Will California Start a National Revolt Against Bad Ideas? – Bridging Differences – Education Week
By Diane Ravitch
The highlight of the week was Gov. Jerry Brown’s State of the State message, in which he announced his intention to reduce the amount of testing across the state. Standardized testing in California has spun out of control. Children in 2nd grade spend five hours on mandated state tests, for no reason at all. And it is no better, even worse, in other grades! He also made this remarkable statement: “My hunch is that principals and teachers know the most …” Can you believe it? He acknowledges that the people who do the work may know more than those who sit on the sidelines taking pot shots at them.
Governor Brown is a visionary. I met with him and his top staff for over an hour and, unlike the policymakers in Washington, D.C., and other state capitals, he understands that over-testing distorts the purpose of education. He understands that Washington has gotten arrogant and has no idea about how its mandates are warping education. He has a deep understanding that education must liberate the minds of students, not chain them to a format that demeans thoughtfulness and punishes independence and divergent thinking.
via Will California Start a National Revolt Against Bad Ideas? – Bridging Differences – Education Week.
Whose children have been left behind? Framing the 2012 ed debate –
From The Answer Sheet – The Washington Post by Valerie Strauss
A speech by Diane Ravitch
In Washington, D.C., there have been many claims in the media about sensational test score gains, but that’s not what you see on the latest federal tests. In fourth-grade reading, the scores have been rising steadily since 2003, but not for all students. The scores of high-income students have gone up but the scores of black students, Hispanic students, and low-income students remain unchanged for the past four years. In eighth-grade reading, scores are down for the past four years for black students, Hispanic students, and low-income students. And most importantly, the District of Columbia public school system has the largest achievement gap of any city in the nation between white and black students, a staggering 64 points in 4th grade, compared to an average of 30 points for all urban districts; and an equally staggering 58 points in eighth grade, compared to 28 points for all urban districts.Since the mayor took charge in 2002, New York City has enthusiastically imposed market-style reforms. It has more choice than any other major city — parents and students get to choose among 400 high schools, as well as more than 100 charter schools. All schools are given letter grades based on test scores. New York City spent $56 million on merit pay, then abandoned the program when it showed zero results. After nine years of market-based reforms, however, the achievement gap between black and white students is unchanged. On the federal tests, math scores are up but no more than in districts without market reforms. Eighth grade reading scores have been flat since 2003.
In Chicago, where [Education] Secretary [Arne] Duncan’s reform program led to the closing of 100 neighborhood schools, only 18% of the new schools were judged successful by the state of Illinois. On the NAEP [National Assessment for Educational Progress] for cities, Chicago continues to be one of the lowest performing in the nation. Since 2003, black and Hispanic students have seen no improvement in their reading scores in fourth grade. In eighth grade reading, there have been no gains whatever for black students or low income students since federal testing began in 2002, and no gains for Hispanic students since 2005. According to the latest research, the black-white achievement gap is larger now in Chicago than when the reforms began.
In Milwaukee, after 21 years of vouchers, black students have among the lowest scores of any city tested, ranked at the bottom along with Detroit, Fresno, and Cleveland. Independent research has shown that the black and low-income students in Milwaukee’s voucher schools have the same low scores as the black students in the public schools. Their scores are about the same as those of poor black kids in the Deep South. Vouchers and competition did nothing for the children of Milwaukee. These children were left behind.
Education Week: Key Obama K-12 Programs Won Out in Budget Deal
I have to admit, the house version looks better to me than all Obama and Duncan’ superfluous nonesense.
By Alyson Klein
The final budget deal funding the U.S. Department of Education through Sept. 30 of next year reflects the Obama administration’s success in fending off House Republican efforts to scrap programs such as Race to the Top, Investing in Innovation, and School Improvement Grants, all administration priorities.
But not everyone is happy about the choice to continue those programs, some of which reflect the administration’s emphasis on competitive grants to finance education initiatives. House Republicans had pushed to eliminate such programs to make room for big, $1 billion increases to major formula-funded programs for disadvantaged children and students in special education.
That would have made some superintendents and advocates for districts happy. The National Association of School Boards, for instance, preferred the House version of the bill, introduced in the fall.
Education Week: Key Obama K-12 Programs Won Out in Budget Deal.
A primer on corporate school reform
by Valerie Strauss
This is a version of a commentary given by Stan Karp edited by Valerie Strauss in her blog “The Answer Sheet.”
Let’s look for a minute at what corporate reformers have actually achieved when it comes to addressing the real problems of public education:
First, they over-reached and chose the wrong target. They didn’t go after funding inequity, poverty, reform faddism, consultant profiteering, massive teacher turnover, politicized bureaucratic management, or the overuse and misuse of testing.
Instead, they went after collective bargaining, teacher tenure, and seniority. And they went after the universal public and democratic character of public schools.
Look again at the proposals the corporate reformers have made prominent features of school reform efforts in every state: rapid expansion of charters, closing low performing schools, more testing, elimination of tenure and seniority for teachers, and test-based teacher evaluation.
If every one of these policies were fully implemented in every state tomorrow, it would do absolutely nothing to close academic achievement gaps, increase high school graduation rates, or expand access to college.
There is no evidence tying any of these proposals to better outcomes for large numbers of kids over time. The greatest gains in reducing gaps in achievement and opportunity have been made during periods when concentrated poverty has been dispersed through efforts at integration, or during economic growth for the black middle class and other communities, or where significant new investments in school funding have occurred.
The Quiz: Test yourself on education in 2011 – The Answer Sheet – The Washington Post#pagebreak#pagebreak#pagebreak
by Valerie Strauss
Valerie Strauss, author of “The Answer Sheet,” has given tremendous support to public education by constantly shining bright lights on the corporate education reform movement. This article presents the most blaring elements of education reform insanity in a test format which emphasizes the great harm Arne Duncan and his billionaire buddies have done and are continuing to do to public education in the United States. I’m sorry to say that I knew the answers to every question – Oh how well I know them. mc
The Answler Sheet – The Washington Post#pagebnitreak#pagebreak#pagebreak.
One Year Ago Congress Defined Untrained Novices “Highly Qualified Teachers” –
Living in Dialogue
By
Guest post by Tara Kini, Public Advocates Inc.
Today marks the first anniversary of one of the most far-reaching legislative actions in education in recent memory. It was highly controversial and addressed a subject at the forefront of the ongoing debate about educational equity. But if you are like most Americans, you probably have no idea that it ever happened. And that is exactly what the measures proponents wanted.
Congress stealthily slipped into a temporary budget bill last year language that allows states to label teachers as “highly qualified” before they have finished or even begun training through alternative certification programs. This measure codified an administrative approach initially adopted during the Bush years and essentially gutted one of the most central equity provisions in the No Child Left Behind Act. For now, the legislation has ended many education advocates’ hopes of addressing in the near term a problem that has lingered for many years: the high concentration of untrained teachers in schools serving low-income, predominately minority students. Even worse, the provision also frees states and school districts from the obligation to inform parents that their children’s teachers are not fully certified.
The “highly qualified teacher” amendment was drafted at the behest of those seeking to overturn a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in favor of low-income students and parents. The plaintiffs in that case, Renee v. Duncan, had successfully challenged the federal regulation that allowed teachers-in-training to be called “highly qualified.” Teach for America, whose model centers on funneling new college graduates with five weeks of training to low-income, high-minority schools, saw this victory as a threat to their program. They successfully lobbied Congress to halt the decision in its tracks by writing the unlawful regulation into law through the 2012-13 school year.
Key Obama K-12 Programs Won Out in Budget Deal
A bit of good news whith some bad.
By Alyson Klein
The final budget deal funding the U.S. Department of Education through Sept. 30 of next year reflects the Obama administration’s success in fending off House Republican efforts to scrap programs such as Race to the Top, Investing in Innovation, and School Improvement Grants, all administration priorities.
But not everyone is happy about the choice to continue those programs, some of which reflect the administration’s emphasis on competitive grants to finance education initiatives. House Republicans had pushed to eliminate such programs to make room for big, $1 billion increases to major formula-funded programs for disadvantaged children and students in special education.
Education Week: Key Obama K-12 Programs Won Out in Budget Deal.
Are All Choices a Choice?
Bridging Differences – Education Week
By Deborah Meier on December 8, 2011
If charters had stuck to their original selling point—the need for innovation on a small, less-regulated scale before we mandated it on a large scale—there’d be a few grumbles and otherwise just curiosity. But, as you point out, Diane, it’s clear that the charters are mostly not innovative, not doing better than the alternative regular public schools, nor designed to be labs to strengthen the larger system. Rather, they are mostly attempts, through the back door, to replace public education with a parallel system of semi-public/semi-private schools; and that, whether they do better or not, will get favored treatment as long as there’s money to be made. That’s a change.
. . . Pilot schools in Boston were meant as experimental labs, not as an experiment in choice (which Boston already had for other reasons) but in teaching, learning, and governance practices. The Pilots were largely very innovative and got good results, but few of their practices were allowed to be implemented in all schools. The “Big Boys” you describe so well, Diane, chose instead to put their weight behind charters rather than Pilots.
Are All Choices a Choice? – Bridging Differences – Education Week.
Why teachers are leaving the profession | Health, Medical, and Science Updates
My cousin brought this article to my attention. I love it when I find an article that explains the most critical threats to education with authority. Unfortunately, those with any credentials in education are NOT the ”go to” people in the current “education reform movement.” Frustrated and demorilized educators are leaving our classrooms because their jobs have become increasingly impossible due to severe cuts in resources and the increase of impossible expectations. Those who have great wealth are making more at the expense of our children and the future of the country.
We will have a dirth of educated citizens including effective educators because money trumps science and logistics while the “reform” is driven by billionaire cronies who find it an interesting new amusement as well as a source for further monetary gains. Check out Diane Ravitch’s blog piece The Outrage of the Week which refers to The Gates Foundation’s connection to Pearson, the company that has a monopoly on all the tests that are driving “reform.” Together they will develop the national curriculum then sell all the materials and tests that will be forced upon teachers and children.
A provocative new article in the American Journal of Education argues that many teachers in the age of rigid curricula, high-stakes testing, and reduced classroom autonomy are finding it difficult to access the “moral rewards” of their profession. This demoralization of teaching threatens to drive away even the most passionate and dedicated of teachers.
“The moral rewards of teaching are activated when educators feel that they are doing what is right in terms of one’s students, the teaching profession, and themselves,” writes Doris Santoro, a professor of education at Bowdoin College. But, she argues, current policy reforms often take away a teacher’s ability to be responsive to students’ needs, and blunt the sense that a teacher is doing what is right for students. This in turn leads to feelings of frustration and hopelessness that are too often misdiagnosed as “teacher burnout.”
via Why teachers are leaving the profession | Health, Medical, and Science Updates.
The Outrage of the Week – Bridging Differences – Education Week
This is what I don’t understand. The free market nearly collapsed our economy in September 2008. Why would anyone now think that our public schools should be turned over to the privatizers, entrepreneurs, and go-getters who have figured out how to market their wares, brand their products, and turn education into a lucrative business? I don’t mean to cast aspersion on American business. I like free markets, I like the range of goods and services they provide. I have no objection to people making a profit on their goods and services, but I also think that a decent society needs a vibrant public sector. Frankly, the handing over of public education to the free market makes me profoundly uneasy.
I Googled “education entrepreneur” and got nearly 1 million hits.
Profound changes are under way, Deborah. Our federal government, the big foundations, and many state governments are allied in their determination to impose radical change on the public schools. Big money is at stake. And the lives of millions of children. What happens when the interests of the investors and the interests of children are not the same? Which will take precedence?
via The Outrage of the Week – Bridging Differences – Education Week.
