Chilling Words | Save Maine Schools

Chilling Words | Save Maine Schools:

Chilling Words

st spring, before my fourth graders took the Smarter Balanced Assessment, I knew that it would not be a test worth administering.

In addition to knowing that it would be long, developmentally inappropriate, and unlikely to inform my instruction in any meaningful way, I also knew that I would be required to sign a security agreement that said I could not view the test as my students took it.  (Were they hiding something or did they really just have that little respect for teachers?)

I also knew a few things that I don’t think many people know even now – that, for example, the “adaptive” version of the test had never been field tested (they used the “fixed” version as the field test, claiming that results from that test would inform the “adaptive” version), and that the “adaptive” claim itself was pretty much bunk.

So, when I got a note from a parent a week or two before the test began asking for my professional opinion on the upcoming test, you might think that I would have been able to do the type of things doctors get to do when parents ask about treatments: explain the benefits (um…), and the risks (your child is being Chilling Words | Save Maine Schools:

Parents Will Continue to Opt Out Until Ed Law Repealed - NYS ALLIES for Public Education

NYSAPE Press Release CC Taskforce - NYS ALLIES for Public Education:

Parents Will Continue to Opt Out Until Ed Law Repealed &Real Change Seen in the Classrooms

The Governor’s Common Core Task Force released a list of recommendations last Thursday, Dec. 10th.  The recommendations while a reflection of the parent and educator voices around the state do not alone restore trust in Albany. How the recommendations and other issues get addressed is the key and parents are watching this very closely.
 
Until there is a halt of the Common Core standards, repeal of the Education Transformation Act, major changes to the state tests, a reduction of unnecessary testing, protection of data privacy, and local control restored, parents will continue to Opt Out in large numbers.
 
The recommendations deliberately state that Governor Cuomo’s ‘signature’ legislation that enforces many of these harmful policies doesn’t need to be touched.  On the contrary, this law is the prescriptive blueprint to these harmful policies that was passed by the legislature as part of the budget last spring.
 
One of the recommendations to put a 4-year moratorium on evaluating teachers based on the flawed Common Core state tests was officially voted into emergency regulations by the Board of Regents at today’s board meeting.  Until the law is repealed, this moratorium does not reduce testing it actually does the opposite, increases testing and further puts a strain on school districts’ budgets to comply.
  
NYSAPE is calling on parents to Opt Out of state tests and any local tests that are linked to this corrupt and invalid evaluation system that clearly doesn’t provide value for the students, educators or schools.
 
“The task force recommendations have opened the door to change. Much of these harmful policies came in through our legislature when they passed the Education Transformation Act against the will of the people they serve. Our State Assembly and Senate must now reverse this harmful legislation so that changes will be meaningful and substantial. Parents will be vigilant in following these changes every step of the way. We will continue to refuse to allow our children to participate in this system until ALL harmful reforms are removed from our classrooms,” said Jeanette Deutermann, Long Island public school parent and founder of Long Island Opt Out.
 
"Until specific laws and policies regarding standards, student assessment, teacher evaluation and school ranking are changed, parents will continue to boycott any system that ties high-stakes to standardized assessments."  Chris Cerrone, Erie County public school parent, educator, and school board member.
 
Jamaal Bowman, Bronx public school parent and middle school principal said, “Although I consider the task force recommendations to be a step in the right direction, it is merely a single step. At this point, there is too much uncertainty to get excited about where we are headed in our public schools. Until we know how the recommendations will be implemented, and by whom, and until the law tying teacher evaluations to test scores is revised or repealed, we will not be able to move forward and properly meet the holistic needs of our children.”
 
“How the Common Core, testing, and other education policies are revamped to be in the best interest of the children will be watched very closely by parents. I will not be opting my children into any unnecessary tests including local assessments that do not provide important feedback for my children,” said Lisa Rudley, Westchester County public school parent and founding member of NYSAPE.
 
"While there is much talk of high standards, there is little discussion of the non-curricular resources required to ensure that all students can succeed in the face of poverty and lack of adequate funding. It is disappointing that the task force failed to raise the question, if disadvantaged students were struggling prior to the implementation of the Common Core, how will simply raising the bar increase student achievement," said Bianca Tanis, Ulster County public school parent, Rethinking Testing member and educator.
 
“After so much time and money has been wasted in forced implementation of flawed policy, students and educators of New York have been hurt and trust has been broken. We must repeal the APPR imposed by politicians who did not understand the domain. Scholars in schools of education and professional educators should design the best systems to achieve goals for public education,” said Katie Zahedi, Dutchess County, principal.
 
Marla Kilfoyle, Long Island public school parent, educator and BATS’ executive director said, "Teachers and parents do not trust NYSED, the ‘Tisch’ Regents’ majority, the legislature, or the Governor to be in charge of education.  What they have done to our public education system and to our children is unconscionable.  I have been an educator in NY for over 25 years and the mass destruction their policies have caused will take years to repair."  
 
NYSAPE, a grassroots organization with over 50 parent and educator groups across the state, is calling on parents to continue to opt out by refusing high-stakes testing for the 2015-16 school year.  Go to www.nysape.org  for more details on how to affect changes in education policies. - See more at: http://www.nysape.org/nysape-press-release-cc-taskforce.html#sthash.hGAmgjuR.dpuf

Magicians and Politicians - The Crucial VoiceThe Crucial Voice

Magicians and Politicians - The Crucial VoiceThe Crucial Voice:

Magicians and Politicians

What do magicians and politicians have in common? Sounds like the lead-in to a good joke, doesn’t it? It isn’t.

Magicians and politicians share a common trick based on the idea that if they can focus people’s attention on one thing, they can do something else and get away with it. For magicians, it’s all in good fun. No harm; no foul. With politicians, it’s time to call a foul on these masters of misdirection.

“The technique of misdirection, which is most notably and professionally practiced by magicians, is also a highly valued technique employed by politicians.”

Manipulation of the public is a valued political technique!?!

“As magicians have long known and neuroscientists are increasingly discovering, human perception is a jury-rigged apparatus, full of gaps and easily manipulated…A great deal of the success of a piece of magic is simply getting the audience’s attention and sending it to the wrong place…Magic shows are masterpieces of misdirection.”

“…people have a pronounced tendency to miss things that are happening right in front of them.”

“…we miss things simply because we aren’t looking at them.”

“…there’s a value in simply coming to grips with the gaps and limits in our awareness…”

People are growing more and more aware of the way politicians use a crisis —a distraction—to push through some law or take some action that leaders more than likely know the public would not accept under normal circumstances. With the Great Recession in 2008, it was the Quiet Revolution in education policies (Common Core Initiative, robust data systems, Magicians and Politicians - The Crucial VoiceThe Crucial Voice:

Tom Torlakson: LAUSD School Closures - Year 2015 (CA Dept of Education)

LAUSD School Closures - Year 2015 (CA Dept of Education):

State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Issues Statement Regarding LAUSD School Closures

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson issued the following statement today due to a threat of violence that closed all K-12 public schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District:

“I support the actions taken by the Los Angeles Unified School district and law enforcement officials to keep students safe. Creating and maintaining a safe environment for students, teachers, parents, administrators, and classified employees is our top priority.

“I urge schools and districts to check their school safety plans to make sure they are up to date. The California Department of Education stands ready to assist school districts in enhancing and improving their safety plans. We have a variety of available resources for districts, including on our Web site.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The CDE Safe Schools Planning Web page includes the School Safety Plan Self-Monitoring Tool designed to assist a school site in creating a comprehensive, compliant school safety plan. The CDE School Safety Elements and ResourcesWeb page is intended to help schools identify elements and resources important in improving school climate and safety.

Torlakson said he has directed his staff to work with the Los Angeles Unified School District so it can qualify for relief from loss of Average Daily Attendance (ADA) funds. Local educational agencies may also receive ADA credit for all purposes and instructional time credit for the days and minutes lost due to an emergency closure. ADA credit and approval of school closures may be obtained by submitting three copies of Form J-13A (DOC).

For more guidance on ADA credit, visit the California Department of Education's Management Advisory 90-01 - AttendanceWeb page.

# # # #

Tom Torlakson — State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Communications Division, Room 5206, 916-319-0818, Fax 916-319-0100

New report proposes helping students qualify for benefits including food stamps - The Hechinger Report

New report proposes helping students qualify for benefits including food stamps - The Hechinger Report:

New report proposes helping students qualify for benefits including food stamps

With tuition up, income flat, statistics show some students can’t afford to regularly eat

 WaSHINGTON — How much trouble are some community college students having paying their way through college? Advocates say the government should make it easier for them to get public benefits such as food stamps as a form of financial aid.

That was one of the ideas put forward at a forum to explore how public benefits can be better leveraged to fill the huge financial gaps that confront low-income students.

“We really need to re-conceptualize how we view financial aid,” said Amy Ellen Duke-Benfield, a senior postsecondary policy analyst at the Center for Law and Social Policy, or CLASP, which advocates for low-income people, and which hosted the forum.

Duke-Benfield called for easing some of the work requirements of public benefits such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which offers up to $194 per month to people who work 20 hours a week. The rule makes the program incompatible with going to college, she said, citing research that students who work that many hours per week are less likely to graduate.

Duke-Benfield also said more must be done to make public benefits from childcare to housing and utility assistance seem “normal and a good thing” to help community college students.

“We’re talking about a small population of people, but we’re talking about people who are no different than an 18-year-old who wants to go to college and get a good job,” she said.

CLASP’s proposal to help community college students qualify for public benefits comes against the backdrop of calls from the Obama Administration to make community college free, and on the heels ofa report that found half of all community college students are going hungry. About one in five have skipped meals because they couldn’t afford food, that report found.

More than 200 food pantries have been opened on college campuses, some at wealthy universities, where low-income students apparently are going without eating, according to the College and University Food Bank Alliance.

If these reports identify a problem, Duke-Benfield’s proposal to help New report proposes helping students qualify for benefits including food stamps - The Hechinger Report:

Federal intervention in Newark. A victory, yes–but for whom? | Bob Braun's Ledger

Federal intervention in Newark. A victory, yes–but for whom? | Bob Braun's Ledger:

Federal intervention in Newark. A victory, yes–but for whom?

PULSE president Sharon Smith addresses press conference outside Newark’s Belmont-Runyon School.

The federal intervention in the state-operated Newark school system is, in fact, a victory both for the parents who sued to obtain it and, ultimately, for the cause of educational equity. But it may not immediately help the children who were hurt by the Christie Administration’s clumsy and misguided efforts at “reform.”

Parents and their lawyers held a press conference to hail the agreement and they used terms like “ground-breaking” and ” break-through” and “important”–and they weren’t wrong. They weren’t wrong because:

1. If the settlement is considered in a national context–and PULSE is part of a network of parent activists–then this represents the first time community organizers have forced the federal government, itself a bastion of reforms like school closing and charter expansion,  to admit it may have contributed to practices that actually harmed children. Similar complaints have been filed in behalf of children and parents in New Orleans, Chicago, and Philadelphia–but none have yet been so successful as Newark’s effort.

2.  The federal intervention raises a cloud over the entire New Jersey experiment in state takeovers as a means of improving urban school districts–it has taken over Jersey City, Paterson, and Camden as well.  Not only has the state failed to markedly improve learning in the state’s largest school districts it runs, it also may have actually harmed children through its efforts. If not, why would the federal government demand remediation?

If nothing else, the parents have given the lie to assertions of competence by both federal and state bureaucrats. The federal intervention in Newark may have forever ended the notion that state and federal governments know best how to fix schools.

But what about the Newark children affected by state-imposed reforms?

“This is an important first step,” said Sharon Smith, president and co-founder of Federal intervention in Newark. A victory, yes–but for whom? | Bob Braun's Ledger:

Closing LAUSD schools after threat was the only option - LA Times

Closing LAUSD schools after threat was the only option - LA Times:

Closing LAUSD schools after threat was the only option

The email could be a hoax. It could be a childish prank to get students out of final exams, or simply a mean-spirited effort to force more than a million people to change their patterns today out of fear.

No matter. Even if there are no explosives-laden backpacks, no mysterious packages and no actual plan to harm children, the online threats that led to the closure Tuesday of every Los Angeles Unified school and preschool demonstrate for Angelenos what it means to be terrorized.

How do I talk about 'terror days' with my first-grader?

As Superintendent Ramon Cortines noted, the district receives threats all the time. But with the San Bernardino shootings still a vivid memory, and with a detailed threat in hand, district officials believed they had little choice but to close the schools. Had anything happened to a student or teacher, the horror would have been unspeakable, a wound from which it would be hard to recover.

The costs of doing this are heavy, though, which is why the second-guessing has begun in earnest. The already cash-strapped district will probably lose millions of dollars as a consequence of closing Tuesday because state funding is based on daily attendance. Thousands upon thousands of parents were forced to change their work plans for the day; chances are that many of those will not be paid, and that’s a sacrifice that L.A. Unified families can ill afford. Meanwhile, other cities and school districts worry that LAUSD has just shown malefactors around the world how to inflict a major economic blow on a community with a few emails.

Whatever the intentions were of the person or people making the threat, this is what terrorism does. The brutal slayings of 14 office workers at a holiday party less than two weeks ago strike such fear into us that a worrisome email can force us to shift our way of life and cost us extraordinary sums, even if absolutely nothing dangerous is actually planned. Terrorism isn't just the infliction of death and injury; its aim is large-scale intimidation and coercion that ripple through society long after the attacks are over.

Yet what options do we as a society have — especially when the possible victims are children? None, really.

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Perhaps if the San Bernardino attack had occurred a year ago rather than this very month, the email would not have seemed as intimidating, though officials say there were reasons to think this threat was more credible than a similar threat made to New York schools. But being more relaxed a year from now could be an even bigger mistake; people with ideologically inspired evil on their minds don't tend to offer warnings.

That's why this threat didn't just target the 700,000 students in L.A. Unified and their teachers and librarians and parents. It targeted everyone who sends children off to school each day with a general sense that those children will be safe there. But then, how drastically are we willing to react to the new awareness that our lives might not be as secure as they had seemed? Sweeps at every public school before each school day? We rightly rebel at sacrificing a way of life and giving terrorists exactly what they want. But we cannot afford to take it for granted, either.

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Closing LAUSD schools after threat was the only option - LA Times:

Dannel “The Master Fund Raider” Malloy demands constitutional transportation lockbox or else! - Wait What?

Dannel “The Master Fund Raider” Malloy demands constitutional transportation lockbox or else! - Wait What?:

Dannel “The Master Fund Raider” Malloy demands constitutional transportation lockbox or else!

Once again we return to the idiom of “Calling the Kettle Black.”

In addition to making an appearance at least once here at Wait, What?, it was used by William Shakespeare, William Penn and can even be found in the epic text of Don Quixote. 

The notion of “Calling the Kettle Black” is a relatively simple one and was in full display yesterday (December 15, 2015) when Democratic Governor Dannel Malloy told the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce that he would get his proposed constitutional amendment for a “Transportation Lockbox” or else.

Malloy, who undoubtedly holds the gubernatorial record for raiding and diverting more dedicated public funds to balance the state budget or paying for things that the funds were never intended to cover told the business leaders that he would demand another vote on his Transportation Lockbox proposal because people had a right to know that their tax revenues were being spent for their intended purpose.

As the CT Newsjunkie reported in Malloy Puts Lawmakers On Notice – Support His Transportation Lockbox Or Face Consequences,

Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy told business leaders Tuesday that he wants a constitutional amendment for his transportation lockbox. Afterward, he told the news media that he will actively campaign against anyone who votes against it.

Malloy didn’t get the three-quarters vote he needed last week during a special session to get the constitutional amendment on the November 2016 ballot.

“If it goes down again you can be assured I’ll campaign against anybody who didn’t vote for it,” Malloy told reporters after his speech to the Middlesex Dannel “The Master Fund Raider” Malloy demands constitutional transportation lockbox or else! - Wait What?:

Who’s Accountable for Students with Disabilities When Things Go Wrong?

Who’s Accountable for Students with Disabilities When Things Go Wrong?:

Who’s Accountable for Students with Disabilities When Things Go Wrong?

Now that the Every Student Succeeds Act has passed, and the power to run public schools has shifted to the local school districts and the state, will that mean  more accountability on their part when things go wrong in the classroom?

Consider the Peck Community School in Holyoake, Massachusetts, a public school for students  with second language needs and emotional and behavioral disabilities. Teachers are being accused of harsh treatment of students in the Therapeutic Intervention Program at the school. HERE.

Too often, when something goes wrong in the classroom, everyone focuses on just the teacher. But think of school districts and the state departments of education like throwing a pebble into a pond. The ripples are all a part of that one pebble’s impact. If something goes wrong in the classroom, shouldn’t the whole kit and caboodle get investigated?

If local and state administrators, and let’s include governors and policy makers too, Who’s Accountable for Students with Disabilities When Things Go Wrong?:

Wall Street Money and Massachusetts Schools | MA Jobs with Justice

JwJ Research Action Committee Report: Wall Street Money and Massachusetts Schools | MA Jobs with Justice:

JwJ Research Action Committee Report: Wall Street Money and Massachusetts Schools

This first report from the Massachusetts Jobs with Justice Research Action Committee exposes the corporate agenda behind Massachusetts' most vocal advocates for charter schools. Our research reveals the way that Wall Street financiers are funding the attempts to privatize our public education system here in New England. Download the full report here.

File: 

 Wall Street Money and Massachusetts Schools: The Truth Behind Families for Excellent Schools

Find out more about the Campaign to Protect Public Education Campaign

John Thompson: A Closer Look at the “Success” in D.C. That Wasn’t | Diane Ravitch

John Thompson: A Closer Look at the “Success” in D.C. That Wasn’t | Diane Ravitch's blog - Linkis.com:

John Thompson: A Closer Look at the “Success” in D.C. That Wasn’t

John Thompson knows that reformers point to the District of Columbia as one of their examples of success. After all, the district has been controlled by Teach for America alumnae Michelle Rhee and Kaya Henderson since 2007. They own whatever successes and not-successes that occurred over the past eight years. The centerpiece of their claims of success is NAEP scores, which are up.

In this post, Thompson identifies the flaws in the narrative of success. Thompson lauds John Merrow for critiquing the narrative of a district he once held up as an exemplar of successful reform. Merrow asked, in his post, why anyone was celebrating Kaya Henderson’s five-year anniversary in the wake of the disastrous scores on the Common Core PARCC tests, which showed a district where academic performance was dismal.

Thompson reviews the NAEP scores, using Rick Hess’s data.

Hess cites overall gains in NAEP growth under Rhee and Henderson, but those same NAEP studies actually support the common sense conclusion that the numbers reflect gentrification. Hess’s charts show that from 2005 to 2013, the percentage of D.C. students who are low-income dropped from 66% to 61.6%. (In my world, a 61.6% low-income urban school seems danged-near rich.) Per student spending increased by 40% during that time. (The new spending, alone, comes close to the total per student spending in my 90% low-income system.)

According to Hess’s chart, the percentage of the D.C. students who are black dropped by 1/8th from 2005 to 2013, and the percentage of students with disabilities dropped by 1/7th. And, the 2015 NAEP excluded as many as 44% of D.C.’s English Language Learners. The John Thompson: A Closer Look at the “Success” in D.C. That Wasn’t | Diane Ravitch's blog - Linkis.com:

The States Where Schools Are Still Allowed to Practice Corporal Punishment and Physical Discipline - The Atlantic

The States Where Schools Are Still Allowed to Practice Corporal Punishment and Physical Discipline - The Atlantic:
Where Teachers Are Still Allowed to Spank Students
Corporal punishment is legal in 19 states.

“But I wasn’t chewing any gum,” the 10-year-old begged, insisting he was innocent.
“You’re a liar!” the adult reportedly responded. “Now you’re really going to get it because you keep lying to me.”

In a scene more reminiscent of a Victorian orphanage or an 1800s one-room schoolhouse, the wooden paddle allegedly hit the child’s backside about a dozen times, each smack accompanied by wailing cries. The door to the hallway was only partially closed, allowing Liz Dwyer, a student at the time who says she witnessed the incident at Muessel Elementary School in South Bend, Indiana, to clearly hear the screams of the third-grader in the music room. Dwyer says she’s still haunted by the memory of corporal punishment over 30 years later. “I knew he didn’t have any gum,” she said, “but I was too afraid to speak up.”

Dwyer, the culture and education editor at the digital advocacy magazineTakePart, distinctly recalls “the swoosh of the paddle, the sound it made as it connected with [his] body… the sobs for mercy.” And she remembers the arbitrary and discriminatory nature of the punishment. “The reasons a kid could be yanked out of class… were inconsistent and petty,” she said. “If our [music] teacher thought a boy—and it seemed to always be a boy—was singing [a song] too loudly… if he seemed bored while he clanged the shiny metal triangle, or if he appeared a tad too enthusiastic while slapping a tambourine, the paddle would come out.”

These days, in the realm of harsh school discipline, suspensions, expulsions, and school arrests most immediately come to mind. Many believe paddling is an archaic punishment from a long-gone era. Federal education data confirms that incidents of corporal punishment reported by schools have declined significantly in recent years. But the practice is still widely in use—and for tens of thousands of public-school students, discipline that “deliberately inflicts pain upon a child” is not uncommon. As a result, education groups, activists, and parents—including those victimized by the practice—are demanding that corporal punishment be outlawed in schools to protect children’s physical and emotional health.

In the 19 states—mainly in the South, Southwest, and Midwest—where corporal punishment is legal, teachers and school officials have wide discretion in how and when to apply such discipline. That’s because of a 1977 Supreme Court case,Ingraham v. Wright, which found that spanking in schools does not violate students’ rights, specifically the Eighth Amendment’s “cruel and unusual punishment” clause and the Fourteenth Amendment’s right to due process. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, Berryhill Public Schools Superintendent Mike Campbell told the Tulsa World he finds paddling useful “for some children” and points to himself as an example. “I know I was paddled as a child, and I grew up to be a productive citizen,” Campbell said. Still, while there’s no formal policy banning corporal punishment in his district, Campbell and school leaders decided to phase it out a few years ago to reduce the likelihood of lawsuits and costly The States Where Schools Are Still Allowed to Practice Corporal Punishment and Physical Discipline - The Atlantic:

Wealthy philanthropists shouldn't impose their idea of common good on us | Joanne Barkan | Opinion | The Guardian

Wealthy philanthropists shouldn't impose their idea of common good on us | Joanne Barkan | Opinion | The Guardian:

Wealthy philanthropists shouldn't impose their idea of common good on us

Almost all multibillionaire philanthropists in the United States set up tax-exempt, grant-making, private foundations when they want to make the world a better place. Not Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan. They plan to give away their fortune gradually over the course of their lifetimes, but they’ll do so through a for-profit corporation.

There’s a simple explanation why: private foundations in the US cannot engage in political activity; they cannot campaign for or contribute to candidates for public office or lobby legislators; with limited exceptions, they cannot fund for-profit organizations. By funding their philanthropic work outside the confines of foundation law, Chan and Zuckerberg reserve the right to do all of these. According to their Facebook post: “The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative will pursue its mission by funding non-profit organizations, making private investments and participating in policy debates”.

The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative is structured as a for-profit business just like Facebook, Microsoft or any other limited liability corporation. In addition to avoiding the restrictions that apply to foundations, they gain other advantages.As described in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, they will have fewer disclosure requirements and can “engage in activities that stretch the definition of charity”. And unlike foundations, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative won’t have to make the annual “payout” in grants – about 5% of a foundation’s endowment –which prevents foundations from hoarding their wealth.

Non-profit regulations in the US have enough loopholes and ambiguities that mega foundations manage to do almost everything except overt political work – including “educating” lawmakers while not lobbying them. Still, Chan and Zuckerberg seem to prefer dissolving the already porous barrier between charitable activities and the market. The model fits not only Zuckerberg’s business experience, but also his growing up in an age that celebrates the free market in all domains.

For anyone worried about growing plutocracy in the US, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative has one positive feature: it will pay taxes – unless accountants discover new loopholes for this hybrid entity.

In the tax-exempt world of American charity, the mega rich increasingly use their foundations and their celebrity as philanthropists to mold public policy to an extent not possible for other citizens. Tax-exempt foundations exert their inordinate influence without public input or accountability, but they are publicly subsidized: a substantial portion of every foundation’s wealth – 39.6% according to the 2015 tax rates – is diverted every year from the public treasury where voters would have determined its use.

There’s a strong argument to be made that the private tax-exempt foundation doesn’t fit well in a functioning democracy. As the eminent US jurist Richard Posner wrote: “A perpetual charitable foundation, however, is a completely irresponsible institution, answerable to nobody. It competes neither in capital markets nor in product markets … and, unlike a hereditary monarch whom such a foundation otherwise resembles, it is subject to no political controls either.Wealthy philanthropists shouldn't impose their idea of common good on us | Joanne Barkan | Opinion | The Guardian:

Philly Schools Sacrificed on the Altar of Pennsylvania Budget Compromise | gadflyonthewallblog

Philly Schools Sacrificed on the Altar of Pennsylvania Budget Compromise | gadflyonthewallblog:

Philly Schools Sacrificed on the Altar of Pennsylvania Budget Compromise

Pennsylvania lawmakers are ready to help all students across the Commonwealth – if only they can abuse, mistreat and trample some of them.

Which ones? The poor black and brown kids. Of course!

That seems to be the lesson of a school code bill passed with bipartisan support by the state Senate Thursday.

The legislation would require the Commonwealth to pick as many as 5 “underperforming” Philadelphia schools a year to close, charterize or just fire the principal and half the staff. It would also allow non-medically trained personnel to take an on-line course before working in the district to treat diabetic school children. And it would – of course – open the floodgates to more charter schools!

It’s a dumb provision, full of unsubstantiated facts, faulty logic and corporate education reform kickbacks. But that’s only the half of it!

The bill is part of a budget framework agreed to by Governor Tom Wolf and the Republican-controlled legislature necessary to finally pass a state-wide spending plan. The financial proposal has been held hostage for almost half a year!

The major sticking point has been school funding. Democrats like Wolf demand an increase. Republicans refuse. And the worst part is that the increase would only begin to heal the cuts the GOP made over the last four years.

Republicans just won’t clean up their own mess.

They slashed public school budgets by almost $1 billion per year for the last four years with disastrous consequences. Voters who could make little headway against a Philly Schools Sacrificed on the Altar of Pennsylvania Budget Compromise | gadflyonthewallblog:

CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Budget Fluffernuttery Threatens Schools

CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Budget Fluffernuttery Threatens Schools:

PA: Budget Fluffernuttery Threatens Schools

We have a budget problem in Pennsylvania. You could call it a budget "crisis," but that makes it sound like it just sort of happened, like a hurricane or male pattern baldness. You could call it a budget "impasse," but that suggests two grown up sides that can't find a compromise. Perhaps budget "screwup" or budget "failure so stupid it is raising the collective blood pressure of the entire state."

If it seems like we've been budget fiasco for a long time, that's because we have. Today is Day 168 of the ongoing budget not-done-on-time event.

There was a time when I would have agreed with a bi-partisan assessment. In the early stages, the GOP controlled PA House and Senate wanted to act as if the previous GOP governor had not been decisively kicked to the curb. Newly-elected Governor Tom Wolf, whose previous work experience is running a successful family business, did not initially seem to grasp that he is not a CEO who can order the legislature around as if they are his minions.

But many of the parties got on a learning curve and seemed to make progress.

At first it seemed like a manageable catastrophe. After all, we're used to this-- we've had five late budgets in ten years.

True, there was fallout. You may remember that the Chester Upland school district, underfunded by the state and sucked dry by charters, had to ask its teachers to work for free when the state missed CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Budget Fluffernuttery Threatens Schools:

Congress makes school attendance a national priority :: SI&A Cabinet Report

Congress makes school attendance a national priority :: SI&A Cabinet Report :: The Essential Resource for Superintendents and the Cabinet:

Congress makes school attendance a national priority

(District of Columbia) Increasing the emphasis on getting more of the nation’s K-12 students to show up for class, the newly-approved federal education law will require Title I schools to report chronic absenteeism broken down by subgroup.

The Every Student Succeeds Act, signed by President Barack Obama last week, does away with the most onerous accountability mandate on schools – adequate yearly progress – while giving states new flexibility to design and implement their own systems for measuring student performance.

But Congress retained some key requirements such as annual assessments in grades three through eight and once in high school for math and English language arts, as well as the need to continue to identify persistently underperforming schools.

ESSA calls on states to create accountability systems that use multiple measures to gauge student outcome. The bill requires that states receiving Title I money must also collect and report “measures of school quality, climate and safety…”

Among the metrics listed that must be broken down by subgroup is chronic absenteeism – both excused and unexcused.

“It is good news that chronic absence data is included in the ESSA reauthorization for Title I schools because it moves us closer to the day when all districts will be using chronic absence data and acting on it,” said David Kopperud, an education programs consultant with the California Department of Education who helps oversee statewide attendance issues.

Long overlooked as a vehicle for improving public education, attendance is increasingly viewed as a fundamental first step in boosting student performance – especially among early learners.

According to a study from Johns Hopkins University, chronic absenteeism in kindergarten was associated with lower academic performance in first through third grade. Johns Hopkins researchers Congress makes school attendance a national priority :: SI&A Cabinet Report :: The Essential Resource for Superintendents and the Cabinet: