The Network for Public Education Action Fund has drafted a proposal for consideration by the Democratic Party’s Platform Committee.
We call for the elimination of federal mandates for annual testing; for a declaration of support for public schools; for a ban on for-profit charters; for regulation of charters that receive federal funds to assure that they serve the same children as the public schools; for revision and strengthening of the FERPA privacy laws to protect our children’s data from commercial data mining; for full funding of special education; for support of early childhood education; and for other means of improving the federal role in education.
The proposal is in draft form. We will be making revisions. If you see something you think needs fixing, let us know.
Please read our draft proposal. And if you agree, add your name of our petition to the Democratic party. We plan to make the same appeal to the Republican party.
Both parties, we hope, will support the public schools, which educate nearly 90% of the nation’s children. Public schools are a bedrock of our society, in the past, now, and in the future.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I signed and shared!
Thank you to NPE Action for using its soap box to help us speak loudly and clearly to the Democratic Party about its duty to public education. This is how we will win.
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Ditto..and done.
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I fully support the recommendations. I wish they were also more explicit about:
1) Shifting school funding from inequitable local taxes progressing income and corporate taxes.
2) Promoting integrated neighborhoods and schools
3) Investing in well-paying jobs that enable family stability
http://www.arthurcamins.com
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Testing plank fails to include bullet about transparency. Affirmative statement is needed to the effect that Transparency and adherence to the principles of truth in testing must be ensured so that the parents, the general public and independent testing specialists have timely information about the design, administration and content of exams, as well as classic item analysis data pertinent to the field testing and operational testing of all items selected for inclusion on the operational tests. Disclosure of relevant information upon which a judgment can be reached about the quality of test instruments is essential to the framing of enlightened testing policies.
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“. . . the principles of truth in testing. . .”
Seems to be an oxymoron in there somewhere.
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Don’t throw out the baby with the bathroom scale…
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Thanks.
We are open to ideas, corrections, suggestions for revision
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Just wanted to say that I signed–and shared!–this NPE Action Proposal via another weblink.
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Thank you, Susan
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As I watched Obama call for strengthening Social Security I got this sick feeling that we had turned back the clock to 2012 and he had decided to be a populist again after four additional years of a neo-liberal assault. Must be election time again.
In the new HBO film on LBJ probably the last president who cared more about his legacy as a champion of the American working class and the poor, than his corporate donors. Johnson turns to Humphrey and says “The platform who gives a —- about the platform no one follows it anyway. ” Or something close to that . One has to elect the right people to office those with the background and the record to represent the issues we care about. Does not look like that will happen once again.
But I signed anyway .
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I will sign and share.
Would love to see some mention of a well-rounded curriculum, including arts, physical education, history and sciences.
Thank you!
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I’m with you, Art Educator. The well rounded curriculum was in there and if it got lost, we will restore it
Less mandated testing means more time for teaching
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It is mentioned as
Provide funding so schools are able to offer a full and rich curriculum to all children, including the arts, physical education, history, civics, foreign languages, literature, mathematics, and the sciences.
in the federal funding section. Perhaps it could be emphasized in the high stakes section as well, since the current tests completely ignore the arts indicating an unjustified pragmatism in education—especially in K-8..
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thanks, Mate.
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We can start by putting the arts where they belong, as part of the communication skills curriculum. Reading, writing, speaking, listening, singing, dancing, visual arts, dramatic arts and on and on all have the fundamental purpose of communicating a message.
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This is excellent and I fully support it! However, I don’t understand why distinctions between for-profit and non-profit charters are being made — or chain and independent. If they have a private school board, the Democratic party should be against them (and very very few do not). Those charter schools run by non-profits can easily move their money around. It feeds into the whole “good” charters and bad charters narrative that is paralyzing any meaningful or effective fight against them.
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Rebecca, I’m with you. Start by banning for-profits.Then: Meaningful regulation of charters would make them less attractive to entrepreneurs and speculators and fast-buck corporations.
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One step at a time. Change is a process.
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I understand what you’re saying, but I would have to disagree on the “one step at a time” approach. The charter industry is coming at public education hard and fast with no mercy whatsoever. “One step at a time” may be far too slow to stop much of anything.The charter industry is big and bold and opposition to it should be too. They have demonized everything and everyone that has anything to do with public education. By only painting one part (blatantly for profit) of the larger industry as problematic, that is almost a tacit approval (or at least less disapproving) of the rest of it. I think lumping all charter schools together and fighting them ALL (such as the proposed ballot initiative to eliminate charter schools in CA) would be a much more accurate and effective strategy. And it would make the issue much clearer to the public. However, I support any and all efforts to stand up to the charter school industry.
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“Most states now allow the transfer of public funds to privately managed corporations”
Come to think of it, can anybody quote any well working examples when outsourcing of governmental or public functions to private companies has worked out?
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As usual, Mate raises a great point in a few words. I can actually point to a great many examples, all local decisions and none universally applicable. The best example of a public-private relationship is in a near county where bus drivers own their own busses. The father of a friend was on the school board when this was set up. The decision was local and designed so well that it still works after almost 50 years.
The point, however, is that this was locally designed and funded and completely transparent. Would it work everywhere? I doubt any idea would work everywhere.
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” I can actually point to a great many examples, all local decisions and none universally applicable. ”
This is a good point: federal, state, city governments of course can hire private companies for certain tasks. One of the mistakes the Soviet block made was that they tried to have all aspects of the economy to be controlled from above. This yields to excessive bureaucracy and, paradoxically perhaps, political corruption.
On the other hand, sweeping tasks, functions which affect the whole population shouldn’t be outsourced to private companies. The exact description of what can and cannot be outsourced is probably quite complicated, but a possible law could have the basic philosophy that if the expectation of profit can alter the function, then private companies cannot be trusted. One such sweeping function, of course, is standardized testing. In particular, ACT, SAT, ETS and Pearson need to get out of the testing business.
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I signed, but would like something included around access to native and/or heritage languages for our growing multilingual country. Multiple research studies show instruction in home language supports English development and overall learning, yet too few students have access to their home languages as a resource.
In addition, would love to see something about funds being given to retain teachers. It is not just about respect, it’s about rewarding teachers monetarily for their expertise, like every other field.
Finally, I would like if it included something about funding to diversify the teaching force.
Thanks for all you do to highlight and advocate for public education!
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I apologize if I missed something, but the platform suggests says nothing about supporting vocational education. We are trying to prepare people for college who do not wish to go. Politicians want to brag that a high percent of their high school graduates are ready for college. This does not constitute a good justification for ignoring the students who want to fix the diesels that truck us our food or build the houses we live in. I have taught hundreds of students in my 30 years who were great kids who wanted to learn a trade and contribute to their community. We need to support that with great vocational education.
We are lucky to have good vocational programs here where I live, but more could be done. All 9th graders take Algebra 1 in Tennessee(unless they have progressed faster than that). The fact is that some students are not ready for this course. How would the public react if all students were required to take auto mechanics? Yet far more of us fix cars than do basic algebra.
In order to allow students who desire to study vocations while in high school, the testing that is being done now will have to go. Schools cannot be judged on a test that has nothing to do with the basic goals of the students. Just as the students need to listen to society, so society needs to listen to some of the students and support vocational education.
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Good point. It is exactly in Tennessee that all focus seems to be on kids going to college and raise the graduation rates to the sky. It’s also in Tennessee that they try to make public colleges training grounds for private companies, hence distorting what vocational schools are supposed to be and what they are supposed to do.
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Signed it, of course. I have a question and some suggestions.
“Reject annual testing. Substitute sampling similar to National Assessment of Educational Progress exams. Sampling is used in Finland, one of the most successful educational systems in the world.”
This is not clear to me “Substitute sampling”. Sampling of what?
Some suggestions.
Stop emergency measures. Whatever they want to implement or change in education should be done after careful considerations and discussions.
Use real experts I couldn’t find the demand that education policies should be set by real experts with at least 15 years of actual teaching experience. Or whatever seems reasonable.
Policies need to be based on research It should be stated that whatever policy they try to implement in education should be based on research. They need to stop conducting experiments with a large population, just because the experiment sounds like a reasonable idea. Only consenting parents and kids should participate in whatever educational experiment anybody is trying to run. This requirement implies the request for opting out.
Justify the purpose and utility of tests The previous requirement for research imply that if they want to use a test for any purpose, they need to be able to justify it by showing verifiable, repeatable, independent research. “Common sense” or “but we test pilots and doctors” is not a justification for what to do in education. If they think, a given test measures something, they need to prove it. (My personal feeling: very few tests can be justified this way.)
Class sizesI do not understand the proposal’s extremely modest requirements for class sizes. According to
http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=28
The average class size in 2011–12 was 21.2 pupils for public elementary schools and 26.8 pupils for public secondary schools.
The proposal’s requests are extremely modest. In order for teachers give personal attention to students, there should be no more than 15 kids in K-8 and 20 in K-9-12. According to the source above, the average class size in 1989 was 17.
The relationship between teacher and student is the basis of education Let’s stop pretending that education is about knowledge transmission. Education is much more complex and its foundation is the relationship between student and teacher. This relationship cannot be described by numbers, hence cannot be measured. As family relationships cannot be described by stuff like “daughter gives 3 kisses to mother”, “mother fed son 4 times”, “father attended 17 soccer games of daughter and 19 basketball games of son”, “John’s parents gave him an average of 3 good advice and 2 bad ones daily”.
Lengths of classes, breaks, school days Here I just ask questions: Is 55 min a reasonable class length? At universities, classes are 50 min long! What do they have in other countries? Is 5 min enough for a break? Do kids have enough time to run to a different building, go to the bathroom? At universities, the breaks are 15 min long! What do other countries have? Is 7 hours in school reasonable? Can first graders pay attention this long? Can teachers teach 6 hours every day with enthusiasm, then grade?
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Wierdl is spot on as usual. I would like to add one thing about the relationship between student and teacher. Not only are the positive relationships important, but the negative relationships often define the educational experience. If our young teachers do not get to interact with students who are rewarding in some way, they will not stay in the classroom. This not only requires training of the new teachers, but requires removing students who are not ready to behave in a matter that helps all the class learn. This is a huge problem, and it is compounded by the absence of funds to promote alternatives to traditional classrooms that are not necessarily punitive in nature.
If a student is not learning and not adding to a classroom where learning is taking place, that student should be able to have some alternatives available so that teachers do not feel they are failing a student when the student leaves for a different class. Unfortunately, this is a huge funding issue, for the biggest reason for disruptive behavior is the background of the student. Who wants to give more to the poor? It is hard to grow up rough and act refined. Think Pygmalion.
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Are there any examples, perhaps in other countries, where this problem is addressed and successfully resolved in public education?
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I think most other countries proceedings the old English model in which students have to test into high school. Our strength used to be that we offered routes for students. I think we still do a pretty good,job of getting people a chance to,go back to school to,acquire a different skill. But it needs to start in grade school. Already, in fourth grade, my daughter is saying things that indicate that her education is being damaged by student behaviors significantly outside the parameters of what school is designed to accommodate. We all know why. But who will vote to fund a place for kids raised up rough? Many who can afford it are home schooling to avoid behavioral interference. They are wealthy enough to avoid their neighbors. This is frightening to me.
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Signed, but please add more about native/heritage language support because research consistently says that home language supports students’ English and content learning. Having ethnic studies is essential, but having home language validated is also crucial.
Also, wondering about fed role in teacher retention. They award grants to TFA, but what are they doing to keep the most experienced teachers in public schools?
Finally, I would love to see something about embracing and advocating for the diversification of the teacher workforce.
Thanks for all you do for public education!
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I agree there is more to do. But this is a start. One step at a time. When I started a fully public school the rules limited me to 18% to 23% black teachers. As I was in an urban neighborhood and was a neighborhood school, I got that waived and had 70%. I wish every school could have a teacher population that is consistent with the student population.
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The focus is on ridding the schools of the most experienced teachers, not on retaining them.
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This is an excellent proposal for the Platform of the Democratic Party. Please read and give your full support
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I see very few responses to this blog comment. Everyone should read this and support it. Yes, it is long and detailed. But it’s time for everyone to read every word and get on board. A great positive statement.
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Mate, no other country that I know of , has gone this far. We must be the leaders in changing the way we think about education. Innovation is not about replicating what was done in the past, it is about going where no one has gone before.
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I support the document with the following suggestions:
1 – End age-based standardization.
My Masters in Education study taught individualization, not standardization was best practice. They called it many names – differentiation, adaptive teaching, universal design, multiple intelligences, entry points, need-based learning.
Students enter my inner city school behind their affluent suburban counterparts, but cannot catch up. Ponderously, they are tested at their age level, instead of their functional level. This means they are expected to advance multiple years in one year, which simply doesn’t happen. Because tests drive what’s taught in the classroom year round, they don’t get the remediation they need, and instead can fall further behind as “differentiated instruction” is replaced by “rigorous” test prep.
2 – Stop standardization, period.
I agree with the document where it says:
“Encourage states to move from standardized tests created by testing corporations to those created by practicing educators and to use those assessments for diagnostic purposes to help students, teachers and schools improve.”
Except for the word “standardized” — yes, practicing educators need to create tests that are diagnostic, but we already do this. Wouldn’t it be more fundamental to just end standardized testing altogether? I am still missing any practical benefit in comparing kids across schools, districts or states via annual testing.
3 – Connect education to the current campaign finance crisis.
I see multiple mentions of “right-wing” philanthropists, venture capitalists, foundations and businesses. This seems to excuse the many left-wing, independent, centrist or “non-partisan” supporters of diabolical ed reform practices such as charter schools, standardized tests and mass-standardization.
Following this money, we find that the biggest names in both parties, including current candidates are deeply entwined in privatized education reform, the revolving door and influence peddling.
4 – Improve the federal role in education by removing the federal role in education.
It’s not clear where Congress and the Executive branch derive authority to interfere with local control of education. ESSA addressed this in large measure, but not completely, as Chairman Alexander and Secretary King continue to tussle over issues like the right to opt out.
Many Republicans call for total abolishment of the USDOE, following a series of unpopular initiatives such as NCLB, Common Core and test-based teacher evaluations. Democrats (including Sens. Sanders and Warren) have been largely absent, secretive or just plain wrong on K-12 policy, hiding behind “civil rights groups” to justify testing and other federal controls.
Perhaps there should be a federal role in preventing discrimination, but the department’s current outcome-based policies are only increasing segregation in schools. The federal role in funding is just as ironic, threatening and punishing the most needy schools instead of making funding equitable. The federal role in helping with disabled students is also ‘paving the road to hell with good intentions’, as IEP compliance ensures special ed teachers are teaching in their classrooms less, not more, than other teachers.
I deeply admire Diane’s work, including this Action Proposal, but because we only have these opportunities every four years, I hope NPE succeeds in calling out politicians that have taken public school families for granted this election cycle.
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Signed it and suggested adding opposing fast track RELAY principals too. As HPE teacher I could add daily HPE of course too, but would settle for mandatory recess in lower grades (though it ends up being more work for classroom teachers.) Fresh from watching “Where to Invade Next” an emphasis on play seems like a place to start, making schools kid-friendly, but then there is also the French school lunches taught as a class. That would be the epitome of Health Education, nutrition lessons supported by nutritious and tasty food. There are so many ways to make schools healthy and happy places.
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Signed, sealed, delivered…and shared. Bravo for keeping democracy going!
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