Colorado: State Tells District to “Reconsider” Walton-Dominated Charter– But Let’s Not Mention Walton. | deutsch29

Colorado: State Tells District to “Reconsider” Walton-Dominated Charter– But Let’s Not Mention Walton. | deutsch29:

Colorado: State Tells District to “Reconsider” Walton-Dominated Charter– But Let’s Not Mention Walton.

Walmart grandson, James Walton, is substantially connected to Colorado’s proposed Great Work Montessori School (GWMS).

In October 2016, the Denver Advisory Committee (DAC) expressed serious concerns about the GWMS application, including the lack of transparency surrounding its “partnering” with a “property services company, TGNA Holdings LLC, and Walton ties to that company.

On November 03, 2016, the JeffCo board voted 3-2 to reject the GWMS application, as the Colorado Independent reports on November 07, 2016:

Chief among the concerns by the [JeffCo] school board: the charter’s business model. The charter planned to rely partly on grants from the Walton Foundation and on tuition, up to $1,500 per month, from parents of pre-K students, to cover the budget.

Then there’s the involvement of the Walton Foundation. Head of School Amy Malick (sp.) told The Colorado Independent that the foundation had no involvement with the charter beyond a $250,000 grant, contingent on the charter winning approval from the Jeffco board.

In fact, the school was the brainchild of Walton Foundation board member James Walton, a resident of Golden.

The Independent obtained a letter from James Walton to the Jeffco board that attempted to clarify the foundation’s involvement. …

Walton’s letter dealt with the school’s proposed location, off West Center Avenue in east Lakewood. A property for the school was purchased last month by TGNA Holdings, which also holds title to the land and building of a Walton-backed private preschool in Edgewater. …

Contrary to Malick’s (sp.) description of TGNA as a non-profit, Walton said the company is a Delaware-based single-member limited liability company. TGNA will either buy or sell property on its own behalf, he wrote.

However, while its articles of incorporation show TGNA is a Delaware company, its principal mailing address, according to documents filed with the Colorado Secretary of State, is a post office box belonging to Walton Enterprise, Inc. of Bentonville, Arkansas.

According to the November 07, 2016, Colorado Independent, James Walton identified Colorado: State Tells District to “Reconsider” Walton-Dominated Charter– But Let’s Not Mention Walton. | deutsch29:

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Overview Thoughts as We Come to the End of 2016

Seattle Schools Community Forum: Overview Thoughts as We Come to the End of 2016:

Overview Thoughts as We Come to the End of 2016

We don't need to have an expanded discussion here on these various issues but here's what I'll be writing about by the end of the year:

- effects of the Trump administration on public education.  (My advice on all this is to 1) Stay Calm and join the resistance; here's a link to some ideas and 2) believe in this country even if you don't believe in the people who will now run it.  Lastly, this will be a fight - not some polite phone calls or e-mails. 

- the continuing mismanagement of this district and the apparent acquiescence of the Board.  As in years past, I continue to not understand either thing continuing on but I'm about done with both.

- the levy cliff.  Spoke to the Governor, spoke to Frank Chopp and folks, get a parachute because anything that does get done to prevent it, will likely come too late.  I don't know if those elected officials are clueless about how school districts plan their budgets but no, this can't wait until the last minute.

And you know what else? There are a lot of legislators who are more than happy Seattle Schools Community Forum: Overview Thoughts as We Come to the End of 2016:

Six countries. Two educational strategies. One consistent conclusion. | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Six countries. Two educational strategies. One consistent conclusion. | Schott Foundation for Public Education:

Six countries. Two educational strategies. One consistent conclusion.

A new book, Global Education Reform: How Privatization and Public Investment Influence Education Outcomes, provides a powerful analysis of different ends of an ideological spectrum – from market-based experiments to strong state investments in public education. Written by education researchers, the authors compare the privatization and public investment approaches to education in three pairs of countries: Chile and Cuba, Sweden and Finland, and the U.S. and Canada. The book consolidates the best available evidence on the implementation issues and specific results of these different approaches.

An introductory chapter offers an overview of the theories guiding both neoliberal reforms such as those implemented in Chile, Sweden and the United States with efforts to build strong and equitable public education systems as exemplified by Cuba, Finland and Canada. The pairs of country case studies that follow examine the historical evolution of education within individual countries and compare and contrast national educational outcomes. A concluding chapter dissects the educational outcomes of the differing economic and governance approaches, as well as the policy implications.

This infographic was a collaboration between the Schott Foundation and SCOPE.

 Download here (408.64 KB)

Six countries. Two educational strategies. One consistent conclusion. | Schott Foundation for Public Education:

Educational Inequities in the New Orleans Charter School System | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Educational Inequities in the New Orleans Charter School System | Schott Foundation for Public Education:

Educational Inequities in the New Orleans Charter School System

New Orleans provides a model for examining the feasibility of a nearly 100% charter, market based system of schools. This is truly an education experiment on a grand scale, and because New Orleans’ system is unique, the nation is watching. How is it working?

A recent SCOPE study examines the New Orleans experiment in terms of the experiences of students and families managing their way through a portfolio of charter schools. Among many findings, the research shows that New Orleans reforms have created a set of schools that are highly stratified by race, class, and educational advantage, operating in a hierarchy that provides very different types of schools and to different types of children. While some have choice; others do not.

A new book, Global Education Reform: How Privatization and Public Investment Influence Education Outcomes, provides a powerful analysis of these different ends of an ideological spectrum – from market-based experiments to strong state investments in public education. Written by education researchers, the authors compare the privatization and public investment approaches to education in three pairs of countries: Chile and Cuba, Sweden and Finland, and the U.S. and Canada. The book consolidates the best available evidence on the implementation issues and specific results of these different approaches.

This infographic was a collaboration between the Schott Foundation and SCOPE.

 Download here (3.28 MB)

Educational Inequities in the New Orleans Charter School System | Schott Foundation for Public Education:

CURMUDGUCATION: Gerrymandering Charter Success

CURMUDGUCATION: Gerrymandering Charter Success:

Gerrymandering Charter Success

Once again I'm reading a spate of charter fan fiction in which charters are lauded for out-performing the rest of the schools in their city.

That one right there near the center is where I've been smacking my head

"Out-perform the rest of the schools in East Egg" is a meaningless metric, and I keep trying to explain why to some folks. Let me try it again, because looking at the mess in North Carolina has given me a thought. 

Let's start with one of the best graphics out there for explaining gerrymandering. It comes from an article by Christopher Ingraham at Washington Post's wonkblog, with the graphic itself adapted from Stephan Wass.

This shows how you can divide up a city to create different combinations of the voters to create particular outcomes. It explains, for instance, how Pennsylvania and North Carolina can have legislatures completely dominated by one political party even though that party doesn't have a vastly greater number of actual voters.

But now, look at the graphic again, and this time, think of the red blocks as high-achieving students.

Let's say East Egg, back when it had only public schools, looked like #2. Five schools, all containing some high-scoring students (aka "high-achieving," but as always I will remind you that "high-  CURMUDGUCATION: Gerrymandering Charter Success:

Schools Matter: DIBELVEC: A Word for Our Time

Schools Matter: DIBELVEC: A Word for Our Time:

DIBELVEC: A Word for Our Time

To DIBELVEC

Verb

•  to deprive  primary grade children daily access to picture books so their school program can qualify as "scientific" according to U. S. Department of Education/Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation guidelines
•  to make overly obedient and patterned to following scripts in preparation for employment as workers in the Global Economy

Related Forms

• Dibelvecee: noun
• Victim  subject to Dibelvecing
• Dibelvecer: noun
• Perpetrator of the crime of Dibelvecing
• Dibelvecable: adjective
• Person with no one to protect him from crime of Dibelvecing
• Dibelvecize:  transitive verb, denoting:
•   "to render, make" (as in corporatize; sterilize)
•    "to convert into" (as in itimize)
•    "to subject to" (as in terrorize)
•    "a change of state" (as in fossilize)
•    "kinds of instances of behavior" (as in tyrannize)

 Pre-Dibelvec indicates “prior to,” “in advance of,” “early,” “beforehand,” “before,” “in front of,” meaning that kindergarten is way  too late for rigorous and rigid phonics skills (as in preschool; prewar).

  

Origin: The term is derived from pseudoscientific DIBELS^® and from the French avec, "dibbled with."

Word first used by Susan Ohanian, June 24, 2009, with no success at getting anyone to refrain from its practice and tyrannical objectives.

Synonyms:

• appall
• browbeat
• cow
• domineer
• eviscerate
• frighten
• grind up
• horrify
• isolate
• jeopardize
• kill
• leave out
• menace
• nullify
• oppress
• paralyze
• quicksandize
•  repress
• stupify
• torment
• unhinge
• vandalize
• walk heavy over
• X-out personhood
• Yuck99
• Zone-ize

Schools Matter: DIBELVEC: A Word for Our Time:

Let's Unpresident Trump [The Progressive] | The Jose Vilson

Let's Unpresident Trump [The Progressive] | The Jose Vilson:

Let’s Unpresident Trump [The Progressive]

I’ve been on a writing tear in the last week or so. The first is a piece I did for the Progressive, reflecting on the incoming President-elect. Here’s some of the post:

Forget fear in classrooms. My students were texting their parents and siblings at home to make sure there’s a back-up plan in case of danger. My students, who come from different racial, ethnic, and religious backgrounds, understand that there are no safe spaces. The election of Trump has only solidified the reality of a hateful America I had seen burgeoning after President Obama’s election. I mean the trolls who popped up in my mentions on Twitter after people like Trayvon Martin, Sandra Bland, and Eric Garner became hashtags. They were also the judges, juries, and district attorneys who didn’t press charges and acquitted people like Daniel Panteleo, Daniel Wilson, and, most recently, Michael Slager. They were the fifth of American Federation of Teachers’ members and third of National Education Association members who deeply resented Randi Weingarten and Lily Eskelsen-Garcia’s enthusiasm for Secretary Clinton.

They were the voters who saw my students and our futures as expendable.

For more, please read and let me know what you think. I appreciate y’all. More to come soon.

About Jose Vilson

José Luis Vilson is a math educator, blogger, speaker, and activist. For more of my writing, buy my book This Is Not A Test: A New Narrative on Race, Class, and Education, on sale now.

Will Texas Parents Save Special Education?

Will Texas Parents Save Special Education?:

Will Texas Parents Save Special Education?

In order for the nation to get back their public schools they have to realize what they’re losing. This is especially true for special education. For years, across the nation we have seen an eroding of services for students with disabilities.

In Texas, denying children their right to special education, since 2004, came in the form of an arbitrary cap that rejected students from getting the assistance they needed. Texas enrollment in special education became the lowest in the nation at 8.5% as opposed to 13%. Authorities audited schools and punished those that went over the cap.

Texas set this “benchmark” while facing a $1.1 billion state budget cut. They didn’t ask the federal government for help.

Children who had every right to quality special education were denied services.

But let’s not forget the U.S. Department of Education’s push to Will Texas Parents Save Special Education?:

Getting Students With Autism Through High School, To College And Beyond : NPR Ed : NPR

Getting Students With Autism Through High School, To College And Beyond : NPR Ed : NPR:

Getting Students With Autism Through High School, To College And Beyond

Colin Ozeki, a high school student with autism, is on track to graduate this year from Millennium Brooklyn High School with an advanced diploma.

Amy Pearl/WNYC

Colin Ozeki, 16, doesn't like to sugarcoat how autism spectrum disorder has affected his interactions with others, his emotions and his own self-confidence. He sees it as an issue to confront, something about himself to work on and improve in order to fully participate in life around him.

He appreciates the adage, "It's a difference, not a disability." But he disagrees with it when it comes to himself.

"I don't think I would be at this place that I'm at right now if it weren't for people acknowledging the idea that I had some kind of problem per se," says Colin. "I might have just been this confused person forever, and somewhat underdeveloped."

We know a lot more about children with autism spectrum disorders than we did just a decade ago, but nationwide students with autism are enrolling in college in relatively low numbers.

Colin, now a senior at Millennium Brooklyn High School, has been part of a program in the New York City schools aiming to change that. It's called ASD Nest (ASD refers to students with autism spectrum disorder) and he's been with it his entire school career.

A key underlying philosophy of the program is that education — the classroom — provides the most effective treatment for autism. The program, run jointly by the city's Department of Education and NYU Nest Support Project, places students with autism who are capable of doing grade-level work in classrooms with their non-disabled peers.

The program came about in 2003 in response to poor academic outcomes among students with autism, including those like Colin, who were academically strong. Very Getting Students With Autism Through High School, To College And Beyond : NPR Ed : NPR:

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Frantic Shopping Edition (12/18)

CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Frantic Shopping Edition (12/18):

ICYMI: Frantic Shopping Edition (12/18)

You're not here today, are you? You're out trying to finish shopping before you get back to school and don't have time to shop at all. Here to help you take a break is this week's selection of reading stuff, culled from about the interwebs. If you like it, pass it on.

Teachers Are Delusional 

Things are a little grim these days. Blue Cereal Education looks at how teachers everywhere cope, for better or worse.

Hanna Skandera as Assistant Secretary of Education

Yet another odd Trumpian choice appears to be coming down the pike. Here is the indispensable Mercedes Schneider with all the background you need to understand why Skandera is a less-than-encouraging choice

Don't Be Fooled; Betsy DeVos Still Loves Common Core

If you think DeVos is an exciting choice because she'll make good on Trump's promise to dump Common Core, Steven Singer has done the homework to show why Trump has gotten the wrong woman for the job.

The Broken Promise of Indiana's Online Schools

Chalkbeat's series on virtual schools continues with a look at how Indiana's cyber schools are still in operation, even though every single one of them is failing.

Is It Time to Rethink Standards 

Josh Starr is guest blogging at Rick Hess's EdWeek spot, and he has some thoughts about school standards and white supremacy. Really.

Terminal Charterism: The View from Michigan

Really, you should just be reading Nancy Flanagan all the time. But right now, as a Michiganian, she has special insight on what a DeVosian eduworld would look like, which makes Flanagan's insights more must-read than ever.

How Ontario's Vision of Equity Contrasts with Pennsylvania's

Kevin McCorry is a name that anyone interested in PA eudcation should know. He's working on a series that takes a broader look at some ed issues, including this intriguing look at how PA and Ontario stack up by comparison.

Teaching Isn't Really a Profession

You've been in this argument. This piece will give you a little more ammo for the next time.

Coleman, the College Board and the SAT

I wrote about this Reuters piece this week, but let me encourage you once again to read the whole thing. It is hard to wrap your brain around just what an amateur-hour cluster-finagle Coleman's College Board is, but we all need to try.

How Much Do Charter School Executives Make?

School Data Nerd tries to answer this question for Los Angeles. Short answer: a whole hell of a lot.

Rebecca Solnit on Hope in Dark Times, Resisting the Defeatism of Easy Despair, and What Victory Really Means for Movements of Social Change

Maria Popova's Brain Pickings is one of the great websites for literature, thought, and a kind of unmushy low-grade optimism. Let's end with this for the week. 

 CURMUDGUCATION: ICYMI: Frantic Shopping Edition (12/18):


Big Education Ape: Catch up with CURMUDGUCATION: NC: New Depths of Shame + Do Poor Students Get the Worst Teachers? - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/12/catch-up-with-curmudgucation-nc-new.html

CT Judges' anti-special education rant attracts federal government concern - Wait What?

CT Judges' anti-special education rant attracts federal government concern - Wait What?:

CT Judges’ anti-special education rant attracts federal government concern

Rather than properly rule that Connecticut historic underfunding of its public schools is unconstitutional and that Connecticut’s state government is failing to ensure  that every child is receiving their constitutionally guaranteed access to a quality education, a former state legislator and now Superior Court Judge handed Governor Dannel Malloy a victory – of sorts- in the CCJEF v. Rell school funding lawsuit by ruling that although Connecticut’s school funding formula was irrational and illegal, the amount of funding that the state provides Connecticut’s schools was “adequate.”

In his controversial ruling, Judge Thomas Moukawsher fixated on the need to teach children literacy and math, dismissing the importance of a comprehensive education or the availability services such as guidance counselors and the broader array of programs that Connecticut’s public school students need and deserve.

In addition, in what may have been the most disturbing aspect of this decision, the judge blasted Connecticut’s special education programs and suggested that a number of children simply didn’t deserve or need to have access to special education programs because, in his view, it was a waste to try and teach them.

Now, the federal government is responding to Judge Moukawsher’s inappropriate and heartless attack on children who require special education services.

As the CT reports in, Feds have concerns with judge’s special education ruling,

The U.S. Department of Education wrote the state’s education commissioner this week to share concerns about a state judge’s order telling Connecticut lawmakers to reassess what level of 

CT Judges' anti-special education rant attracts federal government concern - Wait What?:

Stanford Research: Investing in Public Schools Is More Effective Than Privatization | Diane Ravitch's blog

Stanford Research: Investing in Public Schools Is More Effective Than Privatization | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Stanford Research: Investing in Public Schools Is More Effective Than Privatization

This is a project that should interest all readers of the blog as well as state and local school boards and elected officials at every level. It includes a book that reviews education issues around the globe and resources that you may access by clicking the link. The bottom line of a vast amount of research is that privatization is a failed policy, not an innovation. The most effective way to invest public dollars is in improving public schools.

Stanford Graduate School of Education Research Center Introduces Cross-National Study Central to Debates about Future of the U.S. Education System

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
Contact: Ralph Rogers
Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education
650.725.8600
ralphr@stanford.edu

Stanford, CA – December 13, 2016 – In the midst of the ongoing debate and a potential shift in the U.S. approach to education, the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE) is pleased to introduce new research-based evidence and analysis that supports investment in public schools as a better alternative than the privatization of education.

“This book shows how public investment in education outperforms privatization across three continents, addressing this critical question as President-elect Trump’s appointee, Betsy DeVos, considers shifting U.S. education to a voucher scheme,” said Frank Adamson, PhD, the primary editor, chapter author, and Senior Policy and Research Analyst at SCOPE. “This book offers reasoned evidence to policymakers, communities, and families about how investing in public schools produces better and more equitable outcomes than voucher programs.”

SCOPE’s work addresses the question of how results from public investment approaches compare with those from market-based reforms and provides a timely explanation of alternatives based on real evidence derived from policy analysis and actual outcomes in six different countries. In this project, SCOPE has designed and implemented a set of accessible information resources designed to inform the different constituencies involved in this important debate.

The book, Global Education Reform: How Privatization and Public Investment Influence Education Outcomes, with a set of supporting infographics, videos, and research briefs, provides hard evidence supporting investment in pubic schools. Researchers thoroughly investigated the results of experiments with education in Chile, Sweden, and the U.S. and compared their educational outcomes with those of nearby countries with similar economic and social conditions: Cuba, Finland, and Canada (Ontario). At the national levels in Sweden, the U.S., and Chile, market, charter, or voucher systems are associated with greater disparities and lower student outcomes on international tests.

SCOPE’s project combined in-depth analysis of the different ends of an ideological spectrum – from market-based experiments to strong state investments in public education. Written by education researchers, including Linda Darling-Hammond, Michael Fullan, Pasi Sahlberg, Martin Carnoy, and others, the authors present long-term policy analyses based on primary and secondary research on the implementation and results of these different approaches.
To best support an open debate on the issue of school reform, SCOPE has created the following set of free information resources:

Privatization or Public Investment in Education is a free SCOPE research and policy brief summarizing the findings in the book.
Six Countries. Two Educational Strategies. One Consistent Conclusion is a free infographic presenting an accessible and concise summary of the Stanford Research: Investing in Public Schools Is More Effective Than Privatization | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Four Practical and Four Moral Reasons to Make Your City a Sanctuary City | gadflyonthewallblog

Four Practical and Four Moral Reasons to Make Your City a Sanctuary City | gadflyonthewallblog:

Four Practical and Four Moral Reasons to Make Your City a Sanctuary City

There’s an entire underclass of people living among us.

These are people like you or me who have no choice but to do the most menial jobs for meager pay under the table. And when reality-TV-stars-turned-politicians like Donald Trump come around offering to solve all our problems with magic, you know who they blame for everything? THEM!

They’re illegal immigrants. They had the gumption to flee countries with worse economies than ours for the privilege of being our construction workers, housekeepers, gardeners and janitors. They are the fruit and vegetable pickers and the restaurant workers putting food on our tables.

They don’t collect social security, they don’t have health benefits or retirement plans and employers can pay them less than minimum wage. Heck! We can do almost whatever we want to them because who are they going to complain to – the police? If they do anything to get noticed by the law, they could be deported. So they keep a low profile doing the work no one else wants while the rest of us allow ourselves to be fooled into accepting them as easy scapegoats for all our ills.

What we need are sensible immigration laws that offer these people a path to citizenship, a way for them to climb out of perpetual servitude and fear. But that would cost us too much money, so it will never happen.

The least we can do – literally the least – is allow them some moderate amount of safety. We can let them partake in the minimum advantages of our society – protection from crime, a safe place to live, schools for their children, and an end to Four Practical and Four Moral Reasons to Make Your City a Sanctuary City | gadflyonthewallblog:

Russ on Reading: Beyond Grades: How Am I Doing?

Russ on Reading: Beyond Grades: How Am I Doing?:

Beyond Grades: How Am I Doing?

Part 2 in a series on grading and feedback

In a post two weeks ago, I argued that we need to move away from grades for reporting student achievement. I argued that grades are ineffective in reporting student learning, encourage a grade acquisition orientation rather than a learning orientation, and destroy the motivation of lower achievers. But if I am going to argue against grading, I need to be ready with suggested replacements for grades. I begin an attempt to do this below. I would appreciate it if you tell me what you think of my ideas.

First, I think we need to decide what our goals are for reporting out on student achievement. I would argue that there are three reasons we wish to assess and report out and all of them have to do with providing feedback to stakeholders. First, we want to report on student learning to the student so that the student can answer the question, "How am I doing?" Next we want to provide feedback to parents, so that parents can answer the question, "How is my child doing?" Finally, we want to provide feedback to the school/district to inform curricular and instructional decisions moving forward and to answer the question, "How are we doing?"

In today's post I will address the first question; the one related to reporting out to the student.

How Am I Doing?

Learning is a process of adding new information to information you already know. Any assessment program should inform a student about what she Russ on Reading: Beyond Grades: How Am I Doing?:

Personalized Learning at Weller Elementary School (Milpitas, CA) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Personalized Learning at Weller Elementary School (Milpitas, CA) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

Personalized Learning at Weller Elementary School (Milpitas, CA)

In the Spring of 2012, teachers at Weller Elementary School, along with other schools in the Milpitas Unified School District, presented blueprints for re-designing their schools to Superintendent Cary Matsuoka, his top deputies, and the teachers’ union. The Superintendent’s group chose Weller’s  redesign for its school as one of two pilots for “blended” and “personalized learning” to be put into place using rotation of upper-grade students through the Learning Lab for a few hours a week and for the lower grades, in-class rotation of activities, including online software, supervised by the teacher. Soon after, Milpitas voters approved a bond referendum that produced funds for building new schools, remodeling older ones, and buying new technologies for teachers and students to use.

All of this occurred during the tenure of Weller principal, Raquel Kusunoki.

As a young child, she and her family immigrated from the Philippines to the Bay area. Kusunoke eventually became a credentialed teacher. She has been the Weller principal for four years after serving as assistant principal at the school and then teaching  for 13 years in San Jose Unified District elementary schools. As she told me about her years at Weller, “my umbilical cord is connected here.”

With nearly 450 students (K-6), Weller has a diverse cultural mix. Sixty percent of the students are Asian (including Filipino), 29 percent are Latino, four percent are African American and four percent are white (2015). Of that enrollment, 44 percent are English Language Learners and 47 percent are eligible for free and reduced price lunch–the poverty indicator.

On October 19, 2016, I spent the morning at Weller interviewing the principal, observing  two teachers’ lessons, and then meeting with a group of 6th graders and five teachers who have been closely involved in Weller’s “blended learning” design.

I first went to Richard Hart’s combined 5th and 6th grade class. While they have access to the Learning Lab at scheduled times, when in their classroom, Hart’s Personalized Learning at Weller Elementary School (Milpitas, CA) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice:

A Teacher on Teaching: School Reform: Fifteen Years of "Diet Plans" That Couldn't Fail

A Teacher on Teaching: School Reform: Fifteen Years of "Diet Plans" That Couldn't Fail:

School Reform: Fifteen Years of "Diet Plans" That Couldn't Fail

Imagine you wanted to lose a few pounds. (Most Americans do; so that might not be hard too hard.) Now picture some svelte fitness guru who promises success: “Follow my plan and you cannot go wrong. You will lose all the pounds you could want.”

You try the plan for six months and gain seven pounds. You waste $1500 dollars on special diet supplements, too.

A second weight-loss guru comes your way. “Follow my plan and you cannot go wrong,” she insists. “You will lose all the pounds you could want.”

You do as you are told again, but put on ten pounds. Even your “fat pants” no longer fit. (Not that I would ever know!)

And you wasted another $1200 on diet shakes and exercise CDs.

Eventually, you try a third, fourth and fifth diet plan. Every time, the gurus promise you cannot go wrong.

Not a single plan works.

Well, after fifteen years of school reform that’s where we find ourselves as a nation today.

You may not recall now, but the push to “fix” U. S. education began in earnest in 2001, in large part due to test results from countries around the world, results from a test that had not existed till 2000, the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) test.

In the spring of 2000, 15-year-olds from 32 nations, mostly first-world countries, took the new test. U. S. students finished 15th in reading, with an average score of 504. In math we finished 18th with an A Teacher on Teaching: School Reform: Fifteen Years of "Diet Plans" That Couldn't Fail: