Archives for category: Common Core
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The Reason Jeb Bush Supports Common Core

By dianeravitch
May 26, 2014 //
126

The usual narrative about the politics of Common Core describe it as a split within the Republican Party. On one side are the extremist members of the Tea Party, fearful of a federal takeover. On the other side are “moderate” Republicans like Jeb Bush, eager to make American students globally competitive.

The Southern Poverty Law Center thinks that the grassroots radicals want to use Common Core to destroy public education. Glenn Beck ‘s new book displays equal contempt for Common Core and public education.

But what is Jeb Bush’s role? He is no moderate. He is an avid proponent of vouchers, charters, tax credits for private schools, and virtual charters. He is as eager to destroy public education as any member of the Tea Party.

In this 2012 speech to business leaders, Bush said that the rigorous standards, if linked to rigorous assessments, would show the public just how bad our schools really are. He said,

“Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush captured the scale of the challenge when he told the gathering on the first morning that states are heading for a “train wreck.” He noted that when the new standards and assessments come fully online in 2015 that many communities, schools, and families are in for a rude awakening.”

Furthermore, “Bush warned that such bluntness about the poor health of American education and student achievement will trigger serious political backtracking. He said, “My guess is there’s going to be a lot of people running for cover and they are going to be running fast.”

Jeb Bush, in short, looks forward to the inevitable collapse of test scores on Common Core tests. The public, he expects, will be so shocked by the scores that they will be open to the choices he advocates. Suddenly, there will be a public clamor for vouchers, charters, online learning.

So the great divide within the Republican Party over Common Core is not between the “moderate” Jeb Bush and the “radical” Tea Party, but between factions that are both hostile to public education.

Categories Bush, Jeb, Charter Schools, Common Core, On-Line Education, Vouchers

Schneider: Oklahoma Rejects Common Core, But…

By dianeravitch
May 24, 2014 //
15

The Oklahoma legislature voted decisively to drop the Common Core standards.

“On May 23, 2014, both the Oklahoma House (71-18) and Senate (31-10) voted to dump the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

“All that is left is for Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin to sign the legislation, HB 3399, into law. (Fallin was not governor when Oklahoma signed on for CCSS as part of Race to the Top {RTTT} in 2010.)”

If the governor does not sign, the bill is vetoed.

Categories Common Core

Arthur H. Camins: Have We Abandoned Our Neediest Children??

By dianeravitch
May 22, 2014 //
28

Arthur H. Camins, the Director of the Center for Innovation in Engineering and Science Education at the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ, sharply critiques current education and social policy. He writes in this post that we have given up efforts to reduce poverty and segregation, policies that would produce the greatest number of young people.

Instead, our nation’s leaders are prepared to divert billions into more testing and Common Core, which is unlikely to reduce inequality.

Camins writes:

“If answers on Common Core assessment questions require supporting evidence, it is only fair that evidence-based reasoning should be an expected feature of public education policy. Apparently such consistency is not required when it comes to political decisions. Sadly, too many policy makers seem more committed to enabling profiteering from the results of poverty than ending it. The testing industry is an excellent example. Education policies sanction and encourage multi-billion dollar testing and test preparation corporations that enable destructive punishment and rewards for educators, gaming the system and sorting of students for competitive access to an increasingly unaffordable post secondary system that perpetuates inequity. State and federal education policies support costly, overly stressful and time consuming high-stakes testing in order to verify and detect small differences within the very large socio-economic disparities we already know exist.”

“Well-designed large-scale assessments can contribute evidence for institutional and program level judgments about quality. However, we do not need to test every student every year for this purpose. Less costly sampling can accomplish this goal. I am not opposed to qualifying exams- if they validly and reliably measure qualities that are directly applicable to their purpose without bias. However, imagine if we shifted the balance of our assessment attention from the summative to the formative. Then we could focus more on becoming better at interpreting daily data from regular class work and use that evidence to help students move their own learning forward. Imagine what else we could accomplish if we spent a significant percentage of our current K-12 and college admission testing expenditures on actually mediating poverty instead of measuring its inevitable effect. Imagine the educational and economic benefit if we invested in putting people to work rebuilding our cities, roads, bridges, schools and parks. Imagine if we put people to work building affordable housing instead of luxury high rises. Imagine the boost to personal spending and the related savings in social service spending if a living wage and full employment prevailed. Imagine the learning benefit to children if their families did not have to worry about health, food and shelter. Imagine if our tax policies favored the common good over wealth accumulation for the 1%ers.

“Such investments are far more logical than the current over-investment in testing and compliance regimes. Education, race and poverty are inextricably intertwined. Let’s do everything we can to improve teaching and learning. More students learning to use evidence to support arguments would be terrific. But, if we want to do something about poverty we need to ensure good jobs at fair wages for the parents of our students. That is where evidence and logical thinking lead.”

Categories Charter Schools, Common Core, Poverty, Race to the Top, Segregation , Racial Isolation and Integration

Laura Chapman: The Problems with EdTPA

By dianeravitch
May 22, 2014 //
29

Laura Chapman writes:

Unfortunately, this next generation of teachers is not just subject to manipulation by Teach for America.

The new EdTPA (Teacher Performance Assessment) is one of the new gatekeepers for entry into teaching. EdTPA was designed by scholars at Stanford. It has been rubber-stamped by the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE). AACTE represents 800 teacher education programs..

EdTPA is aligned with the CCSS. It honors direct instruction made evident in video snippets of teaching and plans that prospective teachers submit for scoring. Scoring has been outsourced to Pearson who charges a minimum of $300 per test, while paying $70 per hour to raters of the tests. In early 2014, edTPA was being used in 511 educator preparation programs in 34 states and the District of Columbia. CCSS plus training for direct instruction over authentic education will not just fade away. http://edtpa.aacte.org/about-edtpa

States can use edTAP scores for teacher licensure. Teacher education programs can use the scores for state and national accreditations.

The edTPA scores of graduates, and gains in students’ scores that they produce on the job will now be used to rate the “effectiveness” of teacher education programs. In other words, Obama+Duncan’s flawed K-12 policies are being foisted on teacher education. The Gates’ desire to track student test scores produced by graduates of teacher education programs in on track for becoming the new normal. Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/04/barack-obama-arne-duncan-teacher-training-education-106013.html#ixzz2zwfJdsRs

it is hard to be optimistic. In addition to EdTPA, other tests for teacher certification require knowledge of the CCSS (e.g. Praxis http://www.ets.org/praxis/ccss). Other certifications of teacher education programs are no less troubling.

For example, the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP), approved new standards for teacher education in August, 2013. CAEP is a new entity merging NCATE, the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education and TEAC the Teacher Education Accreditation Council. In 2013, the merged organizations had accredited over 860 programs. CAEP standards must still be approved by USDE and appear to have been written for that purpose.

The standards from CAEP illustrate how hard it is to bury bad policies, and overcome horrific language about education.

Programs that prepare teachers are now called “providers.” Teachers who graduate are now called “completers.” The CAEP standards rely on 110 uses of the term “impact” to describe what teacher education and teachers are supposed to do. (Ask Diane what “impact” meant for her knee, or consider how ‘impacted” sardines may feel in a can).

Here is CAEP’s Standard 1.4 for teacher education: “Providers ensure that completers demonstrate skills and commitment that afford all P-12 students access to rigorous college-and career-ready standards (e.g., Next Generation Science Standards, National Career Readiness Certificate, Common Core State Standards).” http://caepnet.org/accreditation/standards/standard1/

CAEP Standard 4.1: “The provider documents, using multiple measures, that program completers contribute to an expected level of student-learning growth. Multiple measures shall include all available growth measures (including value-added measures, student-growth percentiles, and student learning and development objectives) required by the state for its teachers and available to educator preparation providers, other state-supported P-12 impact measures, and any other measures employed by the provider.” http://caepnet.org/accreditation/standards/standard4/ This standard is absurd. It requires the use of “measures” that are known to be invalid and unreliable.

CAEP Standard 5.4: “Measures of completer impact, including available outcome data on P-12 student growth, are summarized, externally benchmarked, analyzed, shared widely, and acted upon in decision-making related to programs, resource allocation, and future direction.” http://caepnet.org/accreditation/standards/standard5/

Clearly, the demolition derby on K-12 is expanding to damage the independent voice of faculty in higher education, especially those most directly responsible for teacher education.

The “provider” language signals that alternative paths to teachers preparation are being honored. The 42 member “commission” charged with developing CAEP’s standards was dominated by high-level administrators in education and entrepreneurs who appear to be totally unaware of (or indifferent to) the meaning of due-diligence in developing standards. They ignored sound scholarship that should have informed their work, including extensive peer-reviewed criticisms of the CCSS, value-added and related “growth” measures, as well as all the well-document flaws in industrial strength management strategies from mid-century last.

Damn the torpedos, ignore the evidence, full steam ahead.

Categories Common Core, Duncan, Arne, Education Industry, Teachers and Teaching, Testing

Eduardo Porter Recycles the Conventional Wisdom

By dianeravitch
May 21, 2014 //
21

Eduardo Porter recaps the conventional wisdom about American schools, recapitulating in one column all the same tired cliches as Rhee, Gates, Duncan, and our other corporate reform titans.

Our scores on international tests are mediocre. Yes, they have been mediocre since 1964, when the fist such test was given. No, I take that back. We were not mediocre in 1964, we came in last. And in the last fifty years, we surpassed the nations with higher scores.

There is a shameless gap between the test scores of rich and poor, which is true, but that’s because we have such a huge proportion of children who are poor (23%), more than any other advanced nation. Porter talks about various ways too raise the test scores of kids in poverty (the latest unproven fad: blended learning), quoting the salesmen.

Of course, the best way to reduce the gap would be to provide jobs and a decent living wage for the parents of poor children, but that seems to be off-topic. Best to keep up the pusuit of ever higher standards and harder tests, the failed strategy of the past dozen years.

Porter ultimately concludes that our biggest problem is “a dearth of excellent teachers.” How does he know? The OECD told him so.

Maybe he believes this. Maybe he just watched “Waiting for Superman.” I would love to have an hour with him.

The Néw York Times is unusually out of touch when it comes to the issue of education.

Categories Common Core, International

Glenn Beck’s Angry and Ignorant Book About Common Core

By dianeravitch
May 21, 2014 //
272

Over the years, we have seen a steady dumbing down of American culture, especially in the mass media. Whether newspapers, radio, or television, we have lost many of our well-educated, cultured, well-informed thinkers. Often they have been replaced by shock jocks, ranting talk show hosts, and an entire cable channel devoted to trashing liberals, liberal social programs, and labor unions.

I miss Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, and dozens of other smart journalists who brought more than their opinions to their journalism. Bill Moyers is one of that breed. We need more.

Another thing I don’t understand is why people on the far right like to paint their own country in the most negative tones while pretending to be patriots. I used to see a lot of this in rightwing think tanks, where people seized gleefully on every negative statistic to prove what a bad country this is; how horrible our public schools are; how dumb our teachers are; how we are doomed. Michelle Rhee’s advertisements often make me think she really hates this country, that no one is smart enough or good enough for her. .

All of this is a long-winded way of disassociating myself from Glen Beck’s screed against Common Core and public education. It is called “Conform: Exposing the Truth about Common Core and Public Education.”

Here is a review by Hilary Tone of Media Matters that gives you an idea of how false and hysterical this book is. It is clear that Beck did not read “Reign of Error.” I won’t be reviewing “Conform.” I am not interested in reading or writing about crazy rightwing attacks on our great American tradition of public education or on our nation.

In the same vein as the one now being mined by Glenn Beck is a video about a Florida legislator denouncing the Common Core because it will make all children gay. Seriously.

This is crazy stuff, and it makes it difficult if not impossible to have a reasonable discussion about the pros and cons of the Common Core. The Common Core is not wicked, evil, or dangerous, nor are those who wrote it.

Perhaps my critique of Common Core is too sophisticated for those who want simplistic answers. I don’t condemn those who want to use Common Core. I don’t think they are wrong or unAmerican. If they like it, they should use it.

My advice to states that want to use it, who think it is better than what they do now, is this:

1. Convene your best classroom teachers and review CCSS. Fix whatever needs fixing. Recognize that not all students learn at the same pace. Leave time for play in K-3.

2. Do not use the federally funded tests. Do not spend billions on hardware and software for testing. Let teachers write their own tests. Use standardized tests sparingly, like a state-level NAEP, to establish trends, not to label or rank children and teachers.

3. Do not use results of CC to produce ratings to “measure” teacher quality. Study after study, report after report warns that this is a very bad idea that will harm the quality of education by focusing too much on standardized tests, narrowing the curriculum, and forcing teachers to teach to the tests.

4. Do not let your judgement be clouded by people who make hysterical claims about the standards or those who wrote them.

Categories Common Core, US Education

In Which Mercedes Schneider Flays Pearson

By dianeravitch
May 20, 2014 //
127

Mercedes Schneider here reviews the transcript of a board meeting of Pearson in April 2014. Anyone can read the transcript but is allowed to quote only 400 words. That was Mercedes’ challenge.

What struck her was that Pearson’s business plan is heavily tied to adoption of CCSS. In this case, contrary to the assurances of Bill Gates, national standardization promotes monopolization, not competition.

What struck me was that the leaders of this behemoth, now taking control of large sectors of American education, had nothing to say about education. The discussion, not surprisingly, was all about profits and business strategy. Who decided to outsource American education?

Categories Common Core, Education Industry, For-Profit, Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, On-Line Education, Pearson, Testing

Weingarten and Darling-Hammond Call for a New Accountability

By dianeravitch
May 19, 2014 //
93

Randi Weingarten and Linda Darling-Hammond have co-authored a major new statement on accountability.

They write that:

“If we assume that the goal of accountability should be better education, the test-and-punish approach must be replaced by a support-and-improve model. A new approach should ensure that students get what they really need: 1) curriculum, teaching, and assessment focused on meaningful learning, 2) adequate resources that are spent wisely, and 3) professional capacity, so that teachers and school leaders develop the knowledge and skills they need to teach much more challenging content in much more effective ways.”

They add:

“Implementing the standards well will not be accomplished by targets and sanctions. It will require more adequate and equitable resources and greater investments in professional capacity, especially for currently underfunded schools that serve the highest-need students.

“Raising standards in ways that punish children and educators for not meeting them produces the wrong responses from schools. Evidence shows that, rather than improve learning, sanctions tend to tamp down innovation, incentivize schools to boost scores by keeping or driving out struggling students, hasten the flight of thoughtful educators from the profession, and disrupt learning for students whose local schools are shut down.”

They use Néw York as an example of how do accountability wrong, and California as an example of how to do it right.

There are some very good ideas in their statement. I would add my two cents: when some children and families live in such desperate circunstance, not even the best standards, curriculum, assessments, and professional development will be enough to create equality of opportunity. Some kids have tooany strikes against them, and that is a societal failure.

Categories Accountability, California, Common Core, New York

The Mistake of the Southern Poverty Law Center

By dianeravitch
May 17, 2014 //
162

I think there are plenty of well meaning people on different sides of the Common Core issue. It serves no useful purpose to divide people into good guys and bad guys. This is one of those tangled questions where we do best to debate the pros and cons of the Common Core, without challenging the motives of those with whom we disagree.

No doubt, there are some who seek to make profit or who are troubled by Bill Gates’ overwhelming investment in the CCSS. It would be easy to come up with a list of dubious motives for the CCSS, but our national discussion should deal with consequential issues, such as the quality of the standards, whether they are appropriate for students of different age groups, and how they are likely to narrow or increase these gaps among different student groups.

Among the most one sided treatments of CCSS is that of the Southern Poverty Law Center. This is a group that is usually very grounded in its criticisms.

Unfortunately, SPLC chose to paint opposition to the CC as Tea Party and/or rightwing extremists who want to destroy public education. This is odd indeed because the critics and supporters of CC are strange bedfellows.

Jeb Bush, who does not like public education but loves vouchers and charters, is one of the most outspoken supporters of the CC , as is Michelle Rhee, and others on the right. The Chicago Teachers Union just voted unanimously against the CC. CTU is not an enemy of public education

More thinking is needed, less name calling.

Categories Common Core

Pearson: We Need Better PR

By dianeravitch
May 16, 2014 //
57

Pearson, the multi-billion British publisher, plans to launch a new PR offensive to push back against the anti-testing and anti-Common Core groundswell. Pearson has been steadily buying up every aspect of American education: it recently won the contract to adminster the Common Core test called PARCC, which is worth at least $1 billion; states using Pearson tests buy Pearson textbooks; Pearson bought the GED; Pearson owns the online EdTPA, to evaluate teachers as they finish their training; Pearson owns virtual charter schools called Connections Academy; Pearson owns a curriculum aligned with Common Core.

This interview appeared on politico.com:

PEARSON TO PUMP UP THE P.R.: Pearson CEO John Fallon came by the POLITICO office to talk about a whole range of issues – and to make a pledge: His team is going to be more active, he said, in fighting back against the anti-testing, anti-Common Core movement that has swept through a number of states. Rather than see the opposition “as threats to our traditional business,” Fallon said, the company is trying to forge common ground.”We’re all in the business of trying to improve educational outcomes,” he said.

– Fallon said Pearson will step up its social media presence and will also make more of an effort to engage with teachers unions, talk to parents and generally “be very transparent about what we’re doing and why we’re doing it … We’re willing to be held accountable.”

– Asked how he would grade Pearson’s public outreach so far, Fallon demurred. “You probably wouldn’t grade us very highly at the moment – which is probably fair,” he said. “We’re going to try to be more proactive.”

– Don Kilburn, President of Pearson North America, also weighed in. He said he expected Pearson’s sales to pick up after a couple of rough years crimped by tight state budgets for both K-12 and higher education. The company has reorganized and now has a “much cleaner mission and structure” which is expected to propel faster growth, he said.

Categories Common Core, Pearson
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