Mercedes Schneider has fun with Betsy DeVos’ recent words and deeds.
Archives for category: Education Reform
Eight years ago, I wrote a book about corporate reform and pointed out that the deliberate killing of large high schools had eliminated specialized and very successful programs for students, including advanced classes in math and science, and programs in the arts.
Today, the New York Times observed (too late to matter, too late to save Jamaica High Schoool in Queens or Christpher Columbus in the Bronx) that the Bloomberg-Klein decision to close large high schools and replace them with small schools has effectively destroyed successful music programs. The compensation is supposed to be that the graduation rate is higher in the small schools. But as I reported in my book, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education,” the small schools enroll different students from the large schools they replaced. The neediest students are shuffled off elsewhere.
The Times reports today, in a long article,
“When Carmen Laboy taught music at Christopher Columbus High School in the Bronx, beginning in 1985, there were three concert bands. The pep band blasted “Malagueña” and Sousa marches on the sidelines at basketball games, and floated down Morris Park Avenue during the Columbus Day parade. The jazz band entertained crowds at the Ninth Avenue Food Festival, and even warmed the room at a Citizens Budget Commission awards dinner at the Waldorf Astoria.
“Today, Columbus no longer exists. In its former building, which now houses five small high schools, a music teacher struggles to fill a single fledgling concert band. Working out of Ms. Laboy’s old band room in the basement, Steven Oquendo recruits students for a sole period of band class from his school, Pelham Preparatory Academy, and the others on campus, with their different bell schedules and conflicting academic priorities.
“It does make it much more difficult to teach,” he said. “But we always find a way of making it happen.”
“Between 2002 and 2013, New York City closed 69 high schools, most of them large schools with thousands of students, and in their place opened new, smaller schools. Academically, these new schools inarguably serve students better. In 2009, the year before the city began closing Columbus, the school had a graduation rate of 37 percent. In 2017, the five small schools that occupy its former campus had a cumulative graduation rate of 81 percent.
“But one downside of the new, small schools is that it is much harder for them to offer specialized programs, whether advanced classes, sports teams, or art or music classes, than it was for the large schools that they replaced. In the case of music, a robust program requires a large student body, and the money that comes with it, to offer a sequence of classes that allows students to progress from level to level, ultimately playing in a large ensemble where they will learn a challenging repertoire and get a taste of what it would be like to play in college or professionally.
“In a large concert band, “you’re not the only trumpet player sitting there — there’s seven of you,” said Maria Schwab, a teacher at Public School 84 in Astoria, Queens, who is also a judge at festivals organized by the New York State School Music Association. “And you’re not the only clarinetist, but there’s a contingent of 10. In that large group, there’s a lot of repertoire open to you that would not be open to smaller bands.”
“The new schools chancellor, Richard A. Carranza, himself a mariachi musician, has said that he plans to focus on the arts, which can especially benefit low-income or socioeconomically disadvantaged students, according to the National Endowment of the Arts. A 2012 analysis of longitudinal studies found that eighth graders who had been involved in the arts had higher test scores in science and writing than their counterparts, while high school students who earned arts credits had higher overall G.P.A.s and were far more likely to graduate and attend college.
“The Bronx offers an illustration of how far Mr. Carranza has to go. There, 23 high schools were closed during the Bloomberg era, second only to Brooklyn. Of 59 small schools on 12 campuses that formerly housed large, comprehensive high schools, today only 18 have a full-time music teacher. In many of those, the only classes offered were music survey courses known as general music, or instruction in piano or guitar, or computer classes where students learn music production software. Only eight schools had concert bands, and of those, only five had both beginner and intermediate levels.”
The students with cognitive disabilities are not in the new small schools. The English language learners, the newcomers who speak no English, are gone.
Schools that once enrolled 4,000 students now house five schools, each with an enrollment of 500 or less. Do the math. When you disappear 1500 of 4,000 students, it does wonders for your graduation rate!
You can deduce this from the article, but it is never spelled out plainly. The small schools are not enrolling the same students as the so-called “failing high schools” of 4,000. The subhead of the article reads: “Downside of Replacing City’s Big Failing Schools.” I suggest that the big high schools were not “failing.” They were enrolling every student who arrived at their door, without regard to language or disability.
This is not success. This is a deliberate culling of students that involves collateral damage, not only the shuffling off of the neediest students, but the deliberate killing of the arts, advanced classes, sports, and the very concept of comprehensive high school, all to be able to boast about higher graduation rates for those who survived. A PR trick.
The LAUSD board selected banker Austin Beutner in secretive proceedings.
A complaint has been filed saying that the procedure violated state law.
John Merrow recently served as a judge for the Education Writers Association’s annual reporting awards. While admiring the high quality of journalism that he read, he used his post to excoriate Arne Duncan and Margaret Spellings for a self-serving opinion piece that they wrote in The Washington Post.
“Here’s the story that shouldn’t be ignored: The proponents of disastrous ‘school reform,’ which has given us 20+ years of ‘test and punish’ & such, are now positioning themselves as voices of common sense. Exhibit A is this recent Washington Post column by two former Secretaries of Education, Arne Duncan and Margaret Spellings. One guided the Department under George W. Bush’s “No Child Left Behind,” and other created the infamous “Race to the Top” program.
“Their breath-taking chutzpah begins with the title of the piece: What ails education? ‘An absence of vision, a failure of will and politics.’ But their opening sentence actually tops it: “We have long benefited from a broad coalition that has advanced bold action to improve America’s education system.”
“Just exactly who are the WE that have benefited from the ‘bold action’ that the Secretaries refer to? It’s far easier to identify those who have NOT benefited from “No Child Left Behind” and “Race to the Top.” Let’s start with students, because their performance on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which everyone agrees is education’s ‘gold standard,’ has basically been flat for the 20+ years of Bush and Obama. Next on the list are teachers, whose salaries and morale have declined over the years of increasing reliance on multiple-choice testing and ‘test-and-punish’ policies. Collateral damage has been done to the occupation of teaching, which has lost prestige and now fails to attract enough candidates to fill our classrooms with qualified instructors.
“So that’s–literally–millions of students and teachers who have NOT benefited from the ‘broad coalition’ that Duncan and Spellings are so proud of.”
Who benefitted from the Duncan-Spellings billions and mandates?
Testing corporations. Ideologues who want to fracture public education. Profiteers. “And–surprise–the two former United States Secretaries of Education. One now leads the University of North Carolina higher education system, and the other is one of three Managing Partners of The Emerson Collective, Laurene Powell Jobs’ very wealthy and active education venture.”
Wow.
He then goes on to enumerate the “reformers” who are now backpedaling or mansplaining, all to avoid responsibility for the disasters of the past 20 years. They (including Duncan and Spellings) are the people we need to be reduced from, says Merrow.
This is one of Merrow’s best pieces. He is on a roll.
Justin Parmenter writes here about a state legislator in North Carolina who denounced the teachers who plan to protest on May 16 as “thugs.”
He says, here come the teacher thugs!
He writes:
Brody is right to be concerned about the more than 13,500 thugs who will be storming Raleigh on Wednesday. After all, these thugs bring a very special skill set that make us extraordinarily effective advocates:
We are black belts in sarcasm and penmanship. Just wait til you see our signs.
We can hold our pee all day long.
We reserve a special teacher voice that demands attention.
We are very good at waiting in line (no cutting).
We can go 8 hours without sitting down once. The secret is in the shoes.
Most importantly, these thugs are experts in fact-based arguments.
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Gary Rubinstein has followed the progress of the schools that claim that 100% of their graduates were accepted into four-year universities. What he usually finds is very high rates of attrition. But in the case of YES Prep, he found something more. Students are not allowed to graduate high school unless they have already been accepted into a four-year university. Voila! Success!
Today, Jitu Brown and the Journey for Justice will release a report on the steps of the Supreme Court about the continuing failure to enforce the Brown vs. Board decision of 1954.
Journey for Justice Alliance Releases Myth-Shattering Report “Failing Brown v. Board” that Exposes Deep Inequities in Public Education Across Race and Class
The Report examines course offerings in 12 cities revealing inequities that have remained since the civil rights movement, inspiring call from national organizations for a “new Brown v. Board” decision.
The Journey for Justice Alliance, a national network of community-based organizations in 31 cities, released its report “Failing Brown v. Board” which illuminates just how inequitable public education remains today, largely across racial lines. Through examining course offerings at high schools in 12 cities (and one elementary in Chicago), this report, which is backed by substantial research, shows how black and brown students are denied “access to inspiration” in comparison with their white, more affluent peers. “Failing Brown v. Board” was released on the first day of the “Poor People’s Campaign.”
“In America, inequity is ignored as children in the same city have two completely different educational experiences and the dividing line in many cases is race. Every American child and their family have the right to a high-quality neighborhood public school from grades pre-k through 12. We aren’t asking for a handout in this report, we are demanding a fair return on our tax investment,” said Jitu Brown, National Director of the Journey for Justice Alliance. “Without access to great equitable public schools, we are failing an entire generation of students and their families solely based on the color of their skin and their socioeconomic status.”
This shattering myth report, its findings, and multiple statewide educator walkouts have pushed national and local organizers to call for a “new Brown v. Board” initiative for educational equity. On Monday morning at the steps of the Supreme Courts, the Journey for Justice Alliance, in partnership with the #WeChooseCampaign and the Alliance to Reclaim our Schools (AROS), will release the report and outline planks of the nationwide campaign.
“As parents this report is true to our lived experience. We must have zero tolerance for inequity and demand justice for every child now,” Zakiyah Ansari, a New York public school parent and advocacy director of the Alliance for Quality Education. “We choose equity, not the illusion of school choice”
For members of the press who can’t attend the press conference in person, please email Richard Fowler (Richard@richardmediacompany.com) to schedule a one-on-one interview with one of the participants.
WHAT: Press Conference
WHERE: U.S. Supreme Court, 1 First Avenue NE, Washington DC
WHEN: Monday, May 14th at 9am
WHO: Jitu Brown, National Director, Journey for Justice Alliance,
Randi Weingarten, American Federation of Teachers
Judith Browne Dianis, Executive Director, Advancement Project,
Lily Eskelsen Garcia, President, National Education Association
And the following organizations: NAACP, Alliance for Quality Education NY, Alliance for Education Justice, American Federation of Teachers, Camden Parent’s Union, Dignity in Schools Coalition, Badass Teacher’s Association, Save our Schools
Read the report here.
To all the mothers and grandmothers, have a very happy Mothers’ Day!
As Nancy Bailey writes here, moms and teachers together are powerful!
Here’s to Moms and Teachers: Standing Together for Great Public Schools!
http://www.heraldsun.com/opinion/article210896254.html
Two charter school teachers in Durham, North Carolina, write that their schools are closing on May 16 to join the protest against the Legislature’s underfunding of public schools.
Taylor Schmidt and Morgan Carney, teachers at Central Park Charter School, reflect on their school’s advantages and point out:
“As the 10th largest economy in the nation, North Carolina is currently ranked 39th for per-pupil spending. Public school teachers often reach into their own pocketbooks to buy essentials like pencils and copy paper for overcrowded classrooms, nevermind having the financial support to take 95 sixth graders on a bus to a local farm for project work.
“Adding to these challenges is the broken system of creating and managing charter schools in our state, a system that includes our own school. Soon after we arrived at Central Park, structural shortcomings became apparent. Students of color comprised 81 percent of the demographics of Durham Public Schools in 2013, while students of color at Central Park comprised only 29 percent of the student population. Whereas 66 percent of students in Durham Public Schools were eligible for free and reduced lunch, only 7 percent of CPSC students were eligible for the program.
“This realization led to greater clarity: regardless of our intentions, we had become part of the problem of school resegregation. We petitioned the state to become the first charter school to give weighted lottery preference to economically disadvantaged families. We have changed our policies to provide free and reduced-price lunches and transportation assistance. While there is more work to be done, each year the socioeconomic diversity of our student body better reflects the strengths found in the rich diversity of our community and delivers on the mandate for NC charter schools to provide increased learning opportunities for those most in need.
“In 2018, Central Park is arriving at another moment of clarity. We recognize that, despite positive intentions, we are still part of the problem. As a charter school, we play into a system that has strayed from the original goals. The charter school system has been turned into a Trojan horse that severely underfunds our state’s public schools, creates competition for resources, resegregates our schools, and provides blinders to cover the increasing privatization of North Carolina’s educational institutions through for-profit charter schools. The mission of our school, and the original mission of charter schools, forbid us from staying silent on these issues.
“We intend to actively fight against resegregation of schools by race and class in North Carolina. We stand against privatization, vouchers, and for-profit charter schools, believing passionately that we must serve in collaboration and partnership alongside our communities’ public schools.”
Read more here: http://www.heraldsun.com/opinion/article210896254.html#storylink=cpy
In his regular column at Education Week, Marc Tucker cites Anya Kamenetz’s incisive reporting on “A Nation at Risk” and agrees that the report was fake news. The commission agreed in advance that American education was in decline and cherrypicked facts to prove its conclusion. His column is behind a paywall.
Tucker says that achievement was not in decline at the time the report was written. The American people, he says, were lied to. He cites a contemporaneous report by Daniel Koretz, now at Harvard, then at the Congressional Budget Office, which
“showed that there had indeed been a decline, mainly in high school performance, that had begun in the 1960s. But he reported that this decline ended with the cohort of students that entered school in the late 1960s. As that cohort wended its way through the grades, they continued to do better than their predecessors, and those that followed also did better. Further, Koretz reported, the poor and minority students whose test performance was analyzed showed no dip in performance in the period in which the performance of virtually all other students of all ages was falling.
“Put this picture together and you will see that the American people were lied to. Their children had not been falling off an educational cliff right up to the day the report was released. Instead, the performance of American students had been doing better and better beginning with the cohort of students who had entered school in the late 1960s, FIFTEEN OR SO YEARS before the panel sounded its famous false alarm.”
Tucker notes that at least one observer thought that “A Nation at Risk” was beneficial, but he does not agree.
”At the end of her story, Kamenetz quotes Jim Guthrie, now a professor at Lynn University, who has held many prominent positions in the American education establishment. She asked him what he thought about the lack of evidence presented by the authors of the 1983 report. “My view of it, in retrospect,” he says, “is seldom, maybe never, has a public report been so wrong and done so much good.”
“Let us leave aside the question as to whether the end justifies the means to consider, for a moment, whether Guthrie is right. Is it true that A Nation at Risk has done the United States a world of good? What’s the evidence for that?
“Once again, there is none. For as long as there was a long-term version of NAEP (that is the version in which the items in the assessment did not change over time, permitting valid comparisons over the long haul), the scores of high school students changed only very slightly from the 1970s, when the survey was first administered. The 1970s, you recall, was the decade before A Nation at Risk was released, so this data shows no change in high school performance since the report’s release. From the time that PISA, the international comparison of student achievement administered by the OECD, was first given in the year 2000, to the present, the scores of U.S. students have been steady to slightly falling, while students in a growing number of other countries have been doing better. PISA also surveys high school students. So there is good reason to believe that there has been no improvement in the academic performance of high school students since the release of the report. Guthrie might have been referring to the maelstrom of “reforms” instituted in the United States since A Nation at Risk was released in 1983, but reform is not improvement, and there has been precious little improvement.”
He writes that the negative tone of the report
“delegitimized the teachers and school administrators in our public schools and ushered in policies based on a profound distrust of the very professionals on whom the improvement of the system would depend. The subtext of the “reforms” so much admired by Guthrie and his colleagues is the charge that it is the regular public school teachers, their unions and the school administrators who are responsible for the alleged failure of the country’s schools and reform should be about circumventing or at least weakening their control of the system…
“The attitudes toward teachers and teaching, and the actions that flowed from those attitudes, have led to a steep decline in the number of high school students deciding to be teachers, the long slow relative decline in teacher compensation, the early retirement of many capable teachers, the steady decline in the average tenure of school principals and superintendents and the rise in employment of unqualified teachers. William Bennet, President Reagan’s Education Secretary, famously declared school administrators to be “the blob.” While the United States was busy attacking its education professionals, the countries whose students are now outpacing ours were working hard to raise the status of the profession of teaching by improving compensation, raising standards for entering the profession, creating incentives for the most competent professionals to share their expertise with others and instituting myriad other measures, all of which can be characterized as investing in the profession. Not one of these countries chose to improve their education system by implicitly attacking the competence and commitment of their education professionals. A Nation at Risk set the tone and provided the rationale for all of this.”
He adds:
”Kamenetz closed her report with another observation I have made in this space. She wonders whether, rather than painting a picture in which the report produced important gains in American education despite the failures of American educators, it might be more accurate to paint a picture in which we see American educators succeeding despite the attacks on them stimulated by the report. In this view of the world, one that I think has a lot of merit, we need to see the steady scores of American high school students since the 1970s as a victory. Why? Because they held steady in spite of a substantial increase in the proportion of students living in poverty, recent increases in school segregation by socio-economic status and race, a decrease in the equity of school funding within states and an increase in the spread between teacher compensation and the compensation of others with the same amount of education.“
Tucker closes by saying that our education system needs vast improvement to keep up with a changing world, not by looking to the past, but by looking to a different future to meet new challenges, a future in which all must be well educated.
