Education Matters: DeSantis goes after tech and teachers

Education Matters: DeSantis goes after tech and teachers

DeSantis goes after tech and teachers

 Ron DeSantis went after big tech today, signing a bill that will fine them if they deplatform politicians who violate their standards and conditions, i.e., lie and insight violence. Juxtapose this next to what he said the other day when he said he would go after teachers who dared to tell the truth about the systemic racism that has pervaded our history. Welcome to Florida, where only what the ruling party says matters, whether it is true or not.   

At his press conference, he said...

Khomeini Died in 1989, long before Twitter and Facebook even existed, and the reason Trump was Deplatformed was because of his constant lies and him instigating violence. More specifically, he was kicked off Twitter and Facebook, private businesses, because he violates their terms and conditions. 

As bad as this is, it's made worse because DeSantis and his little boot have said they plan to stifle teachers' free speech. 

From Flagler Live:

A proposed rule that will be weighed by the State Board of Education aims to control the way history is taugh CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: DeSantis goes after tech and teachers

Is Critical Race Theory Dividing the Country? | Teacher in a strange land

Is Critical Race Theory Dividing the Country? | Teacher in a strange land

Is Critical Race Theory Dividing the Country?

When people start referring to a cultural phenomenon with initials—CRT for ‘critical race theory,’ say—you know that whatever that thing once was, it’s now morphed into something completely unrecognizable. Made less complex. Reduced to stereotype. And in the case of CRT, politicized.  

In my long years of classroom practice, pedagogical strategies and hot topics went in and out of fashion. Back in the 70s, values clarification was all the rage. Parents were a little iffy on having students discuss their values, however—probably because they assumed those values were not securely embedded in their sixth graders. And God forbid a teacher should attempt to inculcate values. Or even discuss them.

After values clarification, there was lots of talk about character education. My school had a multi-year project on Reason, Respect and Responsibility. Our project was home-grown, but you could buy pre-packaged character, it seemed—complete with manuals, posters, workshops and student day planners. Every package seemed to come with a testimonial—57% reduction in suspensions!

Today, I see lots of teacher-chat about mindfulness and trauma-informed education. If you think I’m skeptical about the efficacy of these programs—I’m not. I am strongly in favor of whatever it is schools are doing to encourage students to consider their CONTINUE READING: Is Critical Race Theory Dividing the Country? | Teacher in a strange land

A state legislator is howling indoctrination because my 7th graders are learning the ocean is polluted - Notes from the ChalkboardNotes from the Chalkboard

A state legislator is howling indoctrination because my 7th graders are learning the ocean is polluted - Notes from the ChalkboardNotes from the Chalkboard

A state legislator is howling indoctrination because my 7th graders are learning the ocean is polluted

A member of the North Carolina House of Representatives held up my teaching as an example of harmful indoctrination of children this week as state legislators met to discuss a new bill which would require teachers to post their lesson plans online for public review.

The K-12 Education Committee approved HB 755, also known as “An Act to Ensure Academic Transparency.” It passed the House by a vote of 66-50 and now moves on to the Senate.  

The legislation mandates that all lesson plans, including information about any supporting instructional materials as well as procedures for how an in-person review of lesson materials may be requested, be “prominently displayed” on school websites.  

Iredell County Republican Representative Jeffrey McNeely gave the bill two enthusiastic thumbs up, pointing to my teaching as an example of the hidden indoctrination that will be exposed if the bill is passed into law:

xhasti · Rep. McNeely on indoctrination of children

We tend to come to teach our kids with everything with a twist to it.  And I think transparency is one of the most important things we can do, and maybe what we’ve learned from this pandemic, through virtual, some of the parents actually seeing what their children are taught and how they’re taught. 

I saw in the Charlotte Observer the other week a English teacher was complaining because he had to do remote learning and in-person learning at the same time and it caused him to shorten his English class on environmental pollution. 

What you think about that? 

So I think this putting out to me this will help the parents going to the next grade be able to look and see what that teacher taught the year before, and hopefully we’re just gonna teach the kids, we’re not gonna try to indoctrinate ’em or teach ’em in a certain way to make ’em believe something other than the facts, the knowledge, the ability to write the ability to read.

McNeely is referring to an editorial I published in the Charlotte Observer last week CONTINUE READING: A state legislator is howling indoctrination because my 7th graders are learning the ocean is polluted - Notes from the ChalkboardNotes from the Chalkboard

Teacher Tom: Seeking Not Truth, But Complete Truth

Teacher Tom: Seeking Not Truth, But Complete Truth

Seeking Not Truth, But Complete Truth

I grew up in a household with magazine subscriptions. We always had the latest edition of Time and Sports Illustrated on the coffee table, and for a long time we took National Geographic as well. I'm pretty sure mom read Women's Day, and there were others. As I got older, when I had my own magazine budget to spend, I chose comic books. Magazines were a habit I took with me into the world. As a young man I subscribed to all kinds of magazines, periodicals I considered more sophisticated than the ones my parents read, like Harpers, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker. Later I began to receive a number of literary journals like The Paris Review, The Sun, and other less well known publications, looking vainly for a place to that might be open to publishing my own strange (and, I know now, immature) fiction. 

At one point, in the late 80's, I cancelled all my subscriptions because I wasn't reading them. The internet had arrived. Today, perhaps out of nostalgia, at any moment I'm subscribed to at least one magazine. Currently it's a quarterly publication called The New Philosopher, published in Australia. Honestly, I await its arrival every four months with great anticipation, and like when I was a boy, I read it cover to cover.

I see now that magazines, in a way, were what we had CONTINUE READING: Teacher Tom: Seeking Not Truth, But Complete Truth

Civility and the Steady Retreat from Truth – radical eyes for equity

Civility and the Steady Retreat from Truth – radical eyes for equity

Civility and the Steady Retreat from Truth

“I hope I live to see the day,” reads the subject line of an email I received a few days ago; the body continues: “That you are dead and rotting in hell along with your grandparents.”

This email arrived two days after another email posed two questions: “Did you really say those vile comments about Rush Limbaugh? Do you like civility or have you been misquoted?”

In the wake of Limbaugh’s death from cancer, conservatives and right-wing media have rushed to confront and chastise the incivility of anyone (especially professors) who expressed everything from glee to stating the facts around Limbaugh’s hate-mongering career, swamped with daily examples of mean-spiritedness, blatant racism, xenophobia, and misogyny.

In my own social media situation concerning Limbaugh, let me return to the two questions above. To whether or not I expressed “those vile comments” or if I have been misquoted, the answer is very complicated.

Of the handful-plus angry emails and voicemails I have received, a couple included my university president and other administrators (those annoying efforts at passive-aggressive intimidation); in one of those I can see the source of outrage at my claimed lack of civility since one email quoted from a right-wing media posting that in effect literally added words to my Tweet CONTINUE READING: Civility and the Steady Retreat from Truth – radical eyes for equity

Education Matters: Greene just can't be honest about the pandemic.

Education Matters: Greene just can't be honest about the pandemic.

Greene just can't be honest about the pandemic.

In a community meeting, Greene said cases of COVID exploded in January because we had just returned from Winter Break. She showed a graph backing this up too. The thing is cases exploded because the district changed the way it revealed cases. Basically, up to that point, we had been lowballing the numbers, and it was a Christmas miracle that they finally decided to be more honest.   

From the Times Union, 

Wednesday evening, when Duval Schools families refreshed the district’s COVID-19 dashboard, they saw a massive spike in cases. But the district says it’s because of the new, more proactive way they're reporting things, not a school-specific case surge. 

Instead of waiting for confirmation from the local Department of Health, Duval County Public Schools announced Wednesday that it will start reporting potential COVID-19 cases into its system as soon as officials become aware of a case.

The change took effect Wednesday night, with 170 new cases populating for one day.

The district said in a post to its website that this will help families and the community make informed decisions CONTINUE READING: Education Matters: Greene just can't be honest about the pandemic.

Education Matters: If Greene and the board will not stick up for staff and students during a pandemic, when will they? - https://jaxkidsmatter.blogspot.com/2021/02/if-greene-and-board-will-not-stick-up.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/iYxgC+(Education+Matters)

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Researcher Says Law Hiding Fiscal Effects of ‘Tax-Credit Vouchers’ from Public View Undermines Valid Analysis | National Education Policy Center

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Researcher Says Law Hiding Fiscal Effects of ‘Tax-Credit Vouchers’ from Public View Undermines Valid Analysis | National Education Policy Center

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Researcher Says Law Hiding Fiscal Effects of ‘Tax-Credit Vouchers’ from Public View Undermines Valid Analysis

Earlier this week, two Kennesaw State University economists wrote about their study that suggests the private school tax credit program saves Georgia money. Today, another researcher questions their conclusions and their analysis, saying they relied on flawed assumptions to buttress their case.

Kevin G. Welner is a professor of education at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education where he chairs the Educational Foundations Policy and Practice program area. Welner co-founded and is director of the National Education Policy Center. He has written extensively on vouchers and tax credits, including the book, “NeoVouchers: The Emergence of Tuition Tax Credits for Private Schooling.”

By Kevin G. Welner

In a guest column published here Monday by Heidi Holmes Erickson and Benjamin Scafidi, the two Kennesaw State University researchers contend that Georgia’s “Qualified Education Expense (QEE) Tax Credit Scholarship Program” generates economic benefits to the state. The QEE program uses tax-credited donations to generate vouchers that fund private school tuition.

The claims made by Erickson and Scafidi are eye-catching. But, upon closer examination, their study clearly lacks sufficient data and rigor for them to reach valid conclusions. Below, I explain just three fundamental problems with the study. In doing so, I do not mean to suggest that additional problems are not also present.

Let’s begin by accepting the underlying figures from 2018 used by Erickson and Scafidi: 13,895 students received a “scholarship” (voucher). The average taxpayer cost per voucher was $3,713 per student. The state average cost per pupil in public school was $5,717.

At this point, the Erickson and Scafidi study turns to speculation: “Using a cautious approach—that 90% of these students would have enrolled in public schools if these scholarships had not been available, the analysis found it would have cost almost $105 million to educate these students in public schools” (emphasis added). This is not a cautious approach. In fact, CONTINUE READING: Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Researcher Says Law Hiding Fiscal Effects of ‘Tax-Credit Vouchers’ from Public View Undermines Valid Analysis | National Education Policy Center

Sam Wineburg on Teaching History | Diane Ravitch's blog

Sam Wineburg on Teaching History | Diane Ravitch's blog

Sam Wineburg on Teaching History

The Silence of the Ellipses: 

Or Why History Can’t Be About Telling Our Children Lies

Sam Wineburg is the Margaret Jacks Professor of Education & (by courtesy) History at Stanford University. His most recent book is Why Learn History (When It is Already on Your Phone), University of Chicago Press, 2018. He tweets at @samwineburg.

Aware his days were numbered, a tuberculosis-stricken George Orwell raced to finish the book that would make his name an adjective. Holed away in a remote cottage on the Isle of Jura off the Scottish coast, he left the island for the last time in 1949, the same year his novel appeared. He died a year later.

I read 1984 in my 11^th-grade English class in the weary rustbelt town of Utica, New York, at a time when Russia was still the USSR and the “focus of evil in the modern world.” With Cliff Notes at my side, I decodedthe book’s more obscure allusions (2 + 2 = 5, I learned, conjured up Stalin’s claim that his five-year plan had been completed in four). But you didn’t need a study aid to get the main point. We lived in a free society; they in a tyrannical one. We respected truth; they disfigured it. Russian-speaking Winston CONTINUE READING: Sam Wineburg on Teaching History | Diane Ravitch's blog

Betsy DeVos Says School Choice Is Coming, Like It Or Not | America 2020 | US News

Betsy DeVos Says School Choice Is Coming, Like It Or Not | America 2020 | US News

DeVos Says School Choice Is Coming, Like It Or Not

The education secretary echoed President Trump’s campaign speeches in warning against socialism and government involvement in education.

WITH PRESIDENT Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence heightening their calls for school choice on the campaign trail, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos delivered the fullest picture of what that might entail and predicted more choice is inevitable whether or not Trump wins his reelection bid.

WITH PRESIDENT Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence heightening their calls for school choice on the campaign trail, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos delivered the fullest picture of what that might entail and predicted more choice is inevitable whether or not Trump wins his reelection bid.

"Let me suggest we could fix education for so many children in America if we 'go Dutch,'" DeVos said. "School choice is not a matter of if, it's a matter of when."

School choice is an ambiguous, one-size-fits-all term used to characterize everything from charter schools to programs like tax credit scholarships and education savings accounts that help families afford private school tuition. The Associated Press recommends journalists not use the term because of how nondescript it is, which is one of the reasons why using it might be working to the Trump administration's advantage.

The idea of school choice has long been heralded by Republicans as a way to give children trapped in failing school systems different education opportunities and criticized in equal CONTINUE READING: 

1619 | Teacher in a strange land

1619 | Teacher in a strange land

1619

When I was a junior in HS, my American History teacher was in a serious car accident in the fall, and did not return to teaching. This was 1967, and Social Studies teachers weren’t thick on the ground. The situation was personally worrisome: I had somehow persuaded this history teacher to let me take his required class as an ‘Independent Study’ so I could take both band and choir (which were infinitely more important to me than American History).

As rounds of fill-in teachers appeared, I was basically living in fear that my arrangement with Mr. Gilbert would be uncovered. He apparently left no record that I was even part of his class load. I might have to drop out of the choir—and I loved the choir—being coerced to return to conventional, one-chapter-a-week-test-on-Friday American History. It could go on my permanent record, or something.

Then fate smiled. My school district hired a young, spanking-new graduate of Western Michigan University, in December. She was cool with my studying American History on my own, added my name to the official grade book, and offered me her college history texts. Assignments would be short papers—and conversations with her. She recommended paperbacks I might enjoy.

In one of those conversations, I mentioned that her college Am-Hist textbooks presented things differently from our HS text. Things like the smallpox-infested blankets and how Andrew Jackson might not be a totally upright guy.

She smiled her praise. Good work, she said. You now understand that the people who CONTINUE READING: 1619 | Teacher in a strange land

Trump Fans Racism As He Rages Against Public High School History and Government Teachers | janresseger

Trump Fans Racism As He Rages Against Public High School History and Government Teachers | janresseger

Trump Fans Racism As He Rages Against Public High School History and Government Teachers

Last Thursday, President Donald Trump spoke at an event celebrating the anniversary of the signing of of the U.S. Constitution on September 17, 1787.  Trump tried to turn the Constitution Day event held at the National Archives into a celebration of whitewashed American exceptionalism and an attack on how educators in our public schools teach history and government.

The Washington Post‘s Moriah Balingit and Laura Meckler cover the speech: “Trump, speaking before original copies of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence… characterized demonstrations against racial injustice as ‘left-wing rioting and mayhem’ that ‘are the direct result of decades of left-wing indoctrination in our schools’… As he campaigns for reelection, Trump has repeatedly cast education that examines the nation’s failures as a betrayal, seeking to rally his base and tap into hostility toward protesters who have taken to the streets to denounce racial injustice and police brutality. His argument casts any criticism of the United States, even of slavery, as unpatriotic… Trump’s gambit seeks to turn local schools—already beset by a global pandemic and many other problems—into another front in the culture war he champions, positioning history teachers as opponents of American greatness along with kneeling football players, police misconduct protesters and racial-sensitivity trainers.”

Education Week’s Andrew Ujifusa reports that on Thursday, Trump specifically attacked something called the 1619 Project, a curriculum developed by Nikole Hannah-Jones of the NY Times and the Pulitzer Center: “Earlier this month, he threatened to pull federal funding from schools that use the 1619 Project as a basis for classroom curriculum—however, Trump lacks the legal authority to do this. The Every Student Succeeds Act prohibits the federal government from endorsing or sanctioning schools for using a particular curriculum. On Thursday, the president also used his speech to announce that he would create the ‘1776 CONTINUE READING: Trump Fans Racism As He Rages Against Public High School History and Government Teachers | janresseger

Nancy Bailey's Education Website – Revive, Rally and Recover Public Schools

Nancy Bailey's Education Website – Revive, Rally and Recover Public Schools

Impact of President Trump’s Covid-19 Deception on Public Schools

The chief function of a President is to make responsible decisions and to keep Americans safe, especially children and society’s most vulnerable. Bob Woodward, in his new book Rage tells of a president who was publicly playing down the coronavirus threat without acknowledging the severity of the virus, which has now claimed over 190,000 American lives.

The President understood the danger to the American public when he twitted:

Democrats, OPEN THE SCHOOLS (SAFELY), NOW! When schools are closed, let the money follow the child (FAMILY). Why should schools be paid when they are closed? They shouldn’t.

President Trump, and his accomplice, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, know the dangers of the virus to children, teachers, and parents. Yet, instead of keeping children safe, they use Covid-19 to promote their school choice plan. They intentionally ignore the threat to children and teachers.

DeVos recently said:

You were disappointed last spring when your kids couldn’t finish the school year with their friends. You tried your best to step up to the plate and become a full-time teacher CONTINUE READING: Nancy Bailey's Education Website – Revive, Rally and Recover Public Schools

When Should Journalists Speak Up? | The Merrow Report

When Should Journalists Speak Up? | The Merrow Report

When Should Journalists Speak Up?

By now everyone must know that President Trump has been lying about the coronavirus for months, telling us it would magically disappear when he knew all along that it was a killer threat. Trump admitted this in phone conversations with Bob Woodward recorded in February and March, but only now–in September–have some of the tapes been released.

That Trump is unfit to serve as our President has been clear for an awfully long time. That most Republicans don’t care what he does is also painfully clear.

So let’s ask another question: Should Bob Woodward have released those tapes months ago. If he had done so, would that possibly have saved thousands and thousands of lives?

At some time or other, every journalist is presented with this classic hypothetical situation: Suppose you are filming or photographing a raging river and you see a young child being swept downstream. The child is clinging to a piece of wood and is clearly in danger of drowning. Should you keep on filming, or do you jump in and try to save the child?

In other words, where is the line between a reporter’s job and their responsibility as a citizen? Which comes first?

Of course, it’s really a no-brainer: You must try to save the child, because public CONTINUE READING: When Should Journalists Speak Up? | The Merrow Report

Russ on Reading: Do Our Children Deserve the Truth?

Russ on Reading: Do Our Children Deserve the Truth?

Do Our Children Deserve the Truth?

Knowing our history, the good and the bad, is the first step, I want my children to love the country they live in, but I also want them to be clear-eyed about what that country is.- America Ferrara , Actor

In 1970, when I was a wet-behind-the-ears, 22 year-old social studies teacher at Bristol Junior-Senior High School, I was teaching a ninth grade Civics course. The topic was the the Bill of Rights and specifically, the First Amendment to the Bill of Rights, which states in part:

Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion...

I explained that the Founding Fathers were concerned about the co-mingling of religion and government that many had escaped in Europe and wanted to be sure that religious freedom was guaranteed in the new country.

A student raised his hand. "Mr. Walsh, if that law is in the Constitution, why do we have do we say "under God" every morning when we salute the flag. Isn't that mixing religion and government?"

Good question. My answer: 

The original Pledge of Allegiance did not contain the words "under God." These words were added in 1954 during the Cold War, a period when the fear of an atomic war between the United States and the communist USSR was high. Many viewed communism as a threat to the American way of life, and were particularly concerned that communism was a godless philosophy.  In this country the period was known as McCarthyism, named after a Senator from Wisconsin, who accused many people of being CONTINUE READING: Russ on Reading: Do Our Children Deserve the Truth?