Archives for the month of: April, 2013
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Monica Ratliff for Los Angeles School Board

By dianeravitch
April 29, 2013 //
13

There is a big race in Los Angeles on May 21. It is a run-off that will determine who controls the board.

There are two candidates.

One–Monica Ratliff–is a working classroom teacher, the other worked on the staff of corporate-friendly Mayor Villaraigosa and has no education experience.

The teachers’ union supported both candidates, hedging their bets.

The mayor’s candidate has the support of the super-elite, the billionaires and their surrogates who don’t like public education, disparage teachers, and defend the status quo. That candidate will have a campaign chest of at least $1 million. Mayor Bloomberg of New York City gave $350,000. Rhee gave $100,000. Eli Broad gave $250,000. More is on the way.

Monica Ratliff is Monica Ratliff. She is a teacher. She can’t campaign during the day because she teaches.

She was raised in Arizona by a single mother from Mexico. Her dad was born in Ohio; he died when Monica was 13, the oldest of 3 kids. She got a National Hispanic Scholarship to attend Columbia University. After she graduated, she went to Columbia Law School.

After Monica finished law school, she worked for the NAACP as a public interest lawyer, helping poor people with their legal problems.

After working as a public interest lawyer, Monica decided to become a teacher. She earned a masters degree in education at UCLA and got a teaching job at San Pedro Elementary school, a high-poverty school. She has been teaching there for 11 years. She has taught 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades. Her peers chose her as their union rep for UTLA. She recently was elected to the House of Reps of UTLA.

She ran for school board this spring. She spent $14,000 and got 34% of the vote. Her opponent accumulated $1.4 million and got 44% of the vote.

The third place finisher Maria Cano has endorsed Monica, as has the retired board member of the district, Julie Korenstein. So has current board member Bennett Kayser.

She has been endorsed by Republican Supervisor Mike Antonovich on the right and Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg on the left.

Monica is still in the classroom. She doesn’t campaign between 7:30 am and 2:45 pm because she is teaching fifth grade.

The LA Times has endorsed her, because of her experience as a teacher, as has the LA Daily News.

Monica will be overwhelmingly outspent. She can win if friends of public education turn out to vote.

She needs our help.

If everyone who loves teachers sends Monica a gift of any size, she would be the best-funded candidate in the race. Send whatever you can afford.

Please help Monica Ratliff if you can.

Categories Education Reform, Los Angeles

Seattle Teachers Expand Testing Boycott

By dianeravitch
April 29, 2013 //
12

Seattlegeachers will hold a press conference today to announce their plans to extend and expand their test boycott.

MEDIA ADVISORY

Seattle Teachers Respond to Spring MAP Test:

Boycott Grows Bigger

New Message: Don’t Renew MAP Contract

Press Conference Called for Monday, April 29th, at 4:30 pm at the Garfield Community Center
(Corner of 23rd and Cherry)

All boycotting schools—including new additions—will have a representative at the press conference to answer questions.

For questions contact Garfield teacher Jesse Hagopian
Hagopian.jesse@gmail.com / 206-962-1685
http://www.scrapthemap.wordpress.com/

Teachers are again refusing to subject their students this particularly pernicious test. The Spring “testing window” is now open and schools across the district are slated for a third time this year to take students out of classrooms to spend hours in front of computers taking a test that the Seattle School District itself has said “has problems” and is invalid (expected point gains on scores are smaller than the margin of error). “The test has not been improved since winter,” said Mallory Clarke, a Garfield reading teacher. “It wasn’t ethical to give the test then, and the test hasn’t gotten any more ethical since.”

The contract for the MAP test with the NWEA (the maker of the MAP test) expires this spring. The Seattle School District would have to buy the MAP test again this year if they wanted to administer the test next year. The teachers are calling for Superintendent Banda to decline to renew the MAP contract with NWEA. Garfield LA teacher Kit McCormick said, “It’s impossible to sit by and watch the District pay the huge price tag for this poorly constructed test, knowing how many crucial line items we had to give up to run our school. We can’t afford supplies for our classrooms or needed support programs for the students, so why are we spending money on this scandalous boondoggle?”

Not only are the same half dozen schools that boycotted previously still committed to this courageous stand, but more schools have joined the MAP test boycott and will be announcing their intention to refuse to administer the spring MAP test at the press conference. Garfield history teacher Jesse Hagopian said, “Our movement for quality assessment is becoming an ‘educators’ spring’ uprising. New elementary and high schools in Seattle are joining the movement here in Seattle. Hundreds of teachers from around the state just voted overwhelming to support the continuing MAP test boycott at the Washington Education Association’s end of April Representative Assembly. In Chicago hundreds of students walked out of school to protest their own high stakes test. In New York thousands of parents have opted their children out of a standardized test—and this is all just in the last week.”

The District responded to the winter boycott with a Task Force on Assessment. While teachers had hopes that this group would help fix the broken assessment system in Seattle Schools, it appears to be a relatively powerless group undemocratically run and undemocratically chosen with only 5 classroom teachers on a committee of 30. Many fear the group is designed to rubber stamp district decisions.

In response, teachers from around Seattle formed their own committee, the Teacher Work Group on Assessment. The Teacher Work Group on Assessment has been meeting to discuss research and send recommendations to the district Task Force. The final report of that group will be presented at the press conference. From the report, “Teachers recoil at the false notions that standardized tests are legitimate measures of student academic and thinking skill, that standardized tests take precedent over instructional time, that standardized tests effectively assess teacher quality—in short, that standardized testing based education is effective education. It is not, and we as teachers stand firm in our refusal to embrace anything that takes our focus away from effective teaching.”

On May 1st—May Day, international workers day—not only will support continue from the thousands of teachers and hundreds of education organizations nationally who have supported this boycott in the past, but teachers and organizations from other countries will participate in an International Day of Solidarity with the Seattle MAP Test Boycott. Details and names of international groups will be available at the press conference.

See https://www.facebook.com/events/420939147942571/

Categories Testing, Washington State

Providence Student Union Will Counter Gist Speech

By dianeravitch
April 29, 2013 //
3

The Providence Student Union will give its first “State of the Student” address on April 30, shortly before Rhode Island State Commissioner Deborah Gist gives her annual State of Education Address to a joint session of the Legislature. The students will present their “positive vision” on what education should be, as opposed to the state’s present sterile and mindless emphasis on high-stakes testing.

The Providence Student Union has emerged in recent weeks as a national exemplar of brilliant, media-worthy civil dissent. Their political theater is amazingly effective.

First, they did a zombie protest in front of the headquarters of the Rhode Island Department of Education; dozens of students covered in catsup marched in front of the building. Then they persuaded 60 accomplished professionals to take a test composed of released items from the NECAP, now a graduation requirement (most would not have received a diploma). Because of their demonstration, the Boston Globe came out against the use of NECAP as a graduation requirement. Like the professionals, nearly half the students are likely to fail the standardized test, which was not designed as a graduation test.

If every city and town had a high school student group as creative and persistent as the Providence Student Union, the corporate reformers’ house of cards would fall down.

MEDIA ADVISORY

April 25, 2013

CONTACT: Hector Perea | Contact@ProvidenceStudentUnion.org | 401-545-1973 (Note: Hector is a Providence high school student. Please wait until after 3:30 to call for more information, as students are not allowed to use their phones during school hours.)

STUDENTS COUNTER ED. COMMISSIONER’S “STATE OF EDUCATION” SPEECH –

OFFER THEIR OWN VISION FOR RI EDUCATION IN “STATE OF THE STUDENT” ADDRESS

What: Immediately preceding Commissioner Gist’s annual State of Education speech, members of the Providence Student Union will hold their own “State of the Student” address. Students from high schools across Providence will describe, from their own on-the-ground experience, the current condition of Rhode Island students, and will present their own proposals for the kinds of educational changes young people actually need to achieve high standards in high school and beyond. Topics include curriculum, teaching and learning, school repairs, assessment and high stakes NECAP testing.

WHEN: Tuesday, April 30 at 4:30 p.m.

WHERE: In front of the RI State House (outside, weather permitting)

This event will have strong visuals. Student participants will be available for interviews.

Categories Students, Testing

Jeff Bryant: Why There Is No Middle Ground

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
21

Earlier today there was a good exchange on the idea of finding common ground. Robert Shepherd explained why it should happen, and Ira Shor said it would not happen in light of the unreasonable attacks on teachers and public schools.

As it happens, Jeff Bryant addressed the same issues two years ago..

He commented today:

“Why there is not a middle ground in the education debate:

http://bit.ly/ZusXoT

key graph:

“Before our country can even attempt to work toward a middle ground in the education debate, we have to establish where that middle ground is. First, with over 85 percent of our nation’s school-aged children attending public schools, public schools will not go away. And insisting on getting rid of them is pure nihilism. Second, public schools cannot be run like businesses, our children are not widgets, and profit cannot be the driving motive for institutions whose mission is to provide all children access to quality education. And third, creating and administering public schools is a democratic process, and no actor in this process can be allowed to control it, no matter how much money they have.”

Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Reform

Dayne Sherman: Jindal’s War Against the People of Louisiana

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
8

Dayne Sherman is going to a rally at the state capitol in Baton Rouge on April 30.

The people of Louisiana are waking up to Jindal’s war against the common weal.

Now, says Sherman, even the Legislature is turning against Jindal.

Four big issues stir public antipathy:

First, we have to repeal the tax give-aways passed under Jindal. Rep. Jerome “Dee” Richard (I-Thibodaux) has a bill to do this very thing. We now give away an extra 2 billion dollars a year since Jindal took office. This is unsustainable, immoral, and just plain crazy. Make no mistake, if we don’t address the tax credits and corporate welfare, our state is toast.

Second, the federal Medicaid expansion has to begin sooner rather than later. According to the Department of Health and Hospitals, the expansion of Medicaid will grant 577,000 Louisiana citizens insurance coverage. 

What if we don’t accept the Medicaid expansion? Your local hospital will struggle or fail, and the state will be in the red for decades to come.

Third, we have to stop selling the state piece by piece. We can’t keep giving away state assets at fire sale prices to plug budget holes. It’s ridiculous, downright goofy.

Fourth, higher education must be fully funded in Fiscal Year 2014. Colleges and universities have been cut $625 million since 2008. More cuts are planned for next year. It has to stop now or we will hamstring the Louisiana economy and harm our children.

Sherman should have added a fifth point: Jindal’s effort to privatize public education and intimidate teachers must stop.

Categories Education Industry, For-Profit, Louisiana, Privatization

Ira Shor: Why Common Ground Is Not Possible

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
36

In response to an earlier post by Robert Shepherd, asking whether it might be possible to find common ground on contentious issues, Ira Shor, a professor at the City University of New York, answers:

“Dr. Shepherd sounds like a person of good will who is extremely uncomfortable with the rash, untested, arrogant impositions of high-stakes testing so profitable to corps. like Pearson, and through which govt. officials like Jindal, Emanuel, Cuomo, Christie, etc., make whimsical decisions to disrupt communities, families, kids, and teachers, none of whom send their own kids to pub schls. The opposition consolidated by the brilliant work of Dr. Ravitch has not done any damage to pub schls, kids, teachers, or families, so to represent the issue as good will on both sides is unfortunately to define a moral equivalence of power and action which simply does not exist. The unholy alliance of govt, big biz, and billionaires has been on a warpath to seize the vast assets of pub schls and segregate them so that one huge chunk of under-regulated and overfunded pvt charter schls operates with a free hand to score profits while the other chunk of over-regulated and under-funded “regular” pub schls operates with 2 hands tied behind its back. The sides are nakedly drawn here, leaving no middle ground to play in a phantom middle.”

Categories Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization

NYC Parent Meeting on inBloom and Student Privacy Tomorrow

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
10

This notice just in:

“Parents, do you know your child’s confidential, personal school records are going to be shared with a corporation called inBloom Inc?

This highly sensitive information will be stored on a data cloud and disclosed to for-profit corporations to help them develop and market their “learning products”

The data will include your child’s names, address, photo, email, test scores, grades, economic and racial status, and detailed disciplinary, health and special education records.

Find out more about this plan from advocates and state and city education officials.

What: Town Hall meeting at Brooklyn Borough Hall, 209 Joralemon Street
(take the #4 or #5 train to Boro Hall; #2, #3 or R to Court St., or A,C,F to Jay Street/Boro Hall)
When: Monday, April 29 at 6 PM

Invited guests include representatives from the NYS Education Department, the NYC Department of Education, the Gates Foundation, inBloom Inc., and the NYS Board of Regents.

Co-sponsored by the Brooklyn Parent Academy, Assemblymembers Danny O’Donnell, James Brennan, William Colton; NYS Senators Liz Krueger and Martin Golden; NYC Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, NYC Council Education Chair Robert Jackson, Council Members Gale Brewer and Leticia James; Class Size Matters, the Learning Disabilities Association of NY, Community Education Councils of Districts 1, 3, 13, 14, 15, 20, 21, 22 and the Citywide Council for Special Education, Alliance for Quality Education, Coalition for Educational Justice, and Urban Youth Collaborative.

The event will be livestreamed at http://www.stopmotionsolo.tv or http://www.ustream.tv/stopmotionsolo (either one is okay)

Categories New York City, Privacy and Privacy Rights

What Happens When Skunks Bust Out of a Cage?

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
6

Nancy Flanagan, retired NBCT, has written a brilliant post about Governor Rick Snyder’s secret project called the Skunk Works. The goal of the project was to invent a brand-new cheap-cheap-cheap school called a “Value School.” Sort of like a discount store where you get a product that looks like the real thing, but it is a cheap copy.

Now that the Skunk Works is out in the open, people are stunned that the group consisted of entrepreneurs and software developers. The only teacher quit the group when he saw where it was going. Can you have education without teachers? It’s cheap but is it good education?

And the last line of her article is right on.

Categories Michigan, On-Line Education, Teachers and Teaching, Technology, Computers

Florida: Phony Video, Phony Names on Petition for Parent Trigger”

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
6

Investigative journalists in Florida are all over the last-minute effort mounted by Jeb Bush and Michelle Rhee to find parents who support the so-called “parent trigger.”

First they circulated a video allegedly made by a group called the “Sunshine Parents,” supporting the trigger. Unfortunately, no one ever heard of this group and it has no website, unlike the PTAs and other parent organizations fighting the trigger bill. Maybe it is based in Jeb Bush’s offices.

Then a petition emerged in support of the bill, but some signatories say they never signed it. Score another trick at the hands of Michelle Rhee.

It seems there is no dirty trick that these pretend reformers won’t stoop to. They work with California-based Parent Revolution, which has received millions from the Walton Foundation, the Gates Foundation, and the Broad Foundation. Parent Revolution has sent a parent from Adelanto, California, to tell other state legislatures how wonderful the parent trigger is. She presents herself as but a simple parent who wanted to seize control of the public school that her community paid for. She doesn’t always admit that she is now an employee of the well-funded Parent Revolution or that her child no longer attends the elementary school she helped to close.

Parent Revolution is in trouble. It pushed through the trigger legislation more than three years ago, and only one school has been privatized, and it won’t get started until September as a charter.

The State Senate votes tomorrow. The bill already passed the House.

Will the State Senate fall for the hoax?

Or will they defend their community public schools against corporate predators?

Categories Florida, Parent trigger

What Did Albert Shanker Say and What Would He Say Now?

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2013 //
16

There is a new parlor game among the cognoscenti called “Albert Shanker Said This 20 or 30 Years Ago So It Must Be Right.”

Last fall, I had a tiff with New Jersey Commissioner Chris Cerf, who invoked Shanker’s name to support the Christie administration’s push for charters. I patiently explained that Al Shanker was indeed a founding father of the charter movement in 1988, but became a vehement critic of charters in 1993. He decided that charters and vouchers were the same thing, and both would be used to “smash” public education. This is not a matter of speculation. It is on the record.

Now the Shanker blog has an article by Lisa Hansel, former editor of the AFT’s “American Educator” magazine and now an employee of the Core Knowledge Foundation, asserting that Shanker would endorse Common Core if he were alive today. (The Core Knowledge English Language Arts program is now licensed to Amplify, which is run by Joel Klein and owned by Rupert Murdoch.)

Hansel also quotes Shanker as a great admirer of “A Nation at Risk.”

But here is the problem. Hansel speculates about what Shanker would say if he were alive today. She doesn’t know.

Would he join with Jeb Bush to endorse the Common Core? We don’t know.

Would he be as enthusiastic about “A Nation at Risk” in 2013 as he was in 1983, now that it has become the Bible of the privatization movement? We don’t know.

However, I can speculate too. Al Shanker cared passionately about a content-rich curriculum. So do I. Would his love for a content-rich curriculum have caused him to join with those who want to destroy public education? I don’t think so.

Would he have come to realize that “A Nation at Risk” would become not a document for reform but an indictment against public education? If he had, he would have turned against it.

Would he have felt good about Common Core if he knew that it had never been field tested? Would he have been thrilled with the prospect that scores will plummet across the nation, giving fodder to the privatizers? I think not.

Would he have been concerned that the primary writers of the Common Core were the original members of the board of Michelle Rhee’s union-busting StudentsFirst? Absolutely.

Would he have allied himself and his union with those who want to destroy the union and privatize public education? No.

Where would Albert Shanker stand on the Common Core if he were alive today?

I don’t know, and neither does anyone else.

Categories Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Common Core, Curriculum, Education Reform, Rhee, Michelle, StudentsFirst, Unions
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