If you think it is okay to cut the arts and make more time for test prep, watch this and this.
It could change your mind.
It could change your life.
Smile.
And make sure that everyone has the chance to sing and dance!
Archives for the month of: July, 2012
A teacher faces the state’s new evaluation with anxiety, uncertainty, fear, and confusion. She has a great idea about how to game this invalid, meaningless, absurd and punitive system:
It’s not just in LA that teachers are afraid. VA is implementing new eval requirements that must include student progress worth 40% of a teacher’s overal eval. The plan at my former school (might be at the new school I will be working for in the fall as well) was to develop pre and post tests to show growth over the year for non-tested subjects (and first year of a subject wouldn’t count, since obviously students would be starting at zero. I wasn’t really sure about the logic there). Yet, I was unable to ever get clear answers on how they would be implented for teachers of multiple levels/preps. One idea was that only one level would count. After I pointed out that this would incentivize focusing on only the level that counted to the detriment of the non-counted levels, I was met with silence. When I asked who was picking, I was also met with confusion. Moreover, it also occurred to me how easy it would be for some teachers to game the system. I teach Latin, which is something that most people have little familiarity with. So, I could create an insanely difficult pre-test and a cake post test so that I showed awesome growth, and really who would know, except me, and maybe the kids (certainly those of my bosses who have no familiarity with the subject would not be able to figure it out). Moreover, they wouldn’t be able to break down how students do on partiular sections and what that means, nor figure out what sections represented higher level thinking and which represented rote memorization. Finally, I began to question how one evaluated the ability to translate Latin to English by only using a multiple choice test. I wondered why the ability to translate Latin to English wasn’t measured by actually having students translate Latin to English. For the first time, I felt the fear and the pressure that teachers of the core had been feeling for years. I dread these new eval requirements with a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that never quite goes away.
If you have been following these posts for the past few days, you will recall that New Jersey Acting Commissioner Chris Cerf claimed that legendary union leader Al Shanker would be on his side, supporting more of the (non-union) charters that Cerf wants to open all over New Jersey.
I wrote a post pointing out that Al Shanker was an original proponent of charters but turned against them in 1993 when he realized that they would become the leading edge of privatization.
I then got a tongue-lashing by someone from New Jersey for daring to say that Al Shanker would not be on board with Chris Cerf and his boss Governor Chris Christie in their campaign to turn more public schools over to entrepreneurs.
And then, blogger Mother Crusader discovered that Al Shanker’s widow, Edie Shanker, had already spoken up and reminded the world that Al would not have supported the “reform” movement.
But best of all, I just read in Jersey Jazzman’s piece that Al’s daughter Jennie Shanker posted the following comment on the article challenging my views:
# Do not speak for Albert Shanker. — Jennie Shanker 2012-07-20 11:26
It was a pleasure and joy to read 2/3rds of your article, at which point your perspective takes its own course.
As his daughter, I treasure the testimony of individuals who knew my father and his work. Lately, it has been, frankly, dreadful to find his name associated with school “reform” that undermines public education. Without exception, these articles offer a few short quotes in evidence, always inappropriately pulled out of the context of his true mission and life’s work.
I can tell you, absolutely and unequivocally, if my father was with us today he would be fighting side by side with Diane Ravitch to preserve and improve public education. The Washington Post re-published an excellent post from Ravitch’s blog this week which very clearly articulats the differences between his vision of charter reform and the for-profit version championed by Chris Cerf and others in New Jersey.
Would he have told that NJ parent to send their child to public schools? Absolutely. As mentioned in the Post article, NJ public schools are among the highest performing in the nation.
Your appreciation for my father’s work and vision was lovely to read. But your stance on this issue is diametrically opposed to his values and intent, and you are dead wrong to shame Diane Ravitch for her position. Indeed, if you consider your thinking to be in line with my father’s, I recommend that you champion her work, as my family does. If anyone can speak for my father in this day and age, the person who should be most trusted is Dr. Ravitch.
It’s unfortunate that many people who read your article will not see this comment. I would like to respectfully request that you reconsider further publicizing your characterizatio n of my father’s position on this topic. From what is in evidence in this article, despite your love for the man, you are in no position to speak for him. -Jennie Shanker
As his daughter, I treasure the testimony of individuals who knew my father and his work. Lately, it has been, frankly, dreadful to find his name associated with school “reform” that undermines public education. Without exception, these articles offer a few short quotes in evidence, always inappropriately pulled out of the context of his true mission and life’s work.
I can tell you, absolutely and unequivocally, if my father was with us today he would be fighting side by side with Diane Ravitch to preserve and improve public education. The Washington Post re-published an excellent post from Ravitch’s blog this week which very clearly articulats the differences between his vision of charter reform and the for-profit version championed by Chris Cerf and others in New Jersey.
Would he have told that NJ parent to send their child to public schools? Absolutely. As mentioned in the Post article, NJ public schools are among the highest performing in the nation.
Your appreciation for my father’s work and vision was lovely to read. But your stance on this issue is diametrically opposed to his values and intent, and you are dead wrong to shame Diane Ravitch for her position. Indeed, if you consider your thinking to be in line with my father’s, I recommend that you champion her work, as my family does. If anyone can speak for my father in this day and age, the person who should be most trusted is Dr. Ravitch.
It’s unfortunate that many people who read your article will not see this comment. I would like to respectfully request that you reconsider further publicizing your characterizatio n of my father’s position on this topic. From what is in evidence in this article, despite your love for the man, you are in no position to speak for him. -Jennie Shanker
A reader sends a description of a teacher’s life in Louisiana, where a new state law changed everything, including tenure, evaluation, charters, vouchers, and whatever else the reformers could throw into a law that was passed without input from educators or any deliberation:
So here in Louisiana we get ready to start the new school year, having spent the summer at “mandatory” conferences and training; middle schools are sending many teachers to become AP certified, math and English teachers have spent their summer in classes 5 days a week for STEM training, CCSS classes abound with little information and three full days of “in-services” await us before we see students. That alone will kill any motivation that remains. So many teachers are exhausted and yet the demands for new and better programs requires 200%, last year teachers were requested to give 200% or find another position. Yet we have no idea what our value added scores really mean-some are told they don’t really matter if you’re a good teacher. Others are told that starting 2013-2014 the firing of the lowest 10% will start.
No one can tell us how the scores will help us improve, where our strong or weak areas are, what we need to change, how we relate to the rest of the state etc. Teachers want to do their best and take it to heart when we are told we failed our kids. Even though logically we know the value added scores are bogus, especially since the numbers are not given meaning with explanations and feedback. Emotionally it has been devastating and most discussions are about the fear of hurting our students again since we don’t know what to improve. Teachers express fear of getting caught up in this mess and losing their tenure knowing that there is no way in hell anyone will manage to get “highly Effective 5 out of 6 years” to regain tenure if we don’t know what we did wrong in the first place!
A student I taught in high school several years ago, both of his parents are teachers, commented that this value added stuff is like failing your drivers test but no one tells you why and then says you have to do it again but since you don’t know what you did wrong in the first place you just keep failing. He said his family had a pretty miserable summer trying to deal with all the stress and fear of trying to decide if they should change careers, move to another state, get another degree (both of his parents have masters degrees and are national board certified and have been Teacher’s of the Year. He said they stick up for their students and that is what gets them in trouble and they fear it will effect their evaluations. He is looking forward to going back to college just to get out of the house and that makes him feel guilty.
If you teach math and English at least the LEAP scores count for your area, science and social studies are the step children. Any idea of how motivated a middle school student is to pass a test they don’t have to? Why focus only on 50% of the core subjects for years and years? Supposedly highly educated people who should know the interrelationship between all the core classes made that decision! Now math and English CCSS are here, with lots of overlap to science and social studies whose CCSS are years away.
No one want to talk about what is really going to happen next year, everyone is afraid, discussion leads to anger and frustration and many just want to ignore it and think all this will go away. Talking about the mess gets many in trouble and the newspapers don’t think it is worth discussing except for an occasional article. The Shreveport paper had a short article about how parents could avoid the inconvenience of PTA/PTO involvement(Thanks Shreveport Times), Jindal is gone running around campaigning for an office he doesn’t have yet while ignoring the one he has and our students are depending on teachers to create the safe, caring, learning environments they need. And we will, because that is what educators do.
Not a surprise that FUD explains our state and many others.
At the GE Foundation’s Summer Business and Education Summit in Orlando, 150 business executives heard former Florida Governor Jeb Bush strongly endorse the Common Core State Standards. He predicted that when they are fully implemented, everyone would see what a disaster American education is. This, one assumes, will facilitate his agenda of getting rid of public education and replacing it with vouchers, charter schools, for-profit charter schools, for-profit online education, and anything else that fertile entrepreneurs can dream up. Bush promised there would be a rude awakening, which clearly made him happy.
As you read this account, you see FUD playing out right before your very eyes.
Meanwhile the business executives, as usual, complained that they can never fill any of the millions of jobs they have available because they can’t find skilled workers. So, of course, they outsource those jobs to China and India where they can find skilled workers willing to work for far less than American workers.
I should have titled this “one of the last living defenders of NCLB speaks,” but it required too many characters for a headline. I am sure that in addition to the author of this article, NCLB is still defended by Sandy Kress, Margaret Spellings, and others who designed it. Maybe there are another 50 or 60 people who still defend it. I just can’t think of their names offhand.
Most people, including educators and parents, think of it as a disaster. Most think it turned our schools into testing factories and squeezed out such things as art, history, literature, physical education, science, foreign languages, geography, civics, and other things that are important. No one can deny the importance of basic skills but no one should claim that they are a complete education, or that scores on standardized tests are all that matters.
NCLB was and still is a landmark in the dumbing down of American education.
The writer is under the misapprehension that NCLB had something to do with raising standards. If only.
The author, it may not surprise you to learn, was President George W. Bush’s chief speechwriter from 2001 to 2006. He was also a member of the White House Iraq Group.
Is it possible to be a classic if the thing is only two years old?
Well, this post is a classic. It’s by a teacher who sometimes calls himself a “union thug.”
I met him last year, and he is one smart guy.
He asks a simple question, “In what other profession?”
And his response is a classic.
As this article shows, publishers are not debating the Common Core Standards, they are trying to figure out how to align their catalogue with the CCSSI as soon as possible. They don’t want to be left out of the national market for materials aligned to the new standards.
At the same time, they are more than a little concerned about the political waters. They listen, and they know there is pushback from both the left and the right, where the idea of national standards remains anathema.
Some are worried about the apparent downgrading of fiction in the CC standards; some plan to use the suggested reading list as a template. Some authors whose work is on the list are thrilled, as are their publishers. And much remains to be seen about how the CCSI will be rolled out, how it will be implemented, how much money will be available for new materials and professional development in a time of austerity.
Many unanswered questions, and a time of great change.
One of the brilliant readers of this blog sent in a comment that made me understand what has been happening to American public education for the past 15-20 years.
It is the conscious, purposeful application of a marketing strategy called FUD: Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt.
Wikipedia says that FUD is used in sales, marketing, public relations, politics, and propaganda. I sensed that this was happening but I didn’t realize that it was a tried and true strategy that has a name and a documented history.
It’s a strategy in which one competitor undermines the other by spreading FUD. Read the Wikipedia entry to learn who the FUDmaster is.
In this country, the enemies of public education use FUD to advance their primary goal of privatization. They say our public schools are “obsolete” and “broken.” They say it over and over again. They use that line to promote privatization and for-profit education. They want to cut costs by getting rid of experienced teachers and replacing them with online instruction, so they belittle the value of experience and push laws to get rid of tenure and seniority. As they succeed in their use of FUD, what is broken is the spirits of teachers.
They say again and again that our schools are failing when they are not. They have wept about international test scores since “A Nation at Risk” in 1983, even as our economy took off. They use FUD to blame the schools for the market failures they cause. They use FUD to blame the schools for poverty.
High-stakes testing is their tool of choice to close schools and fire teachers.
If you want to see the quintessential application of FUD to public education, read the report of the task force of the Council on Foreign Relations, chaired by Joel Klein and Condoleeza Rice, which says that our public schools are a threat to national security and that their salvation is to help kids escape them via charters and vouchers. For an antidote, read my review of that report.
Or you could watch the quintessential documentary of FUD, see “Waiting for ‘Superman,'” and then read my review.
The reader who opened my eyes to this marketing strategy, designed to harm public education and to allow its destroyers to call themselves “reformers” signs her stuff as “chemtchr.” Now we know.
| Your reader is describing a market-capture strategy refined in the hardware/software market wars of the last century. It is based on sowing Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt about competing products. I capitalized each word. because the acronym is for the strategy, FUD, is enshrined now in the history of the dawn of the computer age.Google it, and read how IBM piioneered it, and then how the FUDmaster himself out-fudded them.It’s been unleashed now on public education. The children of a whole free nation, and the very people charged with their daily defense, are deliberately assaulted by fear, uncertainty, and doubt. Our state-imposed subservience to the data industry monopolists eats into every day of their childhood, as the FUDmaster tries to impose his defective new operating system on their minds and hearts. |
There is a rapidly expanding charter chain in Pennsylvania called Propel.
It has charter schools in several districts in the state with a total enrollment of 2,000. They are “no excuses” schools, and they reportedly get high test scores.
The Propel charter chain wants to open a K-12 charter school in the small district of Sto-Rox, which has 1,400 students.
The charter school would enroll 800 students.
Last November, the school board unanimously rejected its request saying that it would have a “devastating” impact on the public schools. The charter chain returned with a revised proposal.
At a hearing earlier this month, residents debated the merits of the proposal. Charter school parents supported the idea. Teachers and students in the public schools opposed it.
Based on the amount of money the public schools would lose, the district would probably be bankrupted by the charter school.
Sto-Rox families would pay no tuition to attend Propel. Cost to the district would be $11,000 per student annually, said Jean Mayes, board member. Currently, Sto-Rox spends approximately $8,000 per student, she said.
According to state Department of Education data, the district spent $7,277 per elementary student and $12,154 per secondary student in 2009-2010. The district had 1,375 students registered that year, with 584 in elementary, 409 in middle school and 382 in high school.
For the 2011-2012 budget, the district lost $1.2 million in funding due to state budget cuts. Accountability Block Grants, which fund such programs as full-day kindergarten, partial charter school reimbursement and Educational Assistance Program, which provides tutoring for students in need, were cut by the state.
During the hearing, Jeremy Resnick, executive director and Propel founder, stated that the demand for another charter school is there.
He referred to a petition with 251 signatures indicating interest in having a Propel school in the area. Of those signatures, 234 were from Sto-Rox residents and 131 checked a box indicating they had children who were interested in attending, he said.
So from the founder’s testimony, the chain wants to open a school for 800 students because the parents of 131 students expressed interest.
Earlier this week, the school board surprisingly agreed to form a committee to sit down and talk with the Propel charter chain.
The founder of the chain called this decision “courageous.”
Will Sto-Rox go the way of Chester-Upland, where a charter school absorbed most of their funding and drove the local schools into bankruptcy?
Diane Ravitch's blog 