The “Magical Me” Ms. Rhee | Seattle Education

The “Magical Me” Ms. Rhee | Seattle Education:

The “Magical Me” Ms. Rhee

The other day I received the type of comment that I love to respond to. I initially thought I would reply to the angry attack in the comment section of the Rhee-event post. Then I decided that it was time to create a special page on Michelle Rhee posting all of the articles that I have collected on her and her career.

After completing the page, I thought hmm, why not make this page into a post to share with all of our Seattle Education readers.

The comment referred to me as being ignorant of Michelle Rhee and that I should stick to issues in the Northwest. Well, you can’t disconnect what is happening nationally from what is happening or might occur in our neck of the woods. It’s all related, this effort at the corporate takeover of our public schools.

So, without further ado, the following post that will be a page on our website:

Michelle Rhee

Ms. Rhee (pronounced “re”)

The “Magical Me” Ms. Rhee has caused destruction in her path from the time she burst onto the scene in DC as Chancellor of DC Public Schools, with little experience in the classroom but a lot of help from Eli Broad of the Broad Foundation. She immediately closed 26 schools and fired 266 teachers with the implication that sexual misconduct was the reason for the firings. As it turned out, one teacher was charged with sexual 

Gettin' Tough! Or Not. - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher

Gettin' Tough! Or Not. - Teacher in a Strange Land - Education Week Teacher:

Gettin' Tough! Or Not.

By Nancy Flanagan on October 1, 2013 4:42 PM

The social media circle in which I travel has been a-twitter this weekend over Joanne Lipman's article, Why Tough Teachers Get Good Results. That circle includes a number of music teachers--my compadres--who were cheering Lipman on, as she praised her old-school, Ukranian-immigrant orchestra teacher, Mr. K., and his tyrannical teaching techniques, like calling students idiots, making them "rehearse until our fingers almost bled," and correcting "our wayward hands and arms by poking at us with a pencil."

What a guy, huh? Lipman says: "Today, he'd be fired." She then goes on to make eight suggestions about how to fix education (you knew that was coming). The article is excerpted from her book, Strings Attached: One Tough Teacher and the Gift of Great Expectations. Cue the orchestra for a quick chorus of "What's the matter with kids--and, presumably, their spineless teachers--today?" 

I'm well acquainted with the blood and thunder school of band and orchestra directing. I've experienced it as student, colleague and observer. And for a time, as a novice music teacher, it was pretty much what I aspired to be: Uncompromising, demanding, a little intimidating. Not 

NYC Educator: The Smiles on Their Faces

NYC Educator: The Smiles on Their Faces:

The Smiles on Their Faces

Sometimes I evaluate myself. I don't use a rubric. I don't analyze my test scores. I don't videotape myself and rewind 500 times to figure out how I can spend 2 fewer minutes handing out papers.

I just look at the kids and see how involved they are. Or not. I see whether they're focused. I see whether or not what we're doing is of interest. Usually it is. I can't say whether or not Charlotte Danielson would agree, and I can't promise you they will excel on standardized tests. After all, they've only been speaking English a very short time.

Today I left a meeting to run to my class. One of the girls in my class saw me and said something about being late. I said I wasn't. She managed to walk in front of me and push her friend in front of me whenever I was about to pass her. I'm not sure how she could see me coming, because I was behind her, but every time I tried, she stopped me. At some point, we all started running, and ran all the way to the trailers.

None of us knew exactly why we did it, but it was pretty funny. The kids in my class are mostly happy. I want my class to be a place where they can be happy and learn English at the same time. Because you don't learn language from doing 

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Breaking -- Oh heavens! Somebody may have overpaid for school desks

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: Breaking -- Oh heavens! Somebody may have overpaid for school desks:

Breaking -- Oh heavens! Somebody may have overpaid for school desks

Forget about the great UNO charter school rip-off. That was small potatoes.

Forget Rahm's great $150 million basketball arena scam. Puny by comparison.

Forget about Rahm's hiring of convicted crook Amer Ahmad as his comptroller. Mistakes happen.

Forget about Arne Duncan hiring a child molester/pornographer to help him run the schools.The guy had a guy. 

You can even forget about the current RTA scandal and Mike Madigan's son-in-law who he placed as an RTA top exec and who is now under investigation over allegations involving 

School Districts Consolidate Only as Last Resort Despite Incentives

School Districts Consolidate Only as Last Resort Despite Incentives:

Communities Cling to Local Schools Despite State Incentives

 

By Maggie Clark, Staff Writer

Students gather at Stockton Borough Elementary in New Jersey. The borough recently voted to consolidate school districts with three neighboring districts. The number of school districts continued to decline during the Great Recession. (Warren Cooper/Hunterdon County Democrat)

When then-Gov. John Baldacci signed legislation in 2007 ordering Maine’s 290 school districts to consolidate into just 80 districts or face penalties, the intention was to get as much state money to students in the classroom as possible.

“Our population was declining, and we just had too much school administration,” Baldacci said in an interview withStateline. “Putting (school consolidation) into the budget irritated the superintendents and the school boards, but I wanted to make sure we actually got it done.”

Maine lost 58 school districts between 2007 and 2012, according to the U.S. Census of Governments, not nearly as many as policymakers hoped. Resistance to school consolidation in Maine, just like across the country, was tremendously strong.

“It was a shotgun marriage,” said Doug Smith, superintendent of the Glenburn school district. The district consolidated budgets with two others in 2010, and the unified district was responsible for 1,400 students and five schools.

“We were forced to do it or incur penalties, and there were no incentives,” Smith said.  

Maine’s consolidation mirrors a century-long national trend toward fewer school districts, beginning with the move away from one-room schoolhouses. The number of independent school districts shrank nearly 90 perce

The Truth about StudentsFirst and Why It Matters | janresseger

The Truth about StudentsFirst and Why It Matters | janresseger:

The Truth about StudentsFirst and Why It Matters

Posted on October 1, 2013 by janresseger

Living as I do in Cleveland, Ohio, I remember not long ago when the names of companies told you just what they made: Republic Steel, Youngstown Sheet and Tube, Cleveland Twist Drill, and Timken Roller Bearing.  I suspect we are the town whose public utility has the most delightful and perfectly accurate name: Cleveland Electric Illuminating.  When trees fall on the power lines here in Cleveland, the Illuminating Company comes to get the lights back on.

Nowadays however, company names no longer tell you very much: Halliburton, Archer Daniels Midland, Enron. What does the firm do? Does it make something?  If so, who does the work?  Does it happen in the U.S. or someplace else?  Does the company pay the workers enough? Does it protect them from injuries and toxins? Does it protect the environment?  Does it pay enough taxes?  Any taxes?  Names no longer tell us much, and we aren’t encouraged to ask questions.

Just last week at two social events I found myself in the uncomfortable situation of having to explain how an organization’s name may not really be designed to tell the truth about what the organization does. This time the issue of the name related to a not-for-profit advocacy organization instead of a company.  In both instances well-meaning people brought me the same flyer advertising the local screening of a movie. The flyer which depicted cheerful young children was designed in appealing primary colors.  At the bottom appeared the logo of the sponsoring organization, StudentsFirst.  The flyer provided no information about StudentsFirst, and those who had picked up the flyer—one at a bus stop and the other in a coffee shop— thought it must be a local group, maybe some kind of PTA.  These people 

porcupine backs into a cactus - 

Beware of AstroTurf Ed Reformers 

porcupine backs into a cactus

Just Like Michelle Rhee's Students first only BETTER

Astroturf lobbying refers to political organizations or campaigns that appear to be made up of grassroots activists but are actually organized and run by corporate interests seeking to further their own agendas. Such groups are often typified by innocent-sounding names that have been chosen specifically to disguise the group's true backers

Just Like Michelle Rhee's

 Students first Astroturf lobbying (only Better) 

Fear and Misunderstanding Grip Many School Districts as Affordable Care Act Goes Into Effect | NEA Today

Fear and Misunderstanding Grip Many School Districts as Affordable Care Act Goes Into Effect | NEA Today:

Fear and Misunderstanding Grip Many School Districts as Affordable Care Act Goes Into Effect

October 1, 2013 by twalker  
Filed under Featured News, Top Stories

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By John Rosales

The Affordable Care Act (ACA), which launches today, includes a provision for “shared responsibility for employers.” This part of the law creates the possibility of financial penalties on employers such as school districts based on the way they offer—or fail to offer—coverage to their full-time employees and, in some cases, their employees’ dependents. These employer penalty provisions have a unique impact on education support professionals (ESPs) who are paid on an hourly basis.

“Some employers believe they must cut ESPs’ hours in order to avoid a penalty,” says Carolyn York, director of Collective Bargaining and Member Advocacy, National Education Association (NEA). “Employers who seek to do that often act out of fear and misunderstanding about the law and regulations.”

Although the statute established January 1, 2014, as the start date for the penalty, the Obama Administration announced in July that the ACA’s provisions on shared responsibility for employers would be postponed to 2015.

“There’s no need to rush to make decisions about ESPs’ hours,” says York. “Employers now have more time to identify and develop practical approaches to the ACA’s employer penalty provisions that are good for students, good for employees, and good for the school district.”

Although there can be no penalties issued until 2015, the Plattsmouth Board of Education in Nebraska convened last summer to consider a plan that would limit non-certified employees to work weeks of 28 hours or less. The proposal was designed to insulate the district against possible penalties for failing to 

Answers to Your Top Six Shutdown Questions — Whole Child Education

Answers to Your Top Six Shutdown Questions — Whole Child Education:

THE WHOLE CHILD BLOG

Answers to Your Top Six Shutdown Questions

October 1, 2013 by Melissa Mellor

The U.S. government shut down this morning because Congress was unable to pass a bill to fund federal programs as the new fiscal year begins. This week's Capitol Connection cuts through the politics and brinkmanship to outline what a shutdown means for the nation's students, educators, and schools.

1. What's the bottom line for schools and districts? How would a government shutdown affect daily operations?

Most schools and districts are unlikely to feel immediate effects of a shutdown because the advanced funding nature of federal education spending means that states and districts have already received much of their federal funding for the school year. In addition, the vast majority of school funding (about 90 percent) comes from state and local sources. Moreover, the U.S. Department of Education has awarded dozens of competitive grants in the past several days so that it is not held up by a shutdown.

2. Will any education programs be affected in the short-term?

Head Start (which provides early childhood education to low-income families) and Impact Aid (which helps fund school districts that cannot fully rely on local tax revenue, such as those on military bases or tribal lands) depend heavily on federal dollars that are not necessarily distributed at the beginning of the school year. Thus, these programs could experience more acute and immediate shutdown consequences. This is especially concerning because Head Start and Impact Aid have already deeply felt the effects of sequestration. More

ED Pulse Poll Results: Does More Recess Increase Academic Learning?

October 1, 2013 by Kit Harris, ASCD Research

ASCD continually seeks to provide solutions to the challenges that face educators of all levels. Recently theASCD SmartBrief ED Pulse poll addressed the debate about recess in elementary schools.

In the rush to meet new standards in math and reading, some school districts across the country have reduced the time for other subjects and for recess. For example, the Washington, D.C., schools started the school year with 15 minutes a day of recess, but after parent protests, the dedicated recess time was inched up to 20 minutes a day. At the same time, D.C. was the first school district in the country to fully commit to First Lady Michele Obama's Let's Move! Active Schools program, which aims to help schools provide at least 60 minutes of physical activity a day for students, either before, during, or after school. In D.C., then, this would leave 40 minutes of daily activity that would be performed presumably in physical education class, or before and after school. As testing requirements and budget cuts take hold, about 40 percent of U.S. elementary schools have reduced or eliminated recess, mostly to make room for more academics, reportsUSA Today.

There are multiple studies that point to the fact that increased activity and aerobics are related to better learning, memory, and better performance on tests while school districts across the country are finding more reasons to cut back on recess. The American Academy of Pediatrics issued its first policy statement on the issue of recess, with its medical members strongly supporting increased recess time, reporting that "recess is a crucial and necessary component of a child's development and, as such, it should not be withheld for 

Head Start hit hardest by federal shutdown, but other education programs face problems in long term | HechingerEd Blog

Head Start hit hardest by federal shutdown, but other education programs face problems in long term | HechingerEd Blog:

Head Start hit hardest by federal shutdown, but other education programs face problems in long term

For the short term, most schools will likely be unaffected by the federal government shutdown that went into effect today. But if the impasse in Congress lasts a long time, schools may feel the financial squeeze.

The shutdown is a result of the House and Senate’s failure to agree on a funding bill, which forced more than 800,000 federal employees into furlough Tuesday morning.

U.S. Capitol. (Photo: Katie Harbath)

If it lasts beyond one week, the government interruption is expected to delay funding to school districts, colleges and universities that rely on federal funds, according to a U.S. Department of Educationcontingency plan. With more than 90 percent of its employees expected to be furloughed, officials at the Department of Education will be unavailable to assist school districts or answer questions as they attempt to implement reforms, The Washington Post reports.

The biggest immediate impact could be felt in Head Start programs, though, which are still reeling from federal sequestration cuts that pushed 57,000 children out of the preschool program for low-income children. According to the National Head Start Association (NHSA), an advocacy group, 23 programs in 11 states with grant cycles that begin Oct. 1 are poised to lose grant money due to the shutdown.

“Beyond the headline numbers, this shutdown has real consequences,” said NHSA Director Yasmina Vinci in a statement. “Government shutdown is one cut atop an already deep wound.”

In Prentiss, Miss., a town of about 1,100 people an hour south of Jackson, the Five County Child Development Program closed its Head Start classes on Tuesday after failing to receive funding. “The 

Shanker Blog » Underlying Issues In The DC Test Score Controversy

Shanker Blog » Underlying Issues In The DC Test Score Controversy:

Underlying Issues In The DC Test Score Controversy

Posted by Matthew Di Carlo on October 1, 2013

In the Washington Post, Emma Brown reports on a behind the scenes decision about how to score last year’s new, more difficult tests in the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) and the District’s charter schools.

To make a long story short, the choice faced by the Office of the State Superintendent of Education, or OSSE, which oversees testing in the District, was about how to convert test scores into proficiency rates. The first option, put simply, was to convert them such that the proficiency bar was more “aligned” with the Common Core, thus resulting in lower aggregate proficiency rates in math, compared with last year’s (in other states, such as Kentucky and New York, rates declined markedly). The second option was to score the tests while “holding constant” the difficulty of the questions, in order to facilitate comparisons of aggregate rates with those from previous years.

OSSE chose the latter option (according to some, in a manner that was insufficiently transparent). The end result was a modest increase in proficiency rates (which DC officials absurdly called “historic”).

I don’t have a particularly strong opinion about how OSSE should have proceeded. I can see it going either way. Setting cut scores is as much a political and human judgment call as anything else.

The controversy surrounding this decision, however, is both ironic and instructive. My understanding is that the actual scale scores are comparable between years (albeit imperfectly), even with the changed tests. The issue, again, is where to set the minimum score above which students are called advanced, proficient, etc., which in turn determines the rates for each of these designations (with proficiency rates getting the most attention). Unfortunately, OSSE doesn’t report anything except the rates. This severely limits the value of their annual testing results as reported to the public.

In other words, much of this controversy is about choosing between two cut score configurations, both of which present the data in an incomplete manner. Changes in the actual average scores, though still cross-sectional and therefore not “progress” measures, arguably provide a better sense of the change in performance of the typical 

10-1-13 Seattle Schools Community Forum

Seattle Schools Community Forum:

Wilson-Pacific; a New Wrinkle

I recently wrote to the Board with some of the bigger ideas that I have heard here and percolated up from the Growth Boundary meetings.   Here's what I told them about Wilson-Pacific:What I hear from parents is that they do NOT want to share their valuable neighborhood space with any program if they don't have to.  APP is NOT a beloved program and it will not be welcomed with open arms anywhere in

by Melissa Westbrook / 4min 

Class Size Count for Washington Kids

Class size matters so let them know YOUR child's class size(s).  Do it today.As it says at the Class Size Counts webpage; Washington State's class size is ranked 47th out of 50 states. 

by Melissa Westbrook / 14min mark as read  //  save

Garfield Hazing Has Principal Upset

Principal Ted Howard of Garfield apparently got wind of hazing happening off-campus and went to inspect.  He was not happy with what he found.He sent this note to parents (red mine):  Do you know where your son or daughter is at tonight? I spent the afternoon with Officer Radford and many other officers walking through the Arboretum. One hundred or more Garfield students were participating in hazi

by Melissa Westbrook / 1h 

Tuesday Open Thread

Interesting six-part series on math in the NY Times, Me, Myself and Math.Oh those kids! Looks like LA high school students found it quite easy to hack into their new school-issued iPads.One week after students started receiving their iPads, students attending at least three Los Angeles high schools had figured out how to disarm a built-in security lock that was supposed to limit what they could do

by Melissa Westbrook / 53min 

9-30-13 Seattle Schools Community Forum

Seattle Schools Community Forum: FACMAC Response to Growth Boundaries draftThe FACMAC made a response to the Growth Boundaries plan. You can read the summary of the response here.Here's the short version:Include high schools now. They take the longest to address, there isn't that much time, and the system is integrated.Instead of messing with nearly all of the elementary school attendance areas an

by mike simpson / 9h 

Arne Duncan Goes After "Armchair Pundits" - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher

Arne Duncan Goes After "Armchair Pundits" - Living in Dialogue - Education Week Teacher:

Arne Duncan Goes After "Armchair Pundits"

By Anthony Cody on October 1, 2013 12:23 PM

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan spoke publicly of Diane Ravitch in an interview in 2011, where he said: "Diane Ravitch is in denial and she is insulting all of the hardworking teachers, principals and students all across the country who are proving her wrong every day,"

Yesterday he expanded a bit on this sentiment. Though he did not mention Ravitch by name, he seemed to have her in mind when labeling his critics "armchair pundits" who are "so supremely confident in their perspective that they have simply stopped listening to people with a different viewpoint."

I do not want to be guilty of this, so I listened closely to Secretary Duncan's talk. Here is some of what he said:

Secretary Duncan:

Also inhabiting this bubble are some arm chair pundits who insist our efforts to improve public education are somehow doomed to fail, either because they believe the government is incapable of meaningfully improving education or because they think education reform can't possibly work since the real problem with schools is that so many children are born poor. In blogs, in books, in tweets, some pundits even say our schools are performing just fine and that fundamental change isn't needed or that we have to 

Former education chief weighs in on No Child Left Behind | K-12 Zone | a Chron.com blog

Former education chief weighs in on No Child Left Behind | K-12 Zone | a Chron.com blog:

Former education chief weighs in on No Child Left Behind

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

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Rod Paige, the former HISD superintendent and U.S. education secretary, attended a ceremony in May 2008 for the new Roderick Paige Elementary School in Houston. (Steve Campbell)

Rod Paige, the former U.S. education secretary who implemented No Child Left Behind, said Tuesday he worries that education standards are being lowered as states continue to get waivers from the federal law.

Paige, in a brief phone interview, said he respected the decision by Texas Education Commissioner Michael Williams to seek a waiver from the law. Still, Paige said he was troubled by the waiver process that has let Education Secretary Arne Duncan grant exemptions to 42 states and the District of Columbia.

“It’s kind of a disregard for Congress,” said Paige, who served as superintendent of the Houston Independent School District before he joined then-President George W. Bush in Washington.

Williams announced Monday that Texas was the latest state to get a break from parts of No Child Left Behind. Texas no longer will have to demonstrate by the 2014 deadline that 100 percent of students are proficient in reading and math, based on standardized test scores. Critics have called the 100 percent standard unreasonable, 

10-1-13 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:

The in box. “The state’s objective, according to CMS, is to save on insurance costs and satisfy an agreement reached by Governor Pat Quinn with the employees’ union, AFSCME Council 31.”

The Illinois Observer: (Chicago) ­– Extra: UnitedHealthcare has won a $3.6 billion contract to provide health care insurance benefits for retired Illinois state employees. As the Affordable Care Act went live today, the Illinois Department of Central Management Services todayissued a notice that it will award contracts to UnitedHealthcare and two other companies to provide Medicare supplemental co

1 by Fred Klonsky / 53min 

Life in Rahm’s Chicago. Toilet paper for the schools

  36th Ward Alderman Nick Sposato, member of the Chicago City Council’s Progressive Caucus. He had to ask the community for toilet paper because the Mayor spent the money on a new stadium for De Paul University. Photo: Alderman Bob Fioretti.

1 by Fred Klonsky / 12min 

Archer Daniels Midland. The very picture of capitalism at work.

. The veto session of the Illinois General Assembly takes place in about three weeks. Will there be a pension bill? Will they vote to give millions in tax breaks to Archer Daniels Midland. ADM is shuttering their Decatur offices. Decatur has among the highest unemployment rates in Illinois, which has among the highest unemployment rates in the U.S. ADM is a mega-agribusiness. The very picture of

1 by Fred Klonsky / 28min 

Illinois is broke? Cut teacher pensions and give millions to Archer Daniels Midland.

Remember the phony front group that Civic Committee president Ty Fahner set up called Illinois is Broke? He wanted you to think the state was broke because of huge pensions to teachers, firemen and cops. Y’know. That $43,000 a year average teacher pension is a real budget buster. Meanwhile Archer Daniels Midland, the giant food processing corporation is leaving job-starved Decatur, Illinois. But

1 by Fred Klonsky / 18min mark as read  //  save

An insult to turds.

4 by Fred Klonsky / 38min 

Fear, loathing and audits for Illinois retired teachers.

In the legislature they are debating whether to cut our meager 3% cost of living adjustment on our average $43,000 a year pension – a pension that you never failed to contribute your 9.4% a paycheck to, but into which the state regularly failed to pay their share. To make matters more threatening and confusing, we have heard that the supplemental insurance, the part we pay for to go along with yo

1 by Fred Klonsky / 1h 

9-30-13 Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.

Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.: The NY Times wants to refight the Sixties?You’ve heard the old joke. If you say you remember the Sixties, you weren’t there. Funny. But not true. I was there. And I remember it. At sixty-five I sometimes forget where I put the keys. Or where I left Ulysses. But the Sixties? I remember it vividly. Bill

by mike simpson / 9h