Friday, February 22, 2013

by noreply@blogger.com (Tim Furman)

Still slammed with school stuff. They're working me like Seabiscut! No blog post for you!

I'm off (at 4AM tomorrow) to a tech conference with some great kids. We've got a number of presentations ready and we're going to rock the house, I'm pretty sure.

Since I'm a tech writer (cough! hack!) I'm going to tell you the five hallmarks of a successful school technology program.

1. Your students can name the books they're reading and give several recommendations.

2. They can talk about their interests, and the discussion is actually interesting.

3. They can talk about how they plan to make the world a better place.

4. They're open to new ideas, new people, different cultures, and change.

5. They can solve problems using technology.

And there you have it. You won't get that by

Daily Kos: Well, if you want to know how I responded

Daily Kos: Well, if you want to know how I responded:

Well, if you want to know how I responded

by rss@dailykos.com (teacherken)

I can point you at what I wrote.
If you do not understand what this is about, several days ago I posted So tell me how you might respond. Something I had written originally at Academe had been posted by Valerie Strauss at her blog at theWashington Post, where it proceeded to go viral. I had mentioned Jay Mathews in the piece, and he responded with a piece in which he somewhat disagreed with me.
Jay and I will have our own direct back and forth, but in the meantime I chose to accept an invitation from Valerie to write something directly for her blog, which went up today as Teacher questions value of AP program
Unfortunately, I cannot simply crosspost here what I wrote there - it is considered Post content even though I was not paid for it, and I can quote nothing beyond fair use. To encourage you to read it, let me offer a snippet

#edreformers: War Pigs! – @ the chalk face

#edreformers: War Pigs! – @ the chalk face:

#edreformers: War Pigs!

by Timothy D. Slekar

In this latest installment of “someone has to say it” I again reveal my attempt to engage EDweek and Teacher Beat author Stephen Sawchuk in a legitimate discussion concerning education reform.
Last week EDweek published Stephen’s story on the “proposed” changes to teacher accreditation unveiled by the new Council for Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP). In case you’ve forgotten NCATE and TEAC merged (CAEP) to further destroy professional teacher preparation and turn teaching into a low wage, low skill temporary job lacking in any intellectual engagement.
The BIG 5 Recommendations:

1. Content and Pedagogical Knowledge
2. Clinical Partnerships and Practice
3. Candidate Quality, Recruitment, and Selectivity
4. Program Impact
5. Provider Quality, Continuous Improvement, and Capacity

Some would say that the five items seem reasonable. Well I guess I’m unreasonable because once you get

Jersey Jazzman: Long Live The Queen of Tenure!

Jersey Jazzman: Long Live The Queen of Tenure!:

Long Live The Queen of Tenure!

by Duke

Accountability begins at home.

The Queen of Tenure has survived her attempted usurpation:

The Perth Amboy Board of Education has voted to end its lengthy fight with Superintendent Janine Caffrey by rescinding her suspension.

On Thursday, the nine-member board — with three new members elected in November and two re-elected — rescinded a resolution it adopted Sept. 23 that placed Caffrey on administrative leave with pay, and notified her she would not be reappointed at the end of her term in June 2014.

Caffrey remained on the job, however, because several weeks after the vote, Assistant Education Commissioner Barrier Erlichson ordered her back to work,

NYC Public School Parents: Why Families Need a Progressive Middle School in District 4

NYC Public School Parents: Why Families Need a Progressive Middle School in District 4:

Why Families Need a Progressive Middle School in District 4

by Leonie Haimson

The following is by Raven Snook, a parent in District 4. WhileDOE often claims to be responding to "parent choice" they are really responding to the choice of privatizers, in their effort to expand charters as quickly as possible, and give them space inside public school buildings, even when they already have leased alternatives, as in the example below.
My 7-year-old attends Central Park East II, one of two progressive elementary schools in East Harlem founded by famed educator Deborah Meier almost 40 years ago. Both CPEI and II have been trying to expand to a combined middle school for the past four years, and in 2012 the Department of Education told us the only thing standing in our way was lack of space in District 4. Cut to today: The DOE is giving away available space in the Jackie Robinson Educational Complex -- the same

Florida 5th grade teache Megan Allen speaks out against budget cuts

Megan Allen of Tampa Florida speaks out against budget cuts that hurt students and families. She is in Washington, DC to testify to Congress today.

Florida 5th grade teacher Megan Allen testifies before the House Democratic Steering Committee on the potential impact of sequestration/fiscal cliff on her school and her students.

Allen is also the 2010 Teacher of the Year and is a member of the Florida Education Association.

PHOTOS: NEA/Bill Clark

Massachusetts professors protest high-stakes standardized tests

Massachusetts professors protest high-stakes standardized tests:

Massachusetts professors protest high-stakes standardized tests

Posted by Valerie Strauss on February 22, 2013 at 3:55 pm

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A coalition of more than 130 Massachusetts professors and researchers from some 20 schools — including Harvard, Tufts, Boston and Brandeis universities — signed a new public statement that urges officials to stop overusing high-stakes standardized tests to assess students, teachers and schools.

The statement — also signed by academics from the University of Massachusetts, Clark University, Boston College, Lesley College and other schools — is the latest effort in a revolt against high-stakes testing that has spread from coast to coast. Students are opting out of taking standardized tests, teachers are refusing to administer them and some superintendents are criticizing the standardized test-based accountability systems passed in various states with the support of school reformers.

The statement asks state education officials to change state assessment policies so that

Schools Matter: Feds cut funding, but the tests will survive

Schools Matter: Feds cut funding, but the tests will survive:

Feds cut funding, but the tests will survive

by skrashen

Sent to the Washington Post, Feb. 22, 2013
“U.S. schools brace for federal funding cuts,” Feb. 21, did not mention that despite anticipated cuts of $1.3 billion in federal funding of education, there are no plans to cut back on the common core standards, accurately described by Susan Ohanian as “a radical untried curriculum overhaul and … nonstop national testing.”
The common core requires that all students be connected to the internet in order to take the tests that enforce the standards. This represents an investment of billions. New York City and the State of Florida have budgeted about a half a billion each just to set up internet connections for all students, and you can be sure that as soon as the infrastructure is in place, it will be declared obsolete, resulting in a never-ending flow of taxpayer money to computer and testing companies.

Jersey Jazzman: LEAP Update

Jersey Jazzman: LEAP Update:

LEAP Update

by Duke

Accountability begins at home.

Here's an update to the LEAP charter school scandal; to my mind, Claudia Vargas of the Philadelphia Inquirerburies the lede:

LEAP has resolved another issue. regaining its status as a tax-exempt organization last week. The IRS revoked that status after LEAP failed to file the required Form 990 for three consecutive years.

That's big news, because this might save the $8.5 million in bonds that LEAP used to finance its expansion, guaranteed by Rutgers-Camden, from going into default. I'll assume that Vargas confirmed the story with the IRS, but I wish she would have asked them why they decided to reinstate LEAP's non-profit status when they hadn't filed the correct forms for three years.

And that still doesn't address the main concern: how could the NJDOE allow LEAP and other Camden

The Fight to Save Our Schools Begins Today | The Sacramento Coalition to Save Public Education

The Fight to Save Our Schools Begins Today | The Sacramento Coalition to Save Public Education:

The Fight to Save Our Schools Begins Today

by Kate_Lenox

It's not just a school, it's a community that will be lost. Parents trust that teachers and staff will act in the best interests of their children to look after them and to teach them for 6 hours a day. It's a stressful and scary situation for a parent to lose the school that is your child's safe haven.

Programs that serve the students can be moved to others schools, but that's pointless if the kids can't participate because of a lack of after school transportation. How can parents without transportation participate in evening events? The board showed a profound disrespect for the concerns of parents when they voted to close schools without a transportation plan in place.

All this for a savings of less than 2 million dollars--budget dust! Our school communities worth more than that. In fact, they are priceless The state budget proposals for the 2012-2013 school year are projecting a 4.3% raise in funding. Why did the board need to close these schools? There will be a community budget forum on March

Sacramento City district trustees vote to close seven schools

by Kate_Lenox

By Melody Gutierrez

The board of the Imagine charter school in Sarasota decided to fire Imagine by a vote of 5-0 and take charge of managing the school, renamed Sarasota Prep. The board had been paying an annual management fee of $890,000 to the Imagine corporation, which is a for-profit charter chain.
The CEO of the charter school, Justin Matthews, announced to the staff that Imagine was no longer in charge.
But then things got more interesting, after the CEO sent this email:
“The almost 1 million dollars per year that was previously paid to our former Educational Management Organization (EMO), Imagine Schools, INC. will now be used directly to enhance our school’s program,” he

LISTEN TO DIANE RAVITCH 2-22-13 Diane Ravitch's blog

coopmike48 at Big Education Ape - 2 hours ago

Diane Ravitch's blog: [image: Click on picture to Listen to Diane Ravitch] Charter Scandal In New Jersey by dianerav The LEAP charter school in Camden, New Jersey, is now caught up in allegations of incompetence, cronyism, and abuse, reports Jersey Jazzman. The finances of the school are a mess, its academic performance is poor, yet State Commissioner of Education showers it with praise. It’s problems are long-standing, but the department close to ignore them. Just last fall, Oklahoma Chief Channels Jeb Bush by dianerav Coach Bob Sikes in Florida knows how phony that state’s A-... more »

A drop in a half empty bucket? In defense of deprivation in NY | School Finance 101

A drop in a half empty bucket? In defense of deprivation in NY | School Finance 101:

A drop in a half empty bucket? In defense of deprivation in NY

by schoolfinance101

First, here’s a primer and reading list on the Empire State of School Finance:

New York State maintains one of the least equitable state school finance systems in the nation
New York State actually allocates a ton of state aid to districts that need it least, exacerbating the disparities
Reformy types in New York State thought, under these circumstances, it would be really cool to make any additional state aid a district receives contingent on adopting a teacher evaluation scheme based on their documented deeply flawed metrics!
To ice that reformy cake, the legislature saw fit to – after slashing state aid year after year – impose a local property tax limit on districts so that they are unable to even raise the funds they would need to provide a sound basic education, if they could raise those funds locally.

ohhh… but I’m just getting started here. Then came the lawsuits. That’s what makes this so fun and interesting

Schools Matter: Common Core State Standards Primer

Schools Matter: Common Core State Standards Primer:

Common Core State Standards Primer

Disclaimer: The publishers of this document, Truth in American Education, have some very disconcerting right-wing membership and advisors. I mean really right wing, like Heritage, Koret, the Teabaggers, and other assorted birthers and Birchers. However, this Common Core State Standards Primer document appears on the Hoosiers Against Common Core site that Professor Ravitch mentions in her recent Two Determined Moms in Indiana Take On Common Core post. Like the old adage: "even a broken clock is right twice a day," this flyer provides factual information on the Corporate, er... I mean Common Core State Standards. While I have major ideological differences with their organization, I find their assessment of CCSS to be pretty much spot on.

Common Core State Standards Primer by Shane Vander Hart

Noble charter school student’s story in Education Week Parents United for Responsible Education

Parents United for Responsible Education » Blog Archive » Noble charter school student’s story in Education Week:

Noble charter school student’s story in Education Week

by admin

Joshua Moore

The story about Noble Charter Schools’ “secret sauce” – their ridiculous and costly discipline policies — that PURE first brought to light has made it into Education Week. Called “Charter Discipline: A Tale of Two Students,” the story details the way Joshua Moore, son of PURE member Donna Moore, was systematically harassed and ultimately pushed out of the school by the discipline code.

A demerit for not looking at the teacher after being reminded. A detention for drawing on a desk. An out-of-school suspension for dozing off instead of doing homework.
Donna Moore, whose son, Joshua, 17, left the Noble system after repeated disciplinary incidents, sees the…policies as petty and subjective. She says they make it more likely that some students

WHY DO TEACHERS PERSIST IN TRYING TO CONVINCE LAUSD OF THINGS THAT NOT EVEN LAUSD BELIEVES ARE TRUE? - Perdaily.com

WHY DO TEACHERS PERSIST IN TRYING TO CONVINCE LAUSD OF THINGS THAT NOT EVEN LAUSD BELIEVES ARE TRUE? - Perdaily.com:

WHY DO TEACHERS PERSIST IN TRYING TO CONVINCE LAUSD OF THINGS THAT NOT EVEN LAUSD BELIEVES ARE TRUE?

by Leonard Isenberg

(Mensaje se repite en Español)

Educated teachers, parents, and even most students knows that 2 + 2 = 4 and yet the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) keep insisting that it equals 5...or sometimes even 3. Then why do teachers continue arguing with them, since to do so only gives the irrational credibility through teachers and others entering into this stupid argument with a district and union that know 2 +2=4, but only insist it doesn't, because it is to their advantage in terms of money and uncontested power- think Broad, Gates, Walton, privatization and dumbing down of America to a place where few have the intellectual ability to question authority. This was George Orwell's prescient view of his future and our present that you might be aware of, if LAUSD hasn't already taken its toll on your higher brain function.

In writing this blog for the last 4 years, a pattern of rather bizarre behavior has made

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Mayor 2% and the freedom riders

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Mayor 2% and the freedom riders:

Mayor 2% and the freedom riders

by Mike Klonsky

All the corporate reformers, from Duncan to Rhee, have been claiming that education is a civil rights issue. Turns out, they were right. Only they are the violators.

Here's the real freedom riders:

“We are here today to declare that school closings and displacing children primarily black and brown children is a civil rights issue,” said the Rev. Krista Alston, whose son attended Price until it closed. “It is a civil rights issue when children are denied the right to a quality education in their own neighborhood where they live.”