The dark side of education research: widespread bias

The dark side of education research: widespread bias

The dark side of education research: widespread bias
Johns Hopkins study finds that insider research shows 70 percent more benefits to students than independent research

Critics have attacked Big Pharma for widespread biases in studies of new and potentially profitable drugs. Now, scholars are detecting the same type of biases in the education product industry — even in a federally curated collection of research that’s supposed to be of the highest quality. And that may be leaving teachers and school administrators in the dark about the full story of classroom programs and interventions they are considering buying.

An analysis of 30 years of educational research by scholars at Johns Hopkins University found that when a maker of an educational intervention conducted its own research or paid someone to do the research, the results commonly showed greater benefits for students than when the research was independent. On average, the developer research showed benefits — usually improvements in test scores —  that were 70 percent greater than what independent studies found.

“I think there are some cases of fraud, but I wouldn’t say it’s fraud across the board,” said Rebecca Wolf, an assistant professor in the Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University and lead author of the draft study.  “Developers are proud of their products. They believe in them. They’ve worked hard in developing these products. They want a study that puts the best face forward.”

Biased research matters because current federal law encourages schools to buy products that are backed by science. In order to tap into federal school improvement funds, for example, low-achieving schools with disadvantaged children are required to select programs that have been rigorously tested and show positive effects.

The study, “Do Developer-Commissioned Evaluations Inflate Effect Sizes?” was presented at a March 2019 conference session of the Society for Research on Educational Effectiveness (SREE) in Washington, D.C.  The paper is a working paper, meaning it has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal and may still be revised.

Wolf and three of her colleagues analyzed roughly 170 studies in reading and math dating as far back as 1984 that are part of the What Works Clearinghouse. That’s an archive of research that the U.S. Department of Education launched in 2002 to help educators decide which educational products to buy. It is by no means a complete or an exhaustive collection of educational research but a group of high quality studies curated by experts. The studies track test score gains and compare students who got the intervention with those who didn’t.

Related: Education researchers don’t check for errors — dearth of replication studies

More than half, or 96, of the studies were conducted by independent researchers while 73 of them had some sort of insider connection with creating or selling the product. Wolf labeled the research a CONTINUE READING: The dark side of education research: widespread bias

iReady Magnificent Marketing Terrible Teaching | tultican

iReady Magnificent Marketing Terrible Teaching | tultican

iReady Magnificent Marketing Terrible Teaching

iReady is an economically successful software product used in public schools, by homeschoolers and in private schools. It utilizes the blended learning practices endorsed by the recently updated federal education law known as the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). iReady employs competency-based education (CBE) theory which is also advocated by ESSA. The outcome is iReady drains money from classrooms, applies federally supported failed learning theories and undermines good teaching. Children hate it.

Public education in America contends with four dissimilar but not separate attacks. The school choice movement is motivated by people who want government supported religious schools, others who want segregated schools and still others who want to profit from school management and the related real estate deals. The forth big threat is from the technology industry which uses their wealth and lobbying power to not only force their products into the classroom, but to mandate “best practices” for teaching. These four streams of attack are synergistic.

Profiting from Education Law

A group of billionaires with varying motives are using their vast wealth to shape America’s education agenda to their own liking. The last rewrite of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 called ESSA was larded up with provisions like the big money for technology which is listed in Title’s I and IV. It also specifies generous grants to promote both “blended learning” and “personalized learning.” (See page 1969 of the official law.) Charter schools, vouchers and social impact bonds are promoted in ESSA. All these initiatives drain money from the classroom and none have been credibly shown to improve education outcomes.

Some of the Unelected and Untrained Billionaires Driving America’s Education Policy

iReady is marketed by Curriculum Associates (CA) of Billerica, Massachusetts. It CONTINUE READING: iReady Magnificent Marketing Terrible Teaching | tultican

“Money Follows the Student” is Voucher Funding | The Crucial Voice of the PeopleThe Crucial Voice of the People

“Money Follows the Student” is Voucher Funding | The Crucial Voice of the PeopleThe Crucial Voice of the People

“Money Follows the Student” is Voucher Funding

The concept behind Voucher Funding is being stated simply as “Money Follows the Student.” But that is a phrase — like “No Child Left Behind” — that carries with it an instant emotional appeal and creates a barrier to debate.

Think about it. Who will openly object to not leaving children behind? Why would anyone disagree with the idea that funding should focus on students? It should, but it should do so without causing harm.

Using Language to Produce Political Conformity

Across the nation funding formulas are being called “out dated” or “antiquated.” Lawmakers and taxpayers are being sold on “new” and “innovative” ideas. Sound familiar?

One reason the NAACP called for a Moratorium on Charter School Expansion.

“School Choice” has appeal. …

“People like the idea of choice,” says Reverend Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

But …

Americans hold firm against allowing public tax dollars to fund private schools. Source: Vouchers, School Privatization, and the Threat to Public Education

Americans do want to increase funding for public schools. But public tax dollars are inadvertently being used for privatization purposes through new modernized funding formulas.

“Money Follows the Student” masks the fact that enrollment based student centered funding formulas are a Voucher Funding scheme.

This is what U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos has to say about the public system she openly defames while traveling the country to promote her Federal School Choice Agenda.

And now, the language of political conformity is being used to promote Voucher Funding by coupling the words “funding follows the child” with the concept of education as a CONTINUE READING: “Money Follows the Student” is Voucher Funding | The Crucial Voice of the PeopleThe Crucial Voice of the People

Jeff Bryant: ‘Tired of being unsupported and messed with’: Teachers stage a bold protest that scores national attention

‘Tired of being unsupported and messed with’: Teachers stage a bold protest that scores national attention

‘Tired of being unsupported and messed with’: Teachers stage a bold protest that scores national attention

Don’t call what Kentucky teachers just did a “wildcat” labor action, at least not when you’re speaking with Tim Hall. Hall, a classroom teacher at Shawnee High School in Louisville, answered my phone call as he was driving to the state capitol in Frankfort to protest the latest slate of education-related bills being considered in the legislature. He and hundreds of other teachers in Jefferson County Public Schools, the state’s largest school district that includes Louisville, called in sick, prompting the district to close schools for over 100,000 students.

Hundreds of those teachers joined Hall at the state capitol. It was the third time in a week and the second day in a row that enough JCPS teachers called out sick to trigger a full district shutdown. The sick-out spread to four other districts that also had to close. But neither the state teachers’ union nor the local union for Jefferson County had anything to do with organizing the action. In fact, union leaders urged teachers to show up for work, preferring instead to have districts send small teams of teachers to lobby state lawmakers.

Yet Hall bristled at using “wildcat” to describe what JCPS teachers were doing. “I don’t like that word,” he said. “I think our concerns are reflective of teachers not only in JCPS but also across the state.”

The Kentucky teachers’ actions are the latest in what has become a wave of teachers using their collective power to influence legislation in state governments, but the sick-out in Kentucky is also a sign of how teacher protests are evolving.

Teachers who once saw labor actions as effective tactical responses to CONTINUE READING: ‘Tired of being unsupported and messed with’: Teachers stage a bold protest that scores national attention

This Is a Book You Should Read: Noliwe Rooks’ “Cutting School” | Diane Ravitch's blog

This Is a Book You Should Read: Noliwe Rooks’ “Cutting School” | Diane Ravitch's blog

This Is a Book You Should Read: Noliwe Rooks’ “Cutting School”

I just finished reading Noliwe Rooks’ superb book, Cutting School: Privatization, Segregation, and the End of Public Education (The New Press). Please buy a copy and read it. It is a powerful analysis of racism, segregation, poverty, the history of Black education (and miseducation), and their relationship to the current movement to privatize public education. She dissects the profitable business of segregation.

You will learn how cleverly the captains of finance and industry have managed to ignore the root causes of inequality of educational opportunity while profiting from the dire straits of poor children of color. In fact, as she shows, financiers and philanthropists have used and misused Black children throughout our history, for their own benefit and glory, not the children’s.

The book is both highly contemporary and at the same time, probably the best history of Black education that I have read. Rooks understands that the fight for equality runs through the schoolhouse door, and she documents how white elites have managed to block access, narrow access, or literally steal from Black families trying to gain access to high-quality education. She knows that charter schools and vouchers are a sorry substitute for real solutions. She understands that the rise of the profit-driven education industry has benefited the profiteers far more than the Black children they claim to be “saving.” “Saving poor kids from failing schools” turns out to be a lucrative business, though not for the kids.

Rooks invents a new term to describe the current “reform” movement: Segrenomics. In her telling, a sizable number of entrepreneurs and foundations, and organizations like Teach for America, have enriched themselves while advertising their passion for equity. Segregation and poverty have given them a purpose, multiple enterprises, career paths, and profit.

My copy of the book is covered with underlinings, stars, asterisks, and other notations, as is my way when I become enthusiastic while reading.

She bluntly states, “The road necessarily traveled to achieve freedom and equality in the United States leads directly through public education…Schools that educate the wealthy have generally had decent buildings, money for materials, a coherent curriculum, and well-trained teachers. Schools that educate poorer students and those of color too often have decrepit buildings, no funds for quality instructional materials, and little input in CONTINUE READING: This Is a Book You Should Read: Noliwe Rooks’ “Cutting School” | Diane Ravitch's blog

FBI Wiretaps Show Importance of Fake Charity and Extended Testing Time in College Admissions Scam | deutsch29

FBI Wiretaps Show Importance of Fake Charity and Extended Testing Time in College Admissions Scam | deutsch29

FBI Wiretaps Show Importance of Fake Charity and Extended Testing Time in College Admissions Scam

William Rick Singer operated The Key Worldwide (KWF), a fraudulent nonprofit, as a front for a massive college admissions scandal for the rich.

William Rick Singer

However, Singer could not state the real purpose of his nonprofit in its declared mission, so he manipulated the language as follows:

The Key Worldwide Foundation endeavors to provide education that would normally be unattainable to underprivileged students, not only attainable but realistic. With programs that are designed to assist young people in everyday situations, and educational situations, we hope to open new avenues of educational access to students that would normally have no access to these programs. Our contributions to major athletic university programs, may help to provide placement to students that may not have access under normal channels.

Compare Singer’s words above with those intercepted in a June 2018, court-approved, FBI wiretap of Singer selling his college admissions wares to a wealthy parent, New York attorney Gordon Caplan, who is now part of this 204-page affidavit in support of criminal complaint.

Gordon Caplan

(Note that Singer says he has perpetrated his scheme a whopping 761 times before):

Okay, so, who we are– what we do is we help the wealthiest families in the U.S. get their kids into school …. Every year there are– is a group of families, especially where I am right now in the Bay Area, Palo Alto, I just flew in. That they want guarantees, they want this thing done. They don’t want to be messing around with this thing. And so they want in at certain schools. So I did 761 what I would call, “side doors.” There is a front door  CONTINUE READING: FBI Wiretaps Show Importance of Fake Charity and Extended Testing Time in College Admissions Scam | deutsch29

NYC Public School Parents: Queens forum with AOC on how our schools must make every child feel like they matter

NYC Public School Parents: Queens forum with AOC on how our schools must make every child feel like they matter

Queens forum with AOC on how our schools must make every child feel like they matter

There was an amazing education forum yesterday with standing room only. Thanks to Jackson Heights People for Public Schools for organizing it. Among the wonderful speakers were Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who represents the district in Congress,  NY Senators Jessica Ramos and Assemblymember Catalina Cruz, who represent the district in the Legislature, as well as Senators Robert Jackson and John Liu.
Among the terrific education advocates who spoke were Johanna Garcia of NYC Opt out, Maria Bautista of AQE, Carol Burris of Network for Public Education, Diane Ravitch, Kate Menken  of the NYS Association for Bilingual Education and me.

I was thrilled to be there and meet AOC, who spoke eloquently about how her family had moved out of the Bronx for good schools, and how no one should ever have to move from their home or to a charter school because the public schools aren't good enough.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the Jackson Heights education forum from Class Size Matters on Vimeo.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the Jackson Heights education forum from Class Size Matters on Vimeo.

My presentation on the fundamental inequities of NYC schools and what we need to do to make every child feel like they matter by lowering class size is below.

NYC Public School Parents: Queens forum with AOC on how our schools must make every child feel like they matter

CURMUDGUCATION: A Huge Problem With Personalized Learning In One Sentence

CURMUDGUCATION: A Huge Problem With Personalized Learning In One Sentence

A Huge Problem With Personalized Learning In One Sentence

You know there's going to be trouble when you see the headline of the article on eSchoolNews-- "Taking personalized learning to scale." But then, this is a business that regularly uses the oxymoron "mass customization" without irony.

But two paragraphs in, Dr. Monica Burns, curriculum and educational technology consultant and founder of ClassTechTips.com,, is quoted from a webinar:

When it comes to student engagement, Burns said, “We want to make sure that we are capturing student attention by having students’ eyes where we want them to be or their hands where we want them to explore.”

Um.

Dr. Burns does has some respectable credentials, including six years teaching in South Harlem and actual degrees in education. But she loves a lot of tech programs; she's also an Apple Distinguished Educator.  Maybe the quote isn't an accurate representation of her ideas-- but it's the quote eSchoolNow chose to use, even as they position her ideas as similar to iNACOL, the big Personalized [sic] Learning pushers. The article itself is filled with lots of edu-babble, such as:

Enjoy our new personalized seating.

Through curriculum mapping, school-wide goals, and thematic exploration, school districts can establish norms and clear standards connections for personalized student experiences. Resources should be curated and differentiated and ready for individual students

There is a lot of technocratic baloney going on here, along with this tell about how we really want to scale up:

Resources can be distributed to individual students using digital tools so that students experience content that is relevant to their goals and interests.

So there's the picture. Personalized [sic] education delivered by computer, padded in bureaucratic blather, and-- well, somehow the individual student will follow her own educational muse through CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: A Huge Problem With Personalized Learning In One Sentence

Is Sacramento the Next Big Fight in #RedForEd Wave? - California Educator

Is Sacramento the Next Big Fight in #RedForEd Wave? - California Educator

Is Sacramento the Next Big Fight in #RedForEd Wave?

Sacramento City Teachers Association authorizes strike over unfair labor practices

The #RedForEd Wave has already swept through Los Angeles and Oakland this year, with thousands of brave educators going on strike and leading massive movements to fight for the soul of public schools. Is Sacramento the next big fight of the Educator Uprising?

Frustrated and fed-up by continued deceit, disrespect and outright violation of their contract, Sacramento City Teachers Association (SCTA) voted to authorize a strike over egregious unfair labor practices and unlawful activity by Sacramento City Unified School District’s superintendent and school board. With 70 percent of SCTA members voting, 92 percent approved a strike to stop the district’s unfair practices and unlawful behavior, SCTA leaders announced Friday.

The SCTA bargaining team offered to meet with SCUSD at the end of the month to give the district an opportunity to correct its ongoing unlawful behavior. If SCUSD’s conduct and unfair practices continue, the executive board is authorized to set a strike date, likely in the next month.

“It’s truly unfortunate that teachers may be forced to strike to get Superintendent Jorge Aguilar, Board President Jessie Ryan and other district leaders to obey the law, including things as simple as agreeing to meet with us and honoring agreements they signed 15 months ago,” said Sacramento City Teachers Association President David Fisher. “What kind of example are they setting for the 40,000 students in our district?”

If 2,800 Sacramento City educators do indeed go on strike, it would be the first #RedForEd-era strike in the country over unfair labor practices and a school district reneging on a contractual agreement. SCTA says SCUSD’s continued unlawful activity is giving them no choice but to take direct action. These transgressions include:

• Refusing to honor the collective bargaining agreement approved by both sides in December 2017, which included class-size reduction and increased numbers of school nurses and psychologists, violating the contract;
• Refusing to meet at reasonable times and places with representatives the educators have elected to have represent them, and attempting to dictate who the teachers have represent them at the bargaining table;
• Making unilateral and unlawful changes to the wages and working conditions of teachers without bargaining;
• Failing to send district representatives to the bargain table who have the authority to negotiate on behalf of the district, rendering bargaining meaningless.

SCTA has also challenged the legality of recent school board actions to lay off 400 educators in light of alleged violations of the Brown Act’s open meeting requirements (detailed here and here). Additionally, SCTA has questioned SCUSD’s gross fiscal mismanagement—the district stands on the brink of state takeover due to insolvency, particularly in the aftermath of a scathing audit by the State of California’s Fiscal Crisis Management Assistance Team. If all that wasn’t enough, there are also serious unanswered questions about potential conflicts of interest by Superintendent Aguilar and other top district administrators. Recently, the California Joint Legislative Audit Committee directed the state auditor to conduct a forensic audit of SCUSD due to growing concerns of fiscal mismanagement.

Follow SCTA on Facebook and Twitter for the latest news on this fight.

Is Sacramento the Next Big Fight in #RedForEd Wave? - California Educator

Billionaire-Backed Lawsuit Against Teacher Tenure Fails in Minnesota - Progressive.org

Billionaire-Backed Lawsuit Against Teacher Tenure Fails in Minnesota - Progressive.org

Billionaire-Backed Lawsuit Against Teacher Tenure Fails in Minnesota
Trump has proposed to slash funding for public education in his 2020 budget. In courts across the country, however, public schools are holding up in lawsuits brought by pro-charter interests.

President Donald Trump just released his 2020 budget, and once again, education funding is on the chopping block. Since taking office in 2017, Trump has prioritized pumping more dollars into the Defense Department while cutting funds from the Department of Education as well as health and human services.

So far, Congress has refused to enact the large-scale cuts to education that Trump has proposed. For 2020, Trump is seeking a 10 percent cut in education spending, equaling just over $7 billion. Targeted programs include a student loan forgiveness program for those who take up public-service jobs, a professional development model for teachers , and funding for student enrichment opportunities.

There are a few education programs that the Trump Administration is eager to douse with resources, however. The 2020 budget calls for an increase of $60 million for federal charter school grants to facilitate the growth of the publicly funded yet privately managed schools. Similarly, Republican lawmakers have pushed a tax-credit scholarship program—worth $5 billion annually—that would divert resources from public education and promote access to private schools.

These priorities line up with those of Trump’s Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos. In a statement regarding the 2020 budget, DeVos praised the Trump Administration for its “continued commitment to expanding education freedom,” and celebrated the many ways this “freedom” can be acted upon—including school choice, and a preference for “returning power education decisions to those closest to students.”

DeVos’s plans and the Trump Administration’s budget proposal reveal a solid commitment to market-based school privatization strategies as the way to manage public education in the United States. But as a recent case in Minnesota highlights, many of these plans may not work.

---

In Minnesota, a billionaire-funded, pro-education reform outfit, recently backed away from its behind-the-scenes effort to blame unionized teachers as the cause of unequal access to a high quality education.

The Partnership for Educational Justice has attempted to tackle teachers’ unions from a legal angle, primarily through a handful of lawsuits filed in CONTINUE READING: Billionaire-Backed Lawsuit Against Teacher Tenure Fails in Minnesota - Progressive.org

Ed Notes Online: School Scope: Parent Action Conference: Opt Out Yes, Charters NYET!

Ed Notes Online: School Scope: Parent Action Conference: Opt Out Yes, Charters NYET!

School Scope: Parent Action Conference: Opt Out Yes, Charters NYET!

By Norm Scott

The annual Parent Action Conference sponsored by NYC Kids PAC, Class Size Matters and Community Education Council District 2 (CECD2) took place on March 9 at the Peck Slip School in lower Manhattan, attracting some of the leading parent activists in the city. Kids PAC is the only lobby group focusing its attention directly on the interests of the children in public schools. The opening session was a discussion with state legislators:
Alicia Hyndman, Queens NYS Assembly Democrat 29th District, Jo Anne Simon, Brooklyn NYS Assembly Democrat 52nd District, Robert Jackson, NYS Senator from Manhattan. They were asked to respond to questions on a number of issues.

They all supported parent rights to opt out of standardized tests, opposed attempts to punish schools when numbers of parents opt out and opposed lifting the cap on charters in New York City, which has been reached. There are still over 90 slots open in the rest of the state and the charter industrialized complex has been pushing to get those added to our oversaturated city. It was pointed out that Republican state legislators support charters but few if any charters exist in their districts – they love them from afar as long as those charter bucks role in – but otherwise, NIMBY. They were also asked about the upcoming renewal debate on mayoral control. They all called for more limits and oversight.

At lunch we heard from Brad Lander, City Councilman from Brooklyn, and newly elected State Senator John Liu, who is making a comeback after being out of the public eye since the 2014 mayoral election – he was my choice. Liu is very well liked and as new chairman of the State Senate Education committee will have a lot to say about education. He is holding hearings on March 15 on the mayoral control issue – I am hoping to cover some of the hearing for The WAVE – maybe after a nice morning ferry ride.

Workshops were held on a number of issues. I attended the opt-out workshop which gave parents thinking of opting their children out of testing some practical hints on how to push back against administrators trying to talk them out of it. There is a parent opt out support group for anyone reading this who might be interested in saving their kids from the torture of the test. Contact me.

I also attended a workshop on fighting charters and there were a hell of a lot of angry parents there whose schools have been fractured by charter co-locations, including some former charter parents whose children were pushed out of the schools. A representative of the Community Education Council in District 15 (CECD15) reviewed some of the proposed changes to the charter law that calls for more oversight of charters. CEC15 has passed resolutions supporting these changes and word is CONTINUE READING: Ed Notes Online: School Scope: Parent Action Conference: Opt Out Yes, Charters NYET!

Badass Teachers Association Blog: Pam Harbin Wants to Go From Pittsburgh School Board Watchdog to School Board Member by Steven Singer

Badass Teachers Association Blog: Pam Harbin Wants to Go From Pittsburgh School Board Watchdog to School Board Member by Steven Singer

Pam Harbin Wants to Go From Pittsburgh School Board Watchdog to School Board Member by Steven Singer

Originally posted at: Pam Harbin Wants to Go From Pittsburgh School Board Watchdog to School Board Member | gadflyonthewallblog - https://wp.me/p4QD1W-35u via @StevenSinger3

My friend Pam Harbin is trying to undergo a startling metamorphosis.

She wants to transform from an education activist into a Pittsburgh School Director.

Now that Board President Lynda Wrenn is stepping down after 4 years, city voters in District 4 will have to decide whether Harbin can make the change. The election is on May 21.

Residents in parts of Squirrel Hill, Point Breeze, Shadyside and North Oakland already know Harbin as a fierce warrior for children’s civil rights, the plight of disabled kids and authentic public schools.

I’ve known Pam, personally, for years in my own role as an education activist. Though I don’t live in the city, I’ve participated in numerous collective actions to fight for the schools all our children deserve. And right beside me in every case – often in front of me – was Pam.

I may not live in the district, but I wish I could vote for her. Harbin is an amazing leader with boundless energy, piercing intelligence, a deep knowledge of education policy, an advanced degree in finance and marketing, and an impressive track record of education justice achievements.

“I am deeply concerned for our system of public education,” she says. “The status quo isn’t working for all children. Thankfully, there are many people here in Pittsburgh and across the country who are fighting for investment in, and transformation of, our public schools. Unfortunately, their efforts are hindered by the well-funded organizations who fight for public school disinvestment, privatization, and for the elimination of teachers’ right to unionize.”

For the past 12 years, Harbin has been at the forefront of every major battle for the future of Pittsburgh’s public schools and the rights of its students.

Harbin was instrumental in pushing city school board directors to enact a suspension ban from Pk-2nd grade for minor non-violent conduct. She successfully fought to stop the district from implementing a physical restraint protocol that wasn’t trauma informed. She successfully fought against a policy that would have allowed school police officers to carry guns. She supported a CONTINUE READING: Badass Teachers Association Blog: Pam Harbin Wants to Go From Pittsburgh School Board Watchdog to School Board Member by Steven Singer