Archives for category: Education Reform
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AFT Endorses Joe Biden

By dianeravitch
March 22, 2020 //
70

For Immediate Release
March 22, 2020

Contact:
Oriana Korin
202-374-6103
okorin@aft.org
http://www.aft.org

American Federation of Teachers Endorses Joe Biden for President

WASHINGTON—The American Federation of Teachers’ executive council voted today to endorse former Vice President Joe Biden in the 2020 Democratic primary as the party’s nominee for president in 2020p. The union represents 1.7 million educators, healthcare professionals and public employees across more than 3,000 locals.

The announcement comes after an unprecedented year of AFT member engagement around the 2020 election and the endorsement process, with more than 300,000 members nationwide participating in candidate events, town halls, polls, regional conferences and other efforts to maximize member participation leading up to the November election.

The AFT’s endorsement decision has been guided by three criteria: selecting a candidate who shares the union’s values, who has the support of the union’s members, and who can ultimately defeat President Trump in November. Internal union polling over the last two weeks has demonstrated that members, like Democrats across the nation, have coalesced behind the former vice president: he earned a majority (60 percent) of member support in all of the union’s constituencies and leads his nearest competitor by a 2 to 1 margin. 75 percent of the Democratic membership support the AFT making an endorsement in the primary.

“Before the COVID-19 epidemic, the 2020 election was about the soul of our country. Now it’s about our soul, our safety, our health, our security and our economic well-being. Joe Biden is the experienced and empathic leader our country needs right now,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten. “His character was forged getting up and going to work every day and trying to make life better for his family, facing the ups and downs so many of us face; it was tested by unspeakable loss and grief in life; and it was nurtured through public service, a love of people and the belief in the dignity of every human.”

Weingarten continued: “Biden is with us on investing in public education; making college a reality for everyone; fixing the broken Public Service Loan Forgiveness program; making healthcare a human right, not a privilege for the wealthy; prioritizing clean energy and environmental justice; and building an economy that respects the value of workers’ voices. His whole career has been devoted to building a pathway to the middle class for the millions of people facing an affordability crisis daily. It’s time to give him the chance to do that as president.

“In this moment of worldwide crisis, the contrast with Trump is clear. Our country is navigating the greatest challenge we have battled in generations, and it is essential that we rally around a candidate who can show courage, conviction and compassion in the face of uncertainty.

“Throughout this national emergency, the president and his administration have failed to secure testing and personal protective equipment to safeguard our frontline healthcare providers, have attempted to conceal the severity of the virus and downplay the public health risks, and have refused to deploy the full arsenal of the federal government’s resources, leaving the difficult work of leadership to our nation’s governors. Now more than ever, we need a standard-bearer who is actually looking out for us, and who has a proven track record of steering the country successfully through economic and social upheaval.

“From the beginning, our endorsement process and ultimate decision was guided by three principles: finding a candidate who shares our values, who has a clear path to victory, and who enjoys the support of a clear majority of our members. That time has come, and that candidate is Joe Biden.”

Follow AFT President Randi Weingarten: http://twitter.com/rweingarten

The American Federation of Teachers is a union of 1.7 million professionals that champions fairness; democracy; economic opportunity; and high-quality public education, healthcare and public services for our students, their families and our communities. We are committed to advancing these principles through community engagement, organizing, collective bargaining and political activism, and especially through the work our members do.

Randi Weingarten Lorretta Johnson Evelyn DeJesus
PRESIDENT SECRETARY-TREASURER EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT

American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO
Communications Department • 555 New Jersey Ave. N.W. • Washington, DC 20001 • T: 202-879-4458 • F: 202-879-4580 • http://www.aft.org

AFT Teachers • AFT PSRP • AFT Higher Education • AFT Public Employees • AFT Nurses and Health Professionals

Categories Education Reform

New York Times: Trump’s Response to Crisis

By dianeravitch
March 22, 2020 //
119

On page one of the New York Times:

“Used to Meeting Challenges With Bluster and Force, Trump Confronts a Crisis Unlike Any Before,” by Peter Baker and Maggie Haberman:

“Mr. Trump is no stranger to crisis. He has spent a lifetime grappling with bankruptcy, fending off creditors, evading tax collectors, defending lawsuits, deflecting regulators, spinning reporters and dueling with estranged wives, usually coming out ahead, at least as he defines it.

“But these were crises of his own creation involving human adversaries he knew how to confront. Nothing in his background in business, entertainment or multiple marriages prepared him for the coronavirus pandemic now threatening America’s health and wealth.

“Mr. Trump’s performance on the national stage in recent weeks has put on display the traits that Democrats and some Republicans consider so jarring — the profound need for personal praise, the propensity to blame others, the lack of human empathy, the penchant for rewriting history, the disregard for expertise, the distortion of facts, the impatience with scrutiny or criticism. For years, skeptics expressed concern about how he would handle a genuine crisis threatening the nation, and now they know.”

Categories Education Reform

Is Congress Using Crisis to Suspend IDEA?

By dianeravitch
March 22, 2020 //
15

I received this notice from two trusted allies.

From: Maggie Hart
Date: Fri, Mar 20, 2020 at 3:23 PM
Subject: Threat to ALL Special Education by COVID-19

Hi Everyone: I’m sorry to be bothering you with something work related but Senator Alexander has attached an amendment to the next proposed relief package that includes a full and complete waiver of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act for the rest of the school year! The National Disability Rights Network has a really simple way to write to your congress people to tell them not to let the amendment pass.

Here is the link:

https://ndrn.salsalabs.org/protectidea/index.html?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=02e0c280-8882-4c85-aefa-7ecd41848d11

The amendment would mean that school districts across the country would not have to provide any more special education services- all year- and they would never have to make up the missed sessions. Not even consultations over the phone or computer for parents to talk to therapists. No special education schools, no speech therapy, no physical therapy, no occupational therapy. No therapy or education (no special schools!!!) for kids with significant disabilities like autism and Down Syndrome.

If you have time, please follow the link and email your reps. It takes about two minutes to do. If you’re inclined, please pass along the link to others who might fill it out too.

Thanks!

Maggie

Categories Education Reform, Special Education

A Mother’s Lament about Distance Learning

By dianeravitch
March 22, 2020 //
35

This video went viral after it appeared on Twitter.

Categories Education Reform, Home Schooling, Online Learning

Robin Lithgow: Why Did A Wealthy Plantation Owner Bring an American Poet to El Salvador to Tell Its Story?

By dianeravitch
March 22, 2020 //
55

Robin Lithgow titles this wonderful post Flores y Canciones: The Poet as Witness. She writes about a culture that values its poets.

She writes:

I’ve just finished a riveting memoir titled “What You Have Heard is True,” by Carolyn Forché. It is about the lead-up to the civil war in El Salvador in the 80s. I recommend it highly because of the perspective Forché gives on our troubling history with Central America and our current concern for immigrants and separated families at the border.

But that’s not the purpose of this post. I’m writing about it here because the author is a poet. I’m intrigued by the fact that a charismatic and mysterious coffee plantation owner named Leonel Gomez Vides, the protagonist of the book, would drive all the way from El Salvador to San Diego in 1978 just to ask a young poet to visit his country and bear witness to its struggles.

Why a poet?

If you read the book, you may understand why poetry might be needed to weave such a vivid and painful narrative. It reminded me of something I learned working with the Office of Multi-cultural Studies during my time in the Arts Education Branch at LAUSD. We were developing a professional development for our elementary dance, theatre, and visual arts teachers, incorporating the arts to focus on the La Llorona (the weeping woman). La Llorona is an oral legend known by virtually every hispanic child in our schools but only vaguely familiar to many of their teachers. In fact, some of our arts teachers were weirded out by the workshop. This is understandable. It’s a terrifying story about a woman who drowns her own children and then spends the rest of her life mourning them and snatching other innocent children away from their homes. Hardly an uplifting tale! But we thought it appropriate that we were drawing on a legend from deep in the cultural consciousness of the children we teach, and, like Euripides’ Medea, as a piece of literature it has the powerfully emotional resonance of a poem.

Here is Carolyn Forché in her own words in an interview with Robin Lindley at George Washington University. explaining why Leonel Gomez Vides chose her to write about his country:

“He came to visit me as an American poet. And of course, I tried to dissuade him from imagining that a poet could accomplish the task he imagined, explaining to him that poets didn’t have a great deal of exposure or credibility in the United States, and that we weren’t consulted on matters of foreign policy. We were considered a subculture or a fringe element. He was surprised by that because, of course, in Latin America poetry is very important and taken very seriously, so he decided that one of my tasks was to change the role of poets in the United States, which I thought was very quixotic and probably more impossible than anything else he was asking me to do.

“I was touched by his faith in poetry and by his regard for it…”

Reading this I remembered that I’ve heard this twice before. Barbara Kingsolver said the exact same thing about her book The Lacuna, which tells the story of Trotsky’s time living in Mexico. In The White Goddess, Robert Graves describes a time in ancient British history when poets sat next to kings in government. Poets are, and have always been, valued in other cultures far more than they are in ours. They interpret, clarify, and vivify the times to which they are witness.

Read on. Finish the post.

Lithgow shows you the beauty and importance of poetry.

What is the role of poetry in the Common Core curriculum? Will poetry help you write a market analysis? What does it do? Why does it matter?

Categories Arts Education, Creativity, Education Reform, Literature

Lessons from the 1918 Flu Pandemic, When Many Schools Closed

By dianeravitch
March 21, 2020 //
22

I was recently contacted by a journalist who asked me if there was any precedent for the current school closings in response to a health crisis.

My first impulse was to say “no,” based on my knowledge of history, but I started googling before responding.

I googled “school closings” and “1918 flu epidemic” and found this excellent article by Alexandra M. Stern, Marin S. Cetron, and Howard Markel, published in 2009.

https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/full/10.1377/hlthaff.28.6.w1066

The authors wrote in 2009, in relation to an outbreak of the A/H1N1 influenza of that year:

”Nine decades before our current encounter with a novel strain of influenza virus, the deadly second wave of the 1918–19 influenza pandemic struck the United States. In response, most urban communities closed K–12 public schools for an extended period of time, in some locations for as long as fifteen weeks. Typically, the order to close schools came late in the epidemic curves of cities—weeks if not days after deaths from influenza and pneumonia mounted. School closure orders almost always were issued in concert with additional nonpharmaceutical interventions, such as quarantine, isolation, bans on public gatherings, staggered business hours, and orders to use facemasks.

”The U.S. historical record demonstrates that on multiple occasions, when faced with a contagious crisis that affects children, school dismissal and voluntary absenteeism are common responses. Past experiences also reveal that school dismissal tends to be applied by a particular community as a reaction, if not a demand, only after a contagious disease has spread through a community and not as a preemptive public health measure.”

During the deadly 1918 flu pandemic, many schools closed. The two biggest districts—New York City and Chicago—did not but intensified health screenings of students.

Some cities closed their schools for the duration of the health crisis, as long as 15 weeks.

Let us learn from the past to act, not react, and put children’s health first.

Categories Education Reform

Chalkbeat: Only 10 Black Students Offered Admission to NYC’s Most Selective Public High School

By dianeravitch
March 20, 2020 //
23

Chalkbeat reports that the number of African American and Hispanic students offered admission to New York City’s elite high schools continued to be very low.

Admissions offers are based on the results of one test given on one day. No other factors are taken into account.

The statistics for next year’s freshman class show sharp disparities:

Only 4.5% of offers went to black students and 6.6% went to Hispanic students, virtually unchanged from last year. Citywide, black and Hispanic students make up almost 70% of enrollment.

Once again, a majority of offers went to white students (25.1%) and Asian students (54%).

The figures were a stark reminder that Mayor Bill de Blasio’s efforts to integrate the schools — which he’s dialed back this year — have failed to win support. In pushing for admission changes, the mayor unsuccessfully lobbied state lawmakers, who must approve any admissions changes to the city’s three largest specialized high schools, Brooklyn Tech, Stuyvesant, and Bronx Science.

At Stuyvesant, the most competitive of the specialized high schools, only 10 offers went to black students and 20 went to Latino students — out of 766 total offers. At Staten Island Technical, only one black student was offered admission, the same number as last year. The number of Hispanic students offered a seat at Stuy dropped to 20 from 33, and at Staten Island Tech, only eight Hispanic students received offers, from 11 the year before.

Mayor

Categories Bill de Blasio, Education Reform, New York City, Testing

The Nation Investigates the Charity of the Gates Foundation and Asks “Who Benefits?”

By dianeravitch
March 20, 2020 //
31

In this must-read article, Tim Schwab reports his investigative journalism into the charities favored by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. He asks, who benefits?

He begins by discussing a three-part Netflix documentary called Inside Bill’s Brain. The film was directed by Davis Guggenheim, who also directed Waiting for “Superman,” the anti-public school, pro-charter school documentary.

Schwab writes:

In the first episode, director Davis Guggenheim underlines Gates’s expansive intellect by interviewing Bernie Noe, described as a friend of Gates.

“That’s a gift, to read 150 pages an hour,” says Noe. “I’m going to say it’s 90 percent retention. Kind of extraordinary.”

Guggenheim doesn’t tell audiences that Noe is the principal of Lakeside School, a private institution to which the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has given $80 million. The filmmaker also doesn’t mention the extraordinary conflict of interest this presents: The Gateses used their charitable foundation to enrich the private school their children attend, which charges students $35,000 a year.

The documentary’s blind spots are all the more striking in light of the timing of its release, just as news was trickling out that Bill Gates met multiple times with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein to discuss collaborating on charitable activities, from which Epstein stood to generate millions of dollars in management fees. Though the collaboration never materialized, it nonetheless illustrates the moral hazards surrounding the Gates Foundation’s $50 billion charitable enterprise, whose sprawling activities over the last two decades have been subject to remarkably little government oversight or public scrutiny.

While the efforts of fellow billionaire philanthropist Michael Bloomberg to use his wealth to win the presidency foundered amid intense media criticism, Gates has proved there is a far easier path to political power, one that allows unelected billionaires to shape public policy in ways that almost always generate favorable headlines: charity….

Describing his approach by turns as “creative capitalism” and “catalytic philanthropy,” Gates oversaw a shift at his foundation to leverage “all the tools of capitalism” to “connect the promise of philanthropy with the power of private enterprise.”

The result has been a new model of charity in which the most direct beneficiaries are sometimes not the world’s poor but the world’s wealthiest, in which the goal is not to help the needy but to help the rich help the needy.

Through an investigation of more than 19,000 charitable grants the Gates Foundation has made over the last two decades, The Nation has uncovered close to $2 billion in tax-deductible charitable donations to private companies—including some of the largest businesses in the world, such as GlaxoSmithKline, Unilever, IBM, and NBC Universal Media—which are tasked with developing new drugs, improving sanitation in the developing world, developing financial products for Muslim consumers, and spreading the good news about this work.

The Gates Foundation even gave $2 million to Participant Media to promote Davis Guggenheim’s previous documentary film Waiting for Superman, which pushes one of the foundation’s signature charity efforts, charter schools—privately managed public schools. This charitable donation is a small part of the $250 million the foundation has given to media companies and other groups to influence the news.

“It’s been a quite unprecedented development, the amount that the Gates Foundation is gifting to corporations…. I find that flabbergasting, frankly,” says Linsey McGoey, a professor of sociology at the University of Essex and author of the book No Such Thing as a Free Gift. “They’ve created one of the most problematic precedents in the history of foundation giving by essentially opening the door for corporations to see themselves as deserving charity claimants at a time when corporate profits are at an all-time high.”

McGoey’s research has anecdotally highlighted charitable grants the Gates Foundation has made to private companies, such as a $19 million donation to a Mastercard affiliate in 2014 to “increase usage of digital financial products by poor adults” in Kenya. The credit card giant had already articulated its keen business interest in cultivating new clients from the developing world’s 2.5 billion unbanked people, McGoey says, so why did it need a wealthy philanthropist to subsidize its work? And why are Bill and Melinda Gates getting a tax break for this donation?

As I wrote, this article is a must-read.

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Education Reform, Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, Philanthropy

Politico: What’s Known, What’s Not Known about the Epidemic

By dianeravitch
March 19, 2020 //
62

Politico has done some great reporting about the global pandemic that’s changed our lives. I recommend you read that summary of what we know, what we don’t know.

https://www.politico.com/newsletters/politico-nightly-coronavirus-special-edition/2020/03/19/into-the-great-unknown-488634

“We’re not close to the peak. The rate of new cases continues to rise steeply and will explode next week as new testing capacity comes online. On March 12, the U.S. had 1,315 confirmed cases, today 11,723 – that’s a ninefold increase, according to the Covid tracking project.

“— We’re lagging on testing. After the Trump administration promised that 1 million tests would be available, just 103,945 people have been tested so far, up from 9,967 on March 12.
— It’s very contagious. Every person who gets the virus infects about two people, and that’s largely been the case in the U.S., though testing screw-ups are making it hard to track.

“— This is bad and will only get worse. New York’s hospitals said they’d run out of medical supplies in two to three weeks and California’s governor thinks half his population will be infected within eight weeks. That’s a preview of where much of the rest of the country, now in a quiet before the storm period, could be headed.

“— Testing, tracking and social distancing work. South Korea and Singapore have had great success in slowing the spread of the virus by rolling out mass testing, tracking the virus spread and keeping people apart. New cases in South Korea have leveled off. China, which shut down an entire province after the outbreak began there, reported no new cases Wednesday.”

Categories Education Reform

Stuart Egan: Teachers in North Carolina Raised All the Right Issues When They Protested Last Year

By dianeravitch
March 19, 2020 //
2

Stuart Egan, an NBCT high school teacher in North Carolina, reminds us of why teachers protested last year and how the elected officials responded (mostly with silence).

Fortunately, the people of North Carolina have a chance to change the state’s direction by electing a genuine and experience advocate for public education as state superintendent: Jen Mangrum won the Democratic nomination and she will campaign vigorously to restore the state’s once-esteemed public schools as great places for students and teachers and communities.

If you live in North Carolina and you are tired of politicians tearing down the public schools and shifting public money to entrepreneurs and religious schools, vote for Jen Mangrum in November.

Categories Education Reform, North Carolina, Supporting public schools
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