Defending the Early Years (DEY) is the premier organization advocating for early childhood education and play.
This week, it launched its Two-Minute Documentary Series: Teachers Speak Out.
In the first mini-documentary, public school kindergarten teacher teacher Bianca Tanis discusses the corporate hijacking of early education and the growing crisis among early learners.
Watch it here:
https://www.deyproject.org/dey-2-minute-documentary-series.html
Diane Ravitch's blog 
This is so sad.
The admins and BOE members who buy into the “test, test, test” mantra that has even been shoved into Early Childhood Education, have no concept of child development, child psychology, or education.
They believe the corporatist BS. The corporatists are only interested in the money they can make on the backs of our kids. They have no interest in what is actually developmentally appropriate for kids.
And then they wonder why there is so much more ADHD than in the past.
It’s not that there is no such thing as ADHD. There certainly is. But a lot of the kids being so diagnosed are not ADHD. They are normal, active kids (especially boys, but a lot of girls, too) who cannot sit in their seats for hours a day, and should not be expected to.
LikeLike
Social Impact Bonds are another area of concern for preschool programs. The goal is to keep at risk students out of special education classes. With Goldman Sachs in charge of early childhood intervention, what could possibly go wrong? We do not know if these endeavors will pay off in the long term, or what harm they may do. However, there are
already concerns that Goldman Sachs is gaming so-called results. It just does not sit well with me that capitalists that helped tank the economy are in charge of preschoolers.http://hechingerreport.org/wall-street-pay-preschool/
LikeLike
You are correct, and the SIB is being marketed for any other social service under the sun. Obama sent $200 million to a SIB “incubator” at Harvard. Just as bad–almost all public-private “partnerships.” Rarely are the terms of these really placed on the table for public consideration. They surface as fiats. Almost always a public good has been “donated” to a private partner.
LikeLike
“Testing Trumps Piaget”
Piaget said “Let them play!”
Coleman said “No way!”
Duncan said “It’s testing day!”
What more is there to say?
LikeLike
“No child Left Unscathed”
“No Child Left Unscathed”
“Race to the Mental Breakdown”
Kindergarteners bathed
In bubble-testing shakedown
LikeLike
“Deforming Clay”
On first school day
Kids used to play
With lumps of clay
And want to stay
“But not today!”
Deformers say
“They must obey
Deform like clay!”
LikeLike
“Kidgets” (wish I’d thought of that!)
Your kids are simply kidgets
They must be standardized
Like manufactured widgets
They must be standard sized
“College-ready in kindergarten”
College-ready in Kindergarten
Bachelor’s in first
PhD in second grade
A life that’s well-rehearsed
LikeLike
Here’s a post I wrote in December 2012:
It seems that special needs preschools were privatized in NYS… and unsurprisingly it resulted in a situation where private pre-school operators “…stole or misspent millions of dollars, piled relatives onto the payroll, billed for no-show jobs and charged for special education services that were never provided.” But that was 5 1/2 years ago. I wish I believed that the situation has improved… but I fear that as funding for pre-school expands the privatization of those services will expand.
LikeLike