If you have been wondering why data mining matters so much,
you will want to see this video.
Please note that the U.S. Department of
Education’s logo is on this video.
In it, an entrepreneur named Jose Ferreira, CEO of Knewton, shares his vision for a future in
which education of every individual child is completely determined
by data. Education today happens to be the most “data-mineable
industry in the world,” he says.
His firm and Pearson can map out whatever your child knows and doesn’t know, design lessons, and do
whatever is necessary to “teach” the concepts needed. There is
nothing about your child that they don’t know, and they will know
more about him or her next year than they do this year. If this is
the future, then teachers will be mere technicians, if they are
needed at all. What do you think?
Peter Greene saw the video and
thought it was scary. He wrote: “Knewton will generate this giant
data picture. Ferreira says presents this the same way you’d say,
“Once we get milk and bread at the store,” when I suspect it’s
really more on the order of “Once we cure cancer by using our
anti-gravity skateboards,” but never mind. Once the data maps are
up and running, Knewton will start operating like a giant
educational match.com, connecting Pat with a perfect educational
match so that Pat’s teacher in Iowa can use the technique that some
other teacher used with some other kid in Minnesota. Because
students are just data-generating widgets. “Ferreira is also
impressed that the data was able to tell him that some students in
a class are slow and struggling, while another student could take
the final on Day 14 and get an A, and for the five billionth time I
want to ask this Purveyor of Educational Revolution, “Just how
stupid do you think teachers are?? Do you think we are actually
incapable of figuring those sorts of things out on our
own?””
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It’s the film _Divergent_ epitomized.
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Data mining on every individual -student and teacher alike.
What EVERY teacher ‘should know’ and ‘be able to do:’
The teaching of DISPOSITIONS is most important to the planners. They are referring to this as ” GRIT.”. This is one of the most important areas that must be taught to change the attitudes, values, opinions, and beliefs of American children. And, teachers MUST abide by these standards.
See the teacher standards starting on page 10-
Essential Knowledge: Critical Dispositions: Performances
Click to access intasc_model_core_teaching_standards_2011.pdf
These terms are re-cycled again, again, again……from Bloom’s Taxonomy
Lets define these categories:
knowledge, behaviors, skills
Cognitive, affective, psychomotor.
Know, do, and be like (orientations)
What you believe, how you feel, and how you will act.
Think, feel, act
In my Old Talking Papers, I explain why, you cannot change behavior, (control the end product) without changing how you think and how you feel. To have standards in dispositions (performance, behavior, act, orientations, non-cognitive)….you must create a conflict to change the child. These behavior changing techniques will all be performed through computers, now. The frustration, the stress created by simulations and re-wiring of brains is in its infancy. With enormous amounts of data mining because of Obama unlocking FERPA, the individual pathways, or the IEP for every child will be simulated on computer through adaptive software. Parents will NEVER know what is happening to their children.
The new term, same as old terms referred to as “deeper learning” (Webb), higher order thinking skills, critical thinking, beyond text, extended thinking…blah, blah, blah…..
Cognitive skills: nonroutine problem solving, critical thinking, systems thinking
Interpersonal skills: complex communication, social skills, teamwork, cultural sensitivity, dealing with diversity
Intrapersonal skills: self-management, time management, self-development, self-regulation, adaptability, executive functioning
Angela Duckworth had a Webinar sponsored by EdWeek Sept 27, 2013.
Using video games to assess the non-cognitive, also stating ” literally re-wiring kids brains”. Really. Do we as parents really think we are going to let Duckworth re-wire our kids brains? I think not.
Click to access intasc_model_core_teaching_standards_2011.pdf
We must stop this now!
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I see the NEA and the AFT participated. Sweet! (sarcasm)
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What is most disturbing is the tacit approval of the Dept. of Education and the current U.S. administration give to this endeavor. If it is salubrious for K-12 children, then imagine what it would do for elected officials at the local, state, and federal levels. I agree Jamie, Divergent indeed.
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These sorts of videos, seminars, presentations are rampant these days as the various rainmakers make the rounds through the country with their “futuristic” and “inevitable” view of what education will look like in the coming years. Rarely do they mention the profit motive. Rarely do they mention there is not a shred of evidence to support any of their BS. It’s more of the same technological determinism wrapped inside piles of cash.
What we have here is a deranged form of techno-utopianism. Through the use of empty jargon we are led to believe that these esoteric processes (they call education) are somehow going to alleviate (or eliminate) the human condition. This is all hackneyed stuff that has been trotted for years in numerous forms.
By now it seems we should all be living on the moon in our cybersuits. And certainly it seems the technology has failed us as we have yet to avoid the need for soil to grow food. And shouldn’t we be able to download our brains into a Microsoft product for full enhancement?
Keep in mind that all of these “futuristic educators” are on the payroll- every single one of them. It’s important also to understand that nearly all of them are extremely uninformed as to how the world actually works- they are all elitists.
One of the primary falsehoods that is regurgitated here is that somehow all of this is inevitable and that somehow we who don’t live in the world of “data jargon” are somehow to be rendered powerless, spellbound by the pretentious mysticism of these rainmakers. Do not believe that for a second.
It takes so little to break the spell of these people. Go to one of these conferences/seminars and ask the idiot in the above clip e.g. if he is interested in the social welfare of children and naturally he will assent. Now ask him if Knewton Inc. will be providing all of it’s “products” for free to the poorest kids on the planet. Watch him squirm and evade. And then ask him how much money he makes off all of this. Simple questioning such as this exposes the profound fraud that is the essence of all these “reformers.”
Ultimately all of these bloviations are no more than the catechism of Corporate America as they trot out their destructive ideologies at the expense of our kids (and ourselves) which I will not stand for. It’s just Taylorism dressed up in modern behaviorist-business jargon.
Be sure to attend these seminars- and disrupt. They are liars and profiteers- all of them.
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This is awful. All of it is awful. He doesn’t know how to present, he moves the slides too fast, he talks too fast, he stumbles over his words, he tries to cover too much, and he’s incredibly boring.
Grade: Ineffectual. We won’t be seeing him on TEDtalks.
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Terrifying in so many ways. Did I hear correctly? Did the speaker really say “that poor shmuck” when referring to a student and did he also say that we (Knewton) “should be able to tell you what to eat for breakfast?” Big Brother is no longer just watching us; he is trying to create us in His own image!
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I musty confess…
I’ve never seen anyone have a data orgasm while being video taped before. I couldn’t stop from laughing. I kept thinking of the film “Elmer Gantry” where Burt Lancaster comes sliding down the revival tent aisle on his knees promising to save everyone.
The truly scary part of this video is that I can envision hoards of on-line colleges such as the University of Phoenix jumping onto this bandwagon. Administrators in higher education are always looking for ways to reduce overhead. Goodbye faculty, hello IT personnel.
I wonder what my new “data point” number will be?
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“Data orgasm” – that’s even better than my “data piety”.
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Children are data, and data is for sale.
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The most at risk to education failure will have an even more difficult time growing out of a data classification. Even if everyone started the measurement process exactly equal (not possible) this is going to give rise to fairness issues one can imagine as an example – by data sorting using zip code.
Districts have to look at the risk of putting the data into this system. The communities that “own” the districts will feel the measure of less equity being worked on their behalf by the system. Key words will be used like computer scanning of resumes. The ability to progress will become more data centric.
This can not be helpful to those facing the education gap and the resultant poverty gap.
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Standardized testing is about data mining children’s minds.
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As much as I could decipher from such rapid speech. Maybe there is an unspoken reason for such fast talking jargon.
“atomic concept area”
“granular understanding of knowledge”
Just two examples!
“Everythiing in education is correlated to everthing else and in a predictable way”.
Let me peer into my magical silicon sphere and tell you what to eat for breakfast so that you can ace that math exercise today!
Yep, Yep, Yep!!!!
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The fast talking is to bamboozle you. He’s thought a lot about this, you haven’t, so you’re intimidated.
That doesn’t mean he’s right. But before you can figure out why, he’s on to the next slide.
Don’t be intimidated!
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Between all the big words there’s a content stream. If you pay attention, you may discover it’s running aimlessly all over the place and arriving nowhere.
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Colorado’s Dept of Ed can be seen bragging on this video about sharing student data with Dept of Social Services, Dept of Labor, Dept of Corrections, Higher Ed. …tracking every child with what they call a Golden Record” for life.
WHY on EARTH, do we need to share kids’ info with these agencies. It has NOTHING to do with academics.
Start digging. Your state Dept of Ed probably has similar sharing practices. watch here
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Oh c’mon, with two minutes of happy music, how can you be against data?
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“So the human race is going to enter into a completely data-mined existence” he says with smirk.
I have two reactions to this.
First, in order to work with data in this way a person would have done some advanced coursework in statistics, psychology, sociology and until just recently economics. Yet because psychometrics is taught as a part of a social science discipline theory, and to a certain extent ethics, are taught along side the technical manipulations. Historically anyone with enough knowledge to do this kind of work would put together a research protocol that would include considerations of theory, method and concerns about research subjects.
This dude has a smirk on his face because he is totally enthralled with what is possible. However, it is not the wondrous technology that is what is making this possible. Item response theory has been around for a very long time although it was mostly statisticians, psychologists and sociologists who developed and used it. This is what is new:
1. An increased understanding of education as the sequential cognitive mastery of discrete facts or “knowledge bytes” on the part of politically-influential people and groups.
2. A willingness on the part of policymakers and the public to conceptualize the education of children aged 5-18 as an X billion dollar market.
3. A willingness on the part of policymakers and the public to allow for-profit companies access to the process of educating children in order to exploit it as a market. The central lynchpin: CCSS.
3. Wiping away FERPA, or at least the intentions of the Act.
4. A shift from local control to federal control when it comes to education so that this national market can be realized.
5. A market-based belief that improved educational products lead to improved outcomes almost exclusively.
I am sure there are other issues, or ways of stating the above better, but the central point I wish to emphasize is that political and cultural changes are what is driving the “possibilities” much more so than the technology. Standardized materials and unprecedented access to school children is what makes this a fast moving thing that carries the “gloss” of being the wave of the future through technology.
This brings me to my second point.
It is not necessary to retool the entire system of education in the United States and use all students as a data point in order to get the end result of customized homework sheets and other benefits. Doing so may be enormously reckless because it cannot easily be undone and it also amounts to incredibly cheap R&D for the companies that stand to profit the most. The beauty of item response theory is that given a large enough representative sample, it is likely possible to identify several learning “types” or “styles” for a specific knowledge domain. You don’t have to test or include every kid in order to get there. Another way of accomplishing the same goal would be to gather a representative sample and pay them as research subjects. This R & D could be done on the sidelines and then brought to market rather than doing the R & D in real time. Of course, this approach would be exceptionally more expensive and take more time and this is not what a for-profit CEO would pursue if given the option. Yet the potential risks of dismantling the system of public education is not a risk or expense his company has to bear.
Finally, the CEO half-joked about being able to tell students what to have for breakfast in order to score well on a test. Again, the statistical power for such “insight” is not new. I am very concerned that presentations such as the CEO’s will inspire the general public to think that the way to an egalitarian, just and sustainable society is through technology provided by for-profit corporations.
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“Historically anyone with enough knowledge to do this kind of work would put together a research protocol that would include considerations of theory, method and concerns about research subjects.”
Agreed!
And would also present to an IRB before beginning research, at least in my experience. That IRB can stop you in your tracks is they feel the proposal contains anything unethical, unsafe, inappropriate, etc.
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And that is what his dystopia of millions of children clicking through educational products will be — research. Only after the students are put in a situation to generate the data en mass, through restructuring so much of public education, will the adaptive materials be created. Thus, your students will be participating in R & D for these educational products. If it turns out that the educational gains were not worth the opportunity cost of radically restructuring public education, Knewton won’t have to fix the problem and return public schooling to something akin to what it was. In fact we ought to count on the fact that the “answer” will be more products.
Personally, I do see the merits in computer adaptive technology. I used the Kaplan materials to prepare for the GRE and they were incredibly helpful. It had been along time since I had used algebra and geometry and I had forgotten a lot. The computer adaptive modules helped me identify where the holes were. However, I was an adult learner and I was highly motivated because gaining points on the test would have a clear benefit for me. So for review, it has great potential. For initial instruction…for children…well, I’d like to see the data.
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These guys are scary not just for their desire to control and catalog everything, but in their absolute faith in their data technology and their absolute lack of faith in humans. The educational implications of this are bad enough, but more ridiculous by far is the implication that humans can best know themselves by feeding data into a computer and then listening as the computer tells them who they are.
Here’s the full post that is referenced above
http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2014/03/who-puts-scary-in-pearson-meet-knewton.html
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“The educational implications of this are bad enough, but more ridiculous by far is the implication that humans can best know themselves by feeding data into a computer and then listening as the computer tells them who they are.”
Well said!!!
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We need a federal investigation on FERPA and how Obama unlocked data and released PII, personally identifiable information, for free. The data mining will not stop without closing the loopholes in FERPA. There is a new definition for school official.
Who has access to our student and family personal data?
There are three main changes in FERPA that should be considered dangerous: the definitions of PII, who can redisclose PII data that was collected, and who can use or have access to the data collected.
Under FERPA, please note that a “contractor, consultant, volunteer, or other party to whom an agency or institution has outsourced institutional services or functions may be considered a school official under this paragraph….”.(99.30 B). In essence, any organization, acting as a school official without your permission. Can access this data theough a written agreement, contract, or MOU. Is that possible? Are there no protections?
Any disclosure is allowed to organizations conducting studies for, or on behalf of, educational agencies or institutions to:
(A) Develop, validate, or administer predictive tests;
(B) Administer student aid programs; or
(C) Improve instruction. 91.31 (6)(i)
Of course, improving instruction means the student will be monitored for meeting Common Core College, Career and Citizenship Standards. Corrective techniques are being researched by big business as you read this passage.
New regulations took effect January 3, 2012 that drastically change the law by under cutting any protections for PII, personally identifiable information, that can be released.
The new rules allows for “data sharing” beyond government agencies to any outside organization that is “evaluating ” or ” auditing” an educational program. The “unlocked” data on an individual is now allowed to be accessed by “others” deemed school officials other than the strict guidelines that was proposed under the Hanson Memorandum which required that under the ‘‘audit or evaluation exception,’’ only an authorized representative of a State educational authority must be a party under the direct control of that authority, e.g., an employee or a contractor to access the data. Obama has allowed the Hanson Memorandum to be rescinded which opens the flood gates of data flowing to outside contractors.
Demand a federal investigation. This must be stopped.
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We are all data points to narcissists, sociopaths and psychopaths—nothing but numbers $$$$$$$$$
Hello to the world of Bill Gates, Google, Apple and Amazon
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I’m heartened by this development for several reasons: it is open source, which means anyone can use the framework and teachers could add to, edit, or delete modules and objectives (as opposed to CCSS); it facilitates a movement toward individualized mastery learning (as opposed to the current age-based-grade levels); it uses frequent formative assessments to measure performance and provides immediate feedback to students and teachers alike (as opposed to the tri-annual SBAM and PARCC); and it makes teachers into diagnosticians (as opposed to technicians who robotically follow a prescribed CCSS curriculum).
And one other point: advertisers are gathering more and better data than they ever did before thanks to the web…. but I think we all know that advertisers were always gathering data on us. Analogously, data mining provides educators with the same opportunity to gather more and better data… and we can’t deny that we’ve been gathering it all along. Just look at the stuffed file folders in the archives of your school district’s repository.
Here’s a post I wrote elaborating on the ideas outlined above: http://waynegersen.com/2014/03/25/datapalooza-misses-the-mark/
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This was filmed at the White House in 2012 during a “Datapalooza” and shows the vision of data collection and data mining in public education. The video is of Jose Ferreira, the CEO of Knewton. Knewton’s largest partners are………get ready for this……..Pearson and Microsoft.
This video helps tie all of the pieces together of a very well thought out strategy that has been in the works for years. A very small number of elite individuals including Gates and Duncan have the vision of revolutionizing global education using a computer based system called Next Generation Learning or Individualized Learning. Some claim it will personalize education. Others claim it will use data mining of powerful, predictive and personal information to profile your child and put them on a predefined educational track. While the benefits seem intriguing at first glance, the risks are simply beyond comprehension if we don’t protect our children’s privacy. All of this is happening without transparency because the elites know parents and teachers would never go for it because it is not proven. Oh, and by the way, Knewton, Pearson and Microsoft all stand to make a lot of money.
Here is their playbook:
1.) Loopholes were added to Federal Education and Privacy Rights Act (FERPA) in 2008/2011 to allow these companies access to student’s personally identifiable information (PII) without a parent’s knowledge or consent in order to “conduct research” or “improve instruction.”
2.) The Common Core national standards provide the tagging structure for the “atomic concept level” data to be gathered in a uniform way.
3.) The national assessments PARCC and Smarter Balance will be aligned to this education taxonomy so that the closer you follow it the higher your scores. Other tests such as the ACT are also being aligned.
4.) The State Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) and college entrance will be used to put pressure on teachers, schools, parents and teachers to get the highest possible test scores driving them to the Pearson/Microsoft on-line curriculum that will collect and mine keystroke level data on our children.
5.) Once all of the data analytics and software are developed it will be nearly impossible to get all of the stakeholders to ever agree to revise or upgrade the copyrighted standards.
This EdTech revolution is going to happen one way or another. The question becomes will it happen in a way that empowers individuals or centralizes control in the hands of a few? The answer all depends on how we treat the privacy of our children’s education data. Let’s be clear, FERPA as it stands today is a joke.
This data collection, data mining and data sharing is what inBloom and TS Gold are being built to facilitate. If you are not already familiar with Teaching Strategies Gold (TS Gold) you need to be. This is the next inBloom but it is so much worse. Here is a great blog written by a teacher in Denver to get you started. We must stop the use of TS Gold in our preschool and kindergarten classrooms before it is too late.
http://www.pegwithpen.com/2013/09/do-not-go-for-gold-teaching-strategies.html
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Scary! He said, “education is the 4th largest industry in the world.” This is the real motivation behind “reform.” Creating data points? Developing a funnel for education monies.
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I tried a couple of computer-based teaching programs, and neither one was any use at all. I doubt this will work either.
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