White Suprmacy: Alive and Well | Bill Ayers

White Suprmacy: Alive and Well | Bill Ayers:

You can read Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s  dissent text here.



White Suprmacy: Alive and Well

The Supreme Court continued its long backward march yesterday, ruling 6-2 that Michigan could ban race as a factor in college admissions. Affirmative action is alive and well for white people, for the children of wealthy donors and alumni, but dead for people who suffered centuries of slavery, Jim Crow apartheid, lynching and organized terror, mass incarceration and more. Fifty years on, “state’s

2 by billayers / 1h 

Who Made That?

A year ago today 1,133 garment workers died in Dhaka, the People’s Republic of Bangladesh, when an 8-story factory making clothes for national brands like Gap and Benetton, collapsed; 2,500 other workers were pulled from the wreckage. Several companies hastily signed an “accord” requiring stricter safety standards, but Target and Walmart, e.g., refused, saying they would conduct their own safety i

by billayers / 1h 

4-24-14 @ The Chalk Face

@ THE CHALK FACE:

Cuomo: Education Conference without Educators.

Guest post from Bianca Tanis: Upstate NY Educator and Parent: Beginning on May 4th, Governor Andrew Cuomo will chair Camp Philos, a three day Adirondack retreat for “Education Reform Philosophers.” The event is being planned and facilitated by Education Reform Now, a non-profit that strongly supports charter schools and to date has donated over $60,000 […]

59 by Chris Cerrone / 45min 

White Suprmacy: Alive and Well

Originally posted on Bill Ayers:The Supreme Court continued its long backward march yesterday, ruling 6-2 that Michigan could ban race as a factor in college admissions. Affirmative action is alive and well for white people, for the children of wealthy donors and alumni, but dead for people who suffered centuries of slavery, Jim Crow…

1 by Michael Paul Gold... / 53min 

4-23-14 @ The Chalk Face

@ THE CHALK FACE: Guest Post: Ken Derstine. “Talking Back to Mark Gleason”The 2014 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, held in Philadelphia from April 3rd – 7th, has come and gone. The thousands of delegates have left town, but for the general public of Philadelphia, the most memorable and long lasting thing to come out of the conference was to get a glimpse of […]1 by

by mike simpson / 20h 

School Privatization Is A Hoax, Reformers Aim To Destroy Public Schools | PopularResistance.Org

School Privatization Is A Hoax, Reformers Aim To Destroy Public Schools | PopularResistance.Org:

School Privatization Is A Hoax, Reformers Aim To Destroy Public Schools

Our public schools aren’t in decline. And “reformers” with wild promises don’t care about education — just profits

As long as anyone can remember, critics have been saying that the schools are in decline. They used to be the best in the world, they say, but no longer. They used to have real standards, but no longer. They used to have discipline, but no longer. What the critics seldom acknowledge is that our schools have changed as our society has changed. Some who look longingly to a golden age in the past remember a time when the schools educated only a small fraction of the population.

But the students in the college-bound track of fifty years ago did not get the high quality of education that is now typical in public schools with Advanced Placement courses or International Baccalaureate programs or even in the regular courses offered in our top city and suburban schools. There are more remedial classes today, but there are also more public school students with special needs, more students who don’t read English, more students from troubled families, and fewer students dropping out. As for discipline, it bears remembering a 1955 film called “Blackboard Jungle,” about an unruly, violent inner-city school where students bullied other students. The students in this school were all white. Today, public schools are often the safest places for children in tough neighborhoods.

The claim that the public schools are in decline is not new. In his Pulitzer Prize-winning book “Anti-intellectualism in American Life,” Richard Hofstadter characterized writing on education in the United States as “a literature of acid criticism and bitter complaint . . . The educational jeremiad is as much a feature of our literature as the jeremiad in the Puritan sermons.” From the 1820s to our own time, reformers have complained about low standards, ignorant teachers, and incompetent school boards. He noted that anyone longing for the “good old days” would have difficulty finding a time when critics were not bemoaning the quality of the public schools.

There is a tendency nowadays to hark back with nostalgia to the mythical good old days, usually imagined as about forty or fifty years ago. But few people seem to realize there never was a time when everyone succeeded in school. When present-day critics refer to what they assume was a better past, they look back to a time when a large proportion of American youths did not complete high school and only a small minority completed four School Privatization Is A Hoax, Reformers Aim To Destroy Public Schools | PopularResistance.Org:

SC is Out of Smarter Balanced, Superintendent’s Race Focused on Common Core | Truth in American Education

SC is Out of Smarter Balanced, Superintendent’s Race Focused on Common Core | Truth in American Education:

SC is Out of Smarter Balanced, Superintendent’s Race Focused on Common Core

Filed in Common Core Assessments, Education at State Level by Shane Vander Hart on April 24, 2014 • 0 Comments

This is a little anticlimactic, especially after reporting that the South Carolina Department of Education was taking steps to pull out of Smarter Balanced earlier this month.  I’m a little late to the party updating this story, but last week The Post and Courier reported that South Carolina Superintendent of Education informed the State Board of Education that they are pulling out.

South Carolina’s top education administrator has decided to withdraw the state from the consortium that would test Common Core standards in the coming school year.

In a letter sent to the chairman of the State Board of Education on Monday, Superintendent of Education Mick Zais said he learned he has the authority to withdraw the state from the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium and was exercising his power to do so.

“I am not wed to any particular test,” wrote Zais in the letter. “I want to have a high quality assessment that meets the specific needs of South Carolina, at a competitive price. If we continue to focus only on Smarter Balanced, we lose any opportunity to consider alternatives.” Jackie Hicks, president of The South Carolina Education Association said Zais “has proclaimed himself State School Czar,” adding Zais has placed his “extreme political agenda ahead of what’s best for our students.”

The Common Core standards and the tests to measure their effectiveness have come under fire in a number of states, including South Carolina, as a way to nationalize eduction, and standardize curriculum at the state level. Legislators, educators and political candidates are coming down on both sides of the issue.

“We are in the middle of a political battle here,” said Hicks through a written statement. “It’s  

SC is Out of Smarter Balanced, Superintendent’s Race Focused on Common Core | Truth in American Education:

4-24-14 Seattle Schools Community Forum

Seattle Schools Community Forum:

TFA: Troubled Waters in Seattle

I had been waiting for this story to come out.  It's just what I thought because it is the reality of TFA in the Puget Sound region.  No real success at all.  Districts?  Just not interested or finding plenty of fully-qualified teachers right here in Washington State. From Non-Profit Quarterly:Maldonado was also feeling the conflict, but also noted that TFA’s national office had stumbled in dealin

by Melissa Westbrook / 19min 

WA State First State to Lose NCLB Waiver

From Sec'y Duncan:As you know, Washington’s request for ESEA flexibility was approved based on Washington’s commitments to carry out certain actions in support of key education reforms. In return for those commitments, we granted your State and your local school districts significant flexibility. However, Washington has not been able to keep all of its commitments. Thus, although Washington has be

by Melissa Westbrook / 5:06 PM UTC-7 

Advanced Learning: Crumbling Faster and Faster

Remember that Leonardo DiCaprio movie, What's Eating Gilbert Grape?  The SPS version is, "What's Going on with Advanced Learning?"  What appears -to me - to be happening is that Michael Tolley and Shauna Heath are quietly making a lot of decisions behind closed doors and quietly spreading them out through the schools.  Spectrum principals, either on their own or thru Tolley and Heath, se

by Melissa Westbrook / 14min 

Race to Nowhere Showing at Orca K-8

FYI, Dear Community Members, We are excited to announce a showing of the groundbreaking film, "Race to Nowhere”. The documentary is a call to action for families, educators, and policy makers to challenge current assumptions on how to best prepare the youth of America to become healthy, bright, contributing and leading citizens. Join us Friday, April 25th for a screening of the film followed

by Melissa Westbrook / 12min 

4-23-14 Seattle Schools Community Forum

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Duncan Gives No Hint about WA Waiver in InterviewIn more in the long line of stuff Arne says comes this interview with Education Week.  But, NCLB waivers ARE brought up and, in specific, Washington State.  But Duncan is both direct and coy.And he pledged to get one long-awaited initiative done that could also have a far-reaching impact: an overhaul of regulations t

by mike simpson / 20h 

PAA en Espanol: La Voz de los Padres | Parents Across America

PAA en Espanol: La Voz de los Padres | Parents Across America:


PAA en Espanol: La Voz de los Padres

Michigan parents: Parent proposal for school improvement better than state takeover

By Steven Norton, PAA Board of Directors member and head of PAA affiliate Michigan Parents for Schools After a bruising vote in the House, the Michigan Senate is slated to take up the latest version of HB 4369, the state school takeover bill. Most people, including us, have been calling this the “EAA bill,” but that’s a misnomer. The latest version of the bill doesn’t even mention the Education Ac

by pureparents / 9min 

(En Inglés)

La  Voz de los Padres
Facsímil sobre la Educación
10 de abril de  2014

Padres se OPONEN al Proyecto de Ley de la Cámara de Representantes  HR 10, Éxito y Oportunidades Mediante las Escuelas Charter,”  ( Success and Opportunity Through Charter Schools”).

La posición de PAA: La organización nacional de padres, Parents Across America ( PAA), se opone a cualquier intento de privatizar la educación pública mediante la expansión de las escuelas charter, los vales, o cualquier otro programa operado  por empresas privadas a costa de limitar las escuelas públicas tradicionales . Las escuelas charter son, en una mayoría de los casos, financiadas con fondos públicos.

A través de los años,  PAA ha hecho ver nuestra preocupación con respecto a las escuelas charter debido a que:
•    no han resultado ser mejores desde el punto de vista académico que las escuelas públicas tradicionales, y en muchos casos, son peores que las escuelas públicas tradicionales;
•    aunque estas escuelas han justificado su existencia a base de que los padres son los que tienen la  opción (choice) de seleccionar y  registrar a sus hijos en la escuela que éstos deseen, tal opción no se le permite a los padres;  éstos se querellan de que las escuelas charter le quitan el derecho que es exclusivo de los padres con la práctica de reservarse la opción de seleccionar y expulsar a los estudiantes, práctica que  aumenta cada día;
•    en el caso de las franquicias como la Noble Network, en Chicago, las escuelas charter  utilizan medidas disciplinarias regresivas, cobran cargos a los estudiantes por infracciones menores, y expulsan a los estudiantes a una mayor tasa que la de los distritos;
•    se caracterizan por tener una trayectoria histórica de no  aceptar matricular a  estudiantes con discapacidades o aquellos cuyo idioma vernáculo no es inglés (English Language Learners, o ELL);
•    y el aumento en la proliferación de éstas, puede ser dañino para los estudiantes y las comunidades, e incluso malgastan los escasos fondos públicos asignados a la educación.

Por lo tanto, PAA se OPONE tenazmente al Proyecto de Ley de la Cámara, HR10: PAA se opone al Proyecto HR10, el cual promueve la expansión de las escuelas charter sin haber atendido los problemas mencionados aquí con respecto a estos negocios, con la posible excepción de la lotería para poblaciones especiales.  En un momento en que tantas escuelas públicas experimentan cortes drásticos a sus presupuestos, ¿por qué razón  el Congreso provee millones de dólares a compañías privadas  que administran escuelas charter, y que no han podido evidenciar que estas escuelas son una mejor alternativa para nuestros estudiantes?

PAA recomienda:

•    mejorar las escuelas públicas que tenemos en lugar de cerrar escuelas con el fin de expandir las escuelas charter;
•    que la operación de las escuelas charter debe estar limitada a los vecindarios (comunidades) donde están localizadas, y que se les exija aceptar a todos los niños y niñas que viven en ese vecindario o comunidad, cuyos padres deciden registrar o matricular en la escuela de dicha comunidad.  El proceso de registro o matrícula de las escuelas charter debe estar acorde con, y ser tan simple como el proceso utilizado en las escuelas públicas de la comunidad;
•    que las escuelas charter NO deben cobrar ninguna tarifa por sus servicios ,penalizar monetariamente a los estudiantes o a sus padres, ni crear barreras financieras los estudiantes, ya que dichas escuelas son financiadas con fondos públicos;
•    las escuelas charter y otras que reciben fondos públicos deben ser igual de transparentes y darle cuentas al público por el uso de dichos fondos.
Comuníquese con nosotros, escríbanos a info@parentsacrossamerica.org

Para obtener más información, visite la página de PAA en la red en www.parentsacrossamerica.org

- See more at: http://parentsacrossamerica.org/paa-en-espanol-la-voz-de-los-padres/?utm_source=feedly&utm_reader=feedly&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=paa-en-espanol-la-voz-de-los-padres#sthash.SLlSJHkl.dpuf

NYC Public School Parents: 2014 Annual "Skinny" Awards Dinner! Please buy your ticket today!

NYC Public School Parents: 2014 Annual "Skinny" Awards Dinner! Please buy your ticket today!:

2014 Annual "Skinny" Awards Dinner! Please buy your ticket today!

On Monday, June 9 we will be holding our annual “Skinny” award dinner, to honor three extraordinary individuals who have given us the real “skinny” about our public schools. 
   

Liz Phillips, Principal of PS 321

Our honorees this year are Liz Phillips, principal of PS 321 in Brooklyn, Carol Burris, principal of South Side HS on Long Island, and Patrick Sullivan, former Manhattan representative to the Panel for Education Policy.  

Liz and Carol are leaders in one of the most exciting developments of this or any year  --principals who are speaking out against the high-stakes and low quality of the NY State exams.  

Carol Burris, principal of South Side HS

Patrick stood up for NYC parents during the Bloomberg years and consistently challenged the DOE to justify their damaging policies.  

Patrick Sullivan, NYC public school parent
and former Manhattan representative on the PEP

Diane Ravitch will also be there to help give out the awards.  Diane is always an inspiration to all of us in the “resistance,”  fighting to protect and strengthen public education and against the forces of corporate reform. 

Please buy your tickets now, to reserve your seat for a terrific  four course dinner at Bocca Di Bacco at 191 7^th Ave (at 21^st St).

If you cannot attend, please donate to our organization if you would like our work on student privacy, parent rights, and class size to continue, or simply to honor these three heroes who have courageously spoken out,  when others would have remained quiet. 
Our annual dinner is always one of the most enjoyable evenings of the year, and one that you will not want to miss. -- thanks 

Relationships: Who needs them? | My Island View

Relationships: Who needs them? | My Island View:

Relationships: Who needs them?

April 24, 2014 by tomwhitby

I have been thinking lately about professional relationships and what role they play in how we learn as professionals, and as people. It would be difficult to learn much in total isolation. We are social beings, so exchanging ideas and opinions is a natural occurrence for us. I think we tend to seek out people with whom we can share things. We have personal relationships to share personal things, professional relationships to share professional things, and casual relationships to handle everything else. These relationships validate, negate, or modify our ideas. We learn from this.

Our culture’s support of these relationships may best be reflected in our support of the Restaurant and Bar industry. I guess these casual, and personal relationships are as much a part of that industry as food and booze. Places of business, and education are where professional relationships mostly reside.  Although many faculty have been known to gather on a Friday afternoon at a watering hole outside the school district limits.

Many of these relationships are very fluid depending on our need to share and learn specific things at various times of our lives. People come and go in our lives continuously. Many of us have people that we refer to as our mentors. A mentor, I believe, is a person who heavily influenced us at specific times in our careers by exchanging, supporting, questioning, and validating our ideas about our profession. All of this is based on trust, which can only be established within a relationship.

Professional relationships prior to the 21^st Century were, with the exception of the occasional pen pal, a face-to-face endeavor. As educators, professional relationships were most often within the school building in which an educator worked. Depending on the size and quality of the faculty, as well as the school’s culture, this was a hit or miss proposition for professional learning. If an educator was limited in professional relationships within the work environment, he, or she could attend classes in local colleges seeking out professional Relationships: Who needs them? | My Island View:

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The Schuette Decision -- This generation's Plessy vs. Ferguson

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The Schuette Decision -- This generation's Plessy vs. Ferguson:

The Schuette Decision -- This generation's Plessy vs. Ferguson

Justice Sonia Sotomayor: Affirmative Action ‘Opened Doors in My Life'

It's not surprising that the right-wing and conservative ed bloggers in particular, are applauding the Supreme Court's racist Schuette decision. The decision, called "this court'sPlessy vs. Ferguson" by Shanta Driver, the attorney who argued the case before the Supreme Court, essentially puts the nail in the coffin of affirmative action plans in states like Michigan, where T-baggers like Gov. Snyder rule the roost.

Among the worst defenders of Schuette is EdWeek blogger Frederick Hess who slammed Justice Sonia Sotomayor for her dissenting vote. He accuses her of "thundering" that judges "ought not sit back and wish away, rather than confront, the racial inequality that exists in our society."

Hess

Sotomayor said the court "eviscerates" a key equal-protection guarantee that government should not make it harder for minorities to participate in self-government.

"I cannot ignore the unfortunate outcome of today's decision: Short of amending the state constitution, a Herculean task, racial minorities in Michigan are deprived of even an Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The Schuette Decision -- This generation's Plessy vs. Ferguson:

4-24-14 LA School Report - What's Really Going on Inside LAUSD

LA School Report - What's Really Going on Inside LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District):

JUST IN: Board Member Galatzan announces bid for third term

Tamar Galatzan LA Unified School Board Member LA Unified school board member Tamar Galatzan, a strong supporter of Superintendent John Deasy and his efforts to reform public education, said today she plans to run for another term next year. “I plan to seek a third term in order to continue the work I’ve been doing since voters in Board District 3 first chose me to represent them in 2007,” she said

by Vanessa Romo / 5min hide  //  save

At least 5 LA Unified staff getting renewed above $200,000 level

Michelle King Deputy Superintendent of School Operations Working for LA Unified could put you among the nation’s highest wage earners. In closed session Tuesday, the school board approved contracts for senior staff, including five worth more than $200,000 a year, more than twice the salary of the highest-earning teachers in the district. The highest paid official in this round of contracts, accord

by Vanessa Romo / 35min 

New report: School info difficult for low-income parents to access

There’s bad news for parents whose kids go to schools in the poorest areas of LA Unified. A new report by a coalition of organizations lead by the United Way found that it’s harder for parents and guardians in low-income neighborhoods to obtain school information, get answers to their questions and access parent resources, than it is for parents in more affluent areas. The study measuring parent e

2 by Vanessa Romo / 2min hide  //  save

Two candidates file to seek Galatzan school board seat

Carl Petersen Whether LA Unified board member Tamar Galatzan runs for reelection or not, voters in her District 3 will have two other candidates to consider in the 2015 board election. Carl Petersen, Director of Logistics for a Glendale manufacturing company, and Elizabeth Badger, owner of an auto repair company in Canoga Park, have filed to run, according to the LA City Ethics Commission. Galatza

2 by Michael Janofsky / 2min 

Californians support changes in school funding, curriculum

Via the Los Angeles Times | By Teresa Watanabe In a broad consensus across racial, political and economic lines, most Californians support two historic changes in how academic subjects are taught and state dollars are allocated to schools, according to a statewide survey released Wednesday. More than two-thirds of Californians surveyed support new national learning standards known as Common Core,

2 25min hide  //  save

Morning Read: Litigation over Miramonte results in struggle

L.A. Unified battles lawyers over Miramonte disclosures The litigation over sexual misconduct at Miramonte Elementary has resulted in a struggle over which documents should be part of the public record. This includes testimony that a former teacher had alerted her principal about sexual misconduct by Mark Berndt, who was subsequently arrested and later convicted of lewd conduct. LA Times Social m

2 13min 

4-23-14 LA School Report - What's Really Going on Inside LAUSD

LA School Report - What's Really Going on Inside LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District): Five takeaways from Supreme Court affirmative-action rulingVia Politico | By Josh Gerstein The Supreme Court’s decision upholding Michigan’s affirmative-action ban was far from a shock, but it generated considerable strife on the high court, producing five different opinions in which the justices traded c

by mike simpson / 20h