MEGAN PRATHER: Epic's controversial 'learning fund' will change, settlement proposed for SVCSB

Epic's controversial 'learning fund' will change, settlement proposed for SVCSB

Epic’s controversial ‘learning fund’ will change, settlement proposed for SVCSB

In meetings Tuesday that lasted until after midnight, the governing board of Epic Blended and Epic One-on-One charter schools, Community Strategies, approved a motion that will move the school’s controversial learning fund from private account management to public bank accounts.

The board also approved items after a nearly four-hour executive session, including a settlement proposal regarding contract termination proceedings with the Statewide Virtual Charter School Board.

Epic’s learning fund reimburses the families of Epic Blended and Epic One-on-One students for up to $1,000 of educational curriculum or extra-curricular purchases and is currently administered by the for-profit management company Epic Youth Services, which is owned by Epic co-founder Ben Harris and David Chaney.

Epic’s assistant superintendent of finance, Jeanise Wynn, presented the proposed changes, which would, effective July 1, place all funds allocated to the learning fund in bank accounts owned by Community Strategies doing business as either Epic Blended Learning Charter or Epic One-on-One Charter School, respectively.

“This will also require that all revenue and expenditure records for the public bank CONTINUE READING: Epic's controversial 'learning fund' will change, settlement proposed for SVCSB

Andrea Gabor: How Big Philanthropy Captured Media Coverage of Their Education Investments | Diane Ravitch's blog

Andrea Gabor: How Big Philanthropy Captured Media Coverage of Their Education Investments | Diane Ravitch's blog

Andrea Gabor: How Big Philanthropy Captured Media Coverage of Their Education Investments

Andrea Gabor is the Bloomberg Professor of Business Journalism at Baruch College, which is part of the City University of New York. Gabor has written insightful articles about education in the New York Times and at Bloomberg.com. She is the author of After the Education Wars: How Smart Schools Upend the Business of Education Reform.

The following is a summary of a chapter in her forthcoming book, MEDIA CAPTURE: HOW MONEY, DIGITAL PLATFORMS, AND GOVERNMENTS CONTROL THE NEWS, which will be published by Columbia University Press in June. She prepared this excerpt for this blog.

She writes:

For the past twenty years, American K-12 education has been on the receiving end of Big Philanthropy’s efforts to reengineer public schools based on free-market ideas, with foundation-funded private operators taking over large swaths of school districts in cities like Los Angeles and New Orleans.

Between 2000 and 2005 alone, three foundations—the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Walton Family Foundation and the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation—quadrupled their spending on K–12 education to $400 million. By 2010, the top 15 foundations had spent $844 million on public education.

Moreover, these Big Philanthropies coordinated their CONTINUE READING: Andrea Gabor: How Big Philanthropy Captured Media Coverage of Their Education Investments | Diane Ravitch's blog

Support for Bill to Diversify Teaching Workforce - Year 2021 (CA Dept of Education)

Support for Bill to Diversify Teaching Workforce - Year 2021 (CA Dept of Education)

State Superintendent Tony Thurmond, Assemblymember Mike Gipson, Educators and Scholars Urge Support for First-of-its-Kind Legislation to Diversify the Teaching Workforce

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and Assemblymember Mike A. Gipson (D-Carson) were joined by education leaders today to urge support for new legislation designed to help support male educators of color and diversify the teaching workforce.

Assembly Bill (AB) 520, sponsored by State Superintendent Thurmond and authored by Assemblymember Gipson, received unanimous approval from the California State Assembly Committee on Education last week. The bill would establish the California Diversifying Teacher Grant Program, awarding $15 million in grants for school districts to provide one-time competitive grants that develop and implement new (or expand existing) programs that address a local need to develop the teacher workforce while emphasizing the retention of male teachers of color.

“We regularly talk about equity, but we must make equity the forefront and center in our schools. This bill is about adding tools to the toolbox and creating the opportunities to motivate more men of color to be in the classroom. The research is undeniable," Gipson said. "The National Bureau of Economic Research reported that having a Black teacher for one year in elementary school raised long-term education attainment for Black male students, especially for those from low-income households. AB 520 would provide schools with the tools to help them build a more diverse teacher population and students with opportunities to succeed.”

State Superintendent Thurmond added, “This is a movement that is taking place all across the country as people are building pipeline programs to expand opportunities for male educators of color. We know we need more educators of all backgrounds, but there is a particular need to diversify our workforce. The research has shown for years that there are benefits to students of color when there is just one educator of color on a campus, and those benefits extend to all students. At the end of the day, this is going to benefit students from all backgrounds.”

During Tuesday’s news conference, a California school district leader shared the real-world impact programs to diversify the teaching workforce has had on student achievement.

“I firmly believe when we as a district increase the number of male teachers of color, we deepen our commitment to diversity and achieving educational equity while also providing a source of inspiration for our students who see male teachers of color as positive examples of their future selves,” stated Micah Ali, President of the Board of Trustees at Compton Unified School District, where fewer than 1 percent of students are white. “By having role models that look like and have similar backgrounds as their students, we help to create a positive campus climate for all. I am confident that AB 520 will lead to a tidal wave of Black and brown male excellence in the classroom, like the one that is sweeping the universities, boardrooms, entrepreneurship and, of course, academia.”

Research validates the goals of AB 520, said Dr. Travis J. Bristol, Assistant Professor at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Education, who serves as the chair of Superintendent Thurmond’s Teacher Diversity Advisory Group and whose work has also supported the Council of Chief State School Officers’ 10-state educator diversity initiative.

“We see in the state of California there is a demographic mismatch between teachers and students: Approximately 75 percent of students in our public system are students of color when compared to 40 percent of teachers of color. Even more concerning, is that the school-based experience of Black boys is similar to Black male teachers—Black boys are suspended and expelled at higher rates than their peers, and Black male teachers have a higher rate of turnover than their peers,” Bristol said. “AB 520 is a bold and comprehensive piece of legislation that addresses the life course of a teacher. It provides funding to districts and county offices to recruit and support mentoring of teachers of color and coaching for school leaders on how to create environments that can attend to the social and emotional needs of our children and our teachers. We need the California Legislature to pass, and for Governor Newsom to sign, AB 520 so California can stand as a leader in diversifying the teacher workforce.”

Information about Dr. Bristol’s research is available on the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Education web page and more information on AB 520 can be found in the bill analysis(PDF).

# # # #

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

Support for Bill to Diversify Teaching Workforce - Year 2021 (CA Dept of Education)

Woefully Short – Tennessee Education Report

Woefully Short – Tennessee Education Report

WOEFULLY SHORT

The Tennessee Education responded to Gov. Bill Lee’s budget amendment today calling the announcement and Lee’s overall education investment “woefully short” of what the state needs to fund schools.

Lee unveiled the budget amendment with no appreciable increase in K-12 spending, merely a rehash of previous announcements regarding holding districts harmless in the BEP formula and an investment in mental health that had been planned in 2020.

Lee’s statement says:

This amendment reflects the Governor’s priorities and includes record investments in broadband, economic development, safety and law enforcement, increasing reserves, and education.

The amendment itself actually does not include record investments in education and it’s interesting that on the list of supposed priorities here, education is mentioned last.

Here’s the TEA response:

“With the state bringing in record surplus month after month, there is no excuse to not make significant increases to public education funding. The governor’s budget CONTINUE READING: Woefully Short – Tennessee Education Report

Russ on Reading: My Learning Loss Formula: Read, Write, Share

Russ on Reading: My Learning Loss Formula: Read, Write, Share

My Learning Loss Formula: Read, Write, Share

As I addressed in a post a month ago, the Henny Penny's of the world are running around clucking about how the pandemic will lead to inevitable LEARNING LOSS!!!!!  Learning Loss, as Peter Greene at Forbes, has pointed out, is the latest scare tactic being used by educational reformers to push their own agenda (standardized tests, vouchers, tutoring programs). In assessing any learning loss prescription, the first question we need to ask is, "Who stands to benefit/profit?" If the answer to that question is anyone other than school children, we should look for a different solution. 

Many educational researchers are looking at pandemic learning loss as a corollary to summer learning loss. Interestingly, summer learning loss is really only an issue for the most vulnerable in our school communities, those with limited access to literacy materials and other learning opportunities during their time away from school. Richard Allington found that simply giving vulnerable readers books to take home over the summer CONTINUE READING: Russ on Reading: My Learning Loss Formula: Read, Write, Share

Teacher Tom: To Continue Becoming

Teacher Tom: To Continue Becoming

To Continue Becoming

A few days ago, a medical doctor was being interviewed on CNN about the psychological impact of the pandemic on children. She provided several caveats along the way, but her bottom line response was "I expect that kids will bounce back."

It's a hopeful answer and one that is, in some fashion, true. More to the point, however, it's what we all want to hear. Perhaps in some ways, we need to hear it because, I suppose, we too hope to "bounce back" from our negative experiences. But no matter how hard we hope, over a half million people in the US died and it's estimated that 40,000 children lost a parent to this plague. I'd very much like for us all to "bounce back," but it hardly seems an appropriate wish, especially for these poor children. A young child doesn't simply bounce back from a parent's death. Indeed, the concept of bouncing back seems far more appropriate to, say, dealing with the loss of a baseball game, than the cruel lessons of life itself.

The doctor, of course, wasn't talking about these children, nor is she talking about the children who suffered themselves, or those who have spent the pandemic trapped in a household CONTINUE READING: Teacher Tom: To Continue Becoming

Jeanne Kaplan: The Battle Against Deformers in Denver is Always Uphill | Diane Ravitch's blog

Jeanne Kaplan: The Battle Against Deformers in Denver is Always Uphill | Diane Ravitch's blog

Jeanne Kaplan: The Battle Against Deformers in Denver is Always Uphill

Jeanne Kaplan is a veteran civil rights activist who was elected to serve two terms on the Denver school board. She has been active in multiple campaigns to stop privatization and over-testing and energize a genuine effort to improve the public schools. She wrote this piece for this blog.

  THE SISYPHEAN TASK IN DENVER

The dictionary defines Sisyphean task as something you keep doing but never gets completed, an endless task.  In Greek mythology Sisyphus is punished by the god Zeus and is tasked with endlessly pushing a rock up a steep mountain, only to have it roll back down each time he nears the top.  I will leave the deeper philosophical meanings to others.  Simply interpreted, public education advocates residing in the Queen City of the Rockies, “transformers” if you will, will find similarities to this story as we reflect on our battle to defeat “education reform.”  In Denver’s case the Sisyphean task master has not CONTINUE READING: Jeanne Kaplan: The Battle Against Deformers in Denver is Always Uphill | Diane Ravitch's blog

After Three Decades, New York Legislature Finally Passes Budget To Equalize Public School Funding | janresseger

After Three Decades, New York Legislature Finally Passes Budget To Equalize Public School Funding | janresseger

After Three Decades, New York Legislature Finally Passes Budget To Equalize Public School Funding

In 2007, New York State agreed to comply with a court mandate to invest five and a half billion dollars over four years—and maintain the investment annually—to equalize school funding in a state with vast differences in wealth and alarming disparities in public school funding across its 688 public school districts.  But in 2008, when the Great Recession hit, New York never invested the promised money in the education of the state’s children.

Last week, however, when both chambers of the state legislature agreed on the 2021-2022 state budget, New York promised once again to invest substantially in the education of its children and finally to comply with the court’s requirement, under the decision in Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. New York, for a legislative remedy.

Rochesterfirst.com reports: “The FY 2022 Enacted Budget provides $29.5 billion in State funding to school districts for the 2021-22 school year through School Aid, the highest level of State aid ever, supporting the operational costs of school districts that educate 2.5 million students statewide. This investment represents an increase of $3.0 billion (11.3 percent) compared to the 2020-21 school year, including a $1.4 billion (7.6 percent) Foundation Aid increase. Approximately 75 percent of this increase is targeted to high-need school districts.”

The NY Daily News’ Michael Elsen-Rooney explains the implications for the public schools in New York City, where over 1 million of the state’s children are enrolled in the nation’s largest school district: “A state budget agreement… includes a long-awaited windfall for New York CONTINUE READING: After Three Decades, New York Legislature Finally Passes Budget To Equalize Public School Funding | janresseger

Whatever Happened To Current Events Lessons? | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Whatever Happened To Current Events Lessons? | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Whatever Happened To Current Events Lessons?

Nearly all social studies lessons that I taught between the 1950s and 1970s contained at least one weekly lesson on “current events.” In these lessons, I tried to connect contemporary happenings to past events I was covering in my U.S. history and world history classes. Moreover, for at least five years, I used cut outs from Time magazine covers portraying world leaders in the 1950s–China’s Mao, Ghana’s Nkrumah, France’s De Gaulle–positioned on a wall ledge to link a particular event that occurred that week to those faces on Time covers.

By the mid-1960s, I had learned to incorporate national events (e.g., civil rights movement and protests against the Vietnam War) into U.S. historical topics such as slavery and Reconstruction and anti-war activism during the Mexican and Civil Wars. Even with those linkages, I still would set aside at least one weekly lesson to connect the past to the present by focusing on “current events” through newspaper articles, political cartoons, and local events in the city. And throughout those years, most other social studies teachers maintained a current events lesson (see here and here)

Looks like those kind of lessons, however, are waning. Except for those instances where national attention is riveted such as the Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd, or sexual harassment allegations against men in powerful positions as New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, current events (data are scant on social studies and other subject matter teachers teaching such lessons) appear fleetingly in classrooms except in traditional Civics and Government courses required for high school graduation.

When did current events lessons begin in social studies classrooms and why?

The Progressive school reforms of the early 20th century including the teaching CONTINUE READING: Whatever Happened To Current Events Lessons? | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Mandatory FDP Contract Packet Update SY 2021–22 + School Nutrition Program Integrity Plan - Nutrition (CA Dept of Education)

Mandatory FDP Contract Packet Update SY 2021–22 - Nutrition (CA Dept of Education)

Mandatory FDP Contract Packet Update SY 2021–22

The California Department of Education (CDE) Food Distribution Program (FDP) is reminding agencies to update and submit their School Year 2021–22 FDP contract in the Child Nutrition Information and Payment System (CNIPS) FDP module by July 31, 2021. Agencies that do not submit their FDP contract by the deadline will be placed on hold and be ineligible to receive their U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Foods.

All FDP agencies, regardless of participation avenue, must complete and submit the FDP Contract Packet component of the CNIPS to the Nutrition Services Division (NSD) for review and approval. The contract packet has three sections that must be completed:

1. FDP contract
2. Agency information update/certification
3. Contacts

To Access the Contract Packet:

• Log on to the CNIPS website.
• Choose the Food Distribution Program box on the Programs menu
• Select Agencies from the blue tool bar located at the top of the screen
• Select Contract from the menu
• Select Contract Packet from the menu
• Select 2021–2022 from the Program Year dropdown menu
• Select SNP from the Program dropdown menu
• Select Continue

Under the Status heading, the FDP Contract Packet status will display as Not Submitted. This means that an agency must complete, verify, and submit their FDP contract to the NSD. The red arrows denote the fields that require information from the agency. When the red arrows change to green checkmarks, this indicates that the contract is ready to submit for approval.

After you complete the FDP contract, Agency Information Update/Certification, and Contacts, the FDP contract packet is ready to submit for approval.

• Select the Submit for Approval button
  
  
• Select Finish

To review the policy regarding this mandate, see Management Bulletin NSD-FDP-07-2011, on the CDE Annual Update of the FDP Contract in the CNIPS.

If you need help completing the FDP Contract Packet, please view the instructional video, How to Complete the FDP Contract in the CNIPS and Useful Features of the CNIPS FDP Module (Video; 28:12), on the CDE Nutrition YouTube channel.

For further assistance, please contact Amy Bell, Child Nutrition Consultant (CNC), by phone at 916-322-5051 or by email at abell@cde.ca.gov, or Sherry Tam, CNC, by phone at 916-324-9875 or by email at stam@cde.ca.gov.

Questions:   Nutrition Services Division | 800-952-5609

Mandatory FDP Contract Packet Update SY 2021–22 - Nutrition (CA Dept of Education)

School Nutrition Program Integrity Plan - Nutrition (CA Dept of Education) - https://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/snpintegrityplan.asp

Coronavirus (COVID-19) Main Web Page

The California Department of Education (CDE) Nutrition Services Division (NSD) recognizes the challenge of providing nutritious meals to children everyday while trying to keep up with the numerous changes, flexibilities, and nationwide waivers that have gone into effect over the past year. As part of receiving the national waivers, the U.S. Department of Agriculture requires program operators to have a written plan in place to ensure program integrity while operating under numerous COVID-19 waivers. The NSD has developed a School Nutrition Program (SNP) Integrity Plan guide to support program operators who are continuing to administer the National School Lunch Program, School Breakfast Program, and the Special Milk Program during the nationwide pandemic.

When operating under the various waivers, program operators are required to maintain written procedures that outline plans to ensure the integrity of the SNP while serving and distributing meals to a child during the COVID-19 pandemic. The SNP Integrity Plan guide assists program operators in the development of standard operating procedures (integrity plan) and helps identify some of the required documents program operators must collect and maintain to meet SNP requirements while implementing the nationwide waivers. This guide also provides prompting questions that program operators should consider and answer when developing an integrity plan to ensure their procedures and documents address and meet all SNP requirements related to preparing, serving, distributing and claiming meals served to children in their SNP.

The SNP Integrity Plan Guide is attached to this email and is available on the Resources tab of the CDE COVID-19 Guidance in the Child Nutrition Programs web page. It is also available in the Download Forms section of the Child Nutrition Information and Payment System (CNIPS), Form ID SNP 76.

Please note, the NSD has also developed integrity plan guides for the Summer Food Service Program, Seamless Summer Option, and the Child and Adult Care Food Program. They are available on the Resources tab of the CDE COVID-19 Guidance in the Child Nutrition Programs web page and in the Download Forms sections of the CNIPS, Form IDs SSO 1 and CACFP 91.

Contact Information

If you have any questions regarding this subject, please contact your Field Services Unit (FSU) Child Nutrition Consultant (CNC). The FSU CNC list is available in the Download Forms section of the CNIPS, Form ID Caseload.

Questions:   Nutrition Services Division | 800-952-5609

CURMUDGUCATION: Don't Forget--No Nation's Report Card NAEP Test This Year

CURMUDGUCATION: Don't Forget--No Nation's Report Card NAEP Test This Year

Don't Forget--No Nation's Report Card NAEP Test This Year

You may have forgotten, or just not noticed at the time, but I want to remind you that last November, the National Center for Education Statistics pulled the plug on the 2021 NAEP, the Big Standardized Test that is supposed to measure the nation's progress in math and reading. Betsy DeVos asked for cancellation. The National Assessment Governing Board, chaired by Haley Barbour agreed with it. The CCSSO exec director said she believed it was the right decision.

The NAGB felt that it was best to put off the test until 2022 "when it should be feasible to collect and report valid and reliable data." (In other words, that's not possible this year.)

James Woodworth, head of NCES, said in part

Due to the impact of the COVID pandemic on school operations, it will not be possible for NCES to conduct the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) assessments in accordance with the statutory requirements defined by the Education Sciences Reform Act (ESRA) which requires NAEP to be conducted in a valid and reliable manner every 2 years (20 U.S.C. 9622(b)(2)(B)).

Also

The change in operations and lack of access to students to be assessed means that NAEP will not be CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Don't Forget--No Nation's Report Card NAEP Test This Year

A VERY BUSY DAY Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... The latest news and resources in education since 2007 #tBATs

  Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

A VERY BUSY DAY

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

The latest news and resources in education since 2007

THIS WEEK IN EDUCATION

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day...

The latest news and resources in education since 2007 - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2021/04/this-week-in-education-larry-ferlazzos_10.html

Wednesday’s Must-Read Articles & Must-Watch Videos On School Reopenings

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

Jazella / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING (& SHOWING) WHAT SCHOOLS LOOK LIKE DURING THE PANDEMIC (you might also be interested in SCHOOLS WENT REMOTE A YEAR AGO – HERE ARE MY CHOICES FOR THE BEST PIECES WRITTEN ABOUT SCHOOL REOPENING SINCE THEN): Over 50,000 N.Y.C. public school students will return to classrooms, including in middle and high school. is from The NY Tim

Education Writers Association Announces Finalists & Winners For Ed Reporting

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

The Education Writers Association has just announced 2020 Category Finalists & Winners for the National Awards for Education Reporting. You can see the names of the finalists and winners at the link. Weirdly, however, you have to click on this icon under each category in order to get to a page that has live links to each article: You can see my posts about previous winners here .

‘We All Have LGBTQ Students, Whether We Know It or Not’

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

is the headline of my latest Education Week column. Three educators provide suggestions to support LGBTQ students, including respecting pronouns & having LGBTQ authors in classroom libraries. Here are some excerpts: I’m adding the series to THE BEST WAYS TO SUPPORT LGBTQ STUDENTS .

Excellent Research Summary On Using Gestures When Teaching

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

I use gestures – and ask students to use them – a lot in my teaching. I’ve shared what I do, and the research backing it, at The Best Resources On Students Using Gestures & Physical Movement To Help With Learning . Today, Scientific American published Students Who Gesture during Learning ‘Grasp’ Concepts Better . It provides an excellent summary of research backing up the use of gestures in educa

Three New Resources For Learning About Different Cultures

22by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

GDJ / Pixabay Here are new additions to The Best Sites For Learning About The World’s Different Cultures : Italian Photographer Shows What Childhood Looks Like In Different Corners Of The World (30 Pics) is from Bored Panda.

Here’s My Tech Set-Up For When We Begin Concurrent Teaching – Let Me Know How I Can Make It Better

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

Clker-Free-Vector-Images / Pixabay After over a year of full-time distance learning, our high school begins concurrent teaching next week. I’m looking forward to seeing students in-person, though there won’t be many of them – only about thirty percent of our students are coming back two-days-a-week to our physical school, while the rest will remain on Zoom five days each week. Of course, even tho

The Newest TED-Ed Lesson & Video Is On The Socratic Method

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

geralt / Pixabay This tool will help improve your critical thinking is the title of the latest TED-Ed video and lesson – it’s on the Socratic Method. I’m adding it to The Best Resources On Teaching & Learning Critical Thinking In The Classroom .

Tuesday’s Must-Read Articles On School Reopenings

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

geralt / Pixabay Here are new additions to THE BEST POSTS PREDICTING (& SHOWING) WHAT SCHOOLS LOOK LIKE DURING THE PANDEMIC (you might also be interested in SCHOOLS WENT REMOTE A YEAR AGO –

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007