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Schools Undo Another Grier Change

Last week I reported that San Diego Unified is planning to reverse changes to its central offices that were made by former Superintendent Terry Grier, returning to a system that looks a lot like what it had before.

Now there's another sign the era of Grier is over in San Diego Unified: The school district will no longer be using a controversial interview tool that Grier introduced to choose principals.

Grier had touted the Haberman interviews as a way to measure would-be-principals' values. We wrote about it nearly two years ago when Grier introduced it:

The interview is modeled on the teachings of University of Wisconsin Milwaukee professor Martin Haberman, who studies disadvantaged students and the educators who help them best. Principals applying for new jobs were interviewed as well. San Diego Unified signed a $23,000 contract with the Haberman Educational Foundation to train staffers in the interview process, which includes problem-

Bright and Early: The Education Newsblitz

A friend of mine did a terrible thing and introduced me to this British television show about high schoolers who run a newspaper. I may never get work done again. At least I managed to scrape together your newsblitz:

• We blog that the San Diego Unified school board will decide tonight whether or not to offer summer school and which grades could get it. Paring back could save money, but as we wrote earlier, it could also have consequences.

• The Union-Tribune writes that the board is also weighing whether to suspend a policyaimed at ending social promotion by requiring students to take summer school or be held back a grade.

• Marsha Sutton at SDNN blogs about national trends on teacher tenure, video essays for college applications and California's so-far-failed bid for Race to the Tip.

• Classroom assistants and other support employees are losing their jobs in Vista schools, the North County Times reports.

• Teacher salaries in California, once the highest in the country in absolute dollars, now fall behind those in New York, the Educated Guess blogs. Meanwhile, student-to-teacher ratios are higher in California than almost anywhere else. John Fensterwald unpacks the information from a national teachers union report.

• Internships are becoming a way of life for college students, the Sacramento Bee writes. One even has a blog called "The Eternal Intern."

• A new report says UC Berkeley spending is wasteful, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

• What works best for English learners? The debate continues: A Kentucky economist finds

Should Kids Be Paid (Bribed) For Good Grades? - THE DAILY RIFF - Be Smarter. About Education.

Should Kids Be Paid (Bribed) For Good Grades? - THE DAILY RIFF - Be Smarter. About Education.

Death Threats, A Time Cover Story &
Morning Joe Debate (With Surprising Conclusions From Scarborough)

Stephen Colbert Interviews Harvard Professor
In Amusing Video (See Below)

When I first came across Time's cover story about paying students for grades, I first thought, "Oh, great. Our kids have no desire to learn, so we have to pay them? Maybe it's what's happening in the classroom and at home that kids don't want to learn . . ."

Well, then I remembered my parents paid ME and I was humbled by my initial knee-jerk reaction. That's right - they paid me 50 cents for an A and 25 cents for a B. Was that what motivated me? I really don't think so. . . or in fact, I know so. That was more of a bonus. I actually think being allowed to stay up to watch "Bewitched" or an ice-cream sundae (Jamie Oliver would not like this) were stronger motivations.

But they still counted as bribery.

Then I recalled one of the techniques used by Rafe Esquith, a past Teacher of the Year and Oprah honor recipient, in the fabulous documentary, The Hobart Shakespeareans, and it was

Controversial Court Pick Attracts Bipartisan Edu-Fan Club - Politics K-12 - Education Week

Controversial Court Pick Attracts Bipartisan Edu-Fan Club - Politics K-12 - Education Week

Controversial Court Pick Attracts Bipartisan Edu-Fan Club

By Michele McNeil on April 13, 2010 12:42 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

Goodwin H. Liu, a prominent constitutional scholar from the University of California-Berkeley who's an expert in educational equity issues such as desegregation, has a fight on his hands as he faces a confirmation hearing Friday for a post on the federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

But a bipartisan group of education policy experts, from Stanford's Linda Darling-Hammond to AEI's Rick Hess, are rallying to his defense.

This Washington Post story story explains why Liu is so controversial, energizing the left and outraging the right as he supports traditionally liberal issues such as same-sex marriage and affirmative action. His appellate court nomination is important, The Post writes, because he might be getting groomed for an eventual U.S. Supreme Court nomination. Russo over at This Week in Education has moreabout Liu's work as a Clinton-era U.S. Department of Education official.

In a March 23 letter to key U.S. Senators, a truly diverse and bipartisan group of 22 education policy experts are urging the U.S. Senate to approve his nomination. The list of Liu's cheerleaders include Mike Petrilli of Fordham and

This Week In Education Classrooms: Teach Sex Ed & Go To Jail, Says WI DA

This Week In Education

Classrooms: Teach Sex Ed & Go To Jail, Says WI DA

from This Week In Education by Alexander Russo

Wow.

A local DA in Wisconsin who claims he's not showboating to to get media attention says that he's going to prosecute teahers who follows state law requiring instruction about the use of

Cartoon: Direct Lending & Marxist Professors

The Obama Administration’s Disappearing College Graduation Agenda � The Quick and the Ed

The Obama Administration’s Disappearing College Graduation Agenda � The Quick and the Ed

The Obama Administration’s Disappearing College Graduation Agenda

April 13th, 2010 | Category: Uncategorized

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They say that everything’s relative, and this is certainly true in politics. Normally, the President signing a bill eliminating $87 billion in corporate student loan welfare would be a huge deal. But when it happens in the same legislation that overhauls the entire American health care system, people take less notice. And the successful student loan reform, in turn, overshadowed the collapse of the Obama Administration’s college graduation agenda. That’s the subject of an article I wrote this week for The New Republic.

In a nutshell, the student loan reform was more a triumph of good government than an improvement in education policy. Cutting out for-profit banks as the middlemen in the federal student loan program was a huge achievement. But nearly half of the savings were either defined into non-existence by Kent Conrad (the article explains how this happened) or targeted for health care and deficit reduction. Most of the remaining funds were used to increase Pell grants.

I’m all in favor of Pell grants. But when the administration boasts of doubling “the amount of funding available for Pell Grants” it’s important to realize that this doesn’t mean that the poorest students are getting twice as much money to pay for

Christopher Mahoney: Kids to California Lawmakers: Spend a Day in a Public School

Christopher Mahoney: Kids to California Lawmakers: Spend a Day in a Public School

Christopher Mahoney

Director of the San Carlos Charter Learning Center

Posted: April 12, 2010 03:22 PM

Kids to California Lawmakers: Spend a Day in a Public School

It is now the Dark Ages for California public schools. While some wealthy districts in the state can choose to spend close to $23,000 per child, the majority of those relying on state funding are limited to a paltry $5,000 per-child allotment. And so in most places, classrooms are overflowing, exceeding 40 kids in a room in secondary schools and 30 kids in grades K-5. For this reason, a group of children, parents, teachers and administrators is calling upon all California state lawmakers to spend a day in a public school. We would like the people making decisions about educational spending to see the devastating impact of their choices firsthand.

Some will say that the economic crisis has had an impact on all aspects of California's economy, so schools should take a hit along with other sectors and state workers. But public education is to our society what research and development are to any company. Regardless of how difficult the economic climate is, companies continue to fund research and development so they can remain competitive. If we systemically shortchange a generation of kids in California, then California's economy will drop to second-rate status, crippling the state for decades to come. Think about it: Why are we choosing to spend more money on prisoners than on the future of California?

What affects California affects all of the United States. California's output stands at $1.9 trillion annually; it has by far the nation's most dominant state economy. Past investment in public schools yielded the brainpower and skills that powered this success. Conversely, California's diminishing commitment to the schools will have a negative impact on the entire country. This will be irreparable for at least a generation.

I believe in free-market competition within public education. The cornerstone for the future of the public schools will be innovation and an entrepreneurial approach to operations. But we can't make public education successful if California's lawmakers don't have a clear understanding of what is taking place in the schools every day. This is why May 15- 17,

Analysis: Teacher Pensions Underfunded by $900 Billion - Teacher Beat - Education Week

Analysis: Teacher Pensions Underfunded by $900 Billion - Teacher Beat - Education Week

Analysis: Teacher Pensions Underfunded by $900 Billion

By Stephen Sawchuk on April 13, 2010 12:02 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

Teachers' pension plans are underfunded to the tune of an eye-popping $933 billion, according to an analysis released this morning by the Manhattan Institute, a think tank. That's close to three times more than official state government estimates of these defined-benefit plans' liabilities, the paper states.

The authors attribute the gap to accounting rules for public pensions that permit actuaries to "discount" future obligations based on estimates of how the investments will fare over time. Unlike in private-sector plans, they aren't required to take into account how risky those investments are, and generally assume a strong stock performance. (Private pensions, the authors state, are often discounted at rates close to the yield of high-quality corporate bonds.)

If the market doesn't perform as desired, states will have to meet the gap between projections and actual benefit costs by raising taxes and, potentially, by scaling back other education services to meet the pension obligations. Think larger classes, fewer teachers, and less money for instruction.

The report adjusts the calculations of teacher-pension plans' present liabilities on

LULAC Opposes Merit-Pay Bill for Teachers in Florida - Learning the Language - Education Week

LULAC Opposes Merit-Pay Bill for Teachers in Florida - Learning the Language - Education Week

LULAC Opposes Merit-Pay Bill for Teachers in Florida

By Mary Ann Zehr on April 13, 2010 11:50 AM | No Comments

Thirty percent of teachers in Miami-Dade public schools stayed home today to protest a proposed law that would create a merit-pay system for teachers and get rid of tenure for teachers hired in the future, according to the Associated Press.

If Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, a Republican, signs the bill, teachers' merit raises would be based on how much their students' scores on standardized tests improved, according to the AP.

Florida's chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens, a Latino advocacy group, opposes the bill because the organization says it would hurt teachers of English-language learners, according to a blog at the Orlando Sentinel. LULAC argues in a resolution that the bill would unfairly punish

Overrun by Charters � The Quick and the Ed

Overrun by Charters � The Quick and the Ed

Overrun by Charters

April 13th, 2010 | Category: Educational Choice

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DC’s local NPR station aired an interesting piece yesterday about one neighborhood in DC that is feeling overrun by charter schools. The neighborhood currently has seven charter schools located in it, including one that might be closed because of poor academic performance. The residents aren’t very happy about the concentration of charter schools–there are traffic issues, noise and trash from students to contend with, and occasional violence.

At a hearing of the DC Public Charter School Board, one resident demanded of the DCPCSB, “if the board considers other charter school applications, particularly in our neighborhood, we expect–repeat, we expect–that no more charter schools be located in the community.”

This raises an interesting question as the number of charter schools continues to expand in the city–whose job is it to ensure that schools are locating in the neighborhoods where they are needed and, alternately, are not over-concentrated in other parts of the city?

As the NPR piece states, school location is one consideration in the application process, so the DCPCSB is clearly paying attention to where a proposed charter school is planning to locate. And public hearings offer residents an opportunity to speak out. But is that sufficient? Charter school applications can be approved before a school finds a suitable facility (which is difficult), meaning that a school’s ultimate location may differ from it’s original proposed location.

The facilities challenge also means that market forces (i.e., where there is demand for a charter school) are insufficient to regulate school locations–school location isn’t just about student demand, it’s also about finding a building, transportation,

Assessing the “Race to the Test” Guidelines

by Bill Tucker

Last July I set out five “must-dos” for the administration’s $350 million “Race to the Test” competition. Ten months later, here’s my evaluation of the work in progress:

• Use Assessment to Drive Support for “Fewer, Clearer, and Higher” Standards:Integrating the assessment conversation can strengthen both educator and political support for the common core. There is widespread agreement on the need to improve assessment, so the connection between improving assessment and “fewer, clearer, higher” should be explicit. If you want to assess more deeply and at a higher level of cognitive challenge, you’ll likely need more extended performance-like tasks (like NAEP Science 2009 or PISA). These take more time to assess and can be expensive — in other words, you need fewer. Clearer is also critical — if the standards cannot be clearly defined within the curriculum, then we end up with generic tests and weaker instruments.

Grade: A — Even skeptics agree that the standards are off to a promising start. Key to assessments is for

UC Berkeley bloated, wasteful, consultants say

UC Berkeley bloated, wasteful, consultants say Nanette Asimov, Chronicle Staff Writer Tuesday, April 13, 2010 Brant Ward / The Chronicle The Campanile on the UC Berkeley campus. View Larger Image MORE EDUCATION On the Proliferation of Unpaid Internships / When 'education' becomes... 04.11.10 College not mandatory under exam program 04.11.10 UC Berkeley suspensions draw ACLU rebuke 04.08.10 For a world-class university studded with Nobel laureates and innovative research, UC Berkeley manages its finances a bit like a sloppy undergrad, a new report suggests. The campus could save about $75 million a year by streamlining purchases, concentrating job duties and laying off "redundant" managers, according to consultants hired last fall to help the school become a leaner operation. "This kind of change is hard," said campus Vice Chancellor Frank Yeary, who is overseeing the Operational Excellence Project. "We will get pushback in certain quarters. But the fact that the state has so consistently disinvested in our organization ... most people really appreciate the need to change." Yeary said UC Berkeley's plan is not only to push the state for more education funding - which has dropped by half since 2002 to $232 million in inflation-adjusted dollars - but to do a better job with the money the university already has. The campus has five big areas of bloat, according to Bain & Co., the Massachusetts consulting firm being paid $3 million to identify waste. The biggest, say the consultants, is too many managers. The human resources

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/04/13/BAIH1CTI5M.DTL&feed=rss.bayarea#ixzz0kzstvCMH