The Powerful, Enforced Silence Around Standardized Testing | deutsch29

The Powerful, Enforced Silence Around Standardized Testing | deutsch29:



The Powerful, Enforced Silence Around Standardized Testing

 Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) testingtakes more than ten hours for students in grades 3 through 8 to complete.

These students have spent countless hours preparing for the PARCC tests, and they have heard that the tests are important. However, they will receive no immediate, clear benefit from taking the tests. Their teachers will receive no clear, immediate information to inform instruction. By the time PARCC scores come, the school year is over, and likely another begun.

The teachers know that student scores on PARCC are meant to be used to grade them and their schools.

All of the above makes for a high-stress situation for both kids and teachers.

And once it is over, kids now know that the testing companies and departments of education are trolling social media to see if kids discuss the experience.

Such constitutes an abuse of power.

Pretend I am Pearson. I have just spent ten-plus hours with your child. You have no idea what we “talked” about, what exact ideas I have presented or how I presented them to the tender mind of your child. I can “discuss” whatever I like and present it with authority. I can promote certain people as “good and others as “bad.” I can promote products. And I can shape your child psychologically via my topics and presentation of such topics. Why, I can even collect psychological information on your child.

And once my ten-plus hours of “meetings” with your child are ended, I make it clear that I plan to monitor your child’s public discourse about the experience.

All that this does is protect me, the one already in incredible power.

You did not request that I meet with your child. Your child did not request the The Powerful, Enforced Silence Around Standardized Testing | deutsch29:

Pearson monitoring social media for security breaches during PARCC testing - The Washington Post

Pearson monitoring social media for security breaches during PARCC testing - The Washington Post:

Pearson monitoring social media for security breaches during PARCC testing

 Updated with response from superintendent

Pearson, the world’s largest education company, is monitoring social media during the administration of the new PARCC Common Core test to detect any security breaches, and a spokeswoman said that it was “obligated” to alert authorities when any problems were discovered.

The superintendent of a New Jersey school district wrote an e-mail to colleagues (see below) about the monitoring, saying that she found the practice “a bit disturbing.”

Students in New Jersey are now taking the PARCC, a Common Core test created by the Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, one of two multi-state consortia given $360 million in federal funds to design new standardized tests that align with the Common Core State Standards. PARCC testing is underway in several other states amid a growing opt-out movement by parents who are refusing to allow their children to take the test. Pearson has a contract of more than $100 million to administer the PARCC in New Jersey.

News of the monitoring of social media was revealed in a message that Superintendent Elizabeth C. Jewett of Watchung Hills Regional High School District in New Jersey sent to colleagues about a disturbing episode that she was made aware of by her district’s testing coordinator. It wasposted on the Web site of Bob Braun, a former reporter, education editor and senior columnist at the Star-Ledger, who called the monitoring of social media nothing less than “spying.”

Asked for a comment about the monitoring of social media during the PARCC administration, Pearson spokeswoman Stacy Skelly said in an e-mail:

The security of a test is critical to ensure fairness for all students and teachers and to ensure that the results of any assessment are trustworthy and valid.

We welcome debate and a variety of opinions. But when test questions or elements are posted publicly to the Internet, we are obligated to alert PARCC and our state customers. Any contact with students or decisions about student discipline are handled at the local level.

We believe that a secure test maintains fairness for every student and the validity, integrity of the test results.

Jewett responded to an e-mail with a link to a letter that she posted on the district’s Web site. It says:

Dear Watchung Hills Regional High School Learning Community,

On Friday, March 13, 2015, Bobbraunsledger.com published a story referencing an email I had sent to other superintendents about issues regarding PARCC testing and Pearson’s monitoring of social media. The email shown in his article is authentic. It was an email I sent on March 10, 2015 at approximately 10:00AM to a group of superintendents to share my concerns and to see if other schools had a similar experience. I did not authorize the release of this email nor am I aware of who did release it. I am also not aware of the motives they may have had behind the release. That said, I completely 

Pearson monitoring social media for security breaches during PARCC testing - The Washington Post:

 

Click Here to go to Bob Braun's Ledger on FaceBook

Click Here to go to http://bobbraunsledger.com/category/education/

Jersey Jazzman: When Pearson Monitors Students, They Prove the Inferiority of Their Product

Jersey Jazzman: When Pearson Monitors Students, They Prove the Inferiority of Their Product:

When Pearson Monitors Students, They Prove the Inferiority of Their Product

When Pearson Monitors Students, They Prove the Inferiority of Their Product

UPDATE: Watching Hill Regional High School has released a statement about the incident below.

Full disclosure: my K-8 district "feeds" into WHRHS, but I am not employed there as it is a separate district. I do not know who the student is but it is possible he is a former student.

Most of you probably know by now that Bob Braun, veteran education journalist and a personal friend, published a blockbuster of a story yesterday: Pearson Education, Inc., creator of the PARCC standardized test, has been monitoring students' social media use and, in at least one case, reported what they considered to be a violation of their test security.

Even worse: Bob's site has been under a "denial of service" attack since shortly after he published the report. As of this morning, I'm still not able to access Bob's story at his blog, but not to worry: Bob published his story on Facebook, where it appears to be immune from DOS attacks. Here's an excerpt:

Pearson, the multinational testing and publishing company, is spying on the social media posts of students--including those from New Jersey--while the children are taking their PARCC, statewide tests, this site has learned exclusively. The state education department is cooperating with this spying and has asked at least one school district to discipline students who may have said something inappropriate about the tests. This website discovered the unauthorized and hidden spying thanks to educators who informed it of the practice--a practice happening throughout the state and apparently throughout the country.

The spying--or "monitoring," to use Pearson's word--was confirmed at one school district--the Watchung Hills Regional High School district in Warren by its superintendent, Elizabeth Jewett. Jewett sent out an e-mail--posted here-- to her colleagues expressing concern about the unauthorized spying on students.

She said parents are upset and added that she thought Pearson's behavior would contribute to the growing "opt out" movement. So far, thousands of parents have kept their children away from the tests--and one of the reasons is the fear that Pearson might abuse its access to student data, something it has denied it would do.

- See more at: http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2015/03/when-pearson-monitors-students-they.html

Schools Matter: Eli Broad funded United Way Greater Los Angeles now also serving CCSA's political arm

Schools Matter: Eli Broad funded United Way Greater Los Angeles now also serving CCSA's political arm:

Eli Broad funded United Way Greater Los Angeles now also serving CCSA's political arm

"By what logic does United Way engage in an activity that is shunned by all the other charities?" — Professor Ralph E. Shaffer

United Way Greater Los Angeles (UWGLA)'s role as a tax deductible lobbying and public relations firm for plutocrats like Eli Broad, Bill Gates, Carrie Walton Penner, and Casey Wasserman is expanding. They are now apparently functioning as adjunct to the deep pocketed California Charter School Association (CCSA). To wit, compare this email from the "non-partisan charity" UWGLA to that of the CCSA trade association's 501c4 wing, CCSA Advocates:

Notice any similarities?

In a discussion with several other social justice activists, we were trying to decide why UWGLA's well paid political consultants didn't have the good sense to at least change the precise order of the candidates that they and their fellow special interest group, the CCSA, feature on their propaganda pieces. UWGLA could argue, unconvincingly, that they put the names in the same order as candidates received votes in the primary election. However, it's far more likely that they used CCSA's billionaire backed candidates' existing information and then tacked on the other candidate information on as a grudging afterthought.

The first clue that UWGLA has absolutely no respect for the candidates outside of the CCSA privatization pushers like Galatzan and Rodriguez? They misspelled the Honorable Bennett Kayser's name as "BENNET KAYSER" in every occurrence of both the image and text of the communication they sent out. This is the seated school board member, and UWGLA has a mind-blowing multi-million dollar budget, but they get everything else correct except the school board member's name? Moreover, notice how all of the head shots are proportional, but they use the old political trick of making one candidate look abnormal by using a disproportional photo crop. A nasty little Fox News style play probably drawn up by CCSA's arch-reactionary political director Carlos Marquez.

We frequently look to UWGLA's plutocrat funding sources and the neoliberal pay-to-advocate paradigm that UWGLA and other members of the Non-Profit Industrial Complex (NPIC) operate under. Nothing is more telling of UWGLA's complete allegiance to the neoliberal corporate education reform agenda than this 2013 photo of privatizer Monica Garcia, the disgraced John Deasy, millionaire Casey Wasserman, billionaire Eli Broad, and UWGLA's Elise Buik. What we typically don't look at is the staff members UWGLA employs to promulgate their donors' agenda.

UWGLA's current Education Program Officer is Elmer G. Roldan. Prior to his UWGLA stint, Roldan worked for the Camino Nuevo Corporate Charter Chain—known for its unelected board of bankers, finance capitalists, and hedge Schools Matter: Eli Broad funded United Way Greater Los Angeles now also serving CCSA's political arm:

Here are the states that serve the most local food at school - Vox

Here are the states that serve the most local food at school - Vox:

Here are the states that serve the most local food at school

 In the Northeast, almost all school districts are on board with the farm-to-table movement — but the rest of the country is still pretty far behind, according to this map from the US Department of Agriculture's Farm-to-School census:

In New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, Delaware, Maryland, and Rhode Island, at least 90 percent of school districts have some kind of farm-to-school program in place, meaning either they buy local produce or they have school gardens.

At the other end of the scale, fewer than 25 percent of school districts in South Dakota, Nebraska, Mississippi, Texas, Nevada, Wyoming, and Arkansas have farm-to-school programs.

But even in states that have embraced the farm-to-table movement, local foods are a small share of the budget. Only 2 percent of Maine schools' food budget is spent locally.

The locavore leader is arguably — no surprise — Oregon. True, just 66 percent of its school districts have some kind of farm-to-school program, less than leading states like Vermont. But in those districts, 24 percent of the food budget is spent on local foods, a greater percentage than anyone else.Here are the states that serve the most local food at school - Vox:

School Funding Inequality Makes Education 'Separate And Unequal,' Arne Duncan Says:

School Funding Inequality Makes Education 'Separate And Unequal,' Arne Duncan Says

 Many school systems remain "fundamentally separate and unequal," U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Friday, with 23 states spending more per pupil in affluent school districts than they do in high-poverty districts. What's more, Duncan said on a call with reporters, the inequality may be getting worse.

Duncan alluded to Republican-backed efforts to overhaul the No Child Left Behind Act, which he said would give even more money to well-off school districts at the expense of struggling districts. In February, House Republicans proposed the Student Success Act as a rewrite of No Child Left Behind. Duncan at the time blasted the bill, which hasn't yet come to a vote, saying a funding provision may have a devastating impact on disadvantaged students.

Duncan on Friday said some Republicans are pushing what he called a "Robin Hood in reverse" funding proposal that "would exacerbate the existing problem by allowing even greater cuts to districts that need the most help."

As it stands, Duncan said, about 6.6 million students from low-income families in 23 states are harmed by local and state funding disparities. The funding inequality data comes from National Center for Education Statistics, a branch of the U.S. Department of Education that collects information on schools.

Federal education funding can help rectify state and local inequalities. But federal dollars aren't meant to balance state and local funding, Duncan told The Washington Post. Instead, federal money is intended to help needy students, he said.

“The point of that money was to supplement, recognizing that poor children, and English language-learners, and students with disabilities come to school with additional challenges,” Duncan told the newspaper. “This is about trying to get additional resources to children and communities who everyone knows need additional help.”

The maps below show where funding inequalities are the worst. The first map shows areas affected by state and local funding differences. Negative percentages indicate that high-poverty schools receive less funding than low-poverty schools. The second graph shows funding disparities after federal dollars are taken into consideration.

Pennsylvania has the worst funding disparities between low-income and high-income schools. The state's poorest school districts receive 33 percent less state and local funding than the richest schools. This inequality is currently the subject of a lawsuitbrought by a group of school districts and parents.

"The problem you have in Pennsylvania is not atypical of the problems you have in many states, which is a reluctance to raise enough revenues to send to the districts," Michael Churchill, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs, told The Huffington Post. "The revenues they do send, they send in a progressive manner -- they just don’t send enough to overcome the huge differences in wealth in the districts," said Churchill.

Churchill noted that Pennsylvania relies heavily on local property taxes for school district funding, meaning that wealthier areas, with a larger tax base, have more money.

A Pennsylvania Department of Education spokesman didn't reply to The Huffington Post's request for comment.

On the other end of the spectrum, states like Indiana and Minnesota spend significantly more on their low-income students than they doSchool Funding Inequality Makes Education 'Separate And Unequal,' Arne Duncan Says:

Two closed charter schools’ records unauditable | The Columbus Dispatch

Two closed charter schools’ records unauditable | The Columbus Dispatch:

Two closed charter schools’ records unauditable

The two Talented Tenth Leadership Academies in Columbus have been shut down, their founder has been indicted on criminal theft charges, and now the former charter schools have been placed on Ohio Auditor Dave Yost’s “unauditable” list.

Yost said financial records for the academies — one for boys and one for girls — were either missing or such a mess that he was unable to review them to determine whether tax dollars were accounted for.

Problems for the two academies started shortly after they opened in 2013. Within months, Ohio school Superintendent Richard A. Ross ordered them closed for health and safety reasons.

State officials said the schools were inadequately staffed, there were numerous student fights, and meals weren’t being served or consisted of fast-food carryout. The schools were sponsored by the North Central Ohio Education Center.

The schools’ founder, Andre Rasheen Tucker, faces two counts of theft alleging that he stole checks made out to his charter school totaling about $7,500.

Yost’s office conducts regular audits of charter schools and other entities to ensure that tax dollars are accounted for. The academies are among four charter schools on his unauditable list.

School officials have 90 days to turn over required financial records or face legal action, and the sponsoring service center must provide a written explanation. The sponsor also is prohibited from contracting with additional charter schools.Two closed charter schools’ records unauditable | The Columbus Dispatch:

Jeb Bush Touts Canada, School Vouchers, ISIS Plan in New Hampshire - US News

Jeb Bush Touts Canada, School Vouchers, ISIS Plan in New Hampshire - US News:

Bush Touts Canada, ISIS Plan in New Hampshire

The potential presidential candidate also blasted public schools as 'monopolies' in a pre-campaign jaunt.

HUDSON, N.H. – In his first trip to the Granite State as a potential 2016 presidential candidate, Jeb Bush defended his inclusive immigration position, blasted public schools as “monopolies” and provided a fresh outline for how he’d confront the barbaric Islamic State group as commander-in-chief.

The former two-term Republican governor of Florida toured a biosciences lab Friday and then fielded nearly 40 minutes of questions from local business and education leaders during a round-table. All the while, a jostling herd of media trailed, photographed and livestreamed his every move, reinforcing his outsize presence in the pre-primary phase of the campaign.

Immigration

Bush stood by his view that the U.S. should move toward an immigration system driven by economics that would allow millions to come out of the shadows and attain legal status.

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He pointed due north for an example.

“Canada has more economic immigrants than we do,” he said. “I wonder which country has the best economic benefit. I think Canada probably has the better deal.”

To those on the right who malign him as an advocate of amnesty, Bush formulated a response.

“It’s easy to say, ‘Anything you propose is amnesty.’ But that’s not a plan. That’s a sentiment,” he said.

School Vouchers

Bush is “all in” on moving to expand vouchers to allow more children to attend private schools. And his disdain for the current public school system was on full display, as he compared it to a company that has grown so large it’s overwhelmed the competition.

“Our funding is based on funding the monopolies. It’s about funding the public school system,” he lamented, “not necessarily the needs of the students.”

Asked later if he favored privatizing the Department of Veterans Affairs to increase the efficiency of care for veterans, he said he didn’t know if that was appropriate.

The Islamic State Group

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Bush, Cruz Curb Their Pander in Iowa

Bush also provided his most extensive answer to date on how he would “tighten the noose” on the Islamic State group.

He said he favored carving out a protected zone in northeast Syria that would provide a haven for an international army led by the Free Syrian Army, which includes defectors from the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad. This would allow an allied coalition to “engage and isolate” the extremists, Bush argued.

He indicated U.S. troops would be part of an overarching plan to deal with borderless violence in the Middle East. Bush said he favored placing “some small-force level” of troops in Iraq to train and assist Iraqi forces.

“You can’t do it by going to the U.N.,” he said.

But Bush also carefully rejected the perception that he’s an Jeb Bush Touts Canada, School Vouchers, ISIS Plan in New Hampshire - US News:

California’s education quality conundrum - Lodinews.com: Joe Guzzardi

Joe Guzzardi: California’s education quality conundrum - Lodinews.com: Joe Guzzardi:

Joe Guzzardi: California’s education quality conundrum

 A report released in January reiterated a familiar theme for California’s teachers, administrators and parents. Compiled by the nonprofit Education Week, “Quality Counts” gave California’s schools a terrible “D-”grade, which put it in 42nd place nationwide as measured by key performance standards including K-12 academic achievement, early education participation and funding.

“Quality Counts” is the latest in a seemingly endless series of reports that place California at or near the bottom of U.S. school systems.

Only eight states did worse. None received an “A” grade. Massachusetts and New Jersey topped the list with “B.”

Among the report’s broader findings, many school-age children are growing up in poverty and in households where parents don’t speak fluent English. California ranked next to last in at-home language proficiency and also 49th in household heads that are employed year-round and participate in the labor force full-time. Since the California Department of Finance projects that most of the state’s population growth over the next 30 years will be Hispanic and Asian, parental language challenges may remain.

California’s Local Control and Funding Formula is the latest attempt to solve the state’s persistent education dilemmas. In addition to emphasizing academic achievement as well as college and career readiness, certainly not a new wrinkle, the LCFF empowers local districts to have greater decision making authority in how they meet the states’ academic goals for all its students.

But an analysis of the National Center for Education Statistics’ Schools and Staffing Survey found that 54 percent of principals view literacy skills as their most important objective while only 2 percent identify college or career advancement as a priority.

The survey, therefore, indicates that school administrators have set a lower bar for success than Sacramento’s Department of Education. The task is how to align teachers’ practical classroom issues with Sacramento’s loftier and possibly unachievable goals.

One ingredient in the quest for success that might help teachers and students alike is LCFF’s requirement for greater parental involvement. To date, few schools meaningfully involve parents in decision making. Only half of schools have staff specifically assigned to encourage parental participation. Most instead rely on traditional parent-teacher conferences, open houses or special language meetings to resolve individual issues.

Including parents in administrative decisions could be difficult to effectively manage. But promoting greater parental involvement in a child’s success is not hard, and is a proven ingredient in success. After the National Education Association conducted decade-long research, it learned that regardless of family income or ethnic background, parental Joe Guzzardi: California’s education quality conundrum - Lodinews.com: Joe Guzzardi:

L.A. teachers launch union drive at Alliance charter schools - LA Times

L.A. teachers launch union drive at Alliance charter schools - LA Times:

L.A. teachers launch union drive at Alliance charter schools

Teachers at the largest charter school organization in Los Angeles have launched a drive to unionize, a move that could alter the path of school reform in the city.

Charter schools, which are independently managed and publicly funded, have grown rapidly in Los Angeles, drawing students and funding from the school district. For the most part, their teachers are not unionized. That traditionally has put charters at odds with the teachers union.

Increasingly, charter organizations and the union are seen as political adversaries in charting the future of public schools.

A successful push by educators at the Alliance College-Ready Public Schools would hand an important victory to United Teachers Los Angeles as it struggles to reverse years of declining membership. The move could also pose a challenge to charters, which have been able to hire and fire staff without union rules — a key factor they believe helps provide the best instruction for students.

Nearly 70 teachers and counselors sent a letter Friday to the high-performing charter group, explaining their intention to partner with the teachers union. The letter asked for "a fair and neutral process" that would allow educators to organize without fear of retaliation.

"We believe that when teachers have a respected voice in policymaking it leads to school sustainability and teacher retention," said Elana Goldbaum, who teaches history at Gertz-Ressler High School, a member of the Alliance group. "We have a lot of talent and we want to see that stay. We want to see our teachers be a part of the decision-making and we want to advocate for our students and ourselves."

Unionizing would require majority support from the 500-plus teachers and counselors at the Alliance schools. The educators who sent the letter Friday also launched a website and asked colleagues to join them.

In a statement, leaders of the 11,000-student charter group said that they would not stop the teachers from pursuing union affiliation.L.A. teachers launch union drive at Alliance charter schools - LA Times:

Did You Know I Am “Funded by the Teachers Union”? | deutsch29

Did You Know I Am “Funded by the Teachers Union”? | deutsch29:



Did You Know I Am “Funded by the Teachers Union”?

 I did not know so myself.

Not until Julie Stroud Trivitt, assistant professor of economics at the Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas wrote as much on Facebook by way of advising another person to “follow the money” on me for my position on charters.

Trivitt draws her paycheck from a “college of business” that advertises itself as “We Are Walton”… When we say “WE ARE WALTON,” we mean it.”

The same page also alludes to its “corporate sponsors.” In 2013, the Walton Foundation paid $1.2 million to the University of Arkansas Foundation.

The Walton Foundation is big on charters and vouchers. The Waltons footed the bill for New Orleans’ OneApp process for applying for admission to New Orleans’ less than impressive, embarrassingly low ACT-scoring charter school system.

The Walton family also has an established, anti-union history.

Given a hefty, Walton-privatizing presence in Arkansas, it should come as no surprise that education privatization should move into Little Rock in the form of a bill to take over any “failing” school district and hand it over to a charter operator.

The Walton Foundation funded the bill. As the Arkansas Times notes:

[Author of the bill] Cozart chairs the Education Committee. His bill is the work of Walton Family Foundation-funded lobbyists and has the apparent backing of Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who’s promised wealthy Arkansans such as the Waltons and Democrat-Gazette Publisher Walter Hussman who back the so-called “reform” movement, to do earthshaking things, beginning in Little Rock.

The Waltons are keen on charter operators. One of their favorites is KIPP. Walton gave the KIPP Foundation $8.8 million in 2013.

Some individuals object to a privatized Little Rock school system. In registering her objection, one such person happened to post a piece I wrote in December 2014, entitled, A Walton’s Plan to Fix Public Education. Uh. Huh.

But Walton-backed economics professor Trivitt was there to set the record straight on the likes of me and my distaste for multi-billionaire-purchased “choice.” Here is what Did You Know I Am “Funded by the Teachers Union”? | deutsch29:

Common Core tests were supposed to be immune to test prep. So why are kids spending weeks prepping anyway? - The Hechinger Report

Common Core tests were supposed to be immune to test prep. So why are kids spending weeks prepping anyway? - The Hechinger Report:



Common Core tests were supposed to be immune to test prep. So why are kids spending weeks prepping anyway?

Third-graders’ reaction to timed tests: “Oh, I can’t do this. There’s no way I can do it.”

NEW ORLEANS — Five weeks before the start of March testing, with excitement bubbling over for Mardi Gras, it was practice-test week at New Orleans’ John Dibert Community School at Phillis Wheatley.

Instead of thinking about parades, beads and king cakes, fourth-graders were intent on the test papers before them and a large digital clock counting down on the whiteboard. Signs posted outside the classroom door cautioned “quiet, testing in progress.”

In Bodie Manly’s fifth-grade math class, students were reviewing material they’d likely see on the test. Some worked independently on laptops at their desks with headphones on while others gathered in a small group on the floor, manipulating colored foam shapes and puzzling over the fractional parts of a hexagon. The three-dimensional pieces enabled them to physically separate the hexagon into its many parts in order to visualize solutions. They were scheduled for the math practice test later that week.

All the preparation may not do much good. This year, Louisiana students are taking new math and English standardized tests linked to the Common Core, the five-year-old national learning standards adopted by more than 40 states — which test-makers and many education experts say will be less susceptible to the intensive test-prep techniques of the past.

Laura Slover, CEO of Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC), whose exam is the model for Louisiana’s new test, has written that “there is no ‘test prep’ for these tests; these are the kinds of test items that require understanding of concepts and application that only come through a year of effective teaching, not through ‘drill and kill.’”

Nonetheless, it’s not stopping many Louisiana schools from trying — not so much to improve student performance, but to boost student confidence as children are tested for the first time on the Common Core.

Fifth-graders Kayla Venson, 11, and Amir Hansell, 10, review math Common Core tests were supposed to be immune to test prep. So why are kids spending weeks prepping anyway? - The Hechinger Report:

So-called Education Reform & the Art of Deception | Creative by Nature

So-called Education Reform & the Art of Deception | Creative by Nature:

So-called Education Reform & the Art of Deception

Posted on March 2, 2015by Christopher Chase

The following are excerpts from a promotional pdf co-written in 2012 by Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) director Joe Williams & Charles Barone. The DFER group has links to Eli Broad, TFA, the Gates Foundation, charter schools and Wall Street hedge funds. They also helped place Arne Duncan in the position of Secretary of Education. From their paper:

PRESIDENT OBAMA IS THE BEST MESSENGER ‘THE MOVEMENT’ HAS EVER HAD

“For years, education reform was strong on message and somewhat weak on messengers. Too many of those who stepped forward to assume that role had their motives questioned… This President, chided by the right for his background as a community organizer, shattered that reality and reminded us that education reform is a deal which can, and must, be closed by Democrats.

The core of DFER’s mission rests on the understanding that it is our Party, the Democrats, which needs to take responsibility for preserving this crucial public institution, the cornerstone of our democracy. As Republican politicians like New Jersey Governor Chris Christie have noted, political reality necessitates that education reforms be led by Democrats if they are to succeed.

Indeed, governors of both parties nationwide have been empowered by the “cover” that has come from a Democratic President who has been willing to embrace reforms that are not always in line with the priorities of the nation’s powerful teachers unions.

The evidence of what this shift in a political messenger can bring is clear-cut. As a result of the RTTT competition, fifteen states lifted caps on the creation of new charter schools, and one state enacted a charter school law. Charter schools flourished more under three years of Obama than under eight years of George W. Bush. Funding for state charter school grants, for example, stayed between about $68 million and $81 million during Bush’s two terms, but jumped to $138 million during Obama’s first full budget year.

This increase wasn’t accidental – it was keeping a promise that then-candidate Obama made on the campaign trail. Obama also initiated, for the first time ever, a competitive grant program to expand and replicate high-quality charter school programs such as KIPP, Success Charter Network, and Uncommon Schools. In its first year alone, this program enabled 76,000 more students to attend 127 new and 31 expanded public charter schools in a dozen charter school networks nationwide.

The results of President Obama’s leadership on education have been profound in other areas as well. States from coast to coast have changed (or are in the process of changing) So-called Education Reform & the Art of Deception | Creative by Nature:

Ignored by the Common Core agenda—Making the link between poverty, nutrition and poor performance in school | Crazy Normal - the Classroom Exposé

Ignored by the Common Core agenda—Making the link between poverty, nutrition and poor performance in school | Crazy Normal - the Classroom Exposé:



Ignored by the Common Core agenda—Making the link between poverty, nutrition and poor performance in school

At a Glance:

Twelve weeks of supplementation with vitamins and minerals was found to boost the attention scores of children, according to results published in the British Journal of Nutrition.

“It is well known that adequate levels of vitamins, minerals and other nutrients are essential for optimal neural functioning. A significant percentage of individuals, including children, suffer from deficiencies in one or more vitamins or minerals. This study investigated whether daily supplementation with a multivitamin could alter cognitive performance and mood in healthy children.

“The randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study included 81 healthy children aged 8-14. The children were reportedly all healthy and free from food allergies. None of the children used other dietary supplements during the three months prior to the study. Participants were randomly assigned to daily multivitamin and mineral supplements or placebo for 12 weeks

“The children underwent laboratory assessments of their cognitive performance and mood pre-dose and at 1 and 3 h post-dose on the first and last days of the trial.  Assessments were also completed at home after 4 and 8 weeks at 3 hours post-dose. Cognitive performance was measured using a battery of laboratory assessments, which included tasks assessing mood and the speed and accuracy of attention and aspects of memory. The children in the vitamin/mineral group performed more accurately on two tests of attention. No effects were observed on measures of the children’s mood

“Although the results of this study require further investigation, it suggests that vitamin/mineral supplementation has the potential to improve brain function in healthy children.”

• Haskell CF et al. Cognitive and mood effects in healthy children during 12 weeks’ supplementation with Ignored by the Common Core agenda—Making the link between poverty, nutrition and poor performance in school | Crazy Normal - the Classroom Exposé: