

But leave it to public school teachers to educate us about a direct attack on democracy that’s been hiding right under our noses since long before the Trump presidency: Privatization.

A wave of teacher strikes is highlighting the country’s deepening education funding crisis while also raising concerns over the expansion of charter schools.

Last month, West Virginia teachers walked off the job to protest legislation that would have opened up the state to charter schools and private school vouchers. Also in February, teachers in Oakland walked off on strike in the midst of their district’s funding crisis, which is being fueled by out-of-date state laws that allow a virtually unlimited number of charter schools to open. And in January, Los Angeles teachers walked out, forcing their district to demand that state legislators reevaluate California’s charter school laws, which they’ve agreed to do in the coming months.

West Virginia teacher Katie Endicott from Mingo County—which Trump won in 2016 with more than three-quarters of the vote—didn’t pull any punches. “It’s infuriating that people would try to profit off us: Privatization would give millions of dollars to elites and it would create even more haves and have not,” she told Eric Blanc for Jacobin.

There should be no doubt that charter schools are a form of privatization. Despite CONTINUE READING: Privatization Is Fundamentally An Attack on Democracy. The Teachers Strikes Show Why.

Separate and Unequal: The Real Education Scandal Is America’s Affirmative Action Program for White People

Affirmative Action for White People

Separate and Unequal: The Real Education Scandal Is America’s Affirmative Action Program for White People

While the conversations surrounding the newly uncovered college cheating scandal have focused on the advantages of the wealthy, the hypocrisy of those who demonize affirmative action, and the outrageous hubris of the elite, there is one indisputable fact that most people have either consciously ignored or overlooked entirely:

In America, white people get a better education.

Schools in white neighborhoods are better. Schools in black neighborhoods are worse. Majority-white public schools receive more funding. Majority-black schools have fewer resources. And despite what the opponents of affirmative action would have you believe, it is easier to get into college if you’re white. There is no evidence to the contrary. Every piece of data shows it.

It is easy to point at the overwhelming evidence of America’s two-tiered education system and call it racist, but it is much more complex than that. It is about capitalism. It is the legacy of Jim Crow and white supremacy. And yes, it is about color.

How Jim Crow Created the Education Gap

One of the least-discussed aspects of public education is how school funding is tied to the history of segregation and Jim Crow. Even when state and federal governments distribute money equally, black schools still end up at a funding disadvantage.

If you’re wondering why the economics of school funding is framed as black vs. white instead of rich versus poor, the reason is simple: the National Center for Educational Statistics reports that three-fourths black high school students attend schools where most of their classmates are poor, citing that statistic as the number one indicator of an inferior school.

According to the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, about 36 percent of education funding comes from local property taxes. This means that schools in white school districts can allocate more money to education than schools in majority black districts.

Eighty years ago, the government practice of redlining, fueled by CONTINUE READING: Affirmative Action for White People

CHARTER SCHOOL SCANDAL SCANDAL SCANDAL NC virtual charter school wants to separate from Pearson | Raleigh News & Observer

NC virtual charter school wants to separate from Pearson | Raleigh News & Observer

A virtual charter school ‘divorce’ leaves 2,400 students caught in the middle

RALEIGH 

More than 2,400 students are caught in the middle of a fight between one of North Carolina’s two virtual charter schools and the for-profit education company that receives millions of dollars a year to manage the school.

N.C. Connections Academy wants state permission to no longer be managed by Pearson Online and Blended Learning, part of the international company Pearson that publishes textbooks and sells a wide range of education products. The fight between the two sides has gotten bitter, with a lawsuit being filed.

Tuesday’s hearing before the N.C. Charter Schools Advisory Board was full of accusations and heated words made by both the school and Pearson. Advisory board members said they need more time to decide whether to recommend that the State Board of Education approve the school’s request — a step that could decide the fate of the school.

“We’ve been calling this a divorce, and it’s a divorce that has 2,400 children involved,” CSAB vice chairman Steven Walker said at Tuesday’s meeting. “A pretty weighty decision and I understand that the (N.C. Connections) board has said that time’s of the essence, and it may be. But we can’t rush to try to make a decision that’s not right on this.” CONTINUE READING: NC virtual charter school wants to separate from Pearson | Raleigh News & Observer

Book shows how leaders cemented segregation in New Orleans schools

Book shows how leaders cemented segregation in New Orleans schools

How New Orleans leaders built a segregated city
Using schools as the building blocks, New Orleans leaders cemented residential segregation that persists today according to a new book

Review: “Race & Education in New Orleans” by Walter C. Stern (Louisiana State University Press, 2018)

Just over 100 years ago, the first public high school for black students opened in New Orleans. The debut of McDonogh 35 was a grossly overdue advance for the city’s black population. But the choice of location was hardly accidental. In picking the Rampart Street corridor for the school’s location, the city’s school board made a strategic decision to semi-officially designate it a “black” area — understanding that might lead over time to the departure of the neighborhood’s white residents, and particularly its many Jewish small business owners — even though blacks comprised just 39 percent of the school’s closest neighbors in 1920. The white majority did indeed flee, and public disinvestment in the area’s stability and upkeep followed.

“In the decades following McDonogh 35’s creation … perhaps no section of New Orleans experienced as much demolition, residential displacement, and redevelopment as this one,” writes Walter Stern in “Race & Education in New Orleans,” a thorough and pointed history of the city’s schools up to the start of desegregation. CONTINUE READING: Book shows how leaders cemented segregation in New Orleans schools

Women at William Franz Elementary School yell at police officers during a protest against desegregation at the school, as three black youngsters attended classes at the school for the second day. Some carry signs stating “All I Want For Christmas is a Clean White School” and “Save Segregation Vote, States Rights Pledged Electors” Bettman/Getty Images

Selective Outrage: Revisiting the Atlanta School Cheating Scandal – Have You Heard

Selective Outrage: Revisiting the Atlanta School Cheating Scandal – Have You Heard

Selective Outrage: Revisiting the Atlanta School Cheating Scandal

In March of 2013, thirty five Atlanta educators, all of them Black, were charged with racketeering and conspiracy for allegedly changing student answers on standardized tests from wrong to right. The teachers were accused of the worst-possible wrongdoing against their students. But behind the longest criminal trial in Georgia history is an untold story – of school privatization and deprivation, of urban renewal and gentrification, and the criminalization, of Black Atlantans and their educators. Shani Robinson, the youngest teacher to be tried and convicted, joins Have You Heard to discuss her new book None of the Above: The Untold Story of the Atlanta Public Schools Cheating Scandal, Corporate Greed, and the Criminalization of Educators, written with Anna Simonton.

You can read a full transcript of the episode here. And if you’re a fan of Have You Heard, please consider becoming a supporter on Patreon.

Selective Outrage: Revisiting the Atlanta School Cheating Scandal – Have You Heard

Trump’s Proposed 2020 Budget Favors the Rich, Increases Inequality, and Shorts Public Education | janresseger

Trump’s Proposed 2020 Budget Favors the Rich, Increases Inequality, and Shorts Public Education | janresseger

Trump’s Proposed 2020 Budget Favors the Rich, Increases Inequality, and Shorts Public Education

Nobody paid much attention to President Trump’s 2020 federal budget proposal for education when it was released on Monday. The 2020, K-12 education budget is similar to what Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos proposed last year and also the year before.  In both of those years, a Republican-led House and Republican-led Senate increased allocations for core public school programs instead of cutting them, and Congress entirely rejected DeVos’s proposals for vouchers. This year, Democrats, who do not share the President’s priorities, dominate the House of Representatives, while key senators in both parties remain committed to maintaining what is already meager public school funding.

Summarizing proposed budget allocations for K-12 public education, Education Week‘s Andrew Ujifusa reports: “Title I funding for disadvantaged students, the single-largest federal funding program for public schools, remains flat at $15.9 billion in Trump’s budget pitch. Special education grants to states would also be level-funded at $13.2 billion. Also flat-funded are the English Language Acquisition formula grants at $737.4 million… (T)he office for civil rights would get $125 million, the same as current funding.” Head Start, which is part of the Health and Human Services budget, would also be funded at the 2019 level.

Several important programs are eliminated in the President’s 2020 budget proposal: Title II for teacher staff development, Title IV for students’ academic support and enrichment, and the 21st Century Community Learning Centers after-school program.  DeVos proposed last year that these same programs be eliminated, but Congress preserved the funding.

The proposed education budget would increase the federal Charter Schools Program to $500 million—up by $60 million from last year.  The proposed budget would double funding for the CONTINUE READING: Trump’s Proposed 2020 Budget Favors the Rich, Increases Inequality, and Shorts Public Education | janresseger

CURMUDGUCATION: Maybe We Should Talk About College Readiness Again

CURMUDGUCATION: Maybe We Should Talk About College Readiness Again

Maybe We Should Talk About College Readiness Again

College and career ready. College and career ready. College and career ready.

How long have we been reading and listening to that magical phrase, quietly at first and now omnipresent as the euphemism of choice for people who no longer dare say "Common Core."

It is a hollow phrase, completely empty of meaning. It never, ever, comes with a list, description, or quantification of what "college ready" actually looks like. No mystery there-- we don't know.

But then, few education policy mavens have ever tried to figure out, really, what college ready means,. and mostly they weren't even tryin. Instead, the phrase has been employed to give weight to the Big Standardized Test. "Students didn't score as well on the BS Test as we wanted them to," is not terribly compelling-- but run around hollering, "OMGZ! 63% of our students are not ready for college!!" and you can draw a crowd and get some money moving around in support of whatever test-driven idea you're selling this week.

But "scored higher than the cut score on the PARCC" is not the same as "college ready." How could any single measure tell us that? What single measure would tell us that one student is ready to attend as pre-law at Yale and another student is ready to attend Julliard to study music and another student is ready to attend East South Dakota Community College to get a history teaching certificate and another student is working on her welding certifications. What one instrument could possibly measure the readiness of students for an infinite variety of Next Steps?

But reformsters keep telling us that test scores measure college readiness, even as we all know that CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Maybe We Should Talk About College Readiness Again

Opposing Mediocre Minds: Einstein on Education | Live Long and Prosper

Opposing Mediocre Minds: Einstein on Education | Live Long and Prosper

Opposing Mediocre Minds: Einstein on Education

Today, March 14 is Pi day (3.14) and the birthday (#140) of Albert Einstein.

Albert Einstein is remembered as the physicist who developed the theories of special, and general relativity.

the laws of physics are the same for all non-accelerating observers, and that the speed of light in a vacuum was independent of the motion of all observers…

…that massive objects cause a distortion in space-time, which is felt as gravity.

He came to the U.S. in the early thirties and, with the rise of the Nazi party in Germany and the accompanying anti-semitism, he decided to stay (after short stays in both Belgium and England). He was already internationally known, having won the Nobel Prize for physics in 1921 for his discovery of the law of photoelectric effect.

Princeton offered him a job and he became a U.S. citizen in 1940 (while also retaining his Swiss citizenship).

MORE THAN PHYSICS

Einstein was more than a world famous scientist. He was also someone who examined philosophy, religion, and politics and much of his writing has applications for students and teachers.

The quotes below (from Wikiquote) reflect the universality of Einstein’s thought and apply to education and learning.

THE SUPPORT FOR SCIENCE AND KNOWLEDGE

It is ironic that the first quote I’ve listed here is one on the value of science institutions to nations. This week I read that our current administration has requested deep cuts in science funding.

Trump once again requests deep cuts in U.S. funding for science.

The administration is asking for…

• a 13% cut for the National Institute of Health.

• an 8% cut for NASA

• a 12% cut to the National Science Foundation

• 17% less for the Office of Science in the Department of Energy

• A cut of 1/3 for the EPA overall and cuts of 40% for science and technical programs and 66% for air and energy research (climate change)

It would be nice if someone would stop the war against knowledge.

Science is international but its success is based on institutions, which are CONTINUE READING: 

Opposing Mediocre Minds: Einstein on Education | Live Long and Prosper

Charter Profiteer in Arizona Plans to Open Charter Chain in North Carolina | Diane Ravitch's blog

Charter Profiteer in Arizona Plans to Open Charter Chain in North Carolina | Diane Ravitch's blog

Charter Profiteer in Arizona Plans to Open Charter Chain in North Carolina

Last year, the Arizona Republic wrote an expose of the millions made by Glenn Way, founder of a charter chain in Arizona, primarily by real estate deals and construction of the schools by “related” companies. He previously ran charters in Utah.

Now Way plans to launch a charter chain in North Carolina, which welcomes for-profit charters.

Way’s chain in Arizona has a red-white-and-blue patriotic theme.

A charter school operator who made millions of dollars building, selling and leasing properties to the schools he runs moved a step closer Monday toward setting up shop in North Carolina.

The N.C. Charter Schools Advisory Board voted Monday to recommend giving a full interview to Wake Preparatory Academy, a proposed K-12 charter school that wants to open in 2020 in northern Wake County. Wake Prep would be managed by a company whose owner also owns the company that would build and lease back the facility to the charter school.

Wake Prep is proposing to contract with Arizona-based Charter One to manage the school. Charter One manages American Leadership Academy, a network of Arizona charter schools. Former Utah state legislator Glenn Way founded ALA and owns Charter One and Schoolhouse Development.

The Arizona Republic reported last year how Way had made as much as $37 million by setting up no-bid deals in which he built school campuses and then sold the properties at a profit to the ALA charter schools. The newspaper’s five-part investigation into charter schools earned it the prestigious George Polk Award for Education Reporting.

Under Wake Prep’s proposed agreement, the school CONTINUE READING: Charter Profiteer in Arizona Plans to Open Charter Chain in North Carolina | Diane Ravitch's blog

Choosing Democracy: SCUSD Budget Fiasco- #Unite4SACKids #WeAreSCTA #WeAreCTA #strikeready #REDFORED #SCTA #CTA

Choosing Democracy: SCUSD Budget Fiasco- 2

SCUSD Budget Fiasco- 2

10 Facts About the Budget Fiasco at Sac City

At its most basic, the Sacramento City Unified District has a budget crisis because Superintendent Jorge Aguilar and the School Board are not honoring commitments to students, educators and even the Sacramento County Office of Education.

Rather than re-balance the budget to put students first, Mr. Aguilar and the Board have continued to prioritize spending on administrators, including $6 million in vacation payouts to top administrators.

To understand the 10 facts about the Sac City Budget Fiasco,  click here to Read More

Big Education Ape: UPDATE: Community leaders come together to launch 'Save Sac Schools' from state takeover | abc10com #Unite4SACKids #WeAreSCTA #WeAreCTA #strikeready #REDFORED #SCTA #CTA - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2019/03/community-leaders-come-together-to.html

Big Education Ape: Choosing Democracy: SCUSD Plans for Teacher Lay Offs #Unite4SACKids #WeAreSCTA #WeAreCTA #strikeready #REDFORED #SCTA #CTA - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2019/03/choosing-democracy-scusd-plans-for.html

Big Education Ape: ATTENTION SACRAMENTO CITY UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT: CHICKENS COMING HOME TO ROOST #Unite4SACKids #WeAreSCTA #WeAreCTA #strikeready #REDFORED #SCTA #CTA - https://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2019/03/attention-sacramento-city-unified.html

Choosing Democracy: SCUSD Budget Fiasco- 2