Friday, May 13, 2011

Open Letter to Pres. Obama: This is What Standardized Testing “Looks” Like! « Diary of a Public School Teacher!

Open Letter to Pres. Obama: This is What Standardized Testing “Looks” Like!

Dear President Obama,

Today was the first day of Round 3 of standardized testing in the state of Delaware. The test is administered online, and the students get their scores immediately. It covers everything we learned in the 5th grade, even though we have not finished the school year.

Let me begin with my morning. I attended a union meeting where I am told the state of Delaware has decided that they will decide whether I am a good teacher according to how well my students do on this test! It’s bad enough, that my school is judged by test scores, but now my ability to teach is questioned because of test scores? Does this seem as ridiculous to you as it does to me? Does anyone realize how many other factors control how our children perform in school?

I have prepared my students to the best of my ability for this test. As much as I despise it, I do not want them to fail. Aren’t we supposed to be creating critical thinkers? How can I do that, when instead of doing projects, or collaborating with our pen pals, we are filling in bubbles!!!!

The test. They worked hard, they really did, and all of them showed growth. In

SBE Announced Plans to Establish AIAC - State Board of Education (CA Dept of Education)

State Board of Education Announced Plans to Establish an
American Indian Advisory Commission

Sacramento -- The State Board of Education (SBE) announced plans to begin the work to establish the American Indian Advisory Commission (AIAC). The SBE discussed the need to establish this commission to help better understand the issues concerning the academic progress that exists between American Indian students and their counterparts.

There are over 44,000 American Indian students in California’s K-12 schools. According to the 2010 Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) program results, only 45 percent of American Indian students scored proficient and above in the English language arts section and only 34 percent of American Indian students scored proficient or above in the mathematics portion of the examination.

"Today is a historical day and the Board has sent a strong statement that it is committed to finding ways to reduce the persistent lack of academic achievement that exists between American Indian students and their counterparts,” said James Ramos, SBE Board Member.

The AIAC will be charged with identifying strategies for advancing academic achievement; tracking federal and state funds that are allocated to support American Indian students; and developing curriculum that respects American Indian culture that provides an accurate account of California history that highlight the contributions of American Indians to California’s society today.

“I am very appreciative of the many letters of support from the American Indian communities of California,” said Ramos.

President Michael Kirst assigned Member Ramos as the board liaison to work with SBE and California Department of Education staff to finalize the charge and scope of work for the advisory commission.

Issues with Educating Everybody | Lefty Parent

Issues with Educating Everybody

by Cooper Zale

Lynn Stoddard

Lynn Stoddard, my friend and fellow participant in the Alternative Education Resource Organization (AERO), shared with me the text of a guest commentary, “Educating Everybody”, he wrote for the Ogden, UtahStandard-Examiner. Lynn is a now retired long-time teacher and founder of the Educating for Human Greatness Alliance. His commentary lays out clearly the vision of holistic education that has its roots in John Dewey,Maria Montessori, Rudolph Steiner and others. He is a great champion for a vision embraced by many alternative educators, and an approach to teaching that I acknowledge and respect. But with my emerging left-libertarian orientation to education, it is a vision that I have developed some issues with.

He sets the context in his opening paragraph…

The time has come to change the way we educate children in our public schools. There are signs

Report on Renaissance Schools is out | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Report on Renaissance Schools is out

by Erika Owens

The District just announced the release of an Accountability Review Council report on year one of theRenaissance Schools initiative. Research for Action was commissioned to conduct a study of the District's school turnaround initiative, and their findings are summarized in the ARC's 50-page report, which will be presented to the SRC on Wednesday. The study looks at the launch of the initiative and indicators like leadership, staffing, and climate, but it was completed too early in the school year to include any analysis of achievement.

The District is soliciting questions and comments on the report online. Anything jump out to you about the report?

Featured Title:

Just released

In exchange for giving up our bargaining and seniority rights, the Illinois legislature will now loot our pensions. « Fred Klonsky's blog

In exchange for giving up our bargaining and seniority rights, the Illinois legislature will now loot our pensions.

by Fred Klonsky

The rough outline of the deal is in. There will be a three tier pension proposal before the Illinois General Assembly by Wednesday of next week. Attacks on the pensions of presently retired teachers are also being considered.

All that is missing are the specific numbers. If it gets passed, teacher retirement as we know it will be gone. The average yearly pension for a teacher in Illinois is under $50,ooo a year and no Social Security. That is what they

Reading, writing and revenue: New education model - Sacramento Bee

Viewpoints: Reading, writing and revenue: New education model - Sacramento Opinion - Sacramento Editorial | Sacramento Bee

Viewpoints: Reading, writing and revenue: New education model

PUBLISHED FRIDAY, MAY. 13, 2011

American education is going to be reformed until it rolls over and begs for mercy. Vouchers! Guns on campus! Just the other day, the Florida state Legislature took a giant step toward ending the scourge of droopy drawers in high school by upping the penalties for underwear-exposing pants.

Today, let's take a look at the privatization craze and the conviction that there is nothing about molding young minds that can't be improved by the profit motive.

Enrollment in for-profit colleges has ballooned to almost 2 million, propelled by more than $25 billion in federal student loans, many of which are apparently never going to be repaid. More than 700 public K-12 schools around the country are now managed by for-profit companies.

Last week, in Ohio, the state House went for the whole hog and approved legislation that would allow for-profit businesses to open up their own taxpayer-financed charter schools.

"It takes the public out of public education," complained Bill Sims of the Ohio Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

This exciting new plan, which seemed to have been inserted into the state budget bill by a magical invisible hand, would also reduce oversight. It got a rave review in the Columbus Dispatch from an op-ed contributor named Thomas Needles, who cheered legislators for trying to end the "drip-drop of wrongheaded regulation" of charter schools.

Needles is a consultant for White Hat Management, the largest company currently managing charter schools in Ohio – and with none too great a record, according to the National Education Policy Center, which said that only 2 percent of the schools White Hat runs have scored well on yearly progress tests. The owner of White Hat is a gynormous donor to the state Republican Party. Not that that would make any difference. Just saying.

So that's the path-breaking privatization news in Ohio. Now let's take a look at Texas, which has been leading the way in putting for-profit companies in charge of certifying teachers.

"Very interesting and very disturbing," said Linda Darling-Hammond, a professor of education at Stanford who studies teacher certification issues.

Darling-Hammond says that when the federal government began demanding certified teachers in every classroom, Texas was among the states that responded by creating alternative certification programs, some of which have

4LAKids - : CALIFORNIA AT A CROSSROADS; MY GENERATION’S FUTURE HANGS IN BALANCE

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: CALIFORNIA AT A CROSSROADS; MY GENERATION’S FUTURE HANGS IN BALANCE

CALIFORNIA AT A CROSSROADS; MY GENERATION’S FUTURE HANGS IN BALANCE

BY MIRIAM HERNANDEZ - JUNIOR AT ROOSEVELT HIGH SCHOOL IN FRESNO | FROM THOUGHTS ON PUBLIC EDUCATION \ HTTP://BIT.LY/LTVRJS

5/10/11 • Today I’m traveling to Sacramento, along with hundreds of student and parent leaders from across California, to deliver an urgent but simple message to the State Legislature and the Governor: It’s time to upgrade California’s education system.

We’re coming to our state’s capitol as part of the Campaign for Quality Education, a statewide coalition of grassroots, civil rights, policy, and research organizations committed to educational equity for all communities in California’s public schools. We travel from the gritty grassroots to the halls of power, as mothers, fathers, students, brothers, sisters, and community leaders.

We’re here because California is at a crossroads. Our state’s economic future depends on the brainpower of the rising generation — my generation.

Over the past two years, $17 billion has been cut from education in California. According to the California Budget Project, in 2009-2010 California’s K-12 per-pupil spending ranked 45^th in the country. And we are last in students-per-teacher ratio.

I’m angry about it. I think we should move in a direction that strengthens the California Dream, not one that jeopardizes our economic future. An educated society is a

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: “THE CHILDREN DO NOTICE”

“THE CHILDREN DO NOTICE” by Paul L. Thomas II, Assistant Professor of Education at Furman University blogs at plthomasEdD | http://bit.ly/kDNEwa Mon May 09, 2011 at 05:12 PM PDT - I spent the first eighteen years of my career as an educator teaching high school English ...

ASSEMBLY GOP ISSUES BUDGET AHEAD OF GOVERENOR’S PLAN Posted by Kevin Yamamura SacBee Capitol Alert | http://bit.ly/jC27um May 12, 2011 - At long last, Assembly Republicans have issued their own budget plan. The proposal includes: a roughly 10 percent reduction in state employee costs; health and ...

WHAT DON’T LEGISLATORS UNDERSTAND ABOUT ’EMERGENCY’? Themes in the News for the week of May 9-13, 2011 by UCLA IDEA | http://bit.ly/mtGksE 05-13-2011 - The California Teachers Association, the state’s largest teacher union, has declared a state of emergency. Is that exaggeration? Hyperbole? Or an accurate ...

Jersey Jazzman: Testing Companies Want Your Money!

Testing Companies Want Your Money! And they're looking to get it in New York! New York state is weighing whether to prohibit high-school teachers from grading their own students' Regents exams. The Board of Regents, which sets education policy for the state, is set to vote next week on ...

What Motivates the Corporate Reformers? What drives today's corporate reformer? Rick Hess gives a clue: It was almost fifteen years ago now that I was sharing my Harvard dissertation, on the dynamics of school reform in fifty-seven urban districts, with a few potential publishers. [...] ...

Silent Blog... ... holy blog... Sorry, but I've got some composing deadlines that can not wait. Be back up Friday at the latest. Until then, the chef recommends: Blue Jersey School Finance 101 stopthefreezeNJ on Twitter And of course the many fine blogs for your ...

NYC Educator: Bursting, In More Ways Than One

Bursting, In More Ways Than One

by Miss Eyre

Kindergarteners sure are cute, aren't they? Back when I worked with younger students, my heart would just melt when I saw the kindergarteners, carefully maneuvering hand-in-hand through the hallways, looking like It's a Small World in action. Most of them love school and truly are filled with wonder and excitement. Not many people can look at kindergarteners and feel cynical.

But I can definitely feel cynical when I read something like this. P.S. 19, in Corona, Queens, is full to bursting with kids. A nearby school opened to ease overcrowding has already doubled in size. The school is so overcrowded that those same freakin'-adorable kindergarteners are going home with red faces and wet pants because they don't have regular access to a bathroom.

School Tech Connect: Deb Meier: Individualization vs. Personalization

Deb Meier: Individualization vs. Personalization

by effacethefacade@yahoo.com (Tim)

There's only so much you can do with a Flip cam from a distance in dim lighting. Next time I'll bring the better camera. Anyway, of all the footage I shot at Navy Pier, this is the only piece that I'm going to post.

In this short clip, Deb Meier is responding to Harold Levy, who had just described his belief that the future of education will be one of individualization through technology in general and in gaming technology specifically.

I think only a fool would assert that technology is going to recede into the background, and as for gaming, I think the military is already going down that road. Anyway, here's Deb.

I love technology, and in my own life, technology has helped me build a voice and a mission. Technology gets me out of the house and into the streets. But I hear what Deb is saying-- there's a difference between

This Week In Education: 5 Best Blogs: Conservative Infighting A Delightful Diversion

5 Best Blogs: Conservative Infighting A Delightful Diversion

Fordham and the Use of Passive Voice Jay P. Greene: Fordham, in coalition with its friends at Gates, Pearson, AFT, and the US Department of Education are trying to subvert this historical and legal consensus against federal control by failing to be candid about what they are proposing... Common Core Meltdown Whiteboard Advisors: These folks are not the tools of Beltway bureaucrats — that much is certain. This will ultimately be their decision, not Washington’s... School Turnarounds: Time to Try, Try Again? Education Next: Even if most individual turnaround attempts fail, you can achieve a cumulative success rate of 70 or 80% by retrying rapidly: bringing a new, more capable leader; closing the school and starting fresh with a new operator; or closing the school altogether and dispersing the students to other, better schools... The Obituaries for Data-Driven 'Reform' Are Being Written John Thompson: We should not rejoice in a return to the 1970s. But the sooner we throw the data-driven accountability hawks on the ash pile of history, the sooner we can get back to reality-driven school reforms... Spring Cleaning EdNext: School districts “with off-cycle elections pay experienced teachers over 3 percent more than districts that hold on-cycle elections.” ...The Facebook Worm Named After a High School Girl Gawker: Nicole Santos does exist. She's a high school student in Northern California running for vice president of her class...

Coal Industry Attempts to Muddy School Curriculum « MomsRising Blog

Coal Industry Attempts to Muddy School Curriculum

by Elisa Batista

I have been writing a lot about air quality as part of my work with Moms Clean Air Force, an initiative by the Environmental Defense Fund. While I have always been passionate about preserving our environment for my children and future generations, I have also learned a lot on the job.

For one, I never realized that half of our electricity is produced by coal plants — heavily polluting coal plants that not only sicken workers and their communities with lung disease, asthma and other respiratory illnesses, but are also responsible for a significant amount of green house gases that are causing erratic weather patterns. (Please see my story on this season’s allergies and how they are related to global warming.)

No doubt that part of the problem is US, the American consumer, failing to conserve energy, like turning off the lights and appliances in the house. But another problem is the manipulation by the coal industry to remain one of the top producers of energy in the country. Now, it’s taking its message to our children directly — in their

A Teacher Appreciation Story that Inspires

Sometimes, it takes a life-changing event to spur people to action. Dr. Lee Buono, a neurosurgeon from Medford, Burlington County, was encouraged by one of his patients to thank Albert Siedlecki, the teacher who inspired him to become a neurosurgeon. In the 1980s, Mr. Siedlecki taught Dr. Buono how to dissect a frogs brain. Nearly 20 years later, Dr. Buono is saving lives. Watch their story.

May 3-9, 2009 is Teacher Appreciation Week - a great time to celebrate the achievements of New Jerseys teachers. This week and every week NJEA is working to highlight the stories of teachers and educational support professionals who are making a difference in the lives of students. Watch Classroom Close-up, NJ on NJN or online to hear more stories of educators making a difference.

Democurmudgeon Fudgeon Back Again...Blogger shut down since Thursday afternoon till around 11 am today

Democurmudgeon

Floyd reunites for recent London concert with Roger Waters. This is a great piece of amateur video of a recent Roger Water's concert in London, with the on the wall guitar work of David Gilmore. Really incredible stuff that just knocked out the audience. *Rolling Stone: The surviving members of Pink Floyd ...

Walkers Budget Balanced on non-citizen Children of Illegal Immigrant Kicked out of College. Rep. Vos: "I wish them the very best." Former Gov. Doyle knew that children of parents who came here illegally grew up as American as any kid, but weren’t citizens through no fault of their own. If they excelled academically, they were given the gift of in-state tuition for college. But ...

Return of the Taxpayers Bill of Rights; Big Brother Republicans Force Big Government Control over Local Property Tax Needs. The state might be open for business, but local cities, villages and townships, not so much. Big government Republican Sen. Alberta Darling (up for recall) and Rep. Robin Vos peered into their crystal ball and decided cities just weren’t responsible ...

Democrats fail to call out state Republicans for Disaster Capitalism Agenda. Striking Vulnerable during a Recession. You knew something was wrong when one of the "tools" to repair the economy was taken off the table; tax the rich. Never a tax increase, even after the deficit commission and most economists admitted that the combination of spending cuts and tax ...

Walker hands our great outdoors to our environmental best friends… polluting businesses. Gov. Walker isn’t going to wait for the recalls, or even his own party’s steamrolling rubber stamp machine in the legislature, he’s decided some things are too dangerous to debate before the people. So Walker’s “Open for Business” agenda is best ...

We will all be safer!! Guns guns guns...in the Capitol building? I wanna know our Senator and Representatives can defend themselves. *This is a great thoughtful piece about the insanity of unfettered gun ownership:* *jsonline: Jim Stingl Here's what I don't get. If concealed carry is such a good idea and is going to make us all safer, why exempt government buildings where lawmakers ...

He is OUT! CTA President Released « State of Emergency

CTA President Released « State of Emergency

CTA President Released

by Leonard Feldman

CTA President David A. Sanchez has been released from jail. Word of the release came at 10:58 a.m.

The CTA leader and 26 other Capitol Insiders – the “Dutton 13″ and the “Conway 14″ — were taken into custody Thursday evening when they refused to leave the corridors outside the Capitol offices of the two Republican leaders until the two GOP lawmakers had agreed to provide votes needed for a temporary tax extension and a budget that would protect schools and students from another $4.1 billion in cuts.

Word has not yet been received about the status of the 26 other captives.

solidaridad: Professor Michael Moore: Cornering the education market

Professor Michael Moore: Cornering the education market

by Robert D. Skeels * rdsathene

The testing business is a $2.3 billion business. But testing is not where the real money is made. If you want to pass the test, you're going to need preparation materials. — Prof. Michael Moore

In the long run, charter schools are being strategically used to pave the way for vouchers. - Jonathan Kozol

It's testing time around Georgia, despite widespread criticism about the inability of the state's standardized tests to reflect student -- let alone teacher -- performance.

Georgia is hip-deep in the school assessment racket, which quietly lines the coffers of corporations beyond the view of an unsuspecting public.

Unfortunately, Georgia may soon be even deeper in the grip of these corporate interests.

Looming on the horizon is the multi-billion dollar battle for common core assessments. But what we don't realize is that the real battle is over far more than assessments; it covers all aspects of curriculum.

A quick reminder of how we got to this point.

Georgia's tests are not made by our state. CTB/McGraw-Hill, which is in the fifth year of a five-year, $62.5 million

Shanker Blog » Quote, Unquote

Quote, Unquote

Posted May 13, 2011

This post is co-authored by Matt Di Carlo and Esther Quintero.

This week, in an Atlantic article, former New York City Public Schools Chancellor Joel Klein dropped an incendiary Albert Shanker quote that you’ve probably heard before:

When school children start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of school children.

The negative implications of this statement are obvious, which is why it is so frequently quoted by (mostly) conservative pundits and journalists.

We didn’t know Al Shanker personally. He died while we were still college undergraduates. So, we were surprised to learn that the people who knew and worked with Shanker have long thought this quote to be apocryphal.

We were skeptical but intrigued, and decided to do a little detective work.

The quote has been used many hundreds, perhaps many thousands, of times in newspapers, magazines, blogs, and speeches. Virtually none of the authors has bothered to provide a source – a date, an event, anything. Nevertheless, after an extensive search, we uncovered two possible sources of origin.

The first is an article in the Meridian Star (a newspaper in Meridian, MS) from August 13, 1985. It is the earliest

School Libraries and Librarians in LAUSD: THE DISGRACEFUL INTERROGATION OF LAUSD SCHOOL LIBRARIANS

4LAKids - some of the news that doesn't fit: School Libraries and Librarians in LAUSD: THE DISGRACEFUL INTERROGATION OF LAUSD SCHOOL LIBRARIANS

School Libraries and Librarians in LAUSD: THE DISGRACEFUL INTERROGATION OF LAUSD SCHOOL LIBRARIANS If state education cuts are drastic, the librarians' only chance of keeping a paycheck is to prove they're qualified to be switched to classroom teaching. So LAUSD attorneys grill them. By Hector Tobar, LA Times Columnist | http://lat.ms/mRucBU ...

School Libraries and Librarians in the Rest of the World: 23 STUDIES FIND POSITIVE LINK BETWEEN LIBRARY SPENDING AND STUDENT LEARNING FROM THE REPORT: “Clearly, the studies confirm that quality school library programs with full-time, certified librarians and library support staff are indicative of and critical to student achievement. In fact, quality school library programs ...

TEACHER LAYOFFS OUT OF SYNC WITH BUDGET IMPASSE Should law be changed to reflect reality? What a concept! Louis Freedberg | Senior Reporter and Adviser to California Watch | http://bit.ly/iHzn8a U.S. Census Bureau May 13, 2011 | Thousands of California teachers will receive final layoff notices by a ...

2 from EdWeek: HOUSE GOP BEGINS TO MAKE OVER NCLB/ESEA/PUBLIC EDUCATION IN THEIR OWN IMAGE House Bill Calls for Eliminating 43 Education Programs By Alyson Klein EdWeek | http://bit.ly/lQ5bLu May 13, 2011 10:44 AM | Forty-three education programs would be scrapped under a bill introduced today by Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., the chairman of ...

WILL CHROMEBOOKS FOR EDUCATION BE A GOOD DEAL FOR SCHOOLS? By Audrey Watters /Read Write Web | http://rww.to/jZEeJE May 11, 2011 3:15 PM - Having long wooed the educational market with its Apps for Education suite of productivity tools, Google is now poised to bring to students and teachers the hardware ...

EAST TRUST—WEST ISSUES STATEMENT REGARDING THE LATEST 2010-11 CALIFORNIA ENGLISH LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT TEST (CELDT) RESULTS For Immediate Release May 12, 2011 Contact: Eric Wagner (510) 465-0859, ext 318 Email: ...

STATE SCHOOLS CHIEF TOM TORLAKSON RELEASES RESULTS OF 2010–11 CALIFORNIA ENGLISH LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT TEST California Department of Education | http://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr11/yr11rel37.asp Release: #11-37 May 10, 2011 Contact: Pam Slater E-mail: communications@cde.ca.gov Phone: 916-319-0818 SACRAMENTO — State Superintendent of Public ...

LAUSD SCHOOL BOARD CANDIDATES TO FACE OFF IN TUESDAY’S RUNOFF/LOS CANDIDATOS A LA JUNTA ESCOLAR DE LAUSD SE ENFRENTARÁN EN LA ELECCIÓN DE ESTE MARTES By Gloria Angelina Castillo,EGP Staff Writer| http://bit.ly/lt0VF3 May 12, 2011 - One of the two races in this Tuesday’s run-off election is a contest for the District 5 seat in the Los Angeles Unified School District’s (LAUSD)

Google Chromebook: 1-to-1 Computing for $180 per Student? - Copy / Paste by Peter Pappas

Google Chromebook: 1-to-1 Computing for $180 per Student?

by Peter Pappas

This week Google launched the Chromebook - a cloud-based "laptop" priced at $20 per month. That's $180 per student for a nine-month school year. Not a bad price for 1 to 1.

It's built on the already popular Google Chrome and Google apps platform. (I'm using both with increasing regularity). It will be a tempting offer for schools - instant on, always connected - plus no apps, anti-virus, or upgrades to worry about. Run it at school on the district WiFi, then take it home and use 3G - Verizon is providing 100mb of data per month for free.

The Chromebook will raise big questions about collection of personal student data, internet security and acceptable use policies. But Google claims to have a features in place which offers granular controls on web access (1st graders can't get to sites that might be acceptable to high schoolers.)

I wonder if schools will take the bait? If I were the school IT guy - I'd be nervous. If it turns out Chromebook works as advertised, I might be out of work.

Friday, May 13, 2011