Sunday, March 28, 2021

CATCH UP WITH CURMUDGUCATION + ICYMI: Palm Sunday Edition (3/28)

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Palm Sunday Edition (3/28)



Palm Sunday Edition

Yeah, that snuck up fast. Let me remind you that you can get a daily dose of education commentary on the Network for Public Education Blog of Blogs. Meanwhile, let's see what we've got on tap here.

Ayanna Presley wants girls of color to stop being punished disproportionately

Rep. Presley is trying again with legislation to disrupt the over-punishment and detention of Black girls. Let's see how far it gets this time.

Let Me Teach Like a Normal @$$ Human

At Affective Living, from active shooter training to pandemesses, Chase Mielke would like to be less superhuman in the classroom.

More than $1 billion for 56 black charter graduates?

Julian Vasquez Heilig with a piece of information that is pretty stark and clear-- Texas spent $1.21 billion over two years on nine charter chains, and those chains graduated 56 Black students. 

What They've Lost

Have You Heard talks to students from Boston, and it turns out they aren't so concerned about that Learning Loss that education thought leaders are all worked up about right now.

Setting Ourselves, and Others, Free

Teacher Tom, the littles, and shame.

Our Kids Are Not Broken

Not sure how I missed this Atlantic piece last week, but it's worth a look. Not sure I agree with all of it, but I appreciate a positive look at the students right now

What we learned about Clearview AI and its secret "Co-founder."

Not directly related, but this New York Times piece digs a bit more into the surveillance giant watching us all.

Why Common Core failed

You will learn nothing new from this Tom Loveless piece for Brookings, but you will have the satisfaction of nodding and saying "I told them so," at your computer screed. However, I do have to issue a trigger warning because Emily Hanford pops up here.

Grit backlash (again)

As a bunch of academics get ready to kick grit around, Hechinger Report talks to Angela Duckworth and gives her a chance to reflect and respond.

Biden is Reigniting the Movement to Oppose Standardized Testing

At The Progressive, Jake Jacobs looks at how the administration's hard line on testing is riling up the troops again.

Who's Zooming Who?

Who's running ed policy in Tennessee? Not the people who are actually supposed to be, TC Weber discovers. Lots of dots to connect here.

Why I'm Opting My Son Out of Standardized Tests (And You Can, Too)

Jose Vilson on why his son will not be taking New York's BS Test this year. "Our students deserve more for their resilience than this country has offered them..."

Federal government pandemic schooling data--three key takeaways

Yeah, the feds finally tried to collect some information. Matt Barnum at Chalkbeat breaks it down.

It's tempting to replace teachers with tech, but it would be a mistake

Victoria Cain and Adam Laats are at the Washington Post to deliver a lesson from history.

What did Florida get for the $1 billion/year it sends to private schools

A blistering column from Patricia Drago in the Daytona Beach News-Journal. "Let’s stop the pretense and the hypocrisy. Either accountability matters, or it doesn’t. Either curriculum matters or it does not. Either teacher certification and school safety matter or they do not. A billion dollars a year says these things don’t matter in Florida."

Stickin' to the Union

Union bashing has been popular of late. Here's Nancy Flanagan with a reply to all that bashery.

The Country Moves Forward, Education Falls Back

Gayle Greene (no relation) is at Counterpunch calling out standardized testing and the folks who are keeping us at it.




Report: How A Non-Profit Charter School Can Be Run For Profit - https://www.forbes.com/sites/petergreene/2021/03/19/report-how-a-non-profit-charter-school-can-be-run-for-profit/?sh=39ee923e3cd4 by @palan57 on @forbes

West Virginia Poised To Spend More On Vouchers, Less On Public Schools - https://www.forbes.com/sites/petergreene/2021/03/22/west-virginia-poised-to-spend-more-on-vouchers-less-on-public-schools/?sh=10fe89b6506a by @palan57 on @forbes



Is Your Charter School A Public School?
It seems to be one of the eternal questions (well, sort of a question) of the education debates-- aren't charter schools public schools? So for those folks who are still a little fuzzy on this, let me offer a handy set of questions to help you decide. Here are the signs of a public school. Is the school and its resources owned by the public? Who owns the building? If the school closed tomorrow, w
Cardona's Failed Non-Defense Defense of 2021 Testing
USED Secretary Miguel Cardona appeared on All In With Chris Hayes, and while much of the interview centered on the issue of re-opening schools, it also included this exchange : HAYES: There`s been some controversy around or some debate around standardized testing this year for understandable reasons. Arguments go in both directions, right? One is, you want to have a guidepost to measure precisely
Do Rising Charter Tides Lift All Boats?
So lately we've been getting the charter-pushing return of the notion that the rising tide lifts all boats. Here's Fordham Institute's head honcho Mike Petrilli at The Hill, throwing in a side of "follow the science" because Petrilli is great (and I say this with all sincerity) at working the angles. The "science" that he's referring to is a 2019 study-ish thing that Fordham put out (with Walton
ND: Kneecapping Public Education
North Dakota's governor just signed SB 2196 into law, allowing the state to quietly slip forward in 2021's race to dismantle public education. While other state legislatures have focused on vouchers, North Dakota took its leap forward by focusing on unbundling and competency basxed education. SB 2196 is short and the changes it enacts even shorter. It amends the rules about instructional time req
Covid, Learning Loss, and Katrina 2.0
Well, here we go. Here's Morgan Polikoff in the Los Angles Times , explaining that we are in a terrible mess, that educational attainment, or at least test scores (as measured by another testing manufacturer) are dropping, that the mental health of children in the nation is a mess. And hurray for the Biden relief plan, which throws a pile of money at all these education. But. But but but. Our edu
Jebucation Has New Five Year Plan
Long long ago, when Jeb! Bush still had White House dreams, he cooked up a Floridian reform group, which then scaled up to national status as the Foundation for Excellence in Education, which has now become ExcelInEd . Headed up by Patty Levesque, the organization remains a clearinghouse for education disruption ideas pushed by well-heeled, well-connected education amateurs. It is hard to pretend
Why We Don't Need The Big Standardized Test In One Quote
This is taken from the reformy Jebucation ExcelInEd website: If we don't have a strong accountability system, then students from low-income families and students of color will not receive the instruction and resources needed to be successful. That's Pam Stewart, f ormer education chief of Florida, the testocrat who famously demanded that a dying child take the Big Standardized Test . It's an illu
ICYMI: Spring Is Here, Apparently Edition (3/21)
It's nice enough, but I've lived in NW PA too long to be fooled. We'll just see where this leads us. In the meantime, here's your reading for the week. Also, your reminder that you can get a daily dose of edubloggery by checking out (or subscribing to) NPE's Blog of Blogs Why Black Parents Aren't Joining the Push To Reopen Schools The short answer is "trust," but you should go ahead and read the
Rules for Rural Philanthropy
Juliet Squire is a partner at Bellwether Education Partners, a reliably reformy part of the Fordham-AEI axis. She has traveled the Phillips Exeter-Yale-AEI career trajectory with a stop in the New Jersey Department of Education