It’s April Fool’s Day but this is no joke.
At the Congressional hearings on the Education Department’s budget, Secretary Betsy DeVos explained the benefits of large classes.
When pressed to supply the research that undergirded her claim, she promised to supply it later.
Watch this short video so you can understand the next post.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Katherine Clark called for her resignation and identified Betsy as a racist there should be an uproar about the in your face racism and class size
DeVos is the April and every day fool. DeVos knows of many studies that support the advantage of large class size? All DeVos knows is the propaganda created by conservative think tanks. That’s not research. Anthony Cody’s silent response is priceless!
If someone (Ditzy DeVoid, the folks picking up Gates money off the night stand at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute) makes the insane claim that “class size doesn’t matter,” then you can safe;disregard anything further that he or she has to say about education. Such a person is totally clueless and thinks that reading the marketing materials from depersonalized learning companies is a fine substitute for actually teaching.
If I have 7 classes and 30 students in each class, and I assign a five-paragraph theme, then that’s 1,050 paragraphs for me to read. That’s a good-sized novel, but not an easy one to read, for it’s full of errors in grammar, usage, mechanics, unity, coherence, and so on.
But Cruella DeVos, of course, is just mouthing whatever the Ed Deform pundits are saying. It’s not as though she is capable of having an idea on her own.
Bob: thanks for the math lesson. It points out what I have always said (no research necessary here, simple math will do). The real figure of importance is how many children a teacher sees in a day. I have a friend who has spent his career in a traditional private school. The most he has ever told me that he was responsible for in a day during his entire career of 40 + years has been 65 kids. Small wonder that these kids can learn to write and discuss ideas with more success.
I object to an extent that DeVos is challenged by suggesting that she produce research. There are some things that do not need research. Of course a teacher will be more likely to be a good math teacher if he or she understands the math taught. Of course it is a bad idea for children to be learning in a schoolroom too hot or too cold. Of course it is bad to raise up kids drinking poison in their water. Save your money. Class size is like this.
Here is someone who just happened to give a ringing endorsement – in fact more than one ringing endorsement! – to Betsy DeVos when her confirmation was in doubt, and this person who gave a ringing endorsement to Betsy DeVos just happens to believe small class size is not important, just as DeVos does.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-cost-of-small-class-size/2011/03/03/AFPGSkkB_story.html?utm_term=.994666706714
https://www.npr.org/2011/03/29/134956184/school-founder-says-class-size-doesnt-matter
Maybe that’s the “research” that Betsy DeVos promises to provide later. One of her biggest fans says class size doesn’t matter.
Thought I would make a comment appropriate to the holiday, so:
Trump
It’s been an April Fool’s day since the last presidential inauguration day.
How time flies! It was 8 years ago Arne Duncan & Bill Gates said the same thing. DeVos took their idea & is running with it. Whod a thunk?
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2010/11/sec_duncan_districts_need_to_r.html
http://www.slate.com/articles/podcasts/education/2013/12/schooled_podcast_does_class_size_matter.html
Here’s Peter Greene’s view on DeVos’ spin on why large classes are great. DeVos is a creature full of unshakable bias and little substance. http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2019/03/devos-class-size-and-reformistan-bubble.html
I’m starting to think Gates dropped out of school because he couldn’t cut it. This whole thing just goes to show Bill “William” Gates and Betsy “Elizabeth” DeVos are of the same ditzy mind. They are billionaires who simply want to shirk paying taxes by having fewer public school teachers. So they say not let them eat cake, but let them eat stale bread crumbs and tell them it’s better than cake. They are just as removed from the people as Marie Antoinette. Actually, more so because telling people overcrowding classes is good for students because it’s meritocratic for teachers is absurd. It’s let them eat grizzlies absurd.
This woman was a destructive influence on MI schools. She was a major lobbyist in the charter movement. Now she is ruining public education with her ignorance. She has never attended, nor have her children, a public school or university. Her sheltered, elitist life experience has created a obstructed view of educational work K -16. Money does not give one expertise. We need to assure that our secretaries of Ed, Housing, Health, etc. have some expertise other than lobbying and a checkbook.
It’s DumbVos Moment. My eyes were glued to the face of a gentleman(I guess it’s Anthony Cody) sitting behind her. His reaction tells everything about DeVos’s idiocy.
That was Anthony. Maybe sucking on a lemon. Or listening to Betsy Devos.
She made me want to cry, but Anthony’s shaking his head angrily, in the background, made me laugh. Sh tis swamp creature.
http://www.icontact-archive.com/archive?c=1748247&f=3100&s=3172&m=91911&t=683ff6e55fceb8d669aa5ea6b8253ac84d14528c98c4873195440427f0ff88d5
Here is the latest Devos idea, Let children decide on the school of their choice, and as the kid in the interview says, that way I can just leave the school if I don’t like the teacher or grades I get. I wonder if this absurd plan with a major promotion will spawn some new case law. It will certainly make some profit-seekers want to keep enrollments up by offering BIG treats at every lunch school and little treats for every thing that will keep a child happy day to day.
It will be all rainbows and unicorns for the dear little ones. Her idea is magical unicorn poop..it might look pretty, but it still smells like poop.
I’m sure there are LOTS of children who would be VERY good at picking out the school of their choice. [sarcasm] They could come in the summer and look around and make a wise decision. I seriously doubt any kid would know what to look for. I was an above average student and I would have been overwhelmed if my parents had told me to pick out a school.
What a bunch of horse hockey. It goes well with the ‘stable genius’ who is ‘leading this country’ by picking out looneys like DeVos.
DeVos is in Tennessee today, meeting with fellow echo chamber members, pushing private school vouchers and bashing public schools.
It’s a shame she can’t find any time to do any work on behalf of public school students. I know she’s ideologically opposed to the existence of our schools, but they do comprise the vast majority of US students.
Can you really say you’re working on “education” when you deliberately exclude public schools students and families? She’s working for charter and voucher students. She refuses to lift a finger for public school students. Most of the time she portrays our students as violent, low performing thugs.
It’s a new low for ed reform, promoting The Agenda by smearing public school STUDENTS. DeVos should be ashamed of herself.
Luckily ed reform is completely irrelevant to public school families, and they exclude public school students, so none of them will be aware they’re being defamed by the public employees their parents pay.
Betsy’s parents missed a big opportunity when they didn’t name her April
Best April Fools joke ever!
Not that it matters to actual public school students, because ed reformers are irrelevant to them, but the whole echo chamber repeats what DeVos said:
“We’ve had a lot of debate about class size. Creating small classes is a politically popular move and is popular with parents. But the quality of the teacher, I’ll argue, matters more than the size of the class. We need to pay our teachers more to attract great talent. Giving teachers more time to engage in professional development is also important.
But think about this, parents: if you were given a choice between having your child go to a teacher who is mediocre but in charge of a class of, say, 20 students—versus going to a great teacher who has a class of 25—which option would you take? I’d take the bigger class.
What about when the spread moves to a class of 30? Would you take the trade? I would. I’d go substantially higher (in class size) to give my child access to a great educator.”
That’s Duncan. They all say exactly the same things. Discussions of class sizes are NOT permitted in the echo chamber.
Duncan also relentlessly pushed ed tech product:
“Effective, blended learning—a combination of in-class work with a teacher and technology-delivered instruction—is the best way to accelerate student learning”
Pure nonsense. They don’t have a scrap of evidence to back that up, yet they pushed ed tech product into every low and middle income school in the country.
Idiotically, entire states adopted this baloney, including Rhode Island and Maine. Maine at least had the good sense to dump it.
Stop taking their advice. You’re not being well-served by these people.
The mind games they play on desperate parents!
Maybe Congress should subpoena DeVos for those promised sources.
“But think about this, parents: if you were given a choice between having your child go to a teacher who is mediocre”
I;ve been a public school parent for 25 years and I went to public schools. Do ed reformers know that parents have different opinions about any given teacher?
They do! This ridiculous idea that we all know and can measure which teachers are “mediocre” is one of their more arrogant conceits. It has no connection to reality.
Incidentally, Duncan was a sub-par public employee. DeVos is too. We should raise our expectations. We could do a lot better if we hired outside the echo chamber.
DeVos is spouting words which have been touted by Gates’ wife — Melinda Gates bought heavily into the idea that getting rid of an overabundance of “bad” teachers while keeping and relying upon a few magical teachers is the best solution.
I saw they’re getting ready to mandate a certain kind of reading instruction on public schools.
Doesn’t this conflict with their big national campaign for vouchers? They won’t be able to control how how private schools teach reading.
So only public schools get their gimmicky, faddish mandates? How is that fair?
We always get the downside. We get their bad ideas but none of the support or cheerleading or extra funding. Can we opt out of this “movement”? I don’t want to take advice ON public schools from people who oppose public schools anymore. They don’t support our schools. Why should we accept their mandates? The mandates don’t apply to the private schools they prefer.
When pigs fly. CBK
Public School Teachers and parents should SUE the deformers. What a day that would be.
My suggestion is that DeVos take over a class of 30 students consisting for a minimum of a week. The class is made up of ELD and special education students.
Not sure even The Onion can top this. It begins…
“This morning [April 1, 2019], Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos joined a coalition of school choice groups in announcing a new campaign, ‘A Child’s School is the Child’s Choice,’ to empower children throughout the U.S.”
https://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/newsletter-school-choice-040119
A class of 40 well-behaved children who learn easily will be successful. A farmer with good soil will produce a good crop regardless of mistakes he may make in planting or harvesting.
It is an unfortunate reality that most people do not learn with some difficulty , and most soil is not river bottom alluvium. Still, proper investment in good farming will, over the generations, produce good students and good soil.
In farming, it is practicing good conservation practices and planting the right crops to preserve soil fertility. In school, it is investing in a community that prizes learning so that, over the years, a dividend of good students results from the stability. Part of this stability is for teachers to minister to the needs of a manageable group of students, whether this be in one class or considering of the total numbers of students seen in a day or class cycle.
NEPC is on a roll, giving The Onion a run for its money…
https://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/newsletter-april-class-size-04012019
I wrote this 6 1/2 years ago. It still rings true today.
Does 5 more students really matter?
https://davidrtayloreducation.wordpress.com/2012/09/28/does-5-more-students-really-matter/
Thanks for the math. It is a great summary of what I have been saying for years. The difference is in how many you see a day
What grade level do teach?
I must say the video of devos standing waiting for the elevator with her posse and being questioned by the press but betsy just stands there and does not say anything actually pretending the press is not even there.
My take from this several minute video of basically devos just standing there, looking like she wanted to say something but the word were not coming out. This to me shows that devos is breaking down. Devos is at the point of no return evident in her dissing the press and not saying a word usually indicating a break down in her defense system.
Clearly when she first started the position she would stand there proudly and speak her mind about her choice and other garbage but two plus years later taking the abuse is finally cracking the vault. I do not expect betsy to stay around much longer.
This comes from the National Institutes of Health. Pollution does matter. Trump is busy making sure that our environment is increasingly polluted. He wants lowered standards for car emissions. This is affecting childhood development. Trump said that he loves ‘stupid people’. Guess he wants more of them since they vote for him.
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/400036-trump-submits-rule-to-weaken-iconic-obama-car-efficiency-standards
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Kids living near major roads at higher risk of developmental delays, NIH study suggests
Young children who live close to a major roadway are twice as likely to score lower on tests of communications skills, compared to those who live farther away from a major roadway, according to an analysis by researchers at the National Institutes of Health and the University of California, Merced. Moreover, children born to women exposed during pregnancy to higher-than-normal levels of traffic-related pollutants — ultra-fine airborne particles and ozone — had a small but significantly higher likelihood of developmental delays during infancy and early childhood. The study appears in Environmental Research.
“Our results suggest that it may be prudent to minimize exposure to air pollution during pregnancy, infancy, and early childhood—all key periods for brain development,” said Pauline Mendola, Ph.D., an investigator in the Division of Intramural Population Health Research at NIH’s Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and the study’s senior author.
Previous studies have linked exposure to common air pollutants in pregnancy to low birthweight, preterm birth and stillbirth. A few studies have found a higher risk of autism and of lower cognitive functioning in children living near freeways, but results of studies about how prenatal and early childhood exposure to air pollution might affect development have been inconsistent…
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/kids-living-near-major-roads-higher-risk-developmental-delays-nih-study-suggests#.XKywTwE86qU.gmail