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Monday, July 9, 2012

2012 NEA Representative Assembly - YouTube

2012 NEA Representative Assembly - YouTube:


2012 NEA Representative Assembly

 Play all

One Teacher’s Opinion on Common Core – Be Wise in the Sniffing. « Continuing Change

One Teacher’s Opinion on Common Core – Be Wise in the Sniffing. « Continuing Change:


One Teacher’s Opinion on Common Core – Be Wise in the Sniffing.

My comment on Diane Ravitch’s blog today. Diane writes,
“In these times of austerity, I wonder how much money districts and states have available to implement the standards faithfully. I wonder how much money they will put into professional development. I wonder about the quality of the two new assessments that the U.S. Department of Education laid out $350 million for.
These are things I wonder. But how can I possibly pass judgment until I find out how the standards work in real classrooms with real children and real teachers?”http://dianeravitch.net/2012/07/09/my-view-of-the-common-core-standards/#comment-8220
There are many people commenting below her blog. I added the following response: 
.
As a teacher, this is what I see. Here in FL, we had Sunshine State Standards. Then, they rewrote 

Behind the scenes, Boston Consulting Group has been a driving force on labor negotiations, school closings, and charters | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Behind the scenes, Boston Consulting Group has been a driving force on labor negotiations, school closings, and charters | Philadelphia Public School Notebook:


Behind the scenes, Boston Consulting Group has been a driving force on labor negotiations, school closings, and charters

by Benjamin Herold for the Notebook and WHYY/Newsworks

 

The Boston Consulting Group has identified up to 60 Philadelphia school buildings as potential candidates for closure and helped line up private vendors willing to replace the School District’s unionized blue-collar workforce at a $50 million discount.
These steps are just part of the blue chip consulting firm’s far-ranging behind-the-scenes effort to help the beleaguered city school system rethink how it does business.
The broad scope of BCG’s efforts this spring are detailed in previously unreleased “statements of work” obtained by the Notebook/NewsWorks under Pennsylvania’s Right to Know law.
Read the documents:
Featured Title: 
Knudsen: District ‘absolutely’ must close 40 schools by Sept. 2013
read more


United Way: BCG funding arrangement messy, but no conspiracy

by Benjamin Herold for the Notebook and WHYY/Newsworks


Private philanthropists have been using a complicated series of pass-throughs to fund the Boston Consulting Group’s far-reaching work to help overhaul the School District of Philadelphia.
But where critics see a coordinated back-channel effort to privatize the city’s public education system, Jill Michal sees evidence of an unusual consensus among Philadelphia’s civic leadership to actively engage in the city’s troubled school system.
read more

Oakland’s special education reorganization: a parent’s critique - The Education Report - Katy Murphy's blog on Oakland schools

Oakland’s special education reorganization: a parent’s critique - The Education Report - Katy Murphy's blog on Oakland schools:


Oakland’s special education reorganization: a parent’s critique


Monday, July 9th, 2012 at 9:36 am in No Comments
Stacey Smith is an Oakland school district parent and volunteer who has served on the District GATE Advisory Committee, the school board’s Special Committee on School Based Management, and the Community Advisory Committee for Special Education. I invited her to contribute periodically to The Education Report; any topic she writes about — including the below piece – does not reflect the view of any group. — Katy
By now you may know that the Oakland school board voted to reinstate $1.75 million in cuts it was asked to approve on June 27. The program specialists still have their jobs, and the Community Advisory Committee for Special Education was assured that class sizes and caseloads would not increase and that vacant positions would be filled for 2012-13.
In a press release vetted by high-level special education, finance, and Leadership, Curriculum and Instruction 

The coo coo birds leave DC and fly to Detroit for the AFT convention. « Fred Klonsky

The coo coo birds leave DC and fly to Detroit for the AFT convention. « Fred Klonsky:


The coo coo birds leave DC and fly to Detroit for the AFT convention.


As I was flying to DC for the NEA RA I was sent a copy of a challenge to the NEA from a group of standardized testing critics (which I am as well). If you go back and read the posts and comments that followed you know that this got all very heated.
All that anti-union invective seemed  odd to me, since the NEA RA did pass a New Business Item offering support for parents who have their children opt out. This didn’t stop the barrage of attacks on my union and the 9,000 delegates, teachers and other education workers who attended the national meeting.
Now some of these same goofy critics are going after the other national teacher union. The AFT holds their 

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The Nat'l. Resolution on High Stakes Testing

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The Nat'l. Resolution on High Stakes Testing:


The Nat'l. Resolution on High Stakes Testing

In the mail box

From: Bob Schaeffer at FairTest

Thank you for endorsing the National Resolution on High-Stakes Testing!

The Resolution campaign is off to a great start. We now have more than 10,000 individual signatures and endorsements from nearly 400 organizations. Our work has earned national attention, including from the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.

The Resolution has generated particular strength in Florida. School boards in several of the state's largest districts and the state PTA have endorsed it, and the Florida State School Board Association passed a parallel 

Pat LaMarche: Dept. of Education Latest Report Shows More than 1% of School Kids in 2011 Were Homeless

Pat LaMarche: Dept. of Education Latest Report Shows More than 1% of School Kids in 2011 Were Homeless:


Dept. of Education Latest Report Shows More than 1% of School Kids in 2011 Were Homeless


Last month the U.S. Department of Education issued their most recent report on the education of homeless children. The results -- which even the agency admits are incomplete -- paint a bleak picture of the nation and its glut of homeless kids.
When it comes to homelessness, the numbers are only as good as the reporting mechanisms, the diligence of the agencies and school departments involved, and the courage of the parents who must admit to authorities that they and their children are homeless.
Many states deem homelessness as a form of neglect and place homeless kids into foster care. Living in a state like this -- or fearing that one does -- keeps parents from seeking services for their homeless children. That fear keeps the number of homeless children artificially low.
With the caveat acknowledged and accepted that the numbers the Department of Education issued 

National Teacher of the Year: 'The revolution begins with us' – Schools of Thought - CNN.com Blogs

National Teacher of the Year: 'The revolution begins with us' – Schools of Thought - CNN.com Blogs:


National Teacher of the Year: 'The revolution begins with us'



National Teacher of the Year: 'The revolution begins with us'
2012 National Teacher of the Year Rebecca Mieliwocki spoke at the NEA annual meeting on July 5.

 By Donna Krache and Jamie Gumbrecht, CNN
(CNN) - The United States is obsessed with high-stakes testing that doesn't show whether teachers are masterful and students are knowledgeable, National Teacher of Year Rebecca Mieliwocki said to nearly 8,000 of her colleagues at the National Education Association annual meeting Thursday.
"When we help a child reach proficiency at any grade level, we have changed the quality of that child's life and that community forever," she said. "But aiming for proficiency means we aim to create generations of children who are average."
Instead, she said "people who haven't set foot in a classroom" should not be making decisions and policies about teaching, and teachers should be aiming to take all students - whether hungry, homeless, in the midst of their first crush or celebrating the big game - beyond the test.
"We have got to stop talking about testing and start talking more about developing, supporting and celebrating teachers," she said. "Teachers are the 

Politicians Ignore Research, Say Smaller Class Size Makes No Difference | NEA Today

Politicians Ignore Research, Say Smaller Class Size Makes No Difference | NEA Today:


Politicians Ignore Research, Say Smaller Class Size Makes No Difference

July 9, 2012 by twalker  
Filed under Featured NewsTop Stories
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By Ava Wallace
Michigan high school teacher Laura Sauer teaches two class periods that are nearly identical in demographics but much less similar in academic achievement. One of Sauer’s English classes has consistently higher test scores, and consistently better writing samples and class presentations.
What makes that difference, Sauer explains, is the number of students in each class.
Sauer’s better-performing English class is made up of 20 students while her other period has 30 students, a disparity she attributes to her school’s scheduling system.
“This has happened throughout my teaching career,” Sauer said. “And the students in the smaller class know that their education is better. They tell me, ‘I would much rather be in this class.’”
Sauer is just one of the countless educators across the nation who are incredulous that politicians are still questioning whether class size really matters. The issue was spotlighted last month when presumptive 
Related posts:
  1. Does Class Size Really Matter?
  2. Is Increasing Class Size a Good Way To Save School Dollars?
  3. How Effective Family Engagement Makes a Difference

Aesthetic Thinking: The Forgotten Dimension in Higher Education | Miguel Angel Escotet

Aesthetic Thinking: The Forgotten Dimension in Higher Education | Miguel Angel Escotet:


Aesthetic Thinking: The Forgotten Dimension in Higher Education

Science and art, as dimensions of creative thought, are universal in nature and develop to the full in freedom. Science stimulates the cognitive processes of the individual involved and art the emotions, but the cognitive and emotional elements coexist in both. Through science it is possible to experience aesthetic enjoyment, and with art it is possible to develop knowledge unfettered. As a scientist myself, I consider essential for my research to combine a multidiscipline approach in consonance with the interrelation between scientific knowledge, ethics and aesthetics. It is at some extend, to be able to dream for achieving facts. It is combining the utopia with the reality. Never one can be at the expense of the other.
Let us not forget, as Octavio Paz points out, that poets nearly always reach the truth before others do. Neither should we forget the integrated knowledge 

Vouchers Create a Split Between "Ed Reform" Conservatives: Accountability Bean-Counters and the Religious Right | K-12 News Network

Vouchers Create a Split Between "Ed Reform" Conservatives: Accountability Bean-Counters and the Religious Right | K-12 News Network:


Vouchers Create a Split Between “Ed Reform” Conservatives: Accountability Bean-Counters and the Religious Right

The New Republic has an interesting analysis of Louisiana’s experiment in privatization of public schools: Ed Kilgore argues in “How the GOP’s New Education Policy Embraces the Market and Abandons Objective Standards” that vouchers pander to parents as the ultimate source of “accountability.” But this emphasis on parents’ subjective evaluation of a school’s worth (private = religious = my religion = better) flies in the face of technocratic, data-driven assessments that use student standardized test scores as the basis of “stack ranking” teachers and deeming schools failures.
Kilgore says:
Now it may be objected that it’s possible to construct a voucher system less cavalier about school quality than Louisiana’s, and that a Romney Administration Department of Education would do a better job of “vetting” schools. But the conflict between no-strings voucher systems and those based on objective standards is not one of competence, but of philosophy. And moreover, even if a Republican Congress and White House (or states following their lead) were willing to partially 

If K-12 matters most, why doesn’t state budget reflect this? | EdSource Today

If K-12 matters most, why doesn’t state budget reflect this? | EdSource Today:


Robert Manwaring
Robert Manwaring
Polling data (here for example) consistently shows that K-12 education is Californians’ highest state budget priority. Indeed, Gov. Jerry Brown plans to put those beliefs to the test with a $7 billion tax initiative on the November ballot aimed at resolving the state’s chronic budget problems. This initiative will hold education funding hostage, threatening $5.5 billion in K-12 cuts if voters don’t approve the new taxes.
On top of the Brown tax initiative, Molly Munger’s initiative would provide $10 billion annually in new revenues for schools and preschool/early education programs. So voters will get to weigh in not once, but twice on how strongly they want to protect K-12 education.
While this year’s budget may prioritize K-12 education – on the condition that voters are willing to raise taxes – most past budgets have not. In fact, the budget that Gov. Brown signed last month basically left in place the damage done to 

FCMAT » Cali Education Headlines Monday, July 9, 2012

FCMAT » Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team:

Education Headlines

Monday, July 9, 2012

Judge: Tustin district did not illegally move students

A Riverside Superior Court judge ruled the Tustin Unified School District followed state law when it approved construction projects at four schools and transferred students to a vacant elementary school while work is being done.

Schools aren't keeping up with anti-bullying law, grand jury says

Not all Orange County schools have posted anti-discrimination and anti-bullying policies in public places as required by law, an oversight that should be immediately corrected as educators work to curb verbal and physical harassment among students, an Orange County grand jury panel has found.

L.A. schools superintendent shaking up district

Faced with a shocking case of a teacher accused of playing classroom sex games with children for years, Los Angeles schools Superintendent John Deasy delivered a jolt: He removed the school's entire staff - from custodians to the principal - to smash what he called a "culture of silence." The controversial decision underscores the 51-year-old superintendent's shake-up of the lethargic bureaucracy at the nation's second-largest school district.

Perris High school district seeks $153 million bond

Voters in the Perris Union High School District will be asked in November to approve a $153.4 million bond measure for school construction and renovations

West Side projects test real-world use of math as learning tool

In regular algebra class, the textbook would tell students the formula and ask them to calculate permutations. In Leigh Krebs' summer school class, kids got wrapped pieces of candy and had to figure out all the ways those could be arranged, prep work for building a combination lock.

Local schools to benefit from $48.5M in Caltrans grants

Seven campuses in the San Fernando Valley will get new sidewalks, bike lanes and other safety improvements as part of a $48.5 million Safe Routes to School program announced Thursday by Caltrans.

Drummond: Oakland School superintendent wrong target

There is a line between a peaceful demonstration and intimidation. The people who marched to Oakland Unified School District Superintendent Tony Smith's house to protest the closing of five public elementary schools crossed it.

Fremont school board votes down controversial book -- again

In what's becoming an annual showdown that's uncommon in the liberal Bay Area, the Fremont Unified School District board overruled English teacher Teri Hu and rejected novelist Dorothy Allison's "Bastard Out of Carolina" for the AP English supplemental reading list. While the book detailing horrific childhood abuse will remain in school libraries, it can't be taught in class.

Green Dot charter schools move toward merit pay instead of seniority for teachers

Teachers unions in California tend not to be big fans of tying teacher evaluations to test scores or linking pay increases to performance ratings - a concept often referred to as "merit pay." One exception is the teachers union at Green Dot Public Schools, a cluster of 18 charter schools throughout Los Angeles County, including two in the South Bay - Animo Leadership High in Lennox and Animo Inglewood Charter High.

After a false start, California school districts prepare to start a new grade level

After a monthslong guessing game about its fate, a new, two-year kindergarten program will open in hundreds of California school districts in August.

Manwaring: If K-12 matters most, why doesn’t state budget reflect this?

While state and local government is not a zero sum game (as the governor’s and other initiative proposals show), there is a need for spending constraint in other areas of the budget – if California is once again going to prioritize its schools like voters say they want.

Kim-Shree Maufas far outspends school board cohorts

For the third time in less than four years, The Chronicle has uncovered a pattern of excessive and questionable spending by a San Francisco school board member, a practice that has continued despite district promises to increase oversight.

Lotto sales at record levels, produce $1.3 billion for schools

Driven perhaps by years of grim economic news and the promise of instant riches, Californians spent a near-record $4.1 billion on state lottery products through early June 2012 with expectations of closing out the fiscal year at nearly $4.4 billion.

LAUSD offers free, nutrititious food to students over summer

The adage, "There's no such thing as a free lunch" doesn't hold true in Los Angeles Unified, which this month hopes to serve up nearly 500,000 burgers, chicken wings and plates of spaghetti at scores of schools around the district.

Brown names former head of military charter to State Board

Gov. Jerry Brown has named Bruce Holaday, who for five years ran the military charter school in Oakland that Brown founded, the next member of the State Board of Education.

Judge revokes state oversight of 6 schools in prominent charter system

A superior court judge has invalidated the State Board of Education's oversight of one of the state's biggest charter school companies, giving six schools until June 2013 to gain approval from local school districts or be forced to close.

Many school budgets assume Brown’s tax plan will fail, sidestepping cuts for now

Despite Gov. Jerry Brown urging them not to, most California school districts have finalized their 2012-13 budgets based on the worst-case scenario – which is, Brown’s November tax measure fails at the polls. But in so doing, district administrators are undermining a key political argument in support of the tax hike – that without new taxes, schools will be forced to absorb enormous mid-year cuts that could include chopping off up to two weeks of instructional time.
Friday, July 6, 2012

Upland Unified School District eliminates busing for grades 7-12

The school district's Board of Trustees has decided to eliminate home-to-school transportation for students in grades 7-12 to address needed cuts in the 2012-13 fiscal year.

$452,000 to pay for Humboldt school projects

Caltrans awarded $48.5 million in state Safe Routes to School Program funds for 139 projects on Thursday, including four at Humboldt County Schools.

Guzik: Migrant worker children encouraged to consider engineering

As California’s political leaders push educators to link high school classes with career options for their students, an Oxnard high school program has succeeded in getting some of the state’s hardest-to-reach students enthused about careers in engineering.

Clayton Valley Charter High School administrators hit the ground running