Are you ready for the new standards? Check out how Microsoft can help your school.
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Love the “partnering” with school districts to help them meet demands of testing, whether they like or not. Well yes when Gates created the demands. School boards need to get involved and question the funds for this and question then question the states It’s all a made up business.
No matter how you feel about CCSS, this is clearly a conflict of interest. And what do Duncan and Obama have to say about it?
How decrepit . . . . . .
Agree, Robert. It’s about $$$$$ and power over to make self look good while actually awful things are being done…in the name of students…what —-.
Duncan and Onama? Well…2+2= 4.
Surprise…Surprise…NOT! What a joke. They wasted no time trying to get in at the end of a (hopefully) sinking testing ship. I’m sure they thought they had quite a bit more time to push this out but not that testing seems to be taking a bit of a turn for the worse, they better get this product out there ASAP. AHHHH this is so tiresome, if only my whole school could afford Macs, I’d switch them all over just for spite (I’m also the tech director)!
When you see something like this, which demonstrates so clearly how Gates stands to profit from Common Core, it’s hard to believe there are naive people who have been hoodwinked into believing that the richest man in America is just being philanthropic and doesn’t want any more money. What a crock!
Even if he did not want a ROI, what he has done and how he has done it is illegal, immoral, and unethical. So too were the people in government who aided and abetted . . . .
Click on the check out Microsoft link above and choose the live chat. I game them an earful and got this in response:
“I am sorry you are feeling this way regarding Microsoft. I will will pass this information to them”
Linda, this is what I got in reply: ”
Good morning, Jean! I will make sure to send you comments and concerns to my supervisor.”
it could be a computer kicking out the response?
Linda and Jean: Scripts! No surprise!
I think TE is working part time in their customer service department. If you ask for his supervisor, he might give you a mainframe to talk to. Beware.
I believe that Gates’ current wealth is about $70 billion. I can’t read his mind but in fact it would not in the least surprise me that he is not greatly motivated at this point to increase his wealth.
From what I’ve read and seen the amount of wealth is only a measure of the power it confers. More money means more power. I believe he is greatly motivated to increase his wealth because he wants more power to interfere in all his pet causes, including the destruction of public schools.
If Gates were strongly oriented to acquiring power I would think he would long ago have used his wealth to finance political campaigns or at least sought out appointment to a a high governmental post. As I said I can’t read his mind but status-seeking seems a more likely explanation of his behavior than either acquiring wealth or power.
Gates doesn’t need to seek status. As the richest man in America and one of the richest in the world, he has enough status. He sincerely believes that the free market creates benefits for everyone, as it did for him. He wants to open up education to entrepreneurs and innovators, thinking that this causes progress. What is has generated instead is profit-seeking, bottom-feeding, and a corruption of the meaning of education. Gates believes in data and measurement, and that has inflicted endless testing on the schools, again corrupting education for the sake of his misinformed ideas.
Jim: there are other ego needs beyond “wealth”; the younger people (namely Commissioners of Education) are on 3 year career ladders; that is a motivator….. wealth is not the only motivator/incentive.
From the letter Gates and his wife posted earlier this year, a plan for the rest of their lives (from Forbes):
“It also matches the way he and Melinda have built the Gates Foundation, which will wind down, deploying all its resources on their stated goals – health equity currently sits at number one — within 20 years of their passing. “Rich people in those times will be able to pick what the problems are then,” says Gates. His work, however, will be done. It starts again today.”
Notice how he emphasizes that the rich get to pick (and supposedly, solve) what the problems are. No mention anywhere in the missive of the people they choose to “save” or how the rest of society gets to be involved. Hint: they don’t.
That level of hubris and belief in privilege can only come from a person wedded to power and wealth.
Diane – Your comment about Gates’ motives seems to suggest that they are altruistic, viz. that he is motivated to improve other people’s well-being but is technically mistaken about how to go about doing this. Am I correct that this is your view?
Jim, I do not impute evil motives to others. I am willing to give Bill Gates the benefit of the doubt and assume that he wants to do well for others. But his ideas–testing and privatization and data collection ad infinitum– are wrong and harmful. I don’t that he is an evil man. I think he is misinformed and ill-advised. Common Core will turn out to be a disastrous bet on his part. It already has.
Diane – My views about Bill Gates and his educational ideas are actually pretty similar to what you have just said.
I do not ascribe motives to others. It is difficult for me to comprehend that a man who has brought so much misery into my life, the lives of my colleagues and our students is well intentioned. As a member of what used to be called the middle class, I cannot fathom a life with seemingly unlimited resources. I was taught to respect the expertise of others. I would never presume to dictate to engineers how to build bridges, or to surgeons how to perform surgery. I am well versed in the perameters of my knowledge and experience. Do I not deserve to be honored for the narrow field of expertise I have cultivated? Mr. Gates, you know nothing about education. You know nothing about developmental psychology. You know nothing about English Language Arts Literacy. Maybe you know something about math. I have more formal education than you do. Why must I bow to your whims?
The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. We can read Gates testimony in the anti-trust case. We can read Paul Allen’s account of overhearing Gates discussing Allen’s lack of contribution (while Allen suffered from cancer) and how to dilute his equity. We can read what Steve Jobs said about Gates in his biography.
Diane, please consider the possibility that you’re wrong about Gates’ motives. Here’s the comment I posted just now on Cody’s new blog:
Bill Gates might not be capable of connecting these dots at all, Anthony.
This wasn’t an “experiment” to improve education outcomes. All of the measures Gates has promoted are a control and enforcement apparatus, and his almost insatiable market control demands are based on the presumption that he could demonstrate whatever outcomes he desired once he had a regulatory monopoly.
Gates made his play for regulatory capture of American public education policy, and almost won it
Yesterday, this Microsoft webpage got a lot of play on the world wide web:
“Microsoft in Education
Partnering with schools to help pass the test
The right technology can help your school ease the transition to the new State Standards for common assessment testing.”
The end game is at hand, and the Emperor has paraded forth without any evidence of data-driven improvements to cover his naked grab for power and profits.
Can he really wrap his mind around that?
http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2014/07/bill_gates_excuse.html
Chemtcher, but why does he want to capture the market? Power? Control? No, I don’t think it is about money, even though Microsoft is in partnership with Pearson and is cashing in.
Oh, no. I left an extra link in. I don’t want to await moderation! Diane (and Jim), it is irresponsible NOT to consider the possibility that a corporate dynasty of total public/private market domination might appeal to the richest man in the nation, even as a hobby. Bill Gates is walking and quacking like the monopolist duck he is.
Here is the comment I posted on Cody’s new blog.
Bill Gates might not be capable of connecting these dots at all, Anthony.
This wasn’t an “experiment” to improve education outcomes. All of the measures Gates has promoted are a control and enforcement apparatus, and his almost insatiable market control demands are based on the presumption that he could demonstrate whatever outcomes he desired once he had a regulatory monopoly.
Gates made his play for regulatory capture of American public education policy, and almost won it
Yesterday, this Microsoft webpage got a lot of play on the world wide web:
“Microsoft in Education
Partnering with schools to help pass the test
The right technology can help your school ease the transition to the new State Standards for common assessment testing.”
The end game is at hand, and the Emperor has paraded forth without any evidence of data-driven improvements to cover his naked grab for power and profits.
Can he really wrap his mind around that?
http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2014/07/bill_gates_excuse.html
It’s time to investigate a suit and charges against Gates and members of Congress and the Obama cabinet who helped Mr. Gates. . . . . a FORMAL investigation at the very least.
Cx: ” . . . . investigate Mr. Gates, and bring about potential charges against . . . . . “
Robert: who were the bureaucrats who went to Gates asking for funds? They seem to think that “philanthropy” is some kind of a fix for the systemic problems of inequality, corporate profits of capitalism? Probably Coleman was among them but there were others and A. Duncan in his suit fits right in.
“Microsoft, where mediocre standards meet a less than mediocre technology company to make education substandard. ”
It’s the Windows redux.
Scroll down to the bottom right corner and choose the live chat option. Tell them we don’t need their services. Abolish the Gates USDOE.
Yessss! This is brilliant!
Agree with Sharon. I’m mailing the Microsoft print-out to my school board with a statement. “Before I support the school levy this fall, I want to see the Board’s letter to the State Board of Education, opposing charters, for-profits and the hijacking of education by multinational tech and testing companies.
All the money that has been and will be spent on the technology requirements of a test is such a waste. What about decent school buildings, quality books, health care and mental health services for families, etc. …?
Tell them on their live chat, bottom right corner:
http://www.microsoft.com/education/ww/products/xpeos/Pages/default.aspx?id=top_5_tech_essentials?CR_CC=200385727
Or, write a letter, for your friends to sign and send, to the local school board, asking them to contact their state legislator.
Thanks for the suggestions, Linda. Along with my colleagues, many things are being done to try and bring some sanity in this age of reform. ‘Hope my previous comment did not indicate otherwise.
I get the feeling that the reaction to PARCC is going to be as late as the reaction to Common Core was. We’re what, 10 months away?
New Mexico lawsuit (AIR) should put everything on hold but the states are still going ahead; the states draw the PARCC money off the New Mexico “lead” state budgets that were awarded as contracts…. air line travel $$$, consultants$$$, etc. M. Chester got 2 trips to London etc. We need our advocacy; law suits aren’t enough.
PARCC is already dead to Gates. Here’s the observation I posted about this Microsoft webpage on Peter’s excellent blog, PARCC Is in Trouble.
The Microsoft website that got so much internet play yesterday doesn’t even mention PARCC.
“Why the smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium Recommends Windows Upgrade for Schools”
“Making Sense of the Smarter Balanced Technology Numbers”
PARCC is dead. This is her sister, the Wicked Witch of the West.
http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2014/07/parcc-is-in-trouble.html?showComment=1404386209419#c7987763104335028954
Gates malignant Narcissistic behavior is sociopathic. He is like a “mad scientist”, and we are sheep to continue allowing him to possess and experiment on our children with his twisted sadistic exploitation.
I read it so I know they’re hawking to both PARCC and Smarter Balanced “states” but I’m wondering if there’s anything out there about how one is better than the other. There seems to be more resistance to PARCC. Is that just geography or is one better at either marketing or substantive work like “collaboration with actual schools” than the other?
I of course am in the “consortium” that seems to be fractious and sort of rebellious; PARCC 🙂
Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I’m just curious.
I’ve been wondering this, too. It may be that we haven’t had a real SB assessment yet? It seems like we’re a couple of years away. Or it may be that WestEd (or is it EdWest looks more like a group of actual educators than Pearson. At least they seem to have actual educators on the board. (I’m not commenting on their quality, just that they seem to be associated with actual Universities and schools.) Does anyone know if there is another group behind WestEd?
Did you find any mention of PARCC on this Microsoft web page, Chiara?
PARCC is already dead. Gates’ minions have fanned out, and are trying to punk us into writing legislation to pre-legislate Smarter Balanced into control automatically as soon as the “moratorium” expires!
Gates is not dumb. He’s going to let us put PARCC out of its misery, in return for concessions!
Darling-Hammond is his current horse in the race. She’s on twitter now, playing it mealy-mouthed. Are others so disarmed by an unwritten “niceness to billionaires” rule that we can’t denounce this evil marketing attack on little children?
Chemtchr
Do you have Linda DH’s twitter handle? I can’t find it.
The comments about Bill Gates on this blog reflect an obessive desire to demonize him rather than an objective analysis.
Bill Gates is the actor behind the destruction of our profession and the destruction of public schools. He was not elected nor was he asked to remake the public school system of the United States of America by the people who utilize it. He does not. He has assumed powers that effectively make him a dictator for life in charge of education.
Speaking against what he says, does, and how he spends his money is completely objective analysis since he is a one-man show.
Some people are very uncomfortable with anger and fighting back. Fredrick Douglass had a few things to say about that.
Objective analysis is a hobby for the idle rich and highly placed and compensated academics, not a strategy for common teachers, parents, and citizens to save the profession and the very existence of public schools.
Jim, you need to dig deeper about Gates and the control he has exerted over education.
The book Plutocrats tells about the inordinate influence he exerted on the medical profession; so i am agreeing with Peter on this point.
Jim has a point here; last week we spent some time vilifying Louisa Moats but that is not the issue (Fordham does that all the time; they promote Moats and attack Calkins)….. The real issue is Duncan (the man in the suit) who is the front for others; I know I’ve watched too many Nixon conspiracy movies in my day. A lot of teachers say they don’t want to get into politics but politics is (a) how the rules are made and (b) how the budgets are set against priorities. So the obsession about Gates will only carry us so far; might motivate a few. Read Klugman and Stiglitz, Jan Ressenger, deutsch etc and pick out the “plums” or “the pearls”….. but I agree with Jim, basically. It’s still good to vent if you feel powerless; there are a couple of songs that came out this week “bues” etc. that also help
Jim, it’s easy to accept the black and white picture of wonderful Bill Gates, wouldn’t we all wish this fairy tale were true!! Always harder to did deeper for the gray area; which is what we’re all fighting for, the freedom to do so. You are able to have rose colored glasses on and this my friend is how Gates wants it!!!!
Mom/Speducator; I am thankful you have commented because these are not “either/or” decisions ….. when we dig deeper there is essential information in the details. Trying to reduce the world to “fish or cut bait” is an error in thinking but we impress it on adolescents maybe to simplifiy the routines they have to go through in order to decide? I know I think about this in trying to work with high school and college students to get them into compare/contrast with some thoughtfulness . I don’t think the computer programs are able to do this at all and it takes human interaction and on-site courses (not distance learning on a computer).
I am not your friend.
Thank you Jim for coming out and admitting that you are not our friend.
It was obvious from your comments that you are not interested in what we have to say.
Honest self-identification is always helpful.
Well done!
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx I for one do not waste emotion nor time thinking this or that about Bill Gates, nor do I think it an efficient use of any voter’s time to “fight back” against Bill Gates.
What angers me is decades of legislation undoing every financial safeguard put in after the Gr Depr by representatives of a foolish citizenry who needed only 12thgr social studies to see the handwriting on the wall.
What interests me is the legal tangle of 501c this’s & thats & the maze of legal & clearly unethical legislative paths established among foundations, campaign funds, lobbyists, banking, industry, etc. which allows a Bill Gates to dream a dream & put it in classrooms nationwide within 3 yrs. The quick turnaround time, if nothing else, should prove to anyone with half a brain (but a full vote) that democracy is not involved.
There will always be people trying to make a buck by corrupting the system. Knock one down another takes his place, whack-a-mole style. Only laws can stop them.
Respectfully, Freelancer, most humans, by nature, are more interested in stories about people. Political fund raisers found invocation of the Koch name, resulted in a greater number of contributors and more money. Complex and multi-faceted issues need to be reduced to facilitate messaging. A cut-throat zillionaire, with a recognizable name, who takes tax dollars, meant for children, is compelling.
The comments about Teachers made by those Gates is supporting financially reflect an obessive desire to demonize them rather than an objective analysis.
Linda
July 2, 2014 at 10:23 am
Click on the check out Microsoft link above and choose the live chat. I game them an earful and got this in response:
“I am sorry you are feeling this way regarding Microsoft. I will will pass this information to them”
Just be nice 🙂
They’re probably some poor underpaid intern or “contract” temp.
Everyone needs a job 🙂
Chiara: I’m agreeing with you about “underpaid” staff. My neice works for Blue Cross/Blue Sheilld and she has elderly patients (my age ) who cry on the phone and she tries to soothe them and help; then she submits ALL her forms for the day’s work and they get sent back because the computer program changed because of some rule change that hadn’t been forwarded in time etc…….. But we need every avenue to “speak up” as Linda has said. Reminding corporations of conflict of interest is one way to do that like the moms who demand action who are going to Target now and some of them get thrown out by the managers. The managers on duty at Best Buy would say “we just give our money to the Chamber of Commerce” (I guess they see it like union dues?) and they don’t want to be “on the spot.”
Oh, I agree. Corporations care a lot about image. It was funny to watch them flee from ALEC over stand your ground and voter suppression laws. Those are not great things for Coca Cola to be associated with.
Sometimes it works. Not often enough, but every once in a while.
Chiara: I wrote to Romney’s site so often they blocked me. I wrote to Scott Brown’s site so often I thought they “destroyed my computer on the night they lost the election.” Now I continue to email Kelly Ayotte because she is the only senator in New England who did not support the senators on appropriate considerations of gun / background checks. I know my neighbors (in MA) go to shop in NH because the tax is less but I tell them : “you get what you pay for” special education, health care etc. Sometimes I get a message back from a MA politician to the extent that “it doesn’t affect you where you live” but I say that I worked for 40 different cities/towns so it does have significance to me…. They try to disparage our comments or refute what we say by turning away the comments or “go back to local elected rep” etc. but I know you will keep up the good work you are doing. Thanks for the encouragement.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Jean Haverhill, I agree completely & admire what you are doing. The squeaky wheel!
I have regular email conversations with my Congressman (an ultra- conservative who pretends to be moderate to get NJ-R votes) & my senator (a wonderful [D] guy who gets back to you in a month w/what he’s doing about it!) My Congressman keeps voting like a TP’r but at least there’s an occasional letter to the ed of the local rag revealing him for what he is.
I also think tiny regular contributions to election campaigns have impact. Sadly I did this for Obama, tho I don’t know Romney could have been worse. And tho I’m out of state I pledged mini-$/mo for the long haul to Elizabeth Warren’s Senate campaign, which looked impossible at the beginning, but hey she won!
thanks for your support…… that is incredible because you don’t live in the state…. this past two years I stopped giving to “democrat” and select only the ones I single out especially the women…. also if I have extra I would contribute to Udall and Sherrod so I too cross state lines. One Senator who would always write back was Carl Levin even though I don’t live in his state so I am greatly appreciative for that.
Elizabeth Warren’s Senate campaign, which looked impossible at the beginning, but hey she won!
jeanhaverhill@aol.com
Who will be left behind when academic performance is proportional to the technology proficiency? The selective enrollment as it is a common practice in charter schools will be reinforced by the Common Core and online testing. What I know for sure is that the English Language Learners will be far away lost! The common core’s common sense is not so common!
Since Bill Gates acts as if he is god, naturally he would attempt to make children in his image – robots.
“Whoever controls the youth controls the future”. Adolfo Hitler aka Bill Gates
Sheila: thanks and also, “if you let me write your tests i don’t care who writes your curriculum”
Bill Gates actually doesn’t seem to me much like Adolf Hitler.
Jim, could you buy into “benevolent despot”? if he were elected I could go for that… but he hasn’t been elected by a democratic process. I’m trying to think about a literary figure I could name that might be closer to what you see. haven’t come up with it yet.
Yes, they have the same mental illness. It is called Narcissistic PD.
jeanhaverhill & Jim,
Looking for a literary figure to compare with Bill Gates? You can start with MacBeth….and his perpetuation of evil from his “over ambition”!
Sheila: I am sending this in good humor…. because I think the literary character would be found in modernity in David Foster Wallace’s quote: “Te occidere possunt sed te edere non possunt nefas est” because the legality is a lot dicier… they can “kill you” and that is why I think of the corporate explosion in public schools as “slash and burn”…. kill off the local peasants (teachers) because we are moving on into the next revolution (following the industrial, the technology revolution etc.) Please accept my comment as “In Jest” in memory of D. F. Wallace
jeanhaverhill, Yes, Rest in Peace D.F.Wallace! The deep sadness that is expressed in much of his writing rings true with children today who are victims of callous cruelty by the Billionaire Boys Club promoting CCSS!
Sheila: since you permit the extension of my weird sense of Humour I have a new set of standards after consulting with D.F. Wallace and have computerized all the tests for his Oxbridge Quadrivium-Trivium. Maybe I can get Governor Patrick and M. Chester to buy my software? Or at least 3 mayors ??? that i can scam.
jeanhaverhill@aol.com
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx This will only work for Gates (or some other billionaire) if we let ourselves become a dictator state. Could happen! Speak up, write, choose candidates wisely & support them, vote!
All students are unique (for … many reasons)! Thus, we cannot rely on standardized assessments as the sole means of …
ONCE AGAIN! I Boldly suggest that we move toward the implementation of portfolio assessments (which may include some “evidence” of our purpose for testing). “We” must become advocates for a strategic assessment paradigm (i.e. vision) that … Testing & Portfolio Assessments (are both necessary). So, The GATES FOUNDATION ought to invest in “a platform” which is not prescriptive? I suggest that MS provide educators with software that permits all students to “exhibit” their uniqueness. However, I suppose it is much easier to mandate behavior than it is to training practitioners to function independently; to force feed our students information, rather than foster collaboration and independent thinking; to stifle innovation. Those advocates of standardized testing (i.e. standardized thinking) ought to update “their” philosophical perspectives. Interested in educational reform; obviously … Visit/follow my BLOG @ http://kennethfetterman.wordpress.com
Interested in learning more about essential teacher training that will bring about … (i.e. Change)? Books published @ http:/www.smashwords.com/profile/view/kennethfetterman
you are right in suggesting this; the teacher preparation program near me uses this for graduating teacher candidates (after they have passed all of the state tests ). It is extremely time consuming (that doesn’t take away from its value) but it is open to the question of inter-rater reliability when you compare across different professors and different perspectives. It is like the essay reading when essays by high school students are scored on holistic scoring, analytic scoring etc… there are considerations of inter-rater reliabilty that need to be reported (but they aren’t being reported with the latest computer scoring of the essays ; cf. Boston Globe article that was cited earlier on Diane’s blog)…. But as far as observation and performance assessment you are very accurate and it has been a strong consideration for special needs students since the 70s… and needs to be expanded in the classrooms generally (with staff development on clinical judgment).
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx That’s hopeful. If it were done in K-12 schools, surely it would be terribly time-consuming, but perhaps no more so than the horrible VAM mess our local NJ district implemented this past year. If there’s “time” for that, there’s time for something student-centered & far better instead.
Say no more. It is all right there, isn’t it? The advertisement for our future.
Get up. Stand up! Don’t give up the fight.
Gotta love Bill and capitalism and developing new markets and customers. Oh, for the days of yore. Pencil and paper.
Where are the Vanderbilts, ca 1920, that put all of the impossible-to-spend-loot into libraries and hospitals.
This isn’t philanthropy; it’s advocacy for biliionaries.
I worry about giving public school kids this constant message that they are dependent on the contributions of philanthropists.
That isn’t how I understand the nature of “public schools”. We all have a duty to support public schools, because “the public” supported the schools we attended. I don’t know when we decided they should all be vying for grants and hoping the money comes through.
I don’t know, are they citizens or supplicants? Since when are public schools charities that we can choose to support? I don’t remember kids agreeing to that deal.
If Bill Gates were truly altruistic, he would focus on mental illness: child abuse, homeless, and prison populations, alcoholism & drug abuse
( all symptoms if mental illness). He would focus on his own symptoms of mental illness ( delusions of grandure associated with entitlement and superiority, lack of empathy or guilt = Narcissistic PD).
I don’t really understand the thinking.
If I buy an insurance policy on the health care exchange with a federal subsidy, the insurance company doesn’t become “public”.
They’re completely changing the meaning of the word.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx & the Carnegies, Mellons, & Rockefellers. I think of this often, too. They all did some horrible things in their time, but ultimately the laws reined them in, & meanwhile they “gave back.” I think, given their era, that they wanted to erase a lowly commercial image & give themselves some ‘class’– model themselves after England’s peerage, who sought to erase centuries of plunder by giving back to the ‘little folks’. Many American citizens (just judging from comment threads on news articles) assume & confer such sentiments to the Koch’s, Waltons, Gates. Perhaps what’s needed is an ethical fed govt with a strong sense of civics– what’s good for the public– to point them in the right direction.
Chiara quoting you: “That isn’t how I understand the nature of “public schools”. We all have a duty to support public schools, because “the public” supported the schools we attended. I don’t know when we decided they should all be vying for grants and hoping the money comes through.”
I may have my details incorrect but I heard the statement that 70% of the people in Texas don’t have children; that has an enormous impact on what they are willing to pay in taxes (I guess for some but not for me and you… I even hear it from parents whose children are grown now)….
If you go to the Jay P Greene blog speaking (he thinks) for Arizona you will see ESAs recommended as the way to support education (which i absolutely cannot agree with and i tell him so in email postings. ) I point out that ESAs are not really better than “vouchers” and that “vouchers” become coupons… and at any rate it is a “stealth” attack if not a direct attack on public education.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx That’s a scary thought, given that we’re moving into the main period when Boomers are aging. The stats you’re seeing in Texas are to some extent going national.
But, but… I remember attributing that attitude (I paid for my kids, now it’s your problem) in my 1st-gen-Amer father-in-law, & thinking what it most had to do with was the long row he hoed to get from poor to middle class. It’s an attitude that reflects 1st & foremost a sense of economic instability. In better times, such folks will be thinking about & gladly paying for the welfare of their grandchildren, to the best of their ability. It’s not just about being old. It’s also about re-framing our economy (the 99%-1% problem) so that middle class in retirement can still contribute to public welfare.
cx. full disclosure on J P Greene at his University funded through Walton Foundation (I don’t know how the other department chairs react to that)
Yes, let’s give up P.E. and art class to pay for taking a bubble test on a computer instead of a piece of paper. What a waste of education money.
readingexchange [above] put it well: “All the money that has been and will be spent on the technology requirements of a test is such a waste. What about decent school buildings, quality books, health care and mental health services for families, etc. …?”
But think of the historically humongous amounts of $tudent $ucce$$ and fawning attention—did I mention the public ego-massaging by the MSM?— one can get by labeling, sorting and ranking the vast majority of students (aka OTHER PEOPLE’S CHILDREN). As a bonus, you get a chance to try out your BFF [Bestest Freakin’ Failed] management ideas over and over and over again even after they were, er, put to a decisive test at that puny little-known company called Microsoft:
[start quote]
Eichenwald’s conversations reveal that a management system known as “stack ranking”—a program that forces every unit to declare a certain percentage of employees as top performers, good performers, average, and poor—effectively crippled Microsoft’s ability to innovate. “Every current and former Microsoft employee I interviewed—every one—cited stack ranking as the most destructive process inside of Microsoft, something that drove out untold numbers of employees,” Eichenwald writes. “If you were on a team of 10 people, you walked in the first day knowing that, no matter how good everyone was, 2 people were going to get a great review, 7 were going to get mediocre reviews, and 1 was going to get a terrible review,” says a former software developer. “It leads to employees focusing on competing with each other rather than competing with other companies.”
When Eichenwald asks Brian Cody, a former Microsoft engineer, whether a review of him was ever based on the quality of his work, Cody says, “It was always much less about how I could become a better engineer and much more about my need to improve my visibility among other managers.” Ed McCahill, who worked at Microsoft as a marketing manager for 16 years, says, “You look at the Windows Phone and you can’t help but wonder, How did Microsoft squander the lead they had with the Windows CE devices? They had a great lead, they were years ahead. And they completely blew it. And they completely blew it because of the bureaucracy.”
[end quote]
Link: http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2012/07/microsoft-downfall-emails-steve-ballmer
Of course, not to put too fine a point on it, Bill and Melinda Gates send their children to Bill’s old school, Lakeside School, where THEIR OWN CHILDREN don’t have to put up with Kommoners Kore and its mandated hazing, er, testing rituals.
A win-win for a founder of the BBBBC [BusyBody Billionaire Boys Club].
For the rest of us, perhaps we need to remember what an old dead Roman guy once said:
“For greed all nature is too little.” [Lucius Annaeus Seneca]
😎
thank to Sheila for her comment and appreciating my weird sense of humour. The archives of d. f. Wallace are in Austin TX and I want to go and spend a week there…. even his lesson plans with his own notes…… thanks again for your comment because you know where I am coming from. I’m in the heat up here on the MA/NH border and wish I were in B.B. with you or my friends in E. Dennis or Mashpee. I told my sister in Austin I would try to take a trip down there to see her when the weather gets cooler and spend some time in the D.F.W. archives.
Can someone please explain to me why the attorney general is not investigating this mess? Scandal after scandal after scandal. Nepotism, fraud, etc, etc. etc. We all know the drill. Anybody who spends even a little time on this blog can see clearly the deception, collusion, and thinly veiled hostile takeover of public goods and services. The Washington Post even investigated and wrote about Gates’ involvement in the CC. It is a textbook example of conflict of interest, and that is only one layer of this particular scandal.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-bill-gates-pulled-off-the-swift-common-core-revolution/2014/06/07/a830e32e-ec34-11e3-9f5c-9075d5508f0a_story.html
So, where are all the lawyers? Did Gates buy them too? Lawyers charge (cost) more than teachers. Has anyone investigated Gates’ contributions to the ACLU or the dozens of other judicial organizations? I am truly baffled as to how this is still continuing to happen. Since when did integrity, duty and honor become quaint antiquated vestiges of a time long past?
Diane Remember that http://www.paceni.wordpress.com warned you about the problems with the Rasch model and adaptive testing.
Something I have always wondered about…
Why does it seem so easy to ascribe self interest to the “little people”? Teachers and other working folks are frequently accused of being lazy, greedy, don’t care about anything but themselves, insisting on “Cadillac” health plans and “lavish” retirements to the detriment of society, etc, right. At the same time, many find it so hard to believe that the very wealthy and successful would be primarily self interested.
I am not talking so much about commenters here…although there are some….but in the broader world . Suggest “vulture philanthropy” or any self interest at the expense of society and the response is often incredulousness.
Just an observation.
Ang: excellent point.
I have noticed this as well.
And as for greed and self-interest…
Someone on this blog wrote a while ago something like “if the rich don’t care about money that much, why are they always trying to get more of it?”
Plus the rich and wannabe-rich always seem to hold fast to Sophie Tucker’s remark:
“I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor. Rich is better.”
I couldn’t [well, I could have but I didn’t] resist—here’s where a very old, very dead and very smart Greek guy comes in handy:
“An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.” [Plutarch]
Hint: for all you closet readers, Plutarch will not—I repeat, NOT!—be on the CCSS bubble-in or computerized tests.
Resistance is futile.
Rheeally!
But not really.
Thank you, as always, for your sage remarks.
😎
KTA,
If any musing of mine constitutes a sage remark in your book, well, …
day made!
🙂
Thank you for all you do here and in the greater world.
Respectfully,
Ang
It may be the case of finding fault because we live among people who are socioeconomic equals. Neighbors engender envy, jealousy, transference… On the other hand, we don’t rub elbows with the plutocrats so, their crimes, flaws… are easilly ignored.
Diane, if only everyone sure the corrupt way Gates orchestrated the promotion of Common Core as you do?
Afbruni: don’t take my word about Bill Gates and Common Core. Read it in the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-bill-gates-pulled-off-the-swift-common-core-revolution/2014/06/07/a830e32e-ec34-11e3-9f5c-9075d5508f0a_story.html
I cannot tell you all how shocked I was to read the following (because it was in a text used for a religious course), but there it was, and it is a must-read for all of you & especially for those of you who question and ponder the Gates dynasty. This, in Bloomberg News, Jan 21, 2014, by Simeon Bennett & Laura Marcinek, “Bill Gates Sees Almost No Poor Countries Left by 2035.” It begins:
“Bill Gates, the world’s richest man, said that by 2035 no nation will be as poor as
any of the 35 that the World Bank now classifies as low-income, even adjusting for
inflation…”
Seriously? Indeed, this MUST be true, because these are the words of “the world’s richest man” and–because he is the richest man–he surely knows everything.
Bill and Melinda, please do us a favor and go back to helping all the third world nations you had been helping in the past–where you truly did some good–before you
make America into a third world nation.
By ruining and dismantling our system of public education, you are off to a good start.
Retiredbutmissthekids, please, please ramp up your skepticism regarding Gates’ designs on third world economies. His profit-driven “charity” controls desperately needed in-country national resources, and he uses his foundation to control the REST of the world’s contributions to world health. His Foundation did NOT pay for the dose of vaccine he is putting into the mouth of a child in those endless promotional photos. The strategy is to keep nations destitute under his corporate heel, just as he does American education.
Gates attacks on world health and agriculture are founded on exactly the same strategies an his attack on American education. He and his foundation leverage their pro-market power to control government actions. He consciously undermines national health services and diverts in-country agricultural supports to his corporate partners.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/randalllane/2012/09/18/bill-gates-my-new-model-for-giving/
Gates promotes Pfizer’s and Monsanto’s political domination of third world governments, on the argument that only profit can drive the “revolution” he promises. At the same time, Gates and his Foundation both own stock in those corporations. He recently had US tax law rewritten so he can count purchase of for-profit stocks as a charitable expenditure, to maintain his Foundation’s tax exempt status.
We are setting a genuine monster loose on the world. Does it even matter if he believes in his own profit-worshiping religion?
I have friends who work in public health.
Many of them complain about the policies if the gates foundation similarly to how we in education complain.
The 800 lb gorilla always gets his way, and it is rarely the best ( or even appropriate ) way.
He seems to be very bad at actually helping anyone.
Thanks for calling me out on this, chemtchr. Yep, Gates very much deserves a GLOBAL bad rap. Bill & Melinda, take your “philamisanthropy” & stick it where the sun don’t shine.
thanks to Chemtchr for this link : title
Gates’ Excuse for Poor Results of Educational Technology: “Unmotivated Students”
By Anthony Cody on July 2, 2014 12:18 PM
And, I’m glad that chemtchr left a comment….
In the Boston high poverty schools NAEP accepted a study (paid for by Gates) that said if they didn’t get the results they expected or wanted : “the students just made stuff up” about their attitudes and their “grit”. I will go and look for the exact quote today have to go out early this morning….
but I did write to NAEP also about that and any study paid for by Gates that comes out of a “university”.
Please consider writing to David Driscoll on the NAEP Governing Board, anyone on the Governing Board (I took on Podgursky the “economist” but I didn’t get very far with him)…
active democratic process with petitions. letters, etc.
quote: “Darling-Hammond is his current horse in the race. … “niceness to billionaires” rule that we can’t denounce this evil marketing attack on little children?”
I don’t know her funding sources but I do know that Jay P Greene and Sandra Stotsky are now totally owned by the Walton Foundation.
Funding is one motivator; keeping your seat at a university is also highly competitive and there are people dusting off her chair just like at every other university across the nation. I saw this at Boston University, attacking and vilifying Jeanne Chall at Harvard, Carol Chomsky at Harvard, and my professor who was dismissed from Harvard and ended up at B.U. (she had a nervous breakdown after the demotion but please don’t quote that). Sharks in the water.
I’m not excusing Darling Hammond so please don’t attack me…. I’m pointing out the realities …. follow the money…$$$$ or the career ladder (which means pension/money or whatever additional ego needs are fulfilled)
Darling Hammond is actively and aggressively leading the faux-progressive charm offensive to install the SBAC when public outrage at PARCC boils over. It is urgently necessary to fight her attempts to influence public education supporters.
That’s been her role from the beginning, I now suspect. We were mistaken when we thought she actually represented a new direction when she led Obama’s search team.
“Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond, Smarter Balanced Senior Research Advisor and professor of education at the Stanford University School of Education, led the development of the content specifications in collaboration with experts in the field. The Smarter Balanced Technical Advisory Committee, Consortium work groups, and the lead authors of the Common Core State Standards also contributed to the documents. Hundreds of organizations and individual stakeholders provided feedback during two rounds of public comment.”
http://www.smarterbalanced.org/smarter-balanced-assessments/
Somebody set up the twitter account for her, i think, and loaded in who she should follow from our side, as well as her own. Then she arrived and tweeted some things. Corporate stooges large and small clambered on and followed her within hours, and now our people are drifting on.
OMG. It just occurred to me maybe those Duncan replacement rumors are founded, and she’s being set up to replace him.
Then we’d all supposedly rejoice, and bask in her neoliberal glow, and Gates’ troubles would be behind him.
Chem teacher , thanks for this: “Linda Darling-Hammond, Smarter Balanced Senior Research Advisor and professor of education at the Stanford University School of Education, led the development of the content specifications in collaboration with experts in the field.” I was totally unaware being familiar only with the Pearson/Parcc as pushed by Mitchell chester and when I hear about Wested that is new to me. She would be another “arne duncan in a suit” being the figure head out in front for the corporate speak. I am glad that you clued me in as to what is happening in the political world…. I call it Moscow 3 ring circus but maybe it is 5 ring circus?
Linda I can’t find any twitter handle …. for L.D.H. but she is ranked on the list as highest on the list of Scholar Rankings — described as university-based researchers and excluding think tankers (e.g. Checker Finn ) whose job description is to influence the public discourse. After all, the point is to nudge what is rewarded and recognized at universities. (The term “university-based” provides a bit of useful flexibility. For instance, Tony Bryk currently hangs his hat at Carnegie. However, he is an established academic who retains a university affiliation and campus digs. So he’s included.)
———————————————————————
If i were to gauge my energy I would spend time going after C. Finn and the other Fordham types like Petrilli; I wouldn’t bother with LDH… I do comment on the J. P. Greene because they are owned by Walton Foundation …..
Podgursky is an “economist” who writes the stuff that C. Finn and P. Peterson love to churn through their “articles” at Fordham Institute and Education Next and I see him as someone to debate. There are many others who are taking the Gates $ in grants and preparing their “research” and I have commented a thousand times here on these others …. I have added David Driscoll to my list and I even wrote to a couple Board members of Fordham I. but they claim total innocence on these issues that we are addressing.
Again, please don’t read my comments that I am defending LDH or L. Moats; but if someone has a substantial body of work over their lifetime then I go after the “bigger fish” at the top who uses their work as authority for their opinion articles and that leads me back to Petrilli and C. Finn and P. Peterson etc. and the “economists” who are bent on disrupting the public schools in a destructive, slash and burn motive.
Here is Darling Hammond’s new twitter
Sandra Shotsky is affiliated with Pioneer institute. From the beginning, their agenda has been privatization, so it makes sense the Waltons fund them. The thieves have fallen out. Pioneer was shocked when Gates stepped in and took over their game, so now they’re anti-CCSS. Here in Massachusetts, they’re trying to stay with their own original MCAS-based assault on the public sector.
None of them are allies, and Darling-Hammond/Randi Weinberg brand of pseudo-ally is the most dangerous right now.
Tee hee. She’s not Shotsky, she’s Stotsky.
she still writes for Pioneer
but I think she may have relocated to Arizona with Jay P Greene and his whole department is Walton Foundation funds
“Sandra Stotsky is affiliated with Pioneer institute.”
Jean Haverhill: not Arizona, but Arkansas.
sorry Diane, it is ARK
http://coehp.uark.edu/2474.php
I was reading the article about the ESA accounts in arizona that was posted on his blog…. which appear to be “voucher only” in terms of purpose but I am still confused on ESA as to how it would work….
( and got confused through my northeastern bias)
Jean,
Some call it the U of Walton.
this is the article at Jpgreene.org that I am having difficulty with.
title: “Milton Friedman’s case for ESAs from 1995
June 24, 2014”
they write with so many comical and sports allusions and metaphors that it is hard to follow the logic of the thinking ….
other than celebrity, hype, bandwagon propaganda.
citing the first two paragraphs of a C. Finn article: “My chief mentor, the late Daniel Patrick Moynihan, occasionally warned against “semantic infiltration,” which he correctly attributed to the late arms-control expert, Fred Ikle. It is, of course, the judo-like practice of using terms that are appealing to an audience as fig leaves for practices that the same audience would find repugnant—turning one’s own language against one’s interests, you might say. Moynihan noted, for example, that countries that style themselves “democratic republics” are almost never either democratic or republics”
He uses claims to authority, someone you might respect like a Moynihan and then his usual style is to throw in a Vienna economist but this time he throws us off with this Fred Ikle but again commanding authority and throwing in a little “scare” tactic (to intimidate teachers in particular).
But immediately thereafter he will go in and attack Calkins for her work in literacy/reading instruction/writing. etc. and promote Louisa Moats because she
teaches phonics.
This is what I mean by the “sharks”….
I am taking up this space so that people will know where I am coming from when I make a comment like : “Jim has a point” ……
About a week ago, I watched the Lyndsey Layton(Washington Post) interview of Bill Gates and when I read this “Microsoft Cashes in” post, something from that interview immediately rang a bell
So I reviewed it and sure enough, at about minute 16 here’s what Bill Gates says in response to a question about whether Microsoft will benefit somehow from Common Core:
“There’s no connection to Common Core in any Microsoft thing”
I wonder. Does that depend on what the meaning of “connection” is? Or the meaning of “thing”?
“I did not (and will not) have common core relations with that state, Miss Issippi” — Bill
I wonder, would that make Chetty the Starr of this story, looking, as it were, for “common correlations”?
Larry,
Good observation!
Larry: there is no excuse for Bill Gates making misleading and deceptive statements.
Does he even read newspapers or go online?
For one example, I got the following from a posting on this blog, 3/5/2014, “Microsoft and Pearson Join Forces to Creat Common Core Curriculum: Are you $urprised?”
The link below was included and accesses an announcement of 2/20/2014:
[start quote]
Today Pearson announced a collaboration with Microsoft Corp. that brings together the world’s leading learning company and the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions to create new applications and advance a digital education model that prepares students to thrive in an increasingly personalized learning environment. The first collaboration between the two global companies will combine Pearson’s Common Core System of Courses with the groundbreaking capabilities of the Windows 8 touchscreen environment. The Common Core System of Courses is the first curriculum built for a digital personalized learning environment that is 100 percent aligned to the new standards for college and career readiness.
“Pearson has accelerated the development of personalized digital learning environments to improve educational outcomes as well as increase student engagement,” said Larry Singer, Managing Director for Pearson’s North American School group. “Through this collaboration with Microsoft, the global leader in infrastructure and productivity tools for schools, we are creating a powerful force for helping schools leverage this educational model to accelerate student achievement and, ultimately, ensure that U.S. students are more competitive on the global stage.”
“Personalized learning for every student is a worthy and aspirational goal. By combining the power of touch, type, digital inking, multitasking and split-screen capabilities that Windows 8 with Office 365 provides with these new Pearson applications, we’re one step closer to enabling an interactive and personalized learning environment,” said Margo Day, vice president, U.S. Education, Microsoft Corp. “We’re in the middle of an exciting transformation in education, with technology fueling the movement and allowing schools to achieve this goal of personalized learning for each student.”
In addition, iLit, Pearson’s core reading program aimed at closing the adolescent literacy gap, will be optimized for the Windows 8 platform. Designed based on the proven instructional model found in the Ramp Up Literacy program, which demonstrated students gaining two years of growth in a single year, iLit offers students personalized learning support based on their own instructional needs, engaging interactivities, and built-in reward systems that motivate students and track their progress.
[end quote]
Link: http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/1748922#ixzz2uLL0Nx7J
So “There’s no connection to Common Core in any Microsoft thing”—
Rheally!
But not really.
But then in some ways Bill is just an old fashioned fella.
“In ancient times they had no statistics so they had to fall back on lies.” [Stephen Leacock]
😎
Competitiveness is Gates’ dominant trait, according to people who personally know him. A competitor sees hedge fund managers targeting public education dollars and he’s driven to take more, faster?