Archives for the month of: April, 2017
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The Indivisibles Now Have Nearly 6,000 Groups Organized to Defeat the Rightwing Agenda

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
15

The Indivisibles started out as a guide for people who wanted to oppose the Trump agenda. It was specific advice offered by former Congressional staff members.

Among other things, it urged people to attend town hall meetings with their elected officials. Thousands of people responded and we have already seen how members of the public are demanding action from their representatives to protect their health care, to stand up for the environment, to oppose the defunding of public schools, and to stop proposals that would harm our society and its most vulnerable members.

Here is an update from the Indivisibles.

Categories Resistance, Trump

Texas: AR-15 Assault Weapon Will Be Raffle Prize for School Charity

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
62

The New Caney school district in Texas is holding a raffle to raise money for Project Graduation. One of the prizes is an AR-15 assault rifle.

This is the same weapon that has been used in numerous massacres, including the massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut and the Orlando nightclub massacre.

The owner of the gun said he would do a background check before releasing the weapon to the winner.

Tickets are $10 each.

Categories Guns in Schools

Have You Heard? Truth in Edvertising

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
13

Jennifer Berkshire and historian Jack Schneider discuss a new phenomenon: schools that advertise for students. They identify one charter that spends $1,000 per student to recruit new ones. This is the new world of school choice and the free market, where schools compete for customers and your tax dollars are spent for advertising and marketing, not for teacher pay or supplies.

http://haveyouheardblog.com/truth-in-edvertising/

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Funding, Privatization, School Choice

Chester Finn Jr. Calls for an End to Teacher Tenure

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
41

In this post, Chester (Checker) Finn Jr. questions the need for teacher tenure. Getting rid of tenure, he says, will save money, as it has in higher education, where money is lavished on administrators’ salaries and facilities, but not faculty (except for the Big Names).

He thinks that teacher tenure is a relatively recent invention, copying tenure in higher education. Actually, this is not true. Teachers began fighting for some form of job protection in the early twentieth century, to avoid losing their jobs to the sister, cousin, or daughter of a politician or school board member. In my reading on the history of tenure, I never saw evidence that teachers wanted to copy higher education, which was then a rich man’s institution. They wanted a modicum of job security to protect them from political interference with their work.

Finn also makes the mistake of confusing teacher tenure with “lifetime employment.” That is a common error. Teacher tenure is NOT lifetime employment. It is a guarantee of due process. If a teacher is accused of an inappropriate action or failure to perform his or her duties, they are entitled to a hearing before an impartial arbitrator. Why is that so onerous? Finn likes the current business model, where a deputy of the boss arrives without notice and says clear out your personal possessions, locks your computer, and escorts you to the door.

He thinks it is a good idea that tenure in higher education is waning but never wonders how “contingent faculty” manage to scrape by on a per-course payment that might add up to only $20,000 a year–or less.

“Tenure arrived in K–12 education as a trickle-down from higher ed. Will the demise of tenure follow a similar sequence? Let us earnestly pray for it—for tenure’s negatives today outweigh its positives—but let us not count on it.

“Almost every time I’ve had an off-the-record conversation in recent years with a university provost, they’ve confided that their institutions are phasing tenure out. Sometimes it’s dramatic, especially when prompted by lawmakers, such as the changes underway at the University of Wisconsin in the aftermath of Governor Scott Walker’s 2015 legislative success, and the bills pending in Missouri and Iowa.

“Often, though, the impulse to contain tenure on their campus arises within the institution’s own leadership and takes the form of hiring far fewer tenured or tenure-track faculty and filling vacancies with what the American Association of University Professors terms “contingent” faculty, i.e., non-tenured instructors, clinical professors, adjunct professors, part-timers, or—especially in medical schools—severing tenure from pay such that professors may nominally win tenure but that status carries no right to a salary unless they raise the money themselves from grants, patients, etc.

“This is happening across much of U.S. postsecondary education, and the data show it. Whereas in the mid-1970’s tenured and tenure-track faculty comprised 56 percent of the instructional staff in American higher ed (excluding graduate students that teach undergrads), by 2011 that figure had shrunk to 29 percent. In other words, seven out of ten college instructions were “contingent” employees—and almost three quarters of those were part-timers…

“In the K–12 world, however, tenure remains the norm for public school teachers in the district sector, vouchsafed in most places by state law and big-time politics, as well as local contracts, even in so-called “right to work” states. It may be achieved after as few as three years of classroom experience and be based on nothing more than “satisfactory” evaluations from a novice teacher’s supervisor during that period. Unfortunately, we have ample evidence that such evaluations are nearly always at least “satisfactory,” if not “outstanding.” Although many states and districts made worthy changes to their evaluation practices in response to long-ago-spent Race to the Top dollars, the pushback against those changes has been intense, the methodology usually had flaws (especially when linking student learning to teacher performances), and lots of places have been backing down. One consequence is that it’s still virtually impossible to fire bad tenured teachers.”

Clearly, Checker thought it was a swell idea to fire teachers based on the test scores of their students, even though this approach was criticized by the American Statistical Association and has not succeeded everywhere.

He does not acknowledge the high rate of attrition among teachers, especially new teachers; about 40% leave without being fired. Most leave because the job is harder than they thought, or the working conditions were intolerable.

What Checker doesn’t show is the alleged benefits of eliminating job security. Where is the district or state that has better schools because it eliminated tenure? Why does he think that districts and states will raise salaries if they eliminate tenure? The same political forces (unions) that protect due process also protect teachers’ compensation.

At a time of a growing national teacher shortage, does it make sense to eliminate job security for teachers, the promise that they will not be fired capriciously?

The challenge today is how to recruit, support, and retain teachers. Checker offers no suggestions to answer these needs. He probably would be satisfied with a steady inflow of Teach for America or other temps.

What most parents want is stability. They want experienced teachers who make a career of teaching, not part-timers and temps. Checker has been stuck for decades on how to get rid of teachers. It is time to think anew about making teaching a desirable career, not a lifetime of near-poverty and sacrifice.

What Finn doesn’t

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reform, Teacher Shortage, Teacher Tenure

James Kirylo: Our Obsession with Standardized Testing is Inhumane

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
22

Mercedes Schneider posted a guest column by James Kirylo on our leaders’ sick obsession with testing and its harmful consequences for students.

Testing has become a grueling rite of spring, he writes.

“Whereas in 1950 those who completed high school took only approximately three standardized tests through their entire K-12 experience, and whereas in 1991 those who completed their K-12 experience took an average of 18-21 standardized tests, students today upon completion of their K-12 school experience can take anywhere between 60-100 standardized tests. In short, more than 100 million standardized tests are administered yearly across the U.S., annually costing the states approximately 1.7 billion dollars.

“This intense focus on testing and its results have moved into the realm of obsession, so much so that we now refer to “high-stakes” testing simply because they are becoming the sole criteria on how we assess and evaluate our children, teachers, administrators, and school districts. In short, the “reform” movement provoked by A Nation at Risk can be characterized as one that is now controlled by the profit-making testing industrialized complex.

“Truly, it has become disturbingly normalized in explaining reform efforts with detached terminology such as outcomes, ratings, scores, performance, monetary rewards, school takeovers, school closures, competition, and comparing and contrasting. As a result we have created an educational system that is analogous to describing a for-profit corporation, which ultimately results in the creation of “winners” and “losers.”

“This corporate-speak loses sight of the humanity behind this type of discourse, which works to objectify school-aged youth, fosters a constricted view of what is educationally important, and largely blames teachers if students don’t “perform” to some kind of arbitrary expectation.

“Make no mistake, this testing environment has placed school-aged youngsters under unnecessary stress, where many are fearful, dealing with bouts of panic, crying spells, apathy, sleeplessness, and depression. Therefore, it ought not be of any great surprise that droves of parents from around the country have opted-out their children from taking these tests, a number among which I include myself.

“And perhaps ironically, this testing movement has yielded very little positive results in improving our schools. In fact, one could argue that our nation is more at risk than it was 30 years ago, still leaving scores of children left behind. Indeed, illiteracy remains high, millions of children still live in poverty, and countless of youngsters are still attending classes with limited resources in schools that are old and dilapidated.”

Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Testing

Steven Singer: DeVos Hires Critic of Civil Rights to Not Protect Civil Rights

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
20

Each day brings more evidence that the Trump administration intends to roll back the social and political gains of the past 50 years (Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society) and perhaps even FDR’s New Deal.

Betsy DeVos hired lawyer and rightwing activist Candace Jackson as acting assistant secretary in charge of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights. When DeVos finds a permanent assistant secretary, Jackson will become deputy to that person. All of this maneuvering enables Jackson to avoid Senate confirmation, where even some Republicans might be uncomfortable with her record.

Stephen Singer writes here about Jackson’s opposition to affirmative action and feminism.

Steven Singer says that Jackson’s appointment signals DeVos’s strident belief in the free market. Part of her project is to negate the regulations that protect the civil rights of students. Let the free market sort things out.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Civil Rights

Mitchell Robinson: The Danger of Silencing Teachers

By dianeravitch
April 20, 2017 //
25

Mitchell Robinson, professor of music education at Michigan State, writes a very sad story here about a dedicated teacher who was threatened with firing if she refused to name names.

“Rachel [a pseudonym] is one of those teachers who has devoted herself, personally and professionally, to her career. The kind of teacher who arrives at school early, leaves late, takes her work home with her at night, creates new projects over the weekend–and purchases the materials out of her own pocket, arranges field trips and brings in guest artists and speakers for her students, organizes birthday parties, and wedding showers, and baby showers for her colleagues, hosts student teachers from the local university, serves as a teacher leader in her school district, attends her students’ concerts, and soccer games, and piano recitals, and dance recitals, and graduation ceremonies, pursues professional development opportunities on the weekends, takes graduate classes and workshops over the summer, has little to no idea how much she makes in her yearly salary, and puts her students’ needs above her own.

“In short, a teacher.

“In addition to her job as a classroom teacher, Rachel had also volunteered to serve as her district’s compliance officer for the state’s review of their status as a PLA (Persistently Low Achieving) school district.”

Rachel mentioned to her principal that she had heard some opt out discussion and thought the staff needed a reminder that the school could be closed if it didn’t have a 95% participation rate. In short order, the superintendent called her in and demanded that she name names. She refused. She got legal counsel from the Michigan Education Association.

Nothing availed. It was her job or her integrity. Why should any teacher be forced to make that choice?

Categories Michigan, Opt Out, Resistance, Teachers

Betsy and Randi Visit Rural School in Ohio

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2017 //
32

Will Betsy DeVos have a better understanding of public schools after visiting one? Or is she measuring it as a potential charter school?

DeVos, Weingarten lay down arms for first-ever joint school visit

https://www.politicopro.com/education/story/2017/04/devos-weingarten-lay-down-arms-for-rare-joint-visit-to-ohio-public-schools-155446

DeVos, Weingarten lay down arms for first-ever joint school visit By Caitlin Emma

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and American Federation of Teachers Presidents Randi Weingarten — longtime combatants in the nation’s school wars — will converge Thursday on a small Ohio school district deep in Trump country where amid forced pleasantries, they’ll seek to score political points.

It’s a schoolyard stare-down of sortsfor the two veterans, who are making a first-ever joint visit to several public schools in Van Wert, a rural community in northwest Ohio that went overwhelmingly for President Donald Trump.

Weingarten extended the invitation to DeVos in February with little expectation the secretary would accept after the teachers unions’ concerted efforts to sink her nomination. DeVos called her bluff, perhaps because she is under pressure to show her commitment to public schools and appearing in a midwestern Republican stronghold plays to her strengths.

The condition was that Weingarten must visit a still unidentified school of “choice” with DeVos. That visit hasn’t been scheduled yet.
“These women are mortal political enemies, bent on destroying the other’s education agenda through deployment of vast financial resources,” said David Bloomfield, a professor of education leadership, law and policy at Brooklyn College and The CUNY Graduate Center.

“But it’s necessary for Weingarten to find favor with the Education Department,” he said. “And it can only help DeVos if she’s seen as the secretary for all schools and not just charters and private schools.”

In fact, the joint tour allows both women to press points that are critically important to them, said several policy watchers. DeVos can show rural Republicans and Democrats that she supports all schools, not just charter and private schools. Weingarten — who once stood next to a protester costumed as a grizzly bear to mock DeVos remarks about the need for guns in schools — can show she is extending an olive branch to the secretary even as she champions public education.

Thomas Toch, an education policy expert at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy and founder of the think tank FutureEd, suggested that few people in the public education sector “are still listening to DeVos and one might argue this is an attempt to address that problem.”

“Until now, she has been reluctant to say anything other than, ‘I’m for good public schools, good charter schools, good private schools.’ She repeats that frame over and over and hasn’t been willing to go beyond that. … She’s going to have to go much farther than she has to date in terms of embracing public education.”

From Weingarten’s perspective, if DeVos makes a strong commitment to public education standing next to the union leader, she might be able to say she helped DeVos soften her stance, Toch said.

Weingarten said in an interview that she hopes the trip will give DeVos a chance to learn what is working in public schools, and not just a photo opportunity. She said she also wants her to understand how Trump’s budget blueprint, which would slash the Education Department’s $68 billion budget by 13.5 percent, would hurt public schools.
“This is an area that voted for Trump, but they love their public schools and they’re really upset about the cuts to education and this polarization about public schooling,” Weingarten said. “They’re wary about [DeVos’] policies and they should be wary about her policies. They’re an attempt to dismantle, defund and destabilize public schools.”

A spokesman for the Education Department declined POLITICO’s request for an interview with DeVos. But in a written statement shared with The Blade in Toledo, DeVos said that “every parent should be able to send their children to a school that meets their unique needs, and for many parents, that is a public school. I support and celebrate all great schools.”

Kaleigh Lemaster, executive director for School Choice Ohio, a statewide choice advocacy group, said she hoped the focus of the trip would be on children, rather than a particular education option.

“We’re happy to see Secretary DeVos and Randi Weingarten visiting great public schools, charter schools and private schools because we believe that every family should be able to choose the best educational environment for their children,” Lemaster said. “This is a great opportunity for them to talk about Ohio’s schools and hopefully find agreement on what should be at the center of all discussions on education policy — the children.”

Van Wert Superintendent Ken Amstutz said he’s eager to have his school district “pull these two people together,” although he noted the Education Department has largely been in the driver’s seat when it comes to planning the visit.

DeVos and Weingarten are expected to spend the day visiting Van Wert’s high school, elementary school and early childhood center, where they’ll hear from administrators, teachers and students. They’ll hear about programs that provide students with social services and food on the weekends when they otherwise might go hungry. And they’re expected to visit with fifth graders and a high school robotics class.

Amstutz said his district has struggled financially, but he’s eager to show how teachers and students are doing innovative things with limited resources — for instance, offering a high school robotics club, which won a regional contest earlier this year.

“A lot of good things are happening in public education. I think the blinders are on and I’d just like to have her open her eyes and take a look at what’s going on,” he said of DeVos. “Maybe Van Wert will be the starting point of where this conversation takes place between Betsy DeVos and proponents of public education.”

As for the people of Van Wert, Republican Party Chairman Thad Lichtensteiger, a farmer, said he believes his neighbors will give DeVos “a fair shake.”

“Van Wert is a really conservative place,” he said. “We’re going to weigh the issues on their own merits, rather than say Trump is evil and paint anybody associated with him with that broad brush.”

Categories Betsy DeVos, Ohio, Unions

Math Professor: Why Our Freshmen Need Remediation

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2017 //
224

One of our regular readers, who is a member of a college mathematics faculty, sent this following comment about the state of math education today:

“I teach at a small four year college in NY. We administer a mathematics placement test to all incoming freshmen. The test we use was created in house and covers basic skills from algebra, trigonometry, and pre calculus. Questions are asked in a straightforward manner (unlike the current NYS common core based regents exams).

“Any student may take a statistics class (taught outside the mathematics department), regardless of placement score. However, we use the results of the placement test, high school coursework and individual discussions with the students to place students appropriately in the remedial algebra, college algebra, pre calculus, calculus sequence.

That said, fully 25% of our incoming freshmen place into remedial algebra–some should probably be placed lower than
remedial algebra, but we do not offer such a course. These students truly need the remedial work.

“The reasons why these students place low are varied. Some have not taken math courses for two years and have become rusty. Some students never really learned the material (the percentage of points required to pass the NYS regents exams is quite low and the tests are so poorly designed that scores are meaningless).

“I am continually bombarded by emails from companies who want to sell textbooks that combine remedial coursework with college credit coursework. Perhaps in some non STEM fields this approach works, but you cannot teach calculus to students who haven’t learned how to add fractions or who don’t understand basic laws of exponents.

“I do not blame their teachers. I blame a state system that shoves a scientific calculator in the hands of every fourth grader–before they’ve learned their multiplication tables, before they’ve learned how to add fractions, and before they’ve gained any practical sense of how numbers work, because apparently solving convoluted word problems is more important than understanding how numbers work. (Some never learn these basic skills–I have students in my classes who need a calculator to multiply 2 times 3).

“This same state system requires every student in algebra to have access to a graphing calculator with equally disastrous results. Calculator overuse is only a small part of the problem. The insistence that all students follow what used to be considered a college prep track and the subsequent rewriting of standards into a bizarre jumble of topics in which necessary skills and techniques are deemphasized in favor of solving pseudo “real world” applications are certainly major contributors.

“The regents exams have become a weird mishmash of questions with teachers left trying to guess all the permutations of how a question about a concept could be asked. I am afraid I have wandered off topic a bit. Anyway, many students truly do need remedial work that cannot be accomplished as part of another course. We do our best to get them through it and get them where they need to be mathematically. We are not 100% successful. Some simply do not have the ability, some do not make the effort, and saddest of all, some are just too far behind.”

Any comments from math teachers?

Categories Curriculum, Education Reform, Higher Education, New York

Colorado Senator Michael Bennett Struggles to Distance Himself from Betsy DeVos

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2017 //
30

Colorado Senator Michael Bennett was previously superintendent of schools in Denver. There he set off the school choice frenzy and led the parade to open charters. Now he finds himself trying to explain that he is different from Betsy DeVos. He is a Democrat, one of DFER’s champions. She is a Republican, Trump’s pick as Secretary of Education. He sold out public education. She wants to privatize it. She loves vouchers. He doesn’t. She is a choice ideologue. So is he.

See the difference? Look closer. No, closer still. I know it’s hard but keep trying.

Categories Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Colorado, DFER, Education Reform, School Choice, Vouchers
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