I have posted a few articles about the sham education offered in cybercharters, which have only one great benefit: They make big money for their sponsors.
One of the worst is ECOT–the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow–which rakes in millions despite its high attrition rates and the terrible performance of its students. The owner of ECOT gives generously to Republican politicians, and they in turn favor ECOT. The scariest thought is that this might be the “classroom of tomorrow,” and if it is, our nation is in deep trouble.
I got this email today:
| As a former ECOT teacher, I can definitely say that the school is a joke and a waste of taxpayer dollars for the majority of students who attend. Money is spent holding huge professional development sessions several times a year that do little than repeat the things heard at the previous sessions. Student performance is abysmal and administration does nothing to curb truancy. You can log in every 29 days, do no work and absolutely nothing happens. They try to push horrible grading policies, such as a 35% in each quarter = a 70% for the year = passing the class with a C. |
Diane Ravitch's blog 
To all who post here: Please spread the news of this blog far and wide. We public school educators, post-secondary teachers, parents and any others who believe in public education need to shout out to all the idiocies that are highlighted daily in this blog.
A very conservative successful businessman friend of mine wrote me in part of a continuing dialogue on the supposed “failure” of public education:
“My point is you are surrounded with regular opinion of the deterioration of the scholastic performance in the USA by almost every measurable standard.
You continue to delude yourself into the position that there is no accurate way to test so no harm has been done.
Every thing other than art has some objective measure of perfomance and accomplishment. My supposition is you will quickly accept the art analogy. However keep in mind that even with art if there is no acceptance of the work as grounbreaking or of significant value the artist starves.
If you can find me 5 quotes from knowledgeable education personnel and I will even take you as one that clearly stipulates that the level of knowledge of today’s high school graduates exceeds the level of those from 1970. Stipulation the opinion must cover math, science, history, reading and verbal written expression of language.
If you can find 4 supporting positions to your own that have experience on a national or worldwide scale. I will be a long way towards converted.
Single caveat the authors must not have a potential secondary agenda — can’t be head of the teachers union where this position is expected or necessary to maintaining a job or income.” (his errors)
Notice in his last sentence the subtle union bashing and that the although it’s okay for his sources, usually the Wall Street Journal to make money off of bashing public education, we promoters aren’t allowed to have any pecuniary interests. My reply follows (with it’s fury included as we are old (since grade school) friends and enjoy lambasting each other as seen by him telling me that I “delude” myself.
XXX,
You state “My point is you are surrounded with regular opinion of the
deterioration of the scholastic performance in the USA by almost every
measurable standard. You continue to delude yourself into the position
that there is no accurate way to test so no harm has been done. Every
thing other than art has some objective measure of perfomance and
accomplishment.” No, there are many things in life other than art,
think maybe of a beautiful woman, that cannot be “measured” and a
student’s learning falls into this category. Logically a quality
cannot be quantified (measured), two separate logical categories. To
do so is to perpetuate a falsehood. When one starts with a falsehood
by definition any conclusion will be false also, except for that chance
occurrence of getting a conclusion right, like the blind and anosmic
squirrel who occasionally finds an acorn. Teaching and learning is an
art and not a science and therefore cannot be “measured”. (And I
consider “teaching and learning” to be a singular entity which is why I
used “is” and not “are”).
You request four experts, other than myself. I’ll give you two for
now. Read and understand what they have to say and you won’t need
others. The easiest way would be to just believe what I have to say
and go from there-ha ha!
No sir, I am not the deluded one! The deluded ones are those that
believe that free market, competition based solutions are the key to
“improving” American public education a la Gates, Broad, Romney and the
various others like M. Rhee who taught for less years than I have
fingers on my left hand minus the thumb or A. Duncan who has less years
teaching experience than I have noses on my face. None, not one of
these folks (minus Rhee with her three years of teaching that included
taping her students mouths shut with tape) has any teaching experience
in a public school. Excuse me, but who the hell is the public
school expert here? One of the richest bastards on the earth who has
repeatedly been adjudicated (and settled for monetary payments) for
having practiced monopolistic/extortionistic business tactics in many
countries on the face of the earth? No way!! He’s just looking to
sell more “product” which is shitty at best compared to a lot of others
that are out there. He of the “stack ranking” employee evaluation
system that many former employees state “kills innovation and morale”?
Nope sorry, I ain’t buying. Just because one has made a shitload of
money does not qualify him to be an expert in public education.
For starters you state “there is no accurate way to test so no harm has
been done”. Au contraire, absolutely there is no accurate way to test,
that is why the harm is so great to those who have been miscategorized,
labelled, and graded. Noel Wilson, a former head of standardized
testing for the state of New South Wales in Australia has written
extensively about educational standards, standardized testing, grading
and the problem of error inherent in those processes. A ton of harm
has been perpetuated on the innocent victim, the student. He estimates
that in the standardized testing process 1 out of every 5 students is
miscategorized due to the error involved in the whole process. Boy,
that’s an accurate measure where 1 out of 5 is wrong, yep that’s what I
want to be judged on. I ask that you read and understand his 1997
dissertation “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” which can
be found at: http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/577 . It’s not an
easy read, I’ve been through it over a dozen times and each time I take
out something I hadn’t comprehended before. Or for an easier read (not
much but you’re an engineer you should be able to handle it) read and
understand his review of the “testing bible”-“Standards for Educational
and Psychological Testing” of the American Psychological Association,
the American Educational Research Association, and the National Council
on Measurement in Education, entitled “A Little Less than Valid: An
Essay Review” which can be found at:
http://www.edrev.info/essays/v10n5index.html . Okay there is one
international expert!
Let me give you a national “expert”, Diane Ravitch, from Wiki: “Diane
Silvers Ravitch (born July 1, 1938) is an historian of education, an
educational policy analyst, and a research professor at New York
University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human
Development. Previously, she was a U.S. Assistant Secretary of
Education. . . . She was appointed to public office by Presidents
George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Secretary of Education Richard
Riley appointed her to serve as a member of the National Assessment
Governing Board, which supervises the National Assessment of
Educational Progress; she was a member of NAGB from 1997 to 2004.” She
was one of the national figures pushing for the “No Child Left Behind”
legislation at the turn of this century. Her book, “Left Back, A
Century of Battles over School Reform” was considered authoritative at
the time. I read it to know what the “enemy” was thinking. I knew at
the time that NCLB was based on falsehoods and lies (Rod Paige who
supposedly had educational miracles-later thoroughly debunked and
shown for the lies that it was, occur under his tenure as
superintendent of the Houston school district was Georgie Porgie’s
Secretary of Education at the time). Ravitch was a huge national voice
and supporter of NCLB back then.
She has, since, in the last 3 years or so totally reversed her
position, stating that she couldn’t have foreseen the negative
consequences of that legislation. You know, I “foresaw” those negative
outcomes at the time reading about similar systems of high stakes
testing that had taken place in England and New Zealand and that was
with the information that was available at the measly UMSL education
library. I could see those negative effects as a Masters then Doctoral
student in Education Administration. I invite you to go to her
education blog at: https://dianeravitch.net/ and read for yourself what
she has to say, all totally referenced as to sources.
XXX, I have been studying this (education reform, standards and
standardized testing) for almost 15 years now, I’ve examined the whole
process top to bottom, I have never taken this self imposed charge of
debunking very harmful educational practices lightly. And yes, I am on
the fringe with my way of thinking about this. Most people are so
conditioned to think that grades, labeling students and standardized
testing are fine and dandy educational practices. I don’t. I believe
that we do a lot of harm to students with these practices. I let my
students know that grades are bullshit, that not a single one can be
accurate and that it is a game that is played that doesn’t need to be
played.
Read what I’ve suggested. I think you will understand better where I
come from in this “debate”.
This gentleman is misinformed.
Please tell him that the test scores of U.S. students on the federal National Assessment of Educational Progress–the only reliable longitudinal data–are at their highest point in history for all groups–for whites, blacks, Hispanics, and Asians.
Please tell him that graduation rates are at their highest point in history.
Tell him to watch for my new book in 2013.
Diane
I can’t wait for your new book! You probably decide this at the end, but a possible title??
I am waiting anxiously. Right now I am re-reading parts of The death and life….as well as keeping up with all posts and links…it is becoming a part time job, but I love being informed. Thank you.
Thanks for being a faithful reader. I don’t have a title yet. Whatever I choose now would change anyway by the time I am done.
Ripoff! If a child misses more than twenty unexcused days in a brick and mortar school in my state, retention is in the works. Attendance of students is often found in teacher evaluation instruments. Here again no accountability expected of charters.
I was happy to read this article in our local paper, Star Watch: Cyberschools multiply but scores fall short -There’s little accountability in state’s fast-growing system.
http://www.indystar.com/article/20120714/NEWS04/207140350/Star-Watch-Cyberschools-multiply-scores-fall-short
Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels & Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett support on-line education & providing options for quality education. Yet, three of these schools’ recent letter grades, given by the state based on student performance in 2010-11, were a D and 2 Fs.
Now, I don’t generally get nauseous reading the news. There are exceptions. Especially with comments like these…Bennett added that, The new achievement gap Is about technology and how students are accessing it. And, operators of the online schools say test scores are not indicative of their performance But rather are the result of a transient student population.
That’s one of the big issues with the two largest urban schools in Indiana, too. But the state will be taking over 5 high schools and turning them over to private operators this fall regardless of the fact that in the Indianapolis area, four out of the ten schools with the biggest drops in test scores were charter schools.
I hope voters in Indiana “wakeup” and get engaged on the educational issues/policies, demand Bennett to defend his flawed agenda, and vote him out of office this November.