Tuesday, April 24, 2012

by YongZhao

A version of this post is published in Kappa Delta Pi Record, 48(1), p. 17-22 in Feb. 2012.

To build a better education system, America must build on what we have—differentiation, uniqueness, and diversity.

It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.
–Justice Louis D. Brandeis, New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann, 1932

America is on the precipice of ruining its foundation for success. The movement toward a centralized education system through federal mandates and common curriculum and testing is threatening the very system that has contributed to America’s success and that holds the potential for its future success: that is a

LAUSD: SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AS A PREREQUISITE FOR EDUCATION (VIDEO #3) - Perdaily.com

LAUSD: SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AS A PREREQUISITE FOR EDUCATION (VIDEO #3) - Perdaily.com:

LAUSD: SCHOOL DISCIPLINE AS A PREREQUISITE FOR EDUCATION (VIDEO #3)

by Leonard Isenberg

(Mensaje se repite en Español)

(For a national view of public education reform see the end of this blog post)

The failure to follow LAUSD's own bulletins, the LAUSD/UTLA Collective Bargaining, and state and federal are only part of the reason that LAUSD remains such an unmitigated failure when it comes to educating predominantly minority students that make up the vast majority of its student body.

At to this LAUSD policy of social promotion and a system of non-discipline that does whatever it takes to continue to collect Average Daily Attendance (ADA) money from the state and you get a rather clear and uncontradicted

Obama honors Burbank educator as National Teacher of the Year - LA Daily News

Obama honors Burbank educator as National Teacher of the Year - LA Daily News:

Obama honors Burbank educator as National Teacher of the Year

By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer

Posted: 04/24/2012 07:52:43 AM PDT

Updated: 04/24/2012 08:15:45 AM PDT

President Barack Obama congratulates the 2012 National Teacher of the Year, Rebecca Mieliwocki, who teaches at Luther Burbank Middle School in Burbank, Calif., Tuesday, April 24, 2012, during a ceremony in the East Room at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) (Charles Dharapak)

CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE

President Barack Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan, right, applaud the... (Charles Dharapak)

Rebecca Mieliwocki, the Burbank school teacher who turned to education as a second career, was honored Tuesday by President Barack Obama as the nation's top Teacher of the Year.The Luther Burbank Middle School English teacher was accompanied at the White House ceremony by her extended family, including her husband, Duane, son, Davis, and her parents, Bill and Sue Lipschultz. Her mom and dad were both career teachers and ultimately inspired Mieliwocki to become a teacher when her previous jobs proved unfulfilling.
Mieliwocki (pronounced Milwaukee) is the "definition of above and beyond," Obama said in his introducton. "She throws herself into her work because she knows her students depend on it."

LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH: How stupid items get onto standardized tests « Diane Ravitch's blog

How stupid items get onto standardized tests « Diane Ravitch's blog:

How stupid items get onto standardized tests

Click on picture to Listen to Diane Ravitch

Many people have wondered how the New York State Education Department permitted the nonsensical story about the pineapple and the hare to get onto the state test.

This is not the first time a really bad reading passage got onto the test and it won’t be the last.

State Commissioner John King was quick to issue a defensive statement saying that people were reading the story “out of context,” as if the full story made sense (it didn’t). And he was quick to pin the blame on teachers, who supposedly had reviewed all the test items. It was the teachers’ fault, not his. In an era where Accountability is the hallmark of education policy, King was quick to refuse any accountability for what happened on his watch. These days, the ones at the top never accept accountability for what goes wrong, that’s for the “little people” like

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Pineapple Rebellion in full swing

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Pineapple Rebellion in full swing:

Pineapple Rebellion in full swing

by Mike Klonsky

Sometimes it happens that way. A single insipid test question has sparked a rebellion and shone a light, not only on current standardized testing practices, but on the whole testing industry and its leading profiteer,Pearson Publishing.

The N.Y. Times reports:

Anti-testing activists have taken up the cudgel, saying that the passage and the multiple-choice questions associated with it perfectly illustrate the absurdity of standardized testing. And by Friday afternoon, the state education commissioner had decided that the questions would not count in students’ official scores.

For its part, Pearson took a passage from Daniel Pinkwater's nonsensical story, The Hare and the Pineapple, distorted it and then asked N.Y. 8th-graders some stupid, irrelevant multiple-choice questions for which there were no right answers. As Pinkwater explains:

I was caught up in the brouhaha that arose from an excerpt from a book of mine, edited out of any resemblance to what I wrote, and included in what was described to me as a “high stakes” test administered to all the eighth-graders in New York....On the test, the story makes even less

NEWS FLASH: Malloy Hits New Low As He Misleads Minority Community on Education Reform - Wait, What?

NEWS FLASH: Malloy Hits New Low As He Misleads Minority Community on Education Reform - Wait, What?:

NEWS FLASH: Malloy Hits New Low As He Misleads Minority Community on Education Reform

One story in today’s Hartford Courant is about Governor Malloy’s visit last night to the Faith Congregational Church where he explained that if the 81 state representatives and 27 or 28 senators from the poorest (and most minority) districts voted for his version of the “Education Reform” bill – it would pass. (CTMirror also has a story)

Governor Malloy suggested that his version of the “Education Reform” bill was the only way to improve educational opportunity for Connecticut’s minority students and that anyone who opposed his bill was dedicated to preventing minority students from achieving.

To call his statement a bold-faced lie is being generous.

According to the Courant, Malloy claimed that his plan was the best because it focused

A Sociological Eye on Education | Aaron’s fable

A Sociological Eye on Education | Aaron’s fable:

Aaron’s fable

Pineapple (courtesy of Alvesgaspar)

(The fable below will make more sense if you know the following: Last week, New York eighth-graders taking the state’s English Language Arts assessment were subjected to six exam questions based on a bizarre and incomprehensible passage featuring a talking pineapple. State Education Commissioner John King Jr.defended the passage, but said that these questions wouldn’t count. Also last week, New York Timescolumnist David Brooks wrote a column calling for value-added assessment in colleges and universities to ensure their accountability to the parents who foot the bill for their children’s schooling. This introduction, gentle reader, is what’s known as content knowledge to support reading comprehension.)

In olden times, pundits, professors and the animals of the forest could speak English just like you and I can. One day, a pundit challenged a professor to a contest. “You, a pundit, have the nerve to challenge me, a

COMMUNITY KILLER? Radical District reorganization, 64 school closings planned | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Radical District reorganization, 64 school closings planned | Philadelphia Public School Notebook:

Radical District reorganization, 64 school closings planned

by Dale Mezzacappa on Apr 24 2012 Posted in Latest news

Tags:

District staff and consultants are recommending asweeping overhaul of how public schools in Philadelphia operate, planning to close 64 schools over the next five years and divvy up those that remain among “achievement networks” led by teams of educators or nonprofit institutions.

The achievement networks would have 20 to 30 schools each and be connected by either geography or a common, creative approach to teaching and learning. The leaders of the network, which could include successful principals, would have

My new blog « Diane Ravitch's blog

My new blog « Diane Ravitch's blog:

My new blog

April 24, 2012 //

I decided to start my own blog because I was overusing Twitter and treating it as a miniblog, which it isn’t.

My weekly blog at Bridging Differences is great fun for me, and I love the format of exchanging letters with Deborah Meier. That format creates a certain aura of informality and encourages me to speak freely in a non-academic tone, the way one speaks to a friend. So, I don’t know where this will go, and I don’t know if I will succeed in remembering: 1) how to access my new blog; 2) my user name; 3) my password.

But if I can overcome these hurdles, I look forward to writing blogs on a near-daily basis, unconfined by the 140 character limit of Twitter, thus relieving my Twitter followers of the cascade of tweets that now clutter their Twitter feed from me.

National resolution against high-stakes tests released - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

National resolution against high-stakes tests released - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post:

National resolution against high-stakes tests released

By Valerie Strauss

A national resolution protesting high-stakes standardized testing was released Tuesday by a coalition of national education, civil rights and parents groups, as well as educators who are trying to build a broad-based movement against the Obama administration’s test-centric school reform program.

This is the latest in a series of recent initiatives taken around the country by academics, educators, parents and others to protest the use of student standardized test scores for high-stakes decisions, including teacher and principal evaluation, student grade promotion and high school graduation.

The high-stakes testing era started with the advent of No Child Left Behind in 2002, and though NCLB has largely been discredited, the Obama administration’s policies have expanded the use of test scores as assessment tools not only for students, but also for teachers and

The Problem Is Bigger Than a Pineapple - Bridging Differences - Education Week

The Problem Is Bigger Than a Pineapple - Bridging Differences - Education Week:

The Problem Is Bigger Than a Pineapple

by Diane Ravitch

Dear Deborah,
The backlash against high-stakes standardized testing is growing into a genuine nationwide revolt. Nearly 400 school districts in Texas have passed a resolution opposing high-stakes testing, and the number increases every week. Nearly a third of the principals in New York state (some at risk of losing their jobs) have signed a petition against the state's new and untried, high-stakes, test-based evaluation system.
Today, a group of organizations devoted to education, civil rights, and children issued a national resolution against high-stakes testing modeled on the Texas resolution. The National Testing Resolution urges citizens to join the rebellion against the testing that now has a choke-hold on children and their teachers. It calls on governors, legislatures, and state boards of education to re-examine their accountability systems, to reduce their reliance on standardized tests, and to increase their support for students and schools.
The National Testing Resolution calls on the Obama administration and Congress to "reduce the testing mandates, promote multiple forms of evidence of student learning and school quality in accountability, and not mandate any fixed role for the use of student test scores in evaluating educators".

Losing it in Louisiana : Are All Schools Mandated to Find 10% of Teachers Ineffective?

Louisiana Educator: Are All Schools Mandated to Find 10% of Teachers Ineffective?:

Are All Schools Mandated to Find 10% of Teachers Ineffective?

by Michael Deshotels

Is Superintendent White really serious about requiring that 10% of public school teachers be rated as “ineffective”? If so, will this be mandated on a school-by-school basis or on a school system basis or on a statewide basis? Comments from some of my readers this week prompted me to research this issue further. The following is an exact reprint of a statement in the Act 54 evaluation plan recently submitted by White to the US Dept. of Education as part of the ESEA Flexibility Request. Judge for yourself what it means.

“4. Establishing Measures of Effectiveness: For teachers where value added data is available, the composite percentile is converted to a 1.0-5.0 scale to use in the teacher’s final evaluation. Teachers and leaders (school-wide) whose value added, composite percentile fall within the bottom 10% will receive an ineffective rating. Teachers in the middle 20-80% range will receive a rating of effective. The top 10% of teachers will receive a rating of highly effective.”

Since that plan was submitted, White has announced that the rating scale will be changed from a 5 level scale

ALEC MATCH? Gov. Christie, Newark Mayor Cory Booker to speak at pro-school voucher national meeting | NJ.com

Gov. Christie, Newark Mayor Cory Booker to speak at pro-school voucher national meeting | NJ.com:

Gov. Christie, Newark Mayor Cory Booker to speak at pro-school voucher national meeting

Aristide Economopoulos/The Star-LedgerNewark Mayor Cory Booker, left, and Gov. Chris Christie will speak at The American Federation for Children's national police meeting next week in Jersey City

JERSEY CITY — Gov. Chris Christie and Newark Mayor Cory Booker will speak to a pro-school voucher group next week in Jersey City.

The two New Jersey politicians will be joined by Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who will travel to the Garden State only two weeks after the he signed a bill that creates a statewide voucher program that will use tax dollars to send children to private schools.

The American Federation for Children said Monday that Jindal is participating in its 2012 national policy meeting, which is set for May 3 and 4 at the Westin Jersey City Newport in Jersey City.

The Louisiana statewide voucher program will begin with the 2012-13 school year, available to low-

Now wait, who is that grassroots group Students for Education Reform? - Wait, What?

Now wait, who is that grassroots group Students for Education Reform? - Wait, What?:

Now wait, who is that grassroots group Students for Education Reform?

by jonpelto

porcupine backs into a cactus -

Beware of AstroTurf Ed Reformers

porcupine backs into a cactus

On April 19, 2012, 60 college students held a rally at the State Capitol demanding that the Legislature pass Governor Malloy “Education Reform” bill.

Students For Education Reform’s Connecticut director claimed that students were coming from a dozen different Connecticut campuses and that the cost of the rally included $10,000 for all the buses and then some for sandwiches for all the participants.

Although the Governor could not make time for Michelle Rhee’s “Education Reform” Rally last month, he was able to come out and speak to the students at this rally saying “this package that we put together will move Connecticut from where it is in the back of the pack to where it should be at the front of the classroom.”

Now, unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make the event but had I been there; here is the interview I believe I would have had with the event’s coordinators.

**Question: So you are from Students for Education Reform?

SFER Answer: Yes, yes we are. We’re Students for Education Reform but you

Just Like Michelle Rhee's Students first only BETTER

Astroturf lobbying refers to political organizations or campaigns that appear to be made up of grassroots activists but are actually organized and run by corporate interests seeking to further their own agendas. Such groups are often typified by innocent-sounding names that have been chosen specifically to disguise the group's true backers

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