ACT president: ‘Relax. Tests don’t define us, nor do they determine our future.’ - The Washington Post

ACT president: ‘Relax. Tests don’t define us, nor do they determine our future.’ - The Washington Post:

ACT president: ‘Relax. Tests don’t define us, nor do they determine our future.’

ACT President Jon Erickson, who has spent three decades in the testing field, is retiring on Sept. 1 after four years in his position. Erickson, 61, answered questions from The Washington Post as the nonprofit organization based in Iowa prepared to release its annual report this week on college admission testing. The ACT is the most widely used admission test in the nation, although the College Board’s SAT draws more students in many states.

[ACT’s latest report: More testing, but scores stagnate.]

Q: Why did you make college testing your career?

Jon Erickson (courtesy ACT)

Interestingly, it wasn’t my plan really. I was a high school teacher and later a university administrator and I used tests and the resulting information to counsel students and also to help plan educational programs. I was never a huge testing proponent, but I always saw their value when used in the proper way. My questioning surrounding the good and proper role of testing in career planning, academic advising, admission decisions, student retention and equal opportunity led me to investigate and later want to understand, influence and change the testing industry from within.

Q: How has the field changed since you began?

There is more creative assessment being done and researched now from unique item types to computer adaptive delivery to gaming. At the same time, testing certainly seems to have reached a high tide. Accountability has used testing as its bell cow, and that has made it more of the focal point of outcomes. Many have used test results in ways they were never designed to do. Transparency behind tests is much clearer now, but there is a fixation or at least a perception that test scores are the most important measure. The assessment models that hold the most promise are those that look at the whole person -and not solely at academic achievement.

Q: What changes do you see coming in the next few years?

The move to computerized delivery will pick up speed. That should make results more immediate and allow for more personalization in reporting as well. New ways in which test questions can be created as well as delivered and scored will also change the industry. The most dramatic impact will be on formative assessment, classroom-based measures that will be teacher friendly and help guide individualized instruction in K-12, college or in the workplace, or in on-line classes or training programs. Assessments will be delivered at any time in any location with resulting information that will help both the examinee and also the parent, guardian or student advocate.

Q: Some students ace their tests. But for many it’s stressful and traumatic. Some students don’t view themselves as ‘good at tests.’ What do you tell them?

Tests are stressful when we place too much emphasis on their importance. Relax. Tests don’t define us, nor do they determine our future. They inform our decisions and reflect achievement to date. Results can change as you learn more. You hold the power, not the tests; you control your learning. Demystify the test, know its purpose, what it covers, what it looks like, how it’s actually used (its relative importance) and then plan how best to tackle it. If you have done well in class, you almost always will do well on the test. Don’t talk ACT president: ‘Relax. Tests don’t define us, nor do they determine our future.’ - The Washington Post:

Want to Reduce the Teacher Shortage? Treat Teachers Like Professionals - NEA Today

Want to Reduce the Teacher Shortage? Treat Teachers Like Professionals - NEA Today:

Want to Reduce the Teacher Shortage? Treat Teachers Like Professionals

Suddenly everyone is talking about the teacher shortage, thanks largely to a recent article in The New York Times that examined the measures districts are taking – including dropping certification requirements – to fill vacancies. Too many pink slips were given out during the recession, the economy is improving, the teacher pool is dry, so we need to recruit, recruit, recruit. End of story? Not so fast, says Richard Ingersoll, professor of education and sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. Ingersoll, who has been tracking the teacher profession for years, recently spoke with NEA Today about the nuances behind the teacher shortage narrative and why we need to turn the spotlight on keeping good teachers in the classroom.

We’re hearing a lot in the media about the teacher shortage across the country, and some are even calling it a “crisis.” What does the data tell us about what is really happening?

Richard Ingersoll: It tells us this: We do not have a teacher shortage in the sense that we have an underproduction of new, qualified teachers. The conventional wisdom – seen in the flurry of news reports at the beginning of every school year – tells us that we do, but It’s not true and it’s never been true. We do, however, have schools where the principals report that they have difficulty filling positions in some fields, which are usually math, science and special education. So there are hiring difficulties, but it’s mostly due to too many teachers leaving before retirement. That’s the basic story.

People look at recent enrollments from colleges and schools of education and say, “Gosh, there are hardly any new graduates.” That seems reasonable, but in fact newly-qualified grads are only a small part – maybe one-fifth – of the teacher supply pool. Far more come from what we call the “reserve pool” – former teachers who come back in –  or “delayed entrants,” people who went through those programs but didn’t teach right away. It’s true that enrollments in teacher colleges over the last few years went down, but that was no doubt due to the fact that hiring had slowed down and people realized that many of last year’s graduates weren’t getting jobs. So maybe as demand is going up, some of these programs may begin to take in more applicants.

So, yes, there are problems out there with hiring. The economy seems to be improving. But I thinks it’s a case of wrong diagnosis, wrong prescription. We should always recruit new teachers but the real issue is, how attractive a job is teaching? Do people want to work in the school and, more importantly, do they want to stay there?

So this is really a retention issue?

RI: If you look closely, the vast majority of job openings are simply a result of people who left at the end of the previous school year. This is pre-retirement turnover, mostly driven by dissatisfaction. And we see large school-to-school differences in turnover, even within the same district. We always want to recruit more, but that totally ignores that too many teachers leave within the first five years. Instead of working on keeping and supporting new teachers, the conversation is about very expensive and often ineffective recruitment initiatives. We’re widening the gate and lowering the bar.

What drives low job satisfaction ?

RI: Salary is definitely a factor, but it’s not the most important one. The data consistently show us that a big issue is how much voice, how much say, do teachers have collectively in the school-wide decisions that affect their jobs? Are teachers treated as professionals? That’s a huge issue. Coupled with that is giving individual teachers discretion and autonomy in their own classroom. Teachers are micromanaged. They have been saying for a log time that one size doesn’t fit all, all students are different. But they’re told to stick to the scripted curriculum, which might work for a weaker teacher but it drives good teachers nuts. And for beginning teachers, the lack of support is a key issue.

The poorer schools and the urban schools have higher levels of turnover overall because they tend to – not aways –  have worse working conditions. They’re usually the most centralized and the most micromanaged in this era of accountability.

What is the turnover rate for newer teachers? There’s been some conflicting numbers about this recently.

RI: Right. We generated this statistic over a decade ago that 40-50 percent of Want to Reduce the Teacher Shortage? Treat Teachers Like Professionals - NEA Today:

California home school interest surges as parents look to sidestep vaccine law

California home school interest surges as parents look to sidestep vaccine law:

California home school interest surges as parents look to sidestep vaccine law

th the passage of a new law this summer mandating vaccines for school kids in California, home school advocates and organizations say they are seeing surging interest in off-campus education options that would exempt them from the requirement.

“The word on the streets is that, yes, people are coming to home schooling,” said Sarah Ford, membership director for Sonoma County Homeschoolers Nonprofit in northern California.

The controversial mandate, co-authored by state Senator Richard Pan, a pediatrician backed by the California Medical Association, requires any student in public or private school to have 10 vaccinations as an attendance requirement, with some exceptions for medical conditions.

En route to passage, the proposal sparked scathing controversy on both sides of the issue, with opponents (wearing red to symbolize children who have been harmed by vaccines and often with their own kids in tow) regularly flooding Capitol hearings to protest.

Pan even received death threats over the measure, and in the wake of its passage is facing both a recall effort and a statewide referendum to repeal the law. But barring any repeal, the law will go into effect at the start of the next school year.

Lyn Elliott, a mother of a 20-month-old girl, says she is taking a serious look at home schooling because of the law. While her daughter Rebel is “mostly vaccinated,” there are certain shots she feels are unnecessary “and that I feel have risks”.

Next summer, she will have to face the choice of giving vaccinations she does not want, or lose access to daycare – where some of the vaccine requirements will also apply. A single parent after her husband died in a motorcycle accident, she says home school could mean a critical drop in her income, but a move she feels compelled to make.

“For myself and my personal situation, school was something I was somewhat looking forward to,” she says. “I think it would actually be more beneficial for (Rebel) to be in public school but I am not willing to take that risk or let them make that decision for me just to make my life easier.”

Nicole Arango, a 34-year-old mother of two, said she faced a similar choice and California home school interest surges as parents look to sidestep vaccine law:

When Parents Get Paid for Homework - Bloomberg View

When Parents Get Paid for Homework - Bloomberg View:

When Parents Get Paid for Homework

Poor kids don't do nearly as well in school as the children of the affluent. There's a vicious cycle when you talk about this, where education reformers blame the teachers, teachers blame the parents and the economic conditions of the children, and everyone sort of gives each other the side eye while glumly agreeing that something really needs to be done.

Adoption studies seem to indicate that parenting does matter. Unfortunately, it's not clear what that actually tells policy makers. Reforming schools is harder than it sounds, but persuading principals and teachers to change what they do looks like a trivial exercise compared with getting millions of people to radically alter the hours they spend each day with their children in the privacy of their own homes. For one thing, we're paying the teachers and can threaten to cut off the checks if they don't change.

A team of superstar economists -- Roland Fryer, Steven Levitt and John List -- decided to see what effect it could have by paying the parents. They designed an expensive yearlong intervention, setting up a parent academy that distributed nearly $1 million to 257 families, including a control group that received minor sums for participating in periodic assessments. The academy was situated in a low-income neighborhood where the overwhelming majority of the schoolchildren qualify for free or reduced-price lunches. The researchers developed a curriculum focused on helping students develop both cognitive and noncognitive skills and then taught it to the parents, who were rewarded for "attendance at early childhood sessions, completing homework assignments with their children, and for their child's demonstration of mastery on interim assessments."

Here are the results from the abstract:

This intervention had large and statistically significant positive impacts on both cognitive and non-cognitive test scores of Hispanics and Whites, but no impact on Blacks. These differential outcomes across races are not attributable to differences in observable characteristics (e.g. family size, mother's age, mother's education) or to the intensity of engagement with the program. Children with above median (pre-treatment) non-cognitive scores accrue the most benefits from treatment.

The paper is fascinating throughout. Before I go on, I will issue, as always, my standard disclaimer: This is one study of one program. Anyone who bases a global opinion about policy based on a single study richly deserves the ridicule and heartbreak they will get.

That said, I will now discuss what this study tells us if the results hold true. 

The effects are real, but not miraculous. The first thing to note is that across the whole group, the improvements in both cognitive skills and noncognitive skills are positive and nontrivial, but not When Parents Get Paid for Homework - Bloomberg View:

Public School Isn't Free, and Not Everyone Can Afford It | Joanne Goldblum

Public School Isn't Free, and Not Everyone Can Afford It | Joanne Goldblum:

Public School Isn't Free, and Not Everyone Can Afford It

If you have three children attending public school, you can expect to pay $3,000 for school supplies and extra-curricular activity fees in the coming year. That information comes courtesy of the Ohio-based Huntington Bank, which does an annual "Backpack Index" to track the hidden costs of going to school. That estimate was arrived at for a family with one child in each level of public school -- elementary, middle and high school.

Parents can expect to pay $649 for elementary school children, a 1-percent increase compared to 2014; $941 for middle school children, a 2.5-percent jump compared to 2014; and $1,402 for high school students, a 9-percent increase compared to 2014.

Why so much? Technology and budget cuts. It's not just about pens and protractors anymore. A high school student might need a graphing calculator to take some math courses. On top of that, school districts are providing fewer necessities, like pencils, composition books, and even things like toilet paper and cleaning supplies. The burden is falling on parents and frequently on teachers who dig into their own pockets to make sure students have what they need.

For low-income parents, this is a disheartening situation, as described heartbreakingly in this Washington Post article.

Felicia Massie, a 57-year-old resident of Northeast Washington, fretted last year because she couldn't afford to buy school supplies for her youngest son, David, then a student at Cardozo High School.

"It makes you feel like you're less than a mother," said Massie, who is disabled and lives on food stamps and $750 a month from Social Security.

It makes you cry in the middle of the night. … When this child was born, I had so many hopes and dreams I thought I would be able to provide for, and then life happens and your body breaks down. You feel like less than nothing.

The situation has moved some fantastic people to help. Comedian Stephen Colbertdonated $800,000 to fulfill the wish lists of teachers in his home state of South Carolina. Non-profits are devoted to providing school supplies, and individuals and small groups around the country run drives this time of year to help families send their kids to school with the tools that they need to learn. I applaud every single one of them, just as I applaud my colleagues who work so hard at diaper banks to keep babies clean, dry and healthy. But I think all of us would agree that we wish this good work weren't necessary.

Poverty pokes holes in a family's life. Non-profit and government programs seek to close those holes. But we tend to so this imperfectly, because we are almost always short on resources. So you've got one great group running a food pantry, another has a clothes closet; a community garden tries to get fresh produce into a food desert; a men's club collects backpacks; a high school puts together gift bags of hygiene products. All of these are wonderful things to do -- things that we must do -- as we cope with a horrible system. It is time to talk about making the system less horrible.

What if Felicia Massie's monthly check covered her family's needs? What if every worker in the U.S. made a living wage? I would be happily out of business. And more importantly, people would have the ability to meet their own needs. They would have their dignity.Public School Isn't Free, and Not Everyone Can Afford It | Joanne Goldblum:

Latinos struggle to close gap with whites in California ACT scores - LA Times

Latinos struggle to close gap with whites in California ACT scores - LA Times:

Latinos struggle to close gap with whites in California ACT scores

A performance gap on the ACT college entrance exam persisted this year between California's Latino and white high school students, according to new test results.

Educators and experts find this trend particularly concerning. They had hoped for better results from the relatively small segment of test takers who are largely a self-selected group of students who are motivated to get to college.

"I find it really disturbing," said Mark Schneider, a vice president at American Institutes for Research who previously directed the federal government's education research arm.

Across the country, the class of 2015 stagnated, with 40% of the 1.9 million test takers showing what the organization calls "strong readiness," according to results released Wednesday.

In California, 30% of the class of 2015 took the test.

California students overall outperformed their peers nationally. While 28% of students across the country met all four ACT targets, intended to represent college success, 37% of California's test takers did so.

"California had some higher-performing students than the country did," said Jon Erickson, ACT's president of education. "That's a good sign."

California's test takers had an average overall score of 22.5, compared to 21 nationally. A maximum score is 36.

The gap between Latino and white students has remained since at least 2011.

In 2011, 25% of Latino students met three or more ACT targets, compared to 69% of white students. In 2015, 28% of Latino students met three or more, compared to 70% of whites — representing a continuous gap of more than 40 percentage points.

The ethnic breakdown of test takers is not precisely the same as the state's: nearly 28% of test takers were white, and about 38% were Latino. According to census data, California's population between the ages of 18 and 24 is 31% white and 47% Latino.



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In all four subject areas, English, reading, math and science, the difference between the percentage of white and Latino students meeting ACT benchmarks ranged from 37 to 39 percentage points.

In California, about twice as many students take the SAT college entrance exam as the ACT, which is typically more popular in the Midwest. Many universities require students to take either the ACT or the SAT as part of the admissions process.

According to the ACT, 23% of test takers came from families that made $36,000 a year or less.

Poverty can have a profound effect on education — but income inequality by itself does not explain educational disparities, according to Ryan Smith, the executive director of Education Trust-West.

"Race does play a factor in student achievement. It's not just an issue of class," Smith said. "It's a conversation that is Latinos struggle to close gap with whites in California ACT scores - LA Times:

School ‘reform’ more like regression

School ‘reform’ more like regression:

School ‘reform’ more like regression

For observers of California’s public schools who look past the normal narratives and distractions, something bordering on despair is in order.

Consider the legislation now advancing in Sacramento to gut the Stull Act, the 1971 law mandating that student performance be a factor in teacher evaluations. Sen. Carol Liu, D-La Canada Flintridge, and Senate President Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, have won Senate passage of a measure to have each individual school district devise teacher evaluation systems in collective bargaining. Assemblyman Patrick O’Donnell, D-Long Beach, and Speaker Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, have won approval of a very similar measure in the Assembly.

This is billed as a reform. It is the opposite of reform. It is nonsensical to not have a statewide standard for evaluation of teachers. By pushing standard-setting to the local level, where teachers unions are nearly always the most powerful political force, the Legislature seeks to end meaningful, consequential evaluations. This has long been a goal of the California Teachers Association and the California Federation of Teachers, the powerful, wealthy unions that appear to dominate Sacramento more than ever.

As for the presumption that Gov. Jerry Brown will act to protect California’s 6.2 million K-12 students by vetoing these bills, that faith is based on Brown’s noble rhetoric about the importance of helping struggling students become productive members of society — not his record. In June, the governor underscored the emptiness of his rhetoric when his administration announced that funds disbursed via the Local Control Funding Formula — the 2013 reform under which billions of dollars was supposed to be funneled to troubled schools to directly help English learners and foster children — could instead be used for broad raises for teachers. That’s exactly what’s being done in many of the urban school districts that got the most extra state funding, starting with Los Angeles Unified, with the governor’s blessing.

Brown’s high-profile 2012 comments, in which he denounced the “siren song” of trendy education reforms and endorsed “subsidiarity” - a fancy word meaning more local control — look downright sinister in retrospect. They appear to be the starting point of a long con job in which the governor and the Legislature first got a fake funding reform in place to help teachers get raises and now are seeking another fake reform to give teachers who already have vast job protections even more guarantees of permanent employment.

And that’s not all Brown has done. There’s also his support for two 2014 bills that are now law. The first forces school districts to spend down their fiscal reserves — a mandate that school administrators looking at California’s boom-and-bust budget cycles properly consider insane. The second — nominally a teacher discipline bill making it easier to fire deviants — instead gives most categories of troubled teachers even more insulation.

As for Atkins’ role in the attempted gutting of the Stull Act, she never would have become Assembly speaker without the CTA’s and the CFT’s support. But California isn’t just opposing or ignoring the education reform policies touted by President Barack Obama; state leaders are going full-bore in the opposite direction, making accountability even less likely.

This is not an inspiring legacy. It is an awful one.

—San Diego Union Tribune, via APSchool ‘reform’ more like regression:

Marie Corfield: @arneduncan sucker punches special needs students

Marie Corfield: @arneduncan sucker punches special needs students:

@arneduncan sucker punches special needs students

As if the Common Core and standardized testing weren't enough. 
As if the funding cuts to public education weren't enough.
As if increased class sizes and decreased services weren't enough.
As if the black listing of education professionals wasn't enough.
As if the closing of neighborhood schools in high-poverty districts wasn't enough.
As if the expansion of segregationist charter schools wasn't enough.
As if teaching to the test instead of teaching to the students wasn't enough.
As if the myth of education 'reform' magic wasn't enough. 
As if all of this, and more, wasn't enough to cripple public education, last week Secretary of Education Arne Duncan delivered a sucker punch to special needs students:

The U.S. Department of Education is doing away with a policy that allowed states to consider some students with disabilities academically proficient without meeting grade-level standards. 

The agency said in a final rule published late last week in the Federal Register that states will no longer be allowed to administer tests to students with disabilities that are based on modified academic achievement standards. 

Previously, states could count up to 2 percent of their students as proficient under the No Child Left Behind Act for taking such exams. But now the Education Department is saying no more to the policy known as the “2 percent rule.” 

“We believe that the removal of the authority for states to define modified academic achievement standards and to administer assessments based on those standards is necessary to ensure that students with disabilities are held to the same high standards as their non-disabled peers,” the agency said in the rule, which will officially take effect Sept. 21. 

The move is designed to ensure that students with disabilities who are capable of meeting general education standards with proper supports are not shortchanged, the Education Marie Corfield: @arneduncan sucker punches special needs students:

What I learned taking the Smarter Balanced (SBAC) test | Seattle Education

What I learned taking the Smarter Balanced (SBAC) test | Seattle Education:

What I learned taking the Smarter Balanced (SBAC) test

It was created for imaginary children who exist only in the minds of the people who made the tests. These imaginary third through fifth graders are perfectly willing and able to sit still and focus for forty-five minutes, type, problem-solve random computer glitches, and effortlessly switch between two or more open windows at the same time. They can easily resist the temptation to just switch tabs on their browser and do something fun instead. Also, they have access to imaginary huge monitors.

I’m a parent with two kids in a Seattle elementary public school, facing the upcoming Smarter Balanced state tests. A week or so ago, our principal gave an informational session on them. Here’s a little of what I learned, and some first impressions.

Full disclosure: I had already made up my mind to opt my kids out, so I’m not what you would call an unbiased observer. On the other hand, I’m not categorically opposed to the Common Core, or standardized testing either. They have potential, if done well and not misused for high-stakes purposes. This test fails on both counts.

First, some of the basics. The Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) is a suite of computer-based tests that will replace the state MSP test in math and English language arts for third through eighth grade. (The MSP will still be given for science.) It won’t replace the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) test, which is still given to some grades, but additional interim tests might replace it.

Twenty-five states are going to be giving this test for the first time. It was piloted last year, in New York State, but that state decided to back out of the program. Based on that pilot and other estimates, an estimated sixty percent of students will fail the test. Scores What I learned taking the Smarter Balanced (SBAC) test | Seattle Education:

CURMUDGUCATION: Tribune Discovers Dyett Hunger Strike #FightForDyett #SaveDyett

CURMUDGUCATION: Tribune Discovers Dyett Hunger Strike:

Tribune Discovers Dyett Hunger Strike

It only took eight days for Chicago's leading "news" outlet to discover that Dyett High twelve community members were staging a hunger strike. But yesterday afternoon, the Chicago Tribunefinally covered the story.

Mind you, they didn't cover it all that well. They reported the 13-student enrollment class without any context, as if it were the result of "plunging enrollment" and not a phased closure (with CPS encouraging students to get out of Dodge).

They reported the two other proposals uncritically. They didn't explain Little Black Pearl's non-past operating schools, and I am becoming really curious about who is behind the athletic school proposal which is always only linked to Charles Campbell, the Dyett interim principal. They did not mention that CPS entertains his proposal even though it was late.

The Trib reported the community proposal, but put "leadership and green technology school" in quotation marks as if this were some sort of crazy idea that community members just pulled out of thin air, as if it were like a school for chinchilla ranchers or underwater basket weavers. And Trib-- you left off "global."

And the Tribune made sure to note that the group on hunger strike has always been tied to the Chicago teachers' union (you know-- Those People).

Still, they did report on many of the group's major concerns-- and they acknowledged that the hunger strike is going on.

Now-- here's what you need to do.

1) Click on over to the article. Remember, every click on an article is a vote saying "I want to read more coverage of this."

2) Comment. I'm not sure if any comments are actually getting through, but make sure the comment section includes the rest of the story.

An action like a hunger strike is only as effective as the public reaction to it, and that depends on the public hearing about it, so the Tribune's end of their news blackout of the event means that progress is being made. Keep the pressure on. Spread the word. And remind the Tribune that the worlds needs to know about what's going on.CURMUDGUCATION: Tribune Discovers Dyett Hunger Strike:

The Newark board defies Cerf. Cerf (politely) defies the Newark board. Christie is still the “decider.” | Bob Braun's Ledger

The Newark board defies Cerf. Cerf (politely) defies the Newark board. Christie is still the “decider.” | Bob Braun's Ledger:

The Newark board defies Cerf. Cerf (politely) defies the Newark board. Christie is still the “decider.”

An unapologetic Cerf takes control of Newark schools

The Newark school board Tuesday night ordered an end to the “One Newark” enrollment plan that has resulted in the dispersal of children throughout the city, the closing of public schools and programs, and a brave new future for charter schools. Of course, the Newark school board doesn’t have the power to do that and the entrepreneurial educator who does–Chris Christie’s former boss, Christopher Cerf–said he would continue “One Newark” despite the board’s action.

The school board did what it could to assert its independence and members of the community loudly and repeatedly signaled their distaste for the Montclair resident who once was state education commissioner and an officer of Edison Learning, a company that hired a second-rate lawyer from Morris County named Chris Christie to be a lobbyist.

The board also voted to fire Vanessa Rodriguez, the district’s “chief talent officer,” for allowing a former assistant superintendent to take unwarranted sick leave–something else Cerf doesn’t want to happen. He called the collection of New York refugees hired by former superintendent Cami Anderson to be top staff “spectacular.”

Cerf is much slicker–or, to put it another way, has much better manners–than the woman he both hired and replaced, Anderson, and he displayed them in his “superintendent’s report,” an oily recounting of how committed he was to “public schools” and “the children of Newark.”

Public policy, however, is a matter of definition–and Cerf made it clear he defined “public schools” as including charter schools–he was a member of the board of directors of the National Association of Public Charter Schools and a business The Newark board defies Cerf. Cerf (politely) defies the Newark board. Christie is still the “decider.” | Bob Braun's Ledger:

Florida Students Must “Qualify” to Take the Fourth-grade NAEP | deutsch29

Florida Students Must “Qualify” to Take the Fourth-grade NAEP | deutsch29:

Florida Students Must “Qualify” to Take the Fourth-grade NAEP

Jeb Bush wants to be president. So, it is important that he sell his Florida education reforms as a success.

However, when test-score-based education reforms are put on display, one should seek out “the rest of the story.” Such is true when Florida’s fourth-grade NAEP scores are showcased

According to a post written by Jeb Bush’s right-hand, Patricia Levesque, in October 2014, Florida has made marvelous, gap-closing gains, particularly on the fourth-grade NAEP:

Florida Minority Students Outperforming the Nation: In 2013, Florida outperformed the national average in every subgroup for fourth-grade reading.

• Florida’s fourth-grade low-income readers rank first in the nation in reading.

• Florida’s black fourth-grade students outperform their peers nationally by more than half a grade level in reading.

• Hispanic fourth-grade students outperform the average student in 38 states and their peers by almost two full grade levels, according to NAEP reading test.

• Low-income Hispanic fourth-grade student achievement improved more than one grade level from 2003-2013 according to the 2013 NAEP reading test.

• Florida’s eighth-grade black students rank 7^th nationally in reading and are tied with two other states for 11^th in eighth-grade math.

What Levesque does not include is “the rest” of the fourth-grade NAEP story, which involves high student retention rates in third grade based upon state test results, a practice that has been part of Florida law since 2003.

Retaining students who cannot pass state tests in third grade artificially “improves” Florida Students Must “Qualify” to Take the Fourth-grade NAEP | deutsch29:

What's Up With That Big Grant to the Atlantic Monthly From the Walton Family Foundation? - Inside Philanthropy: Fundraising Intelligence - Inside Philanthropy

What's Up With That Big Grant to the Atlantic Monthly From the Walton Family Foundation? - Inside Philanthropy: Fundraising Intelligence - Inside Philanthropy:

What's Up With That Big Grant to the Atlantic Monthly From the Walton Family Foundation?

We've been saying for a while that the tight new embrace of journalism and philanthropy is tricky, and for some obvious reasons. Foundations have agendas, so when they give money to media outlets, you can't help wondering how that might influence coverage. 

Last year, we reported on the controversy around a big grant from the Arnold Foundation, which favors pension reform, to support a television series called Pension Peril at the PBS station in New York, WNET. The money was returned after public criticism.

We've also noted a double standard at work in scrutinizing this funding, and how some large foundation grants to media outfits attract very little scrutiny, even though they should—for example, the generous support of public radio for coverage of such issues as healthcare and inequality by two foundations with progressive agendas, Ford and Robert Wood Johnson. If the Koch brothers made similar grants to media outlets, you can bet there'd be a firestorm. Ford has also given over $1.5 million to the Los Angeles Times in recent years. 

Still, it doesn't feel great to complain about philanthropic support of journalism at a time when serious media outlets are struggling to survive. What's more, evidence that funding has any impact on coverage is hard to establish. And anyway, the old model of relying on corporate advertising was filled with conflicts, too, and the media created rules to mitigate those conflicts. 

All of which is important context behind a grant of $550,000 made last year by the leading philanthropic proponent of charter schools, the Walton Family Foundation, to the Atlantic Monthly, a storied magazine that's been commanding attention from the nation's educated elite for a century and a half. The grant was made as part of Walton's effort's to shape public policy. The foundation describes its goal in this area as catalyzing a "national movement demanding choice and accountability."

So how, exactly, does the Atlantic help the foundation advance its game plan? 

That's a good question. The money funded two live events hosted in partnership with the Aspen Institute, a Washington D.C.-based think tank. The first was the Washington Ideas Forum 2014, which featured participation by U.S. Senators John Barrasso (R-WY), Joe Manchin, III (D-WV), Delaware Gov. Jack Markell (D) and U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, along with ABC News’ chief White House correspondent Jonathan Allen and the Atlantic Monthly’s National Correspondent James Fallows. The second event is the Aspen Ideas Festival 2015, scheduled for June 25 to July 4, 2015, in Aspen, Colorado. These gatherings are billed aWhat's Up With That Big Grant to the Atlantic Monthly From the Walton Family Foundation? - Inside Philanthropy: Fundraising Intelligence - Inside Philanthropy: