Editorial: When charter schools fail | Dallas Morning News

Editorial: When charter schools fail | Dallas Morning News:

Editorial: When charter schools fail

 Faith Family Academy of Oak Cliff is a sprawling charter school wedged between the Interstate 35E service road and the Christ for the Nations campus. The school has several metal-clad buildings, a couple of playgrounds, almost no greenery and more than 2,000 students in grades prekindergarten through high school.

All of those students will need to find a new school next fall. Texas Education Commissioner Michael Williams warned Faith Family’s leadership in December that it would lose its charter because of poor financial and academic performance. The revocation should become effective this summer.

The school’s impending closure may surprise its students and parents — and leaders of nearby Dallas ISD schools, many of which also struggle with student achievement. According to news reports, Faith Family sent a note home to parents. It also posted an accreditation warning letter on its website, but you have to hunt for it.

There’s no “Going out of Business” banner; in fact, new job openings were posted on its website this month. Parents may not realize they need to start searching now for another, hopefully better school for their kids.

Charter schools are public schools that typically operate independent of traditional districts. They’re intended to encourage innovation and provide parents with more tuition-free educational options for their children.

From 1995, when Texas lawmakers first authorized charter schools, through last month, the state awarded 313 charters and revoked 24. Revocations accelerated after 2013, when legislators made it simpler to shutter underperforming charters. Faith Family is among the groups losing its charter under the new rules. (A sister school, Waxahachie Faith Family Academy, is not affected.)

Faith Family’s situation has received little attention compared with the well-publicized fight over another charter, Prime Prep Academy, just down the freeway; it closed in January. And Faith Family’s revocation process has been quicker than the bitter battle to pull the charter of Honors Academy, which had campuses in Oak Cliff and Wilmer, among others. Honors Academy continued operating even after losing its charter and finally closed in December.

However, the revocation of Faith Family’s charter is more important because its enrollment is larger than that of Prime Prep and Honors Academy combined. Its students are just like kids who attend nearby traditional schools: at high risk of failing because they’re almost all low-income and many are learning English. Because there’s no requirement to track where students from closed charters go, it’s hard to know whether their next school performs better or worse than their old one.

The state should prod charter schools to make their status clearer sooner. That would give community groups and education officials a chance to help parents learn how to find a stable, higher-performing school.

The last thing these children need is to hop from one school to the next, never finding the good education they need and deserve.

By the numbers

313 Charters awarded by the state

since 1995

188 Operating charters

24 Charters revoked

800 Approximate enrollment of Honors Academy at the time of closure Dec. 1

300 Approximate enrollment of Prime Prep Dallas/Fort Worth Uplift at time of closure Jan. 30

2,200 Approximate enrollment of Faith Family Academy of Oak Cliff

SOURCES: Texas Education Agency; Faith Family Academy 2013-14 school report card

Editorial: When charter schools fail | Dallas Morning News:

Ravitch Speaks Out Against Walker's Proposed Budget A 'War On Education,'

Proposed Public School Cuts Are A 'War On Education,' Says Policy Expert | Wisconsin Public Radio:

Proposed Public School Cuts Are A 'War On Education,' Says Policy Expert

Ravitch Speaks Out Against Walker's Proposed Budget

By KP Whaley

Wednesday, March 18, 2015, 1:00pm

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Diane Ravitch.

The featured speaker at a Wednesday night rally in Milwaukee in support of public schools says proposed cuts in Gov. Scott Walker's budget are nothing short of a war on education.

The proposed budget cuts $127 million dollars in public school aid, while expanding charter and voucher schools statewide. Diane Ravitch — a leading national education expert in accountability, testing and privatization — said those cuts will result in larger class sizes and cuts to the arts.

In his state budget address earlier this year, Walker highlighted his track record on property tax cuts, saying: "Property taxes by the end of 2016 will be lower than they were in 2014. That means lower property taxes for six years in a row."

Ravitch, who also served as assistant secretary of education in the George H.W. Bush administration, believes that those savings aren't worth the cost.

"If you have property tax relief, but your son or daughter is going to a school where the classes have gotten very large and then doesn’t have the opportunity for a public higher education, then that property tax relief came with a very high price tag," she said.

According to her, Wisconsin isn’t the only state seeing significant cuts to education. 

"In other states, Republican governors are going right for education funding. You have to wonder, do they not believe that education is important?" she asked.

She added: "I would think that most of them went to public schools, so why are they so eager to defund public schools and take public money and give it to private entrepreneurs? It doesn’t make any sense except as a matter of ideology that is impervious to evidence."

According to Ravitch, more and more states have adopted voucher and charter school programs. But even as these schools are gaining in popularity, Ravitch said evidence shows that they do not outperform public schools.

"All of these programs that have been evaluated — in particular Milwaukee, Cleveland, and D.C. — have found that voucher students don’t do any better in the voucher schools, and they also do much worse," she said.

Hundreds of educators and concerned parents and students are expected at the rally at the MATC Cooley Auditorium in Milwaukee, which was organized by the Milwaukee Teacher's Education Association in advance of Friday's public hearing on the proposed biennial budget at Alverno College.

Host: 

Kathleen Dunn

Guest(s): 

Diane Ravitch

Producer(s): 

KP Whaley

Proposed Public School Cuts Are A 'War On Education,' Says Policy Expert | Wisconsin Public Radio: 

Be there! Upcoming Budget Hearings

On February 3, Governor Walker introduced his proposed budget for the 2015-2017 biennium.  Walker’s budget misses the mark and is full of bad news for Wisconsin’s working people and communities.

From “drafting errors” that cut the Wisconsin Idea, transportation funding problems, cuts to public schools, and many more concerns for working families – working families will take the brunt of this budget full of shortsighted and backwards priorities. 

Starting this week the public will have the chance to provide input and weigh in on the budget directly to legislators at hearings around the state.

Joint Finance Budget Hearing Schedule 

March 18    Brillion
        Brillion High School (Endries Performing Arts Center, W1101 County Road HR)
        10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

March 20    Milwaukee
        Alverno College (Pitman Theatre, 3400 South 43rd Street)
        10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

March 23    Rice Lake
        UW-Barron County (Fine Arts Theatre, 1800 College Drive)
        10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

March 26    Reedsburg
        CAL Center Auditorium (1100 South Albert Avenue)
        9:30 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Can’t make it to one of these four hearings?  The Democrats on the Joint Finance Committee believe that the above four hearings are insufficient for receiving public input from all corners of the state. Therefore, they will be holding additional hearings to receive public input:

March 19    Wisconsin Rapids
Common Council Chambers (444 Grand Ave.)
5 p.m. - 8 p.m.

March 21    Rhinelander
        Nicolet Technical College (5364 College Dr., Room 207)
        10 a.m. – 2 p.m.

March 21    Wausau
UW Marathon (518 S 7th Ave, Room 100- The Terrace Room)
12 noon - 4 p.m.

March 24, 2015 – Green Bay 
West High School, The Thune Center 
966 Shawano Ave. 
4:00-7:00 p.m.


March 28    Menomonie
Menomonie Public Library (600 Wolske Bay Rd., Meeting room)
10 a.m. - 2 p.m.

March 28    Platteville
City Hall, City Council Chamber (75 North Bonson Street)
12    noon - 4 p.m.

March 30, 2015 – Oshkosh
UW-Oshkosh, Reeve Union, Room 213
800 Algoma Blvd.
4:00-7:00 p.m.

March 31    Dodgeville
Dodgeville Council Chambers (100 E. Fountain St)
5 p.m. - 8 p.m.

April 11    Eau Claire
UW-Eau Claire, Centennial Hall (1698 Park Ave., Room 1614)
10 a.m. – 3 p.m.

Hard working people can clearly see that this budget is a checklist for Gov. Walker’s presidential ambitions and will only further hurt the hard-working men and women of Wisconsin.  Make your voice heard at upcoming Budget Listening Sessions.

Workers want to see a budget that supports good job creation and higher wages.  Tell your legislators!  Attend a public hearing near you!

- See more at: http://wisaflcio.typepad.com/wisconsin-state-afl-cio-blog/2015/03/budget-hearings.html#sthash.CNcbWpes.dpuf

Links between NJ education and Pearson are cozy indeed | Bob Braun's Ledger

Links between NJ education and Pearson are cozy indeed | Bob Braun's Ledger:

Links between NJ education and Pearson are cozy indeed

Andrew Erlichson/LINKED-IN

Bari Anhalt Erlichson, an assistant New Jersey education commissioner and chief testing officer who supervises PARCC testing throughout the state, has a personal connection of sorts to PARCC’s developer, the British publishing giant Pearson. Anhalt Erlichson is married to Andrew Erlichson, a vice president of a company named MongoDB. MongoDB (the name comes fromhumongous database) is a subcontractor to Pearson, developing its national student database that provides the larger company with access to student records in New Jersey and the nation.

Anhalt Erlichson wrote a memorandum to New Jersey educators March 17 defending the actions of her department and  Pearson in monitoring the social media of New Jersey students while they took the PARCC tests. She blamed the uproar caused by the revelation of the cyber-spying on the failure of parents and educators to understand social media.

She did not mention her personal ties to a company that profits from the business relationship to Pearson–and the state education department. Bari Anhalt Erlichson and Andrew Erlichson own a home in Princeton valued at $2.9 million, according to property records.

State education department spokesmen declined to answer inquiries about Erlichson’s connections to MongoDB.

Erlichson, third from left, with friends from the NJ School Boards Association, which supports PARCC

Erlichson is expected to appear Thursday before the Legislature’s Assembly Links between NJ education and Pearson are cozy indeed | Bob Braun's Ledger:

Another Example Why Teaching Must Become a Team Effort | John Thompson

Another Example Why Teaching Must Become a Team Effort | John Thompson:

Another Example Why Teaching Must Become a Team Effort

 The research of Robert Pianta and others indicates that as few as 25% of teachers "provide a level of instructional or emotional support consistent with the production of learning gains." I can believe it, at least in places with the challenges that my old high school faced.

I think school reformers were wrong, but I can understand why some of them (to borrow historian Larry Cuban's words) tried to "deputize" teachers as the agents to defeat poverty. If we could somehow "build a better teacher," so that 100% of us had the ability to overcome the legacies of poverty, the so-called "teacher quality" experiment would have been the ultimate quick fix - with a simple lever moving an incredibly complex world.

I wouldn't have bet the farm on the idea that better teacher quality could drive a victory over the educational legacies of extreme poverty. But, an attempt to focus on improved instruction within the four walls of the classroom in order to improve inner city schools was not necessarily irrational. The key to improving high-challenge schools might have been a heavy investment in teaching teachers how to offer more engaging instruction and, especially, to better tend to students' emotional needs. It sure would have been cheaper and easier than implementing comprehensive whole school improvements.

By now, however, it should be clear that there are no shortcuts. It takes a team effort to improve student performance in schools serving intense concentrations of children from generational poverty who have often survived extreme trauma.

The Tulsa Public schools has an excellent record of starting down the path to high-quality early education and full-service community schools. So, it might have made sense for Tulsa to accept a Gates Foundation grant to improve teacher quality, as long as it was seen as a supplement to more holistic approaches. But, even if money was no object, there are only so many hours in the day, and we must prioritize the tasks we impose on educators.

In retrospect, even the best of the high-dollar Gates efforts look like a mistake if they Another Example Why Teaching Must Become a Team Effort | John Thompson:

JUST IN: Cortines warns UTLA to abandon boycott of faculty meetings - LA School Report

JUST IN: Cortines warns UTLA to abandon boycott of faculty meetings - LA School Report:



JUST IN: Cortines warns UTLA to abandon boycott of faculty meetings

 LA Unified SuperintendentRamon Cortineswarned the teachers union,UTLA, today that urging its members to boycott three upcoming faculty meetings violates the terms of a directive from the Public Employees Employment Board.

In a harshly-worded statementCortines said attending the meetings is “a required professional duty under the LAUSD-UTLA contract agreement” and a boycott would violate a 1990 directive issued by PERB that arose out of “previous unlawful boycotts of required duties.”

That order, he asserted, “still holds today.”

“Nothing could be more detrimental to the extraordinary educational progress that this District has made in recent years,” Cortines said in the statement. “As we await the involvement of a mediator in negotiations, I urge UTLA to stop this irresponsible and unlawful effort, and instead work with the District to complete negotiations so that all employees can devote their entire focus to the District’s core mission of educating students and ensuring student safety.”

He made the same points in separates letter to UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearland to LA Unified employees.

UTLA did not respond to a request to comment, and it is unknown how Cortines received information that UTLA members had been urged to boycott meetings. There has been no public declaration by the union either on its website, social media accounts or public statements by leaders that it was encouraging members to boycott meetings.

The union and the district are currently in contentious contract negations that were recently declared to be in an impasse as the sides remain an estimated $800 million apart on key issues like teacher pay and class size. Over the last six months, the union has ramped up pressure with a series of monthly “escalating actions” that included press conferences, picketing at schools and a large rally last month attended by thousands in downtown’s Grand Park.

However, no “escalating actions” for the month of March have been announced by UTLA, and Cortines in his statement expressed hope that boycotting faculty meetings wasn’t the next step. LA School Report reached out to Caputo-Pearl earlier this JUST IN: Cortines warns UTLA to abandon boycott of faculty meetings - LA School Report:

“Peeping Pearson” and Depersonalizing A Student’s Understanding of Right from Wrong:

“Peeping Pearson” and Depersonalizing A Student’s Understanding of Right from Wrong

MARCH 18, 2015 BY NANCY BAILEY LEAVE A COMMENT

The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell.

― Confucius

Hidden within this past weekend’s Peeping Pearson spying incident is a problem that is pervasive and increasing across the country—student cheating.

Bob Braun, former education reporter and news editor for The Star-Ledger, bloggedabout a student being monitored on social media by test publishing company Pearson. A New Jersey superintendent had been notified that a student in their district had tweeted something about the PARCC test on Twitter. This raised countless critical questions and concerns about what constitutes student privacy on social media.

Despite being appalled like most about the surveillance, I was curious about why this student put something about the test on Twitter in the first place. In fairness, the superintendent didn’t think it constituted cheating. But why did the student mention the test? Did someone set them up? Were they just goofing off? Was the student scoffing at the test? Were they trying to help someone who had not taken the test yet? If it wasn’t important, why did Pearson care enough to notify the superintendent?

What concerns me, is the impersonal nature of Pearson, a faraway testing company, playing gotcha with the student. It dismisses what is going on with the student if they are actually cheating. I am not accusing this student of cheating. I have no information to suggest such a thing.

But what happens to students when they get caught cheating this way? The“Peeping Pearson” and Depersonalizing A Student’s Understanding of Right from Wrong: