Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Announcing The Great May Giveaway Winner The Women’s Conference

Announcing The Great May Giveaway Winner



Announcing The Great May Giveaway Winner
  • Architects of Change

06/9/10 | The Women's Conference | 0 Comments
minerva head246x5
Just last week we announced the recipients of the2010 Minerva Award®. This week we want to share with you the many, many more Minervas among us in The Women’s Conference community.
On May 1st we asked you to tell us when you first realized that you could make a difference --What was your Minerva Moment?
Hundreds of you have had Minerva Moments and recognize the power you wield in your day-to-day lives. Many of you have started foundations and nonprofits to answer a need in your communities and the world; others have used your time and skills to raise money or awareness on behalf of others. Some of you have stood up to abusive partners, and still others of you have taught your children the value of giving back.
Explore The Women’s Conference community’s many Minervas and Minerva Moments here, My Minerva Moment.
Below is The Great May Giveaway winning response, as well as the three honorable mentions. These women found the strength – sometimes in the face of adversity – to help the women in the Congo who had been brutally raped, to remember that giving back is something we can do every day, to reach out to AIDS patients, and to help other women who have been in abusive relationships.
Winner:
Kate
My Minerva Moment occurred when I was a senior in high school. My mother was watching the Oprah Winfrey show as she normally did after work. One night she called me into the room
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Never Underestimate the California Teachers Association | Intercepts

Never Underestimate the California Teachers Association | Intercepts

Never Underestimate the California Teachers Association

by Mike Antonucci
There was a lot of excitement in the California education community this week, anticipating the election for state Superintendent of Public Instruction. All of the major candidates were Democrats, but the contest was widely viewed as a faceoff between Tom Torlakson, the choice of the California Teachers Association, and Gloria Romero, the choice of the reform crowd.
Some people felt this was the time for CTA comeuppance, particularly after a May 28 e-mail from a Southern California UniServ director was leaked. The memo revealed, “The polling data on our own members has Gloria Romero ahead of Tom Torlakson by a healthy margin, about 31-21…. Most of our members have no idea who Tom Torlakson is and what he stands for.”
The Latino Politics Blog, which posted the e-mail, opined, “This is a primer in how unions mobilize their base, but in this case, there seems to be a disconnect between who the leadership wants to see in the state superintendent role vs. the sentiment of the rank and file teachers.”
You’re reading this blog, so you know this is hardly an unusual circumstance. When CTA leaders and
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BP destroys lives. Congress protects it from liability. � Fred Klonsky's blog

BP destroys lives. Congress protects it from liability. � Fred Klonsky's blog

BP destroys lives. Congress protects it from liability.

by preaprez

“My name is Diane Wilson. I am a fourth generation shrimper from the Gulf. With this BP disaster, I am seeing the destruction of my community and I am outraged. I am also seeing elected representatives like Senator Lisa Murkowski blocking BP from being legally responsible to pay for this catastrophe. She stopped the Big Oil Bailout Prevention Act and wants to keep the liability cap at a pitiful $75 million. This is outrageous. How dare she side with big oil over the American people who have been so devastated by this manmade disaster.”

For four generations, Diane Wilson‘s family has shrimped the Gulf coast. At a Senate Energy Committee hearing
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Notes from the news, June 9 | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Notes from the news, June 9 | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Notes from the news, June 9

by Erika Owens

In West non-vote, did the SRC violate the Sunshine Act? The Notebook blog
The Sunshine Act requires that decision-making take place in public, but it's unclear where the decision was made to delay the vote on West's Renaissance Schools provider.

See also: While controversy swirls, life goes on for many at West The Notebook blog
Turmoil at West Philadelphia High could leave 50% teaching posts empty WHYY

Phila. teacher reassignment put on hold The Inquirer
The forced transfer of more than 500 teachers has been put on hold due to confusion and complaints of contract violations.

Schools set to pick new deputy chief Philadelphia Tribune
Leroy Nunery will likely be named deputy superintendent at today's SRC meeting.

S. Philly High 6 months later: What still needs work The Notebook blog
The statistics District officials have cited during a recent media blitz do not reflect the reality of ongoing harassment and violence, or stats on the District's own site, writes Helen Gym.

How one Phila. school diffused a recent conflict The Inquirer
At the seventh of 11 hearings on school violence before the Philadelphia Human Relations Commission, the principal of Kensington Business High School described how a proactive approach helped defuse a potentially explosive situation.

Show the love: Become a Notebook Member The Notebook blog
We need your help to reach our goal of 500 Members. Meet other Notebook readers and Members at our event next Tuesday!

One Week Away Practical Theory blog
One week till Science Leadership Academy graduates its first class.

Graduación de escuela charter virtual en PA Al Día

Dud grenade found at S. Phila. elementary school The Inquirer

Kindergartner missing from school had walked home The Inquirer

As education level rises, unemployment rate falls The Inquirer

Kids squeezed out of school programs Roxborough Review

Area schools taking bigger economic hit Courier Times News

Students Hurt in SW Philadelphia School Bus Ax KYW

Tech Tool vs Learning Tool Philly Teacher blog

Please email us if we missed anything today or if you have any suggestions of publications, email lists, or other places for us to check for news.

Click here to get Notes from the news in your inbox every day.

Notes from the news

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The Educated Guess � Parent activists come together

The Educated Guess � Parent activists come together

Parent activists come together

Posted in Advocacy organizations, Revenue and taxes
Cupertino parents’ success in raising $2.5 million in eight weeks to save 100 teachers’ jobs and small classes is providing a model for parents in other communities distraught over budget cuts threatening their schools.
The huge, time-consuming effort also taught a lesson to Cupertino parents, which they are happy to share: Once is plenty; don’t count on doing this every year to bail out your budgets.

The outgrowth of the Cupertino experience is a new, as yet unnamed Silicon Valley organization of parents with a two-prong goal: grass-roots organizing to save local schools and regional and state activism to reform education funding.
“Ours was a band-aid solution so the next logical step is long-term solutions,” said Hoi-Yung Poon, one of the parent organizers in Cupertino. “We need to look at the larger revenue and funding structure.”
Last month, a forum to discuss Cupertino’s fund-raising tactics drew 50 parent leaders from the Bay Area. Since then, parent leaders from 10 districts have met to lay out steps to create their organization over the summer. They have created a Yahoo group, parentsforaction, and plan to hold candidates’ forums on education and on Proposition 13 in the fall. Some of the organizers are interested in Close the Loophole, a campaign organized by San Francisco assessor Phil Ting to fix tax loopholes benefiting owners of commercial real estates.
The statewide PTA does advocacy and has joined the state school boards and administrators associations in Robles-Wong v. California, challenging the state’s level of school funding. But on a local level, most PTAs are focused on raising
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National Journal Online -- Education Experts -- What Effect Will D.C. Teachers' New Contract Have?

National Journal Online -- Education Experts -- What Effect Will D.C. Teachers' New Contract Have?

No Model, Pointless Anyway

Diane Ravitch
Research Professor Of Education, New York University
The DC teachers contract has no lessons for other districts. At this time of budgetary constraint, no district could afford to pay big bonuses or salaries to the teachers who produce the highest test scores. Where would the district get the money to pay bonuses while handing out pink slips to hundreds or thousands of other teachers? Perhaps the Gates Foundation and a few other foundations with lots of money would like to underwrite similar plans for other districts, but it is hard to see the point.
After all, there is now a solid body of research demonstrating that teacher effects are unstable; that teachers whose students get high test scores one year may not produce the same results consistently year after year because students are not randomly assigned to classes. So teacher A may get a big bonus or salary one year, then fall to the middle of the pack the next year.
And to what purpose? To produce higher scores on standardized tests with multiple-choice questions in which students are not asked to demonstrate knowledge or understanding. To do this at the same t...
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For-Profit Colleges Fight Limits On Student Loans : NPR

For-Profit Colleges Fight Limits On Student Loans : NPR

For-Profit Colleges Fight Limits On Student Loans

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June 9, 2010
For-profit colleges are lobbying to kill new regulations designed to hold down student debt loads. The Department of Education is expected to formally propose rules that would cut off federal aid to colleges whose graduates don't earn enough to pay back their loans. A draft of the regulations was released in February.
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November runoff set for state schools chief

November runoff set for state schools chief

November runoff set for state schools chief

Jill Tucker, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
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Rich Pedroncelli / Associated Press
Tom Torlakson
Three candidates emerged from a crowded field of 12 for state superintendent of public instruction, with two career politicians and a dark horse contender still in the race late Tuesday.
The top two vote getters will head into a November runoff for the nonpartisan post.
Assemblyman Tom Torlakson, D-Antioch, and former district Superintendent Larry Aceves carried the most votes in early returns. State Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, a favorite in the race, was in third place late in the evening, with a significant number of Los Angeles County votes still uncounted.
The runoff will give voters a clear-cut choice. Torlakson has the big-money support of the state's largest teachers union. Romero has cast herself as an education reformer, with heavy support from business leaders pushing for competition in public schools.
Aceves, a dark horse in the race, appealed to voters wanting a middle ground between Torlakson's traditional education establishment and Romero's reforms. He received newspaper endorsements from his opponents' home turf, including the Los Angeles Times and the Contra Costa Times.
Whoever comes in third could tip the scales in the November election with an endorsement and the added backing of unions, business or a bevy of school superintendents from across the state.
The California Teachers Association has strongly opposed Romero in the election, and it appears likely that the organization would toss its political and financial weight behind Aceves in the runoff if Torlakson is out.
Romero rolled the dice, trying to win the state's top schools job without the support of the teachers union - something that hasn't been done in decades and rarely before that.
Given Romero's support for charter schools and her stand against current teacher seniority rights, she had the support of business, including Eli Broad of the Broad Foundation, and Netflix CEO Reed Hastings.
It's unclear whether such business interests would stand as strongly behind either Aceves or Torlakson.
Aceves, the former superintendent of San Jose's Franklin-McKinley and Alum Rock Union elementary school districts, thinks he would be a breath of fresh air on the Sacramento stage, someone who gets what's going on in schools and knows what works. A Romero or Aceves win in November would give the state its first Latino superintendent of public instruction.


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/06/09/MNL71DOO8C.DTL#ixzz0qNGN1H6a
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