Vicki Cobb Reviews SLAYING GOLIATH | Diane Ravitch's blog

Vicki Cobb Reviews SLAYING GOLIATH | Diane Ravitch's blog

Vicki Cobb Reviews SLAYING GOLIATH

Vicki Cobb is an award-winning author of more than 90 children’s books, mostly about science.

In this post, she reviews SLAYING GOLIATH.

The review begins like this:

For the past 25 years there has been a national war between so-called education reformers and public schools.  Education historian and indefatigable blogger on the topic, Diane Ravitch, has been chronicling the attacks, losses and now, finally, victories through her blog, where she posts up to ten times a day, every day, since April of 2012. In her new book Slaying Goliath: The Passionate Resistance to Privatization and the Fight to Save America’s Public Schools, she pulls the disparate threads together and writes a brilliant,  page-turner story of this war against public schools for a period that included my 5 grandchildren.

Who are the bad guys?  Millionaires and billionaires who come from a business background where forces of free-market choices,  competition, and new standards create disruption in the market place allowing the best products to rise to the surface.  Ravitch names names.  We know who they are and they include Bill Gates, Betsy De Vos, and the Walton (Wallmart) families.
Ravitch aptly changes their names from education “Reformers” to education “Disrupters.” Measurement is key to determining educational CONTINUE READING: Vicki Cobb Reviews SLAYING GOLIATH | Diane Ravitch's blog

NANCY BAILEY: Problems Surrounding Amplify’s Core Knowledge Language Arts to Teach Reading

Problems Surrounding Amplify’s Core Knowledge Language Arts to Teach Reading

Problems Surrounding Amplify’s Core Knowledge Language Arts to Teach Reading

Many teachers and parents raise concerns that instruction is age-inappropriate. Many school districts have signed on to Amplify to teach subjects including language arts and reading. Teachers must teach virtual, scripted, commercial programs.

Even if you don’t live in Oklahoma, I recommend checking online to read Tulsa Kids. Betty Casey is the editor and her reports about schools are well-written and informative.

Betty gave me permission to repost this report. It’s about Amplify’s Core Knowledge Language Arts online program. It’s an eye-opener! It raises questions about how Amplify is being used not only in Oklahoma but around the country.

Are the instructional objectives and expectations with Amplify’s online reading and CONTINUE READING: Problems Surrounding Amplify’s Core Knowledge Language Arts to Teach Reading

America’s Social Policies and School Funding Levels Fail Our Poorest Children | janresseger

America’s Social Policies and School Funding Levels Fail Our Poorest Children | janresseger

America’s Social Policies and School Funding Levels Fail Our Poorest Children

President Donald Trump has been at Davos this week exalting the United States’ soaring economy. While Trump brags about more people working, however, he neglects to mention the ongoing collapse of manufacturing and its replacement—gig and temporary employment—along with the paltry wages of many workers. Last week Paul Krugman more accurately described how many families are faring  in greater Cleveland, Ohio, where I live.  Krugman writes: “The other day a correspondent asked me a good question: What important issue aren’t we talking about? My answer, after some reflection, is the state of America’s children.”

The problem starts with today’s jobs and today’s low minimum wage, but Krugman explores a range of other ways the fraying social safety fails to support the poorest children: “What’s especially striking is the contrast between the way we treat our children and the way we treat our senior citizens. Social Security isn’t all that generous… but it doesn’t compare too badly with other countries’ retirement systems. Medicare actually spends lavishly compared with single-payer systems elsewhere. So America’s refusal to help children isn’t part of a broad opposition to government programs; we single out children for especially harsh treatment… The answer, I’d suggest, goes beyond the fact that children can’t vote; while seniors can and do. There has also been a poisonous interaction between racial antagonism and bad social analysis.” Krugman describes all the myths about social programs causing “a culture of dependency” among the poor, and he continues: “At this point, however, we know that cultural explanations of social collapse were all wrong. The sociologist William Julius Wilson argued long ago that social dysfunction in big cities was caused, not by culture, but by the disappearance of good jobs. And he has been vindicated by what happened to much of the American heartland, which suffered a… disappearance of good jobs and a similar surge in social dysfunction… Multiple studies have found that safety net programs for children have big long-term consequences.  Children who receive adequate nutrition and health care grow up to become healthier, more productive adults.”

Here are just some of the issues that have emerged in recent articles in my clipping file about the plight of America’s children.

At the top of the list is the persistence of family homelessness in America’s cities.  At the end of October, New York City’s Advocates for Children reported that for the fourth year in a row: CONTINUE READING: America’s Social Policies and School Funding Levels Fail Our Poorest Children | janresseger

With A Brooklyn Accent: Woodie Guthrie and Billie Holiday- Revolutionizing Music and Society in the Great Depression

With A Brooklyn Accent: Woodie Guthrie and Billie Holiday- Revolutionizing Music and Society in the Great Depression

Woodie Guthrie and Billie Holiday- Revolutionizing Music and Society in the Great Depression

The Great Depression was a moment in US history when two features of American life in the 1920's were decisively challenged- the unchecked leadership of the nation  by its business elite,  and the rigid segregation of Blacks in all areas of social and economic life  As the nation's economy collapsed, and a large percentage of its population experienced poverty and insecurity on an unprecedented scale, radical activists- some of them Socialists and Communists-  organized protests which challenged the idea that  the leadership by the rich, and the segregation and stigmatization of Black people was good for the nation as a whole. In fact, they argued the opposite- that if the nation was to be saved, its working people, not its wealthy elite had to take the lead, and that Black people had to be an integral part of every movement for progress and national renewal. Little by little, these ideas began to influence political discourse, labor organizing, journalism and literature. and by the end of the decade,  popular culture and popular music  Though racism remained virulent in all spheres of American life, the Depression marked a time when a critical mass of whites began to join with blacks in movements to protest lynching, employment discrimination, limitations on voting rights, and segregation in all its forms. These anti-racist  protests drew strength from, and were often connected to, an unprecedented upheaval of America's working people, resulting in the funding of  government aid to the jobless, the beginnings of a social safety net and the unionization of the nation's largest industries, efforts in which Black people played an important part

Popular music of the Depression reflected, and at times reinforced these changes in the way the nation saw itself and conducted its business.  For the first time in many years, artists began singing  about the hardships faced by the poor, the displaced and the homeless; CONTINUE READING: With A Brooklyn Accent: Woodie Guthrie and Billie Holiday- Revolutionizing Music and Society in the Great Depression

Cartoons on Technologies Today | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Cartoons on Technologies Today | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Cartoons on Technologies Today

OK, I confess: I cannot resist cartoons that poke at Americans’ love of technologies. Sure, affection for new machines and devices is age-old. From colonial times to yesterday, Americans–not all, of course–have invested their dreams of convenience, entertainment, and effortless labor into new technologies. Here are some cartoons that get at that unstoppable, irresistible urge. Enjoy!

MORE CARTOONS: Cartoons on Technologies Today | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

School Choice Fails Students and Parents – radical eyes for equity

School Choice Fails Students and Parents – radical eyes for equity

School Choice Fails Students and Parents

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

It has been a decade since I raised this question, Parental Choice?, after spending about a year examining all the research available as well as the public and political debate about school choice.

Now, Education Week seems to have finally recognized some of the conclusions I presented in that book: Why Don’t Parents Always Choose the Best Schools? I think it is important that this article does not ask “if” parents choose the best schools, but concedes that parental choice is a flawed part of the school choice as an avenue to educational reform argument.

In short, my research and analysis show that parental choice and school choice fail because they suffer from the same problem concerning all choice driven by America’s idealized perception of individual freedom and market economies. If school choice were a powerful and effective lever for positive educational reform (and it isn’t), market forces remain indirect ways to create the sort of equity of opportunity that a democracy could accomplish directly.

Choice, at best, is slow and erratic, depending on the quality and expertise of CONTINUE READING: School Choice Fails Students and Parents – radical eyes for equity

White Folks Must Stop Appropriating and Start Appreciating Dr. King - Philly's 7th Ward

White Folks Must Stop Appropriating and Start Appreciating Dr. King - Philly's 7th Ward

WHITE FOLKS MUST STOP APPROPRIATING AND START APPRECIATING DR. KING

On Monday, white America celebrated the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 91st birthday, even though he was born on Jan. 15 in 1929.

And just like white America got the date wrong, it also got MLK himself wrong. Or, better stated, it continues to treat him wrong by appropriating instead of appreciating this revolutionary. Yes, I said revolutionary — and I meant it, too. I’ll explain why shortly.

By the way, if y’all white folks play that 1963 “I Have A Dream” speech one more damn time, I’m gonna scream! That speech wasn’t even his first at the Lincoln Memorial. MLK had already given one six years earlier in 1957 in front of a massive crowd of up to 30,000.

He is much more than that 1963 “I Have A Dream” speech. He is much bigger than that 1963 “I Have A Dream” speech. He is a revolutionary “recidivist ex-con” who had been jailed 29 times for his “anti-social” behavior. And if he said today in 2020 what he said back in 1963, which was that “One has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws,” y’all white folks would call the cops on him. And they’d beat him, shoot him, and/or kill him.

Before I explain his indisputable revolutionary street cred, allow me to CONTINUE READING: White Folks Must Stop Appropriating and Start Appreciating Dr. King - Philly's 7th Ward

Wanted: Chapters About No Excuses Charters | Cloaking Inequity

Wanted: Chapters About No Excuses Charters | Cloaking Inequity

WANTED: CHAPTERS ABOUT NO EXCUSES CHARTERS

Much has been written about “No Excuses” charter schools and their deleterious impacts on student of color (See for example Colonizing the Black Natives). Amber Kim is leading a groundbreaking new book project entitled,  Inexcusable: Contemporary Counter-Narratives that Expose the “New Face” of No Excuses Schools. You may remember Dr. Kim from the Diane Ravitch episode of Truth for America podcast.

Here’s the link to the call for chapter proposals and the questions the book seeks to address.

1. Were you associated with a high-compliance school that promised a rigorous education and college acceptance but demanded compliance, obedience, and silence?
2. Did you find yourself at odds with the methods, policies, curriculum, and/or testing?
3. Do you feel like your experience and concerns were unwelcome, shamed, discredited, or silenced?
4. Do you feel a need to describe your lived experiences in writing or in art?

Amber Kim has an extensive background studying and critiquing “No Excuses” charters. She writes,

We want you to propose a chapter! We are collecting counter-narratives that expose the rougher side of high-compliance schooling, the side that is often hidden from the public and we need authors who are present/former students, educators, or family members of high compliance, “No Excuses” schools to tell their stories. in writing or another art form. No writing experience necessary! No minimum length. You only need first hand experience in No-Excuses-like schools.

By publishing a collection of counter-narratives validation and healing can take place for those impacted by NES. Additionally, people who are considering creating, attending, promoting, and/or working in No Excuses schools will have access to a fuller truth about them and their costs to students, staff, and families. This volume unmasks the new face of NES, exposing its existence, methods, and impacts. Knowing the  contemporary face of NES allows for accountability, repair, and systemic solutions.

Please pass this call along and Facebook Like, Tweet, etc below and/or reblog to share this discussion with others.

For all of Cloaking Inequity’s posts on charters click here.

Check out and follow my YouTube channel here.

Twitter: @ProfessorJVH

Click here for Vitae.

Wanted: Chapters About No Excuses Charters | Cloaking Inequity

History Wars: How Politics Shape Textbooks – Have You Heard

History Wars: How Politics Shape Textbooks – Have You Heard

History Wars: How Politics Shape Textbooks

What are students learning about American history in these hyper-polarized times? That’s what New York Times reporter Dana Goldstein wanted to know. And so she set off on an epic reading adventure: 43 middle and high school American history textbooks, 4,800 in all. Have You Heard talks to Dana about how our divided nation shows up on the pages of these books on subjects such as immigration, the economy and suburbanization. Also, Jack revisits the great debate in the 1990’s over history standards. Full transcript of the episode is available here.

And in this episode’s segment of In the Weeds, available to our Patreon subscribers, Jack and Jennifer discuss the emergence of the National Parents Union, a new group with an old cause and some powerful friends. Listen in by becoming a patron!

History Wars: How Politics Shape Textbooks – Have You Heard

Gene Glass and David Berliner Publish a Joint Essay-Review of SLAYING GOLIATH | Diane Ravitch's blog

Gene Glass and David Berliner Publish a Joint Essay-Review of SLAYING GOLIATH | Diane Ravitch's blog

Gene Glass and David Berliner Publish a Joint Essay-Review of SLAYING GOLIATH

The two most distinguished education researchers in the nation are Gene V. Glass and David C. Berliner, both of whom have held the highest positions in their profession and are universally admired for their careful research and long history of defending the highest standards in the research community.

Together they wrote an essay-review of my book SLAYING GOLIATH.

The review can also be accessed here.

They found the book to be fair-minded and unbiased. And they liked it a lot!

They did some genealogical research about me and my family.

They refer to this blog as “the most influential communications medium in the history of public education.”

They describe the book “as the efforts of a historian to find the facts and follow where they lead.”

They write “We sincerely thank Ravitch for her careful CONTINUE READING: Gene Glass and David Berliner Publish a Joint Essay-Review of SLAYING GOLIATH | Diane Ravitch's blog

NYC Educator: Fairness in Dress Codes

NYC Educator: Fairness in Dress Codes

Fairness in Dress Codes

It appears that dress codes must be uniform, and you can't simply ban halter tops with cutoffs split up to the belt loops. For me, at least, that's a relief. I never, ever say a thing to young women wearing revealing clothes. For one thing, I honestly don't much care what they wear. For another, if I were otherwise inclined, I'd be really preoccupied with crossing some line or other that would bring me over CR A-421, verbal abuse.

Verbal abuse is kind of in the ear of the beholder. If I say something about a young woman's clothing, she may feel uncomfortable or ridiculed, and then I'm sitting in the principal's office explaining why I said whatever I did. Better I keep my stupid mouth shut. As for school policy, if it were clear to me that I had no business speaking to this young woman about her choice of clothing, perhaps the world would be a marginally better place.

I have said things to students with blatant obscenities on their shirts. Since I teach ESL, it's always possible they don't even know what those things mean. I once had a boy put his jacket on and promise not to wear that shirt to my class again. He didn't seem all that worried about it, and I didn't get a letter in my file, so I guess it worked out.

Nonethless, schools will have to readjust their dress codes. You can't just ban the halter top, but you can say torsos must be covered. You can't ban the mini-skirt, but maybe you can say legs must be covered from the knee down. Or up. Or from mid- CONTINUE READING: NYC Educator: Fairness in Dress Codes

How Diverse Is Your Syllabus? – radical eyes for equity

How Diverse Is Your Syllabus? – radical eyes for equity

How Diverse Is Your Syllabus?

During an impromptu pre-department meeting chat with literacy colleagues, we began to think about examining our syllabi for diversity of required and recommended texts. We noted that often people examine reading lists for K-12 students in terms of diversity, such as children’s literature, adolescent literature, and the secondary canon.

Below are the texts listed on my course syllabi for all courses I currently teach on a regular basis. I have put white male authors in red text for a quick glance at diversity.

Assigned and Recommended Texts in Taught Courses

[In many courses, students choose among these texts, and in some courses, students have choice outside this list. These are texts offered on course syllabi as limited choice but required in courses.]

White male author

Why We Teach Now, Sonia Nieto

White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk about Racism, Robin DiAngelo

For White Folks Who Teach in the Hood…and the Rest of Y’all Too, Chris Emdin CONTINUE READING: How Diverse Is Your Syllabus? – radical eyes for equity

Mothers, Make A Phone Call Today | Real Learning CT

Mothers, Make A Phone Call Today | Real Learning CT

Mothers, Make A Phone Call Today

Today, let’s each of us call the office of one Republican senator and ask the question: “Why would an innocent man and you as a jurist interested in the truth not want all the evidence out and all the witnesses to testify? Wouldn’t you if you were innocent?”

Tom Friedman explains why that simple question is what we must ask now. 

For millions of mothers to ask that question now of senators will save our republic from shame and disgrace and could even save the republic itself. It can allow as to prove that we still have a government with three equal branches and that the U.S. Constitution is still the foundation of that government.

We bring up our children to tell the truth, to know right from wrong, to admit CONTINUE READING: Mothers, Make A Phone Call Today | Real Learning CT

You may phone the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.

Louisiana Educator: Louisiana's K-12 curriculum is not preparing students for college or for life!

Louisiana Educator: Louisiana's K-12 curriculum is not preparing students for college or for life!

Louisiana's K-12 curriculum is not preparing students for college or for life!

Part I of a two part examination of our failing graduation standards

The Louisiana Commissioner of Higher Education announced recently that only 18% of our students are succeeding in college.
At the joint meeting of BESE and the Board of Regents in December 2019, the Commissioner of Higher Education, Kim Hunter Reed, reported on studies that reveal that of 100 ninth-graders, only 45 enter college and 18 will earn a two- or four-year degree. This is a tacit admission that the big push for college prep by BESE and the Department of Education for the last 20 years has been a dismal failure. But the Advocate report of the joint meeting quotes the education leaders promising to double down on college prep for all by offering more dual enrollment courses. The only positive result of this version of college for all is that now, vo-tech courses will be added to the menu.

During the school years spanning from 2000 to 2015, our state education officials had abandoned almost all support for career and vocational education in our K-12 schools, and had shifted to pushing virtually all students to take a college prep curriculum without regard to student aptitude or preferences. At the urging of education reformers, BESE had adopted the Core 4 curriculum for high school graduation which was designed to prepare all students for college. The education reformers and business leaders breathed a sigh of relief that soon almost all students would be prepared for college. The assumption was that even students who chose to seek technical careers that did not require college would benefit from CONTINUE READING: Louisiana Educator: Louisiana's K-12 curriculum is not preparing students for college or for life!

Chaz's School Daze: Governor Cuomo's Steath Charter Cap Expansion

Chaz's School Daze: Governor Cuomo's Steath Charter Cap Expansion

Governor Cuomo's Steath Charter Cap Expansion

Governor Andrew Cuomo has buried in his proposed budget an expansion of the charter cap in New York City. This shows that the Governor is still beholden to the Chharter industry and their education reform supporters despite his claims that he supports public education in the State..

Buried in budget documents released late Tuesday was a proposal to make room for more charter schools in New York City. In 2015, the state set a limit on how many charter schools could open in New York City in the years ahead: 50. Authorizers hit that cap last year. But the total number of charters available has actually been slightly higher, since a 2017 deal allowed authorizers to reissue 22 charters originally issued to charter schools that closed before July 2015.

This week, Cuomo proposed expanding that number, offering a new pathway to open charters as state lawmakers show no signs of CONTINUE READING: Chaz's School Daze: Governor Cuomo's Steath Charter Cap Expansion

CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Another Bill To Take Down, Sort Of, Cyber Charters

CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Another Bill To Take Down, Sort Of, Cyber Charters

PA: Another Bill To Take Down, Sort Of, Cyber Charters

Rep. Curt Sonney is a GOP top dog in the Pennsylvania Education Committee, and he's never been known as a close friend of public schools. But he represents Erie, a district that has been absolutely gutted by school choice, so maybe that's why he has spent the last couple of years nipping at the heels of Pennsylvania's thriving cyber charter industry.

Harrisburg just had hearings on his latest proposal, a bill that he first announced last October and which has something for virtually everyone to hate.

Pennsylvania cyber schools are an absolute mess, barely covered by laws that never anticipated such a thing and protected by a massive pile of money thrown both at lobbying and campaign contributions.

The cybers do offer a service that is useful for some students (I personally know of one such case). But they also provide a quick exit for parents who don't want to deal with truancy issues or other disciplinary problems. Their results are generally very poor (none have ever been ranked proficient on the Big Standardized Test), and state oversight is so lousy that many were allowed to continue operating for years without ever having renewed their charters.

But what really has drawn the wrath of even people who don't pay much attention to education CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: PA: Another Bill To Take Down, Sort Of, Cyber Charters

Trump Administration’s “Junk Food Loophole” is Symptomatic of School Privatization | gadflyonthewallblog

Trump Administration’s “Junk Food Loophole” is Symptomatic of School Privatization | gadflyonthewallblog

Trump Administration’s “Junk Food Loophole” is Symptomatic of School Privatization

Who wants children to eat more junk food?

Apparently the Trump administration does.

This seemed to be the Department of Agriculture’s concern when it announced plans last week to further reduce regulations for healthy meals at the nation’s public schools.

The Department’s new scheme would change the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 to include what critics call a “junk food loophole” in meals offered at public schools – usually breakfasts and lunches.

Currently, sweets and fried foods are allowed only once in a while as part of a CONTINUE READING: Trump Administration’s “Junk Food Loophole” is Symptomatic of School Privatization | gadflyonthewallblog

What Is the National Parents Union? Well… It’s Sure Not a Union.| Fatherly

What Is the National Parents Union? Looks Like a School Choice Group. | Fatherly

What Is the National Parents Union? Well… It’s Sure Not a Union.
Don't get too excited.

On January 16, 2020, veteran union organizers Keri Rodrigues and Alma Marquez hosted the inaugural summit of the National Parents Union. Their new organization’s aim? Advocating on behalf of working-class and poor parents who feel their children are excluded from what they refer to as the “education conversation.”  Some 152 delegates, representing all 50 states, D.C., and Puerto Rico, showed up to lend their support and draft bylaws.

For those versed in education policy, the so-called union founded by Rodrigues and Marquez, both moms, is confounding. While it’s true that the United States’ public education system is a tale of two cities — one wealthy and rich with educational opportunity, one not — the union does not seem designed to push policy targeting inequality. Prior to this latest gig, Marquez worked for Green Dot Public Schools, a pro-charter school organization. For her part, Rodrigues organized Massachusetts Parent’s United, which was criticized for being anti-union and vague in its goals. The National Parents Union is currently funded in part by the Walton Family Foundation, which is run by Sam and Helen Walton, who Rodrigues knows well (they gave her organization $500,000) from pro-charter school work. The union is also supported by the Eli & Edyth Broad Foundation. The Broad Foundation is considered one of the “Big Three” organizations that fund education reform and pro-charter initiatives, alongside the Walton Family Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

This is all to say that the National Parents Union seems to have been constructed rather specifically to oppose the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, millions-strong member organizations that have historically opposed charters, citing the fact that they serve a small group of students and don’t meaningfully address larger inequities in the public school system. This seems to also explain why an CONTINUE READING: What Is the National Parents Union? Looks Like a School Choice Group. | Fatherly