Seattle Schools Community Forum: Teaching & Learning Needs Help Soon

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Teaching & Learning Needs Help Soon:

Teaching & Learning Needs Help Soon

by Melissa Westbrook

In the category of "fix this and soon", comes news of who is heading T&L until a new person is hired.  Marni Campbell might be okay but I have never had much faith in Mr. Tolley (a MGJ holdover).  They need to get someone good and qualified and stat.

From SPS:

Dear Seattle Public Schools staff,

I am pleased to announce an interim leadership plan while we conduct a national search for an Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning and Executive Director of Curriculum and Instructional Support.

Executive Directors of Schools Michael Tolley and Marni Campbell will serve as co-Interim Assistant Superintendents for Teaching and Learning.  Michael and Marni will provide leadership in all areas of teaching and learning for the next several months. We do intend to fill the position of Executive Director of Curriculum and Instructional Support, and hope to announce an interim plan soon. I want to thank Kimberly Kinzer and Paul Robb for filling in for the last several weeks, after Wendy London’s departure from the District.

Michael will continue to supervise principals in the Southeast region and Marni in the Northwest region. We will 

Authenticity and Party Politics « Student Activism

Authenticity and Party Politics « Student Activism:

Authenticity and Party Politics

by Angus Johnston

The primary purpose of the political convention of a presidential candidate’s political party is to advance that candidate’s chances of winning the November election. This is hardly a counter-intuitive proposition, but it bears repeating occasionally, particularly in the face of complaints like those offered by Gawker editor Hamilton Nolan today.
Nolan is offended. He’s offended by the (ostensible) fact that Michelle Obama sometimes affects a stutter she doesn’t naturally possess, and by the production values of the DNC, and that “no political party stands for honesty.”
“Both parties,” he writes, “and their candidates, and their party machines, and their loyalists, and we in the 

Jersey Jazzman: Is "Reform" Really About Selling Schools Junk?

Jersey Jazzman: Is "Reform" Really About Selling Schools Junk?:

Is "Reform" Really About Selling Schools Junk?

by Duke

What if all the hype over education reforminess is really an excuse to sell schools worthless techie junk?

In the spring of 2010, the School of One was implemented at IS 228, in Brooklyn. By Sept. 2010, it was added to two more middle schools, MS 131 in Manhattan’s Chinatown, and IS 339 in the Bronx.   I visited the program in Chinatown and was not impressed; I saw chaos and many disengaged kids, as I described here.  As Joel Rose said during my tour of the school, it is intended to substitute for smaller classes, since “no human being” can provide fully individualized instruction to a class of 25.

As Gary Rubinstein first explained on his blog, in two of these schools it caused achievement to slip in math, according to the DOE’s Progress reports: slightly at IS 228, and drastically at IS 339. 

All Education Matters: Michelle Obama's Convention Speech And Student Loan Debt

All Education Matters: Michelle Obama's Convention Speech And Student Loan Debt:

Michelle Obama's Convention Speech And Student Loan Debt

by Cryn Johannsen

Photo Credit: AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

Student loans were mentioned several times in Michelle Obama's moving speech last night at the Democratic Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. Her talk has been widely praised by the press, and twitter was abuzz with positive remarks as the First Lady spoke. In fact, people were so engaged while she was speaking there

CALLING ALL STUDENTS!

by Cryn Johannsen

Undergraduates, graduate students, law school students, medical students,and nursing students . . . Seeking no more than 5 sentences from each of the following questions below. Email me: info@alleducationmatters.org

Please indicate if you wish to remain anonymous or if I may use your name in the article.  Thank you!

 

1) Who are you going to vote for Pres. Obama or Mitt Romney, and why? 

2) Does your student loan debt have a bearing on your choice?  

3) Anything else you wish to share about your vote for President.

4) Are you in school or out of school?

5) What was/is your area of study?

Rocky Mountain High – Details for Bus Tour Stops in WY and CO | ED.gov Blog #DNC2012

Rocky Mountain High – Details for Bus Tour Stops in WY and CO | ED.gov Blog:

Rocky Mountain High – Details for Bus Tour Stops in WY and CO

Posted on September 5, 2012 by Cameron Brenchley

ED’s third annual back-to-school bus tour is taking Secretary Duncan and top federal education officials across the country for a series of events and community conversations reinforcing the message that Education Drives America. Yesterday we provided details on our stops in California, Nevada and Utah. Here is additional information on our stops in Wyoming and Colorado:

Rock Springs – Sept. 14

After making their way across the deserts of Nevada and through the rugged mountains of Utah’s Wasatch Front, Under Secretary Martha Kanter and Chief of Staff Joanne Weiss will board the Education Drives America bus and head to the Equality State for a stop in Rock Springs, Wyo. Kanter and Weiss will tour career academies and participate in a roundtable discussion at Rock Springs High School. Read about other events in the Rocks Springs area.

Rawlins – Sept. 14

Later that day, Kanter and Weiss will visit the Carbon County Higher Education Center in Rawlins, Wyo., to participate in a roundtable discussion on the topic of distance learning, with an audience including Wyoming’s state and county school superintendents, local college leaders, and local community college students and teachers.

Cheyenne – Sept. 14

Under Secretary Kanter, and Chief of Staff Weiss will end the week by joining Assistant Secretary Brenda Dann-Messier on a visit to Laramie Community College in Cheyenne, Wyo., to highlight education successes and lead community conversations about school reform, college affordability and completion, and the link between education and jobs.Read more about other events near Cheyenne.

Denver – Sept. 17

Secretary Arne Duncan will rejoin the Education Drives America tour on Monday, Sept. 17, and will start off with a visit to Lowery Elementary School in Denver, Colo. Duncan will participate in a “Let’s Move!” nutrition event and group fitness activity. Read about other tour events in the Denver area.

Limon – Sept. 17

Secretary Duncan will then make a stop at Limon Public School—a K-12 school—in Limon, Colo., addressing some 200 students, parents, teachers and community members at the school’s Constitution Day celebration.

Next stop, the Sunflower State. Details coming soon.

More specific details about these stops will become available as the time for the events draws closer. For live, up-to-the-minute updates from the road, follow the Education Drives America tour on Twitter using the hashtag #edtour12, and read more about the entire tour at ed.gov/bustour.

Cameron Brenchley is director of digital engagement at the U.S. Department of Education

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Ten minute drawing. Democratic Party poster child. « Fred Klonsky

Ten minute drawing. Democratic Party poster child. « Fred Klonsky:

Ten minute drawing. Democratic Party poster child.

by Fred Klonsky

Seats at the Table | AMPS

Seats at the Table | AMPS:

Seats at the Table

by Thomas J. Mertz

David Hockney, Walking Past Two Chairs 1984-6

Jimmy Cliff , “Sitting In Limbo” (click to listen or download).

The big item at the Madison Metropolitan School District Board of Education meeting/retreat/workshop last night was the process for replacing the collective bargaining agreement with an employee hand book (thanks Scott Walker).  Being a retreat/workshop, nothing was decided.  In my view, at this point the most important issues are who will have seats at the table for the drafting of the handbook and what roles will the Board of Education play.
Matt Defour has a sti on this portion of the meeting and Karen Vieth has a great write-up, so I’m mostly just going to offer comment, observations and opinions.
As of now, the default process, as put in place by departed Superintendent Dan Nerad (apparently without 

NYC Public School Parents: The reality and the hype behind online learning and the "School of One"

NYC Public School Parents: The reality and the hype behind online learning and the "School of One":

The reality and the hype behind online learning and the "School of One"

by Leonie Haimson

Today’s Daily News has a story about a new negative evaluation of DOE’s much vaunted “School of One” program.  This study, which found no significant achievement gains from the program, was quietly placed on the Research Alliance website in the middle of summer with no apparent outreach to the media or the public. 

This contrasts with the huge publicity machinepromoting this online program that has operated since its inception as a pilot started in the summer of 2009. 

The School of One is an online or “blended” learning math program, combining online with small group instruction. It was started by Joel Rose when he was at DOE, using an algorithm devised by Wireless 

More teachers green in the classroom – USATODAY.com

More teachers green in the classroom – USATODAY.com:

More teachers green in the classroom

By Greg Toppo, USA TODAY

Updated 7h 33m ago

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WASHINGTON – With three years of teaching under her belt, Allison Frieze nearly qualifies as a grizzled veteran. The 28-year-old special education teacher at E.L. Haynes Public Charter School here already has more experience than the typical U.S. teacher.

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  By Sam Roberts, AP
  Students across the country are more likely to see new teachers this fall.

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By Sam Roberts, AP

Students across the country are more likely to see new teachers this fall.

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She remembers her first year and says no new teacher really wants to relive that. "You have so many pressures on you and you're kind of swimming, trying to keep your head above water with all of the things you have to do," Frieze says.

Research suggests that parents this fall are more likely than ever to find that their child's teachers are relatively 

Schools Matter: Rehire Professor Mandeloni

Schools Matter: Rehire Professor Mandeloni:

Rehire Professor Mandeloni

by Jim Horn

From UOO:

On June 7th, 2012, we posted the following: This week United Opt Out National stands in solidarity with the UMass teacher educators and the sixty-sevenstudent teachers at UMass Amherst School of Education who together chose toboycott the Teacher Performance Assessment field test via Pearson. Barbara Madeloni, lecturer at UMass and one of the teacher educators who joined the boycott, has 

Criminal parents? They just want a better education for their child:

Criminal parents? They just want a better education for their child

Dom Giordano

Philadelphia Daily News

For the Daily News

 Post a comment

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WHAT SHOULD the penalty be for two Philadelphia parents caught sending their child just to a neighboring school district just over the Philadelphia border? In the spectrum of law enforcement, what is the appropriate punishment for these parents trying to get their elementary-school-age daughter a better education in a suburban school district?
Should the daughter be removed and the parents warned? Should she be removed and the parents fined? Should the daughter be removed and the parents forced to pay back to the taxpayers of Lower Moreland Township $10,753, which is the cost of tuition for an out-of-district child attending Lower Moreland schools?
Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Ferman doesn't think any of those remedies are enough. She has demanded that the family pay back the $10,753 and she has charged them criminally with theft of services and conspiracy of 

The speech Obama should give to help him win - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

The speech Obama should give to help him win - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post:

The speech Obama should give to help him win

By Valerie Strauss

Many of the nation’s more than 3 million teachers are unhappy with Obama administration school reform policies that they believe are using them as scapegoats for problems in failing schools.

Both the National Education Association and the American Federation
(LARRY DOWNING/REUTERS)of Teachers — the two teachers unions with, collectively, more than 3 million members — have endorsed Obama because they see important differences between the Democratic and Republican investment in public education. But many teachers are unhappy with the president’s 

How Democrats have changed on school reform

by Valerie Strauss

You can track the changes in the way the Democratic Party views school reform and the role poverty plays in student achievement by looking at the education sections of party platforms in previous election years and comparing it to the one that was approved Tuesday.
Read full article >>

RheeFirst! » In case you missed it: StudentsFirst dodges parent activists at the DNC

RheeFirst! » In case you missed it: StudentsFirst dodges parent activists at the DNC:

In case you missed it: StudentsFirst dodges parent activists at the DNC

by admin

If you haven’t read it already, check out Parents Across America’s encounter with StudentsFirst at their screening of “Won’t Back Down” in Charlotte.  StudentsFirst staff invite protesting parents in to the screening, only to give them the slip at a security checkpoint (one attendee emails: “they practically did a DNA swab to check identities” at the door).
Also, North Carolina Policy Watch reports that StudentsFirst could soon be bringing their roadshow to North Carolina.  Naturally, they spoke with the head of the N.C. Public Charter Schools Association.  He already sounds giddy over his possible windfall.

The missing word last night: democracy « Deborah Meier on Education

The missing word last night: democracy « Deborah Meier on Education:

The missing word last night: democracy

by debmeier

Am I right? I don’t think I heard any of the wonderful Convention speeches mention the word “democracy” as part of the reason to be proud o0f America, one of the things we need to preserve, one of the dangers of income inequality, and at least a marginal purpose for public education!!! In its place we’ve substituted “a strong economy” etc. Attention to Hypocrisy has to be on our radar screen–but it seems odd that we’ve reached the point where we aren’t even hypocritical about the centrality of democracy in the American dream. Inspiring struggles for democracy world-wide was once part of our proud tradition–and what our young people were 

Shanker Blog » Who's Afraid of Virginia's Proficiency Targets?

Shanker Blog » Who's Afraid of Virginia's Proficiency Targets?:

Who’s Afraid of Virginia’s Proficiency Targets?

by Matthew Di Carlo

The accountability provisions in Virginia’s original application for “ESEA flexibility” (or “waiver”) have received a great deal of criticism (see here, here, here and here). Most of this criticism focused on the Commonwealth’s expectation levels, as described in “annual measurable objectives” (AMOs) – i.e., the statewide proficiency rates that its students are expected to achieve at the completion of each of the next five years, with separate targets established for subgroups such as those defined by race (black, Hispanic, Asian, white), income (subsidized lunch eligibility), limited English proficiency (LEP), and special education.
Last week, in response to the criticism, Virginia agreed to amend its application, and it’s not yet clearhow specifically they will calculate the new rates (only that lower-performing subgroups will be expected to make 

The NYC Teacher Unionist Behind “Strange Fruit” | Edwize

The NYC Teacher Unionist Behind “Strange Fruit” | Edwize:

The NYC Teacher Unionist Behind “Strange Fruit”

by W.J. Levay

NPR’s Morning Edition today had the fascinating story of Abel Meeropol, the New York City teacher unionist and social activist who penned “Strange Fruit,” one of Billie Holiday’s most haunting and powerful recordings.
Meeropol, who graduated from the Bronx’s Dewitt Clinton HS in 1921 and later taught English there for 17 years, wrote the poem after seeing a photo of a lynching. It was first printed in a teachers union publication. He set it to music, and it eventually made its way to Billie Holiday.
Popout
But here’s where his story really gets interesting: He was also the adoptive father of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg’s two sons.

Robert Meeropol [né Rosenberg] says that in the months following his parents’ execution, it was unclear who would take care of him and his brother. It was the height of McCarthyism. Even family members were fearful of being in any way associated with the Rosenbergs or Communism.
Then, at a Christmas party at the home of W.E.B. Du Bois, the boys were introduced to Abel and Anne Meeropol. A few weeks later, they were living with them.

Read the rest at NPR.org »