The Quick and the Ed » A Civilian Marshall Plan for Urban Schools?

The Quick and the Ed » A Civilian Marshall Plan for Urban Schools?:

ACivilianMarshallPlanforUrbanSchools?

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08 Nov 2012

by Peter Cookson Jr.

Categories: Accountability and Standards, Improving Schools and School Systems, K-12 Education,Teacher and Principal Quality

We want our kids to grow up in a country where they have access to the best schools and the best teachers.

President Barack Obama

Election victory speech

November 7, 2012

In his victory speech Tuesday night President Obama reached out to the country to help him make the next four years a time of renewal and reaffirmation. There is no better place to launch such a shared mission than a complete, uncompromising, and unequivocal commitment to transforming our urban public schools into 21^st century oases of learning and opportunity.

Equality of educational opportunity is the civil rights issue of our era. Allowing over a million students a year to drop out of high school before graduation is a sign of bad faith, straining the social contract to a near breaking point.

We have strong evidence that we can fix urban schools. Recently, the Council of Great City Schools and Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation released a study calledFoundations for Success that clearly identifies effective improvement strategies used in innovative urban districts. These include a focus on student achievement, accountability systems, allocating additional resources to the lowest performing schools, district wide 

How Obama helped Georgia charter measure win:

How Obama helped Georgia charter measure win

Posted by Valerie Strauss on November 8, 2012 at 2:00 pm

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Jim Galloway of the Atlanta Constitution Journal explains here how interesting it is that Georgia’s ballot measure to permit the state to create a committee to approve charter schools passed with big support from African Americans — even though black lawmakers and other leaders in the state said it would lead to the resegregation of public schools.

In fact, the state superintendent of schools was against it, as was the Georgia PTA, as was the League of Women Voters, as was Georgia’s NAACP, just to name some of the opponents.

So what or who made the difference?

President Obama, Galloway says, thanks to a 60-minute radio spot that aired on African American radio stations. Obama doesn’t talk specifically about Georgia’s charter initiative but he is heard in the ad as supporting charter school expansion.

On Party Politics and Education Reform Right Now - Dana Goldstein

On Party Politics and Education Reform Right Now - Dana Goldstein:

On Party Politics and Education Reform Right Now

by Dana Goldstein

If you're interested in a detailed policy analysis of what Obama's second term could mean for early childhood and K-12 education, take a look at what my colleagues and I at the New America Foundation are projecting. I just want to say a word here about the larger, political realignment of the parties and various interest groups on school reform. A lot of standards-and-accountability reformers are rending their garments over the loss on Tuesday of Tony Bennett, the Indiana state schools superintendent who worked with Republican governor Mitch Daniels to implement the Common Core curriculum standards, tie teacher evaluation to student test scores, allow the state to takeover struggling schools, and provide vouchers for private school tuition. He was defeated at the ballot box by Glenda Ritz, a veteran teacher, union leader, and school librarian who ran with support from both organized labor and conservatives angered by the Daniels' administration's embrace of the nationally-shared Commore Core standards.
With the exception of vouchers, the Daniels/Bennett reform agenda was indistinguishable from that of many Democrats who have forged productive, if at times strained, relationships with teachers' unions, including President Obama, Newark mayor Cory Booker, New York governor Andrew Cuomo, and so on and so forth. So what we're seeing is that data-driven, standardized testing-centered school reform is most politically palatable 

My View: An open letter to George Lucas – we need your independent vision – Schools of Thought - CNN.com Blogs

My View: An open letter to George Lucas – we need your independent vision – Schools of Thought - CNN.com Blogs:

My View: An open letter to George Lucas - we need your independent vision

By Anthony Cody, Special to CNN

Editor’s note:Anthony Cody worked in schools in Oakland, California, for 24 years. He taught middle school science 18 of those years. He lives in Mendocino County, California, and leads workshops for teachers. He writes the Living in Dialogue blog, and you can follow him on Twitter,@AnthonyCody.

(CNN) - Dear Mr. Lucas,

I have recently read of the $4 billion that you will receive for selling your movie empire to Disney, and your plans to give most of this money to support education. This is wonderful news. I deeply appreciate this generosity. I am writing a letter to encourage you to think outside the box as you decide how to spend these funds. It is critical to consider where educators find ourselves in 2012.

The George Lucas Education Foundation already has made a substantial impact on our schools. Edutopia has been an amazing resource for years, sharing news and examples of project-based learning, authentic inquiry and other innovations. The emphasis is almost always on giving students rich 

Bad losers in Tuesday’s election

Bad losers in Tuesday’s election:

Bad losers in Tuesdays election

by Valerie Strauss

Glenda Ritz, newly-elected Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction.

No sooner had veteran teacher Glenda Ritz upset Tony Bennett as schools Superintendent of Public Instruction in Indiana’s election by questioning his corporate-based school reform agenda than unhappy Republican state leaders threw down the gauntlet to Ritz and her supporters.

Here’s what Gov.-Elect Mike Pence (R) said, according to the Evansville Courier & Press:

    I want to be very clear: I support the policies and progress that we’ve made on education. We will support that in the next four years, and we will seek for ways to build on that to really put kids first and continue to keep Indiana in the forefront of the kind of education reforms that focus on results.”

He said that voters, by keeping Republican legislative majorities in the state, really liked  

Daily Kos: Why the GOP Will Double Down on a Losing Strategy

Daily Kos: Why the GOP Will Double Down on a Losing Strategy:

Why the GOP Will Double Down on a Losing Strategy

by rss@dailykos.com (teacherken)

is the title of this eye-opening piece by Michael Grunwald at Time which I strongly urge people to read. Grunwald talked with a number of key Republican insiders, and what they have to say does not indicate that the Republican party has learned that their current path is doomed because both of demography and changing attitudes of young people.  As Grunwald notes early in the piece, after mentioning discussions about a possible internal civil war in the Republican party,

But for all the punditry about a coming Republican civil war, it’s not clear that the party really wants to change in any serious way — or that it could change if it wanted to. Even GOP elites, while concerned that winnable races are being sacrificed on the altar of extremism, suggest that the party is likely to stay the course that worked in 2010.

Youth help guide Sandy relief effort in Queens Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública

Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública:

November 7, 2012

Youth help guide Sandy relief effort in Queens

By Michelle Miller 

 

(CBS News) ROCKAWAY, Queens -- We've seen the agony caused by a storm named Sandy -- Homes destroyed; Families left in the dark; Fistfights on gas lines -- but there are always stories about our better nature.

Shalaka Cox has been navigating darkened hallways and staircases in Rockaway, Queens, for three days.

The 17-year-old is handing out food, water and flashlights to people stranded in their apartments.

"There's times when it might be overwhelming but then I think about what we're actually doing.

I think in the last few days we've been able to reach over 500 families, so knowing that keeps me going," Cox said.

Cox is a foot soldier in a relief force recruited by 23-year-old Milan Taylor.
 "It's time for us to step up and prove we are willing and able to step up," Taylor said.
The college student directs the effort from his smartphone.

"We put out a call on Facebook, and the supplies and the food just started to come pouring in," Taylor said.

He's enlisted more than 100 teens and twenty-somethings to help their neighbors.

If he wasn't helping Sandy victims, Taylor said he "would be in school right now."

At the core of his band of volunteers is the community group he founded a year and a half ago to mentor kids. He's spent the group's last $500 to buy diapers and blankets.

"There is no community leadership guiding FEMA, guiding the Red Cross, because they're not from this community, so they don't know where the needs are," Taylor said.

In less than a week, they've figured out how to distribute two days' worth of s

FCMAT » Cali Education Headlines Thursday, November 8, 2012

FCMAT » Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team:

Education Headlines

Thursday, November 8, 2012

Monterey County school officials excited about election results

Except for a parcel tax measure in Pacific Grove, school bonds in Monterey County were overwhelmingly approved in Tuesday's election.

Marin schools officials cheer passage of Proposition 30

Marin schools officials breathed a sigh of relief Wednesday after the passage of Proposition 30, expressing gratitude to Californians for taxing themselves more to help fill a gaping state budget hole.

Long Beach's Roosevelt Elementary School demolished for new facility

Roosevelt Elementary opened in 1921 and is one of Long Beach Unified's oldest and largest elementary schools.

EdSource: Ed advocates foresee new era with supermajority

Many education advocates were giddy when they awoke Wednesday. Not only had Proposition 30 passed, with its promise of nearly $7 billion in new funding for schools and community colleges, but in an unexpected outcome, Democrats won supermajorities, two-thirds of the seats in both the State Assembly and Senate. It was like hoping for a pony on your birthday and instead finding a horse with a giant bow around its neck.

Federal bias suit against Plumas schools can go to trial

A federal judge has ruled that a racial discrimination lawsuit filed against the Plumas Unified School District has sufficient grounds to proceed to a jury trial.

Passage of Prop. 30 hailed by educators

For public school districts, the measure's success was mostly about escaping another wave of severe budget cuts, including teacher layoffs, curtailed instructional time and larger classes. But for higher education, the measure is expected to reap immediate positive benefit

LAUSD looks to restore some staff, programs with Prop. 30 revenue

With a financial catastrophe averted by the passage of Proposition 30, Los Angeles Unified officials said Wednesday they'll begin looking for ways to restore some of the personnel and programs lost during five years of budget cuts.

Moraga school trustees, attorneys apologize to sex abuse victim

School district trustees on Wednesday apologized to a former student for saying in legal papers that she may have borne some responsibility for the sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of former teachers.

Schools, colleges in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties relieved at Prop. 30's passage

With the passage of Proposition 30, California educators for now no longer feel that a 6-ton boulder is perched precariously above their heads. "I'm happy! I've overjoyed!" said Ann Jones, chief business official of the San Jose Unified School District, Wednesday afternoon.

Skelton: Gov. Jerry Brown gets big win but also big responsibility

Gov. Jerry Brown and fellow Democrats have scored a stunning, historic victory in California. But they should have been careful what they wished for. Brown sold his Proposition 30 tax increase largely on the premise that it would stanch the budget bleeding — that it would end the painful school cuts and, he implied, halt the university tuition hikes. He'd better hope that's what happens and that state revenues don't continue to fall short of spending. Because voters never like to be fooled.

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Panama-Buena Vista, Standard voters appear to authorize school bonds

Voters in the Panama-Buena Vista Union School District seemed headed Tuesday night toward approving a $147 million bond measure to upgrade the district's aging infrastructure.

Chaffey Joint's $848M school bond gets thumbs up in early voting

If voters approve Measure P, district residents will pay an additional $19 annually per $100,000 of assessed value on their property tax bills.

Proposition 30 wins: Gov. Jerry Brown's tax will raise $6 billion to prevent school cuts

Overcoming decades of anti-tax sentiment in California, Gov. Jerry Brown's Proposition 30 -- billed as a tax hike to rescue the state's schools -- emerged victorious Wednesday morning.

Modern School: (Not) Ending Bullying Through Exaggeration and Misinformation

Modern School: (Not) Ending Bullying Through Exaggeration and Misinformation:

(Not) Ending Bullying Through Exaggeration and Misinformation

by Michael Dunn

Mean Girls (Image from Flickr, by Combined Media)

First the good news: With the increased media coverage and public attention we’ve seen over the past decade, bullying is on the decline in some parts of the U.S. In California, for example, the school bullying rate has been reduced to one-third that of the rest of the nation.  

Despite this promising statistic, my colleagues and I were recently informed at an anti-bullying workshop that bullying is on the rise nationwide. The presenter did not provide any references or documentation to support her claim. Instead, she showed us a heartbreaking video about bullying victims who had committed suicide and told us that 3,000 teens commit suicide each year, implying that teen suicide is primarily caused by bullying.

There is now a sizable anti-bullying movement and with it a growing network of nonprofits and 

Educators and the Election, What's Next? | Lily's Blackboard

Educators and the Election, What's Next? | Lily's Blackboard:

The Election is Over…So Where Do We Go From Here?

Nov 8th, 2012 

by Lily.

I was not neutral in this race. I see the re-election of President Obama as an important way forward for our students, preschool to graduate school. But the election is not the end. It’s the beginning of some very hard work.

First, we must pass the Dream Act. We must show compassion for the undocumented children who were brought here; who were educated here; who have stayed out of trouble and only want to work and study and be accepted in the only country many of them have ever known.

The issues of comprehensive immigration reforms are complicated. But I’m a teacher, and for me one thing is very simple: You never punish children for things beyond their control. The President did a very important thing in approving a change in visa regulations to allow a temporary safe harbor for the young “Dreamers” who would have qualified under the Dream Act, had Congress acted. But it is temporary. Congress must pass the Dream Act as part of comprehensive immigration reform. 

Next, Congress must see the importance of Head Start as an equalizing factor for poor little boys and girls coming to kindergarten prepared to 

Wishes for Public Education in the Next Four Years… | LFA: Join The Conversation - Public School Insights

Wishes for Public Education in the Next Four Years… | LFA: Join The Conversation - Public School Insights:

Wishes for Public Education in the Next Four Years…

by Cheryl S. Williams

Candidly, and not surprisingly, I’m delighted that Barack Obama was elected to a second term as President of the United States.  As someone whose entire professional career has been devoted to public education and life-long learning, I believe that President Obama’s values and priorities are closer to mine than his opponent’s are. 
Having stated my delight in the President’s re-election, I also want to enumerate my hopes for his administration’s leadership in strengthening and improving public K-12 education over the next four years. I fervently hope that:

• The President, Secretary of Education, and administration leaders will STOP saying that our public school system is failing.  We all know that there are serious inequities in the current system that need to be addressed and that a collective effort needs to be made to increase the rigor of instruction in many of our schools.  But, most public schools in this country do a good job; indeed, a better job than has ever been done before.
• The President, Secretary of Education and their spokespersons will STOP saying that the current teaching force is largely recruited from the weakest students in any

read more

What Next for K-12 Schools Post-Election? - Bridging Differences - Education Week

What Next for K-12 Schools Post-Election? - Bridging Differences - Education Week:

What Next for K-12 Schools Post-Election?

by Deborah Meier

Deborah Meier—visionary teacher and founder of successful small schools in New York City and Boston—and Pedro Noguera—author and director of the Metropolitan Center for Urban Education—debate issues relevant to schools, teachers, and students.

Dear Pedro,
There were two post-election possibilities for me: I'd head off to visit friends and allies in Providence, R.I., and beyond to get some comfort, or to celebrate. But it's not an altogether comfortable celebration since President Obama faces more deadlock. Listening to CNN as I write this, I think how many commentators keep focusing on the deficit, living within our means, etc. They have bought into the conservative narrative that leads to austerity and that is poised to lead us all over the cliff. Enough!! Enjoy the moment.
Now, what next? By the time I get back home (Nov. 17) I'll have a little clearer set of ideas since I'll be seeing think-alikers at the Coalition of Essential Schools' Fall Forum and then I'm speaking several times in Illinois, including Chicago, and at a student conference in Massachusetts. I'll be seeing individuals whose opinions will be interesting to listen to, including Karen Lewis of the Chicago Teachers Union.
I have more sympathy than many of my dearest colleagues for the labor movement's reluctance to go on an all-

UPDATE: The in box. The 87%. « Fred Klonsky

The in box. The 87%. « Fred Klonsky:

California had a good idea. Don’t cut. Tax the rich.

by Fred Klonsky

La Super Rica taco stand in Santa Barbara, California.
I grew up in LA. Back in the sixties.
In those days, a lot of good ideas came out of California: The Free Speech Movement. The Jefferson Airplane. Fish tacos.
It is happening again.
One of the wins I didn’t cover in yesterday’s post was the victory of California’s Proposition 30.
It was a simple idea. Instead of cutting education funding, California will raise taxes on those earning over a

The in box. The 87%.

by Fred Klonsky

From Will Guzzardi.

Dear friends, We’ve all seen our share of close elections. I know a thing or two about them myself. But Tuesday’s vote on the elected school board referendum wasn’t one of them.  Across Chicago, 65,763 people voted “yes” on the measure, while only 10,174 voted “no.” 87% of voters approved the referendum.  This is a huge win for those of us who believe in community-driven education, in grassroots school leadership that understands our neighborhoods’ needs and fights for us, not against us. It’s a statement that even here in Chicago, people believe in democracy, and believe that we deserve a voice in how our schools are run.  I’m deeply grateful to all of you who joined us in this fight. Some of you collected signatures with us to get the question on the ballot this summer. Some passed flyers and knocked doors to raise awareness Ten minute drawing. The party’s over. by Fred Klonsky Click on drawing to enlarge. Two thumbs up. Go see Brooklyn Castle. by Fred Klonsky I saw this last night at Chicago’s Landmark Cinema. Great. Go and brink Kleenex. Popout

UPDATE: Connecticut has a new Chief Academic Officer: Has experience with testing and bonuses! - Wait, What?

Connecticut has a new Chief Academic Officer: Has experience with testing and bonuses! - Wait, What?:

Connecticut has a new Chief Academic Officer: Has experience with testing and bonuses!

by jonpelto

The Connecticut State Department of Education has a new Chief Academic Officer.  Chosen by Commissioner Stefan Pryor, and the State Board of Education of Education, Diana Roberge-Wentzell’s job is to do for Connecticut what she did for Hartford.

As Hartford’s Assistant Superintendent of Schools, Roberge-Wentzell helped to set up the absurdly extensive testing system that is used on the students of Connecticut’s poorest city.

Not only do Hartford students take the Connecticut Mastery Test in March of each year, but they take three other major standardized tests, along with a variety of other specific standardized tests and standardized assessments.

Working with former superintendent of schools, Steven Adamowski, Roberge-Wentzell was part of the leadership team that instituted the “Modified Assessment (MAS) Test,” in Hartford, the system in which 10 percent of Hartford’s lowest performing students were 

Waivers intensify injustice of No Child Left Behind (Another must read column by Wendy Lecker)

by jonpelto

Categories: Education, Malloy, No Child Left Behind Act, Stefan Pryor, Wendy Lecker Tags: Education Reform, Malloy, NCLB My colleague, fellow public education advocate and commentator, Wendy Lecker, had another “must read” column in the Stamford Advocate, Connecticut Post and the other papers that make up the Hearst Connecticut Media Group. While many readers know about the problems associated with the federal No Child Left Behind Act, many may not fully appreciated why a [...]