Archives for category: Common Core
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Susan Ohanian Reviews New York Times Education Coverage

By dianeravitch
November 13, 2015 //
34

Susan Ohanian has written a scorching article about the New York Times coverage of education.

She documents the newspaper’s lack of attention to big issues, its reliance on a small number of conservative commentators as experts, and its consistent editorial support for high-stakes testing, No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and other failed policies.

“The Times Editorial Board, like the legendary Boston Brahmin Cabots, who spoke only to God, finds no need to communicate with education practitioners or researchers to reinforce their claim that the Common Core is necessary for the economic well-being of the country. The board is joined by staff op ed writers in insisting that the Common Core is heavily researched and jam-packed with critical thinking and problem-solving skills that workers need to keep the nation competitive in the Global Economy. Like people waiting for Senator McCarthy to open his briefcase at the House UnAmerican Activities Committee meetings, Times readers wait for even a snippet of a study by one education researcher providing evidence for all this phantasm.

“It just isn’t there.

“The New York Times education coverage has become quasi-governmental, promoting the corporate push for standardization of public schools. Not only are readers not informed that the Common Core was developed and heavily promoted with hundreds of millions from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the oft-repeated selling point that these “standards that have been adopted by 45 states and the District of Columbia” fails to acknowledge that the states did it for the money, accepting the Common Core for the Race to the Top financial bribe handed out by the US Department of Education, most definitely not for the pedagogy. Savvy readers keep a count of how often the Times intones unproven key phrases right out of the press releases from Common Core headquarters: “the Common Core sets a national benchmark for what students should should learn”[10]; “a focus on critical thinking and primary investigation”[11]; “set more rigorous classroom goals for American students, with a focus on critical thinking skills, abstract reasoning in math and reading comprehension”[12]; “emphasize critical thinking”[13]; “emphasis on free-form thinking”[14]; “emphasize deep analysis and creative problem-solving”[15]; “written by a panel of experts … focus on critical thinking and analysis”[16]; “modeled on the teaching strategies of countries, especially in Asia, that perform better on international comparisons”[17] ; “a more rigorous set of standards”[18]; “heightened expectation of student progress. . . ideal of a rigorous national standard”[19]; “tougher learning standards taking root across the country”[20]; a set of rigorous academic standards”[21]; “the new, more rigorous academic standards”[22]; “a set of rigorous reading and math standards”[23]; “a tougher set of standards”[24]; “the standards were written by a panel of experts convened by a bipartisan group of governors and superintendents to emphasize critical thinking over memorization, to better prepare students for college and jobs”[25]; “new benchmarks for what students need to know and be able to do”[26]; “new and more rigorous set of academic standards”[27]; “more rigorous academic standards.”[28]

“As we read this over-the-top legerdemain about the Common Core—verified by absolutely no evidence from research or classroom practice—we have to wonder about the absence of those reportorial strategies so clearly outlined by the Pulitzer science reporter:

* Interviewing researchers

* Interviewing unconnected experts

* Talking with real people and relevant experiences”

Categories Common Core, Education Reform

Arne’s Former Speechwriter Explains Why Conservatives Should Support the Common Core

By dianeravitch
November 11, 2015 //
20

David Whitman wrote a paper for the Brookings Institution called “The Surprising Roots of the Common Core: How Conservatives Gave Rise to ‘Obamacore.'” The goal of the paper is to persuade readers that conservatives, starting in the Reagan administration, laid the groundwork for national standards and tests. As a participant in some of the events he describes, I have a somewhat different take on the past.

Whitman was Arne Duncan’s speechwriter from 2009 to 2014. He is the author of a 2008 book for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute calling “Sweating the Small Stuff,” which praises “no-excuses” charter schools. His prime example was the American Indian Charter School in Oakland, whose leader subsequently resigned after $3.8 million went missing in a state audit. Given Whitman’s admiration for “no excuses” schools, it makes sense that he wrote speeches for Arne, who believes in them as an effective answer for the educational crisis of African American students who live in poverty.

There are several major differences between the advocacy for national standards in the Bush 1 administration and in the Obama administration.

First, the effort to develop voluntary national standards in the early 1990s did not take place in secret, as did the drafting of the Common Core standards.

Second, the mechanism of the Bush administration was not to convene a secret and unaccountable committee to write standards but to award grants to the nation’s leading organizations that represented teachers and scholars in each field. There was no federal involvement in the writing of the standards; each field wrote its own document about what students should know and be able to do.

Third, the Bush 1 effort was not limited to reading and math. It included the arts, science, foreign languages, history, economics, civics, and physical education.

Fourth, the Bush 1 effort did not direct any teacher about how to teach. The standards were guides, not directives.

Fifth, the Bush 1 strategy was a low-cost effort, as compared to the CCSS. The Bush 1 administration spent about $10 million, as compared to the $200+ million spent by the Gates Foundation to subsidize the CCSS.

Sixth, unlike CCSS, the Bush 1 push for voluntary national standards did not include any element of coercion. Teachers, schools, districts, or states could use them or not. The standards were truly voluntary. The theory of action was that if they were good, states would copy them, or parts of them, if they so chose.

Seventh, unlike the CCSS, there was no national public relations campaign to promote them on national television and in the print media.

Eighth, the Bush 1 voluntary national standards quickly failed after the U.S. history standards became a nasty, politicized national controversy in 1994. But when the standards failed, they didn’t drag anyone down with them, because so little was expended to create them. The Bush 1 standards did not take billions away from other purposes of schooling. They did not suck up education dollars as schools were forced to absorb budget cuts. They did not lead to increases in class sizes and billions spent on consultants and technology.

At the time the Bush 1 standards were written, Senator Lamar Alexander was Secretary of Education. He does not believe that the federal government should force states and districts to reform their schools to satisfy federal mandates. He has always opposed a “national school board.” Even as Secretary, he did not want that power. He believes in federalism.

Unfortunately, the Obama administration and the Department of Education do not understand federalism. They do not understand that federal laws specifically prohibit any federal official from attempting to influence or control curriculum or instruction. They recklessly promoted the Common Core standards, and they paid $360 million for testing the Common Core standards. Secretary Duncan pretends that the setting of national standards and the creation of tests aligned to those standards have nothing to do with either curriculum or instruction. What the federal government, and Secretary Duncan in particular, have done in trying to establish national standards and tests violates federal law. It is not only illegal, it is impractical. The theory seems to be that if everyone studies the same subjects and has the same tests, everyone will become equally successful. This is absurd. And the test results prove that the theory is absurd on its face.

Defend the Common Core standards if you wish. Use them if you choose. But please don’t say that they are a direct descendant of the failed effort in 1991-92 to create voluntary national standards, written by teachers and scholars. The Common Core standards will fail, not only because they cost billions to implement, but because of their indifference to teachers and to democratic processes.

Categories Common Core, Education Reform, Testing

The Reformers’ War on Language and on Democracy

By dianeravitch
November 9, 2015 //
57

Maybe it is just me, but I find myself outraged by the “reformers'” incessant manipulation of language.

“Reform” seldom refers to reform.

“Reform” means privatization.

“Reform” means assaults on the teaching profession.

“Reform” means eliminating teachers’ unions, which fight for better salaries and working conditions.

“Reform” means boasting about test scores by schools that have carefully excluded the students who might get low scores.

“Reform” means using test scores to evaluate teachers even though this practice has negative effects on teacher morale and fails to identify better or worse teachers.

“Reform” means stripping teachers of due process rights or any other job security.

“Reform” means that schools should operate for-profit and that private corporations should be encouraged to profit from school spending.

“Reform” means acceptance of privately managed schools that operate without accountability or transparency.

“Reform” means the incremental destruction of public education.

I am reminded of George Orwell’s lines from his prophetic novel 1984:

“War is peace.

“Freedom is slavery’

“Ignorance is strength.”

The goal of the leadership in the novel was to teach the population “doublethink.” To believe in contradictory ideas.

So we see schools closed, teachers and principals fired, and we are supposed to believe this is “reform.”

The media, with few exceptions, say that what is happening almost everywhere is “reform,” so it must be reform to replace public schools with privately managed charters, and to fire experienced professionals and replace them with newcomers, with untrained and inexperienced teachers and with principals who taught for one or two years.

It must be reform to allow out-of-state billionaires to buy local and state school board elections so they can control the schools of a state they don’t live in.

I confess I am also irritated by the habit of referring to young children as “scholars.” To me, a scholar is someone who has devoted his or her professional life to the advancement of knowledge. If a five-year-old is a “scholar,” what do you call a distinguished university professor who is widely recognized for her research and publications?

Has the public been suckered into believing that the destruction of public education is “reform”?

Does the public willingly accept the idea that hedge fund managers and equity investors are taking control of what is supposed to be a public responsibility?

Will we let them monetize our children and their public schools?

Does the public understand that a small group inside the Beltway wrote the “national standards” behind closed doors, that one billionaire (Bill Gates) paid for them and paid millions to national education organizations to advocate for them, and that the federal government bribed 45 states to endorse them?

How long will the public tolerate tests tied to those standards that are designed to fail 65-70% of the nation’s children?

How much longer will we allow the nation’s children to be labeled and sorted by standardized tests whose outcomes may be predicted by family income?

When will the public realize that test-based accountability does not improve education, does not promote better teaching, and actually reduces the quality of education?

How long can the Emperor parade through the streets before someone tells him he is naked?

How long can a charade persist before the public knows they have been conned?

How long will it take to unmask this great theft of a democratic institution that belongs to the public, not to entrepreneurs, foundations, rightwing ideologues, hedge fund managers, or their compliant politicians?

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Democracy, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization, Testing

Lisa Rudley: What Parents Want for Their Children

By dianeravitch
November 8, 2015 //
5

Lisa Rudley, the leader of the New York State Allies of Parents and Educators and a prominent proponent of Opt Outs, here presents to the Cuomo Commission to review the Common Core standards and tests. Lisa is a public school parent in Ossining, New York.

She explains the origins and flaws of the Common Core standards, and she explains the critique of them.

She also offers specific recommendations to improve education in the state.

She expresses the impact of the standards and high-stakes testing on children with disabilities and students who are new to English.

She demands a thorough review and changes in standards, assessment, curriculum, and teacher evaluation.

She says, “When you hurt teachers, you hurt kids. And when you hurt kids, parents get very angry.”

With leaders like Lisa and NYSAPE, parents are leading the way to a much better, far richer, quality of education than the one offered by the “reformers.”

But whoa! Hang on. Don’t turn it off when Lisa finishes. She is followed by the informed and eloquent Jamaal Bowman, principal of the Cornerstone Academy for Social Action. He has a series of clear and pragmatic recommendations on truly reforming the public schools.

 

Categories Common Core, Education Industry, Education Reform, Testing

Vermont Board of Education: Common Core Tests Don’t Mean Much

By dianeravitch
November 7, 2015 //
25

Vermont continues to be amazing.

 

It recently issued a letter to parents telling them not to worry about the Common Core tests because the passing mark is set so high that they are meaningless. No national the world has ever reached the level expected of students on these tests.

 

This is an excerpt from the letter:

 

These tests are based on a narrow definition of “college and career ready.” In truth, there are many different careers and colleges, and there are just as many different definitions of essential skills. In fact, many (if not most) successful adults fail to score well on standardized tests. If your child’s scores show that they are not yet proficient, this does not mean that they are not doing well or will not do well in the future. 

 

We also recommend that you not place a great deal of emphasis on the “claims” or sub-scores. There are just not enough test items to give you reliable information.

 

The Vermont Board hits on a bizarre aspect of the Common Core and the associated tests: There is no single curriculum or test that can test for both college and career readiness. The student who plans to go to an Ivy League school, the student who plans to be an electrician, and the student who plans to join the military, the student who plans to be a farmer, cannot be judged by a single measure.

 

 

 

 

Categories Common Core, Testing, Vermont

Jon Pelto: Is It Fair to Test Students on Content They Have Not Studied?

By dianeravitch
November 7, 2015 //
40

Obviously not. But as Jonathan Pelto writes, the new SAT will be much harder than the old SAT, including content that many students have never been exposed to. Since Jon lives in Connecticut, he notes with dismay that the state legislature has mandated that all eleventh grade students take the new SAT. He predicts disaster.

He writes:

A New York Times article last week entitled, Everything You Need to Know About the New SAT, laid out the facts about the NEW SAT including the news that,

“The addition of more-advanced math, such as trigonometry, means the test will cover materials from a greater number of courses. That will make it more difficult for students to take the SAT early. Some questions will require knowledge of statistics, a course relatively few students take in high school.”

Thanks to Democratic Governor Dannel Malloy and the Democrat and Republican members of the Connecticut General Assembly, a new state law adopted last spring mandates that high school students now take the SAT in their junior year.

The test results will be used to judge both students and teachers.

However as high schools students (and parents) know, most high school juniors are, at best, tackling Algebra in 11th grade and many are still working to master Geometry.

But that coursework won’t be enough for high school juniors to succeed on the NEW SAT.

Even in academically successful Connecticut, few students will have even taken the courses needed to master the SAT and the majority of juniors may not have been provided with the math content to even survive the NEW Common Core aligned SAT.

According to most recent data published by the United States Government’s National Center for Education Statistics, only 16% of high school graduates in the country had taken a calculus course, 11% a statistics course and only a third had even come in contact with pre-calculus concepts, all of which they will be expected to answer if they want to master the NEW SAT.

And that was graduating seniors, not juniors!

Of course, you know that David Coleman, architect of the Common Core, is now president of the College Board, which sponsors the SAT. So the SAT had to be aligned with the Common Core.

Soon we can expect to hear that Connecticut, one of the leading states on NAEP, has a failing school system. We can expect the charter industry to rush in to the rescue and the revenue.

Categories Common Core, Connecticut, Testing

Cuomo’s Common Core Task Force Meets Opt Out Movement on Long Island

By dianeravitch
November 7, 2015 //
13

Governor Cuomo’s Common Core task force held its first meeting on Long Island–the epicenter of the Opt Out Movement–and it got an earful. Parents, teachers, even superintendents turned out to tell the task force that testing should be delinked  from teachers’ job ratings; that testing was overwhelming the school calendar; and that the Common Core should go.

Jeanette Deutermann, leader of the opt out group on Long Island, predicted that opt outs might double (from 220,000 in 2015 to 500,000 in 2016), if real changes do not happen.

The reporters pointed out that the hearing was very different from the one conducted by State Commissioner John King in 2013, when the audience was angry and rowdy, and King canceled future public meetings.

Lesson: ignoring parents makes them angry. Patronizing them and condescending to them will energize the opt outs.

PS: when I opened the article, I read it in full. When I went back to open it again, it was behind a  paywall. Hope you are lucky.

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Categories Common Core, Education Reform, Opt Out, Parents, Testing

Yohuru Williams: An Amazing Speech on the Real Civil Rights Movement of Our Time

By dianeravitch
November 5, 2015 //
10

Dr. Yohuru Williams, historian at Fairfield University in Connecticut, recently delivered a blockbuster speech to a conference on educational justice in New York City.

He begins by quoting FDR on the Four Freedoms, then moves on to weave together the current movements and issues of our day. It is eloquent and powerful rhetoric on behalf of children, justice, and equity.

I promise if you start watching, you won’t be able to stop.

Categories Common Core, Corporate Reformers, Education Reform, Equity, Justice, Poverty, Privatization

Gene V. Glass: What Should Teachers Do in the Age of Reformation?

By dianeravitch
November 4, 2015 //
9

Gene V. Glass here quotes a young woman, Susan Tran, who completed her bachelor’s degree in Spanish and is now finishing graduate studies to be certified as an elementary school teacher. He wonders how new teachers are able to resolve the contradictions between what the demands of the state and their professional ethics.

Glass writes:

Susan is mature and intelligent; she recognized early in her career that becoming a teacher in the Age of Reformation is forcing idealistic young teachers to resolve contradictions — contradictions between 1) messages from reformers who believe that teaching is a low level trade that has no right to organize on its own behalf and for which six weeks of indoctrination are adequate training, and 2) messages from university-based teacher trainers who believe that good teaching is rooted in children’s unique interests and capabilities and treats them as individuals, not as replicates of a governmentally defined template.

Susan Tran writes (quoted in part):


Throughout my education to be a teacher, one of the biggest questions that has arisen for me is “How do I meet the expectations and standards of the state and district, while also meeting the true needs of my students?” One of my biggest fears coming into the teaching profession is that we have started to confuse the acquisition of knowledge with the process of learning. In an effort to meet numeric goals and score high on standardized tests, we have become obsessed with how to get our students to perform in a way that satisfies a checklist, or a numerical score, or a national standard. I’m fearful that we have forgotten about instilling passion, excitement, and curiosity in our students. It is becoming less important to us to create better people, who care about each other and the world around them and think of ways to deal with the problems that they see in front of them. We discuss world problems only in so far as they fit into our standardized curriculum, but we don’t address the difficult yet inevitable issues that our students will eventually find themselves confronted with in the very near future.

I do understand the need for progression in a student’s knowledge. I see why it’s important that our students are exposed to and encouraged to master a large variety of topics. However, I do not understand why we have begun to think that the best way to do this is to have them fill in a bubble sheet, or sit in front of a computer for an hour and take the exact same test. We’ve become immersed in this notion that there is a “standard,” which then implies that there is a norm. There’s a ‘normal’ level that a student must attain at a certain time, and that the best way to get them there is to maintain the same timeline across the board.

In spite of the fact that our methods classes certainly cover the topics of differentiation, and “meeting the needs of each student,” we see classrooms all around us that teach to the same set-in-stone standards, which translates into more information and less context, relevance, and appeal to students’ interests. This may all sound like a long rant criticizing the methods of current teaching, and that is absolutely not the point that I am trying to make. I think that teaching and teachers should be one of the most highly valued professions. I think that many schools do their very best to create well-rounded students who will enter the world as functional citizens who can contribute to society. I am simply trying to express the fact that we are in danger of getting lost along the way. We have focused too much on the numerical scores that we are producing rather than the wonderful, creative, and inspired individuals who we are helping to shape.

I know that I am entering this profession at a time of great change. There are shifts occurring within the standards, the expectations, and the focus of what we are teaching. I constantly wonder how I am going to be the teacher I imagine myself to be during this time of reform. I wonder how I am possibly going to adhere to these state and national standards with each class that I have, since I know that every single student, and thus every classroom, is unique. The state declares that a class must be at a specific point in the curriculum at a specific time, but what if we need more time? What if we need less? How can I possibly fit in all of the projects and support and guidance that my students will need to fully understand why what they’re learning is important and applicable to the real world? How will I foster minds that love learning, instead of ones that dread testing and begin to believe that they are “too stupid” to learn because they’re not categorized in the “correct” numerical column? These are all things I’ve seen already, and it would be a lie to say that I’m not overwhelmed and terrified.

Categories Accountability, Common Core, Education Industry, Education Reform, Teachers and Teaching

Arts Education in Los Angeles: A Victim of Misguided Reforms

By dianeravitch
November 3, 2015 //
23

The Los Angeles Times reports that arts education has been shortchanged in the Los Angeles Unified School District in recent years, even as the district leadership was pouring millions of dollars into testing, test-prep, and technology. Former superintendent John Deasy was willing to allocate $1.3 Billion to buy iPads for Common Core testing, but at the same time, many schools across the district had no arts teachers.

Under the philosophy that test scores are the only measure that matters, that low scores lead to school closures, the district neglected the arts.

Normandie Avenue Elementary Principal Gustavo Ortiz worries that he can’t provide arts classes for most of the 900 students at his South Los Angeles school.

Not a single art or music class was offered until this year at Curtiss Middle School in Carson.

At Carlos Santana Arts Academy in North Hills, a campus abuzz with visual and performing arts, the principal has gone outside the school district for help. A former professional dancer, she has tapped industry connections and persuaded friends to teach ballroom dancing and other classes without pay until she could reimburse them.

Budget cuts and a narrow focus on subjects that are measured on standardized tests have contributed to a vast reduction of public school arts programs across the country. The deterioration has been particularly jarring in Los Angeles, the epicenter of the entertainment industry.

The Los Angeles Unified School District is discovering the extent of those cuts as it seeks to regain the vibrancy that once made it a leader in arts education. For the first time, L.A. Unified in September completed a detailed accounting of arts programs at its campuses that shows stark disparities in class offerings, the number of teachers and help provided by outside groups.

Arts programs at a vast majority of schools are inadequate, according to district data. Classrooms lack basic supplies. Some orchestra classes don’t have enough instruments. And thousands of elementary and middle school children are not getting any arts instruction.

A Los Angeles Times analysis that used L.A. Unified’s data to assign letter grades to arts programs shows that only 35 out of more than 700 schools would get an “A.” Those high-performing schools offered additional instruction through community donations, had more teachers and a greater variety of arts programs than most of the district’s campuses.

State policy is strong in support of arts education, but LAUSD doesn’t have the money to support the arts. Instead, the money has been spent on testing and implementing the Common Core.

Eight out of every 10 elementary schools does not meet state standards in the arts. The students least likely to engage in the arts are in the high-needs, low-income schools. In schools where there are parents with resources and contacts, they are able to supplement what the school does not provide.

Only four elementary schools — West Vernon, Magnolia, Bonita Street and 49th Street Elementary — had an arts teacher five days a week, according to district data.

“I feel real guilty because my kids go to schools where an art teacher and a music teacher are there five days a week,” said Ortiz, who pointed to Normandie’s limited budget. “I come here and I can’t give the kids what my own kids get. It just tears me up. It’s such an inequity.”

Arts education was not meant to be a luxury in California.

State law requires that schools provide music, art, theater and dance at every grade level. But few districts across the state live up to the requirement.

According to a story in the Wall Street Journal today, the state has allocated $4.8 Billion to the implementation of the Common Core standards and testing. This is a matter of priorities: What matters most: The joy of learning or standardized test scores?

It is ironic that billionaire Eli Broad, who just opened a new museum to house his own collection, wants to spend $490 million to open 260 new charter schools, but can’t find it in his heart to subsidize the arts in the schools of his adopted city.

Which will matter more to these children? The joy of performance, the discipline of practice, the love of engagement promoted by the arts or taking the Common Core tests that most will fail again and again?

You decide.

Categories Arts Education, Broad Foundation, Common Core, Los Angeles
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