Seattle Schools Community Forum: Seattle Schools and Planning for Reopening for Fall 2021

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Seattle Schools and Planning for Reopening for Fall 2021

Seattle Schools and Planning for Reopening for Fall 2021

The Board had a “special meeting” yesterday afternoon to vote on a reopening plan. The Board rarely has this types of meetings because when all seven of them are together AND voting outside of a regularly scheduled Board meeting, it’s a big deal. (Director Harris was calling in from a beach and Conzie Pedroza, head of, said she, too, was on vacation.)

Why this reopening plan now? In a word, OSPI. The State Superintendent’s office required all districts to submit a reopening plan - per OSPI template - by June 1st. 

Here’s an overview with the link to the plan from the district’s webpage about this action.

The biggest takeaway that district staff told the Board was that this plan is NOT the entire plan and staff are still working on that. Rob Gannon, Deputy Superintendent, said this is a plan but it is “not comprehensive.” He said there is more engagement to come and this is “just a moment in time.”

The district promised a FAQ on June 7th.

The SPS Academic and Student Well-being Recovery Plan addresses six themes, required by OSPI: CONTINUE READING: Seattle Schools Community Forum: Seattle Schools and Planning for Reopening for Fall 2021

President Biden Is Investing to Help Children at School: Secretary Cardona Needs to Provide the Policy Vision | janresseger

President Biden Is Investing to Help Children at School: Secretary Cardona Needs to Provide the Policy Vision | janresseger

President Biden Is Investing to Help Children at School: Secretary Cardona Needs to Provide the Policy Vision

The Education Law Center headlined the press release about its annual Education Justice Lecture: “President Biden’s First 100 Days Set Stage for Overhaul of Federal Education Policy.”

The press release sounded exciting as it described Linda Darling-Hammond, the event’s primary speaker, “underscoring the backdrop of the multiple crises facing the United States and their impact on structural inequities and racism in the nation’s public schools.” It described Dr. Darling-Hammond explaining, “how these profound challenges are behind the President’s call for a comprehensive federal policy to support major investments and reforms in public education, including addressing discrimination and segregation, equitable funding and resources, universal preschool, wholistic student supports, investments in the teacher workforce and access to post-secondary education and college.”

Immediately I opened the link to Darling-Hammond’s presentation, where I found myself disappointed, even though she titled her remarks, “President Biden’s First 100 Days: A Transformation in Action”—and even though I agree that what Darling-Hammond reported is important.  She describes the American Rescue Plan Act which would, according to Darling-Hammond, definitely help children and families by expanding access to affordable health insurance; boosting families’ access to needed nutrition services; supporting and stabilizing child care and Head Start; supporting child mental health; offering stimulus payments, unemployment supplements, and tax credits for family medical leave; and most important of all, expanding the child tax credit and making it fully refundable. As Darling-Hammond CONTINUE READING: President Biden Is Investing to Help Children at School: Secretary Cardona Needs to Provide the Policy Vision | janresseger

In rare school board campaign visit, national teachers union president calls Scranton recovery plan 'immoral'

In rare school board campaign visit, national teachers union president calls Scranton recovery plan 'immoral'

In rare school board campaign visit, national teachers union president calls Scranton recovery plan 'immoral'

May 16—SCRANTON — Calling Tuesday's election a critical moment for the Scranton School District, the national president of the American Federation of Teachers visited the city on Saturday to campaign for the union-endorsed candidates.

The unprecedented visit by Randi Weingarten comes amid the Scranton Federation of Teachers' push to elect candidates who say they will question the financial recovery plan, restore the preschool program, settle the teachers contract and hold the line on taxes.

Nearly two years into the recovery plan, the progress and the process of obtaining solvency has led to the highly contentious primary campaign. More than 100 people gathered behind the SFT Wyoming Avenue headquarters to hear Weingarten, who called the recovery plan "immoral." Using the slogan from President Joe Biden's economic recovery proposal, she challenged attendees to spend the next few days encouraging neighbors to vote for the endorsed candidates.

"You build back better by building a better school board," she said. "When you want to help a community thrive, you don't take away anchors and foundations."

With four four-year seats available, incumbent President Katie Gilmartin, Director Sean McAndrew, former Director Tom Borthwick and newcomers Danielle Chesek and Tyrone Holmes seek both Democratic and Republican nominations. Newcomers Chris Gaidos and Tucker J. Hottes seek Democratic nominations.

Former Director Greg Popil and Gilmartin seek both Democratic and Republican nominations for one two-year seat. Hottes and Gaidos also seek a Democratic nomination for the two-year seat.

The union has endorsed Borthwick, Chesek, Holmes, McAndrew and Popil. In remarks Saturday, the five candidates vowed to ask questions of the administration and chief recovery officer and push for fair funding from the state.

As teachers complete their fourth year of working under an expired CONTINUE READING: In rare school board campaign visit, national teachers union president calls Scranton recovery plan 'immoral'

SPI Praises Governor's $15B Schools Plan Proposal - Year 2021 (CA Dept of Education)

SPI Praises Governor's $15B Schools Plan Proposal - Year 2021 (CA Dept of Education)

State Superintendent Tony Thurmond Praises Governor’s Proposed $15 Billion for Schools Plan for Putting Needs of Students and Families First

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond joined Governor Gavin Newsom, Secretary of Health and Human Services Mark Ghaly, and State Board of Education President Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond at Elkhorn Elementary School in Castroville to herald a bold plan to propel public education in California back to the top in the nation.

State Superintendent Thurmond cheered the unprecedented investments proposed for class-size reduction; learning acceleration; afterschool programs; universal transitional kindergarten; and critical wraparound mental health, social, and family services so critically needed to put students and families back on track as California continues to make its way out of the pandemic. Underscoring how students and schools are facing “the toughest experience of our lifetime,” Thurmond praised the proposal for the much-needed investments in social-emotional and mental health supports. Drawing on his personal history, Thurmond recounted experiencing tragedy at age six when he lost his mother to cancer and was uprooted to be raised by an unknown cousin across the country. He emphasized the importance of recognizing the personal trauma of students who may have lost family members to COVID-19; face housing and food insecurity; or struggle emotionally with the acceleration of hate, bigotry, and racism throughout our communities and nation.

“It is not lost on me,” Thurmond stated, “That as more and more students return to classrooms, as much as it is important for us to focus on how we accelerate learning and provide tutoring and professional development for educators to offset learning gaps that our students have experienced, I can’t think of anything more important than how we address the social-emotional learning needs of our students and their mental health and their well-being.”

Specifically, Thurmond commended the Governor for committing billions of dollars to help the behavioral health systems that support California students. Thurmond cited a stretched and fractured system that has existed for decades trying to support student mental health through a patchwork created by school and county health resources. He called for the investments to be used to fill gaps and to layer resources that address trauma and support the well-being of students.

Sharing the essence of the California Roars Back plan for schools, Thurmond underscored, “As we come out of this difficult circumstance, we are capturing the moment to make the investments that propel us forward to support the needs of our students and, at the same time, to reimagine how we approach education. We must look at all the things that didn't work for our students and families before and take that knowledge to support them going forward.”

View Governor Newsom’s Transforming Public Schools proposal.

A recording of the press conference is available on YouTube.

# # # #

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

SPI Praises Governor's $15B Schools Plan Proposal - Year 2021 (CA Dept of Education)

How would you recommend spending the billions of American Rescue Act dollars? Everyone seems to have ideas(s). | Ed In The Apple

How would you recommend spending the billions of American Rescue Act dollars? Everyone seems to have ideas(s). | Ed In The Apple

How would you recommend spending the billions of American Rescue Act dollars? Everyone seems to have ideas(s).

New York City will be deciding how to spend billions of education dollars within the next few months, and, everybody has ideas.

The interim chancellor (the term used for superintendent in New York City) immediately suggested summer school, as did many others (including the new law). The law also says the dollars must be spent on “evidence-based” interventions: a challenge.

The evidence that summer school is effective is slim and discouraging.
. 

Research studies done before the pandemic show that summer school usually don’t accomplish its purpose of raising reading or math achievement. 

 “Generally, summer programs are not effective because they don’t really engage young people and they’re not run well,”

Even if the evidence is discouraging we’re going to have summer school: will it be the same old review and remediate (“boring”) or an interesting program that excites kids?   I would suggest summer school is project-based. Spend the last two weeks in June selecting a project and the summer working on a standards- CONTINUE READING: How would you recommend spending the billions of American Rescue Act dollars? Everyone seems to have ideas(s). | Ed In The Apple

In the Absence of COVID Safety Plans, Teachers Are Resigning and Retiring Early

In the Absence of COVID Safety Plans, Teachers Are Resigning and Retiring Early

In the Absence of COVID Safety Plans, Teachers Are Resigning and Retiring Early

This should have been Cheryl Dubberly’s 40th year as a music teacher, but in August 2020, she resigned from her position with the Duval County Board of Education in Jacksonville, Florida.

“It was dreadful to think about continuing,” Dubberly told Truthout. “I would not have been able to stay safe because I was responsible for teaching music to the entire school — 500 to 600 kids.” The job, she says, required her to go from classroom to classroom even though the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that singing with others can spread COVID-19.

“The job was not worth my life,” she says.

Like Dubberly, Christine Vehar, also a music teacher, left her position in the metro Atlanta area this fall. She had taught for just three and a half years. “When the schools closed in March, I had a great remote teaching experience,” she says. “The students were very engaged and despite some initial disorganization, it worked well, and I ended up loving teaching from home.” But when Vehar’s district decided to move to a hybrid schedule in October — holding in-person classes from 7:15 am to 2:15 pm four days a week, with Wednesdays as a remote teaching and learning day — she resigned.

The reason was fear of catching and spreading the virus.

“My mom is 63, and she lives with me,” Vehar told Truthout. “She is a three-time cancer survivor and an amputee with a compromised immune system, so there was absolutely no way for me to give her the care she deserves and continue to teach in-person.”

A fall 2020 survey conducted by the National Education Association (NEA) confirms that neither Dubberly nor Vehar are unusual. “Teachers with less than 10 years in are leaving the profession,” NEA President Becky Pringle told Truthout. “And 40 percent of mid-range teachers — CONTINUE READING: In the Absence of COVID Safety Plans, Teachers Are Resigning and Retiring Early

Newsom offers $2 billion plan to bring back in-person instruction in elementary grades | EdSource

Newsom offers $2 billion plan to bring back in-person instruction in elementary grades | EdSource

Newsom offers $2 billion plan to bring back in-person instruction in elementary grades

Gov. Gavin Newsom presented a $2 billion proposal for financial incentives Wednesday to prod school districts to bring back elementary school students for in-person instruction, starting in mid-February.

School districts would receive extra funding — from $450 to about $700 per student — if they agreed to a timetable for reopening schools, a rigorous regimen of testing both students and staff for the virus, and a strict health and safety plan that teachers and employee unions would have to consent to. Newsom said more details would be available with the state budget next week.

Districts would receive a minimum of $450 for every student in the district, plus additional money per student, based on the Local Control Funding Formula. It provides extra money for English learners, homeless, foster and low-income students.

Districts would receive the funding if they offered in-person instruction from transitional kindergarten (TK) to second grade in the first phase, starting Feb. 15, and for third to sixth-graders in the second phase, a month later. Districts would get full funding, regardless of how many parents decided to continue with distance learning. They would also have to agree to bring back small cohorts of students of all ages with the most needs, including homeless and foster children and students with CONTINUE READING: Newsom offers $2 billion plan to bring back in-person instruction in elementary grades | EdSource

Newsom pushes California school reopening plan that could begin in February

Newsom pushes California school reopening plan that could begin in February

Newsom pushes California school reopening plan that could begin in February

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a $2 billion push Wednesday to reopen California elementary schools for the youngest students in February, offering incentives and testing to school districts that resume classroom instruction.

Most of California's 6 million public school students have been learning remotely since the pandemic forced widespread closures in March. While a smattering of districts opened this fall when infection rates were lower, most kept campuses shut and stayed online, especially those in large metropolitan areas.

Newsom's plan relies on carrots rather than sticks in trying to reopen elementary schools across California. The centerpiece is a $2 billion mid-year budget request that would channel money toward getting kids back in classrooms, with an emphasis on younger children who are in transitional kindergarten through second grade. Priority will be given to districts with large numbers of low-income students, foster youth or English learners — groups whose disadvantages have been exacerbated during distance learning.

The framework also seeks to ramp up testing at schools and to furnish educators with more protective equipment, including by distributing millions of surgical masks for free. Newsom's plan would prioritize inoculating school staff through the spring; teachers and child care providers are expected to be next in line for CONTINUE READING: Newsom pushes California school reopening plan that could begin in February

RANDI WEINGARTEN: A blueprint to safely open schools | TheHill

A blueprint to safely open schools | TheHill

A blueprint to safely open schools

The United States has the sad distinction of having the most confirmed coronavirus cases and death in the world, which has kept many schools shuttered for instruction in person. Parents and educators know that our children do best at schools, where they can get support, and they worry that the lack of learning in person has hurt students in need.

Systems from New York City to the Netherlands have shown that, with the necessary protocols to prevent transmission, students can safely return to learning in person. But schools are not islands. Americans must summon the collective will to follow science both in and out of schools. If we can do this, we can allow children across the country back to schools for the second semester and then for enriched summer programs.

Reopening schools is vital for the health and education of our children. It is also critical for the economy. We all have a role in doing this safely. Our holidays will look very different this year as infections surge with hospitals at capacity. Our leaders must use every tool at their disposal to reduce the spread of the coronavirus and pass a relief package that includes funding for states, schools, businesses, and the Americans who now struggle with rents, nutrition insecurity, and student loans. It is why we need a national blueprint that has these objectives to safely reopen schools.

We must get the coronavirus under control. This will take a national mask mandate, a federal system for both testing and contact tracing, targeted regional closures of schools and restaurants, making sure our exhausted health care workers have everything they need, and a robust coronavirus vaccination program once it is proven as sound and effective.

We must place public health protocols in schools. We know what works, such as masks, hand washing, physical distancing, sufficient ventilation, electrostatic cleaners, and broad testing. These protocols are enabling CONTINUE READING: A blueprint to safely open schools | TheHill

How Will Biden Approach School Reopenings? - The New York Times

How Will Biden Approach School Reopenings? - The New York Times

How Will Biden Approach School Reopenings?

Answer: Schools over restaurants, for now.

This is the Coronavirus Schools Briefing, a guide to the seismic changes in U.S. education that are taking place during the pandemic. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.

Several months into the 2020-2021 school year, things are bad and getting worse. Most American children are not in classrooms, with many suffering ill effects. The country seems doomed to face increasing coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths. There seems to be little chance of improved conditions for the rest of the year.

So what will President-elect Joe Biden do about it when he takes office on Jan. 20?

The incoming president’s coronavirus task force has said it would prioritize open schools over open businesses like restaurants, bars and gyms.

“I would consider school an essential service,” Dr. Celine Gounder, a member of the task force, told our colleague Apoorva Mandavilli. “Those other things are not essential services.”

Biden has promised money — lots of money — to help schools function safely. He has backed plans to send at least $88 billion to local and state governments, which would pay for protective equipment, ventilation, smaller classes and other expenses.

“Schools, they need a lot of money to open,” he said during the last presidential debate.

Biden has also said his administration would create national guidelines for school reopenings. It would also provide advice about remote learning and distance learning, and conduct research into how the coronavirus affects children. Systemically, it would work to close gaps “in learning, mental health, social and emotional well-being, and systemic racial and socioeconomic disparities in education that the pandemic has exacerbated.”

President Trump, by contrast, pushed to keep schools open and threatened to restrict federal funding from noncompliant districts, but did not offer significant funds or guidelines to help meet that goal. Trump’s Education Department, reported our colleague Erica Green, “has all but absolved itself of tracking the virus’s impact and offering solutions.” CONTINUE READING: How Will Biden Approach School Reopenings? - The New York Times

A Marshall Plan for saving American public schools. – Fred Klonsky

A Marshall Plan for saving American public schools. – Fred Klonsky

A MARSHALL PLAN FOR SAVING AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

In the darkest days of the Trump administration there were many of us who doubted the concept and reality of public education would survive.

Trump’s Secretary of Education advocated for its destruction.

The pandemic, as in all things, has made it worse.

It was good to read in the New York Times that the Biden administration wants to reverse course on Betsy DeVos.

But that is not enough.

Public schools remain on life-support.

Teachers on the front lines of the pandemic are exhausted. Thousands are leaving the profession.

Local funding – never sufficient, particularly in Black and Brown communities – has CONTINUE READING: A Marshall Plan for saving American public schools. – Fred Klonsky

Why Biden's free childcare plan is a worthy feminist reform | Salon.com

Why Biden's free childcare plan is a worthy feminist reform | Salon.com

Why Biden's free childcare plan is a worthy feminist reform

Beyond the social element, there's a strong economic argument to be made for such a policy

Joe Biden wasn't the first choice for many women during the Democratic presidential primaries, yet the president-elect's social agenda has proven to be surprisingly feminist in its orientation. Nowhere is this clearer than in his proposal for subsidizing toddler-age childcare, a progressive platform that has earned plaudits from feminists and which has been a local success story in local jurisdictions in which it has been implemented. 

According to the Biden-Harris transition website, the administration plans to make it "far easier to afford child care and to ensure aging relatives and people with disabilities have better access to home and community-based care." The new administration also promises to "elevate the pay, benefits, and professional opportunities for caregivers and educators; to create millions of good-paying new jobs in these areas with a choice to join a union; and to free up millions of people to join the labor force and grow a stronger economy in return."

This refers to the $775 billion plan Biden announced while campaigning in Delaware in July, when Biden proposed a national pre-K for all children ages 3 and 4. In that proposal, families earning less than $125,000 a year would receive an $8,000 child care tax credit per child, up to $16,000. Parents earning less than 1.5 times the median income in their state could subsidize child care and would pay no more than 7 percent of their income. Those with a very low income would pay nothing.

Notably, the pandemic's economic affects are seriously setting back gender equality, as I've previously written. Large swaths of women in America left the workforce or cut down their hours to be a stay at home caregiver during the pandemic. As of May 2020, women account for 54 percent of initial coronavirus-related job losses. According to the Women in the Workplace report, Black women said they were more likely to consider stepping away from their careers due to the pandemic. One in four women are thinking of either leaving the workforce of downshifting their careers—a move that would have been dubbed CONTINUE READING: Why Biden's free childcare plan is a worthy feminist reform | Salon.com

Education Matters: DCPS's be lucky rather than good strategy is reckless.

Education Matters: DCPS's be lucky rather than good strategy is reckless.

DCPS's be lucky rather than good strategy is reckless

It pains me to put these words on paper but the undeniable truth is DCPS is not doing all it can to keep its staff and students safe and has gone with an “it’s better to be lucky than good” strategy.  

Let me tell you about my personal experience with their contract tracing. 

Last week a colleague went out on a Monday not feeling well thinking it was probably allergies. They went to the doctor who also thought it was probably something fairly benign but since they did have some COVID symptoms, there is a lot of overlap with colds, flu, and allergies, they should have a test just to be safe.   

Three days later when the results came back, unfortunately, it turned out they were infected. What did we do in the meantime? Absolutely nothing. Everyone who had been around them carried on as if it was business as usual. As infuriating as that was, what we did next was even worse. 

The staff has to cover classes like never before. When the superintendent over the summer said we had 2000 ready to go, she was at best wildly inaccurate. So schools have either been splitting classes up or creating sub-teams. My now sick colleague was part of a sub-team that went to a resource one day to help cover.   

So when the district did its contract tracing they checked the room that she was usually in all day every day and the room she was just in part of one day. Mind you now this person has been out four days and the district only found traces of COVID in the resource room.  

So instead of quarantining the staffs of both rooms they just quarantined the staff of the resource room, but none of the kids that go into that room every other day, which would have been at least four different classes CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: DCPS's be lucky rather than good strategy is reckless.

COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It | janresseger

COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It | janresseger

COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It

What are all the ways the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown obstacles in the paths of America’s poorest young people?  The numbers are staggering. Hardship is so overwhelming that it is almost impossible to grasp the deeper meaning of the data in the reports from major policy organizations.

Here is the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: “Households with children are more likely to have trouble affording food or paying the rent or mortgage than households without children. Based on five weeks of Census Bureau Pulse Survey data collected from June 18 to July 21, we estimate that: Approximately 19 million children, or 1 in 4 children, live in a household that isn’t getting enough to eat, is behind on rent or mortgage payments, or both. These levels of hardship are substantially higher among Black and Latino children, reflecting longstanding inequities that the current crisis has exacerbated.”

The Economic Policy Institute describes barriers to learning: “The pandemic has exacerbated well-documented opportunity gaps that put low-income students at a disadvantage relative to their better-off peers. Opportunity gaps are gaps in access to the conditions and resources that enhance learning and development, and include access to food and nutrition, housing, health insurance and care, and financial relief measures. One of the most critical opportunity gaps is the uneven access to the devices and internet access critical to learning online. This digital divide has made it virtually impossible for some students to learn during the pandemic.”

First Focus on Children tracks family suffering:”The Household Pulse Survey from the Census Bureau tracks food insecurity, financial hardship, and other indicators of child and family CONTINUE READING: COVID-19 Widens Inequality Among America’s Young People, But So Far, There Is No Plan to Address It | janresseger

CURMUDGUCATION: DeVos Has No Plan

CURMUDGUCATION: DeVos Has No Plan

DeVos Has No Plan

t's a brief three and a half minute interview on Fox's "The Daily Briefing," but in just a few quick questions, Dana Perino pushes Betsy DeVos to show that during this pandemic, families with concerns about school are on their own.

The spot opens with a quick clip from an Alabama infectious disease expert explaining that you kids "pose an even bigger risk than college students." Dr. Michael Saag warns  of a "silent epidemic" within K-12 arena. Saag says we knew what was going on in colleges because we are testing and quarantining, "but in K through 12 we're not doing that."

Now here comes DeVos.

Perino asks: Do you have concerns as well about the younger kids that are going back to school?

I'm going to transcribe DeVos's non-answer in its entirety so that you don't think I cherry-picked my way around her actual answer to the question. Spoiler alert: if you've heard DeVos say anything in CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: DeVos Has No Plan

NYC Educator: Day One

 NYC Educator: Day One

Day One

I've spent hours, days, weeks and months dreading September. There were so many issues. As chapter leader, I don't feel like I've had a day off since June. How in the hell were we going to open the schools?

No one really knew. De Blasio's ridiculous plan fell apart, as anyone who gave it a cursory examination could have predicted. I remain amazed that he and Carranza could have stood behind such a senseless plan for a moment, let alone many months.

We have to be really careful selecting the next mayor. Full disclosure--I worked for and contributed to Bill de Blasio. I attended his inauguration. We're gonna need a mayor who will rid Tweed of Bloomberg's ghost. We're gonna need a mayor who will not continue to ignore the miserable state of our school facilities. 

We can't go through this again. Once is more than enough.

Then there's COVID, of course. My school is on the list of the dreaded 55. As far as I, or anyone in my school administration can tell, the only reported COVID case comes from a person who self-reported before the 8th and hasn't been in the building since March. It's entirely believable to me that the DOE could screw up something like that, because incompetence is their CONTINUE READING:  NYC Educator: Day One

Education Matters: Set up to fail

Education Matters: Set up to fail

Set Up to Fail

 I was so mad I was on the brink of tears. Yesterday I could use a curriculum that I had for years and where not perfect, gave me lots of material to work with, then like a light switch turning off, it was gone. The district didn't even think teachers were worthy of a heads up. I felt set up to fail, and sadly, I am not the only one, and the district's only response seemed to be, cry me a river.

In the last few days, I have read about on Facebook or heard from several how they too felt set up to fail.

No books or the right materials.

No access to a printer, or a working one anyways.

12 hours of work over the weekend and still not caught up.

They spent their planning calling parents of students who hadn't shown up or shown much interest if they did.

Crazy big Duval homeroom classes.

Crazy big brick and mortar ones too.

Way too much to do, and not nearly enough time to do. No slack is given, expectations higher than ever.

Then there is that pesky pandemic too. It's almost like the district office is unaware. You would think they CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: Set up to fail

Education Matters: Where did all the, planning, time go.

Education Matters: Where did all the, planning, time go.

Where did all the, planning, time go.

Let me tell you my story first.

I didn't lose my planning period, I still have the 90 minutes I had last year. I did however since we are self-contained go from two preps to five. Now I have been sharing with my department and them with me, but it's still a lot more work.

I did lose my lunch however as the kids eat in the room. Now I guess technically I could go somewhere else, though I have no idea where that would be.

This morning a colleague asked me if they should reach out to the super (YES!!!!) because the thirty minutes they had been getting in elementary school was now being eaten up by serving breakfast in the class, and no you can't really plan around eating children. Mind you elementary school teachers already get the short stick when it comes to planning.

Then there is my high school and middle school friends who lost almost half of their planning when they went to a 6 period day. Now I actually like the 50-minute class, but the idea behind that is staff gets two of them off to plan.

Now you might be thinking well the classes are shorter so there is less to plan, but the thing is now they meet every day instead of every other so the reality is there is more.

Teachers in effect all across the board have more to do and a lot less time to do it. You would think the district CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: Where did all the, planning, time go.