The Every Student Succeeds Act was released to the public on November 30, passed both houses of Congress with large majorities within 10 days, and was signed into law today by President Obama. That was fast. The good news is that No Child Left Behind is gone. There is so much we don’t know because there has been so little time to read it, discuss it, and hear different perspectives on how it will work.
Randi Weingarten here explains the charter portion of the law. Sure, some would prefer that the federal government stop subsidizing privatization. But this is a Republican-controlled Congress, so what did you expect? School choice is their favorite school reform.
Randi writes:
“This is what is in the bill on charters:
“The program is reauthorized through FY 2020 and replaced the current charter school grant program with a program awarding grants to states, and through them subgrants to charter school developers, to open new charters and expand and replicate high-quality charter school models. At the same time, ESSA strengthens and updates the charter school program by: · ensuring charter school quality, accountability and transparency including required fiscal audits; · incentivizes stronger charter school authorizing practices; · requires charter schools to improve community outreach and engagement · provides dedicated funding to expand and replicate the highest quality charter schools so that they can reach more students; · focuses on charter school practices recruitment, retention and discipline practices, particularly for underrepresented groups such as homeless and foster students. There is a grant priority for charter management organizations that operate racially integrated schools and prioritize serving a majority of low-income students. There is money for facilities assistance as the bill reserves 12.5 percent of the charter school program funding to be used for facilities assistance. ESSA also requires the Secretary of Education to address the recent findings of the Office of the Inspector General pertaining to operational challenges within the Charter School Program.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
If ESSA is not a gift to Michael Milken and Robert Rubin and their ilk, I don’t know what is…
Let’s just kick those public school teachers where it hurts, said every elected official and president voting yes. Let them writhe in agony. And students with disabilities? let’s experiment on them for profit. Speaking of which, thank you for opening the portals of data for profit, said no parent ever. Bernie Sanders disappoints me for not voting against this. This is not a gift, unless, of course, you like poisonous snakes. or ALEC and Eli Broad.
Please do not put venomous snakes in the same thought as ALEC and Broad.
It was a compromise with Republicans. They would never agree to a bill without some corporate giveaways.
we’ve discussed this “Compromise” before about being bipartisan… I think they just wanted to get it over and done with and out of the way — because — you know kids don’t count and .. we have to get home for Christmas etc… (to our own families so we duck out of Washington early)… They know they can’t disappoint their cronies and the lobbyists and the robber barons so who gets kicked? Always…
.
You will be tired of me for repeating this over and over…
but Ted Kennedy and George Miller made agreements to be bipartisan and then had a press conference where they denounced Bush for violation of their verbal agreement and trust and not coming up with any funds (2002-2007 ESEA budget increased only 2 billion — fact copied here from Politics of Structural Ed Reform)… and then at this point in the discussion somebody usually makes a comment about how much they disliked Ted but that is not the point!
I got an e-mail from Randi today saying we won. . . Does she support public education? Her celebration of this law concerns me a lot. . and now this stuff on charters sound horrible?
Where is the funding for our neighborhood public schools??
I feel like I’m living in a Twilight zone. Will anyone take a strong stand and say this bill in wrong for children and public education.
I just get so frustrated as nothing about this bill is good for us and so why are we celebrating?
This charter stuff alone is enough to scare me. . .
How can she support this? How can she support this???
Randi took $11 million from Gates to love the Common Core which makes her also inclined to love ESSA. So in 2014, under pressure from the membership she decided to make an announcement that she would no longer accept Gates money. So now the membership will just have to come up with the cash since Randi’s work is clearly worth every penny. She said “We won!” ….so it must be true. Education since Randi has been the head of the AFT is just getting better and better.
The American Federation of Teachers, to date the recipient of more than $11 million in Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation largess, will no longer accept Gates funding for its Innovation Fund, Politico has reported, citing increasing criticism from members.
The Innovation Fund supports local projects. Politico also says that the AFT will seek ways of funding the initiative through a dues surcharge, which would have to be approved by members at this year’s biennial AFT convention in Los Angeles.
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/teacherbeat/2014/03/aft_will_not_accept.html
Randi Weingarten: Sleight of Hand Artist
http://goo.gl/hH5Z0Z
While you can blame the Republicans for some of the content, we have had a Democrat in the White House for the last seven years and his policies have shown nothing but partiality towards charter expansion. I would be curious to know how Randi views the “Pay for Success” schemes in this law. I see lots of potential abuse and problems. I see additional problems with the dumb down standards for those serving special education and ELL students. This is a step in the wrong direction.
The new No Child Left Behind bill, S. 1177, as reported by the Conference Committee between the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House includes the permissive use of Federal funds by States and by local school districts of Pay for Success.
Title I, Part D
‘‘(A) may include—
‘‘(i) the acquisition of equipment;
‘‘(ii) pay-for-success initiatives;”
Funded by Goldman Sachs, Pay for Success in Utah
denied special education to over 99 percent of the
students that were in the early childhood Pay for Success program.
Goldman Sachs has received a first payment of over
$250,000 based on over 99 percent of students NOT being identified for special education.
Based on these results, Goldman Sachs may receive
an over 100 percent return on its investment as it
will receive yearly payments based on students
continuing to NOT be identified for special education (multiple yearly payments for one student).
“If special education is reduced to less than 1 percent of students, for all practical purposes it will cease to exist,” says Bev Johns, Chair of the Illinois Special Education Coalition.
https://dianeravitch.net/2015/12/02/warning-essa-threatens-special-education/
It’s easy to for students to be non-identified, in the early grades. Eventually some will be identified. How many years after pre-school are these children followed?
Who is going to pay for the charter school monitoring and enforcement? I assume the usual dupes… taxpayers. We foot the bill for an expense that is unnecessary because the majority of people in our state, don’t want charter schools.
Diane- What is the status of Common Core? Last night on the news I heard they are obsolete. And yet today in school we used a rubric which uses the standards. Thanks.
States are no longer required to maintain the illusion that Common Core standards
are what politicians long profess them to be. While states must maintain standards,
Massachusetts, for example, is free to go back to genuinely higher standards.
“Massachusetts, for example, is free to go back to genuinely higher standards.” I’m not quite that optimistic… but I’m hoping they will use the Curriculum Frameworks in order to do this and also leave some autonomy for local faculty and curriculum administrators to describe what will be in the curriculum… Still, they are going to invent some new “whackadoodle ” experimental test and you had better have your local curriculum align with that or else… punished again!
Randi is a spin doctor selling the disgraceful ESSA for the retrograde Democratic Party whose President spent the last 6 years demolishing public schools and promoting privatization and standardized testing, with more money for charters and for bogus TFA-style teacher academies to come via ESSA. Now, Randi wants to blame the GOP for the terrible ESSA she celebrates as a victory. Where has her candidate Hillary been as public schools were being decimated? Giving speeches to Goldman-Sachs for $200,000? Not a single Democratic stood up and gave a full-throated defense of the beleaguered public sector in this abysmal rush to pass ESSA before anyone could read it and object. If Randi does not retire to a cushy job offered by Pres. Hillary in 2017, Randi should resign or be driven out of office. The sorry residue of public education and of the teaching profession will be Randi’s inescapable legacy.
i believe i left a comment here, directed at randi, and it’s gone; i see other comments at least equally critical of her…
i shall leave (a version of) it again…
Randi…. you know that ESSA is NCLB on steroids; that it cements in place the final destruction of what we recognise as public education and its control and the commodification of our children by corporations….
it funds and supports the creation of more charters and will eventually lead to the vanishing of all public schools as we know them…
you helped make this happen…. bit by bit, step by step over the years, you have sold children, the teaching profession and public education down the river… shame on you…
and for what? a seat for yourself at the table of the movers and shakers? maybe a cabinet position? a cushy assignment, catchy job title, flash office and life-long perks that come with it, given to you by Hillary? a swanky job heading up some (astro) institute for Bill or Eli? again, shame on you…
I don’t know Diane, I’ve only looked at the last federal grant to Ohio for charter schools and the application was riddled with errors and outright falsehoods, yet it was approved for 71 million dollars.
It’s not like accurate information on Ohio charter schools is difficult to find. It’s on the Ohio Department of Education website.
I don’t know who reviews these grants (and it’s Top Secret- the Obama Administration won’t say) but there’s apparently absolutely no verification of the information submitted before the grants go out.
I looked at the language in the new charter section and it looks to me like the feds are only offering these grants to states that either have laws that promote charters or states that will change their laws to promote charters. Maybe she could explain that part of the new law- it looks like more incentives for states to promote charters with state law changes in order to get this funding. If we see a lot of state law changes to increase funding to charters to qualify for these federal grants we;ll know that’s what THAT was really about.
I think they’re just warming up on charter mania in DC.
Chiara,
When NY won a Race to the Top grant, I received a copy of the reviewers’ comments. They were riddled with errors. For example, the reviewers commended NY’s improved NAEP scores in math, although they had been flat for years. I had the feeling they were reading the application from another state. The charter lobby is powerful and the only way to beat it is to keep exposing the corruption
Randi W. is, has been, and will continue to be as much of the problem as any individual in the reform movement. She is the absolute archetype for current teacher’s union leadership (Mcgee, Mulgrew, etc.) that will inevitably be regarded in history books simply as the union leader(s) who lost the whole game, gave up the store, and thereby shut the lights out on the last great group of unionized folk in the US.
So there is that, but more importantly, the history books will also, if historians at that point are honest, point out that the membership of said unions allowed such deeply ridiculous leadership to stay in power and steer the ship directly into the rocks.
This is why the only request I will have to anyone who cares when I croak is that they leave out entirely from my obituary that my career was that of public school teacher. I deeply do not want to be seen as part of the demise of this profession and thing called public education. It’s a shame…..a deep shame….that “leaders” like Weingarten are allowed to continue in their positions. Shame.
Oh joy! More money for “high quality” charter schools. The only definition I have ever seen of high quality centers around test scores. I am also puzzled why money is being provided to purchase facilities. I thought they already had a pretty good racket going between free co-locations and the purchase of public property with public money. How do we ignore this stuff? I will scream if another person tells me it is legal!
Have to do this 2o2t: It is legal!
Sorry!!
Yep, just heard you all the way down here in the Show Me State-heh heh!!
Sad but true. It is legal to sell our public school system. Hey, it used to be legal to own slaves. I know, not the best of analogies, but we are being “sold down the river.”
I do agree with you 2o2t that the rationale/justification of “it is legal” is one that many a crook hides behind (think bankstas, insurance execs, politicians, etc. . .).
Being legal is only one half of the definition of being just and it is the weak half at that.
Particularly with all the deregulation of the last twenty years.
Does this codify the destruction of public education envisioned in ” tough Times-Tough Choices”?
I also received Randi’s propaganda. AFT members should all RSVP to join Randi and her elite AFT national officers and “a special guest from the White House policy team for a telephone town hall Thursday, Dec. 17, at 8 p.m. Eastern time to discuss this new law and our next steps. RSVP today.”
Here is her e-mail in full to dissect, if anyone cares to do so:
“I just left the White House, where the president signed the Every Student Succeeds Act into law. This law will usher in the most sweeping, positive changes to public education policy in nearly two decades, from pre-K through college.
“Today marks the beginning of a joint responsibility for public education, as opposed to the top-down accountability we’ve experienced since the passage of No Child Left Behind.
Congress maintained the best of the original intent of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act—targeting funding to support the disadvantaged schools and children who need it most—and slammed the door on federally prescribed high-stakes testing.
“Join me, the AFT’s national officers and a special guest from the White House policy team for a telephone town hall Thursday, Dec. 17, at 8 p.m. Eastern time to discuss this new law and our next steps. RSVP today.
“ESSA represents a significant course correction acknowledging that more than a decade’s worth of education reforms based on test-and-sanction policies were a failure, and sends a strong signal to states that these failed policies should not be pursued. This bill:
“Maintains funding for the students who need it most;
Prohibits the federal government from mandating teacher evaluations;
Stops the federal government from prescribing high-stakes consequences like school closures and conversions;
Opposes support for private school vouchers, portability or other divisive policies;
Includes more transparency and accountability for charters; and
Maintains certification requirements for paraprofessionals.
We have a lot of work ahead. Join our telephone town hall next Thursday, Dec. 17, at 8 p.m. Eastern time to hear more from AFT leaders and a special guest from the White House policy team about what this means for public education. RSVP today.
While the new bill doesn’t solve all problems, it opens the way for states to give teachers the latitude to teach so their kids can reach their potential, and gives us the chance to press the reset button so public schools can be places where teachers want to teach, parents want to send their kids and students are engaged.
Today’s victory is just the beginning, and now we have a lot of work to do at the state level. We must send a clear message that the policies of No Child Left Behind, waivers and Race to the Top should be abandoned, not replicated.
We will continue to engage our members and allies as work shifts to the states to fix accountability systems and develop teacher evaluation systems that are fair and aimed at improving and supporting good instruction. And, we will make sure our members’ voices are heard and listened to throughout this process.
RSVP for Thursday’s telephone town hall today.
The world often seems very unsettled these days. But as we close 2015, we now have a potential paradigm shift that could return the joy to our schools and our teaching as we move away from the era of test-and-punish school policy.
I wish you all a peaceful and joyous holiday season,
In unity,
Randi Weingarten
AFT President
P.S. You can find more information about the final ESSA bill and what it means for your state by checking out this helpful briefing document.
http://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/how_will_esea_essa_affect_schools_in_your_state_113015.pdf?can_id=&source=email-we-won-rip-no-child-left-behind&email_referrer=we-won-rip-no-child-left-behind&email_subject=we-won-rip-no-child-left-behind&link_id=3
Gotta luv that first line. Randi is sooo important!
Randi Wiengarten received an awful lot of blowback from AFT members for her staunch support of the Common Core standards. That’s the ONLY reason she “reconsidered” their value.”
In a Huffington Post column praising the Common Core, Weingarten concluded with this:
“We can’t reclaim the promise of public education without investing in strong neighborhood public schools that are safe, collaborative and welcome environments for students, parents, educators and the broader community. Schools where teachers and school staff are well-prepared and well-supported, with manageable class sizes and time to collaborate…schools with wraparound services to address our children’s social, emotional and health needs.”
Weingarten implies – in all seriousness – that Common Core is the necessary ingredient to achieve what she outlined in that paragraph. Sadly though, Common Core has little if anything to do with neighborhood schools that are “safe, collaborative, welcome environments.” It has nothing to do with “manageable class sizes” and “wraparound services” that “address…social, emotional and health needs.”
Weingarten wrote a piece last year with Vicki Philips of the Gates Foundation in which they opined that it was critical for American public education to adopt “a new paradigm” and “align teacher development and evaluation to the Common Core state standards.”
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/112746/gates-foundation-sponsored-effective-teaching
I’ve noted before that the Sandia Report (1993) – issued in the wake of A Nation at Risk – examined the allegations that public education was “broken” and “in crisis” –– that it needed a “new paradigm” –– and concluded that:
* “..on nearly every measure we found steady or slightly improving trends.”
* “youth today [the 1980s] are choosing natural science and engineering degrees at a higher rate than their peers of the 1960s.”
* “business leaders surveyed are generally satisfied with the skill levels of their employees, and the problems that do exist do not appear to point to the k-12 education system as a root cause.”
* “The student performance data clearly indicate that today’s youth are achieving levels of education at least as high as any previous generation.”
The Common Core is predicated on the notion that “rigorous” standards (and the testing of them) are needed – are imperative – to prepare students (and the nation) “to compete successfully in the global economy.” Nothing could be further from the truth. The U.S already is economically competitive. When it drops in the World Economic Forum competitiveness rankings – as it has done over the last several years – it’s because of really stupid economic policy choices, policies that have been pushed aggressively by many of those who now insist that schools and teachers must be the ones to fix the problem.
Achieve was one of the instigators of Common Core (along with the ACT and the College Board). It just so happens that Achieve is funded by groups like Battelle (which argues for STEM when there is no STEM shortage), the Gates Foundation, Prudential and State Farm and Travelers, Boeing, GE, JPMorgan Chase, Intel, IBM, the Helmsley Foundation, DuPont, Cisco, Chevron, Microsoft….many of these companies pay little or no taxes. You can read about Microsoft, just to pick one, here:
http://www.vanityfair.com/business/2012/08/microsoft-lost-mojo-steve-ballmer
The ACT and College Board’s products (the PSAT SAT, and AP) are more hype than useful educational resources. They just don’t do much in predicting college (or workplace) readiness or success. But they are big business. And contrary to what they say, they stack the deck AGAINST opportunity for all students. As Matthew Quirk wrote, “The ACT and the College Board don’t just sell hundreds of thousands of student profiles to schools; they also offer software and consulting services that can be used to set crude wealth and test-score cutoffs, to target or eliminate students before they apply…That students are rejected on the basis of income is one of the most closely held secrets in admissions; enrollment managers say the practice is far more prevalent than most schools let on.”
I suppose it’s significant that NCLB has expired. But it can hardly be called a “victory” when the chief cheerleaders for Common Core support its replacement. Here’s how John Engler of the Business Roundtable put it:
“We are particularly pleased that the final legislation includes challenging academic standards; annual testing; increased transparency of school performance through state, district and school report cards; required state action to improve low performing schools; and enhanced support for public school choice and charter schools…CEOs believe that current accountability systems, which place an emphasis on test scores and graduation rates, must remain a central feature…”
Weingarten is not leading. She’s reacting – she’s doing her version of being a “player” – and she’s doing it badly.
Excellent post …. I wish someone would rise up and run against her ….
Here’s the actual language from the above link. I found several misrepresentations, to put it gently:
“How Will the New ESEA/ESSA Affect Schools in Your State?
The reauthorized Elementary and Secondary Education Act, formerly known as No Child Left Behind and now officially known as the Every Student Succeeds Act, is a long overdue reset of the federal role in education policy.
Back in January, our union laid out four very clear goals for the reauthorization of ESEA:
• Maintain the fiscal equity provisions of the original ESEA.
• Get the federal government out of the business of teacher evaluation.
• Ensure that paraprofessional requirements remain intact.
• End the test-and-punish accountability system, creating instead one that will be more aligned with student learning and needs, and will give schools and educators the latitude to teach rather than simply require them to test.
The final version of ESEA meets these goals and paves the way for a public education system that’s much more focused on teaching and learning, and that gives states and educators more latitude while maintaining federal funds for the students who need it most. While not perfect, there is a lot to like in this overhaul.
The ESSA bill:
• Protects ESEA’s original intent of mitigating poverty and targeting resources to students in need, and it adds an early childhood investment. (She’s actuallly PRAISING Pay-For-Success!!)
• Prohibits the federal government from mandating or prescribing the terms of teacher evaluation.
The receipt of federal funds can no longer be conditioned on using test scores in teacher
evaluation.
• Maintains paraprofessional certification requirements.
• Resets testing and accountability by improving tests and creating an accountability system that is less test-based, allowing joy to return to teaching and learning. (Really, how many of our courageous *snark* politicians will actually do this?)
“This is an opportunity for states to reshape their education systems. It will not happen overnight, but without federal prescriptions on exactly what accountability, interventions for struggling schools, and teacher evaluation must look like, there is a path forward for states to reset these systems.
• The state will be in control of its teacher evaluation system. Federal funds will not be tied to federal teacher evaluation requirements.
• Within parameters, the state will set its own accountability system that does not have to follow a rigid “adequate yearly progress” construct. States will still have to disaggregate results by subgroup.
• The accountability systems can include non-test measures like working conditions, school climate and safety, and educator engagement.”
What Randi fails to mention is that the language was changed from “public charter schools” to “high quality charter schools” a difference that can open the door for private, for-profit charters to apply for these grants. Once again, allowing people to make money on the backs of our children. With the additional grants for low income areas, ourge most vulnerable students will become even more compromised.
The law makes it easier to sell off large swaths of the public commons to private enterprise. We should push states to also require school districts to bring any good innovation from charters to scale in district schools. That was one of the original purposes of charters and currently charters get all the benefits while neighborhood schools are simply sucked dry of resources.
“also require school districts to bring any good innovation from charters to scale” are there any innovations in charter school that should (or even could) be taken into the public sector schools? Would you please cite with evidence if you know of any….….
Charters’ top innovation: cutting down on the misbehavior that plagues so many public schools. But I doubt this can be scaled up b/c it relies on a credible threat of expulsion. It will never be fair to compare public and charter schools if the former are denied this power.
After her lying for the better part of a generation, and collaborating with those who would destroy public education and the union, why should we ever believe a word this woman says?
I’m disturbed to see that charter expansion is incentivized instead of requiring districts to take some of the innovations of charter schools to scale in district schools. We need to push out states to take on because already charters are sucking resources out of public schools. All the resources flow in one direction.
*push our states to take this on because already charters are sucking resources out of public schools
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
thanks…. i have asked my folks to put the good aspects in a list form… as you can imagine between this and cuomo commn yesterday i was swamped…. This is what i wrote on medium: https://medium.com/school-house-voices/why-we-support-the-every-student-succeeds-act-f1e65212fbd7#.fie7elrcl
Randi,
From your writing:
“And in an about-face from current federal policy that prescribed interventions for turning around low-performing schools, such as school closings, the bill gives states much more flexibility to determine the best approach.”
Who said it was the feds role “to give states much more flexibility”? And that flexibility? Well if I have 5 degree movement of my knee before having it replaced and end up with 10 degree movement, well, that’s “more flexibility” but it don’t mean squat overall.
“And since half the children who go to public schools are poor, it’s significant that the bill maintains federal funding. . . ” It’s significant?? that we (meaning this country and the feds) maintain what is insufficient to begin with??
“. . . especially poor neighborhoods.” I know you “big city folk” have a hard time understanding that much of this nation’s poverty is rural “In the United States, where rural poverty rates are higher and more persistent than in urban areas” (from wiki) so not only what you said but also in the countryside.
“We know this rewrite of the ESEA law will not solve all the problems in public education, but it’s a huge step forward. It has the potential to create a new paradigm in public education, relegating the era of test-and-punish strategies to the trash heap.”
Which, test and punish strategies, you and the AFT helped to create through the various agreements including APPR in NY.
“It even could begin to solve a serious teacher recruitment and retention problem, especially in hard-to-staff schools.”
And I “could begin to solve a serious” personal budget “problem” by winning the lottery.
Sorry, Randi, but I wouldn’t believe anything that comes out of your mouth, even if your tongue were notarized!
“The Weingarten”
The wine is very nice
In garden, with some ice.
And rubbing elbows too
Is what I like to do
Here’s Arne Duncan identifying the groups who will have to work harder to “meet expectations” for the good of America:
“Today, @POTUS signed #ESSA into law. This law is good for America & expects more of students, educators & schools.”
Sadly, they’re the only groups who will be expected to contribute because public schools have lost funding every year since 2008:
“Public schools in most of the United States are receiving less state funding now than seven years ago, putting at risk the quality of education for many students, a new report shows.
The study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that at least 31 states provided less funding per student in the 2014 school year than in 2008.
In at least 15 states, the funding for K-12 education is down 10 percent or more.”
If ed reformers were serious, wouldn’t they advocate to push funding up to at least the level it was when Duncan took office? That’s probably a tougher sell politically than “expecting more of students, educators, and schools”, which of course demands no contribution from anyone outside the 4 walls of the school. “Expecting more” costs me absolutely nothing. No wonder this stuff is so popular.
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/12/10/report-school-funding-cuts-still-affected-by-great-recession.html
A line from Thomas Pynchon’s novel, Gravity’s Rainbow:
“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about answers.”
No hay duda, NoBrick
How do you say “Bingo!” in Spanish?
¡Bingo!
🙂
So that’s how you translate an English word to Spanish?
¡{English word here}!
I never realized it was so easy.
Thanks. That should come in handy when I travel to Spanish speaking countries.
SDP,
Actually that would be how bingo! in Spanish would be written as it is a borrowed/loan word from English.
But the best way to translate an English word to Spanish is: to add an “o” to the end of the word (with some minor spelling changes due to the “silent e” in English). Foro exampelo, youo couldo doo thiso easilyo.
And no Spanish speaking would understand a word you said!
Yep!
I have a “banner” made by my Sp 5 students who threw a good bye party for us (they were seniors and I was in the process of being hounded out of the school and they knew it) where you string together the letters to make it say something. I have it up in my game/sun room “Weo loveo Swackero”. Best class I ever had.
cx: no Spanish speaking person
Duane
reminds me of a trip I took to Ecuador and Peru ages ago with some college friends of mine.
One other friend and I knew a little Spanish, but another friend thought that if he just spoke very slowly and loudly the people would understand.
It was actually very funny in a pathetic sort of way.
And the most pathetic part was that I was acting as a translator and had only taken a brief intro to Spanish course on cassette tapes from the library. I had memorized a bunch of phrases and for the most part had no idea what I was saying.
very slowly and loudly in English
I copied this out from M. Schneider (Deutsch29) and sent it to Ed Markey’s office
“ESEA has become really complicated, and through it, the federal government has made standardized testing its centerpiece and has shaped the document in favor of market-based education reform.”
I added the FERPA law violations because Markey has tried to do something about that …. don’t know if he has had much success.
Just so you know, charter school lobbies are counting the new law as a big win:
“The CSP now includes dedicated funding for the replication and expansion of high-performing charter schools. In addition, state grants can also be used for the same purpose.
The state grant program can now be administered by governors and charter support organizations in addition to state educational agencies.
The state grant program prioritizes funding to states that provide equitable resources to charter schools and that assist charters in accessing facilities.
The state grant program provides schools with additional spending flexibility for startup funds. For example, they will be allowed to use CSP funds to purchase a school bus and make minor facility improvements.
The state grant program includes new protections to ensure funds go to charter schools with autonomy and flexibility consistent with the definition of a charter school.
Charter school representatives must be included in Title I negotiated rulemaking and must be included, like other stakeholders at the state and local level, in the implementation of many federal programs.
CSP recipients will have more flexibility to use a weighted lottery to increase access to charter schools for disadvantaged students. CSP grantees will also be permitted to use feeder patterns to prioritize students that attended earlier grades in the same network of charter schools.”
The line about “autonomy and flexibility” seems to me to directly contradict what DC Democrats promised, which was better regulation. It looks to me like the Obama Administration and Congress codified their policy preference for charter schools in this new law. If they open 500 charter schools a year does that mean they close 500 public schools a year? If that’s the federal plan voters should probably be told.
http://www.publiccharters.org/press/charter-schools-step-closer-big-win-senate-passage-essa/
When the smoke clears away, what is going to be the situation on
the ground? Will the common core still be in place? Will standardized
tests still be the major criteria of ranking schools?
Is this a partial victory or another defeat? Is there anything here that
we will look back upon as a blessing or are we still headed for
the end of public education? I don’t know but the situation is way
beyond personality. What can be done to stop the reformers, GATES and company, from
destroying public schools?
Is there anyone, except Bernie, in this entire political world who can’t be bought for the right price. Why would anyone think that privatizing education, the profit motive, is the answer to its problems. It’s insane. When the profiteers control something, anything, they control it for those at the top and their particularly ideologies. Most of the new billionaires today didn’t finish college. They had high-tech brains and used them, but from what I’ve read, they had little regard for real education–the arts, science, music, history, civics, literature, reading, etc.