Increased Access to Print Materials for Students Who are Blind and Print Disabled | ED.gov Blog

Increased Access to Print Materials for Students Who are Blind and Print Disabled | ED.gov Blog:

Increased Access to Print Materials for Students Who are Blind and Print Disabled

Posted on July 17, 2013 by Guest Blogger

On June 27, 2013, delegates representing over 160 member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), finalized an international treaty that, once ratified, will allow cross-border exchange of published works in specialized formats — braille, large print and audio — increasing access to the content of print materials for persons who are blind and print disabled.

The Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons who are Blind, Visually Impaired, or otherwise Print Disabled is unique in that it represents an international effort to address an issue affecting persons with print disabilities in all parts of the world. The treaty is a first step to eliminating the “book famine,” a phrase first used in a 1970 UNESCO study that addressed the lack of access to print materials in developing countries, but more recently used to describe the dire shortage of accessible texts for persons with print disabilities.

If ratified, the Marrakesh Treaty promises to benefit students and other persons with print disabilities in the United States. Among the potential beneficiaries of this treaty are the over 255,000 students with print disabilities, K-12, currently receiving accessible books through Bookshare, an online library of digital books for people with print disabilities, supported in part through a cooperative agreement with the Department’s Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP).

The Marrakesh Treaty would also permit authorized entities, like Bookshare, and individuals with print disabilities to locate and obtain accessible books from holdings in other countries, including for example, materials in foreign languages, accessible versions of rare books, and specialized STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) texts and materials. Increased availability to a wide range of materials in accessible formats raises the floor for students and others with print disabilities by providing equal access to information, knowledge and education, the keys to meaningful careers and employment and full inclusion in the community.

The final treaty language and additional information about the Marrakesh Diplomatic Conference can be found at http://www.wipo.int/portal/index.html.en

Information on eligibility and accessing materials at Bookshare can be found athttps://www.bookshare.org/

Glinda Hill is an education program specialist in the Office of Special Education Programs at the U.S. Department of Education

Diane in the Evening 7-17-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

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

Rally Against Bloomberg 4th Term

From the NYC Parent blog: Subject line: Join us Thurs 12 noon at City hall., July 18: No 4th term for Bloomberg! Dear Parents, grandparents and Education Activists, I hope that you can come and help turn out fellow parents for an important rally and press conference at noon tomorrow, Thursday, July 18, on the City Hall steps to protest Mayor Bloomberg’s attempt to effectively have a fourth term r

by dianerav / 3min 

A Synonym for “Reform”

This reader says that reformers almost never protest budget cuts. Another word for reform these days is……….neglect. “I think the “abandonment” idea is really powerful. As the parent of a public school kid in Ohio, I really do feel abandoned by both my state government and the federal government. Ordinary local public schools need not apply! The crazy state and federal focus on the 5% of schools t

by dianerav / 17min 

What You Need to Know About CPS Budget Cuts

As we learned in earlier posts (and see here), Chicago Public Schools cuts the central office budget every year. It is ruthless with the central office budget. No one works at headquarters except possibly Barbara Byrd-Bennett. This reader has studied the budget and offers an overview: “Since 2008, CPS has claimed $1.3 BILLION in central office budget cuts. That’s based on an annual budget of som

by dianerav / 16min 

Outrage: How to Destroy Neighborhoods While Making a Profit

Wendy Lecker, civil rights attorney and director of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, read an opinion article in the New York Times and was outraged by its recommendations. Here is her analysis:   It seems like these days, one has to be wary of anyone claiming to “help” poor neighborhoods. An oped in the New York Times on July 13 by Michael Rubinger extolled the virtues of federal “new market tax cr

by dianerav / 16min 

For Shame, Mitch Daniels

An earlier post described efforts by then-Governor Mitch Daniels to make sure that Howard Zinn’s leftist history of the United States was not taught in Indiana’s public schools. But even more alarming is his attempt to shut down Professor Chuck Little of Indiana University, a vocal critic. Little had the audacity to defend public education, which Daniels did his best to privatize. When governmen

by dianerav / 28min 

LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 7-17-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all: Now the Gates Foundation Is Destroying Higher EducationWith $36 billion, the Gates Foundation has too much money, too much power, and not enough common sense nor willingness to listen to those who warn that they are doing harm to basic social institutions. Now the foundation has decided to destroy the civilizing and humanizing miss

by mike simpson / 2h 

ASCD Affiliates Unconference — Whole Child Education

ASCD Affiliates Unconference — Whole Child Education:

THE WHOLE CHILD BLOG

ASCD Affiliates Unconference

July 17, 2013 by Walter McKenzie

Over the past year, in my work with ASCD affiliates, we have been exploring ways to revolutionize the ways we serve their affiliate members. Why? The writing is on the wall that today's educators have different needs and expectations. It's difficult to get out of the classroom to attend conferences, and when educators can get away for professional development they want to be actively engaged in acquiring meaning and building understanding. One concept I have asked affiliates to explore is the deconstruction of conferences, workshops, and seminars into a newly emerging kind of professional development: the unconference.

Why unconference? It's a back-to-basics movement—a new minimalism—wherein the participants define the learning and then contribute to its success. There are no keynote speakers, no concurrent sessions, and no matrix schedules. They can be held anywhere you can find conducive free space so there are literally no overhead costs. And the payoff is that those who attend get to connect, learn, and network for follow-up discussions after the event is over. Sounds intriguing, but scary! As one affiliate board member remarked to me at its summer retreat: "No headliners? No identified agenda? No pre-registration? What if nobody comes?!"

"Take a chance!" I replied. "If nobody comes, then

Interest – perhaps transient – gathers in the House for ESEA reauthorization SI&A Cabinet Report – News & Resources

SI&A Cabinet Report – News & Resources:

Interest – perhaps transient – gathers in the House for ESEA reauthorization 
By Kimberly Beltran
Wednesday, July 17, 2013

A key House panel is set today to consider some 76 amendments to a Republican bill reauthorizing the nation’s top education law – activity that might otherwise suggest that Congress is finally serious about updating the 12-year-old legislation.

Possible additions to H.R. 5 – U.S. Rep. John Kline’s reiteration of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act – include provisions for removing any requirement to carry out teacher evaluations, dropping several testing mandates, providing options to better serve students at risk of dropping out, and improving graduation rates for students with disabilities.

H.R. 5, also known as the Student Success Act, would reauthorize No Child Left Behind – the current version of the ESEA that was adopted in 2001 – and is set for possible floor consideration tomorrow.

With partisan gridlock firmly entrenched in the Capitol, few insiders – if any – expect much to come of the GOP efforts as bigger political battles continue to be waged with the Democratically-controlled Senate and the Obama administration over health care, immigration and even farm subsidies.

The bill, written by Minnesota Republican Kline, also chairman of the House education committee – has received only partisan support thus far.

And, there is an alternate reauthorization proposal, submitted earlier this year by Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa and chair 

‘Stand Your Ground’ group pushes privatization of public education:

Stand Your Ground’ group pushes privatization of public education

By Valerie Strauss, Published: July 17 at 1:51 pmE-mail the writer

ALEC logo of Center for Media and Freedom

The group that pushed “Stand Your Ground” laws in Florida and other states has been mighty busy working to get laws passed in the area of school reform — and the aim has been the privatization of public education.

Theat group is the American Legislative Exchange Council, better known as ALEC, which likes to call itself a “nonpartisan public-private partnership” but is actually acorporate-backed enterprise that writes “model legislation” that its membership of nearly 2,000 conservative legislators use in states to pass laws that promote privatization in every part of American life: education, health care, the environment, the economy, etc.

Bill Moyers, in a program called “United States of ALEC,”  “the most influential corporate-funded political force most of America has never heard of,” one with a “vast network of corporate lobbying and political action aimed to increase corporate profits at public expense without public knowledge.”

As education historian and activist Diane Ravitch explained in this ALEC primer, the 

What Teachers Know - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher

What Teachers Know - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher:

What Teachers Know

By Nancy Flanagan on July 17, 2013 1:26 PM

"What about the teachers unions who insist on this 19th century educational process? We take summers off because that's when people used to farm and stuff because teachers want to go on vacation."

Matt Lewis on Real Time with Bill Maher (7/12/13)

Working with a national non-profit on teacher leadership issues awhile back, the CEO introduced me to a young teacher leader by telling me that she gave her students five minutes to talk before beginning classroom instruction. "Genius!" he said, beaming at the teacher. "She lets kids finish their conversations before demanding their attention!"

Well...OK. It's a useful strategy, and I'm always happy to see novice teachers develop workable ways of engaging their particular kids. But the comment speaks more to what non-teachers see as pedagogical brilliance than a truly ground-breaking idea. This was on full display in Jay Mathews' blog Inside the Class of America's Best Teacher, wherein he quotes--at considerable length--Rafe Esquith's conversation with a student who wants to use the restroom.

With all due respect to Esquith, whose work I greatly admire, I'm not sure that his method of establishing bathroom routines and expectations is a) evidence that Esquith is the best teacher in America or b) workable for any other teacher. That's the thing about the craft 

How Teachers Should Respond to Bullying:

How Teachers Should Respond to Bullying

Setting the stage for responding to bullying:

First, it is important to acknowledge that students rarely bully victims in front of an adult. The chance of a teacher observing bullying is limited. Furthermore, research indicates that only 56% of students report that they have personally observed bullying at school.[1] Therefore, since it is unlikely you will observe a bullying incident first hand, and because so few bullying incidents are reported by students, it is a given fact that children are being bullied at school.

The best approach to prevent bullying is to implement a school wide program, with administrators, parents, staff, students and community all working together toward the same goal, a great school where students feel safe to learn.

Prior to implementing a school wide push, the staff should evaluate the current bullying situation and identify any “hot spots” for bullying at school. Typical hotspots are the lunchroom, restrooms, and the playground. Evaluating the current situation can be accomplished through student interviews, an anonymous reporting box, or staff, student and parent surveys, etc.

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has published a free set of assessment tools for 

FCMAT » Cali Education Headlines Wednesday, July 17, 2013

FCMAT » Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team:

Wealthy schools keep bounty under new funding system

Education Headlines

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

New system offers schools hope

Gloom has been replaced by optimism, and empty pockets have been supplanted by visions of overflowing coffers. But amid California's increasingly sunny financial outlook, the experts who provide direction to the business officials from the state's school districts continue to preach caution.

Monterey and other coastal school districts are looking for teachers

Wanted: special education teachers. Apply almost anywhere in California. Usually by this time of year, most school districts are fully staffed and ready to start the upcoming school cycle. But teachers in some districts had until July 1 to confirm whether they would return in the fall, and in an effort to help fill those last-minute vacancies, the Monterey County Office of Education was recruiting replacements Tuesday. 

Upland Unified School District board hears update on budget

The district submitted the budget in June with $7 million in deficit spending, which did not include concessions recently agreed upon by employee groups. The Upland Unified School District Board of Trustees was updated Tuesday on the county's rejection of their adopted 2013-14 fiscal year budget.

New school nutrition rules prompt few changes at Fresno Unified

New federal guidelines handed down in late June will nix sugary beverages and sodium-filled snacks from public school vending machines by fall of 2014, an edict that Fresno Unified School District officials say is largely in line with current operations.

Wealthy schools keep bounty under new funding system

California's new way of funding schools – designed to give extra dollars to districts with English learners, foster children and low-income families – leaves unchanged the status of one group generally considered financially elite. They are the basic-aid school districts – about 132 of the state's 1,038 districts where local property taxes exceed the state's minimum funding promise.

Schools chief zeros in on principals

The school principal might conjure up images — or memories — of uncomfortable meetings for unruly students and their parents. Come fall, the principal will step out of that often-feared office in San Diego Unified as Superintendent Cindy Marten shines a spotlight light on the job she believes is so crucial to a school’s success.

Riverside superintendent discusses education reform

Riverside Unified School District Superintendent Rick Miller joined U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, and other community leaders in Washington, D.C., on July 15 to discuss partnership opportunities between cities and the U.S. Department of Education to foster effective approaches to education reform.

Teachers trained to avoid sexual misconduct, officials say

Keep your classroom door open. Never hug students with both arms. Don’t text students as if you were one of their friends. Teachers are reminded of these boundaries over and over, yet at least five Inland high school educators have been arrested this year on suspicion of having sex with teenage students.

House GOP rolls out conservative education bill

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor made a fresh push Tuesday to pass a massive rewrite of No Child Left Behind, as Republicans try to roll back the controversial education performance standards of the past decade while touting conservative priorities like charter school vouchers.

Adams: Fruits and veggies will flourish in classrooms with new grants

Hungry students don’t learn as well, which is why schools on Tuesday welcomed the announcement of new or renewed federal and state funding to provide students with fruits, vegetables, breakfasts and summer meals.

California budget includes new emphasis on foster youth in schools

A group of Bay Area advocates lobbied Sacramento legislators to keep "categorical" funding set aside for foster youth services intact and to add accountability measures to school funding to force districts throughout the state to track the academic progress of foster kids. As part of the Local Control Funding Formula signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown, school districts must adopt plans by next year showing how they intend to spend extra money earmarked to help low-income students, English learners and foster youth.

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Recall decision looms over Coachella Valley school board

The Riverside County registrar’s office has until Thursday to decide if an effort to recall the Coachella Valley Unified school board will finally move forward.

Tustin schools offer healthier lunches, more vegetarian choices for fall

Come fall, Tustin Unified School District will serve healthier, less processed options for lunch, including more vegetarian entrees and no peanut or nut items.

Tustin police increase, improve lockdown trainings for district teachers

The Tustin Police Department and Tustin Unified School District plan to increase and update lockdown training for school personnel and shore up building security. The changes are in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Conn., that killed 26 people in December.

UPDATE: Institutional Racism, a primer Seattle Schools Community Forum: Washington Board of Education Denies SPS' Request for Waivers

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Washington Board of Education Denies SPS' Request for Waivers:


Institutional Racism, a primer

This comment appeared in the Trayvon Martin thread:"Could someone calmly describe the institutional racism is Seattle Public Schools? Whose actions are racist - and what exactly are they doing? Is it a policy issue? What policy is it? I'd be happy to read something if you could direct me to it."I'll try to respond to this because I think it's really important. There is a range of opinion here and

by Charlie Mas / 11min 

Washington Board of Education Denies SPS' Request for Waivers

From reader DK:

Looks like the 2013-14 school calendar will not be what the district originally assumed- our kids will actually be with their teachers for 3 more days than planned, as Seattle’s request for the 3 full Waiver days for professional development has been denied for a 2nd time by the State Board of Education last week.

From the posted July 10-11th meeting highlights:
BASIC EDUCATION ACT WAIVERS
“The Board considered requests from 13 school districts for Option One waivers from the basic education requirement of a minimum 180-day school year. Six of the requests are resubmittals of requests presented but not approved at the May meeting, with additional information provided by each district as requested in May…The Board directed staff to provide written notice to Columbia (Walla Walla), Fife, and Seattle districts that their requests were not approved.”

Among the reasons given for the final denial for Seattle- lack of community support or engagement (required by state law). The district did not even release the information to the public (or to the Board, which had to vote approval of the 1st application) that they were 

Stranger Endorses Peters, Blanford

The Stranger's endorsements for School Board were pretty much on point.  (The Times hasn't issued their endorsements for School Board but does have a sweet editorial about how expensive it is to go to weddings.  No, really, apparently that's the burning issue of the day.)District No. 4Sue PetersAs if you needed more proof that the Seattle School Board is a dystopian shithole, the board members, in

by Melissa Westbrook / 0min

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Testing the limits in Bizarro World

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Testing the limits in Bizarro World:

Testing the limits in Bizarro World

Students didn't suddenly get less intelligent. They were not doing as well in the past as everyone was led to believe. The state had dumbed down the tests and lowered cut scores to avoid sanctions from the federal No Child Left Behind Act.-- Tribune editorial. 

In the Bizarro World that is Chicago's corporate school reform, worse is better. If students score too high on standardized tests, they simply re-norm the tests to push scores downward, causing angry parents and students lots of grief and fear while elating the corporate reformers and school privateers over at the Civic Committee. Then, faced with the data showing that less than half our kids scoring at or above grade level (not the 75% they were claiming a year ago), they turn around and declare how awed they are by the "steady progress" being made (despite that nasty, disruptive teachers strike).

Says the Trib:

The results will be ugly. Thousands of students statewide who were rated as meeting standards in 2012 will not make the cut in 2013. Teachers, 

What Would James Baldwin Do (Say, Write)? | the becoming radical

What Would James Baldwin Do (Say, Write)? | the becoming radical:

What Would James Baldwin Do (Say, Write)?

Posted on July 17, 2013 by plthomasedd

My future son-in-law is black. My daughter is white. And we live in the South where, despite their (possibly naive) idealism, interracial relationships still matter, often in negative ways.

I have been deeply concerned about race, class, and literacy for my 30-year career as a teacher, writer, and scholar, but I must confess that their relationship increases the poignancy of those issues for me because on the day the Trayvon Martin murder became the focus of the media, my future son-in-law left my house in a hoodie covering his dreadlocks. It was nighttime, and I wrestled with telling him to be careful in a way that had nothing to do with the perfunctory “be careful” people often use to say good-bye.

Their relationship has also colored my watching the documentary The Loving Story, and purchasing Loving v. Virginia in a Post-Racial World: Rethinking Race, Sex, and Marriage.

Over the past couple of years, as well, I have been exploring the work of James 

Louisiana Educator: Zero Sum Game

Louisiana Educator: Zero Sum Game:

Zero Sum Game

There are many serious flaws in the Louisiana Act 54 evaluation system, but the most serious one is that it is a zero sum game. Here is the Wikipedia definition of a zero sum game:
a zero-sum game is a mathematical representation of a situation in which a participant's gain (or loss) of utility is exactly balanced by the losses (or gains) of the utility of the other participant(s). If the total gains of the participants are added up, and the total losses are subtracted, they will sum to zero. Thus cutting a cake, where taking a larger piece reduces the amount of cake available for others, is a zero-sum game if all participants value each unit of cake equally (see marginal utility).

The way the VAM portion of the teacher evaluation system was designed, there will always be 10% of teachers each year rated as ineffective. This will happen even though student performance may improve from one year to the next. The teaching force will never be seen as improving even if student scores go up statewide, because this zero sum system always dictates that 

UPDATE: The Truth About Trayvon | Larry Miller's Blog: Educate All Students!

The Truth About Trayvon | Larry Miller's Blog: Educate All Students!:


Zimmerman Verdict: It’s Time to Wake the Hell Up

July 17, 2013 9:44 a.m. MJS Leonard Pitts Four words of advice for African-Americans in the wake of George Zimmerman’s acquittal: Wake the hell up. The Sunday after Zimmerman went free was a day of protest for many of us. From Biscayne Blvd. in Miami to Leimert Park in Los Angeles to the Daley Center in Chicago to Times Square in New York City, African-Americans — and others who believe in rac

by millerlf / 6min 

The Truth About Trayvon

Filed under: Trayvon Martin — millerlf @ 10:19 am 

---

July 15, 2013 NYTimes By EKOW N. YANKAH

THE Trayvon Martin verdict is frustrating, fracturing, angering and predictable. More than anything, for many of us, it is exhausting. Exhausting because nothing could bring back our lost child, exhausting because the verdict, which should have felt shocking, arrived with the inevitability that black Americans know too well when criminal law announces that they are worth less than other Americans.

Lawyers on both sides argued repeatedly that this case was never about race, but only whether prosecutors proved beyond a reasonable doubt that George Zimmerman was not simply defending himself when he shot Mr. Martin. And, indeed, race was only whispered in the incomplete invocation that Mr. Zimmerman had “profiled” Mr. Martin. But what this case reveals in its overall shape is precisely what the law is unable to see in its narrow focus on the details.

The anger felt by so many African-Americans speaks to the simplest of truths: that race and law cannot be cleanly separated. We are tired of hearing that race is a conversation for another day. We are tired of pretending that “reasonable doubt” is not, in every sense of the word, colored.

Every step Mr. Martin took toward the end of his too-short life was defined by his race. I do not have to believe that Mr. Zimmerman is a hate-filled racist to recognize that he would probably not even have noticed Mr. Martin if he had been a casually dressed white teenager.

But because Mr. Martin was one of those “punks” who “always get away,” as Mr. Zimmerman characterized him in a call to the police, Mr. Zimmerman 

UPDATE: Teach For America under heavy fire! + 7 Things Educators Want To Tell Bill Gates toteachornototeach

toteachornototeach | This is the place to come for your daily rant about life in the public school system!:

Teach For America under heavy fire!

Posted on July 17, 2013

Teach For America under heavy fire
from educators and former members

by Amanda Holpuch

Critics allege that the program destabilizes schools and
communities and questioned its role in privatization of education
Teach for America, a program which places high-achieving college graduates as teachers in low-income schools around the country, is coming under heavy criticism by educators who allege its training for teachers is insufficient and that it destabilizes schools and communities.

About 100 of those critics assembled in Chicago last weekend at the Free Minds Free People education conference to discuss “organizing resistance against Teach for America”, which is one of the most well-known efforts to improve the nation’s flagging educational system. Its educators represent less than 1% of teachers in the US.

TFA alumni, parents, community activists and veteran teachers gathered to discuss concerns over the role the program plays in the privatization of education. Their criticisms 

7 Things Educators Want To Tell Bill Gates

Posted on July 16, 2013

‘Teachers’ Letters To Bill Gates’ Website Reveals 
7 Major Things Educators Want The Mogul To Know
by Rebecca Klein

Just five years after leaving the day-to-day operations of Microsoft, Bill Gates has become a major player in education policy — and some teachers are not pleased.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has donated billions of dollars to advocacy groups and research organizations that support causes such as charter schools and standardized testing. The foundation’s ability to spend unprecedented amounts of money on education reform causes has recently made Gates unduly influential in the education world.

The organization supports groups that generally have an anti-union and pro-testing agenda. Therefore, the emergence of a site featuring letters from teachers bemoaning how Gates has affected their classrooms may not be entirely surprising.

The website, titled “Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates,” encourages educators to share their