Wash Met Closing on Jan 9 Education Town Hall – Education Town Hall Forum

Wash Met Closing on Jan 9 Education Town Hall – Education Town Hall Forum

WASH MET CLOSING ON JAN 9 EDUCATION TOWN HALL

On our January 9 show, the first of 2020, Education Town Hall will be talking with four current students at DCPS’s Washington Metropolitan high school about their journey, and that of their fellow Washington Met students, since learning right before Thanksgiving that DCPS proposed closing their school.

Listen at 11 a.m. EASTERN on Thursday, January 9, via TuneIn or by visiting We Act Radio and clicking on arrow at upper left (NOTE: Not all “listen” buttons are working at present).

Guests:

• Lyric Johnson: 16 years old and on the DCPS chancellor’s cabinet; came to Wash Met in middle school
• Na’Asia Hawkins, 18 years old, arrived at Wash Met after 2 years out of school; has 2-year-old son
• Travius Butler, 17 years old, arrived at Wash Met after leaving Woodson HS; hopes to enter the military
• Angel, 19 years old, has been at Wash Met for 3 years; has 5-month-old baby

Washington Met is one of four opportunity academies within DCPS, ensuring that students who have not found academic success at other schools will have a pathway to graduation. But citing poor attendance, low enrollment, and poor test scores, the DCPS chancellor has proposed closing Washington Met. effective next school year.

For these students, and a host before them, however, the school has provided a safe and welcoming haven away from difficulties of their lives, including serious trauma. For many, the school’s small classes and personal attention have been critical in their educations, something that other schools could not provide them.

Yet, years without a gym, library, day care for students’ children, and substantive career training, Washington Met. appears to have been poorly provisioned by the city—a reality not lost on its students.

As a result, these students have begun a difficult, but brave, journey in advocating for their school in the face of incredible odds against both them and their school.

The Education Town Hall with Thomas Byrd
broadcasts from Historic Anacostia
in Washington, DC, on We Act Radio,
Thursdays at 11:00 a.m. Eastern
New programming 2nd and 4th Thursdays, alternating with classic shows.
Listen live via TuneIn.
Shows are archived for convenient listening shortly after broadcast.

After years of weekly broadcasts, the program now focuses one show each month on local CONTINUE READING: Wash Met Closing on Jan 9 Education Town Hall – Education Town Hall Forum

Keeping Progressive Schools Alive | Deborah Meier on Education

Keeping Progressive Schools Alive | Deborah Meier on Education

Keeping Progressive Schools Alive

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

Happy New Year and a special thanks to those who respond to past blogs about choice, et al. I always mean to respond to each comment.

They helped my thinking a lot. And, I have decided to start a new political tendency: “The ‘It Depends’ Party.” I find it is my answer to so many of the issues facing us in life, and in schools.

For example, school choice can be very useful, or very dangerous, it depends. Ditto for small schools, although I worry less about its misuse.

But self-governance, my third principle, I think holds up best. (However, I can think of examples of where I would be against it and that is why in some cases we need a law against any “it”).

Watching helplessly as some of our wonderful New York City small, self-governing schools of choice have been destroyed, I have learned a lot. But not yet how we could have avoided it. Rereading Seymour Sarason’s last book, The Predictable Failure of Educational: can we change reform before it’s too late, I wish I could confer with him. At the time I just thought that if I understood him right I could avoid the mistakes. I didn’t. I thought, for example, that in the absence of a strong movement behind us I would have to rely on powerful allies. It worked for 30 years. But that was not enough.

Some of those schools we started in the 1970s and 80s have survived. So we need to explore how they did it. In some cases their original leaders are still there, hanging on tenaciously for fear that they to will fall prey.  Some have succeeded perhaps by being so invisibly unnoticeable that they made no enemies. In contrast, many of us were very noisy about our beliefs hoping to encourage a movement.

In Boston, the Pilots were protected for a while by the local union’s support and our existence in the labor-management contract. But Boston has gone through several leadership changes since the Boston Pilots began and each time we are nervous. And the original idea was that the autonomies offered the Pilots would expand over time to the whole system. We had modest success in a few areas.

At the heart of the failure is our weak belief in democracy, the absence of a larger CONTINUE READING: Keeping Progressive Schools Alive | Deborah Meier on Education

NANCY BAILEY: Students with Disabilities: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Students with Disabilities: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Students with Disabilities: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Parents with students who have disabilities are troubled by the problems their children face in public schools. They may turn to charter schools believing they will finally get the services they find lacking in public school.

But charter schools are not an acceptable answer in most cases. We’ve known for years that students with disabilities are often excluded from charter schools where there’s inclusion. In schools where there’s segregation (only students with disabilities) children may not have qualified teachers. Nor do they get to socialize with their non-disabled peers.

This is especially disturbing since parents of students with disabilities are supposed to have a legal right to appropriate services. Their children should have access to the least restrictive environment with appropriate Individual Educational Plans in their public schools.

While charter schools are not viable, underfunded public schools are plagued with overcrowded inclusion classes, unsympathetic district and school administrators, CONTINUE READING: Students with Disabilities: Between a Rock and a Hard Place

More US schools teach in Spanish, but not enough to help Latinos

More US schools teach in Spanish, but not enough to help Latinos

HECHO EN USA: BILINGUAL EDUCATION

More US schools teach in English and Spanish, but not enough to help Latino kids
Classes taught in both languages help students from various backgrounds, but many districts have fought to keep Spanish out of schools.

The USA TODAY Network is launching a series on the Latino community in the USA called Hecho en USA, or made in America. Roughly 80% of all Latinos living in the USA are American citizens, but media coverage of Hispanics tends to focus on immigration and crime, instead of how Latino families live, work and learn in their hometowns. Hecho en USA tells the stories of the nation’s 59.9 million Latinos – a growing economic and cultural force, many of whom are born in the USA.

LOS ANGELES – Preschool teacher Rosa Ramirez has a special way of asking her students to line up for playtime outside. 

“Pueden pararse si llevan puesto algo de color amarillo, como una abeja,” she tells them. 

In English, Ramirez would say, “You can stand up if you are wearing yellow – like a bee.” But this is the half of the school day in which she teaches exclusively in Spanish. 

Her students are not confused by her language choice. Most of the 4-year-olds wearing even a smidgen of yellow stand up as instructed.

The preschool dual-language program at Gates Street Early Education Center in Lincoln Heights, one of Los Angeles’ oldest neighborhoods with dense populations of Latino and Asian residents, is part of a growing number of bilingual education models taking root in California and across the country. Many of them are designed to serve students from Spanish-speaking families, as well as students from other cultures, under mounting evidence that learning two languages can help people from all backgrounds become stronger students.  

Roughly 3.8 million students in U.S. schools are native Spanish-speakers who are not proficient in English. They make up the bulk of the approximately 5 million students nationwide identified as English language learners, the fastest-growing demographic in schools – and the lowest-performing, as judged by achievement tests and graduation rates. 

Sixty-seven percent of students with limited English skills graduated high school after four years in 2016, compared with 84% of all students, according to federal data. 

Language experts recommend how to improve those outcomes: More high-quality, long-term dual-language CONTINUE READING: More US schools teach in Spanish, but not enough to help Latinos

Shawgi Tell: Teachers Unions Not the Only Ones Opposing Charter Schools | Dissident Voice

Teachers Unions Not the Only Ones Opposing Charter Schools | Dissident Voice

Teachers Unions Not the Only Ones Opposing Charter Schools

Promoters of privately-operated non-profit and for-profit charter schools that seize billions of dollars a year from public schools have long promoted the illusion that it is mainly teachers unions that are opposed to charter schools.

Keeping in mind that 90% of charter schools have no teacher unions and that charter school owners-operators usually react bellicosely when teachers try to unionize to defend their rights and their students, it is not only teachers unions that oppose charter schools.

For years, many legislators, governors, school boards, superintendents, parents, students, teachers, community residents, education advocates, education associations, college professors, and others have also opposed non-profit and for-profit charter schools run by unelected individuals. These forces are being joined by new people from all walks of life every day.

People do not want segregated, deregulated, unstable, privatized, unaccountable, non-transparent, corrupt, and crisis-prone schools that enrich owners of capital while masquerading as “schools” that “benefit the kids.” People increasingly see through all the charter school hype and are not prepared to abandon America’s 170-year-old public school system that today educates 50 million youth in 100,000 schools.

Thousands of charter schools have closed over the years and thousands perform poorly every year. The performance of cyber charter schools is CONTINUE READING: Teachers Unions Not the Only Ones Opposing Charter Schools | Dissident Voice

The Decade in Education: What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been | Teacher in a strange land

The Decade in Education: What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been | Teacher in a strange land

The Decade in Education: What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been

I’m sure you’re not geeked to read yet another combination critique/regret-fest/prognostication blog on the preceding Decade in Education. So I’m not going to write one. Besides, two extremely excellent ‘decade pieces’ were recently published, very different but both relevant and well worth your time.

The first is Audrey Watters’ The 100 Worst Ed-Tech Debacles of the Decade, a long and fascinating chronicle of ‘ed-tech failures and fuck-ups and flawed ideas’. Don’t be put off by the ‘ed-tech’ designation (or the naughty word).  The piece isn’t about computers or devices or digital programs, per se, but covers all technologies—so very many technologies—that were supposed to transform education in some way and ended up being so much splat on the classroom floor.

Go ahead. Skim through it. It starts with smaller, quicker-to-die, media-fueled sexy innovations, and works its way up through virtual charter schools, personalized learning, and venture philanthropy, disrupting all the way. The hits just keep on a-comin’ and just as rapidly disintegrating, disappointing and malfunctioning. I recognized about 90 out of the 100 Watters’ flops, and have been personally involved CONTINUE READING:  The Decade in Education: What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been | Teacher in a strange land

It's Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... A VERY BUSY DAY | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

It's Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... A VERY BUSY DAY 

 The latest news and resources in education since 2007

Most Popular Posts Of The Week

by Larry Ferlazzo / 4h

I’m making a change in the content of the regular feature. In addition to sharing the top five posts that have received the most “hits” in the preceding seven days (though they may have originally been published on an earlier date), I will also include the top five posts that have actually appeared in the past week. Often, these are different posts. You might also be interested in IT’S THE TWELFT

YESTERDAY

“Author Interview: ‘Culturally Responsive Education in the Classroom'”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 11h

Author Interview: ‘Culturally Responsive Education in the Classroom’ is the headline of my latest Education Week Teacher column. In it, Adeyemi Stembridge talks about his new book, “Culturally Responsive Education In The Classroom: An Equity Framework for Pedagogy, including explaining the difference between “equity” and “equality.” Here are some excerpts:

A Look Back: “Shortcuts, School Reform and Private Foundations”

by Larry Ferlazzo / 12h

I thought that new – and veteran – readers might find it interesting if I began sharing my best posts from over the years. You can see the entire collection here . Today, I’m featuring a piece I wrote for The Huffington Post years years ago titled Shortcuts, School Reform and Private Foundations. Here’s an excerpt:

The Best Resources To Learn About The Importance Of Teacher Modeling

by Larry Ferlazzo / 13h

mohamed_hassan / Pixabay I’ve written a lot in posts and in my books about the importance of teacher modeling and how, usually, if one of my lessons goes south (which happens more frequently than I would like), I can usually find the reason in lack of teacher modeling. Literacy researcher Timothy Shanahan has just written the best piece I’ve seen on the importance of modeling – and how to do it.

My Latest BAM! Radio Show Is On Connecting Current Events To The Classroom

by Larry Ferlazzo / 15h

My latest ten-minute BAM! Radio Show is on connecting current events, including impeachment, to the classroom . I’m joined by Suzie Boss and Kristen Koppers, who have also contributed written commentaries to my Education Week Teacher column. I’m adding this show to All My BAM Radio Shows – Linked With Descriptions .

This Year’s “Doodle for Google” Student Contest Opens

by Larry Ferlazzo / 15h

Google’s annual contest for students to create “Doodles” opened up today . They will accept entries until March 13th. Even though there’s only “one” national winner, they seem to have enough finalists for it to be worthwhile for students to participate with a decent chance of gaining some recognition.

Chinese (Lunar) New Year Takes Place On January 25th – Here Are Teaching & Learning Resources

by Larry Ferlazzo / 1d

nguyentuanhung / Pixabay Chinese (Lunar) New Year takes place on January 25th this year. You might be interested in The Best Resources For Chinese (Lunar) New Year.

Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day... | The latest news and resources in education since 2007

The Greatest Ed Tech Goof Of All Time (Adam Laats) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

The Greatest Ed Tech Goof Of All Time (Adam Laats) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

The Greatest Ed Tech Goof Of All Time (Adam Laats)

Adam Laats is an educational historian at Binghamton University, State University of New York. A former teacher, he is currently at work on the Lancasterian system of schooling in early 19th century America. Laats had read a post by Audrey Watters, “The 100 Worst Ed-Tech Debacles of the Decade.” He then wrote this post for his blog.

What have been the top ed-tech goofs of all time? The top choice from my current research is pretty clear, c. 1804. [My readers] are probably sick of hearing about Joseph Lancaster. And I’m sorry. But his plan was such a perfect mix of tech-naïveté and Zuckerberg-level hubris that I can’t stop marveling over the 21st-century feel of Lancaster’s tech-obsessed school system.

If you’re just joining us, Lancaster was a young man who opened a school for poor kids in London in 1798. He tried some new tricks, including banishing corporal punishment and using students as teachers. He really believed technology could solve all the problems of education and therefore of society.

For example, he dreamed of new systems of “reading telegraphs,” “alphabet wheels,” and benches with holes for hats. His assumption—like that of so many of his peers—was that the right machine could eliminate traditional problems with school organization.

None of those failed ed machines, however, gets my pick as the top ed-tech goof CONTINUE READING: The Greatest Ed Tech Goof Of All Time (Adam Laats) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Opting Out: The Story of the Parents’ Grassroots Movement to Achieve Whole-Child Public Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Opting Out: The Story of the Parents’ Grassroots Movement to Achieve Whole-Child Public Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Opting Out: The Story of the Parents’ Grassroots Movement to Achieve Whole-Child Public Schools

This is a book you will want to read if you are a parent, a teacher, a teacher educator.

Opting Out: The Story of the Parents’ Grassroots Movement to Achieve Whole-Child Schools is an essential addition to your bookshelf.

It was written by Professor David Hursh of the University of Rochester and parents leaders of the New York Opt Out movement Jeanette Deutermann, Lisa Rudley, and Hursh’s graduate students, Zhe Chen and Sarah McGinnis.

Together they explain the origins and development of the one of the most significant parent-led reactions against high-stakes testing and in favor of education that is devoted to the full development of children as healthy CONTINUE READING: Opting Out: The Story of the Parents’ Grassroots Movement to Achieve Whole-Child Public Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

Jeff Bryant: Have Democrats Changed Course On Charters? | OurFuture.org by People's Action

Have Democrats Changed Course On Charters? | OurFuture.org by People's Action

Have Democrats Changed Course On Charters?

Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bennet wants you to know how much he cares—really cares—about education. Speaking at the Public Education Forum 2020, Bennet began his remarks by declaring he is “the first school superintendent in the history of America to run for president of the United States.” Bennet led the Denver school district from 2005 to 2009 before he was appointed to fill the state’s empty U.S. Senate seat. “Every single thing I do in the Senate runs through the lens of the kids that I used to work for in Denver,” he said.

Not that other Democratic presidential candidates at this strictly education-focused event weren’t equally intent on convincing the crowd they’re also deeply committed to educating the nation’s children. After all, the forum was sponsored and organized by the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers along with some other labor unions and civil rights and education advocacy groups. An audience of 1,500 in attendance seemed to be comprised mostly of educators and former educators from across the country.

Seven candidates each took to the stage one after the other, including Bennet; South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg; billionaire activist Tom Steyer; former Vice President Joe Biden; and Senators Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren. (New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, who has since left the race, had committed to attend but dropped out due to a bout of the flu.)

But Bennet at times seemed the most passionate among the candidates, raising his voice and jabbing the air on a number of CONTINUE READING: Have Democrats Changed Course On Charters? | OurFuture.org by People's Action

CURMUDGUCATION: How Tech Killed Tractors, And Why Teachers Should Care

CURMUDGUCATION: How Tech Killed Tractors, And Why Teachers Should Care

How Tech Killed Tractors, And Why Teachers Should Care

If you don't spend a lot of time around farms and farmers, you might have missed this story, which just made its way into legit journalistic coverage via the Star Tribune of Minnesota-- there is an exploding market for forty-year-old tractors.

Adam Belz reports on auction bidding wars over old tractors. Is it because of tractor nostalgia? Nope-- and if you think about your car or music system or the device with which you're reading this post, you already know the answer. Those earlier tractors were well-built and have lots of hours in them, but there's one other factor:

The other big draw of the older tractors is their lack of complex technology. Farmers prefer to fix what they can on the spot, or take it to their mechanic and not have to spend tens of thousands of dollars.

“The newer machines, any time something breaks, you’ve got to have a computer to fix it,” Stock said.

The tractors are loaded with shiny new tech. As Jason Bloomberg put it at Forbes, "John Deere is but one of thousands of enterprises undergoing digital transformation as it becomes a software company that runs its technology on tractors, rather than the other way around."

Farmers have steadily lost the right to repair, meaning that a tractor breakdown can result in a lomng wait for your turn to get a costly repair. It's not just the cost and the downtime that suck; as pointed out by Greg Peterson, the CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: How Tech Killed Tractors, And Why Teachers Should Care