Archives for the month of: December, 2013
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Eva’s Success in Getting Whatever She Wanted from Bloomberg Administration

By dianeravitch
December 11, 2013 //
10

Eva Moskowitz is a tough taskmaster. Lucky for her, the New York City Department of Education was willing to do whatever she demanded, no matter the cost.

As this article reports, what Eva wants, Eva gets. That may explain why Eva closed her schools this fall and led a protest march across the Brooklyn Bridge to demonstrate her opposition to Bill de Blasio’s demand that her charter chain pay rent for using public space. Unlucky for her, de Blasio won the election and will be the Mayor on January 1, 2014.

James Fanelli writes:

“NEW YORK CITY — When Eva Moskowitz starts a new charter school, top officials at the city’s Department of Education move heaven and earth to meet her demands.

“During the past two years, the DOE gave Moskowitz’s controversial chain, Success Academy, rent-free space in city school buildings to open 14 new co-location sites. In each handover, Moskowitz demanded the DOE deliver the space clear of furniture and broom-swept by 5 p.m. on the last day of the school year, according to sources and emails obtained by DNAinfo New York.

“But since students used the space until the second-to-last day of the school year, the DOE was left with less than 36 hours to clear the area — costing the department tens of thousands of dollars in overtime from contracted workers scrambling to meet the onerous deadline.

“The cost was astronomical,” a DOE insider told DNAinfo New York. “We don’t have to do it the very last day of school. There’s absolutely no need for this.”

The high-octane moves, insiders say, show the preferential treatment that DOE officials — including deputy schools chancellor Kathleen Grimm — give Success Academy, whose 22 schools serve just 6,700 of the city’s 1.1 million students.

Emails obtained by DNAinfo highlight the special relationship the high-profile school leader has with the DOE.”

As Mercedes Schneider reported recently, after reviewing Success Academy’s tax returns, the chain has millions in assets and can afford to pay rent. Moskowitz’s salary for overseeing 6,700 students is nearly $500,000, about double that of the NYC schools’ chancellor, who is responsible for overseeing 1.1 million pupils.

Categories Charter Schools, Education Industry, New York City

Amy Prime: What Is the Right Answer to This Test Question?

By dianeravitch
December 11, 2013 //
41

Amy Prime teaches second grade in Iowa. She wrote this post about a confusing question. The following question appeared on a test for her students. She posted it on her Facebook page to see how adults would answer it.

Here is the question:

Read and answer the following:

Animal Alley rescued Cloud and Clip. One night, a helper saw two baby animals. They were hungry. They were dirty. The helper fed them. She cleaned the animals. After a few weeks, the babies changed. They changed from skinny to chubby. A loving family adopted them.

What happened to Cloud and Clip?

A. A loving family adopted them.

B. Alley Animals rescued them.

C. They changed from skinny to chubby.

D. They were dirty and a helper cleaned them.

What do you think is the right answer? Read Amy’s post to find out.

Categories Teachers and Teaching, Testing

Thanks to StudentsFirst, John King Gets a Friendly Forum in New York

By dianeravitch
December 11, 2013 //
20

Commissioner John King finally got a friendly forum about Common Core. At the only hearing in Brooklyn, a borough in New York City with four million residents, every speaker but one praised Common Core and many accused its critics of racism. Reports from those on the scene (directly to me) as well as in the media said that the speakers’ list consisted of people who were affiliated with Michelle Rhee’s StudentsFirst and charter parents. Parents who were not part of these two groups could not get a chance to speak. The list was closed.

I had heard for the previous two weeks that speakers were being trained to support the Regents and King. And they got their chance to do so last night. One estimate sent to me was that 44 people spoke enthusiastically about Common Core and only one was opposed.

Categories Common Core, New York

Tom Loveless: Does the Common Core Matter?

By dianeravitch
December 11, 2013 //
27

In the spring of 2012, Brookings scholar Tom Loveless set off a firestorm when he wrote a study of the Common Core State Standards and concluded that they would make little or no difference in student achievement.

He did not pass judgment on the quality of the standards but on the question of how much standards matter.

He wrote:

“The finding is clear: The quality of state standards has not mattered. From 2003 to 2009, states with terrific standards raised their National Assessment of Educational Progress scores by roughly the same margin as states with awful ones.”

Does rigor matter? In fourth grade, he found, that was some evidence that raising cut points “is associated with increased achievement. But the effect is not large, and it is difficult to determine the direction of causality. At 8th grade, states with lenient cut points have made NAEP gains similar to those of states with rigorous ones.”

Most important, Loveless finds that “Test=score differences within states are about four to five times greater than differences in state means…Common state standards might reduce variation between states, but it is difficult to imagine how they will reduce variation within states. After all, districts and schools within the same state have been operating under common standards for several years and, in some states, for decades.”

In this article, which links to his study and to critics of the study, he concludes that the Common Core State Standards are not likely to make much of a difference.

Hmmm. How many tens of billions of dollars will be spent on Common Core-aligned hardware, software, professional development, and consultants to see if he is right? How many districts will increase class size, abandon the arts, and eliminate other necessary program along the way?

Couldn’t we have tried the idea out first in three to five states before imposing it on 45 states?

Categories Common Core

The Most Important Post of the Day: The Rightwing Assault on the Public Sector

By dianeravitch
December 11, 2013 //
21

Jan Resseger here links to a startling expose that appeared in the Guardian, a U.K. newspaper.

The Guardian gained access to secret documents showing the ties that bind a far-right network of public policy groups called the State Policy Network.

There is a public policy institute in almost every state, all sharing the same far-right ideology.

This group, which operates in tandem with the ALEC agenda, seeks to deregulate and privatize public services, privativepublic schools with charters and vouchers, reduce the corporate tax burden, reduce or eliminate regulation of greenhouse gases, and eliminate any public restriction on private greed.

Resseger writes:

The Guardian describes the State Policy Network as a sister organization to the American Legislative Exchange Council, ALEC. “SPN’s president, Tracie Sharp, told theGuardian that ‘as a pro-freedom network of thinktanks, we focus on issues like workplace freedom, education reform, and individual choice in healthcare: backbone issues of a free people and a free society.'”

Despite that the majority of the state affiliates of the State Policy Network are 501 (C) (3) organizations, according to The Guardian, the State Policy Network makes grants to its member think-tanks for projects “aimed at changing state laws and policies, or (that) refer to ‘advancing model legislation’ and ‘candidate briefings’, in ways that arguably cross the line into lobbying.”

See if your own state is represented on the list here.

The proposals submitted by specific state think-tanks for funding from the State Policy Network’s war chest include attacks on public employee pensions, campaigns to eliminate or reduce taxes, promotion of school vouchers, attacks on worker and union rights, and opposition to Medicaid.

Another post by Resseger reported the source of funding for this far-right assault on the public sector. Stinktanks.org reveals that the State Policy Network (SPN) has $83 million in funding from such sources as the Koch Brothers:

Stinktanks writes:

SPN has become an $83 million right-wing empire. SPN and its affiliates are not required to disclose their donors, and almost none of the groups publish a list of funders. Tax documents and other available records reveal that SPN is funded by large corporations, right-wing foundations, and wealthy conservative ideologues. Some of the most notable corporate funders of SPN and its web of “think tanks” include Big Tobacco companies (like Reynolds), Big Oil corporations (like the Koch family fortune), AT&T, Kraft Foods, Verizon, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Facebook, and Microsoft. SPN and its “think tanks” are also largely funded by right-wing special interest groups and individuals, including the Koch brothers, the DeVos family, the Coors family (of Coors Brewing Company), the Walton Family Foundation (of Walmart), Richard Mellon Scaife, Art Pope, the Roe Foundation, and the Bradley Foundation.

Stinktanks was written and posted by the Center for Media and Democracy, which also posts about “ALEC Exposed.”

If you want to know who is funding and lobbying for the attacks on public education and on teachers, this is a good place to start.

For more on the “Guardian” exposé, read NPR’s interview of “Guardian” correspondent Edward Pilkington by Terry Gross.

Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Privatization

No, the District of Columbia Is Not a National Model

By dianeravitch
December 10, 2013 //
22

Despite its recent gains on the 2013 NAEP, the District of Columbia is not a national model.

It remains the lowest performing urban district in the nation.

Its policy of test-and-punish-and-fire have produced a startlingly high attrition rate among teachers.

Churn is not good for schools or for children or for building a culture of collaboration.

Few of the principals hired by Rhee remain in the system.

The real story in D.C.: Thanks to Mayor Vincent Gray, D.C. started universal pre-K, and it is showing benefits in the early grades. A writer in the Washington Post called Gray’s work “a staggering achievement.”

As for the rest of the story, read this article that I wrote for Talking Points Memo.

It is hard to imagine that anyone would want to copy a system built on striking fear into the hearts of teachers and principals.

No successful corporation–large or small– operates in that manner. The best of our nation’s business companies boast of how they carefully select new hires, support them, and pamper them with perks to make them happy in their work.

Success in schooling grows from collaboration, love of learning, experienced teachers and principals, equitable and adequate funding, and leadership that holds itself accountable for its decisions.

Categories Childhood, Pre-K, K, District of Columbia, Education Reform, Rhee, Michelle

North Carolina: Teacher Attrition Reaches 5-Year High

By dianeravitch
December 10, 2013 //
27

Teachers in North Carolina are leaving their schools at a significantly higher rate this year.

The governor and legislature have targeted teachers for punitive measures, and they are succeeding in making teaching a less desirable career path.

Lindsay Wagner of NC Policy Watch reports:

“In 2008-09, only 35.55 percent of teachers who had tenure, also known as “career status,” left their jobs. That percentage has steadily risen and last year nearly half (49.35%) of all of those who left their positions were tenured teachers.

Mooresville Graded School District Superintendent Dr. Mark Edwards said it’s important to consider the fact that the state will see large numbers of baby boomers retiring during the next five years or so.

“We need to recruit people to stay,” said Edwards to his colleagues at this month’s State Board of Education meeting in Raleigh.

North Carolina ranks 46th in the nation in teacher pay. It takes 15 years for a teacher to make about $40,000 a year.

Last summer, state lawmakers decided to stop funding the North Carolina Teaching Fellows program, which awards scholarships to North Carolina high school students to pursue teaching degrees in state. Graduates then must teach for four years in North Carolina. More than 75 percent of Teaching Fellows teach in the state beyond five years, and many stay on for their entire careers.

Lawmakers took some of the money designated for the Teaching Fellows program and put it toward expanding the state’s presence of Teach For America (TFA), a national program designed to place graduates without degrees in education in teaching posts that are in low-performing schools.”

You can see where this is going.

As the state pushes out experienced teachers and eliminates its Teaching Fellows program, it clears the way to hire more inexperienced TFA, who pledge to stay for only two years. Call it turmoil by design.

Eric Guckian, the governor’s senior education advisor, is a TFA alumnus.

– See more at: http://www.ncpolicywatch.com/2013/12/05/teacher-turnover-in-north-carolina-significantly-higher-than-previous-year/#sthash.xL5z2KML.dpuf

Categories North Carolina, Teach for America TFA, Teachers and Teaching

Sweden: Market-Based Reforms in Big Trouble

By dianeravitch
December 10, 2013 //
60

Privatizers like to point to Sweden as their model (conveniently ignoring Chile, where the military dictator Pinochet’s advisors embraced Milton Friedman’s free-market policies). Since a conservative government came to power, Sweden has vouchers, publicly financed private schools, and for-profit schools. It is everything that ALEC, Bobby Jindal, Scott Walker, Rick Scott, Tom Corbett, and Rick Snyder could dream of.

But Swedish education just ran into a huge problem. Private equity firms are booming, as social and economic equity is growing.

And, oops, one of the biggest private firms went bankrupt earlier this year, causing many legislators to wonder if the nation is on the wrong path.

Reuters reports:

“STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – When one of the biggest private education firms in Sweden went bankrupt earlier this year, it left 11,000 students in the lurch and made Stockholm rethink its pioneering market reform of the state schools system.

School shutdowns and deteriorating results have taken the shine off an education model admired and emulated around the world, in Britain in particular.

“I think we have had too much blind faith in that more private schools would guarantee greater educational quality,” said Tomas Tobé, head of the parliament’s education committee and spokesman on education for the ruling Moderate party.

In a country with the fastest growing economic inequality of any OECD nation, basic aspects of the deregulated school market are now being re-considered, raising questions over private sector involvement in other areas like health.

Two-decades into its free-market experiment, about a quarter of once staunchly Socialist Sweden’s secondary school students now attend publically-funded but privately run schools, almost twice the global average.

Nearly half of those study at schools fully or partly owned by private equity firms.

Ahead of elections next year, politicians of all stripes are questioning the role of such firms, accused of putting profits first with practices like letting students decide when they have learned enough and keeping no record of their grades…..”

Categories Education Industry, Education Reform, International, Privatization

Why Does John King Stubbornly Cling to His Views, No Matter What Public Says?

By dianeravitch
December 10, 2013 //
61

This article arrived in my email unexpectedly, and I decided to post it because it contains a good analysis of how decision makers get stuck defending bad decisions.

Sean Brady explains the dangers of cognitive bias. He writes that it is “becoming increasingly apparent that he [King] may be doing more to undermine the implementation of the Common Core than he is doing to support it. For example, his approval of cut points on the 2013 assessments that resulted in the vast majority of the state’s grade 3 — 8 students to be deemed failing has created a firestorm of criticism, galvanized his critics in New York and stalled the implementation of the Common Core in some other states.

“Commissioner King is clearly a very smart man. Why might he take actions that do not support what he is trying to achieve? A search for cognitive biases and fallacies may provide some insight. There are a number to consider. King’s positive assessment of New York’s Common Core implementation despite mounting evidence of serious problems suggests optimism bias. His reference to a few, narrow data sets to defend his policies points to confirmation bias. However, two others seem to be at the the root of his troubles….”

King, he says, suffers from certainty bias and the sunk cost fallacy.

This is well worth reading.

Categories Common Core, New York

AFT Video: The Real Lessons of PISA

By dianeravitch
December 10, 2013 //
5

The AFT prepared an excellent video about the real lessons of PISA.

It shows graphically what the high-performing nations are doing.

It shows that poverty matters.

It shows that equitable resources matter.

It shows that teachers need to be supported and to work in a collaborative environment.

It shows the importance of early childhood education.

The PISA report offers no support for current U.S. policies.

Categories International, Pre-K, Teachers and Teaching
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