How Vocational Education Got a 21st Century Reboot - POLITICO Magazine

How Vocational Education Got a 21st Century Reboot - POLITICO Magazine

How Vocational Education Got a 21st Century Reboot
With schools across 10 states, the P-TECH program prepares its students for good jobs that corporations pay well

NEWBURGH, N.Y. — Suriana Rodriguez is only 19, but she’s already lined up a full-time job at IBM. After her junior year in high school, she interned at the tech giant’s Poughkeepsie, N.Y., campus, 20 miles north of her hometown, for $17 an hour. For a year, Rodriguez has worked 40-hour weeks as an apprentice test technician, examining IBM mainframes to confirm they work before shipping them to customers. In January, she’ll move to a permanent position with a future salary that she says, is “definitely much more than I ever thought I’d be making at 19.”

Rodriguez’s opportunities with IBM came to her thanks to her high school, Newburgh Free Academy P-TECH. It’s part of an innovative public-school model that combines grade 9-12 education with internships and tuition-free community college. P-TECH, which stands for Pathways in Technology Early College High School, has spread to 10 states and 17 countries since its founding in Brooklyn in 2011. The P-TECH network is growing fast. By the end of 2019, there will be 220 P-TECH schools in operation. With 93,000 students nationwide, it is one of the most extensive career and technical education programs in the United States.

For public school districts, starting P-TECH schools is a way to try to address the “skills gap”—American education’s often-elusive goal of tying vocational training to what actual employers such as IBM and Cisco and Microsoft want. It focuses on the much-valued STEM subjects—science, technology, engineering and math. It aims to prepare students for so-called new collar jobs: work in tech that requires more than a high school diploma, but not always a four-year college degree. And at a time when free college education is surging toward the top of the progressive agenda, it’s an affordable free-college program that’s taken root in poorer cities, boosting high school graduation rates and two-year-college completion rates among CONTINUE READING: How Vocational Education Got a 21st Century Reboot - POLITICO Magazine

Rednecks, Hillbillies, and Crackers | radical eyes for equity

Rednecks, Hillbillies, and Crackers | radical eyes for equity

Rednecks, Hillbillies, and Crackers

Before my father graduated high school, he had a full set of false teeth. Finding—and later being able to afford—dentures that fit well were an important part of his life for sixty years.

Once his health began to deteriorate nearly as precipitously as his bank account in the last several years, that final set of dentures, lower quality and cost, made him look even less like himself than the disorienting transformation from aging and ill health—both making him enlarge, barrel-chested and swollen, as he simultaneously shrank in stature.

My father was a rough and rambunctious 1950s redneck growing up, losing teeth a few at a time from playing sports and the occasional fight. His dentist eventually decided to pull the last few and fit him with false teeth.

My mother, my sister, and I, then, never knew my father when he had teeth.

This was part of my 1960s childhood, a redneck life in Upstate South Carolina, my father’s home town. It seems fair to say that my mother was, as a North Carolinian raised mostly in Lexington and Lumberton, a hillbilly of sorts.

But theirs was no mixed marriage.

In fact, it took me many years, and well after I had moved out, to recognize CONTINUE READING: Rednecks, Hillbillies, and Crackers | radical eyes for equity

TODAY'S SPECIAL Education Research Report

Education Research Report

TODAY'S SPECIAL Education Research Report

Millions more American children are attending school with students of other races, even as many urban schools remain deeply segregated

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / now

The number of children attending U.S. public schools with students of other races has nearly doubled over the past quarter century, a little-noticed surge that reflects the nation’s shifting demographics, a Washington Post analysis has found. At the same time, children in most big cities and many suburbs remain locked in deeply segregated districts, with black students more likely to be enrolled

'Nudging' Helps STEM Students at 2-Year Colleges

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 41min

The purpose of this implementation report is to help community college leaders, foundations, and public education policymakers understand the impact that nudges have on student success, especially for students from populations that typically have low rates of college completion. The promising results of the NTSS initiative reflect the opportunities that nudging offers, and they have important imp

YESTERDAY

2019 State of Computer Science Education

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 14h

The Computer Science Teachers Association. along with Code.org and the Expanding Computing Education Pathways (ECEP) Alliance , a National Science Foundation Broadening Participation in Computing funded Alliance, has released the report. The report describes the policy trends and momentum over the past 12 months and contains: an analysis of national and state trends in AP CS by gender and race,

More Than One in Four Students Attend Schools with High or Extreme Levels of Chronic Absence

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 14h

This report describes how chronic absence and conditions for learning are interconnected issues that can have an impact on a child's educational success. The report identifies specific conditions for learning that can improve school experiences for students and staff and help reduce absenteeism and improve academic outcomes. It includes brief case studies from the state of Georgia and the Clevela

Education at a Glance 2019

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 16h

Education at a Gla nce is the authoritative source for information on the state of education around the world. It provides data on the structure, finances and performance of education systems across OECD countries and a number of partner economies. More than 100 charts and tables in this publication – as well as links to much more available on the educational database – provides key information o

Adolescents with high levels of physical activity perform better in school over two years

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 18h

Adolescents with higher levels of physical activity performed better in school during transition from primary school to lower secondary school than their physically inactive peers, a new study from Finland shows. However, the researchers, from the University of Jyväskylä, found that increased physical activity did not necessarily result in improved academic performance. Previous cross-sectional s

Time spent using social media associated with mental health problems among adolescents

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 18h

Adolescents who spend more than three hours a day using social media may be at higher risk for mental health problems. This observational study included a nationally representative sample of nearly 6,600 U.S. adolescents (ages 12-15) who reported time spent on social media during a typical day and who reported information about mental health problems. After accounting for factors including a hist

SEP 10

Education Policy Responses to the Opioid Crisis

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 2d

The opioid crisis is a top priority issue we continue to hear about and research. While most of the policy action taken related to the crisis has been in the health sector, state education leaders are looking for ways to address the direct and indirect implications on students through policy action. explores the connection between education policy and the opioid crisis, provides examples of rece

Career and Technical Education by Locale

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 2d

Public high school graduates from towns and rural areas earn more credits in career and technical education (CTE) than do graduates from cities and suburban areas. The National Center for Education Statistics Data Point, 

Education Research Report

The La. “Teaching Authorization”: Potentially Teach for Life With No Ed Degree– But There’s a Catch | deutsch29

The La. “Teaching Authorization”: Potentially Teach for Life With No Ed Degree– But There’s a Catch | deutsch29

The La. “Teaching Authorization”: Potentially Teach for Life With No Ed Degree– But There’s a Catch

On September 09, 2019, the Hechinger Report published an article entitled, “A New Teacher Vows to Help in a Classroom Full of Need: ‘Under the Right Conditions, They’d Be Stars.'”

The article features a teaching intern who is part of the Norman C. Francis Teacher Residency, an alternative teacher certification program specifically aimed at recruiting individuals who already hold a bachelors degree in another area to agree to teach three years beyond an initial “residency year” at an assigned New Orleans charter school in exchange for roughly $29K in residency-year financial assistance toward earning a masters degree in education.

From the site’s “about” page:

Who we are

The Residency is a first-of-its-kind partnership not only in New Orleans, but nationally.

• Partners. Xavier University of Louisiana, New Schools for New Orleans, and charter school networks across New Orleans. Our school partners for the 2019-20 school year include Arise Schools, Audubon Schools, Crescent City Schools, Elan Academy, FirstLine Schools, Foundation Preparatory Charter School, KIPP New Orleans Schools, Lake Forest Charter, Morris Jeff Community School, and ReNew Schools. We are continuing to add school partners for the upcoming school year and beyond.

And from the “what to expect” page:

Residency Year 1

The Norman C. Francis Teacher Residency merges the best of Xavier CONTINUE READING: The La. “Teaching Authorization”: Potentially Teach for Life With No Ed Degree– But There’s a Catch | deutsch29

North Carolina: Republican Legislators Trash Democracy | Diane Ravitch's blog

North Carolina: Republican Legislators Trash Democracy | Diane Ravitch's blog

North Carolina: Republican Legislators Trash Democracy

Republican legislators in North Carolina pulled a fast one on the Democrats. After assuring them that no votes were scheduled, the Republicans took advantage of the Democrats’ absence to override Governor Roy Cooper’s veto of the Republican budget.

https://apple.news/ARwmvDp7KQ1O0PQfx-alHAA

NBC reported:

“North Carolina House Democrats are calling foul on their Republican colleagues for voting to override the governor’s budget veto on Wednesday while most Democrats were not present.

“The uproar began after GOP Rep. Jason Saine made a motion early Wednesday morning to reconsider the budget that was vetoed by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper earlier this year, according to The Raleigh News & Observer.

“Democrats excoriated Republicans on social media and the few who were present in the House at the time of the vote furiously protested the decision. Only 12 Democrats were in the House, but they did not all have an opportunity to vote and their microphones were cut off, the paper reported. The vote passed 55-9. The issue now moves to the state’s GOP-controlled Senate.

“How dare you do this, Mr. Speaker!” said Democratic Rep. Deb Butler, who was surrounded by fellow Democrats on the House floor as she shouted in protest CONTINUE READING: North Carolina: Republican Legislators Trash Democracy | Diane Ravitch's blog

Education Department threatens to suspend employee who provided The Post with budget data - The Washington Post

Education Department threatens to suspend employee who provided The Post with budget data - The Washington Post

Education Department threatens to suspend employee who provided The Post with budget data

The U.S. Education Department is proposing a five-day suspension for a budget analyst who provided information to The Washington Post about the Trump administration’s 2017 budget proposal before it was released, according to a letter sent to the employee. Her attorney says it is retaliation for whistleblowing.

Rebecca Delaney, an analyst in the Education Department’s Office of Finance and Operations since 2016, received a letter dated Aug. 30 from the director of the Budget Service telling her about the proposed suspension. The letter, which noted that she admitted to providing the information to the press, said Delaney knew the data was “subject to an embargo” and that it is “uncouth or unprofessional” to violate the embargo. It accused her of “conduct unbecoming a federal employee.”

The Education Department did not respond to requests for comment. Delaney declined to comment. The copy of the letter obtained by The Post has the name of the budget director redacted, but he is identified on the department website as Larry Kean. He did not respond to a request to comment.

Washington Post officials declined to comment.

Delaney’s attorney, Cathy Harris, said in a statement: “This is one of the starkest examples of direct retaliation for whistleblowing that I have seen. The Department of Education is threatening to suspend an employee for blowing the whistle, which is wholly protected under the law. The Department should be thanking Ms. Delaney for her courage, not retaliating against her for exercising her right to blow the whistle by contacting the press about what she saw as gross mismanagement by public officials.”

Harris has asked the U.S. Office of Special Counsel to issue a stay of any disciplinary action against Delaney, saying in a Sept. 5 letter: “It could not be more stark: the Department of Education charged that Ms. Delaney committed ‘conduct unbecoming a federal employee’ solely because she disclosed information to the press, and later to CONTINUE READING: Education Department threatens to suspend employee who provided The Post with budget data - The Washington Post

Mike Klonsky's Blog: Talk about privilege. Rich get to live longer. Poor & middle class don't.

Mike Klonsky's Blog: Talk about privilege. Rich get to live longer. Poor & middle class don't.

Talk about privilege. Rich get to live longer. Poor & middle class don't.

"Poverty is a life-threatening issue for millions of people in this country, and this report confirms it."—Sen. Bernie Sanders

There are now around 100 million, or nearly a third of the U.S. population living in poverty or near poverty. This figure is missing from glowing news reports about the booming Trump economy. While there are millions of white people living in poverty, poverty rates among African-Americans, Latinx, and Native Americans run two to three times higher. 

A newly released report from the U.S. General Accounting Office on Retirement Security, commissioned by Sen. Bernie Sanders reveals that the rich are living longer lives, while poor and middle-income Americans are dying at a comparatively earlier age. Talk about privilege!

This from the report:

GAO found that among Americans aged 51-61 in 1992, fewer than half of those in the poorest 20 percent of America’s wealth distribution had survived by 2014—48 percent. Among the richest 20 percent, 75.5 percent were still alive. The poorest 20 percent were twice as likely to die over the 22-year period than the wealthiest 20 percent.

 GAO similarly observed this massive disparity in life expectancy when examining CONTINUE READING: Mike Klonsky's Blog: Talk about privilege. Rich get to live longer. Poor & middle class don't.

CURMUDGUCATION: Education and Remembering

CURMUDGUCATION: Education and Remembering

Education and Remembering

It's 9/11, and social media is plastered with a thousand variations on a single theme-- Never Forget.

Well, of course we'll forget.

First of all, we don't can't even articulate a shared version of what it is that we're remembering. That somebody once successfully attacked us? That we subsequently lost our national shit and chewed through a variety of civil liberties in hopes that Benjamin "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" Franklin was wrong and that everything from surveillance to some airport theatrics would be just the thing? That a mass of people dying for no good reason sucks? That people in the world wish us harm? That we are all fragile tiny humans stuck together on a tiny rock spinning into a vast cold void?

I've seen a handful of posts praising the spirit of 9/12, and I get that-- it was nice to set aside a lot of petty bullshit and just try to help each other, to take care of people in the way that I'm pretty sure we should be doing all day every day. I would like to see folks do that all the time. But I also remember that the spirit of 9/12 included a teenage girl getting harassed in a high school parking lot because she was Muslim-looking. Not to mention some serious warmongering and a renewed patriotism that was sometimes inspiring and warm and sometimes scary and jingoistic. I remember that anti-terrorism wrapped in a flag and carrying a Bible became an excuse for a lot of bad stuff.

So which part of that should we never forget? I'd say all of it, but that brings us to the second CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Education and Remembering

With A Brooklyn Accent: A Glimmer of Hope on September 11

With A Brooklyn Accent: A Glimmer of Hope on September 11

A Glimmer of Hope on September 11

As I watched the Twin Towers fall from the my 6th Floor Seminar room in Dealy Hall at Fordham, I knew that our country would be tested as it never had been since the multiple crises of the 1960's

Would we come out of this terrible ordeal , which would include the deaths of friends, co-workers, and family members, with our hearts hardened to the suffering of those following different traditions than our own, or would we come out of it more open minded and compassionate?

The jury is still out on that issue. The unity that followed those awful events has dissipated, and we live in a country where many people are filled with rage, at war with their own neighbors, as well as people who do not think they way they do.

Yet all is not lost. We are not beyond redemption

So I ask this: :Let the heroism and unselfishness of so many people that day, of individuals not in uniform as well as first responders, offer a model of how we can be better than we ever thought possible, both as individuals as as a country

I honor my friends who died when the Towers collapsed, some of whom were fellow coaches in Brooklyn CYO basketball, but I also honor the transcendent possibilities of compassion and generosity that were revealed that day, and in the days that followed.

At a time when we see, on a daily basis, too many people drawing on their worst instincts,.let us find the best in ourselves the way so many people did on that tragic day

Peace to all.

With A Brooklyn Accent: A Glimmer of Hope on September 11

Healing From Our Current Wreckage | Real Learning CT

Healing From Our Current Wreckage | Real Learning CT

Healing From Our Current Wreckage

On the evening of September 11, 2001, I listened to the death toll from the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and from the plane crash in the fields of Pennsylvania.  I knew too well what the sudden death of one loved family member does to the rest of that person’s one family and thought that the grief of 2,977 families in shock about the deaths of their loved ones would crush us all. I was sure that we, as a society, could not survive so much  grief.

Grief doesn’t ever go away, but Manal Ezzat, a Muslim woman and engineer with the U.S. Army who was present at the attack on the Pentagon, took her grief and used it to connect with others in need. She was the project manager for the Army’s space in the Pentagon at the time of the attack. After the attack, she was in charge of redesigning the area where the attack had occurred. She knew immediately that the area should not return to its prior use and decided to build a chapel in the place of the former offices. Recently with the approach of the 18th anniversary of that awful day, Ezzat said that she still can’t fully understand that tragedy and also can never forget it. About CONTINUE READING: Healing From Our Current Wreckage | Real Learning CT