Big Education Ape

Monday, March 1, 2010

Title I College- and Career-Ready Standards � The Quick and the Ed

Last week President Obama announced plans to require all states to certify that their standards were “college- and career-ready” in order to obtain their portion of $14.5 billion in federal education funds. This is the single largest pot of education money in the federal budget–it’s previously been called Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA)–and it is the promise of this money that led to states following the rules in the ESEA, including those in the latest version, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2002. Theoretically any state could choose to opt out of these funds and their attached restrictions. Many states have threatened to pull out, but none have done so.

Would the college- and career-ready standards requirement be the last straw to push states over the limit? No, it wouldn’t, and the reason is because nothing will stop states from asserting their standards are preparing students for colleges and careers, even if they really are not. That’s federalism, and Obama is not likely to actually try to, nor could he, change it.

Others have pointed out that college- and career-ready is actually a higher standard than what exists now. Under current law, states just have to define a set of standards in math, reading, and science, have a set of assessments to measure student success, and then evaluate schools on whether students are “proficient” on those standards. States have set their standards at a rather low level; forcing those state standards to prepare students to be “college- and career-ready” would be a significantly higher benchmark.

The political opposition to No Child Left Behind has not really been about standards–most people believe it’s a good thing for teachers to have some

Race to the Top Madness - Politics K-12 - Education Week

Race to the Top Madness - Politics K-12 - Education Week:

"My colleague over at State EdWatch, Lesli Maxwell, and I teamed up to put together our Race to the Top Madness bracket. We should know the finalists any day now.

For more about the reasons behind our selections, check out Lesli's blog. In the meantime, here's our bracket predicting the finalists and the winners. Who would you cross off—or who would you add—if you did your own bracket?"

Meeting set to consider vandalism at UC Davis - Sacramento News - Local and Breaking Sacramento News | Sacramento Bee

A community meeting is scheduled for this evening to discuss offensive graffiti sprayed at the University of California, Davis, during the weekend.

The town all meeting is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. at Regan Main community building in the Segundo housing area on campus.

The vandalism at the UC Davis Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Resource Center was discovered about 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Derogatory words were directed at those who used the center.

The vandalism was present today at the building at the request of center officials.

"As a center we wanted not to immediately remove the vandalism in order to ensure that this hate crime does

Education Week American Education News Site of Record

Peer Reviewers Winnow Race to Top Hopefuls

Expert panels play a key role in determining who makes the cut in the $4 billion stimulus grant competition.

• Rick Hess Straight Up Blog: Of 'Transparency' and Credibility

• On-Demand Webinar: Is the Stimulus Meeting Its K-12 Goals?

• Complete coverage: Schools and the Stimulus

For more stories, visit Education Week's homepage.

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	TODAY'S COMMENTARY

Commentary

The Proficiency Delusion

Letting states set the cut scores for tests used with "common-core standards" would repeat a bad mistake and set back reform, writes Mark Schneider.

View more Commentaries from Education Week.


	MORE HEADLINES

ED Releases Teacher Incentive Fund Regs

(February 26, 2010, Teacher Beat Blog)

Obama Touts School Improvement Plans

(March 1, 2010, Politics K-12 Blog)

GOP Challengers Join Texas Ed Board Battleground

(March 1, 2010, Associated Press)

Senators Unveil Bill to Promote Engineering Education

(February 26, 2010, Curriculum Matters Blog)

Draconian Measures at R.I. High School Are Misconceived

(March 1, 2010, New Blog: Walt Gardner's Reality Check)

The National Security Archive a good resource for teachers

The National Security Archive

New Postings

New - February 12, 2010Project AzorianThe CIA's Declassified History of the Glomar Explorer

New - February 2, 2010Seeing human rights in the "proper manner"The Reagan-Chun Summit of February 1981

January 15, 2010The Air Force versus Hollywood
Documentary on "SAC Command Post" Tried to Rebut "Dr. Strangelove" and "Fail Safe"

December 18, 2009
Kyoto Redux?
Obama's Challenges at Copenhagen Echo Clinton's at Kyoto

Obama Endorses Central Falls Decision This Week In Education

This Week In Education

Turnarounds: Obama Endorses Central Falls Decision

"If a school continues to fail its students year after year after year, if it doesn't show signs of improvement, then there's got to be a sense of accountability. And that's what happened in Rhode Island last week at a chronically troubled school, when just 7 percent of 11th graders passed state math tests -- 7 percent."

- President Obama in prepared remarks (see full text below) first noted by @D_Aarons

Subject: Remarks by the President at the America's Promise Alliance Education Event

Recognizing What Historically Black Colleges and Universities Mean to America | The White House

As I stood watching the Virginia State University drum-line perform in the White House this week (likely the first time an HBCU drum-line has ever perform

ed at the White House), I was reminded of how far we have come as a nation and hopeful about where we are heading. The nation’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities have served our nation since 1837. They educated freed slaves, giving them the priceless gift of a mind filled with world’s possibilities. Today, this noble goal of our HBCUs continues as they unveil for their students the world of possibilities for themselves, their communities and our nation.

Guests attending this White House event left with a glow not unlike that of January 20, 2009, but they also left with a resolve to do the work that will be necessary to ensure all students have access to a high quality education and armed with the tools they need to reach for the American Dream.

Helping America Become a Grad Nation The White House Blog | The White House

The White House Blog | The White House

Helping America Become a Grad Nation

Posted by General Colin Powell on March 1, 2010 at 9:01 AM EST

My wife Alma and I are honored to have President Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan joining us today to announce a new multi-year campaign to mobilize all Americans to help end the high school dropout crisis. We call this work Grad Nation.

For the past two years, America’s Promise Alliance has been traveling the country, raising awareness about how high dropout rates and low readiness for college and work undermine our nation’s future. In nearly all 50 states and 55 cities, we have convened high-level Dropout Prevention Summits that brought together nearly 30,000 mayors and governors, business and community leaders, school administrators, students and parents. They have committed to concrete action plans to improve graduation rates in their states and communities.

To that end, the time for talking and planning has ended. Now we must turn our attention to solutions. This means acting on all the lessons we’ve learned at our summits, and more importantly, making sure all Americans see their stake in this and join us to reach an important goal, which is to see that 90 percent of today’s fourth-graders graduate from high school on time. If we achieve this, we will not only be a more healthy and prosperous nation, but we can also help realize President Obama’s goal of making the United States the global pacesetter of college graduation by 2020.

The simple proposition is this—improving graduation rates is not just an education issue; it’s a community issue. We cannot expect more from our schools and young people until all Americans are prepared to be more involved, because so many of the building blocks that make for success in school involve effort outside of the classroom.

Grad Nation is the way for us to mobilize to win this battle.

Much like the Olympic athletes we’ve been inspired by recently, we all need to push past our comfort levels and make our work benefit something greater than ourselves — our country. Whether it is through City Year’s “In School and On Track” initiative or The First Tee’s National School Program, our nearly 400 national Alliance partners and their local affiliates are stepping up to lead the way. We’re already seeing the impact of this type work in cities like Philadelphia and Tucson, which have improved their graduation rates by more than 20 percentage points in a decade.

So the question remains: What will you do? How can you help? The choice is simple. If we are to remain a great nation, we must be a Grad Nation.

To learn more about America’s Promise Alliance and Grad Nation, visit: www.americaspromise.org.

General Colin Powell is founding chairman of America’s Promise Alliance

Decision to fire all of R.I. school's teachers sad, desperate - washingtonpost.com

Decision to fire all of R.I. school's teachers sad, desperate - washingtonpost.com

Finally, a school system has decided to fire all the educators at an ailing school.

Why didn't we think of this sooner?

Firing some of them hasn't really proven effective in turning around schools, has it? So why not get rid of all of them and start over?

The school committee in Central Falls, Rhode Island's smallest and poorest city, voted to fire every educator at Central Falls High School at the end of the school year. The committee did this because about half of the school's students graduate, and only 7 percent of 11th-graders were proficient in math in 2009.
At the committee meeting Tuesday night, 93 names were called for firing -- 74 classroom teachers, plus reading specialists, guidance counselors, physical education teachers, the school psychologist, the principal and three assistant principals, according to the Providence Journal.
Not one was good enough to stay.

Some of the teachers at the city's only high school cried, but the committee held firm.
It's no wonder that Education Secretary Arne Duncan applauded the move, saying the committee members were "showing courage and doing the right thing for kids."

Courage, indeed.

Now, all they have to do is find 93 excellent professionals to take their places. Recruiting the best educators should be easy, especially when you can offer them life in a very poor town and a job with no security.

And, of course, the powers that be will have to ignore all the other influences on high school students because their poor performance was all about the adults at the high school.

Their elementary and middle school education -- or lack thereof? Not a problem. Their sometimes difficult home lives? Naw. That doesn't affect how a kid does at school.

No Child Left Behind, a federal law that has driven schools to narrow curriculum and use rudimentary standardized tests to

National Journal Online -- Education Experts

National Journal Online -- Education Experts:

"Tying Title I To College- And Career-Ready Standards

The principal vehicle through which the federal government distributes money to low-income students nationwide, Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, could be facing a major overhaul. During the National Governors Association conference last week, President Obama unveiled a proposal to make Title I funding contingent on a state's adoption of reading and math standards that prepare students for college or a career.

Under current law, Title I money goes to schools with high numbers of poor children through statutory formulas that are based primarily on census poverty estimates and the cost of education in each state. Under the Obama proposal, which would be part of the forthcoming congressional reauthorization of the ESEA, states would be required to join with other states in creating rigorous common standards, or to work with their"

Education Research Report

Study of four national English language arts standards

*
A Systematic Comparison of the American Diploma Project College Readiness Standards with those of the ACT, College Board, and Standards For Success

This study of four national English language arts standards compares the content of three sets of standards with a benchmark set, the American Diploma Project (ADP), to see how closely the sets agree on what students should know in English language arts to prepare for college. The match between each of the three comparison sets and the 62 content statements in the ADP benchmark varies, from 77 percent of the statements for the College Board College Readiness Standards and 68 percent for Standards for Success to 34 percent for the ACT College Readiness Standards. But only 5 percent of the ADP statements fully match the content in all three comparison sets-27 percent when partial matching is also considered.
*

Friday, February 26, 2010

Report Calls For Greater Federal Responsiveness To Needs Of Rural High Schools

Despite rural high schools often being shortchanged by current federal education policies, a new report from the Alliance for Excellent Educationfinds that rural schools routinely use practices that could be useful to boosting student performance in their urban and suburban counterparts.

According to the report, Current Challenges and Opportunities in Preparing Rural High School Students for Success in College and Careers, the tight-knit nature of rural communities has resulted in the development of promising practices in meeting the challenge of preparing students for success in the twenty-first century. For example, in the highly personal rural environment, at-risk students are not as likely to be overlooked. Additionally, successful rural high schools have utilized online courses and other distance learning to expand advanced learning opportunities for their students. By using local businesses as “place-based” learning opportunities, schools engage students’ interests, which often creates a college- and career-ready culture.

voiceofsandiego.org | News. Investigation. Analysis. Conversation. Intelligence. - A School Where You Shouldn't Raise Your Hand

By EMILY ALPERT

Before she began the lesson, Kerry Ferguson reminded her kindergarteners not to bother each other, not to interrupt -- and not to raise their hands before speaking. Some timid, some eager, the tiny students offered up their ideas about a story in which the mouse saves a lion by chewing through a net.

"Why was the little mouse so scared, terrified and afraid of the lion when they first met?" Ferguson asked them.

"The little mouse was too little and the lion was big," one girl said.

"Because mice are afraid of cats," another girl added. "Like house cats will chase a mouse."

It might seem strange to ask squirming kids toavoid raising their hands. But it is crucial to what Muir is trying to do. On the other end of campus, Chet Hancock actually nudged one raised hand aside. His class of middle and high schoolers was poring over a dense text by Ralph Waldo Emerson about manual labor laden with words like "antagonism" and sharing ideas.

Muir has changed the way it looks at learning. It pulled teachers out of the limelight. It let kids drive the discussions. And it focused on individualized projects that pull from different subjects, such as having students study their personal heroes and making websites about them.

Three years ago, the K-12 magnet school in Clairemont turned to an educational philosophy called Paideia, a relatively rare approach that emphasizes freewheeling seminars, personalized projects and critical thinking. Lectures are frowned on. Nobody has the one right answer. Muir's immediate goal was to get students more engaged in class, but the method has a broader aim -- to teach kids to think, read and write critically all their lives.

Small discussions break out all the time at Muir, a public school where middle schoolers ponder why to do math or high schoolers analyze Surrealist paintings. The whole school also sits dow

Privatization of California Continues Apace | California Progress Report

By Robert Cruickshan

Privatization is typically a very costly and wasteful way to deal with public services. Usually it is little more than a transfer of public wealth to well-connected people in the private sector, done in spite of the fact that that it's usually unnecessary and forces the public to spend more money than they would have before the privatization.

That scenario is likely to repeat itself in the upcoming privatization of 11 state office buildings:

California has put up the "for sale" sign on 11 state office buildings, including the San Francisco Civic Center and Ronald Reagan building in Los Angeles.

Real estate firm CB Richard Ellis began marketing the buildings Friday on behalf of the state.

Vice chairman Kevin Shannon says the firm is pitching the sale worldwide as a low-risk investment because the state is planning to lease the space back, giving the new owners a steady stream of income.

The sale was adopted as part of last year's budget agreement between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and lawmakers to raise money for the state. California is facing a $20 billion shortfall through the middle of next year.

The sale is expected raise more than $2 billion.

Read that again. The sale is pitched as "low risk" because you and I will give the new owners a steady stream of income. We're going to rent these buildings indefinitely, ultimately at much greater cost than $2 billion.

Public ownership of office buildings is a much cheaper way to operate government. We pay back the construction loan and the ongoing maintenance, and that's usually more affordable than leasing from a landlord who seeks profit in the arrangement. The costs come out of our pockets, especially if we're cutting other services down the road to pay the privatization cost.

California: the golden state of special interests | California Progress Report

By Peter Schrag

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger likes to complain about the pernicious influence of “the special interests” (almost always with the definite article). If you parse the context carefully, he seems mostly to mean public employee unions – the teachers, the prison guards, maybe the nurses and firefighters who’ve beaten him in some costly ballot fights and wag a lot of tails in the legislature.

But of course, the special interests are not just the public sector unions. It’s hardly a secret that they also include a long list of other people and groups some of whom are among the governor’s best friends and biggest backers.

Among them: energy companies and utilities, banks, insurance interests, home builders and the real estate developers, the medical industry, retailers, the liquor industry, big agriculture, Silicon Valley, the movie industry, builders and contractors and hundreds of professional, trade and commercial associations, the political parties, and the Chamber of Commerce, all advocating for their programs and budgets and/or against regulation of their activities.

Put them all together and, one way or another, they represent almost everybody in the state several times over. Yet even including them all, the governor would still be only half right. “Special interests” aren’t the largest cause of the state’s problems.

What’s missing in this picture is the public interest. In California, particularly, who speaks for the public interest? How many Californians these days are even aware that there is – or should be – such a thing? At least since the passage of Proposition 13 in 1978, Californians – and most other Americans as well – have become increasingly wedded to a market ideology rather than the communitarian ethic generated in World War II that continued to drive the state through the generation following.

Madison believed that in checking one another, no “faction” would ever become dominant. But as we’ve also learned in California, the mutual checking often means that while no one prevails, nothing gets done.

Teacher unions challenged in unprecedented face-off | Rhode Island news | projo.com | The Providence Journal

Teacher unions challenged in unprecedented face-off | Rhode Island news | projo.com | The Providence Journal

Teacher unions challenged in unprecedented face-off

01:00 AM EST on Sunday, February 28, 2010

By Jennifer D. Jordan

Journal Staff Writer

State Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist, who approved the firing of teachers, support staff and administrators at Central Falls High School, has said she will “do whatever it takes to create better schools.”

The Providence Journal / Steve Szydlowski

Eight months ago, Deborah A. Gist began her first staff meeting at the state Department of Education with a call to arms: “Are you ready to change the world?”

The woman who once climbed Mount Kilimanjaro made it clear that she would bring the same resolve to her job as the state’s new commissioner of education.

“Our state’s 150,000 public school students are depending on all of us to do whatever it takes to create better schools,” Gist said in her first speech.

Her urgency to fulfill this promise places Gist — even more than Supt. Frances Gallo — at the center of the turmoil now playing out in Central Falls.

New software multiplies computers in schools

New software multiplies computers in schools:

"Often still requires a trip to the computer lab or competing for a couple of tired machines in the back of a classroom.

But Microsoft and a handful of hardware partners are trying to seed schools with many more computing stations by getting single computers to power many more terminals.

The concept, called shared resources computing, involves having a handful of stations draw their processing power from one traditional desktop PC, connecting through simple USB wires to form one shared network.

Microsoft released a new operating system last week called MultiPoint Server 2010 that is designed for easy installation in schools looking to expand access to their computers. The software can deliver a Windows 7 desktop experience to up to 10 other terminals, also called thin clients. Additional software applications can be accessed from the host PC, although some may require"

Obama Touts School Improvement Plans - Politics K-12 - Education Week

Obama Touts School Improvement Plans - Politics K-12 - Education Week:

"Even though this Associated Press story makes it sound like President Obama is making big news today with a school improvement plan, it's really old news.

According to the story, he's using an America's Promise Alliance education event to tout the four turnaround models that are tied to acceptance of the Title I School Improvement Grants. We've written about this endlessly.

And his news peg is that he now wants to devote some $900 million to it; again, we've already covered this, courtesy of EdWeek's Alyson Klein, as part of our budget coverage."

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