Archives for the year of: 2013
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Daniel Denvir: Pennsylvania Covering Up Major Cheating Scandal

By dianeravitch
July 23, 2013 //
7

Daniel Denvir, crack investigative journalist in Philadelphia, reports that the state has dragged its feet on an investigation of a major cheating scandal.

Despite evidence of high rates of erasures, the state has done nothing and refuses reporters’ requests for information.

Denvir writes:

“Over the last two years, inquiries were closed or altered with little explanation, and state and school administrators refused to answer basic questions about the investigations’ nature or methods. Some schools were left to investigate themselves. Only a handful of administrators and one teacher have been publicly held to account.

“It’s dragging on at an incredibly slow pace compared to investigations elsewhere,” says Bob Schaeffer, public-education director at FairTest, an organization critical of high-stakes testing. “And it makes you wonder: What’s going on?”

“The Notebook and, to a lesser extent, the Inquirer have covered each turn in this story. But despite continued questions, few answers have been forthcoming. “Some people probably want this story to go away,” says Notebook editor Paul Socolar. “Some people may think it has gone away because there hasn’t been a lot of information coming out about what actually happens. That’s not for lack of effort. We’re not getting a lot of information from the authorities about what they found out in their investigations.”

“After all, politically, the state would have a great deal to lose by prosecuting cheaters. Some of the most damning evidence of cheating has come from Philadelphia, a district run by the state since 2002, and from charters, including a Chester school run by a prominent leader in Pennsylvania’s self-described school-reform movement who is a backer of Gov. Tom Corbett. But more than that, bubble tests have become the high-stakes centerpiece of American public education; when the scores are tainted, it could throw an entire way of running schools into question.

“Given the scope of the issue and the lack of action since, it appears Pennsylvania is covering up one of the country’s largest cheating scandals — and doing so in plain sight.”

The pursuit of ever higher scores, Denvir reports, has produced not only massive cheating, but also intensive test prep, narrowing the curriculum, unjust firings and school closings.

Categories Closing schools, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

Superintendent or CEO?

By dianeravitch
July 23, 2013 //
12

A reader encourages us to watch our language and use the right titles:

“PLEASE, PLEASE stop referring to Paul Vallas or Arne Duncan as “Superintendent” of Chicago Public Schools. They were CEOs – because in Illinois, they were unqualified to be Superintendents. If you’re the CEO, you don’t need an education background.”

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Corporate Reformers

This Post Went Viral Today

By dianeravitch
July 23, 2013 //
7

Congratulations to Yevonne Brannan, whose post about the legislative attack on public education in North Carolina went viral today. Nearly 30,000 people read her post. That is amazing!

Congratulations, Yevonne, and forgive me for misspelling your first name in the post.

Yevonne is one of the leaders of Public Schools First NC.

She and other devoted parents, teachers, and citizens will win this battle. Not today, not this year, maybe not next year, but they will win.

Here is the announcement of the formation of her group of brave fighters for the common good. They got started only last February. They are determined. They will take back NC from the cultural vandals. It will happen. They have just begun to fight.

Public Schools First NC Forms to Champion Public Education

We are pleased to let you know that a a new statewide, non-partisan, grassroots advocacy group committed to high-quality public schools for North Carolina has formed. Public Schools First NC is a group of citizens, parents, teachers, businesses and organizations joining together out of a deep concern about the growing threat to privatize and weaken North Carolina’s public schools.

Public Schools First NC’s common sense agenda includes:
Adequate, equitable funding reflecting at least the national average for North Carolina’s school district
A limited number of truly innovative charter schools designed to work with local school districts, managed with careful local and state oversight.
Excellent educational environments that are partnerships between schools, families, teachers and the community.
Increased support for pre-school, because high quality, early childhood education is a wise investment for communities and has lifelong, positive results for children.
Programs that encourage the training and retention of professional experienced teachers and principals.
Take the next step for public education in NC!

Join Public Schools First NC to receive news, information, and important action alerts: http://www.publicschoolsfirstnc.org/join-us/
Like Public Schools First NC on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/publicschoolsfirstnc
Follow Public Schools First NC on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ps1nc
_________________________________________________________________________________

Categories North Carolina, Vouchers

Georgia Withdraws from PARCC Testing Consortium

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
30

The U.S. Department of Education is prohibited by law from interfering in curriculum, but Secretary Duncan was itching to get the Common Core standards adopted. First, he said that states would not be eligible for a share of $5 billion in federal stimulus funds unless they adopted common college-and-career-readiness standards. Wink, wink, almost every state agreed to adopt the Common Core.

Then the Secretary awarded $350 million to two consortia for the purpose of developing tests of the Common Core (which of course he had nothing to do with).

Last, he offered waivers from the absurd requirements of NCLB but only for states that went along with Common Core.

Not so fast: some parents are in revolt against the deluged testing, and some states don’t have the technology and can’t pay the heavy costs.

Georgia just dropped out of the PARCC consortium. Below are the stated reasons:

July 22, 2013 – State School Superintendent Dr. John Barge and Gov. Nathan Deal announced today that Georgia is withdrawing from the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) test development consortium.

Instead, the Georgia Department of Education (GaDOE) will work with educators across the state to create standardized tests aligned to Georgia’s current academic standards in mathematics and English language arts for elementary, middle and high school students. Additionally, Georgia will seek opportunities to collaborate with other states.

Creating the tests in Georgia will ensure that the state maintains control over its academic standards and student testing, whereas a common assessment would have prevented GaDOE from being able to adjust and rewrite Georgia’s standards when educators indicate revisions are needed to best serve students.

“After talking with district superintendents, administrators, teachers, parents, lawmakers and members of many communities, I believe this is the best decision for Georgia’s students,” Superintendent Barge said. “We must ensure that our assessments provide educators with critical information about student learning and contribute to the work of improving educational opportunities for every student.”

Georgia was one of 22 states to join PARCC several years ago with the aim of developing next generation student assessments in mathematics and English language arts by 2014-15.

“Assessing our students’ academic performance remains a critical need to ensure that young Georgians can compete on equal footing with their peers throughout the country,” Gov. Deal said. “Georgia can create an equally rigorous measurement without the high costs associated with this particular test. Just as we do in all other branches of state government, we can create better value for taxpayers while maintaining the same level of quality.”

Superintendent Barge was one of the state school chiefs serving on the governing board for the consortium, but he frequently voiced concerns about the cost of the PARCC assessments. The PARCC assessments in English language arts and math are estimated to cost significantly more money than Georgia currently spends on its entire testing program.

Superintendent Barge also expressed concerns over the technology requirements for PARCC’s online tests. Many Georgia school districts do not have the needed equipment or bandwidth to handle administering the PARCC assessments.

As GaDOE begins to build new assessments, please note that our Georgia assessments:
· will be aligned to the math and English language arts state standards;
· will be high-quality and rigorous;
· will be developed for students in grades 3 through 8 and high school;
· will be reviewed by Georgia teachers;
· will require less time to administer than the PARCC assessments;
· will be offered in both computer- and paper-based formats; and
· will include a variety of item types, such as performance-based and multiple-choice items.

“We are grateful to Georgia educators who have worked hard to help develop our standards and assessments,” Superintendent Barge said. “We look forward to continuing to work with them to develop a new assessment system for our state.”

——————————————–
Matt Cardoza
Director of Communications
Georgia Department of Education
2062 Twin Towers East
205 Jesse Hill Jr. Drive SE
Atlanta, GA 30334
(404) 651-7358
mcardoza@doe.k12.ga.us
http://www.gadoe.org
Follow us on Twitter: @gadoenews and @drjohnbarge
Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/gadoe

“Making Education Work for All Georgians”

Categories Common Core, Georgia, Testing

North Carolina: A First Look at the Destruction of Public Education

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
22

Lindsay Wagner is an excellent journalist at NC Policy Watch. She covers the legislature.

Here is her summary of the slash-and-burn policies that the legislature applied to public education:

1. Vouchers. $10 million set aside. This week, legislators will consider vouchers for students with disabilities. This is an ALEC priority, but ironically students with disabilities have greater rights and protection in public schools than in private schools.

2. Elimination of teacher tenure. Teachers now become temporary employees.

3. Teacher pay. NC teachers are among the worst paid in the nation. This legislation won’t help. “Teacher pay: no raises for teachers, who have only seen a 1% pay increase in the past five years. Supplemental pay for teachers who have master’s degrees is gone, with the exception of those whose jobs require advanced degrees. A scheme for merit pay is included, with highly performing teachers getting bonuses in the second year.”

4. Funding for teacher assistants was cut.

5. Class size limits were removed. Class sizes will grow.

6. Virtual charters: the state board is urged to give them another look.

The North Carolina legislature and governor are systematically dismantling the teaching profession and privatizing public education. These people are cultural vandals.

Categories Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, North Carolina, Teacher Tenure, Vouchers

Connecticut Teacher On Vallas’ Record

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
30

A Connecticut teacher named Linda who comments frequently on the blog decided to research the record of Paul Vallas. This is her summary:

“I have been keeping track for a while now…easy to goggle Vallas and Pelto, Ravitch, Mercedes Schneider, Philly Notebook, George Schmidt, substance news.

Who is Paul Vallas and why is he coming to Madison?

Vallas launched the nation’s most extensive experiment in privatization, which was evaluated by the RAND Corporation.

Here is RAND’s report on Vallas’ foray into the “diverse provider model.”

Click to access RAND_RB9239.pdf

“The major findings of the analysis of achievement effects under the diverse provider model in its first four years of operation are as follows:

http://thenotebook.org/summer-2007/07119/vallas-leaves-changed-district-again-tumult

VALLAS FACTS: Philadelphia schools ‘bankrupt’? Only because austerity politics of the ruling class dictate that lies and the policies of ‘standards and accountability’ have been an expensive failure

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4386

VALLAS FACTS: ‘The Paul Vallas I Knew’… Paul Vallas and the origins of the corporate ‘school reform’ policy to eliminate black teachers and principals in Chicago.

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4397

VALLAS FACTS: ‘The Paul Vallas Hoax’ in the March 2002 Substance exposed every lie, half-truth, and self serving utteration of Vallas… But it took other places a decade to check out Vallas’s nonsense and try to stop his ‘school reform’ nonsense

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=4370

Indianapolis, $18 million

http://jonathanpelto.com/2012/08/13/paul-vallas-new-corporate-partnership-signs-18-million-deal-with-indianapolis-school-system/

Click to access revised-reco-and-provider-info.pdf

See claims page 10 and 11:

NOLA debunked:

Here is the deception: “combined school districts” means RSD and the 17-school Orleans Parish Schools (OPSB), which was primarily magnet schools turned into selective admission charters. Attempts to make RSD look better by combining its data with that of OPSB is nothing new. See this post:

“In Case You Missed It… You Really Didn’t Miss Much”

Also, the “50% decrease in dropout rate” is an inflated stat; also, it does not include the fact that the definition of “dropout” was changed to exclude students who after dropping out decided to attend education programs (like night school). See this link:

http://www.thepelicanpost.org/2011/04/11/louisiana-dropout-rate-falls-31-percent/

Another word regarding Edison Learning (pg 13 of report): Jeb Bush used the Florida teacher pension money to bail out Edison, a company that never succeeded in what it said it could do: raise student scores for less money:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson/chris-cerf-there-you-go-a_b_835180.html

New Orleans’ Recovery School District: The Lie Unveiled

The school- and district-level data presented in this post unequivocally demonstrates that the state-run RSD is hardly a miracle. It should be an embarrassment to any reformer insisting otherwise. And it should come as no wonder why RSD doesn’t even mention school letter grades on its website.

The history of the state-run RSD in New Orleans is one of opportunism and deceit, of information twisting and concealing, in order to promote a slick, corporate-benefitting, financially-motivated agenda. It is certainly not “for the children.”

To other districts around the nation who are considering adopting “the New Orleans miracle”:

Reread this post, and truly consider what it is that you would be getting: A lie packaged to only look appealing from afar.

New Orleans’ Recovery School District: The Lie Unveiled

Paul’s program in New Orleans was not to rebuild public education after the hurricane, but to create a privatized system of schools.

The NOLA miracle that wasn’t:

http://deutsch29.wordpress.com/2013/06/29/rsds-watered-down-incremental-miracle-and-continued-fiscal-embarrassment/”

Categories Chicago, Connecticut, Philadelphia, Privatization, Vallas, Paul

Louisiana: $615 Million for Consultants, $0 for Home Care for Disabled

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
28

Governor Bobby Jindal eliminated a $4 million program that provides home care for people with developmental disabilities. You know, the state can’t afford it.

But the state treasurer pointed out that the Louisiana Department of Education spent an astonishing $615 million on consultants in the five years from 2005-2010.

According to the local media:

“State Treasurer John Kennedy gave Gov. Bobby Jindal an idea last week of where to find dollars to expand home services for the developmentally disabled.

“Jindal vetoed $4 million that would have allowed more disabled to get care that keeps them out of institutions.

“Kennedy said in his “opinion column” that even though “money is tight” there is a way to restore the funding. A “good start” would be for Jindal to reverse his axing of a legislative plan to cut $2 million in consulting contracts.

“The state Department of Education pays tens of millions of dollars to consultants each year, many of whom are out-of-state,” Kennedy wrote. “In fact, from 2005 to 2010, the department issued 5,499 consulting contracts worth $615,773,580.74.”

Some of the $615 million spent for consultants:

Contract #662421; “Create a public awareness campaign targeting multiple
audiences in Louisiana to establish a positive image of high school
redesign;” $341,465.48.
Contract #655743; “Contractor to provide services related to interactions
with media, arrange interviews and provide reporters with information, draft
written materials;” $100,000.
Contract #663689; “Contractor will select and train focused individuals from
within education, as well as former educators, to become leaders in the
RSD;” $200,000.
Contract #672113; “Contractor to provide program that will assist students
to learn valuable social skills through organized play on their recess and
lunch periods;” $94,000.

Categories Budget Cuts, Jindal, Bobby, Louisiana, Special Education

Pelto: The Background of the Vallas Controversy in Bridgeport

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
5

Jonathan Pelto, a blogger who is considered an “electronic graffiti” artist byPaul,Vallas, is a former Democratic legislator in Connecticut.

Here he summarizes the background of the Vallas controversy, which began when the Dannel Malloy administration dissolved the elected Bridgeport school board and engineered a state takeover. This move was challenged in court and ruled. Illegal. However, the illegal board hired Paul Vallas and gave him a three year contract.

Then a state judge ruled that Vallas lacked the legal qualifications to serve as superintendent.

The lawyer who defended the illegal state takeover is now on the state’s highest court and has refused to recuse himself from ruling on the Vallas issue.

Categories Connecticut, Corporate Reformers, Vallas, Paul

Vallas Refers to Bloggers as “Electronic Graffitti”

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
62

These days, the blogosphere has become a medium for democratic expression. With so few mainstream media still in existence, blogging has become an important forum for those who have no voice.

Today’s New York Times has an article about the controversy surrounding Paul Vallas in Bridgeport. Vallas speaks contemptuously of bloggers as “electronic graffitti.”

The article speaks dismissively of the fact that Vallas does not have the credentials required by state law to be superintendent. After all, he served as superintendent in Chicago, Philadelphia, and the Recovery School District. The article failed to review how Vallas performed in those districts, while suggesting that this real-life experience should suffice to qualify him as superintendent of Bridgeport.

Is Chicago a successful district after years of control by Vallas and then Arne Duncan? Hardly.

What about Philadelphia? Vallas introduced the nation’s most sweeping privatization experiment when he was in charge, and it was a colossal failure. When he left, the city was in deficit, and it is now facing financial and educational collapse after a decade of state control.

And the Recovery School District? Its partisans, who have poured millions into privatization, keep speaking of “progress” and rapid test score gains, but fail to mention that the RSD in Louisiana is one of the state’s lowest performing districts, where at least 2/3 of the charter schools are rated D or F by the state.

Note that Secretary Duncan defends Vallas and his lack of credentials. This is not surprising because Duncan never had the credentials or education experience to be superintendent.

A reader commented on Duncan’s remarks:

The article says, “Arne Duncan, the federal education secretary, said the opposition to Mr. Vallas was ‘beyond ludicrous.’ He said too many school districts were afraid of innovation, clinging to ‘archaic ideas.’

‘This, to me, is just another painfully obvious, crystal-clear example of people caught in an old paradigm,’ Mr. Duncan said in an interview. ‘This is the tip of the iceberg.’”

“I imagine that the “old” paradigm is the one about true education: students learning and teachers teaching, based upon their philosophies, knowledge, and assessment of the moment, etc. That is, their professionalism, compassion, and fortitude.”

This is my comment:

What is the new paradigm? Education reduced to test scores delivered by inexperienced people with no professional preparation. Principals and superintendents with no education experience.

How, exactly, is that “reform”?

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Connecticut, Education Reform, Vallas, Paul

OECD Wants to Measure And Grade Universities

By dianeravitch
July 22, 2013 //
24

The OECD is so pleased with the “success” of international testing for K-12 that it wants to bring the same testing to higher education. Then, presumably, it would be possible to compare higher education across nations and see who is best, who ranks lowest, and get everyone to compete on the terms that OECD chooses.

This is nothing less than a bold power grab by OECD, which arrogates to itself the authority to determine the rules of the game, the shape of the playing field, and the definition of winners and losers. If nothing else, it reminds us how nonsensical it is to compare institutions that differ in many ways within the same city, the same state, and of course, the nation.

What happens if OECD determines that higher education is better in nation A than nations B, C, D, etc.? Should everyone move to nation A?

If this idea proceeds, we can be sure that universities will start teaching to the OECD tests. OECD will become the arbiter of the question, “what knowledge is of most worth?”

We can safely predict, as I did in a speech to the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities last year that the NCLB framework will ensnare higher education and restrict imagination and creativity. Who will measure the value of courses in art history, Ancient Greek, anthropology, diplomatic history or other studies that have enormous cultural rewards, but limited economic promise? How do we measure the economic value of independent, well-informed thought?

For a good critique of the testing obsession, read Pasi Sahlberg’s “Finnish Lessons” and Yong Zhao’s “World Class Learners.”

OECD’s ambition to measure the world exemplifies what Sahlberg calls the Global Educational Reform Movement, or GERM.

Many years ago, I interviewed an MIT professor who was widely renowned as a physicist but also for his interest in K-12 issues. He said to me, “Let me write a nation’s tests and I care not who writes its songs or poetry.” Think about it. The power to judge a nation by whether it passes tests of your design is the power to control.

Categories Global Education Reform Movement (GERM), Higher Education, International, Testing
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