The Answer Sheet 4-2-14

The Answer Sheet:

Is testing taking over our schools? An entire faculty answers

Here is an unusual post about resistance to high-stakes standardized testing in one school, co-written by the entire faculty of P.S. 167 – The Metropolitan Expeditionary Learning School: John Atorino, Jen Avellino, Robin Baumgarten, Tarin Baxter, Sarah Bever, Randi Bivona, Yazmin Brigido, Matthew Brownstein, Dan Cassagne, Lesley Crawford, Christine DiLapi, Emily Edwards, Alyson Emmett, Amelia […] 

by Valerie Strauss / 38min 

Reader’s response: ‘We’re constantly having to remind the… public about our humanity’

There has been a strong reaction from some to Tuesday’s post titled “So did he apply to Stanford?” Some people liked it. Others thought I was making light of the achievements of two teens of color who were accepted into the Ivy League. I wasn’t. My intention was to draw attention to the obsessive focus […]    

by Valerie Strauss / 1min 

Walton Foundation’s pours $164 million in 2013 education grants. Who won?

The Walton Family Foundation spent more than $164 million in 2013 to promote its corporate-influenced education reform agenda in 2013, according to a new list (see below) of grants that went to dozens of organizations. The foundation’s priorities are evident in who won the biggest amounts. Among the winners are: Teach For America, which got […]    

1 by Valerie Strauss / 1min 

Why the SAT drives us N.U.T.S.

What is it about the SAT that drives people nuts?  Ned Johnson explains. Johnson is president and self-described tutor geek at Prep Matters, a tutoring and test prep company with offices in Bethesda, Md., McLean, Va., and Washington D.C. By Ned Johnson Did you ever feel a bit of stress when you took the SAT […]    

by Valerie Strauss / 51min hide  //  save

10 things wrong with what kids learn in school

The debate over the Common Core State Standards overlooks the broad problems inherent in the core curriculum that has been taught in schools for decades. Below Marion Brady explains. Brady has worked as a teacher, administrator, college professor, contributor to academic journals, textbook and professional book author, consultant to publishers and foundations, newspaper columnist. By […]    

9 by Valerie Strauss / 3h 

The Answer Sheet 4-1-14

The Answer Sheet: Case study: How politicians ignore parents on school reformIf you read this blog regularly, you will be familiar with Carol Burris, an award-winning principal from New York. She has done a remarkable job for well over a year detailing the botched school reform efforts in her state.  (You can read some of her work here, here, here,  here, and here.) Below is a new post from Burris

by mike simpson / 8h

No Questions for You! - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher

No Questions for You! - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher:

No Questions for You!

By Nancy Flanagan on April 1, 2014 9:21 PM

I remember the first time I heard teachers talk about scripted lessons and pacing charts. It was a group of Detroit teachers who were pursuing National Board Certification, and I had a hard time comprehending what they were telling me--every teacher on the same lesson, subdividing a pre-set block of time into prescribed, timed single-skill segments. Actual, physical scripts that they were compelled to read, no paraphrasing. Compliance monitors, who showed up at random times with clipboards. Objectives written on the board, and "progress" charted on the wall. 

But--I asked the teachers--what if your students are beyond the assigned daily lesson and don't need it repeated? What if they've already got that, and need something new to stay focused on this skill or strand? Or what if they need another day of practice to nail something down? Shrugs. You had to follow the pacing chart. Better to be in the "right" place than to slow down and make sure they've got it, or extend a lesson that captured your students' imagination.

Which--when you think about--is the worst possible kind of teaching: following a pedagogical structure and rate set by someone who'd never met your students. Remote 

4-2-14 Seattle Schools Community Forum

Seattle Schools Community Forum:

Student Data Privacy for Washington State Public School Students

My big focus for the foreseeable future is student data privacy.   Data collection is the future of our nation and nowhere else is that more clear than public education. My goal is a student data privacy bill passed in the Washington State Legislature.  In a future thread, I will outline what SPS is doing versus what it should be doing but really, I don't have time to wait for the Board to wake up

by Melissa Westbrook / 16min 

Is There Money in Public Education? Yes, There Is

Do hedge funder managers and big investors like the Koch brothers and others invest just for the heck of it?  No, they want to make money and lots of it.  Public education is just that mother lode.From Education Week:It's already been a banner year for ed-tech startups, and we've only closed the first quarter.Ninety-nine startups in education have raised more than $500 million, a record in the pas

by Melissa Westbrook / 17min 

Seattle School Board Meeting Tonight

In advance of the Board meeting, I wanted to point out a couple of things, some of which Charlie and I have pointed out in the past.One, just to let you know, the speaker list is NOT full so you can call up and still get on. Two, staff has a bad habit of waiting until the very last minute - particularly on Intro items on capital issues - to fill in the blanks.  They like to leave "placeholder

by Melissa Westbrook / 11min hide  //  save

Following Thru, NY State Ed Department Severs Ties to inBloom

And then there were none.inBloom, the student data cloud created via Gates Foundation dollars, started off with a roster of about nine states.  One by one they pulled out as states - via their legislatures - started asking more questions especially around notification of parents and student data security.  New York State had been the last one standing.But a recent report on Common Core by a group

by Melissa Westbrook / 49min 

Portables; Here to Stay (and Preschool, What about That?)

A hilarious article about portables in NYC by the NY Times.  We're not alone.But eight years later, Mr. Cosby, 46, is busier than ever as an all-around handyman for the seven timeworn trailers that house 283 students outside the crowded main school building.He has chased opossums, raccoons and turtles from the alleys around the corrugated metal structures, which were installed in the 1990s and now

by Melissa Westbrook / 11h hide  //  save

New York State Parents Say No to Common Core Testing

From the blog, NYC Public School Parents:Will one teacher please copy the whole test and post it anonymously on the internet for all to see? We need to dismantle this by the best Edward Snowden means possible.  From Fox News, New York:Indelecato, a member of the parent group NYS Allies for Public Education, said she has been picking up her son at the beginning of the testing sessions and going to

5 by Melissa Westbrook / 12h  

4-1-14 Seattle Schools Community Forum

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Seattle Schools Odds and Ends - MeetingsI went to the Board meeting two weeks ago and a couple of Work Sessions/Committee meetings.   This thread is the Board meeting and Operations Ctm. meeting. Here are the highlights:Board MeetingThis was the one where the high school basketball teams were honored.  Very fun to be there (although the Garfield boys wanted to look

by mike simpson / 8h 

4-2-14 Schools Matter

Schools Matter:

Whose Interests Are Served When United Opt Out Website Goes Down

With hundreds of billions of dollars depending upon the continuation of high stakes testing, the corporate fascists of the technology-testing complex have sent their dirty tricksters to detonate the United Opt Out website. If you don't think these billionaire thugs and their stooges are not playing for keeps, you're wrong. Until UOO gets another website up, those needing information should go here

by Jim Horn / 43min 

Beware of STEM Fever

Sent to the Register-Guard, April 2, 2014Before Eugene's educators continue with their plans ("Leaders eye transforming academy to STEM school," April 1), they should know that a number of studies have concluded that there is no shortage of science-technology trained potential workers in the US.Rutgers University professor Hal Salzman has concluded that there are approximately three qual

by skrashen / 13min 

Weingarten Pumps Common Core

Randi Weingarten just won't stop digging when she find herself in a hole dug for her by Gates and Bloomberg.  She used the latest PISA announcement yesterday to manufacture another reason to support the chosen solution that has no proof that it will do anything other than to serve as the testing delivery system for another generation of human rights abuses in schools.  

2 by Jim Horn / 21min 

SAMS Academy of Corruption, Albuquerque

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – Scott Glasrud oversees about 800 public school students grades 4 through 12, but he makes hundreds of thousands of dollars a year doing it.That has the state’s attention.The SchoolsGlasrud’s charter schools are high-performing. Southwest Learning Center in the Heights and SAMS Academy, located next to Double Eagle, focus on science and aviation.Some students can even get

2 by Jim Horn / 10h 

4-1-14 Schools Matter

Schools Matter: TN BATs Out of the Cave and Into the LimelightDemocracy is alive and well in those organizations that truly advocate for children and public education.  Two such organizations are Tennesseans Reclaiming Educational Excellence (TREE) and Badass Teachers of Tennessee (BATS).  Jim Horn and Denise Wilburn, authors of The Mismeasure of Education, were the guest speakers on March 1 at a

by mike simpson / 7h 

4-2-14 Scathing Purple Musings | Color me purple in Florida

Scathing Purple Musings | Color me purple in Florida, red in Washington, dark sky-blue in Israel and public school in Education:

Step Up For Student’s Desperate Spin to Save Florida Voucher Expansion

One would think that an entity which assumed to be the primary steward of almost $1 billion dollars in money belonging to Florida taxpayers would have their numbers straight. Whatever number families on a voucher waiting list that Step Up for Students finally settles upon will have as much credibility as does the Obama administrations claim to have 7.1 million enrollees in those new Affordable Car

by Bob Sikes / 3h  

4-1-14 Scathing Purple Musings | Color me purple in Florida

Scathing Purple Musings | Color me purple in Florida, red in Washington, dark sky-blue in Israel and public school in Education: Florida Voucher Bill “Like a Zombie That Won’t Die”From Palm Beach Post writer Frank Cerabino: And by the time the program seeps into the middle class, it will be too late to stop. Florida’s expansion of public funding of private schools will have a significant “domino e

by mike simpson / 8h 

NYC Public School Parents: Parent power wins! NY severs its relationship with inBloom, which has no known clients left; but the threat to student privacy remains

NYC Public School Parents: Parent power wins! NY severs its relationship with inBloom, which has no known clients left; but the threat to student privacy remains:

Parent power wins! NY severs its relationship with inBloom, which has no known clients left; but the threat to student privacy remains

This morning, Stephanie Simon of Politico Pro reports that indeed, after a long battle, the NY State Education Department has finally agreed to sever its relationship with inBloom and will ask them to delete all the student data already stored on its cloud.  This was the clear intent of the state budget bill approved on Monday, and marks the end of a long battle that started when the Regents approved this egregious contract in December 2011.

This also means that inBloom has NO known clients left, as Stephanie points out (contrary to the credulous article in the WSJ recently.)

" Massachusetts is still officially considering a contract with the nonprofit, but a state education department spokesman said it was unlikely to proceed. Illinois no longer plans to upload large amounts of data, though individual districts may participate; inBloom won’t say whether any have agreed to do so."

In state after state, district after district, the original nine partner states of inBloom have cancelled their contracts, after protests from parents, teachers, and voters to get rid of this data-engorging monster, an $100 

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 4-2-14

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit:

‘High Quality Teachers Act of 2014’: VERGARA-LIKE BALLOT INITIATIVE PULLED UNTIL 2016, REPORT SAYS

Projected annual cost of teacher assessments exceeds $1 billion. by Yana Gracile | LA School Report | http://bit.ly/1ec1igc April 1, 2014 2:39 pm  ::  A state ballot initiative aimed at regulations governing teachers that was headed for the November ballot has been pushed to 2016, according to a report by ABC affiliate KXTV in Sacramento. The measure was seeking to change the way

by smf / 29min hide  //  save

Deasy ay USC: VERGARA IS THE NEXT BIG CIVIL RIGHTS CASE

Posted on  by Vanessa Romo | LA School Report | http://bit.ly/1hA9BHh April 1, 2014 10:03 am  ::  More than two months ago LA Unified Superintendent John Deasy took the stand as the first witness for the plaintiffs in Vergara v California, a lawsuit challenging teacher protections. He testified for three days, laying the foundation of their overall case. Now that the trial has ended, the head

by smf / 13min hide  //  save

Pencils down, iPads up! - LA SCHOOLS’ NEW EXAM STRATEGY PUT TO THE TEST + smf’s 2¢

Annie Gilbertson | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC http://bit.ly/1opXim0 by Lexie Flickinger via Flickr March 31st, 2014, 4:56pm  ::  L.A. Unified students will be taking the new test on iPads. Gone are the No. 2 pencils and eye-crossing bubble sheets — Los Angeles Unified schools will begin piloting a new state exam on Tuesday, [April 1st] administered entirely by computer. Students in grades 3-8

1 by smf / 25min 

Nutritious but uneaten: SOLUTIONS SOUGHT TO REDUCE FOOD WASTE IN SCHOOLS

Federal rules require students to take at least three items each day, but an L.A. Unified manager wants to change the policy to reduce the $100,000 in food thrown away daily. By Teresa Watanabe | LA Times | http://lat.ms/PirlMW ●●smf: With the line that long, why is the service window to the left closed?  And why are Cheetos, juice and Pop-tarts available in the student store?  :: 

by smf / 35min 

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 4-1-14

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: The “other” CORE: TEACHERS UNION FIGHTS NEW PLAN BY SACRAMENTO, LAUSD AND OTHER SCHOOL DISTRICTS TO ADDRESS LOW-PERFORMING SCHOOLS + smf’s 2¢By Loretta Kalb The Sacramento Bee | http://bit.ly/1dKwbh5 Sunday, Mar. 30, 2014 - 12:00 am/Modified: Sunday, Mar. 30, 2014 - 10:40 am  ::  In the seven months since Sacramento City Unified School District won unpr

by mike simpson / 5h