School Prayer Isn’t in Question, but Wednesday, Supreme Court Will Hear Important Church-State Separation Case | janresseger

School Prayer Isn’t in Question, but Wednesday, Supreme Court Will Hear Important Church-State Separation Case | janresseger

School Prayer Isn’t in Question, but Wednesday, Supreme Court Will Hear Important Church-State Separation Case

President Donald Trump made a splash last week pretending that students’ right to pray at school has been threatened.  While this subject may appeal to his base, the law is settled on this matter.

Education Week‘s Evie Blad explains: “Courts have held that students may pray at school alone or in groups, but that prayer may not be organized or sanctioned by the school… The Elementary and Secondary Education Act, in its current and past versions, requires the U.S. Department of Education to provide guidance on prayer in schools every two years, but that guidance hasn’t been updated since 2003… The new school prayer guidance, published in the Federal Register Thursday morning, reiterates requirements under existing law that school districts must annually certify to their state departments of education that they have ‘no policy prohibiting participation in constitutionally protected prayer’….”

The Washington Post‘s Moriah Balingit and Ariana Eunjung Chah quote Charles Haynes, an expert on this issue at the First Amendment Center’s Freedom Forum: “It’s overdrawn and somewhat political to keep this so-called school prayer fight going… This is in some ways a manufactured crisis because it plays well politically to say, ‘We want God back in schools.'”

Although prayer in school is not really at issue this week, another controversy involving religion and public education will reach the U.S. Supreme Court.  The justices will hear oral arguments on Wednesday in an important case involving the First Amendment’s protection of the separation of church and state. The subject is the long fight over the First Amendment’s prohibition of “establishing” religion, in this case by using public tax dollars to pay for CONTINUE READING: School Prayer Isn’t in Question, but Wednesday, Supreme Court Will Hear Important Church-State Separation Case | janresseger

Call An End To Closing The Achievement Gap | Real Learning CT

Call An End To Closing The Achievement Gap | Real Learning CT

Call An End To Closing The Achievement Gap

We hear so often, including from the new Connecticut Commissioner of Education, that the most important goal for K-12 education is to close the achievement gap. Well, what if it isn’t? What if that goal to have students affected by poverty and racism achieve standardized test scores as high as students of privilege is not only an impossible goal, because standardized test scores are correlated with family income, but one that is damaging to all K-12 students in this country?

Equating achievement with high standardized test scores does a terrible injustice to all of our children. What if we gave up on closing the achievement gap and gave up on standardized testing? What then could our schools look like?

A picture of what those elementary, middle, and high schools could look like is provided by James Hatch, a first year student at Yale who is a 52 years old retired Navy SEAL, covered with tattoos and accompanied by a service dog. Read his story here. 

James Hatch began his college education afraid of the academic competition from his classmates but left that behind when he became engaged in shared CONTINUE READING: Call An End To Closing The Achievement Gap | Real Learning CT

Union democracy, PACs and dues. – Fred Klonsky

Union democracy, PACs and dues. – Fred Klonsky

UNION DEMOCRACY, PACS AND DUES

When I was in charge of a Illinois Education Association local we were very careful about keeping dues money and political action money separated into totally different buckets.

We had to be very careful, and I was warned over and over again by union leadership in Springfield – and by my IEA Uniserv Director – never to use my work computer for anything other than union business.

No politics.

And local dues money could never be used for local political activity.

I thought this was dumb, but I followed the directive to the letter.

In fact, in 2011 my entire history of work emails were the subject of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by Ben Velderman of the Michigan-based Education Action Group. Velderman on behalf of the anti-union EAG wanted  to find even just one email that showed I had crossed the line between union work and so-called political activity.

The line that separates the unions’ duty of fair representation and political action is CONTINUE READING: Union democracy, PACs and dues. – Fred Klonsky

Support for best practices for digital device use in schools grows | Parents Across America

Support for best practices for digital device use in schools grows | Parents Across America

Support for best practices for digital device use in schools grows

Parents Across America-Roanoke Valley leader, Laura Bowman, shared the following email with Virginia Delegates who are considering a bill on best practices for digital device use in public schools. As the use of digital devices in schools continues to grow at unprecedented rates, it’s vitally important that the parent voice is heard when it comes to the healthy and safe use of these devices by children.

“On the Communications Subcommittee docket tomorrow morning, you will see Delegate Hope’s House Bill 817.  Parents across the state are grateful to Delegate Hope for listening to their voices of reason and concern. 

HB 817: Department of Education; Department of Health; guidelines for use of digital devices in public schools. Requires the Department of Education, in collaboration with the Department of Health and medical professional societies, to develop and implement health and safety best practice guidelines for the use of digital devices in public schools no later than the 2021 – 2022 school year.

There is growing and warranted concern for children’s health and safety due to the over-use of digital devices. Some incorrectly maintain that not all screen time is equal, and if it’s being implemented for educational purposes, we need not be concerned for the safety and well-being of children. The problem is this: The eyes and body don’t differentiate between content that’s deemed educational and content that’s deemed entertainment.

Regardless of content, there are health risks posed to children when using digital devices. One of these is myopia linked to excessive screen time. 

According to this report by the Keck School of Medicine at USC: “The largest study of childhood eye disease   CONTINUE READING: Support for best practices for digital device use in schools grows | Parents Across America

CATCH UP WITH CURMUDGUCATION + ICYMI: Saturday Snow Day (1/18)

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Saturday Snow Day (1/18)

Saturday Snow Day (1/18)

A Saturday Snow Day is when the weather is so awful that adults are absolved of any obligation to go anywhere and get anything done. We were having one right now in NW PA, with Interstates shut down and folks huddled up home. It's not a bad thing. If you need something to read while you huddle, I've got you covered.

Why Aesha Ash Is Wandering Around Inner City Rochester In A Tutu
Let's start the week with a really cool story about a Black ballerina creating her own project to make a difference.

The Rhetorical Secretary
Okay, so much for good feelings. Here's Mark Hlavacik in The Kappan breaking down Betsy DeVos for her part in the history of the Ed Secretary as leader of a national conversation about education. This is actually from last November, but I missed it till now. It's thoughtful and worth a look. Here's a snippet, considering some of DeVos's attacks on her opponents:

Such rhetoric is not an attempt to persuade those who disagree with her. It is not even an invitation for further conversation or meaningful debate. Instead, the insults that pepper her addresses serve to exclude any part of her audience that disagrees with her and — given how many Americans disagree with her, by her own account — functionally makes the enactment of rhetorical leadership on a national scale impossible.

Two States. Eight Textbooks.
Dana Goldstein at the New York Times does some detailed comparison of history texts from Texas and California. The differences may not be surprising, but they're still concerning.

Texas School District Falls For Email Phishng Scam, Loses $2.3 Million
Reminder-- your security is only as good as the people you let get behind the keyboard. A cautionary tale.

Minneapolis Public School Stands To Lose 1/3 of Families with Redesign  
Sarah Lahm continues to provide a sharp and insightful look at what some brands of ed reform look like on the ground in Minneapolis. Not pretty.

Are You Ready to Make 2020 the Year of Early Childhood Education  
The folks at Defending the Early Years have lots of important stuff planed for this year. Here's the rundown so you can mark your calendar now.

The Misleading Rhetoric of School Choice
Jersey Jazzman digs down and looks at how the word "choice" is deployed in ways that are misleading. This is a really good piece.

The Tennessee ASD: Booted or Re-Booted?
Gary Rubinstein has been following the ill-fated Tennessee Achievement School District since Day One (the one that was use magical state takeovers and charter management to move the bottom 5% of schools to the tippy top), and now that they appear to be throwing in the towel, he takes a look back. He also, unfortunately, makes a convincing case for why folks can't heave a sigh of relief just yet.

Equitable Education Funding Isn't Happening Yet
Andre Perry at Hechinger talks about what we don't like to talk about-- that wealthy and nmiddle-class folks just don't want to pay to educate the poor.

About That Montana Choice Program
Espinoza v Montana is coming up, poised to take down the wall between church and state when it comes to school funding. But Rebecca Klein at Huffington Post took a look at the schools in that tiny choice program and found lots of explicit discrimination against LGBTQ students.

How Higher Salaries for Teachers Became a GOP Governor Thing 
Erin Einhorn at NBC news takes a look at the new sort of trend. Not sure I agree with all of this piece, but it's still an interesting overview.

Charter Schools Have No Valid Claim To Public Property
From Shawgi Tell, at Dissident Voice, an argument against handing public property like school buildings over to private companies.

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Saturday Snow Day (1/18)

CATCH UP WITH CURMUDGUCATION

AND DON'T FORGET PETER GREENE ON FORBES CLICK HERE 

OH: A Superintendent Who Gets The Problem of EdChoice

by Peter Greene / 3h

Woodridge School District is located a bit north of Akron. The district is highly rated and has escaped the current Ohio school rating system with no low ratings. Which means they didn't have to speak out against the problems being created for districts across the state by the EdChoice program. But on their website, you'll find this message from their superintendent, who offers a clear an explana

ICYMI: Saturday Snow Day (1/18)

by Peter Greene / 7h

A Saturday Snow Day is when the weather is so awful that adults are absolved of any obligation to go anywhere and get anything done. We were having one right now in NW PA, with Interstates shut down and folks huddled up home. It's not a bad thing. If you need something to read while you huddle, I've got you covered. Why Aesha Ash Is Wandering Around Inner City Rochester In A Tutu Let's start the w

YESTERDAY

Trump, Prayer and School

100+by Peter Greene / 1d

Donald Trump yesterday took the very Trumpian action of solving a problem that didn't actually exist until he made it up, in this case involving religion and education (two things in which he appears to have no actual interest). But hurray-- after today, students and teachers are free to pray in schools, which they were also free to do yesterday and last week and last year, etc etc etc. That's why

JAN 17

Six Stories To Watch For In 2020

by Peter Greene / 1d

I made these predictions about three weeks ago, and now that we're halfway through January, I still stand by them. It's a cheap writer's game-- we won't know if I'm right until December, and I predict that nobody will remember what I predicted. So here are my guesses wise predictions about six stories that will heat up in 2020. Ed Tech Will Try To Grow Its Market Tech companies are sure that educ

JAN 16

National Parents Union: Do You Smell Astroturf

200+by Peter Greene / 3d

This week Lauren Camera treated us to a warm, fuzzy piece of launch PR for the National Parents Union ; the US News editor announces right in the headline that this group is here to challenge the teachers unions, but in a totally organic grass roots kind of way. Two Latina mothers from opposite sides of the country have joined forces to form their own union to disrupt an education agenda they say

JAN 15

DeVos on Fox: Six Minute Baloney Digest (With Homelessness)

500+by Peter Greene / 3d

Betsy DeVos went on Fox and Friends this week , the softest of soft interview destinations form members of this administration. If you want a quick six-minute sampler of her current talking points , you could do worse, but it you don't think you can take looking at the patented smile d'smarm, here are the highlights- and there are a couple of revealing moments here. The segment is nominally titled

DeVos: Remote Work Bad, Remote School Good

by Peter Greene / 4d

Betsy DeVos has long been a fan of cyber-schooling. Her husband was an investor in K-12 , the cyber-charter behemoth, way back at beginning of the millennium (we can start saying that now, right?) Back when she was still running the American Federation for Children, she had this to sa y Families want and deserve access to all educational options, including charter schools, private schools and virt

JAN 14

Should Tax Dollars Pay For This Discrimination

26by Peter Greene / 4d

From Kentucky comes the story of a fifteen-year old student expelled for wearing a rainbow t-shirt . Seriously. Kayla Kenney used to be a student at Whitefield Academy , where the mission is "to serve Christian families by providing a Christ-centered, Biblically-based education marked by academic excellence and spiritual vitality." Part of their vision is "to produce powerful and effective student

JAN 13

More Proof The Big Standardized Tests Mean Diddly-Squat

89by Peter Greene / 5d

Chad Aldeman (Bellwether Education Partners) wants us to take heart. He's over at The 74 ( Campbell Brown's House of Reform Advocacy ) arguing that although reformsters are writing off the last ten years as a " lost decade " there was actually some good news-- while "educational achievement" (by which Aldeman actually means "standardized test scores") remained stagnant, college attainment has been

JAN 12

ICYMI: Unexpected Spring Edition (1/12)

by Peter Greene / 7d

It is unseasonably warm here, even as some parts of the country deal with a fresh helping of winter. Either way, we've got things to read. Remember-- if the piece strikes you as an important one, go to the original location for the post or article and share it through your social media. It's all about the amplification. Putting a Price Tag on Public Schools Wendy Lecker doesn't write enough, so th

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