Parents Across America Update | Seattle Education

Parents Across America Update | Seattle Education:

Parents Across America Update

by seattleducation2011

Parents Across America Action News May 2, 2013

Welcome to PAA Action News, the information and action newsletter of Parents Across America.

PAA Action Alert

Help a student speak out against using tests to evaluate teachers

Here’s a quick action for the week:

Please sign this petition posted by Miami University of Ohio student Aaron Shafer. Aaron explains: “Standardized tests are not a sound or fair way to evaluate teachers. The higher the stakes we give these tests, the more we will see test prep and test cheating, which goes against the positive, democratic nature of public education.”

We agree! Take a look at PAA’s fact sheet, “Tying Teachers’ Salaries to Test Scores Doesn’t Work.”

PAA and PAAers in the News

Great news for PAA!

After several months of arduous work, the PAA Board of Directors has finalized our by-laws and application for our IRS 501c3 status.

We also elected officers:

Dora Taylor, President

Natalie Beyer, Vice-President

Julie Woestehoff, Secretary

The by-laws have been sent to the PAA leadership group for feedback, then we hope to have our application in the mail.

Many thanks to our current Board for all of their hard work – to Karen Miller and Officers Dora, Natalie and Julie, and to former Board members Pamela Grundy and Karran Harper-Royal. We have had excellent advice and support from Dusty Federko, a volunteer attorney from Chicago’s Katten Muchin law firm via The Law Project, a Chicago-based group that provides pro bono legal assistance to non-profit organizations.

Congratulations to Rita Solnet on Florida parent trigger win!

The indomitable Rita Solnet, who helped beat back the parent trigger bill last year in Florida, has done it again, with the help of other parent groups and some major goofs by Parent Revolution.

The astroturfers got caught setting up front groups, forging signatures on pro-trigger petitions, and lying about a video used to show Florida legislators that there were, yes, there were some 

Raise Your Hand for Illinois Public Education Executive Director Wendy Katten walked the distance between Earl Elementary and Goodlow Elementary Magnet School in Chicago. Earl is being closed, and its students will be sent to Goodlow where the staff is being replaced by the Earl staff. | Fred Klonsky

Raise Your Hand for Illinois Public Education Executive Director Wendy Katten walked the distance between Earl Elementary and Goodlow Elementary Magnet School in Chicago. Earl is being closed, and its students will be sent to Goodlow where the staff is being replaced by the Earl staff. | Fred Klonsky:

Raise Your Hand for Illinois Public Education Executive Director Wendy Katten walked the distance between Earl Elementary and Goodlow Elementary Magnet School in Chicago. Earl is being closed, and its students will be sent to Goodlow where the staff is being replaced by the Earl staff.

by Fred Klonsky

Popout.

Posted by Tim Furman

.

Had an interesting walk through West Englewood with Raise Your Hand’s Wendy Katten on Sunday morning. On this particular visit we walked the distance between Earle Elementary and Goodlow Magnet.

This is one of the scenarios that probably made sense to some TFA intern somewhere and it made its way up the ladder of yes-people to the top. I have trouble even explaining it— basically, the Goodlow staff is being shown the door, and the Earle staff is going to take over, and they’re going to bring the Earle neighborhood kids along. Earle may or may not be converted into some kind of magnet, and whether or not that magnet will have any seats reserved for the kids in the neighborhood is beyond me.

I also don’t know what’s happening to the Goodlow magnet concept, now that it’s a sorta-kinda magnet with a bunch of neighborhood kids and their teachers. The only thing reasonably certain is that it’s going to be a crowded, crowded school, and there aren’t very many people in the neighborhood who think it’s a good idea.

Steve Cohen: From Closing the Achievement Gap to Closing the Opportunity Gap - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher

Steve Cohen: From Closing the Achievement Gap to Closing the Opportunity Gap - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher:

Steve Cohen: From Closing the Achievement Gap to Closing the Opportunity Gap

by Anthony Cody

Guest post by Steve Cohen.
On Monday, when teachers headed back to classrooms, 15,000 other educators descended on San Francisco's upscale Union Square hotels for the American Educational Research Association (AERA) annual meeting.
Feeling a tad overwhelmed by 2,400 sessions, I braved my way to the Westin St. Francis where an audience of about 250 gathered for a session based on the just-released book Closing the Opportunity Gap: What America Must Do to Give Every Child an Even Chance in School It proved to be a wise choice. Judging from the audience's response to the session, it seemed to reasonably represent a direction that most other AERA meeting goers would like to follow to improve American education.
Here's the SparkNotes version: The kids who come to school with less get less from school. Closing the achievement gap with high-stakes, test-centric teaching combined with low resources, few opportunities and a lack of support has failed. The best way out is to close the mushrooming opportunity gap, create more equitable opportunities and gauge how well states and districts are doing to create those opportunities. Achievement follows from opportunities to learn.
The book's editors, Kevin Welner and Prudence Carter, plus five of the 17 Opportunity Gap chapter authors -- Christopher Tienken, Harvey Kantor, Linda Darling-Hammond, Bob Lowe and Patricia Gandara -- were on hand with mounds of evidence on how we need to reboot: how to go from the proverbial Education 1.0 with a focus on 

Jersey Jazzman: Computerized Testing Disaster Preview

Jersey Jazzman: Computerized Testing Disaster Preview:

Computerized Testing Disaster Preview

by Duke

It's going to be so feakin' awesome when we finally get all the kids taking all those Common Core and PARCC and state-level standardized tests on computers! Because - considering they must all take them at the same time - what could possibly go wrong?

School testing came to a halt statewide early Monday because the CTB/McGraw-Hill testing company servers in New Jersey crashed around 9 a.m., state education officials said.

In the last week of Oklahoma's April testing window, the outage has raised rescheduling concerns among school officials across the state.

"We're working with (McGraw) very closely" to resolve the problems, said Sherry Fair, spokeswoman with the state Department of Education.

School districts were advised to cancel online testing because of the server crash, 

Questions about the questions on new Common Core tests:

Questions about the questions on new Common Core tests

Posted by Valerie Strauss on May 3, 2013 at 2:28 pm

New York state students in several grades recently took new high-stakes accountability tests aligned to the Common Core State Standards (even though there is not yet a Core curriculum in New York schools), and a number of educators who saw the test reported problems with some of the questions.

Some questions, they said, appeared to have more than one correct answer and no single obviously correct one; others were considered so time-consuming to answer that many students couldn’t finish. Some literacy experts said that versions of the English Language Arts 5th grade reading test had some multiple-choice questions that did not really lend themselves to the multiple-choice format.

I have a copy of the 2013 Common Core English Language Arts Test Book 1, Form C, for fifth grade. Because of copyright issues, I can’t publish the whole thing, but I can include a few questions. (The New York Daily News received the test earlier and published some questions, here.)

Look at this question and tell me if you can be sure of the right answer:

Students are asked to read a poem titled “Aloneness,” by Gwendolyn Brooks, and answer 

Ed Notes Online: Randi's "Mid-Course" Babble on Common Core: Who's doing more harm to public education, Glenn Beck or Randi Weingarten?

Ed Notes Online: Randi's "Mid-Course" Babble on Common Core: Who's doing more harm to public education, Glenn Beck or Randi Weingarten?:

Randi's "Mid-Course" Babble on Common Core: Who's doing more harm to public education, Glenn Beck or Randi Weingarten?

by ed notes online

Can we call for a moratorium on Randi Weingarten? -- Fred Smith

Susan Ohanian asked that intriguing question about Glenn Beck and Randi in the headline. The amount of damage Randi's AFT/UFT capitulation has done to public education is exposed as parents and teachers reacted to Weingarten's worthless words to cover her ass with a soundbite when the entire common core crap she has had the AFT/UFT push down everyone's throats comes apart, as so much of ed deform has before it, ed deform 

Follow up Question Guide for Ed Writers (on Teacher Evaluation) | School Finance 101

Follow up Question Guide for Ed Writers (on Teacher Evaluation) | School Finance 101:

Follow up Question Guide for Ed Writers (on Teacher Evaluation)

by schoolfinance101

I was reviewing the past few days of news coverage on NJ teacher evaluations and came across the following quote, which was not-so-amazingly left unchallenged:

Cerf said research shows test scores are “far and away” the best gauge of teacher effectiveness, and to not use test score data would be “very anti-child.”

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2013/05/state_board_of_education_adjus.html
Here’s a reporters’ guide to follow up questions….
Mr. Cerf… can you show me exactly what research comes to that conclusion? (this should always be the immediate follow up to the ambiguous “research shows” comment)
Exactly how is “far and away” measured in that research?
And what is meant by “best gauge of effectiveness?”
That is, what is the valid measure of effectiveness against which test scores are gauged? (answer… uh… test scores themselves)
So, Mr. Cerf, are you trying to tell me that the Gates MET study proved that test scores are “far and away” the 

NPE Friends & Allies | The Network For Public Education

NPE Friends & Allies | The Network For Public Education:

NPE FRIENDS & ALLIES

MAY 3, 2013

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Diane in the Evening 5-3-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all:

Will Common Core Make Kids Smarter?

by dianerav

Arthur Goldstein teaches high school in Queens, New York. Many of his students are English language learners. He blogs at NYC Educator. His blog is one of the best in the nation.
He wrote the following for readers of this blog:
How Smart Will Common Core Make Our Kids?
Judging from the editorials in the papers, you’d think Common Core was the best thing since sliced bread. Actually, sliced bread is highly overrated, as anyone with fresh artisan bread and a good knife can attest.
The Daily News predicts over 60% of our kids could fail Common Core tests, and appears to see this as a good

Rahm and the Madness of Mayoral Control

by dianerav

Suppose you were mayor of Chicago and had complete control of the public schools.
Suppose one of your high schools had an outstanding record by any measure.
Suppose it had an excellent IB program.
Would it occur to you to make the entire school an IB school?
Would it occur to you to get rid of some of the veteran

“Education Drained of Its Humanity”

by dianerav

This thoughtful and provocative essay by Shawn Gude situates present-day corporate reform in its historical context. Gude shows the connections between early 20th century social efficiency and the present-day demand for testing, standardizing, and data-based decision-making.
Here is an excerpt:
“There’s a special resemblance between the struggles against scientific management, or Taylorism, and today’s teacher resistance to corporate reform schemes. Just as factory workers fought top-down dictates, deskilling, and the installation of anemic work processes, so too are teachers trying to prevent the undemocratic implementation of high-stakes testing and merit pay, assaults on professionalism, and the dumbing down and 

Good Riddance! Cyber School in Virginia May Close

by dianerav

The K12 cyber charter in Virginia may close.
The school enrolled 350 students.
The county “hosting” the school decided it was too much of a bother, and only five students from the host county were enrolled.
There have been persistent questions about the quality of virtual charter schools, but their profitability has never been in doubt.
K12 will go looking for another partner or the governor will find another way for them to make a profit by providing inferior education to students in Virginia.

LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 5-3-13 Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all

mike simpson at Big Education Ape - 3 hours ago

Diane Ravitch's blog | A site to discuss better education for all: [image: Click on picture to Listen to Diane Ravitch] Robert Shepherd: When Will We Ever Learn? by dianerav Robert Shepherd has long experience writing and editing textbooks and assessments. I appreciate his kind comments about my book, written in the 1990s, but also his recognition that “reforms” come and go with regularity. My comment: The current wave of phony reforms is the most destructive in the history of American education. He writes: “One of the reasons why I love Diane Ravitch’s brilliant Left Back: A Ce... more »

Louisiana Educator: Democracy Works!

Louisiana Educator: Democracy Works!:

Democracy Works!

by Michael Deshotels

We live in a representative democracy. This means that while we do not get to vote on each individual law or regulation, we elect persons to represent us in making important laws and policies. Part of the process is the need for citizens to communicate with those elected representatives and tell them how we want them to vote.Finally this communication part of the system seems to be working much better this year than it did last year for educators.

HB 57 would have forced current educators to pay an additional 2% of their salary to help reduce the unfunded liability of the retirement system that was caused by underfunding by the legislature. It would have been an unfair tax on only some citizens (school employees) but not all others. That bill was voluntarily deferred by the author of the bill after he and the retirement committee members received hundreds upon hundreds of emails from school employees asking them to vote no on the bill. You did it! Once again you stopped a bad piece of legislation because you were willing to express your concerns to your representatives.
Congratulations! Keep it up.

Your next major democratic task, should you choose to continue to do your part in our democracy is to send 

How Parent Trigger Opponents Claimed #ParentEmpowerment As Their Own | StateImpact Florida

How Parent Trigger Opponents Claimed #ParentEmpowerment As Their Own | StateImpact Florida:

How Parent Trigger Opponents Claimed #ParentEmpowerment As Their Own

MAY 3, 2013 | 10:45 AM

BY JOHN O'CONNOR

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@GATORBONBC / TWITTER

Just over 24 hours ago, the Tallahassee-based Foundation for Florida’s Future sent out an email asking parent trigger backers to tweet their support.

The bill died in the Florida Senate earlier this week on a 20-20 tie vote — for the second year in a row.

The bill would allow parents at schools earning a failing grade to choose how to restructure the school, including firing staff and administrators, closing the school or converting to a charter.

It’s the last option that drew criticism. Opponents argued Florida was passing the bill just prior to new standards kicking in which would ensure more Florida school earned a failing grade. The Florida PTA, the NAACP and other advocacy groups fought the bill.

The Foundation, started by former Gov. Jeb Bush, backed the bill along with national 

Breaking: Williams elementary and middle school students and parents hold sit-in this morning. No school closings. | Fred Klonsky

Breaking: Williams elementary and middle school students and parents hold sit-in this morning. No school closings. | Fred Klonsky:

Breaking: Williams elementary and middle school students and parents hold sit-in this morning. No school closings.

by Fred Klonsky

BREAKING NEWS: Williams Elementary, Chicago — Middle School students, parents hold sit-in demonstration to protest school closing
OccupyCPS facebook.com/occupyCPS @occupyCPS #occupycps
Twitter hashtag: #WilliamsProtest
Press contact: Jitu Brown, Greg Goodman
At Williams Elementary, Middle School students, parents hold sit-in demonstration to protest school closing
Schedule: Friday, May 3 at Williams Elementary and Williams Middle School at 2710 S. Dearborn, Chicago, IL.
10 am: 65 students and 5 parents assemble inside the hallway of Williams Elementary School and 

Mother Crusader: How Do Education Foundations in New Jersey's Top Towns Stack Up To Billionaire Philanthropy? Not So Well.

Mother Crusader: How Do Education Foundations in New Jersey's Top Towns Stack Up To Billionaire Philanthropy? Not So Well.:

How Do Education Foundations in New Jersey's Top Towns Stack Up To Billionaire Philanthropy? Not So Well.

by darciecima

A comment I received on my post Hebrew Charters Hit The Broadway Stage kind of irked me.  Don't get me wrong, I LOVE a good debate, and have no problem being challenged. In fact, I welcome it. 

I just wish anonymous commenters that take the time to do some research and go toe to toe with me would let me know who I have the pleasure of debating.  

Anonymous brought up an interesting point, that when I compared the Hebrew Charter School Center's (HCSC) Broadway fundraiser to my school's PTO collecting boxtops, I was leaving out the fact that often Education Foundations raise far more money for districts than PTOs or PTAs.

Point well taken.

So it made sense to look at how Education Foundation giving stacks up to the likes of the HCSC.

As I was doing some research for my response to Anonymous' comment I realized there were lots of links I wanted to add, so here is the comment and my response as a post instead.

AnonymousMay 2, 2013 at 6:29 PM 

Darcie, really? 

It seems to me that that the Hebrew Language people may have learned from Highland Park what a good fundraiser theater can be: This past