'Nation at Risk' warnings about shortcomings in US education 30 years ago still resonate today | StarTribune.com

'Nation at Risk' warnings about shortcomings in US education 30 years ago still resonate today | StarTribune.com:

'Nation at Risk' warnings about shortcomings in US education 30 years ago still resonate today

• Article by: PHILIP ELLIOTT , Associated Press 
• Updated: April 24, 2013 - 2:34 AM

WASHINGTON - U.S. students are falling behind their international rivals. Young people aren't adept at new technology. America's economy will suffer if schools don't step up their game.

"A Nation at Risk," the report issued 30 years ago by President Ronald Reagan's Education Department, was meant as a wake-up call for the country. It spelled out where the United States was coming up short in education and what steps could be taken to avert a crisis.

But its warnings still reverberate today, with 1 in 4 Americans failing to earn a high school degree on time and the U.S. lagging other countries in the percentage of young people who complete college.

"A Nation at Risk" spooked the public, urged an overhaul of how and what children are taught and sparked the school reform movement in the country. Current reform advocates such Michelle Rhee, the former District of Columbia schools chancellor, and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush can trace their work back to the report.

"We opened the genie from the bottle and said, `You aren't doing so well,'" said Xavier University of Louisiana President Norman C. Francis, a member of the commission that produced the dire warning. "For us, we felt good about the fact that we wrote something that needed to be said. We had the research. And we hoped we 

MORNING UPDATE LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 4-24-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all:

Shameless StudentsFirst Tries to Buy Iowa

by dianerav

Even though Michelle Rhee suffered multiple embarrassments in the past few weeks–with John Merrow reporting her refusal to investigate the cheating scandal that occurred on her watch and the Broader Bolder Approach reporting the failure of her “reforms”—her organization continues to push her failed “reforms” on states across the nation.
StudentsFirst pumped over $317,000 into legislative races in Iowa to ensure that legislators would listen to its radical, anti-public education message. It was the single biggest contributor to state races in 2012.
Now it is filling the airwaves with ads urging the legislature to adopt changes that will advance Rhee’s personal vendetta against teachers and public education.
She demands that teacher evaluations be tied to test scores, even though research and experience have shown 

Common Core: Are Schools Ready?

by dianerav

Paul E. Barton, an experienced education researcher and author of the book National Standards: Getting Beneath the Surface, is concerned that the implementation of the Common Core standards is happening too quickly. He wrote this post for this blog:

A Critical Stage for the Common Core

The much-anticipated Common Core Standards have been rolled out—and widely praised—and tests based on the standards are being created. Now is a really critical stage when teachers must be trained and a curriculum created, and states and schools seem to be on their own. The standards have been described as very rigorous and challenging, requiring teachers to learn new pedagogies. These tasks will be both time consuming and expensive.

The early returns publicly available are worrisome. A recent Education Week story bore the headline, “Teachers 

Testing Madness Goes Totally Nuts

by dianerav

Woodrow Wilson High School in Washington, DC, warned students that anyone who did not take the DC tests would not be allowed to play in my athletic activities next year.
In addition, the school posted a table of prizes and raffle tickets that students could win every day they took the tests.
Says the school: “DCCAS Testing Schedule – We will be administering the DCCAS April 23-25, 2013 to all scholars that have been identified to take one or more of the assessments. Scholars who do not show for a

Paul Barton on Common Core Implementation

by dianerav

Paul Barton, an experienced analyst of trends in American education, has written this piece to emphasize the importance of appropriate implementation of the Common Core standards. He warns that testing should not begin until teachers are prepared, a curriculum is in place and has been taught, and teachers have the materials they need.
A Critical Stage for the Common Core
​The much-anticipated Common Core Standards have been rolled out and tests based on the standards are being created. Now is a really critical stage when teachers must be trained and a curriculum created, and states and schools seem to be on their own. The standards have been described as very rigorous and challenging, requiring 

Jersey Jazzman Says John Merrow “Created” Michelle Rhee

by dianerav

Jersey Jazzman deconstructs John Merrow’s post “Who Created Michelle Rhee?”
If you recall, Merrow spread the blame for her undeserved celebrity among four suspects:
1. Rhee herself, by inflating her resume
2. The media, including himself, for featuring her 12 times on PBS
3. Rightwing funders
4. The unions because of their intransigence.
JJ pins the blame for Rhee on…..read it yourself.

Did John White Pull Out of inBloom or Not?

by dianerav

Mercedes Schneider tries to figure out what John White did or did not do in relation to Louisiana’s agreement to share confidential student data with the Gates-Murdoch inBloom project. It appears that the state board of education never knew about this arrangement and that it was a secret deal made by John White.
Is there some kind of secret government-corporate group that makes these deals about students without bothering to inform democratically elected officials?

This Blog: One Year Old, 4 Million + Hits

by dianerav

One year ago today, I started this blog.
This week, on April 21, the blog reached 4 million page views.
I had no idea when I started a year ago that the blog would turn into a platform for parents, students, teachers, principals, superintendents, school board members, and everyone else who is dissatisfied with the status quo.
The people now controlling education policy in Washington and the big foundations are defenders of 

David Berliner on “A Nation at Risk”: Three Decades of Lies

by dianerav

Three Decades of Lies

We have endured 30 years of lies, half-truths, and myths. Bruce Biddle and I debunked many of these untruths in our book, The Manufactured Crisis, in 1995. But more falsehoods continue to surface all the time. The most recent nonsense was “U. S. Education Reform and National Security,” a report presented to us last year by Joel Klein and Condoleezza Rice. A Nation at Risk had us losing the political and economic races to the Soviet Union and Japan. Did we? No. Our economy took off, the Soviet political system collapsed, and Japan’s economy has retreated for two decades. So much for the predictions of A Nation at Risk.

Diane in the Evening 4-23-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

mike simpson at Big Education Ape - 3 hours ago

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all: Be Wary of This Website by dianerav About once a week, I receive emails from an organization I do not know. It contains beautiful graphics claiming to rate different aspects of education. Usually I delete without opening, but this one caught my eye because it said it was rating the states. The email says: “Hi Diane, “Ever wonder how your state working to create a better education system? Please take a look at this infographic based on data from the State of Education: State Policy Report Card 2013. Feel free t... more »

School-to-Prison Pipeline: Wrong Lessons From Sandy Hook

School-to-Prison Pipeline: Wrong Lessons From Sandy Hook:

School-to-Prison Pipeline: Wrong Lessons From Sandy Hook

by Jeff Bryant

By now, there have been plenty of negative reactions to last week’s defeat of sensible gun regulation in the U.S. Senate due to the power of the gun lobby to have more sway with senators than popular opinion has.

In his Rose Garden address, President Obama was incredulous that legislation favored by90 percent of Americans couldn’t get 60 votes in the Senate.

News stories about the bill’s defeat invariably referenced the origin of the bill in the “tragedy” of the horrific shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

Even former U.S. House Representative Gabrielle Giffords – an ardent backer of the bill and a victim of gun violence herself – castigated the senators’ fear of the gun lobby as a shameful contrast to “the fear the first graders in Sandy Hook Elementary School felt as their lives ended by a hail of bullets.”

The quick take on this might lead you to believe that the massacre of innocent school children in Newtown has had little to no effect on how Americans have dealt with school 

John White’s crumbling house of cards – From VAM to worse | Crazy Crawfish's Blog

John White’s crumbling house of cards – From VAM to worse | Crazy Crawfish's Blog:

John White’s crumbling house of cards – From VAM to worse

by crazycrawfish

These days John White might be needing a hug. It appears all the ill-will he has sown over the past year is coming home to roost on his doorstep, all at the same time.

Support the Louisiana Student Privacy Act

Recently we called out White for lying to everyone in the state of Louisiana over carelessly and needlessly exposing all of our school children to unnecessary risks by handing over their some of their most private data to companies hoping to make a profit off the information by direct marketing products to children, charging the state millions of dollars for the privilege of using their storage services, and by marketing and providing this information to unlimited third party vendors. I encourage the legislature to craft and pass the Louisiana Student Privacy Act, which will go further than FERPA (the Federal Student Privacy Act) and actually protect our children’s privacy instead of selling it to anyone who asks.

Reject House Bill 650 – DOE reorg

White is trying to push through a bill that supporting the reorganization of the Louisiana Department of Education, about a year too late according to this DOE employee: (Link to testimony from April 11^th)

Last week Beth Scioneaux indicated in House Education that the LDOE is going to lose another 34 positions. She didn’t say how many actual bodies were going to be lost but the numbers are getting pretty low with the exception of the TFA types. Erin Bendily lied through her teeth when she said that the department wasn’t working under the proposed reorg. White starting putting 

A Wyoming School’s Common Core Gag Order | Truth in American Education

A Wyoming School’s Common Core Gag Order | Truth in American Education:

A Wyoming School’s Common Core Gag Order

by Shane Vander Hart

I received this email from a 6th grade teacher in Wyoming whose school placed a gag order on her regarding her opposition to the Common Core State Standards.  I’m withholding her name to protect her privacy (and career).

I am currently a teacher in a smaller district in Wyoming. I attended a Wyoming Department of Education training for the ELA Common Core Standards in July, prior to starting the 2012/2013 school year. I came to this training knowing only that Wyoming, along with 45 others states were choosing to adopt the standards fully by 2015. The WDE presenters were suggesting we use some of the methods I had been trained to use in Utah, and had previously used when I taught there. Since our state and district benchmarks would not be fully aligned with textbooks, curriculum, and testing until 2015, I wanted to get a head start.

I looked into what my former colleagues were doing in Utah. This is when I discovered the 

UPDATE: #blogtalkradio: A primer of sorts + Thinkers or Test Takers? – @ THE CHALK FACE knows SCHOOLS MATTER

Thinkers or Test Takers? – @ THE CHALK FACE knows SCHOOLS MATTER:

At the Chalk Face on #blogtalkradio: A primer of sorts

by Chalk Face, PhD

We have to brag a little bit. The weekly radio show makes us unique because it supports the commentary we do, and vice versa. We work our BEE-hinds off to bring everyone stories and conversations that don’t get covered, related to education and public schools. In addition to our weekly shows at 6PM EST on [...]

The palpable racism of school closures

by Chalk Face, PhD

There I said it. School closure policies are racist. Not necessarily bigoted, but indeed racist. Look up the difference.

Thinkers or Test Takers?

APRIL 24, 2013 BY CHRIS CERRONE 2 COMMENTS

Here are the thoughts from a colleague, John Borden, after the first day of the New York State ELA Assessment last week:

 

On Tuesday, the ten and eleven year old children in my class began taking the 2013 Grade Five Common Core English Language Arts Test. The students had 90 minutes to read a number of passages and answer multiple choice questions. These passages, with their increased “rigor,” challenged the children to read carefully and think critically about what they read before attempting to answer the questions.

For about 45 minutes I watched my students read the passages, often more than once. I watched them pause after each paragraph to think about what they had read. I watched them take notes. I watched them highlight. I watched them 

Of Partisanship and Education “Reform”

by Kris Nielsen

This is a different topic for me.  I would rather write about teaching, parenting, and what’s best for kids.  But I’m often asked about my affiliations, my political leanings, and my feelings about other issues.  First, there is no other issue right now for me.  I feel a sense of urgency about the course of [...]

How private money is driving public education policy:

How private money is driving public education policy

Posted by Valerie Strauss on April 24, 2013 at 5:00 am

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In this era of school reform, private foundations and wealthy philanthropists have used their money to play a big role in helping to shape public education state and federal policy. Here’s an interesting piece that describes the history of  such giving and considers whether it is a good idea. It was written by Stanley N. Katz, who teaches public and international affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University and is president emeritus of the American Council of Learned Societies. This essay appeared in Stanford Social InnovationReview, Spring 2013, and on Larry Cuban’s School Reform and Classroom Practice blog.

By Stanley N. Katz

Twenty-five years ago, if I had been asked to describe the attitude of the major foundations toward education policy, my answer would have been that they were predictably supporting the reform ideas of the leading K-12 academic specialists, who were then concentrated in the best graduate schools of education, especially those at Stanford and Harvard Universities. Lots of ideas were circulating, of course, but the “hot” idea, largely emanating from Stanford, was that of “systemic reform”—the notion that we had not gotten very far by undertaking piecemeal improvements. We needed to come up with grand strategies to improve the entire public education system.

This movement was very much a collaboration between university experts, leading national K-12 organizations, and large foundations. In those days nearly all of the big foundations (Rockefeller, Ford, Pew, MacArthur, and Atlantic) had senior program officers (and 

Is the Common Core Standards initiative in trouble?

by Valerie Strauss

Education Secretary Arne Duncan recently met with Chamber of Commerce leaders and urged them to be more vocal and forceful in defending the Common Core State Standards. Why? Duncan made the appeal, which was reported by Education Week, because the … Continue reading →

A brief history of Pearson’s problems with testing

by Valerie Strauss

A few days ago I wrote a post about how Pearson, the world’s largest education company, was forced to apologize for making errors in its scoring of assessments for entry into gifted-and-talented programs in New York City public schools. I … Continue reading →

Has Jeb Bush’s Foundation Created a Faux Parents Group to Support Parent Trigger? | Scathing Purple Musings

Has Jeb Bush’s Foundation Created a Faux Parents Group to Support Parent Trigger? | Scathing Purple Musings:

Has Jeb Bush’s Foundation Created a Faux Parents Group to Support Parent Trigger?

by Bob Sikes

Scathing Purple Musings discovered last August that Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Florida’s Future (FFF) had created a petition to support its efforts to pass Parent Trigger. Not many had signed the petition and many of the one’s who did were employees of one of Bush’s two foundations. At the time of the post, top Bush advisor Patricia Levesque even signed the petition twice. Shortly after the August post was published, Levesque’s June 12 signature disappeared.
At any rate, the petition is back. Only this time with new packaging. Sunshine Parents has this mini-documentary film  that was sent to legislators during the past week and includes  this note:

We want to be sure our sons and daughters are getting the very best educational opportunities, regardless of circumstances. The voices of all families should be heard in decisions about how to improve schools and where and what type of school our children attend. Senate Bill 862 and House 

One Teacher's Perspective: Dittoing Diane on School Vouchers

One Teacher's Perspective: Dittoing Diane on School Vouchers:

Dittoing Diane on School Vouchers

by Imagine Wisconsin

Yesterday's release of Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) choice school data is ditto to what Diane Ravitch has been reporting on Wisconsin's voucher program for some time.

America's premier education historian, Diane Ravitch has been building the case that Wisconsin’s “voucher schools perform no better than public schools.”  

For the third straight year since being required to pony up test scores, Wisconsin's voucher schools trail neighboring public schools in reading and math scores and lag significantly behind the state averages in student achievement, according to DPI's reporting.

Ravitch dedicated a big chunk of her landmark book, The Death and Life of the American School System, to the flaws and failures of voucher systems in Wisconsin and elsewhere. Ravitch can add DPI’s 2013 data to her pile of reports showing how Milwaukee's and Racine's voucher schools have

We Are Chicago Students, and We are Here to Save Our Schools! - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher

We Are Chicago Students, and We are Here to Save Our Schools! - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher:

We Are Chicago Students, and We are Here to Save Our Schools!

by Anthony Cody

Today many Chicago students will not be in their schools. One of them has written this, explaining the reasons why.

Guest post by Brian Sturgis.
I'm a senior at Paul Robeson high school, and I'm an organizer with Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools (CSOSOS). We are led by students from across Chicago in 25 different high schools and we believe in justice and equality for all. Today over 300 Chicago students are boycotting, including 100 juniors who are boycotting the state exam, to tell Chicago Public Schools and Mayor Rahm Emanuel that we are over-tested, under-resourced and fed up!
Mayor Emanuel and his Board of Education want to close 54 grammar schools around the city, all of which are in black and Latino communities: this is racist. These schools are also being judged based on assessments and tests given throughout the year: this is foolish. These school closings will leave neighborhoods dismantled, parents lost, students unaccounted for, and more importantly, will put children in harmful situations: this is dangerous.
My alma mater, Benjamin Banneker elementary, is one of 

Cartoons on Preschool | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Cartoons on Preschool | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

Cartoons on Preschool

by larrycuban

Recently, I posted two pieces on preschools. In writing those pieces, I began collecting cartoons.  Cartoonists exaggerate key ideas–thus, the humor–driving the national passion for starting school earlier and earlier, collecting credentials in the race to get into college, pushing toddlers up the ladder of financial success, and giving Mommy and Daddy a break from racing around. Often, they poke at the pretentiousness of middle- and upper-middle class parents seeking the edge for their three year-old. So here they are in a monthly feature of my blog.* Enjoy!

Why We Need Principals | Connected Principals

Why We Need Principals | Connected Principals:

Why We Need Principals

by sleibowitz

There are questions that resonate, holding our imaginations and keeping us wondering. There are questions that activate our learning, causing us to reflect and helping us to grow.
Do We Need Principals? asked  Josh Stumpenhorst in a blog post last May.
Do We Need (Great) Principals? responded George Couros replying to a question with a question in a blog post published shortly thereafter.
Recently Josh Stumpenhorst may have answered his own question with another post, this time an affirmation rather than a question:  We Need Leaders #cpchat.
Once overcoming my initial defensiveness at the very thought that principals might not be needed, I began to ponder a number of related questions. Do we need principals? Do we need great principals? What makes a principal great? Do we need leaders? Do we need great leaders? What makes a leader great? As a principal and 

Jersey Jazzman: Newark Says "Enough!"

Jersey Jazzman: Newark Says "Enough!":

Newark Says "Enough!"

by Duke

Ruh-roh:

The Newark Schools Advisory Commission this evening issued a unanimous no-confidence vote in the leadership of Schools Superintendent Cami Anderson.

The vote was 9-0.

The board earlier this month rejected the budget Anderson submitted, and tonight reiterated its assessment that Anderson has not fostered a relationship with board members.

The board again complained about what it cited as Anderson's lack of transparency regarding her