Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Nite Cap 1-1-14 #BATsACT #RealEdTalk #EDCHAT #P2

"Pearson is developing performance-based assessments for all grades..."Parents' Coalition of Montgomery County, Maryland:

Parents' Coalition of Montgomery County, Maryland: "Pearson is developing performance-based assessments for all grades...":

"Pearson is developing performance-based assessments for all grades..."

That Pearson will be developing the performance-based assessments for all grades using Curriculum 2.0 is just one of many fun facts that can be gleaned from the Request for Proposal for the Project North Star Evaluator.

Project North Star is also known as the Pearson-MCPS Curriculum or Curriculum 2.0.
Call it what you like, the questions and answers below tell a lot about the Pearson-MCPS curriculum project. The questions and answers were part of the Request for Proposal for a contract for a project evaluator. Through this Q&A we also learn that 8 companies were interested in bidding on this contract.

Here's one of the Q and A's:
Question 43: In the i3 proposal, it indicates that the 2009-2010 school year will serve as a baseline year for student achievement analysis, but the RFP indicates that this current school year (2010-2011) will serve as a baseline. Please clarify.
Answer: Voluntary implementation of North Star in MCPS began in 2009-2010. However, the grant was not awarded until September 2010, therefore, baseline year has not been established.

Project North Star RFT

The Board of Education ultimately awarded the contract (see page 11 at link) to evaluate Project North Star to RMC Research Corporation for$249,905.

The 2013 Review of the Attack on Teachers: focus on earned delayed compensation | Reclaim Reform

The 2013 Review of the Attack on Teachers: focus on earned delayed compensation | Reclaim Reform:

The 2013 Review of the Attack on Teachers: focus on earned delayed compensation

Posted on January 1, 2014by Ken Previti

The 2013 Attack on Teachers included the vicious slow impoverishment of elderly retired teachers. By attacking the earned delayed compensation (pensions) of active and retired teachers, the corporate led war against public education hits a terrorist level of ruthlessness. Who wishes to teach if they are assured of having their paychecks cut and plundered by corporate controlled legislators when they become old? Yes, this is The Shock Doctrine applied to teachers in state after state. Teachers, students, parents, taxpayers and the future of America are victims on the sacrificial altar of Insane Profit.

Focusing on the major attack being brought to the courts in Illinois as a legal test for the nation, Glen Brown offers an overview of the year’s events, complete with well researched sources, in his superb blog.

“Retirees are being deprived of an earned and promised benefit. They were not represented at the table when (legislators) made their agreement. They were excluded from the process that affects them. It’s

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: More on Fariña pick: You can't go wrong expecting the worse from Duncan.

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: More on Fariña pick: You can't go wrong expecting the worse from Duncan.:

More on Fariña pick: You can't go wrong expecting the worse from Duncan.

In yesterday's post on de Blasio's appointment of Carmen Fariña as schools chancellor, I implied that pressure from Arne Duncan and his assistant, Jim Shelton (a Gates Foundation insert at the DOE), was being exerted on the new mayor to appoint a corporate reformer type. As it turns out, I was right on the money. I've learned long ago, that you're almost always on safe ground when anticipating unethical behavior from the Duncan gang.

Yesterday's Washington Post reports:

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan and at least one other Education Department official urged New York Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio and his team not to choose Montgomery County Schools Superintendent Joshua P. Starr as the city’s next schools chancellor, according to several people knowledgable about the selection process. It was an unusual move by the nation’s top education

Happy New Year of Struggle Against Corporate Education Reform: MAP test boycott tops lists of most important struggles of 2013! | I AM AN EDUCATOR

Happy New Year of Struggle Against Corporate Education Reform: MAP test boycott tops lists of most important struggles of 2013! | I AM AN EDUCATOR:

Happy New Year of Struggle Against Corporate Education Reform: MAP test boycott tops lists of most important struggles of 2013!

By I AM AN EDUCATOR on January 1, 2014

2013 was the best year of my life.

My younger son was born–on Martin Luther King Jr.’s, birthday, no less–only two days after my colleagues at Garfield High School announced that they were going to defy corporate education reformers by refusing to administer the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) test. Seeing my older son receive an unparalleled education at his play based preschool, while becoming a loving big brother; getting to know my magnetic, now almost one-year-old, son; and participating in the collective resistance of the MAP test boycott with my fellow educators at Garfield, made 2013 a defining year in my life.

There were many inspiring struggles to defend public education and create a more just society in 2013. The teachers in Seattle who refused to administer the district mandated MAP test, and helped ignite a national movement to curb the abuses of standardized testing, are honored to be included in these remembrances of the most important acts for social justice of 2013:

Alternet named the MAP boycott the number one biggest win for public education in 2013!:10 Big Wins For Public Education in 2013: http://www.alternet.org/education/10-big-wins-public-education-2013

Zinn Education Project named the MAP boycott as part of “A People’s History for 2013″

Schooling in the Ownership Society: The Ward Room: Chicago charters, "a tangle of insider dealing, cronyism and political favoritism"

Schooling in the Ownership Society: The Ward Room: Chicago charters, "a tangle of insider dealing, cronyism and political favoritism":

The Ward Room: Chicago charters, "a tangle of insider dealing, cronyism and political favoritism"

NBC's Ward Room report on charters offers an unequivocal assessment.

As charter schools continue to take root, however, one fact is clear: No process this steeped in political cronyism and insider dealing should be allowed to continue.

The report recounts the way a politically-connected Chicago charter school operator, Concept Schools, Inc. (owned by Turkish billionaire Fethullah Gulen) used it's clout to receive approval and funding to open two schools in Chicagoafter being turned down by the Chicago Public Schools.

CPS said the charter’s current school, Chicago Math and

1-1-14 Wait What?

Wait What?:

From Diane Ravitch: The Best of 2013: The Great Awakening about the Status Quo

America’s leading public education advocate has written a series of blog posts as we leave 2013 and move into the New Year. Her wisdom, perception, courage and conviction continue to inspire tens of thousands of teachers, parents, public education advocates and citizens across the country … and with each passing day, thousands more join the […]The post From Diane Ravitch: The Best of 2013: The Gre

8 by jonpelto / 7min

12-31-13 Wait What?

Wait What?: Governor Malloy: Blessed are the PoorAt yesterday’s press conference at the State Capital, Governor Malloy bragged about the extraordinarily positive impact Connecticut’s new minimum wage law have when it takes effect at midnight tonight. “As the clock strikes 12 in this state, many people … will actually lift themselves out of poverty,” Malloy said during a press event and rally. […]

by mike simpson / 21h

1-1-14 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:

Duncan’s interference in NY school choice.

The Washington Post is reporting on Obama’s Secretary of Education Arne Duncan attempted interference in New York Mayor Bill De Blasio’s school chancellor choice. Duncan reportedly told De Blasio not to choose Montgomery County Schools Superintendent Joshua P. Starr, according to several people knowledgable about the selection process. Star has been a vocal critic of Duncan’s corporate-driven re

by Fred Klonsky / 1min

The Ward Room. “Halt charter school expansion process.”

NBC’s The Ward Room. Both Concept and UNO are part of a veritable land rush of charter schools in the city even as public schools are shuttered at an historic rate. For fiscal year 2014, CPS has projected a reduction in salaries for teachers and staff of $148.8 million, while increasing the amount of money going to charter schools by $80 million. Currently, CPS is considering opening 21 new chart

3 by Fred Klonsky / 26min

Ten minute drawing. Reg Weaver.

by Fred Klonsky / 8min

12-31-13 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.: 2013 Gallery.. by Fred Klonsky / 10min 12-30-13 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacherFred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.: Public employees want unity in the defense of our pensions.

by mike simpson / 17min

Education officials lobbied against Starr in New York City - The Washington Post

Education officials lobbied against Starr in New York City - The Washington Post:

U.S. education officials lobbied against Starr for New York City schools post

(Jeff Martin/ ) - December 10, 2012 - Joshua Starr, Superintendent, Montgomery County Schools, at Washington Post Live's Education forum.

By Valerie Strauss, Published: December 31 E-mail the writer

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan and at least one other Education Department official urged New York Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio and his team not to choose Montgomery County Schools Superintendent Joshua P. Starr as the city’s next schools chancellor, according to several people knowledgable about the selection process. It was an unusual move by the nation’s top education official and came in the wake of Starr’s vocal criticism of some of the Obama administration’s school reform policies.

Starr, who has led Montgomery County schools since July 2011, was a finalist in de Blasio’s two-month search for a superintendent to lead the nation’s largest school system, and people familiar with the search said he might have been offered the job had Carmen Farina, a 70-year-old veteran educator and longtime adviser, not come out of retirement for it. Starr was offered the No. 2 spot in the department, with the understanding that he would become chancellor within a few years, but he declined it, according to several people familiar with details of the search who spoke anonymously because of its political sensitivity.

(Astrid Riecken/For The Washington Post) - Montgomery County Schools Superintendent Joshua Starr makes a grimace while taking a class at Gaithersburg High School in 2012.

Michael R. Bloomberg (I), and Starr

De Blasio Appoints Experienced Educator as NYC Chancellor: A Sign of Hope | janresseger

De Blasio Appoints Experienced Educator as NYC Chancellor: A Sign of Hope | janresseger:

De Blasio Appoints Experienced Educator as NYC Chancellor: A Sign of Hope

Posted on January 1, 2014 by janresseger

In A Brief History of Reform!, life-long and much beloved educator Deborah Meier contrasts the educational philosophies of John Dewey, who believed the school should model and therefore teach democracy, and Ellwood Cubberley, the technocrat who promoted so-called scientific management of schools. As an educator Meier founded schools that modeled Dewey’s philosophy; Cubberley was the direct ancestor of today’s school reformers.

Today Meier celebrates New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s appointment of Carmen Farina, a 40-year teacher, principal, and school administrator—her entire career spent serving the children of New York City.

Clearly Farina and de Blasio have much work to do to curb special favors like free rent for charters and to undo policies like almost universal school choice at the high school level. This is the policy that the Annenberg Institute for School reform exposed last year for assigning

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