Shepherd: How to Be an EduPundit, Made EZ

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1. FLERP! says:

   April 18, 2014 at 11:04 am

   One of the big problems with this world is everybody’s got to earn a living.

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   • Cosmic Tinker says:

     April 18, 2014 at 11:19 am

     Right, FLERP!, it’s a huge problem, but lots of us do it with integrity and don’t aim to pull one over on unsuspecting marks.

     Bob, you forgot “transformational.”

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     • Bob Shepherd says:

       April 18, 2014 at 11:31 am

       Of course! Many possible additions. For those you will need the complete iPad InstaEduPundit software system, which you can avail yourself of by signing up for our five-week training. No previous education experience necessary! Only a sincere desire to bring about Creative Disruption.

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     • Bob Shepherd says:

       April 18, 2014 at 11:32 am

       And, of course, money to pay the course fees, materials fees, certification fees, and fee processing fees.

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     • Ang says:

       April 18, 2014 at 11:57 am

       Thank you, CT.

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     • Cosmic Tinker says:

       April 18, 2014 at 2:33 pm

       I think “Creative Disruption” is a euphemism. Many edupreneurs refer to it as “Creative Destruction.”

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     • Cosmic Tinker says:

       April 18, 2014 at 2:34 pm

       Thank YOU, Ang!

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     • Bob Shepherd says:

       April 18, 2014 at 5:04 pm

       Yes, thanks, CT and Ang.

       The meme has its origins in a book by Michael Horn, Curtis Johnson, and Clayton M. Christensen called Disrupting Class. The book is an attempt to apply to education ideas from Christensen’s The Innovator’s Dilemma. But certainly “Destruction” is more appropriate given the damage that Ed Deform is causing.

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     • Ellen Lubic says:

       April 20, 2014 at 9:58 pm

       Creative Destruction based on U. of Chicago economist’s theory. eg..When a new industry emerges, as with CC, it invalidates, kills off, the older industries in the same business. Applied to horse and buggies and automobiles, and now to “old” teaching methods from John Dewey to today, finished off in favor of “new” CC.

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2. Chiara Duggan says:

   April 18, 2014 at 11:37 am

   alexanderrusso ‏@alexanderrusso 2h
   “Talk-radio bombast and interest group resistance to change” at the heart of CommonCore resistance, says NYT Brooks http://ht.ly/vVhCd

   He has his finger on the pulse of the nation! From his desk in suburban DC.

   I love the “interest group” dismissal. Those darn interest groups are ruining his theoretical program what with all the….people getting involved and messing it up 🙂

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3. The Reading Professor says:

   April 18, 2014 at 11:53 am

   I read the David Brooks opinion piece this morning and felt sick. He must have had lunch with Thomas Freidman. I can understand that they have a right to their opinions but their writing on educational issues is so superficial. They need to do some “close reading” of their own works. Now I’m starting to wonder… if they can’t get the educational stuff correct, why should I believe they can write with any in-depth understanding on other important issues. I’m not trying to be harsh…just an “I wonder” question.

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   • Ellen Lubic says:

     April 20, 2014 at 10:03 pm

     Here is the long tedious rational from hedge fund manager Tilson who seems to speak for poor students of color while he concurrently teaches his clients how to invest in public education. Sorry for the length but he just sent this as a newletter momens ago…based on the David Brooks piece today. 1) David Brooks with a powerful and compelling defense of the Common Core: We are pretty familiar with this story: A perfectly sensible if slightly boring idea is walking down the street. Suddenly, the ideological circus descends, burying the sensible idea in hysterical claims and fevered accusations. The idea’s political backers beat a craven retreat. The idea dies. This is what seems to be happening to the Common Core education standards, which are being attacked on the right because they are common and on the left because they are core. About seven years ago, it was widely acknowledged that state education standards were a complete mess. Huge numbers of students were graduating from high school unprepared either for college work or modern employment. A student who was rated “proficient” in one state would be rated “below basic” in another. About 14 states had pretty good standards, according to studies at the time, but the rest had standards that were verbose, lax or wildly confusing. The National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers set out to draft clearer, consistent and more rigorous standards. Remember, school standards are not curricula. They do not determine what students read or how teachers should teach. They are the goals for what students should know at the end of each grade. This was a state-led effort, supported by employers and financed by private foundations. This was not a federal effort, though the Obama administration did encourage states to embrace the new standards. These Common Core standards are at least partially in place in 45 states. As is usual, the initial implementation has been a bit bumpy. It’s going to take a few years before there are textbooks and tests that are truly aligned with the new standards. But the new initiative is clearly superior to the old mess. 2) Speaking of the Common Core, here’s an article from the front page of today’s NYT about how some in the Republican party are turning against it – which boggles my mind because this is a Republican idea! The main reason for the rising opposition I think, is because Obama supports it. (Heck, they hate him so much that if he proposed eliminating Medicaid, food stamps and unemployment benefits, deporting 12 million illegal immigrants, and cutting taxes in half, they’d suddenly oppose it.) A nice pic of Jeb Bush at KIPP Oklahoma City though… The health care law may be Republicans’ favorite weapon against Democrats this year, but there is another issue roiling their party and shaping the establishment-versus-grass-roots divide ahead of the 2016 presidential primaries: the Common Core. A once little-known set of national educational standards introduced in 44 states and the District of Columbia with the overwhelming support of Republican governors, the Common Core has incited intense resistance on the right and prompted some in the party to reverse field and join colleagues who believe it will lead to a federal takeover of schools. Conservatives denounce it as “Obamacore,” in what has become a surefire applause line for potential presidential hopefuls. Other Republicans are facing opprobrium from their own party for not doing more to stop it. At a recent Republican women’s club luncheon in North Carolina, a member went from table to table distributing literature that called the program part of “the silent erosion of our civil liberties.” 3) Yesterday’s article about the re-segregation of schools in Tuscaloosa and elsewhere generated some interesting comments. One friend wrote about his experience in NYC in second grade (which is similar to what happened in Tuscaloosa): This is such a tough issue Whitney. When I was in 2nd grade, NYC tried to force the (mostly Jewish, middle class) kids in my neighborhood to attend junior high school at a predominantly black junior high school in a rough part of Jamaica, Queens. What happened? Parents pulled just about every kid out of public school and said “okay, go ahead. You’ve got no one to bus.” They also pulled the elementary school kids out and for about six months I went to a makeshift private school. Finally, the city rescinded the order because there were literally no white kids to bus and the public elementary school was empty. It’s not entirely about racism though. It’s about class. It’s about the fact that people feel they’ve managed to work hard enough to move their kids to a school where everyone else is going to college and where the families share similar values about the importance of education. These are people who’ve struggled to rise up and they don’t want to be pulled back down. Integration in the South was easy because blacks and whites tended to live in proximity to each other. Elsewhere it was tougher because the races were geographically segregated and it really did feel, like Ed Koch once said, that the notion was that black kids needed to sit next to white kids in order to learn. And it didn’t work. People moved to avoid busing. Worse, “forced busing” – the notion that the liberal judiciary was going to stick it to the striving middle class and totally disrupt cities across the country (Boston, Los Angeles) created so much anger and distrust of liberal ideas– there’s no clearer example of the government telling people “we know what’s good for you, whether or not you like it” and no one likes being talked down to. Buffet is right – beyond forcing people to go to randomly assigned public schools, you will always have a situation where people choose to not have their kids be the ones who are sacrificed for the greater good. Which is exactly how it’s seen. So whether it’s private school or moving to another town/county to avoid busing, people will do it. But I’m glad you are working on figuring it out. Someone needs to. 4) Another friend wrote: Charges of “segregation” are the latest blob talking point in denying communities access to great charter schools. I saw it recently in Stamford where the board voted 7-1 to oppose the plans of a fantastic Blue Ribbon winning operator, Bronx Excellence, which hopes to open a charter. The board cited the fact that the district has done a fantastic job in achieving racial balance in its schools. What if failed to note is the terrible academic performance of its African-American and Latino students. In a recent article, Jason Riley noted the following: “A recent study from UCLA’s Civil Rights Project criticized charter schools for being too racially segregated. Never mind that many of these charters outperform the surrounding neighborhood schools and that excellent all-black schools have long existed and predate Brown. Liberals remain convinced that black children must sit next to white children in order to learn. The Obama Justice Department currently is trying to shut down a Louisiana voucher program for low-income families on the grounds that it may upset the racial balance of public schools in the state.” I remember when I was a kid seeing the image of some southern politician standing on the schoolhouse steps and saying “black children may not enter”. Now we have northern politicians standing on the schoolhouse steps and saying “black children may not leave”. The thing they have in common is that these politicians don’t seem to care much about the education of those children, they’re just pawns in a political game. I replied: I agree that our opponents are using this issue against charters – and they’re wrong. For more on the myth that charter schools perpetuate segregation, see my posts in response to a UCLA “study” on this is April 2010: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2010/02/ucla-report.html, http://edreform.blogspot.com/2010/02/charter-schools-and-civil-rights.html, http://edreform.blogspot.com/2010/02/james-forman-blasts-ucla-report.html, and http://edreform.blogspot.com/2010/04/ucla-report.html 5) Another reader wrote: It’s strange to me that you make a distinction between segregated schools and schools like KIPP. Are KIPP schools integrated? Do KIPP graduates fare as well as upper east side kids, or do they just fare better than south Bronx kids? I believe that charter schools are the very same apartheid schools you reference below and it’s dishonest to say anything else. It seems that the goal of charter schools is simply to make better separate but equal schools. Am I wrong? What do charter schools do to advance the cause of integration? I replied: My point was that integration isn’t a REQUIREMENT for good schools for minority kids, as KIPP schools prove (KIPP is nearly 100% minority), but high-quality schools for minority kids are the rare exception. I think most KIPP schools are better than most public (and many private) schools on the Upper East Side, in terms of the quality of the instruction and changing life outcomes for kids. The kids on the UES are pretty much all on a wonderful life trajectory, so I’m not sure the schools are making much of a difference in terms of how well their graduates fare in life. Have you ever visited a KIPP school? I assume not, because no one who has would ever use a pejorative term like “apartheid schools” to refer to KIPP. That phrase doesn’t just mean segregated/separate, but separate AND UNEQUAL (i.e., low-quality schools). In contrast, KIPPs are wonderful, joyous schools where students get a great education. True, there are almost no white students, but that’s because KIPP’s mission is to serve the students who are being most poorly served by the regular public schools, so KIPP locates its schools in the poorest neighborhoods in every city it’s in. Do you think KIPP should do otherwise? KIPP (and similar schools) do many wonderful things – but no one has ever claimed that they “advance the cause of integration.” But they don’t hurt the cause of integration either – they simply reflect the demographic reality of the neighborhoods they’re in. 6) I’ve written quite a bit over the years about this vexing issue. Here are my comments about “right-wing-nitwit-Tea-Partiers trying to undo the highly successful integration of the schools in Wake Country, North Carolina”: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2011/02/colbert-response.html and http://edreform.blogspot.com/2011/03/seeking-integration-whatever-path.html. And here’s what I wrote in Oct. 2007 (http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/10/school-integration-efforts-face-renewed.html): This story from the front page of Thursday’s WSJ about efforts to better integrate the four elementary schools in Milton, MA is a good case study of similar efforts made over many decades around the country. The hard truth is that in virtually every town and city in this country, the lowest-performing schools are those that serve minority kids (in most cases, they are low-income, minority kids, but this is true even when they’re not low income; the article notes that in Milton, the “average household income of the neighborhood that feeds Tucker is $102,000 — not much lower than the whiter areas of town.”). I believe that this is one of the greatest challenges facing this nation, so it drives me crazy when even intelligent, well-meaning people look at these facts and (consciously or unconsciously) come to two very erroneous conclusions: 1) the problem is that minority kids (and/or their parents) aren’t very bright and/or academically motivated; and 2) the solution to the problem is to socially engineer who attends which schools such that more minority kids share classrooms (or at least schools) with white or Asian kids. (I guess the idea is that white and Asian kids studying hard will somehow inspire the African-American and Latino kids to study hard as well?) I have many, many problems with this thinking and the resulting actions that people in Milton and around the country are taking. First of all, this article is completely silent on the teachers at the four elementary schools in Milton, but I would bet my last dollar that if one were to carefully evaluate every teacher at the four schools and rate them based on dozens of metrics (both “input” measures like years of experience, the caliber of the college and ed school they went to, grades and scores, whether they majored or minored in college in the subject they’re teaching, etc.; as well as “output” measures like principal, parent and student evaluations, increase in test scores of each teacher’s students, etc.), you would find that the white kids in Milton are far more likely to have the most effective teachers, whereas the African-American kids get the least effective teachers. Every study I’ve ever seen shows this to be the case nationwide (it’s true of principal talent as well), so it strains credulity to think Milton would be any different. Thus, is it any surprise that the students at Tucker are performing at lower levels!?!? Sure, Milton’s African-American kids would benefit from moving to one of the “white” schools, but less because of white kids being good role models, and more because they’d get better teachers! Every study shows that teacher quality swamps every other factor: in other words, a class of low-income, minority kids from broken homes and chaotic neighborhoods will learn more with a highly effective teacher than my kids will with a highly ineffective teacher. So given this, if Milton wants equality of educational opportunity among its schools, why on earth is it shuffling students around?! Instead, Milton should be moving teachers and principals around!!! Ah, but I forgot: our schools aren’t run by and for kids — they’re run by and for adults! GRRRR!!! Haven’t we learned by now that shuffling students around, even if that results in better educational opportunities for minority kids, just doesn’t work? Students and parents don’t like being moved around, forced to attend distant schools and being in a foreign environment — and even if some minority families will do it for the educational benefit, we know with 100% certainty that white families will simply abandon the public schools altogether if their children are forced to attend schools that are perceived to be (usually correctly, sadly) dangerous and/or ineffective. Let me be clear: I don’t like how segregated our schools are and wish every school in our nation were beautifully integrated. But it’s not going to happen, and trying to pound that square peg through a round hole hasn’t worked and, I predict, will never work, especially in light of the current Supreme Court. As a nation, we need to accept the reality that most people choose to live near people just like themselves, and therefore the local schools will reflect this segregation — and nothing’s going to change that anytime soon. Now, in truth, if Milton were to suddenly swap the principals and teachers between Milton’s highest performing school and Tucker, I don’t think the achievement gap would reverse or even disappear — there are no doubt other factors at work (the African-American kids would still come from households with lower income levels, probably watch more TV and spend less time doing homework ( for data on this, see slide #2 here: http://www.tilsonfunds.com/Personal/Homeworkmyth.pdf ), are more likely to come from single-parent families with lower average education levels of parents, etc.). But I’d bet that the majority of the achievement gap would disappear if the quality of the schools and teachers were equalized. Therefore, we need to have a paradigm shift: stop blaming the victims of failing schools and commit to improving those schools. I know with certainty, because I’ve seen it with my own eyes, that schools comprised primarily or entirely of low-income African-American and/or Latino students can succeed, if they have high expectations, a strong culture and high-caliber teachers and school leaders (the things Jon Sackler talks about below). One doesn’t have to look far to find examples that prove what’s possible: for example, at KIPP, in 12 years in NYC, to my knowledge we’ve never had a single white student — yet we’re sending 80%+ of our graduates to four-year colleges. It can be done! 7) Fellow blogger Gary Rubinstein, who likes to be a gadfly, emailed me: “What percent of teachers do you suppose you hate?” Here’s my reply: This is a “when did you stop beating your wife” kind of question, in that it assumes that I (and my fellow reformers) hate a lot of teachers. This is, of course, complete nonsense. Do people who want to get rid of bad doctors who harm patients hate doctors? The easy answer would be that I don’t hate any teachers – that I just think ineffective ones need to be replaced. But that would be a lie because I do hate some teachers – I don’t know the exact percentage, but it’s very small – and I would certainly hope it’s the same percentage that you hate. Hate is a very strong word, so let me define which teachers I hate: the ones who knowingly and deliberately harm them children in their care. At the top of the list would be sexual predators. I really hate them. Don’t you? I also hate teachers who abuse kids psychologically and emotionally – for example, one young child in a documentary I saw said that when she told a teacher she aspired to be a doctor one day, the teacher laughed at her and said, “You’ll never be a doctor. You’re dumber than a bump on a log!” I really hate any teacher that would say something like that to a child. Don’t you? In my book, that one sentence is grounds for immediate termination. Wouldn’t you agree? What are your feelings about the teachers and administrators a good friend of mine described to me in this email (http://edreform.blogspot.com/2009/07/story-from-trenches-send-me-more.html) about some of his experiences as a TFA corps member in the South Bronx in the late 1990s? For example, the assistant principal of his school calling Puerto Ricans “God’s stupidest people”, the art teacher who “spent almost every minute of every day screaming at the top of her lungs in the faces of 5-8 year olds who had done horrible things like coloring outside the lines,” and the principal who told teachers on the first day they were hired: “as long as they are quiet and in their seats, I don’t care what else you do.” Maybe hate is too strong a word for how I feel about “educators” like this – but I really, really hate the behavior of the union that protects them and ensures that they have a job for life, even though they are doing real damage to students every day of their careers. I’m not saying that people like this are the norm. Far from it. In fact, if I were to guess, I’d say that extremely horrible people like this account for maybe only 1% of teachers and administrators in our schools. But here’s the catch – they’re not evenly spread out. Because they’re fairly easy to identify (most of them aren’t very subtle!), they don’t last long in well-run schools (which tend to serve wealthier, whiter kids). But because it’s impossible to get rid of them (short of conviction – not indictment – for a major felony), they gotta go somewhere. So guess where they end up? The dumping ground schools, the apartheid school, the inner-city schools, the schools where only the children from the poorest, most marginalized families go to school. In these schools, the percentage of teachers who I hate might be as high as 10% — and then add the far larger number of teachers who maybe are trying hard, but are burned out or just not good at imparting knowledge to and inspiring children – and the kids don’t have a chance. This is what really makes me angry. For more on this, Gary, see our discussion about teacher quality from July 2011: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2011/07/email-discussion-with-gary-rubenstein_76.html 8) A nice profile of the Newark mayor’s race: One is an educator and activist, the son of a political-minded poet. The other is a civil rights attorney and law professor who overcame a family tragedy. With former Newark Mayor Cory Booker now a U.S. senator, New Jersey’s largest city faces a choice between two Democrats with widely different styles in a May 13 mayoral election: Ras Baraka, a municipal councilman, and Shavar Jeffries, a Seton Hall University professor. Both men have been reserved about the legacy of Mr. Booker, who was credited with bringing unprecedented investments in development and education to Newark but also accused of leaving its poorest residents behind. “Historically Newark always seems to be at a crossroads, and we are at another one,” said Clement Price, a distinguished professor at Rutgers University-Newark and the city’s official historian. “Newark is constantly reinvented with each mayor.” Mr. Baraka, a 45-year-old former high school principal who first ran for mayor at age 24 in 1994, has cast himself as an urban populist, negotiating with gang leaders to help combat crime. He has cooled his rhetoric this year but remains popular with the city’s activist wing. Mr. Jeffries, 39, has charted a different course, and is known for being a strong supporter of charter schools. He has positioned himself as a fresh face and friend to development, with backing from some powerful state Democrats. I’m scratching my head, however, at what Cory Booker is thinking as Ras Baraka becoming mayor would be a return to everything he fought against (re. Sharpe James, etc.): Mr. Jeffries has been backed by a number of New York financiers—much as Mr. Booker was—along with lawyers and education leaders. Mr. Baraka has the support of artists such as Spike Lee and Ms. Hill and professors such as Princeton University’s Cornel West, along with prominent alumni from his Howard University days. Mr. Booker and the interim mayor, Luis Quintana, haven’t made endorsements in the race. “I’m bullish on the city,” Mr. Booker said. “Newarkers have nothing to worry about in this election.” 9) Kudos to de Blasio for changing his views: Mayor de Blasio’s lawyers claim the Bloomberg administration’s controversial charter school co-locations were thoroughly planned and proper — an amazing turnaround from de Blasio’s campaign rhetoric last year. The city’s Law Department issued the extraordinary defense in court papers responding to a lawsuit filed by Public Advocate Letitia James and other plaintiffs to block 36 co-locations initially approved by Bloomberg and later seconded by de Blasio. The space-sharing arrangements approved by the Bloomberg-run Panel on Educational Policy last year “were neither arbitrary nor capricious,” Corporation Counsel Zachary Carter’s office said in a 37-page brief filed in Manhattan Supreme Court. The city lawyers said the environmental impact statements used to justify the 49 co-locations “were issued in a timely fashion” and in “full compliance with education law.” But when he was running for mayor last September, de Blasio took a much different view. “Bloomberg’s proposals are a cynical effort to lock communities into permanent changes while ignoring community voices…” de Blasio said at the time. Seven months later, city lawyers are defending Bloomberg’s actions. 10) This will be a key test for de Blasio (and kudos to Educators 4 Excellence for engaging with a balanced proposal): As negotiations drag on over a new contract for the city’s teachers, one sticky issue involves how to handle teachers who lost permanent jobs during cutbacks but keep getting full paychecks as they bounce around schools for brief stints, filling in for absent staff. Hundreds spend years in limbo. A city Department of Education analysis in July said the group’s size fluctuates but totaled 1,186 teachers last spring and cost at least $105 million last year in salaries and benefits—after counting the savings from not hiring regular substitutes. Critics say paying these teachers to rotate through schools, often by the week, can amount to an expensive form of baby sitting. Many in the pool say their talents are being wasted as short-term substitutes, and they deserve more respect and permanent responsibilities. Representatives for Mayor Bill de Blasio and the United Federation of Teachers confirmed that how to treat the group, called the Absent Teacher Reserve, is under discussion as they hammer out a contract to replace one that expired in 2009. They declined to comment further. Other major issues include back pay and raises. Educators 4 Excellence-New York, an advocacy group of more than 8,000 teachers, plans to release a policy brief Wednesday recommending that teachers in the pool get two April-to-August hiring seasons to find jobs. The brief argues that if they don’t get hired within that period, they should be put on unpaid leave. “Two hiring cycles strikes a balance between providing a fair opportunity for teachers to find a new teaching position and at the same time provides schools and the system the autonomy they need,” said Jonathan Schleifer, executive director. 11) Keep an eye on Camden – great things are happening there under new super, Paymon Rouhanifard, who is taking tough, needed steps: Paymon Rouhanifard is not the type to point fingers. Though he’s Camden’s fourth schools superintendent since 2006, he doesn’t name names when it comes to the self-dealing, errors and negligence of his predecessors. He acknowledges that city schools are nowhere near as safe or as academically rigorous as they must be for students to thrive, but rather than assigning blame for the sorry state of affairs, he’s demonstrating that he’d rather move forward and fix the problems. Of course, we’ve heard that before. Since Annette Knox took the job in 2001, a parade of superintendents have passed through Camden, leaving in their wake broken vows to transform the district from one of chronic failure to one in which children can learn and succeed. Oh, there’s been change, all right: In 13 years, the district has lost more than 7,000 students, largely to charter schools that are no more academically impressive than the neighboring public schools. But while the number of children in city schools has shrunken dramatically, the number of adults has not. There is now one employee for every four students, a top-heavy ratio and one that Rouhanifard says is neither financially sustainable nor educationally necessary. 12) Achievement First is hiring: Achievement First, a high-performing charter network in the Northeast, is looking for a talented person to join their senior team. We are looking for a Regional Superintendent to coach and develop a cohort of elementary school principals in NYC. If you are (or if you know) a former or current principal of a high-performing school who wants to remain engaged in schools but is looking for an opportunity with broader impact, please have them reach out to explore this role. It is a great opportunity for someone who wants to support the development of talented school leaders and to serve as a senior leader in a nationally-recognized charter network. Check out the job description – http://www.achievementfirst.org/fileadmin/af/home/2012_New_Site/7_Careers/2014-15_Job_Descriptions/AF_Regional_Superintendent_2014-15_Final.pdf and reach out to beccahowlett@achievementfirst.org for more information. 13) I heard the song Hall of Fame by will.i.am recently and it was giving me goosebumps and I couldn’t figure out why – until I remembered that it was the theme song of the KIPP School Summit 2013 Gala video – check it out – it’s awesome! http://vimeo.com/71541412 ———————– When the Circus Descends APRIL 17, 2014 David Brooks We are pretty familiar with this story: A perfectly sensible if slightly boring idea is walking down the street. Suddenly, the ideological circus descends, burying the sensible idea in hysterical claims and fevered accusations. The idea’s political backers beat a craven retreat. The idea dies. This is what seems to be happening to the Common Core education standards, which are being attacked on the right because they are common and on the left because they are core. About seven years ago, it was widely acknowledged that state education standards were a complete mess. Huge numbers of students were graduating from high school unprepared either for college work or modern employment. A student who was rated “proficient” in one state would be rated “below basic” in another. About 14 states had pretty good standards, according to studies at the time, but the rest had standards that were verbose, lax or wildly confusing. The National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers set out to draft clearer, consistent and more rigorous standards. Remember, school standards are not curricula. They do not determine what students read or how teachers should teach. They are the goals for what students should know at the end of each grade. This was a state-led effort, supported by employers and financed by private foundations. This was not a federal effort, though the Obama administration did encourage states to embrace the new standards. These Common Core standards are at least partially in place in 45 states. As is usual, the initial implementation has been a bit bumpy. It’s going to take a few years before there are textbooks and tests that are truly aligned with the new standards. But the new initiative is clearly superior to the old mess. The math standards are more in line with the standards found in the top performing math nations. The English standards encourage reading comprehension. Whereas the old standards frequently encouraged students to read a book and then go off and write a response to it, the new standards encourage them to go back to the text and pick out specific passages for study and as evidence. The Thomas B. Fordham Institute, which has been evaluating state standards for more than 15 years, concluded that the Common Core standards are “clearly superior” to the old standards in 37 states and are “too close to call” in 11 more. But this makes no difference when the circus comes to town. On the right, the market-share-obsessed talk-radio crowd claims that the Common Core standards represent a federal takeover of the schools. This is clearly false. This was a state-led effort, and localities preserve their control over what exactly is taught and how it is taught. Glenn Beck claims that Common Core represents “leftist indoctrination” of the young. On Fox, Elisabeth Hasselbeck cited a curriculum item that supposedly taught students that Abraham Lincoln’s religion was “liberal.” But, as the education analyst Michael J. Petrilli quickly demonstrated, this was some locally generated curriculum that was one of hundreds on a lesson-sharing website and it was promulgated a year before the Common Core standards even existed. As it’s being attacked by the talk-radio right, the Common Core is being attacked by the interest group left. The general critique from progressives, and increasingly from teachers’ unions, is that the standards are too difficult, that implementation is shambolic and teachers are being forced into some top-down straitjacket that they detest. It is true that the new standards are more rigorous than the old, and that in some cases students have to perform certain math skills a year earlier than they formerly had to learn them. But that is a feature, not a bug. The point is to get students competitive with their international peers. The idea that the Common Core is unpopular is also false. Teachers and local authorities still have control of what they teach and how they teach it. A large survey in Kentucky revealed that 77 percent of teachers are enthusiastic about the challenge of implementing the standards in their classrooms. In another survey, a majority of teachers in Tennessee believe that implementation of the standards has begun positively. Al Baker of The Times interviewed a range of teachers in New York and reported, “most said their students were doing higher-quality work than they had ever seen, and were talking aloud more often.” The new standards won’t revolutionize education. It’s not enough to set goals; you have to figure out how to meet them. But they are a step forward. Yet now states from New York to Oklahoma are thinking of rolling them back. This has less to do with substance and more to do with talk-radio bombast and interest group resistance to change. The circus has come to town. —————————————— Republicans See Political Wedge in Common Core By JONATHAN MARTIN NYT, APRIL 19, 2014 Former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida and Gov. Mary Fallin of Oklahoma participated in a discussion with students at KIPP Academy in Oklahoma City in April. Credit Jim Beckel/The Oklahoman, via Associated Press WASHINGTON — The health care law may be Republicans’ favorite weapon against Democrats this year, but there is another issue roiling their party and shaping the establishment-versus-grass-roots divide ahead of the 2016 presidential primaries: the Common Core. A once little-known set of national educational standards introduced in 44 states and the District of Columbia with the overwhelming support of Republican governors, the Common Core has incited intense resistance on the right and prompted some in the party to reverse field and join colleagues who believe it will lead to a federal takeover of schools. Conservatives denounce it as “Obamacore,” in what has become a surefire applause line for potential presidential hopefuls. Other Republicans are facing opprobrium from their own party for not doing more to stop it. At a recent Republican women’s club luncheon in North Carolina, a member went from table to table distributing literature that called the program part of “the silent erosion of our civil liberties.” Photo Karima Hawkins of Mississippi, foreground, protested the Common Core, an initiative that set learning benchmarks intended to raise students’ proficiency in math and English, at the Capitol in Jackson in January. Credit George Walker IV/The Tennessean, via Associated Press The learning benchmarks, intended to raise students’ proficiency in math and English, were adopted as part of a 2010 effort by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers to bolster the country’s competitiveness. Some conservatives, in an echo of their criticism of the health care law, say the standards are an overreach by the federal government. Yet there is an important distinction: Unlike the health care law, the Common Core retains bipartisan support and has the backing of powerful elements of the business community. Its most outspoken Republican defender, former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida, is also the most talked-about potential presidential candidate among mainstream party leaders and donors. Mr. Bush has called out some Republicans who have switched positions, drawing what will be a dividing line in the campaign if he or other defenders of the Common Core choose to run. He is joined by Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, but theirs is becoming a small club. “I’m a big fan of Jeb Bush; I think he’s an important leader on many issues,” said Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas. “But on the question of Common Core, I emphatically do not agree with Common Core.” His opinion of the program is shared by two Senate colleagues and possible 2016 rivals for the presidential nomination, Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky and Marco Rubio of Florida. Mr. Cruz’s view also aligns with that of several Republican governors contemplating presidential runs. Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana signed legislation last month that made his state the first to opt out of the Common Core after having adopted it. Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin said he wanted his state to establish its own educational goals. And Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana suggested that he might use executive authority to go around the State Legislature if lawmakers did not withdraw from the group of states developing the standardized test associated with the Common Core. Mr. Jindal’s position, a reversal for him, shows how quickly conservative opposition has grown. He recently announced his support for a bill that would remove Louisiana from the Common Core, on the same day the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, which supports the program, released a video featuring his earlier endorsement of it. The Republican revolt against the Common Core can be traced to President Obama’s embrace of it, particularly his linking the adoption of similar standards to states’ eligibility for federal education grants and to waivers from No Child Left Behind, the national education law enacted by President George W. Bush. It underlines the ascendance of a brand of conservatism notably different from that of the most recent President Bush. Less than 15 years after No Child Left Behind passed with just 34 House Republicans opposed to it, the conservative center of gravity is shifting toward a state-centric approach to education. “When I arrived on Capitol Hill in 2001, not only was the Republican administration not devolving power to the states, the No. 1 priority of the administration was a massive expansion of the federal Department of Education,” recalled Mr. Pence, who, as a congressman, opposed No Child Left Behind. The opposition to the Common Core also captures another shift since the Bush administration: While long contemptuous of an expanding federal government, some Republican activists are growing wary of big business, too, including figures like Bill Gates, the billionaire Microsoft founder whose foundation supported the development of the standards. “There is a legitimate concern about large institutions, be they government or others, who haven’t really delivered the America everybody thought we were on our way to,” acknowledged John R. McKernan Jr., a former Maine governor who leads the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation. But, he said, that fear is “totally misplaced” when it comes to the Common Core. But would-be presidential candidates are paying more heed to the conservative activists holding packed meetings in their states and flooding them with emails. “The Republican Party is getting more and more responsive to the grass roots, and that is a very healthy thing for the party and the country,” Mr. Cruz said. Jeb Bush said the pivot seemed more like pandering. In remarks this month during an event at his father’s presidential library, he affirmed his support for the Common Core. “I guess I’ve been out of office for a while, so the idea that something that I support — because people are opposed to it means that I have to stop supporting it if there’s not any reason based on fact to do that?” he said. “I just don’t feel compelled to run for cover when I think this is the right thing to do for our country.” With a knowing grin, he added, “Others that supported the standards all the sudden now are opposed to it.” Some other former Republican governors who pushed the adoption of the Common Core agree with Mr. Bush. “There is a great deal of paranoia in the country today,” said Sonny Perdue, a former governor of Georgia, who was also instrumental in creating the program. “It’s the two P’s, polarization and paranoia.” Supporters of the Common Core, which outlines skills that students in each grade should master but leaves actual decisions about curriculum to states and districts, say that it was not created by the federal government and that it was up to the states to decide whether to adopt the standards. But opponents say Mr. Obama’s attempt to reward states that adopt the standards with grants and waivers amounts to a backdoor grab for federal control over what is taught in schools. “Standards inevitably influence the curricula being taught to meet those standards,” Mr. Cruz said. It is not just conservatives who have turned against the Common Core: The leaders of major teachers unions are also pushing back because of the new, more difficult tests aligned to the standards that are being used to evaluate both students and teachers. “You have this unlikely marriage of folks on the far right who are convinced this is part of a federal takeover of local education, who have joined hands with folks on the left associated with teachers unions who are trying to sever any connection between test results and teacher evaluation,” said Gov. Bill Haslam of Tennessee, a Republican who supports the Common Core. But it is on the right that the anger is growing. A recent forum on the Common Core in Columbus, Ohio, drew 500 people, most of them concerned parents, said Jane Robbins, a senior fellow at the American Principles Project, a conservative group opposed to the program. Such meetings reflect discontent that is bubbling up at the local level, where some county Republican committees are moving to punish legislators who do not oppose the standards. “I think the establishment in the party has been slow to recognize how big this is,” Ms. Robbins said. ———————- NY Politics Newark Mayor Race Turns on Personalities Two Candidates With Widely Different Styles Vie After Booker’s Departure By Heather Haddon http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303626804579507582358321654 April 18, 2014 8:53 p.m. ET Shavar Jeffries, left, faces Ras Baraka in the Democratic primary for Newark’s mayor. One is an educator and activist, the son of a political-minded poet. The other is a civil rights attorney and law professor who overcame a family tragedy. With former Newark Mayor Cory Booker now a U.S. senator, New Jersey’s largest city faces a choice between two Democrats with widely different styles in a May 13 mayoral election: Ras Baraka, a municipal councilman, and Shavar Jeffries, a Seton Hall University professor. Both men have been reserved about the legacy of Mr. Booker, who was credited with bringing unprecedented investments in development and education to Newark but also accused of leaving its poorest residents behind. “Historically Newark always seems to be at a crossroads, and we are at another one,” said Clement Price, a distinguished professor at Rutgers University-Newark and the city’s official historian. “Newark is constantly reinvented with each mayor.” Mr. Baraka, a 45-year-old former high school principal who first ran for mayor at age 24 in 1994, has cast himself as an urban populist, negotiating with gang leaders to help combat crime. He has cooled his rhetoric this year but remains popular with the city’s activist wing. Mr. Jeffries, 39, has charted a different course, and is known for being a strong supporter of charter schools. He has positioned himself as a fresh face and friend to development, with backing from some powerful state Democrats. The nonpartisan municipal race for a four-year term has proved divisive. The Candidates Ras Baraka Kevin Hagen for The Wall Street Journal Ras Baraka Title: Municipal councilman Previously: principal of Newark Central High School; deputy mayor Personal: Age 45, single ‘Ultimately, my leadership is about grassroots organizing.’ Shavar Jeffries Claudio Papapietro for The Wall Street Journal Shavar Jeffries Title: Associate professor, Seton Hall Law School Previously: assistant attorney general Personal: Age 39, father of 2 ‘My whole life is rooted in serving the community that has given me so much.’ Mr. Baraka’s campaign bus was set on fire in February in an act that has resulted in the arrests of two paid campaign workers for Mr. Jeffries. The Jeffries campaign condemned the fire and called on prosecutors to fully investigate the incident. Then, on Monday, the Jeffries campaign announced that its chief strategist was the victim of a burglary. Both sides have called on New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman to monitor the election for foul play. The requests are being reviewed, a spokesman for Mr. Fishman said. There are no independent polls on the race, and internal surveys have varied widely. Both men have run vigorous campaigns that have highlighted their Newark roots but also their divergent biograph1ies. Mr. Baraka’s father, Amiri, was a legendary and controversial poet known for his activism and leftist politics. His Newark home was a de facto cultural center when he was growing up, and Mr. Baraka is a spoken-word writer who has collaborated with singer Lauryn Hill. “Ultimately, my leadership is about grassroots organizing. We are talking about more inclusion for people,” said Mr. Baraka, a former principal of Central High School in Newark. He said he wants to spread development to the city’s neighborhoods to a greater degree than the previous administration. Mr. Jeffries grew up in the same section of Newark, the South Ward, as the Barakas. His mother was murdered when he was 10, and his father was absent, he said. Mr. Jeffries’ grandmother raised him. He received a scholarship to attend a private preparatory school, and graduated from Duke University and Columbia Law School. “My story is the story of Newark kids,” said Mr. Jeffries, an associate professor of law at Seton Hall University School of Law in Newark and a former state assistant attorney general. The election takes place against a changed city landscape. Mr. Booker, a Rhodes Scholar, tapped a network of celebrities and corporate executives to bring hundreds of millions of dollars to Newark. Hundreds of new units of housing—including lofts and market-rate apartments—are being built while hotels, restaurants and parks are opening downtown. At the same time, crime has remained a problem. The city had 110 homicides in 2013, one of the most violent stretches in years and an increase from 96 in 2012. State officials have discussed taking over the city’s budget after the interim mayor hired staff without approvals, and an auditor retained by the state Department of Community Affairs is reviewing the city’s books. The state’s oversight of the city’s school system has also become a polarizing issue. With Hispanics joining the traditionally large African-American population, the mayoral election will test the city’s appetite for change, Mr. Price said. Mr. Baraka has captured more union endorsements, while Mr. Jeffries has the backing of many political operatives known as district leaders responsible for turning out votes. Mr. Jeffries has raised more than $1.3 million total with $750,000 coming in this year, according to his campaign. Mr. Baraka has raised $781,000 through his individual and Council slate accounts, his campaign said. The two men have both looked to New York City for money, but their donor bases are different. Independent expenditure groups have poured money into the local race, with two groups spending more than $600,000 on network and cable television ads, according to a person familiar with the spending. Mr. Jeffries has been backed by a number of New York financiers—much as Mr. Booker was—along with lawyers and education leaders. Mr. Baraka has the support of artists such as Spike Lee and Ms. Hill and professors such as Princeton University’s Cornel West, along with prominent alumni from his Howard University days. Mr. Booker and the interim mayor, Luis Quintana, haven’t made endorsements in the race. “I’m bullish on the city,” Mr. Booker said. “Newarkers have nothing to worry about in this election.” ————————————– De Blasio’s lawyers defend charter schools in stunning reversal By Carl Campanile April 17, 2014 | 2:14pm http://nypost.com/2014/04/17/de-blasios-lawyers-defend-charter-schools-in-stunning-reversal/ De Blasio’s lawyers defend charter schools in stunning reversal De Blasio’s lawyers claim the Bloomberg administration’s controversial charter school space-sharing arrangements were thoroughly planned and proper. Photo: AP Mayor de Blasio’s lawyers claim the Bloomberg administration’s controversial charter school co-locations were thoroughly planned and proper — an amazing turnaround from de Blasio’s campaign rhetoric last year. The city’s Law Department issued the extraordinary defense in court papers responding to a lawsuit filed by Public Advocate Letitia James and other plaintiffs to block 36 co-locations initially approved by Bloomberg and later seconded by de Blasio. The space-sharing arrangements approved by the Bloomberg-run Panel on Educational Policy last year “were neither arbitrary nor capricious,” Corporation Counsel Zachary Carter’s office said in a 37-page brief filed in Manhattan Supreme Court. The city lawyers said the environmental impact statements used to justify the 49 co-locations “were issued in a timely fashion” and in “full compliance with education law.” But when he was running for mayor last September, de Blasio took a much different view. “Bloomberg’s proposals are a cynical effort to lock communities into permanent changes while ignoring community voices…” de Blasio said at the time. Seven months later, city lawyers are defending Bloomberg’s actions. “Because the subject co-locations were proposed and approved in accordance with the law in all respects — and there are no facts in the petition to the contrary — the petition should be dismissed,” city lawyers Chlarens Orsland and Charles Carey argued. Further, the city said the plaintiffs should raise their objections with the state education commissioner before turning to the courts. And in a case of friendly fire, de Blasio’s law department suggested James, his progressive ally and successor as city public advocate, was grandstanding. They said she had no legal standing to bring the suit. “As this court is likely aware, the Public Advocate [James] had campaigned for her current office as a strident foe of charter schools, and merely seeks to continue her political advocacy here,” the city filing said. James defended her position. “Public Advocate James’ principled position remains consistent: forced co-locations must not move forward without parents’ input or when they result in overcrowding, students being warehoused in trailers, loss of space for special education and physical education, and elementary students being mixed with high school students,” her office said in a statement. James and other plaintiffs initiated the lawsuit last December, but held it in abeyance until de Blasio had a chance to review them, anticipating that the new mayor would roll back many of the co-locations. As it turned out, that didn’t happen. They refiled the suit. Though he accused the Bloomberg administration of hastily ramming through the co-locations, de Blasio ended up approving 36 of them following a fresh review by his newly appointed Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina. Nine co-location were withdrawn, including three of Eva Moslowitz’s Success Academy Charter schools. Four others were put on hold. Following a backlash, Gov. Cuomo and the state Legislature approved a law that ordered the city to find space for the three charters whose co-locations were cancelled. The law also requires the city to offer new and expanded charter schools rent-free space in city buildings, or to pay for their rent in private facilities. ——————– NY Schools Teachers in Limbo Contract Talks Address Those With No Permanent School By Leslie Brody http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304572204579503923887990620 April 15, 2014 8:53 p.m. ET Pasqual Pelosi, at his Bronx home on Tuesday, is tired of being bounced around: ‘There’s plenty of frustration,’ he said. Craig Warga for The Wall Street Journal As negotiations drag on over a new contract for the city’s teachers, one sticky issue involves how to handle teachers who lost permanent jobs during cutbacks but keep getting full paychecks as they bounce around schools for brief stints, filling in for absent staff. Hundreds spend years in limbo. A city Department of Education analysis in July said the group’s size fluctuates but totaled 1,186 teachers last spring and cost at least $105 million last year in salaries and benefits—after counting the savings from not hiring regular substitutes. Critics say paying these teachers to rotate through schools, often by the week, can amount to an expensive form of baby sitting. Many in the pool say their talents are being wasted as short-term substitutes, and they deserve more respect and permanent responsibilities. Representatives for Mayor Bill de Blasio and the United Federation of Teachers confirmed that how to treat the group, called the Absent Teacher Reserve, is under discussion as they hammer out a contract to replace one that expired in 2009. They declined to comment further. Other major issues include back pay and raises. Educators 4 Excellence-New York, an advocacy group of more than 8,000 teachers, plans to release a policy brief Wednesday recommending that teachers in the pool get two April-to-August hiring seasons to find jobs. The brief argues that if they don’t get hired within that period, they should be put on unpaid leave. “Two hiring cycles strikes a balance between providing a fair opportunity for teachers to find a new teaching position and at the same time provides schools and the system the autonomy they need,” said Jonathan Schleifer, executive director. Last summer, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s administration expressed less patience. According to testimony at a fact-finding panel for the contract negotiations, the education department proposed taking these teachers off the payroll if they couldn’t find permanent jobs within four months, with the clock ticking at the start of the academic year. The department estimated that change would save more than $63 million a year. But others say time limits would unfairly penalize dedicated, seasoned staffers left stranded by school closings, cutbacks and program changes. “The teachers in the ATR pool are an important resource for the school system, a resource that the Bloomberg administration constantly misused to serve its own ideological ends,” said union President Michael Mulgrew in an email. “Despite the administration’s repeated vilification of these teachers, they have saved the system millions of dollars by serving as full-time subs while they looked for permanent positions.” David Levin, a 13-year teacher in his fourth year in the pool in the Bronx, said it isn’t his fault principals usually prefer to hire cheaper “newbies.” He makes $80,987 a year. Mr. Levin said the system should be fixed somehow—perhaps by deploying these teachers as mentors or extra help in difficult classrooms. It is hard for substitute teachers to keep students under control because there is little time to learn their names and behavior, he said. In one class, rowdy teenagers turned off the lights and started throwing chairs. “I don’t know the students, the culture or the school,” he said. “The kids act out.” Pasqual Pelosi, a language arts teacher in the Bronx pool who makes $75,937 a year, said his 12 years of experience were being squandered. He said at times he thinks shuttling teachers to different schools weekly is designed to wear them down so they quit in disgust. “There’s plenty of frustration,” he said. Among the frustrations over his career, Mr. Pelosi acknowledged facing several accusations, including an instance of alleged corporal punishment. “Any teacher who has been around for as long as I have is bound to have had some sort of allegations lodged,” he said, adding that was especially true for a “disciplinarian” such as himself. “Nothing has been proven against me,” he said. The pool swelled after 2005, when a compromise by Mr. Bloomberg and the union ended a practice called “forced placement” that let tenured teachers who lost positions use seniority rights to get jobs at other district schools, even if principals didn’t pick them. The pool aimed to give displaced teachers security while hunting for principals who wanted them. Many found new spots quickly. Some faced serious obstacles. According to the city’s July testimony, 27% of those in the pool last spring had gone through disciplinary proceedings that didn’t lead to termination. Further, 59% of those in the pool had lingered there for two or more years. New York Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina has said she doesn’t want to bring back forced placement. But earlier this month, two advocacy groups that have sought more rigorous teacher evaluations—StudentsFirstNY and TNTP (formerly The New Teacher Project)—expressed concern that contract changes might pressure principals with openings to hire first from the pool. They said principals need freedom to pick candidates they deem the best for children. Parents “should trust that each year their child will have an effective teacher and shouldn’t have to fear that an ineffective one will be forced into the classroom,” said Jenny Sedlis, executive director of StudentsFirstNY. Advocates also argued that children in high-poverty areas with high teacher turnover would suffer most if principals had to hire from the pool. Daniel Weisberg, executive vice president of TNTP, said teachers in the pool long term were likely unable or unwilling to find work: “There are so many vacancies that if you have any sort of ability to show you’re worthwhile, you get hired.” The union’s Mr. Mulgrew said nearly three-quarters of the teachers in the pool get permanent jobs within three years. “Our studies show that the most important single factor is money,” he said. “The least experienced (and thus cheaper) teachers are the first to be selected.” —————— Cutting city school costs long overdue 12:16 a.m. EDT April 13, 2014 Courier-Post editorial http://www.courierpostonline.com/story/opinion/editorials/2014/04/13/editorial-cutting-city-school-costs-long-overdue/7663803/ -VINBrd_04-04-2014_Daily_1_A014~~2014~04~03~IMG_-CHLBrd_09-25-2013_D_4_1_AV6.jpg Paymon Rouhanifard is not the type to point fingers. Though he’s Camden’s fourth schools superintendent since 2006, he doesn’t name names when it comes to the self-dealing, errors and negligence of his predecessors. He acknowledges that city schools are nowhere near as safe or as academically rigorous as they must be for students to thrive, but rather than assigning blame for the sorry state of affairs, he’s demonstrating that he’d rather move forward and fix the problems. Of course, we’ve heard that before. Since Annette Knox took the job in 2001, a parade of superintendents have passed through Camden, leaving in their wake broken vows to transform the district from one of chronic failure to one in which children can learn and succeed. Oh, there’s been change, all right: In 13 years, the district has lost more than 7,000 students, largely to charter schools that are no more academically impressive than the neighboring public schools. But while the number of children in city schools has shrunken dramatically, the number of adults has not. There is now one employee for every four students, a top-heavy ratio and one that Rouhanifard says is neither financially sustainable nor educationally necessary. The district faces a $75 million shortfall in revenue for the 2014-15 school year. Most of that was inherited, but a decline in grants, growth in charter schools and an investment in the Camden Commitment — the five-pronged plan to improve schools — have widened the gap. The district is tapping its $18.4 million fund balance to minimize cuts, and Rouhanifard has trimmed more than $28 million of nonpersonnel costs from the central office. But that still leaves a $28 million gap, and that means mass layoffs — an estimated 30 percent of central administration employees and 20 percent of school staff. No one is celebrating the impending loss of up to 575 positions. Middle-class jobs are scarce in Camden, and many families will be hurt when the layoffs take effect. Rouhanifard says he’s tried to minimize the impact on students, but many of these kids have already lost important adults in their lives. They can hardly afford to lose any more role models. However, the schools must spend money more efficiently, and adapting to the reality of a smaller district is long overdue. Rouhanifard is moving fast, and that scares a lot of people who are deeply invested in the schools. We certainly won’t agree with every one of the superintendent’s decisions, but he has demonstrated that he is willing to listen to the community. We commend him for taking swift action to deal with the untenable situation he’s inherited. And he’ll be doing it without a state-appointed fiscal monitor. The position was technically abolished last spring, when the state took over the district’s schools, but Michael Azzara, who had served as monitor since 2009, stayed on as a senior adviser to the superintendent. He left earlier this month in what Rouhanifard calls a mutual decision that was supported by the state. It doesn’t seem like much of a loss, considering how freely the district spent money even as Azzara oversaw the school board’s business operations and personnel matters. During Azzara’s tenure, his highest profile achievement was installing John Valore as Camden High School’s basketball coach. We’re looking forward to a culture in which academics trumps athletics. And we hope that Rouhanifard, who’s had a meteoric rise from teacher to Wall Street analyst to inner-city schools chief, will stick around long enough to see it through. Frankly, students living in poverty need far more than the schools can give them. But safe, intellectually stimulating places to learn are integral to their success. LikeLike

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4. ira shor says:

   April 18, 2014 at 12:13 pm

   Wow, at last, the training I’ve been seeking my whole life, how to become an Insta-Education Pundit. Phd and books didn’t do the trick, so Robert, pls sign me up ASAP for your 5-week training.

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   • Bob Shepherd says:

     April 18, 2014 at 5:18 pm

     Glad we at InstaEduPundit dot com could fix this deficiency in your “training,” Ira (“Sit up. Roll over. Lie down. Good boy.”).

     Your problem has always been that you thought and felt about this stuff too much, as your Commie pinko books so abundantly illustrate. The time is over for thought in education. This is the time for action. We’re in a war here. A race to the top. We can show you how to teach whole courses of perfectly aligned CC$$ lessons with no thinking at all! After all, David Coleman has done that for you and the rest of a grateful nation. Where would we be without him? The Singaporeans would probably have completely overrun us by now!

     We at InstaEduPundit will be looking for your check, Dr. Shor. And may your future as an InstaEduPundit be extraordinarily profitable!

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     • Bob Shepherd says:

       April 19, 2014 at 1:01 am

       More profitable, certainly, than writing all those misguidedly compassionate, informed books based in actual experience attempting to create environments in which young people learn to think critically and creatively for themselves that you’ve been writing all these years! All the time and trouble you wasted, there, Dr. Shor, when you could have been an InstaEduPundit. Look at Michelle Rhee, David Coleman, Arne “Dunkin” Duncan. Not three years’ classroom experience put together and ZERO scholarship. And look where they are! Leaders in the Race to the Top of the big pile of Plutocrat cash!

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   • Bob Shepherd says:

     April 19, 2014 at 1:07 am

     Seriously, now, everyone. If any here have not read Ira Shor, treat yourself. This man is everything that the InstaEduPundit is not. In an age where “The Real Thing” is the latest Big Lie from advertisers and PR mills, Ira Shor is the real real thing.

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   • Ellen Lubic says:

     April 20, 2014 at 10:07 pm

     Hey Ira…if you are not careful, the Waltons may sign you on for TFA at inner city schools as another 5 week vunderkind. If so, please demand that they place you with Deasy in LAUSD.

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5. Robert Berkman says:

   April 18, 2014 at 12:17 pm

   Here’s my take on today’s “deformers” when compared to real “reformers” bltm.com/blog/2014/04/16/discrepancies-1

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6. Susan Lee Schwartz says:

   April 18, 2014 at 12:26 pm

   I am adding a comment here, which I posted after the quick link to Pundit-clown David Brook’s article in The NY Times “When The Circus Descends.” His title is Ironic to the extreme, as HE is the clown act. http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Teachers-A-Call-to-Battle-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Attack_Battle_Career_Challenges-140416-581.html

   My comment is below, and I hope you and some of the writers here might consider going to that general (progressive) NEWS site, and commenting on it, because ordinary folks are trying to figure out the truth, and need to hear the voices of TEACHERS, who tend to ‘preach to the choir’ on all the wonderful sites where important discussion evolve in the threads..

   HERE’S MY COMMENT:
   “Well, as my 10 year old granddaughter says, “everyone is entitled to an opinion.” Too bad it is so uninformed and published in this prestigious paper.

   Perhaps, David might go to the blog of Diane Ravitch and actually learn what teachers are saying, and the true nature of the tests, which she examines in many excellent posts. He might learn that the common core has its purpose, to test, test and test, and that a core curricula is not the same as ‘standards for learning’ or a syllabus for LEARNING Objectives, which we in NYS have used forever to create lesson plans that meet real goals for learning in each grade, and in each discipline.

   He might even dig up the GENUINE standards — the Harvard 3rd level research on “The 8 Principles of LEARNING.” Not teaching!

   LEARNING, which David believes he understands, without the benefit of a degree in pedagogy, or any practice. Perhaps he should become a pundit on the subject of medicine, where his knowledge base is equally insecure.

   I highly recommend that he go to the Curmuducation blogspot, and read the essay, “The Wrongest Sentence Ever in the CCSS Debate.”Perhaps, he will gain some insight as to the philosophy that drove the non-educator businessmen who wrote the CC– this prescription for TEACHING, WHICH HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH learning and everything to do with enriching those who have monetarized the education ‘industry.

   If not Peter Green makes it very clear in “The Failure of the CCSS” . Then, he might read Mercedes Schneider’s explanation of the Common Core.

   He could go and read what this Colorado teacher explains about why she resigned.

   But David did not need to read Robert Shepherd’s “How to Be and EduPundit Made EZ” as he has figured it out

   PS Hey, Bob, Shulamith tells me she is carrying on a philosophical conversation with you.

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   • Bob Shepherd says:

     April 19, 2014 at 1:22 am

     She is amazing! What a pleasure it has been to converse with her–so wise, so learned, so human. In some people, the soul is open, like a green field, like the wide expanse of the sky. She is one such.

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7. Susan Lee Schwartz says:

   April 18, 2014 at 12:27 pm

   oh, BTW in the actual comment are the LINKS, so I hop it brings some folks to your great essay.

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8. Alan says:

   April 18, 2014 at 12:33 pm

   Too bad most teachers are overqualified for this line of work. It seems easy and generously remunerative.

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9. Michael Fiorillo says:

   April 18, 2014 at 1:38 pm

   Beware of geeks bearing grifts.

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   • Alan says:

     April 18, 2014 at 3:01 pm

     Timeo Duncanaos et dona VAMentes.

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   • Bob Shepherd says:

     April 18, 2014 at 5:07 pm

     Exactly!

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10. Laura H. Chapman says:

    April 18, 2014 at 3:22 pm

    Love your list, and the intellect that’s behind this satire. Put the words in a spreadsheet and generate an endless array of snake-oil claims. Someone did an academic jargon generator on a website. Similar idea I guess, but not nearly as spirited and memorable.

    I just read a Kappan article under the banner of “Leadership” where a person who seems to be clueless about teaching is given the space to show how badly literature can be mangled by the CCSS.

    The editor(s) of this once reliably reputable magazine seem to be clueless about what they are promoting as “leadership.” The author is the manager director of Uncommon Schools and author of “Great Habits, Great Readers,” ( 2013).

    His article is all about complying with the CCSS, hovering over 6th graders and using codes to communicate quickly on whether they are on track to come up with the one and only correct meaning, the error-free answer to questions about the figurative and connotative meanings in the text–close reading of course.

    The teacher has chosen a short story by Amy Tan called “Fish Cheeks.” The author of the article portrays her as a good teacher for placing ” a check-mark next to each piece of correct evidence” and circling “evidence or explanations that require correction.”
    The author refers to the teacher’s “laser-like feedback,” ability “to target exactly what students need” to meet standard 6.4 and achieve “rigor” and accomplish “deep instruction” in just 10 minutes while “giving nearly every student individualized coaching…”. Some one posted a video-equivalent of this sort of teaching aided by computer software for tracking compliance with with the CCSS, student and teacher time on task, and the rest.

    Unfortunately, the author and the teacher he appears to mentoring seem to have no understanding that literature is not created for the reasons that the teacher is using to organize her instruction, namely to comply with CCSS 6.4. Even without the CCSS, figurative language and connotative meanings are not the stuff from which only one correct answer can or should be fashioned.

    In the meantime, the students in this narrative do not get to talk about context of the story, or the characters, or the amazing imagery in Amy Tan’s story, especially of the Chinese feast being prepared in the kitchen, complete with:

    “A slimy rock cod with bulging eyes that pleaded not to be thrown into a pan of hot oil. Tofu, which looked like stacked wedges of rubbery white sponges. A bowl soaking dried fungus back to life. A plate of squid, their backs crisscrossed with knife markings so they resembled bicycle tires.”

    The kids did fixate on bicycle tires as a “piece of evidence,” but they were sluggish in using that evidence to “build an argument.”

    This is the farce and the tragedy of teaching literature under the CCSS using the method recommended by David Coleman, appreciated by Bill Gates, and mindlessly approved for publication in this journal titled “When students don’t meet the bar.” (It is possible the author did not select the title. See pages 72-73 April, 2014 Kappan).

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    • Ang says:

      April 18, 2014 at 5:06 pm

      Ah, the Kappan. Remember when they regularly ran a column by Gerald Bracey?
      For anyone unfamiliar with Dr Bracey, here is one of his articles you may enjoy

      Click to access bracey_standard-tests.pdf

      Also wrote several books.

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    • Bob Shepherd says:

      April 18, 2014 at 5:06 pm

      “Unfortunately, the author and the teacher he appears to mentoring seem to have no understanding that literature is not created for the reasons that the teacher is using to organize her instruction, namely to comply with CCSS 6.4.”

      Well said, Laura.

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    • Cosmic Tinker says:

      April 18, 2014 at 5:58 pm

      “students in this narrative do not get to talk about…”

      Kids don’t get to talk period there, except when called upon to recite the one right answer. Uncommon Schools is noted for Doug Lemov’s rigid SLANT expectations of children. How thoroughly disgusting that Kappan is promoting the military style approach of a no-excuses charter school test-prep chain as “leadership” in education.

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      • Laura H. Chapman says:

        April 18, 2014 at 9:04 pm

        Thanks for this background. I posted my reaction to this article before looking up Uncommon Schools. Kappan editors now invite comments to articles via Facebook. I don’t do Facebook (or Tweets).

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      • Cosmic Tinker says:

        April 19, 2014 at 2:58 am

        You’re welcome. I don’t do Facebook either. I can’t stand it. (I do tweet but very rarely.)

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11. Susan Lee Schwartz says:

    April 18, 2014 at 6:00 pm

    Bob, you are so funny. I love you sense of humor!

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    • Ang says:

      April 18, 2014 at 8:48 pm

      totally agree!

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      • Bob Shepherd says:

        April 19, 2014 at 1:04 am

        Your response means a lot to me, Ang. Thank you!

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    • Bob Shepherd says:

      April 19, 2014 at 1:03 am

      Thanks, Susan!

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12. Laura H. Chapman says:

    April 18, 2014 at 8:58 pm

    Robert, Your spin deserves a video version, perhaps performed in the spirit of the late George Carlin who made me realiza how important “stuff” is. And wow do I miss Gerald Bracey.

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    • Bob Shepherd says:

      April 19, 2014 at 1:03 am

      You and me both, Laura!

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      • Cosmic Tinker says:

        April 19, 2014 at 2:53 am

        I miss both of them. They brought so much clarity to this insane world.

        Sometimes, I feel like Moses condemned to wandering in the desert for 40 years so the old fogies and misguided ogres die off before entering the Promised Land, but the wrong people are dying.

        May God bless Diane and keep her healthy for many more years to come.

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      • Ang says:

        April 19, 2014 at 2:02 pm

        “but the wrong people are dying.”

        You got that right, my friend!

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