John Thompson understands that the big money has been betting heavily on testing and accountability. When did the billionaires realize that test score gains were the result of cheating? Did they care? Will they learn? Or will they continue to promote the same failed policies? Why? What do they hope to accomplish?

Categories Rhee, Michelle

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Ron Poirier says:

April 27, 2013 at 3:45 pm

The cheating scandals are just another opportunity. Obviously, school systems can’t trust their own to manage testing honestly. Pearson is here to help with its mobile testing specialist unit! Composed of neutral third party test administration specialists, this unit will come to YOUR district and handle all high stakes testing from packet distribution to collection and delivery back to Pearson!
(For a nominal fee, of course!)

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- Duane Swacker says:
  
  April 27, 2013 at 11:04 pm
  
  Any teacher that administers these tests without reading and vetting them beforehand do not deserve the label of “teacher”.
  
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  - Duane Swacker says:
    
    April 27, 2013 at 11:10 pm
    
    does not do
    
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  - Ron Poirier says:
    
    April 28, 2013 at 10:25 am
    
    Duane, did you mean to reply to someone else? I don’t see how your comment has much to do with mine.
    
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  - Duane Swacker says:
    
    April 28, 2013 at 11:01 am
    
    Ron,
    It was an attempt (albeit not very clear at all) to respond to “Obviously, school systems can’t trust their own to manage testing honestly” in the sense that a teacher who does not do what I suggest is therefore not “managing testing honestly”.
    Duane
    
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Jon Awbrey says:

April 27, 2013 at 3:45 pm

As a general rule, con artists know their art is a con long before they pick up their chisel.

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George Buzzetti says:

April 27, 2013 at 4:10 pm

This was all part of the master plan. There is nothing they do by accident. Do they operate in any other part of their business and personal lives by accident? NO WAY. Gates spent $1 billion and 10 years on small schools and when the destruction was done they hired Deasy, superintendent of LAUSD with the phony PHD and work record, one week after he quit his superintendents job in Prince Georges County when the phony PHD stories broke. Immediately, using Deasy they began the “War on Teachers.” Now it is to totally destroy public education to complete their master plan of total domination and a permanent class of indentured servants through “Permadebt.” This is where they have most now. Much of their income goes to interest on things they cannot pay off. Nice profit center I would say and also allows you to control what they do and with controlling education you can plan the society you desire just like Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Kim Il Jong did. Read the history of Russia and how education was used to beat Hitler in WWII just after the Revolution. Not a joke here. Hard facts of life is what it is.

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- natasha featherstone says:
  
  April 27, 2013 at 5:49 pm
  
  Elizabeth coleman, mother of David Coleman Notorius putz king of common core, has some admirational words for those Russian educators and their system…. talk about apples falling not far from
  trees. talk about a stalin jujitsu hegelian mastermind!
  “wholesale transformation’ she loves it!
  
  scary and outrageous indicator of why we are where we are….
  get em out!!!!
  
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  - Reflective Thinking says:
    
    April 27, 2013 at 8:52 pm
    
    I would agree with her on many things said in this video, speaking as a college student. At least where I go to school teaching for democracy and civic-mindedness has gone out the window. there is no sense of student empowerment and any capacity to think critically is squashed under a regime of traditional lecture-style pedagogy. also the notion that just because someone is an expert in their field, he or she can teach, that is not true, and I believe does a profound disrespect to the teaching profession at the higher education level. i don’t know about her views on the common core, which I disagree with, but there’s a lot i’m hearing here that I can identify with as a college student.
    
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Ken Mortland says:

April 27, 2013 at 4:20 pm

Doubt very much the ” billionaires” gave it much thought. but, if they did, it probably went something like this.

Hmm… Some teachers in some school districts have begun systematic cheating on their standardized tests.

Makes it clear to us that they know how important this is and how effectively it reflects their teaching effectiveness. Why else would they cheat?

As what they’re doing is both unprofessional and possibly illegal, they should be punished for it.

Now, what’s next on the agenda? ……….

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wgersen says:

April 27, 2013 at 5:45 pm

According to Thompson’s article the billionaires’ money “…was contingent on the continuity of leadership within D.C. schools, as well as meeting “student achievement outcomes detailed in the ‘Predicted Gains’ document” of 2010″… So, let’s see, Rhee left after three years and the gains were illusory… It seems to me the billionaires are giving out money for NOTHING… I’d like to get some of it… where do I sign up?

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- mathman says:
  
  April 27, 2013 at 7:07 pm
  
  You would need to sell your soul first.
  
  Many are doing so and cashing in.
  
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Michael Fiorillo says:

April 27, 2013 at 6:50 pm

The cheating epidemic and increased parent recognition of the abusiveness of the testing regime guarantee that at some point a backlash will derail it, but until then it’s a perverse win-win for the so-called reformers: testing and everything that follows from it – money, control, school closings, teacher firings, a culture of conformity and compliance – is more deeply entrenched, while even more resources are diverted to a punitive enforcement apparatus.

While Gates, Murdoch, Broad, the Waltons, et. al. try to smash and grab everything in sight, the tests are both the the electrified fence keeping teachers penned in, and a whip to move them along as necessary. For the kids, the tests are a sorting mechanism, a source of commodified data, and way to socialize them for the tedium-filled, repressive, surveillance-heavy workplace they face in the future.

Instead of reconsidering their failed, destructive program, they double down on it and increase the level of threats and intimidation. It’s indicative of the nasty cocktail of aggression and derangement that is so-called education reform.

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