4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 5-14-14

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

UNPACKING THE MAY REVISE: Proposed pension fund fix, New formula to identify low-income kids, No mention of transitional kindergarten expansion

The State is constitutionally responsible for the CalSTRS program – but Brown proposes to pass almost all the costs of fixing it to school districts and teachers, Some new thinking to identify children-in-poverty, The move to bring all 4-year olds into a universal pre-K program is ignored+unfunded. ALSO SEE: 4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: First impressions: THE GOVERNOR’S MAY

by smf / 5min 

It’s A Small World meets Godzilla v. King Kong: PEARSON CONTRACT FOR COMMON CORE TESTING FACES LEGAL CHALLANGE + smf’s 2¢

By Sean Cavanagh | Education Week | http://bit.ly/1iLDwZw Another blogger reblogged an earlier version of this story with the Godzilla v. King Kong allusion; that headline was, as Teddy Roosevelt said, ‘stolen fair-and-square’ A Beaudry insider – and frequent commenter on the goings-on within the Puzzle Palace -  observes: Pearson, of

by smf / 5min 

First impressions: THE GOVERNOR’S MAY REVISE BUDGET + May Revision Budget Document

via email/in order received from ESEA Cabinet Report May 13, 2014 No major improvements for schools in May Revise by Tom Chorneau (Calif.) Focusing his attention and much of the $2.4 billion in unanticipated state revenue in other directions, Gov. Jerry Brown offered a revised education budget Tuesday with few major changes from what he proposed in January. Brown offered no new

by smf / 8h 

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit 5-13-14

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: Lausd And The Ritualistic Killing Of SchoolWritten by Odysseus Bostick - THE BOSTIC REPORT in LA CityWatch | http://bit.ly/1jCOx4D 13 May 2014  ::  If the Los Angeles Unified School District were a used car, parents would be reading the fine print of California’s historic lemon law by the end of first grade. The second largest school district in the nat

by mike simpson / 8h 

UPDATE: empathyeducates – New Orleans Teachers and Students Wrestle With Racial Tension

empathyeducates – New Orleans Teachers and Students Wrestle With Racial Tension:


Chicago Principals Say They Operate Under ‘Gag Order’

by empathy / 26min 

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New Orleans Teachers and Students Wrestle With Racial Tension

Students at a fundraiser for Liberation Academy in New Orleans March 14, 2014. Some of the students who led protests over the district’s Collegiate Academy charter schools withdrew from those schools and enrolled in Liberation Academy, founded by parents and local activists.
By Jordan Flaherty| Originally Published at The Root. May 13 2014 3:00 AM

Every year hundreds of young, idealistic recent college graduates flood into New Orleans to teach at the city’s public schools. But in a school system where the vast majority of students are African American, the mostly white influx of new teachers has brought complaints of racism and cultural insensitivity, and helped birth a new student-led protest movement.

African Americans are about 60 percent of New Orleans’ population (down from 67 percent before Hurricane Katrina) but make up 88 percent of the city’s public school system. White students are clustered at a handful of high-performing schools, and other ethnicities make up only small portions of the system, so most schools are almost entirely African American. Before Hurricane Katrina, most teachers were black women, mostly from New Orleans and often from the neighborhoods of the schools in which they worked.

But in the weeks after Hurricane Katrina, the entire staff of the school system—about 7,000 teachers and other employees—was laid off, their contract was ignored and their union was powerless to help. Katrena Ndang, who worked for 17 years as a teacher in New Orleans, found out she’d been fired while watching the news after being evacuated. “Even though we had given them forwarding addresses, they never sent us empathyeducates – New Orleans Teachers and Students Wrestle With Racial Tension:

5-14-13 Curmudgucation

CURMUDGUCATION:

Jennifer Rubin Strikes Out

Over at the Washington Post, Jennifer Rubin took her turn at propping up the ever-besieged conservative defense of Common Core. She did not succeed.Strike OneRubin starts out with the old standard "We were getting totes whupped on the PISA by all the other kids on the playground, which was completely a crisis because we're worse than Korea and the Netherlands." She crunches some of the s

by Peter Greene / 27min 

Where Are the Teacher Leaders?

Over at EdWeek, Nancy Flanagan is asking "Is genuine teacher leadership dead in the water?" It's one more way of asking the time-honored question, where the heck are all the teacher leaders?Flanagan has paid her dues on this subject. A Michigan teacher of the year, National Board certified, member of the Teacher Leaders Network and an organizer for the Institute for Democratic Education

by Peter Greene / 11min 

Brookings Whips Up Some Teacher Eval Research

The Brown Center on Education Policy at Brookings has released a new report, "Evaluating Teachers with Classroom Observations,"  a study intended to Tell Us Some Things about teacher evaluation and how to do it best. Is this going to be a trip to the unicorn farm? The very first sentences tell us where this report's heart is:The evidence is clear: better teachers improve student outcomes

by Peter Greene / 6min 

Why Isn't the 21st Century Here Yet?

Technology is awesome and transformative, and will completely change the way we do business in schools and in the classroom. So why hasn't that really happened yet? Why aren't we all working in high-tech, super-duper computer driven schools yet? I think I know, and it has nothing to do with philosophies of education or resistance to change.I'm starting this piece on my laptop. I'm doing that becau

2 by Peter Greene / 2h 

5-13-13 Curmudgucation

CURMUDGUCATION: Better Teacher TrainingThe US DOE recently revived an initiative for improving teacher training in this country. It's a dumb initiative. Pearson offers edTPA, basically a new gateway into the profession, to insure that only the qualified enter the profession. edTPA is a dumb program. TFA is only the most prominent of the many "alternative paths" into teaching. As a means

by mike simpson / 8h 

5-14-14 Perdido Street School

Perdido Street School:

Cuomo's All Class

From State of Politics:The Cuomo administration on Wednesday is denying claims being made by Republican Rob Astorino’s gubernatorial campaign that a top aide sought to move the county executive to a less-than-prominent seat at an event featuring President Obama. Astorino spokeswoman Jessica Proud says the White House had initially offered to seat him in the front row at today’s announcement on the

by reality-based edu... / 12min 

Get Ready For Another Common Core/Civil Rights Speech From NYSED Commissioner John King

NYSED Commissioner King has already compared himself to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and said the education reform/Common Core fight is much like the fight for civil rights:Paraphrasing Martin Luther King, Jr., the commissioner said: “In a real sense, this afternoon, we can say that our feet are tired, but our souls are rested. “Change is hard,” he continued. “It is challenging, and it is tiring, bu

by reality-based edu... / 2h 

5-13-14 Perdido Street School

Perdido Street School: Opt-Out Movement Posied To Grow Even BiggerFrom Gary Stern and Randi Weiner at LoHud:More than 3,140 students in the Lower Hudson Valley sat out the recent state math tests, an 84 percent increase over the number who opted out from the ELA tests only four weeks earlier.Overall, 3.4 percent of local students in grades 3-8 were directed by their parents to skip the math tests,

by mike simpson / 9h 

Barbara Kanninen for Arlington County School Board

Barbara Kanninen for Arlington County School Board:

Barbara Kanninen for Arlington County School Board

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Barbara Kanninen - for Arlington County School Board

Perhaps a single seat on a local school board might not seem a matter of sufficient importance for a national political blog such as Daily Kos.

And after all, I am prejudiced.

I live in Arlington Virginia, so my taxes go towards our superb public school system.

I am also a professional educator (although I teach in Maryland), so I take the matter of school governance very seriously.

Besides, we do our elections differently in Arlington, which gives me a chance to explain, or if you prefer, "teach" a bit about how we do things.

Most of all, it gives me a chance to tell about a superb candidate whom I have come to know and whom I am proud to call my friend.

Her name is Barbara Kanninen, she holds a Ph. D. in Economics, she has served as a member of the County Government's Fiscal Affairs Advisory Committee, and has more than twenty years service to our young people as a volunteer in and to the schools.  In fact, rather than list her many accomplishments, I suggest that you read her biographical material.

And if you would be so kind, please continue to read what I have to say.

What is happening on two days this week is that the Arlington Democratic Party is selecting its nominee for the position on the school board that is open as the result of Sally Bai4d's decision Barbara Kanninen for Arlington County School Board:

RAS BARAKA WINS NEWARK MAYORALTY, DEFEAT FOR ED SABOTEURS Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública:

Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública: RAS BARAKA WINS NEWARK MAYORALTY, DEFEAT FOR ED SABOTEURS:

RAS BARAKA WINS NEWARK MAYORALTY, DEFEAT FOR ED SABOTEURS

 The New Mayor Will Struggle to Take Back Newark Public Schools for the People

Mayor Ras Baraka with his daughters.

Ras Baraka, a high school principal and the son of a poet, yesterday easily defeated a Wall Street-backed promoter of school privatization to become the next mayor of Newark. Baraka's victory repudiated the policies not just of his rival, Shavar Jeffries, but those of Gov. Chris Christie, former Mayor Cory Booker, and state-appointed superintendent Cami Anderson who is trying to close neighborhood public schools and replace them with privately run charter schools.

"We are the mayor!" declared Baraka, 45. A constant theme of his campaign was that, if he wins, all Newark residents become mayor. Jeffries, 39, a faculty member at Seton Hall Law School, conceded shortly afterward.

Baraka's victory celebration at the downtown Robert Treat Hotel erupted into cheers shortly after 10 pm when it became obvious the son of the late poet and playwright Amiri Baraka, had won with strong backing from his home South Ward—which he serves as a councilman—and the predominantly African-American Central and West Wards. His rival, also an African-American, was strongest in the predominantly white and Latino North and East Wards. Baraka won 54 percent of the vote.

Baraka, an often tough-talking champion of the poorest residents of the city, had been the front runner for most of the race. But, in the last few days, Wall Street financiers and hedge-fund managers—strong supporters of former Mayor Cory Booker—poured $3 million into the Jeffries campaign, including $300,000 in street money that went to young men and women in the city, many of whom apparently took the money and then urged voters to vote for Baraka.

He also won despite an extraordinarily harsh depiction of his campaign by the local newspaper, The Star-Ledger, Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública: RAS BARAKA WINS NEWARK MAYORALTY, DEFEAT FOR ED SABOTEURS:

NYC Educator: Would You Buy a Yugo from this Man?

NYC Educator: Would You Buy a Yugo from this Man?:

Would You Buy a Yugo from this Man?

My jaw drops at some of the nonsense I'm hearing in defense of the new contract. The first line of defense, of course, is Mulgrew's threat to the DA. If you vote no, you have to wait for 150 unions. Let's be clear. First, there is history here. In 1995, Sandra Feldman told us anyone who thought we'd do better must be "smoking something." Nonetheless, we voted it down. When I hit maximum in my 22nd rather than 25th year, I was very glad we did.

Can I wait for that whopping 2% compensation increase waiting for me, or that thousand-buck pre-tax bribe? Well, yes I can. And even if I wanted it really badly, it would be unacceptable if it cost one of my ATR brothers or sisters a job. And second-tier due process for ATRs, for those of you who don't know what a giveback is, is a giveback.

Isn't due process for one teacher due process for all? Isn't that fundamental to us as unionists? How can Mulgrew call the process fast and fair when he himself now states that arbitrators will set policy? We don't even know what the policy is and we're praising it.

You may have also seen a recent post here trying to organize a free and fair forum so both sides could be heard. A UFT rep got back to me and objected to Geoff Decker of Chalkbeat NY as a moderator. I understand that they may have been upset with Chalkbeat reporting Mulgrew's DA comments. I proposed the names of several other journalists, but the UFT rep expressed concern about UFT inside baseball being reported by the press. This was troubling, as it then became NYC Educator: Would You Buy a Yugo from this Man?:

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Independent movement carries Ras Baraka to victory in Newark

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Independent movement carries Ras Baraka to victory in Newark:

Independent movement carries Ras Baraka to victory in Newark

Speaking to the crowd, Baraka wished his mother a happy Mother's Day and said he knew his father, who died in January, was "in the room tonight." He urged the crowd to "be the mayor" and work for positive change, a reference to one of his campaign slogans, "When I become mayor, we become mayor." -- AP Wire

Yesterday's historic victory of Ras Baraka over corporate-backed Shavar Jeffries, following on the heels of progressive mayoral wins in New York, L.A. and a string of other cities, has meaning way beyond Newark. Harold Meyerson, writing on Bill Moyers' blog calls it, "the revolt of the cities." Baraka, who served as principal of Central High School, in addition to his duties as councilman, made opposition to school closings and corporate reform an integral part of his platform.

Despite millions of dollars being poured into Jeffries' superPAC by panicked DFER and other corporate school reformers, Baraka was able to ride the power of an independent Working Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Independent movement carries Ras Baraka to victory in Newark:

We Gave the Common Core Elites the Power. It is Time to Take it Away. | Missouri Education Watchdog

We Gave the Common Core Elites the Power. It is Time to Take it Away. | Missouri Education Watchdog:

We Gave the Common Core Elites the Power. It is Time to Take it Away.

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Your children owe nothing to education reformers, federal agencies, third party researchers or the Chamber of Commerce. Not their data, not their allegiance, not the power to determine if they will be a good worker by kindergarten.  It is time to absolutely and utterly walk away.

We are trying to pass a bill against Common Core (HB1490) in Missouri that has morphed into a bill that doesn’t stop it, but rather slows it down.  Some folks are disappointed the bill is watered down while some folks understand the political reality of how hard it is to pass anything in Jefferson City.  The Common Core State Standards Initiative is a culmination of many years of introducing “school to work” concepts and learning how to mandate educational reforms, rather than passing laws through legislatures.  It has come from years and years of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) running an agency with little legislative oversight.   It has occurred because the Board of Education members and Commissioner of Education are appointed positions, held unaccountable to the voters.  It comes from the Federal Government telling states how they had to deliver education or (horrors!) they would lose money they needed to hire more bureaucrats to keep track of ever increasing Federal mandates the states/schools could never reach (think 100% proficiency).

We are primarily in this place because the rule of law means little to nothing.  Remember Governor Jay Nixon’s words onWe Gave the Common Core Elites the Power. It is Time to Take it Away. | Missouri Education Watchdog:

Weingarten Wants Common Core; Lewis Says We're Done | Mercedes Schneider

Weingarten Wants Common Core; Lewis Says We're Done | Mercedes Schneider:

Weingarten Wants Common Core; Lewis Says We're Done

In the spring of 1991, I completed my student teaching at Ascension High School in Gonzales, Louisiana. I taught Lord of the Flies, a creepy novel about the dangers of groupthink.

So often when I think of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) Unity Caucusmindset of unquestioned (and unquestionable) allegiance to a single position on an issue impacting teachers and the teaching profession, I think of Lord of the Flies.

American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten hails from that Unity Caucus mindset, and it has shown itself time and again (and again and again) in her unwavering allegiance to the never-tested, secretly-c0ncocted, corporate-benefiting Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

Then there is Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) President Karen Lewis.

CTU once had its own Lord of the Flies Unity Caucus. However, according to Lewis, the CTU Unity Caucus died with her re-election in 2013.

I can't imagine Lewis bending to groupthink.

I first came to "know" Lewis through writing my book, A Chronicle of Echoes. The book includes three chapters on the history of mayoral control of education in Chicago. Lewis is a major part of that history.

In February 2014, I had the pleasure of meeting Lewis for the first time during her travels to New Orleans for the AFT Executive Council meeting. We had dinner one evening, and I asked Lewis to dump CCSS. She told me that she needed to act in a manner that supported her constituency, and if her teachers were going to be saddled with CCSS, she would need to support them in that situation, which might include securing teaching materials.

In that conversation, it was clear to me that Lewis listens to and serves her constituency.

I cannot stand CCSS because I know what it is: a business deal designed to benefit Weingarten Wants Common Core; Lewis Says We're Done | Mercedes Schneider:

Doing Classroom Research | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Doing Classroom Research | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

Doing Classroom Research

At a time when Big Data rules, I look for small answers to big questions about how policies get translated into classroom practices. Big Data can be seen in massive surveys when thousands of teachers respond to questions that pollsters ask. And yes, there are huge data sets derived from major projects that video teacher lessons as well as from students who answer questions about their teachers when taking national and international tests.

But if you really want to know and understand teachers, teaching, learning, and students, one must spend time in classrooms listening and watching the key actors who create good-to-poor lessons. Big Data go for the generalization overlooking the particular that often matters to policymakers, researchers, and practitioners.

Classroom research is crucial to understanding how policymaker decisions aimed at improving instruction and curriculum (think Common Core Standards, 1:1 tablets for kindergartners, Judging teachers on the basis of student test scores, and new courses teaching children to have “grit”) get put into practice. Unfortunately, as I scan the current research terrain, such labor-intensive  research–such Small Data–is done less and less. In this post, I want to describe how I do (and have done) classroom research and why, I believe, it is important to do so.

I have been a social studies teacher for 14 years and a district superintendent for Doing Classroom Research | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

How young is too young to be suspended from school? | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC

How young is too young to be suspended from school? | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC:

How young is too young to be suspended from school?

Deepa Fernandes | May 14th, 2014, 5:00am

Deepa Fernandes / KPCC

Norwalk preschool teacher, Stefanie Servin, reads to her class as her LAUP coach, Astrid Feist, observes and takes notes from the back of the classroom.

Last September, Ronan started at his forth school in two years. He did well for a few weeks, but then moments of aggression reappeared. He’s been sent home twice for acting out. One more and Ronan will be expelled yet again.

“You would never know about the bad days on the good days because he’s so charming,” said his mother, Juliane Crump, as he played with blocks a few feet away.

Ronan is 3-years-old and the schools that have expelled him are local private preschools. He’s never seriously hurt another child, but he can be trying.

Crump’s experience puts her at the center of a raging debate: is suspension or expulsion the right punishment for children who misbehave in school at any age, or is it just hampering their education?

In March, the U.S. Department of Education released statistics showing 5,000 preschoolers nationwide were suspended at least once during the 2011-12 school year. Half of them were suspended more than once.

That’s not even the complete picture; Those numbers only include children at public schools, not private preschools or home-run childcare centers like Ronan attended.

And one national expert doubts the federal numbers are accurate even for public school-based programs.

Some of the largest school districts in California – Los Angeles, Santa Ana, Oakland, San Francisco  – showed zero preschool expulsions in the 2011-2012 federal data, the first year the federal government required school districts to report it. The state doesn’t require school districts to break out expulsion reports by grade.

L.A. Unified has an unwritten policy against suspending or expelling preschoolers, said Maureen Diekman who runs the district’s early education programs.

“When there’s a child with challenging behavior, we work with the family and work to How young is too young to be suspended from school? | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC: