Archives for the month of: April, 2015
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Michigan Reader Explains Why You Should “Follow the Money”

By dianeravitch
April 13, 2015 //
18

This reader reacted to the post about Steve Mathews, the superintendent in Novi, Michigan who is now on our honor roll for speaking up against punitive corporate reform. This reader explains with great clarity what the game is all about:

 

 

I taught in the same district as Steve Matthews when he was a Curriculum Director some years ago so I am familiar with who he is. He was well liked during his time there.
Something that is missing from Steve’s well spoken article and most of the subsequent comments is the fact that not only is the de-funding of public education deliberate and premeditated but it has a purpose in addition to demoralizing school employees. Two major factors are at play.
One is by keeping school districts cash strapped, it puts less money into the paychecks of teachers. Therefore less money will be going to Democratic candidates running for elected office. Starving the Democrats of donations by teacher union members, who are often the largest union in any particular state, makes it easier to outspend the Democrats by rich Republican donors. No less than Karl Rove, has stated that is a major goal of his political machine.
Another key ingredient of this premeditation for breaking down public schools is public schools are one of the last great untapped sources for the greatest stack of dollars in the country, taxpayer money. By making the school systems appear incompetent, even if it means actually ruining the education of millions of students, Republicans can create large inroads for privatization of school operations. That means Republican’s Corporate Masters will be getting those easy taxpayer monies with long-term contracts for “services.” Republicans/Corporate America have made big strides in taking over school transportation, food and custodial services to date, in addition to creating charter schools with shockingly little accountability for how taxpayer money is used and for actual student achievement. Legislative bills are being introduced in many states that will allow districts to hire non-certified teachers for the classrooms. Those “teachers” will be woefully underpaid and have little skills to deliver any kind of quality education.
The saying of “follow the money” is a real cue to see what those who seek to demonize public education are up to.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Michigan

BATS Congratulate Hillary Clinton and Tell Her They Are Ready to Pitch In If…….

By dianeravitch
April 13, 2015 //
69

The Badass Teachers Association wrote a letter congratulating Hillary Clinton on her announced candidacy for the Presidency. They remind her of many strong statements she has made in support of public education. And they pose a list of issues that are very important to them and to teachers and parents across the nation.

 

This is an excerpt from the BATs letter to Hillary:

 

We have been reviewing the history of your educational platform with interest in anticipation of your announcement.

 

In 2000 you said:

 

“I’ve been involved with schools now for 17 years, working on behalf of education reform. And I think we know what works. We know that getting classroom size down works. That’s why I’m for adding 100,000 teachers to the classroom. We know that modernizing and better equipping our schools works. And we know that high standards works. But what’s important is to stay committed to the public school system.”

 

As an organization we could NOT agree more. We believe that when you add REAL educators to the table when discussing education policy, you do so because educators know what works.

 

In 2007 at the NYSUT Convention in NY you said,

 

“Public education must be defended, yes it has to be modernized but never doubt for a minute if we turned our back on public education we would be turning our back on America. I will not let that happen.”

 

We are pleased to hear those amazing words of support for public education. In your long history of public service, you have proven you can be a friend to education. You pushed for universal pre-kindergarten, arts education, after-school tutoring, smaller class sizes and the rights of families. As a college student in the 1960s, you even volunteered to teach reading to children in poor Boston neighborhoods. You fought to ensure voting access for African Americans and even worked at an alternative newspaper in the black community.
In 2007, you said of testing:

 

NCLB stifles originality and forces teachers to focus on preparing students for tests. You criticized the program as underfunded and overly restrictive.
You asked delegates at the NEA of New Hampshire, “While the children are getting good at filling in all those little bubbles, what exactly are they really learning?”
You continued, “How much creativity are we losing? How much of our children’s passion is being killed?”

 

We are hoping that statements like this follow you into the White House!

 

In 2007 you said of public education:

 

“The majority of children are educated in the public education system. So we have to support the public education system whether or not our children are in it or whether or not we have children. The public education system is a critical investment for the well-being of all of us.”

 

We could not agree with you more. We feel , like you, that an investment in strong public education is the best investment this country can make!

 

We were most happy to hear this statement that you made in 2007, “I do not support vouchers. And the reason I don’t is because I don’t think we can afford to siphon dollars away from our underfunded public schools.”

 

Many educators are skeptical of promises because they feel betrayed by President Obama and Arne Duncan, whose program differs not at all from NCLB (except that it is ever more punitive and has set off a national fetish for measuring teachers by student test scores, a practice unknown in any of the world’s high-performing nations). Teachers, principals, and the millions who work in public schools and support public schools are looking for a genuine commitment to strengthen our nation’s public education system and to stop expanding privatization.

 

Will Hillary Clinton win the support of educators? She has her work cut out for her to win their hearts and minds after the last seven years of test-and-punish-and-privatize. In 2000, before the charter industry evolved into a competitive and boastful sector, embraced by the Walton family and rightwing governors; before the federal government mandated high-stakes testing every year for every child from grades 3-8; before the U.S. Department of Education became the cheerleader for profit making enterprises, charter schools, the Common Core, and the testing industry; before Teach for America lost its idealism and turned into a richly funded temp agency; before the onslaught against collective bargaining and teachers’ due process rights; Hillary’s commitment to public education would not have been doubted. But Arne Duncan has managed to demoralize educators and turn the federal department of education into a source of unfunded mandates and bad, top-down ideas. Hillary Clinton will have to prove herself to educators and parents to win their support. They were fooled once.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Democrats, Education Reform, Privatization, Testing

Parents in Upstate New York: Why Our Daughter Will Not Take the Common Core Tests

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
38

This email arrived today. The parents who wrote it live in a small town in upstate New York. New York is on fire with opt outs. Last year, 60,000 children refused the Common Core tests. This year, the number will grow significantly. Panicked superintendents, pressured by state bureaucrats, are sending out letters warning parents not to opt out. The Chancellor of the Board of Regents has told affluent communities that she might exempt them and their teachers from the punitive consequences of the testing, in an effort to dampen the Opt Out movement. As this letter shows, this all-hands-on-board attempt to quell the opt outs is not succeeding.

 

 

 

 

Why Our Third Grade Daughter Will NOT Take NYS Assessments

 

The direction of NYS public education is being driven by political control and corporate greed instead of what is best for children. The FREEDOM for school administrators to lead, teachers to teach, and students to learn in a child-centered classroom has been STOLEN by bully bureaucrats in Albany and Washington D.C. who know little about education and believe a “one size fits all” approach will somehow “fix” public education.  

 

In 2010, New York State officials, lured by MONEY from the Federal GOVERNMENT through the Race To The Top program, agreed to implement Common Core State Standards (CCSS) which were heavily financed by Bill Gates and developed by private interest groups with heavy influence from the corporate testing industry. CCSS were hastily adopted with no transparency while “grave concerns” from childhood development specialists and educators were ignored. Contrary to the marketing rhetoric that continues to be sold to the American people, CCSS were NOT state led, NOT internationally benchmarked, NOT piloted or tested, and NOT evaluated for cost or efficacy prior to implementation.

The Federal Government then spent hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to develop National Standardized Tests based on the unproven Common Core Standards which quickly drove the development of unproven curriculum and teaching methods. Now, NYS Dept. of Ed. and our Governor intend to have students take these costly and developmentally inappropriate tests to evaluate the “performance” of school districts and determine whether teachers should keep their jobs.

 

The NYS Common Core Tests (Grades 3-8) to be administered in April 2015:

  1. Compel teachers to narrow curriculum and spend a high percentage of the year prepping students to take tests on two subjects (Math and ELA) rather than teaching a well-rounded and balanced curriculum that inspires creativity and fosters the joy of learning for all students.
  2. Requires many hours to take and have NO diagnostic value for teachers in supporting the academic achievement of students.
  3. Are flawed, ambiguous, and intentionally designed to fail a high percentage of children by deliberately manipulating the “passing score” through arbitrary and subjective means.
  4. Are being used to collect a vast amount of data on children without parental knowledge or consent.
  5. When refused, will not affect a student’s classroom grade, placement, or services received.

 

Parents refusing to allow children to take the NYS Standardized Tests will send a clear and powerful message to Albany (and Washington D.C.) that children are not guinea pigs, high-stakes testing based on unproven standards is harmful to public education, and implementing destructive academic reforms using bully tactics will NOT be tolerated!

 

We have the power to say NO to government overreach. Refuse NYS Assessments and become part of the critical movement to put the “public” back into public education. The time to act is now.

 

 

Lynn and Steve Leonard

Corning-Painted Post School District Parents

 

 

 

Categories New York, Opt Out, Resistance, Testing

I Signed a Petition to Judge Baxter on Behalf of Atlanta Educators

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
43

I saw a tweet with a petition to the judge in the Atlanta cheating case. After reading it, I signed it.

The punishment should fit the crime. No bankers or mortgage lenders were sent to jail for the crimes that nearly destroyed our economy and caused many people to lose their homes and savings.

The Atlanta educators cheated. They lost their professional licenses, five years of compensation, their pensions, and their reputation. Some are facing 20 years in prison. This is wrong.

If you agree, sign the petition. If you don’t,don’t sign it. Think about it.

Categories Atlanta, Cheating, Georgia

Ohio State Board Member Criticizes Obsession with Testing

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
9

Bill Phillis of the Ohio Equity and Adequacy Coalition sent this commentary by a member of the Ohio State Board of Education, retired Judge A.J. Wagner..

State Board of Education member A. J. Wagner weighs in on testing

Retired Judge A. J. Wagner, member of the State Board of Education, shared his views in a letter to Senator Peggy Lehner, chair of the Senate Education Committee and the members of an ad hoc committee she appointed to examine issues regarding the current testing debacle. His views are worthy of a read.

Dear Senator Lehner and Members of the Committee:

I am writing to you to share my opinion which is formed by the February 2015 Policy Memo from the National Education Policy Center on “Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act: Time to Move Beyond Test-focused Policies.” I urge you to carefully consider the analyses and recommendations in this Memo.

A compelling body of research exists about the problems with test-focused reforms, as described in the Memo. (available online athttp://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/esea). Key concerns include:

i) Research suggests at least two major problems with test-driven school reforms. First, the tests themselves have validity issues. The resulting scores are only loosely linked to the wide array of topics and depth that we all want for our students. So attaching high stakes consequences to those test scores results in decisions being made on weak data. Second, and probably even more important, when we attach high stakes consequences to test scores we change what and how our children are taught. This is not always bad, since much of what is tested is indeed important. But the overall effect is to narrow our children’s learning opportunities, squeezing out important and engaging lessons.

ii) Not surprisingly, then, we now face the failure of more than a decade-and-a-half of test-focused reforms. Even though we’ve been focusing on the content of our tests and even though we’ve been preparing students to demonstrate knowledge on tests, the testing trends after No Child Left Behind’s (NCLB) implementation are almost identical to the trends before NCLB’s implementation. Not only did we come nowhere near the NCLB goal of almost-universal proficiency on standardized tests, we gained no benefit at the cost of broader, deeper learning – and at the cost of pursuing evidence-based practices that could have helped our children.

I urge moving away from test-focused reforms, and to a state role that encourages a focus on sustained and meaningful investments in practices shown to be effective in improving the educational opportunities and success of all students, particularly those in highest need. There are no magic wands, and the formula for success is very straightforward: children learn when they have opportunities to learn; closing opportunity gaps will close achievement gaps.

Key recommendations from the Memo include:

i) Assess students, teachers, and schools using frameworks that paint a more robust, accurate, and complex picture, with multiple data sources and scientifically credited methods of analysis. For example, for students, we might look at authentic performance assessments (http://fairtest.org/k-12/authentic assessment), and for schools, we might look at the Annenberg Institute for School Reform’s “Time for Equity Indicators” (http://timeforequity.org) or the National Education Policy Center’s “Schools of Opportunity” criteria (http://opportunitygap.org).

ii) Enrich opportunities through proven interventions such as high-quality early-childhood education beginning before birth. Extend learning time in ways that engage students, rather than just more time on drill-and-kill test preparation. Demand more of our schools, but only when providing the supports for students and teachers to succeed. Address problems not only at the level of individuals, but also at the level of systems. Test-focused reforms detract attention from deeper and more systemic factors that can hinder any student’s opportunity for success, including such factors as poverty, racial segregation, inadequate resources, narrow and ineffective curriculum and assessment.

iii) Involve students, families, educators, and educational researchers in more substantive ways in decision-making processes involving educational policy and reform. It is particularly important to have powerful, listened-to voices arising from the communities that have been targets of educational reform.

This is a brief summary of the Memo, a document supported by over 2000 researchers and professors from colleges, universities, and other research institutions throughout the United States. I urge you to, please, consider the evidence based practices put forth by the National Policy Education Center.

My prayers and best wishes are with you for these important Deliberations.

Judge A.J. Wagner, Retired
Member of the Ohio Board of Education
District 3

William Phillis
Ohio E & A

Ohio E & A | 100 S. 3rd Street | Columbus | OH | 43215
ohioeanda@sbcglobal.net

Categories Ohio, Standardized Testing

Audrey Beardsley: Tom Kane Is Still Trying to Prove That VAM Works

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
22

Audrey Beardsley, on her blog “Vamboozled,” notes that Tom Kane, Harvard economist and leader of the Gates Foundation’s $45 million Measures of Effective Teaching, has returned to the hustings to argue on behalf of the causal value of value-added measurement, that is, the idea that teachers directly “cause” the test score gains of students. For VAM to work, she argues, students would have to be randomly assigned, and they almost never are. Even “random assignment” might not truly be random, because teachers would still face vastly different classes, some with many highly motivated students and others with many unmotivated students, as well as a host of other unmeasured variables. Imagine sitting at a poker table, and the dealer randomly assigns cards. One person has a royal flush, another has a hand without even a pair. The assignment was “random,” but the cards dealt were very different.

 

Beardsley writes:

 

Kane, like other VAM statisticians, tend to (and in many ways have to if they are to continue with their VAM work, despite “the issues”) (over)simplify the serious complexities that come about when random assignment of students to classrooms (and teachers to classrooms) is neither feasible, nor realistic, or outright opposed (as was also clearly evidenced in the above article by 98% of educators, see again here).

 

The random assignment of students to classrooms (and teachers to classrooms) very rarely happens. Rather, the use of many observable and unobservable variables are used to make such classroom placement decisions, and these variables go well beyond whether students are eligible for free-and-reduced lunches or are English-language learners.

 

Ah, if only the real world were as tidy as many economists would like it to be.

 

 

Categories VAM (value-added modeling)

Help These Teachers Make Robo-Call to Every Parent in Néw York: Opt Out!

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
13

A group of teachers in New York have an audacious idea. They are raising money to make a Robo-call to every public school parent in the state. They are close to their goal. They need your help.

They write:

“We have, in a little over a week, come very near to achieving what seemed like the impossible. At the time of this writing, we are on the final push to our funding goal. We did a tremendous amount of work, sometimes going without sleep or meals, and hope that our action inspires others. We have raised enough funds to place robocalls to strategic areas throughout New York, and our ultimate goal is to call the entire state, so donations are urgently needed at this time. Our ripple in New York will add to the wave being felt throughout the nation. To donate and help us complete our mission, go to:

http://www.crowdrise.org/refusethetestsrobocall.

I will contribute, will you? If they got $10 from everyone who reads this, they would succeed and keep going.

The billionaires have the money. We have the ideas, the enthusiasm, and the energy of millions of educators and parents. And we are on the right side of history. Not high-stakes testing. Not privatization. Great public schools for all children.

Categories Opt Out, Resistance, Students, Teachers, Testing

BREAKING NEWS: Michigan PTA Wants Halt to State Online Assessments

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
13

Michigan PTA passed a resolution asking the state to stop the online testing. The state said no. They forgot that public education is for the public, not for the bureaucracy.

MONDAY, APRIL 6, 2015
Michigan PTA Adopts M-Step Resolution

The Michigan PTA recently adopted the Clarkston PTA Council’s resolution calling on the State Legislature and the Michigan Department of Education to cease the administration of the M-Step assessment, scheduled to begin on April 13. The resolution follows:

Michigan PTA’s
M-Step
Resolution (Adopted 2015)

WHEREAS the State of Michigan
implemented a new statewide, standardized test on November 13, 2014, after the school year
had begun;

put in place required testing windows after the curriculum was set, meaning some content
included in the M-STEP may not yet be covered;

communicated changes in test requirements on January 29, 2015, resulting in potential shifts in schedules for the computer-based version;

released the test software on February 26, 2015, a month and a half prior to testing, revealing
the need for updates to the existing technology in a number of districts;

notified schools on March 12, 2015 that the management portion of eDIRECT, used to print test tickets (27,357 tickets for an 8,000-student district) and to input test accommodations and student related information, will not be released until April 3, 2015, the first day of a week-long holiday for many school districts, which necessitates the re-work of test schedules to allow for completion of above tasks on the first day of testing, April 13, 2015;

requires the presence of test proctors paid by school districts;

will discontinue the M-STEP assessment after one year to create a different tool for the school
year 2015-16 and beyond; and

WHEREAS the State, in November 2014, notified school districts that the M-STEP would utilize a computer-adaptive format, meaning that it would individualize the assessment questions for students based upon their responses; and

on February 9, 2015, notified school districts that M-STEP is not computer adaptive; and

WHEREAS the State originally notified school districts that M-STEP data would be available to schools shortly after the tests were administered so that schools could use the data to inform instruction; and as of March 24, 2015, cannot confirm when M-STEP data will be available to school districts after the test is completed; and

WHEREAS the M-STEP, due to technology limitations in a number of school districts, will disrupt schooling, render technology inaccessible for curricular needs, and interrupt the exploration of content from April to June, meaning that secondary students will miss out on classroom time and new learning in order to take the M-STEP; and

WHEREAS the State has determined that it will use M-STEP results to prescribe how districts will allocate At-Risk funding, which the State has historically targeted toward students at risk of failing in school due to adverse factors in their lives;

WHEREAS the M-STEP process, in its entirety, is largely out of the control of local school districts;

NOW, THEREFORE, IT IS HEREBY RESOLVED: That Michigan PTA

● Calls for the immediate cessation of the M-STEP assessment process and administration for the year 2014-2015;

● Calls for not utilizing M-STEP’s results to negatively impact school district funding and funding allocations.

● Supports a balanced, localized, nationally normed assessment system.

Categories Michigan, Testing

Joanne Yatvin: In Praise of Teaching What Matters Most

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
24

Joanne Yatvin, former teacher, principal and superintendent and literacy expert in Oregon, sent me the following email after reading the story in the New York Times about Success Academy and its regimented environment, focused on test scores:

Diane,

I read the New York Times article on the Success Academies around the same time that you did and came away shivering for the children who are being “educated” there. Here is my take on what those charters actually teach.

In my career as a teacher and principal I came to know a great deal about what children learn at school. It’s not only academics and proper school behavior, but also how to operate in personal relationships and the outside world. Reading the New York Times article about the Success Academy Charter Schools earlier this week, I saw some pretty tough demands being made of all kids and humiliating consequences for those who didn’t meet them. I can’t help wondering if Success Academy students aren’t also learning some or all of the following life lessons:
The only thing that matters is being a winner

Competition works better than cooperation

Do what you’re told even if it makes no sense to you

Keep quiet when you see other people being abused

Those who are not successful at their work are just lazy

Punishment and humiliation are good training for children

Prepare yourself for stressful situations by wearing a diaper

If that’s what children learn at the Success Academies, I’m glad my children went to mediocre public schools and emerged as independent thinkers and dedicated supporters of their less fortunate neighbors.

Categories Charter Schools, Harlem Success Academy, Joy, Real Education

Peter Greene Watched Chris Hayes Interview Arne Duncan

By dianeravitch
April 12, 2015 //
20

Chris Hayes interviewed Arne Duncan and Peter Greene reports on what happened.

You can imagine Arne artfully dodging and weaving when Chris asked straightforward questions. Arne insists that Common Core is confused with the unpopular tests (that Arne funded). Arne suggests that politicians are upset by Common Core but Real Parents welcome it.

“Hayes: I want to talk about Common Core for a second. (And he smiles a little smile, like “let’s do this silly thing, I’m going to ask a question, you’re going to sling baloney, it’ll be fun”). Are you surprised by how controversial Common Core (which he characterizes as “kind of an obscure issue in certain ways”) has become?

“Duncan: “It’s actually very simple. The goal’s to have high standards.” So, kids, the whole national consistency issue, the whole being able to compare kids in Idaho and Maine, the whole keeping everyone on the same page so mobile students will never get lost– that’s no longer the point.

“Duncan goes on to display how much he doesn’t understand about how this works. He talks about how, under NCLB, too many states dummied down standards. He says this was “to make politicians look good.” I’d be more inclined to say “to avoid punitive consequences for their schools.” If Arne had reached my conclusion (and really, given that he was in charge of a large school district at the time, it’s kind of amazing that he didn’t reach my conclusion) then perhaps he wouldn’t have figured that the solution was to make the consequences of high stakes testing even more punitive than before.

“Insert story here of how schools lied to students about how ready they were for college. So brave governors decided to stop lying to children. “Let’s have true college and career ready standards for every single child.” As always I wonder why reaching that conclusion leads to a next step where one says, “Let’s hire a couple of guys who have no real education experience, either pedagogical or developmental, and have them whip something up.”

As Greene shows, this is vintage Arne. Adroitly changing the subject, mouthing high-minded platitudes, never accepting that parents have valid reasons to be upset by the administration’s unvarnished support for high-stakes testing, closing schools, and inviting entrepreneurs to cash in on the educationmarket. NCLB went wrong, he admits, but he never acknowledges that Race to the Top was no different philosophically from NCLB and far worse in actuality when judged by the whipping it has given to schools and educators.

Categories Common Core, Duncan, Arne, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Race to the Top
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