Archives for category: Education Reform
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Connecticut: Reformers Take Aim at Charter Critics in Next Week’s Primaries

By dianeravitch
August 6, 2016 //
16

Jonathan Pelto reports on the latest chapter in the corporate reform movement in Connecticut. Bear in mind that Connecticut has one of the best school systems in the nation.

But reformers are unhappy. They want more charters. They know they won’t get them by appealing to the public. So, they are entering political campaigns to try to oust the elected officials who don’t like charters. The hedge fund managers have moved in with their political operation, DFER. And other groups have been created to give the veneer of grassroots support, which the charter industry never has, unless they pay for it.

Pelto explains the background:

Change Course CT, a front-group for Democrats for Education Reform, was formed on July 18, 2016.

Charters Care, a new appendage of the Northeast Charter School Network, was formed a few days earlier on July 13, 2016.

Both Democrats for Education Reform and the Northeast Charter School Network are corporate-funded charter school advocacy groups based in New York City and both receive the bulk of their money from the billionaires and millionaires who are trying to privatize public education in the United States.

According to forms filed with the Connecticut State Elections Enforcement Commission, all the funds collected by Change Course CT come from Education Reform Now Advocacy, a non-profit 501 (c) 4 corporation that is operated in conjunction with New York City based Democrats for Education Reform Now and Education Reform Now.

Signing the official documents on behalf of Change Course CT has been Jenna A. Klaus, who appears to be the daughter of Jeff Klaus and Dacia Toll. Toll is the CEO of Achievement First, Inc., the large charter school management company that owns and operates charter schools in New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island. In addition to collecting the bulk of the $110 million in Connecticut taxpayer funds paid to charter schools, Achievement First, Inc. earned its infamy from suspending record numbers of kindergarteners in an apparent attempt to push out children who don’t fit the company’s limited definition of appropriate students. Jeff Klaus is a regional president for Webster Bank and can often be found, throughout the day, attacking education advocates and posting pro-charter school comments on various Connecticut media websites.

The Charters Care election documents are being signed by Christopher Harrington, the Connecticut Policy Manager for the Northeast Charter School Network and the PACs money has come from OxyContin’s Jonathan Sackler and from yet another New York based corporate education front group called Real Reform Now.

Not surprisingly, Jonathan Sackler, a Greenwich, Connecticut multi-millionaire is one of Governor Dannel Malloy’s biggest campaign contributors and is on the Board of both the Northeast Charter Schools Network and Achievement First, Inc., as well as, being the founder and board member of ConnCAN, Connecticut’s leading pro-charter school lobbying group.

The charter school industry has spent in excess of $9 million lobbying on behalf of Governor Malloy’s charter school and education reform agenda.

As reported in the local press, Connecticut will hold Democratic primaries for its General Assembly next week, and corporate reformers plan to take out critics of charter schools and privatization.

Pelto has been warning about the big money forces and their alliance with Governor Dannell Malloy.

As we are seeing in states across the nation, such as Washington, Tennessee, and Massachusetts, corporate reformers are now using their money to knock out those who get in their way.

They failed abjectly in Tennessee, where every one of their school board candidates in Nashville lost. If the public is informed, they can be defeated everywhere. But it requires a strong grassroots effort to explain that the word “reform” is a synonym for privatization, budget cuts, union-busting, and driving out experienced teachers.

Categories Charter Schools, Connecticut, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization

Florida: What’s the Trouble with Teachers?

By dianeravitch
August 6, 2016 //
46

At last, an article in the mainstream media that tries to understand why teachers are troubled! It’s not the New York Times or the Washington Post, but still…it’s in print.

Roger Williams of the Fort Meyers, Florida, Weekly titled “Troubled Teachers.” He dwells at length on the stresses that have changed the nature of teaching, not for the better.

Williams interviews many teachers, who tell him what is happening in their classrooms.

“At least one disturbing conclusion can be drawn from what they tell us: Teachers now face what is arguably the most difficult and demanding stampede of challenges in the contemporary history of public education. And that’s not good for students who face, in turn, a range of contemporary social challenges they might not have experienced en masse in previous generations.

“For teachers, there is less time than ever before to teach, they say. There is data crunching and lack of trust and constant state-mandated testing of stressed students. Teacher evaluations and one-year contracts are based on the success of students as measured in tests created by people who don’t teach. There is pay that will not cover the costs of education and family life.

“In the face of all this, what makes a great teacher, we asked them — and conversely, what makes it difficult to be a great teacher? Why are so many leaving a profession so essential to our futures?

“Teachers are ill-prepared for the demands of the current system. So it’s not just a matter of how to make better teachers. It’s also how teachers are made to work within their system now,” says Sandy Stenoff, co-founder of The Opt Out Florida Network, a grass-roots organization based in Orlando that advocates a variety of assessments instead of a single, state-mandated test.

“If you look at other professions, the ‘masters’ all have one thing in common,” she adds: “Excellent mentorship — an expert under whom they really trained, learned the best ‘techniques.’ Doctors, lawyers, even craftsmen.

“We don’t do that in education anymore. It would help to reduce attrition, too. But expert teachers are leaving. They can’t teach the way they know teaching works best.”

Never before have state and federal governments imposed their will so forcefully in every public school classroom. Their often I’ll-advised intrusions aim for standardization, making teachers and students alike unhappy.

Williams writes:

“If the system has massive weaknesses right now, it also has very good people, it seems — people who advocate passionately, even when they leave.

“Can all this be changed? Yes,” says Bruce Linser, a musical theater teacher and outgoing dean of dramatic arts at the Alexander W. Dreyfoos School of the Arts in West Palm Beach.

“I think we need fewer administrators and more teachers. We need fewer people telling us how to do our jobs, and more people who know how to do this, and want and love to do this, being allowed to do this. Without all the strings and standardization. I’m not arguing against oversight, I think that’s important. There are things that need to be taught and learned and I totally agree with that.”

“But all the extra duties of teachers — the extra programs and management requirements — inhibit the teaching they’re called to do.”

Low pay and lack of respect are part of the reason for teacher discontent. Florida ranks 39th in the nation in teacher pay, and many teachers must work a second job to make ends meet.

Very likely, one of the reasons that hedge fund managers and billionaires look down on teachers is because they are paid so little. Instead of recognizing that teachers sacrifice financial security for being in a career that makes a difference, the 1% simply don’t understand why people choose to teach and feel justified in trying to redesign education and teachers’ working conditions.

Categories Education Reform, Florida, Teachers and Teaching

New Jersey Mandates PARCC as High School Graduation Requirement

By dianeravitch
August 6, 2016 //
19

Governor Chris Christie made a big deal of pretending to get rid of Common Core, but he tenaciously stayed with PARCC, the federal test of the Common Core standards. Now the state board of education has voted to make PARCC a high school graduation test, starting in 2021.

https://www.tapinto.net/towns/south-brunswick-cranbury/sections/education/articles/south-brunswick-opting-out-of-parcc-testing-no

This is insane.

To begin with, no standardized test should be a high school graduation test. They are normed on a bell curve, which guarantees a high failure rate. The children who do not receive a diploma will disproportionately consist of children of poverty (most of whom are African-American and Hispanic), children with disabilities, and English language learners.

Next, it is clear that the PARCC test produces high failure rates. Most students in New Jersey failed it last year. Only about 25% passed the algebra and geometry tests; only 40% of high school students passed the 11th grade ELA tests.

http://www.nj.com/education/2016/08/new_jersey_parcc_results_2016_released.html

What plans has the state made for the tens of thousands of students who will not get a high school diploma?

Please, ACLU and Education Law Center: Sue New Jersey to stop this travesty, this injustice towards children.

Categories Common Core, Education Reform, High School Graduation, New Jersey, Testing

NYSAPE: Did New York Manipulate Tests to Get Higher Scores?

By dianeravitch
August 5, 2016 //
7

New York State Allies for Public Education reviewed the recently released test scores and found curious anomalies. The group–which represents more than 50 other organizations–issued this statement.

http://www.nysape.org/nysape-pr-score-analysis.html

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: August 5, 2016

NYS Allies for Public Education (NYSAPE) http://www.nysape.org
More information contact:
Lisa Rudley (917) 414-9190
Kevin Glynn (631) 291-2905
Bianca Tanis (845) 389-0722
Email: nys.allies@gmail.com

Did NYSED Manipulate Test Scores to Boost Proficiency?

Parents Demand Explanation of Anomalies in State Test Data and the Immediate Release of Suppressed Test Information

New data reveals that the percentage of raw points necessary to achieve a proficient performance (level 3) were lower on eleven out of the twelve 2016 NYS Common Core tests.

After analyzing the raw score to scaled score conversion charts that NYSED provides, advocates are asking whether NYSED has manipulated the raw score to scale score conversion in order to increase proficiency rates this year​ as the department did in the past under former NYS Commissioner of Education, Richard Mills.

While Commissioner Elia can factually claim that the “cut scores” have not changed this year, the percentage of raw points (also called raw scores) needed to receive a scale score associated with proficient performance were lowered across the board.

[Open link above to see graph Revised Cut Score Raw Percent]

​​An analysis provided by ​Michael O’Donnell of the New Paltz Board of Education as well as the chart below form the basis for concern.

[Again, open he link above for graph Percent of Raw Points Change.jpg]

Slight, annual changes in the raw scores required to achieve a given scale score are to be expected. This is a process called “equating,” which is routinely used in the administration and scoring of all standardized tests to reflect fluctuations in test difficulty. Compared to the implementation of Common Core-based state tests in 2013, however, the 2016 conversion charts show atypically large decreases in the raw scores required to be deemed proficient, especially in math. This could indicate that the 2016 tests were significantly more difficult than previous years. However, Commissioner Elia has repeatedly stated that the content of the 2016 tests was comparable to previous years in terms of rigor.

The use of test scores for high stakes accountability decisions makes test scores vulnerable to manipulation ​in order to serve political purposes. Maintaining the same “cut scores” from year to year while artificially decreasing the number of raw points needed achieve a scale score in the proficient performance range could result in inflated passing rates.

Given NYSED’s attempt to increase passing rates through the practice of untimed assessments and the State’s failure to maintain any data on the number, demographics, and performance of students who availed themselves of additional time, the state is admittedly unable to attribute or explain any increases in scores.

Michael O’Donnell, public school parent and New Paltz Board of Education member stated, “Assessment proficiency rates, in addition to not being reflective of college readiness or grade-level skills, are now not comparable to previous years’ results and have been subject to aggressive manipulation. It is hard to find any utility in these data.”

“The State seems to be doing everything it can to convince parents that these tests and the flawed standards they are based on are educationally sound. Year after year, 60 percent of our children are labeled as failing when we know this is simply not true. Increases in test scores based on inappropriate standards are meaningless, even more so if they have been manipulated to placate the public. We demand fully funded schools, equitable learning opportunities for our children, and an end to test and punish policies,” said Johanna Garcia, NYC parent and Co-President of District 6 President’s Council.

“It is foolish to have a conversation focused on data when 22% of students have opted-out. That is a 10% increase over the 20% who opted out last year. NYSED chose to cure flawed tests with fewer questions and unlimited time. When that wasn’t enough, they lowered the requirements for proficiency in a quest to show progress. Politicians gained new talking points, but students lost meaningful classroom time and schools are targeted for punishment because of flawed tests,” said Kevin Glynn, Long Island educator and public school parent.

Eileen Graham, Rochester public school parent and founder of Black Student Leadership said, “These exams have always negatively affected students, schools, and districts. As a black parent, I’m not satisfied with Commissioner Elia’s claims that the changes as they relate to black and Hispanic students are improvements or have created a different experience for this population. It seems she is using that narrative to appease and “trick” the community into believing things got better for the most vulnerable students. This is nonsense and in my opinion, patronizing.”

“The only question is how much the level of distortion goes up each year. Since Common Core-aligned testing began in 2013, SED and test publisher Pearson have depended on keeping information about the construction and quality of the exams hidden from independent review. Given all that has gone wrong over the last four years, it’s no wonder they want to operate in the dark,” said Fred Smith, testing specialist and former administrative analyst for New York City public schools.

“NYSAPE demands the public release of all state test analysis data from 2013-2016 and urges NYSED to account for the unprecedented lowering of the raw scores aligned with proficiency. These anomalies must be explained by Commissioner Elia if the State continues to maintain that state test scores are valid and reliable.

“NYSAPE is a grassroots coalition with over 50 parent and educator groups across the state.”

###

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, New York, Testing

Delaware: Funny Business in State Auditor’s Office re Charter Schools

By dianeravitch
August 5, 2016 //
7

Blogger Exceptional Delaware smells a rat in the State Auditor’s office. An employee named Kathleen Davies was a tad too eager to audit the charter schools’ finances, especially their petty cash. Davies mysteriously was placed on administrative leave. This is the audit you will never see.

It seems Davies was too diligent. She discovered too much. She had to stop. And she was given an extended vacation to stop her investigations of charter school spending. The deal seems to have backfired since her removal is not exactly a secret.

Bear in mind that Delaware is a very reformy state. It won Race to the Top money and is Gung-ho about all Arne Duncan’s bad ideas. Governor Jack Merkell is one of those governors like Cuomo (NY) and Malloy (CT) who embrace corporate reform. He loves the Common Core and charters.

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

Tennessee Civic Group Seeks Investigation of “Stand for Children” as Conduit for Dark Money

By dianeravitch
August 5, 2016 //
18

The local press in Nashville reported recently that the pro-privatization political outfit called “Stand for Children” had amassed a war chest of $200,000 to fund the campaigns of charter advocates for the Metro Nashville school board. Across the state of Tennessee, the Oregon-based SFC was spending $700,000 in state and local races, apparently to assure Continued Republican dominance of the state.

Yesterday a liberal advocacy group and a Metro Nasville parent asked for an investigation of the ties between SFC and the candidates it supports:

“Consumer rights group Tennessee Citizen Action and a Metro Schools parent plan to file a petition requesting an investigation into potential campaign finance violations involving Stand for Children after questions emerged over whether the group illegally coordinated with pro-charter school candidates.”

SFC is now a money-laundering operation for the plutocrats who hope to eliminate public schools. The hedge fund managers, billionaires, and equity investors are pouring money into key school board races across the country, hoping to undermine democracy–since locals who are committed to public schools are vastly outspent–and to promote privatization.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Education Reform, Nashville, Privatization, Stand for Children, Tennessee

EduShyster: A Close Reading of Doug Lemov’s “Teach Like a Champion”

By dianeravitch
August 4, 2016 //
11

EduShyster hosts a guest blogger, Layla Treuhaft-Ali, who demonstrates the results of a close reading of Doug Lemov’s “Teach Like a Champion,” which is required reading in no-excuses charter schools. EduShyster calls it “Teach like It’s 1895.”

She writes:

“The book, and its teaching techniques, looms large for any teacher who works in an urban school. Not only has the TLC model of teaching become a fixture of most *high-performing* charter school networks, but it is increasingly making its way into urban school districts as well. And that’s just the start. Teach Like a Champion’s approach also underlies broad efforts to transform the way teachers are educated, forming the *backbone of instruction* at an expanding number of charter-school-owned teacher education centers like Relay Graduate School of Education and Match’s Sposato School of Education.

”
Teach Like A Champion advertises 49 discrete techniques that teachers can master to raise student achievement and help increase their students’ college readiness, with a strong emphasis on classroom culture and shaping student behavior, down to the most minute actions. As I was reading Teach Like A Champion, I observed something that shocked me. The pedagogical model espoused by Lemov is disturbingly similar to one that was established almost a century ago for the express purpose of maintaining racial hierarchy. Like Teach Like a Champion, this initiative was implemented largely through teacher education and funded and directed entirely by wealthy white businessmen and industrial philanthropists.”

She discovered that Lemov’s teaching philosophy was strikingly similar to the pedagogy of places like the Hampton Institute, where black students were taught to be docile and obedient in preparation for their subservient lives.

“Today, largely white philanthropists pour money into charter schools that place a high value on order, efficiency and discipline, serving children who are almost entirely Black and Latino/a. These wealthy elites are increasingly invested in teacher-training and pedagogy as a means of enacting their vision for minority children. Most disturbingly, this vision heavily emphasizes behavioral norms that are eerily similar to those used a century ago to preserve social hierarchy and prevent students from challenging injustices done to them by the powerful. Every detail of students’ behavior is scrutinized and corrected, even that which would seem to have little to do with children’s academic performance.”

Conformity, docility, obedience. Teach like it’s 1895.

Categories Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Reform, Privatization

Bill Honig: A Good Site for Wisdom about Schools

By dianeravitch
August 3, 2016 //
18

Bill Honig was State Superintendent of Schools in California in the late 1980s. I came to know and admire him at that time. Bill Honig has spent many years dedicated to the improvement of education. He continues to work in schools, providing ideas and support.

He recently created a website to share what he has learned about education.

The site is designed to present the research and experience supporting the “build and support” approach and show why the more extreme measures of the “test and punish” approach haven’t worked. It has 16 short articles about the major issues in the debate including a piece about experience in California and is designed for educational and political policy makers and members of the media. The site provides accessible background, research, and evidence and could be a useful tool. If you read the home page and the introductory remarks you can get the flavor of the effort.

I urge you to read it. Bill is a staunch friend of public education.

Categories Education Reform, Research, Supporting public schools

Andrea Gabor: Will Massachusetts Learn from Michigan’s Disaster with Charters?

By dianeravitch
August 3, 2016 //
20

https://andreagabor.com/remote-login.php?login=99995c3631b250a1e88a2a361708c854&id=17217480&u=4b02cca4a9dd7cab56c5a57171d726e0&h=

Massachusetts is considering lifting the cap on charter schools. This move is being pressed by Republican Governor Charlie Baker and the usual gang of hedge fund managers, entrepreneurs, and free-market ideologues.

Public school parents are rightfully alarmed. Massachusetts is renowned for having the best schools in the nation. It is the birthplace of public education. This is where Horace Mann, as the state’s first Secretary of Education, persuaded his fellow citizens that the entire community would benefit by supporting the education of the young in common schools.

Now, almost 200 years later, a coterie of faux reformers want to destroy the great public school system that Horace Mann built and that millions of taxpayers have sustained. These so-called reformers believe that Horace Mann was wrong. They want taxpayers to fund privately managed schools, chain schools run by corporate entities.

Andrea Gabor, professor of business journalism at Baruch College of the City University of New York, writes here that Massachusetts should learn from the “calamity” caused by charter school expansion in Michigan.

She analyzes a study by David Arsen of Michigan State University that shows how the growth of charters affects the remaining public schools. (Jennifer Berkshire, who blogs as EduShyster, interviewed Arsen about his study, which is cited by Gabor.)

The charter landscape in Detroit is so bad it makes New Orleans, which has the largest concentration of charters in the country and, a decade after Hurricane Katrina, more than a few growing pains—see here and here and here and here look like a well oiled machine. While there is little transparency or regulation in either city, Detroit has so many charter authorizers that when a school’s charter is revoked for poor quality—as has often happened—they need only go shopping for a new authorizer; New Orleans, by contrast, has had only two main authorizers.

Arsen’s study, which looked at every school district in Michigan with at least 100 students and followed them for nearly two decades, found “that 80 percent of the explained variation in district fiscal stress is due to changes in districts’ state funding, to enrollment changes including those associated with school choice policies, and to the enrollment of high-cost, special education students.”

To put it simply, Arsen told Berkshire: We found that, overwhelmingly, the biggest financial impact on school districts was the result of declining enrollment and revenue loss, especially where school choice and charters are most prevalent.”

Arsen points out that Michigan has one of the most “highly centralized school finance systems” in the country. “[T]he state sets per pupil funding levels for each district, and most operating revenues follow students when they move among districts or charter schools. Districts have very limited authority to raise additional tax revenues for school operations from local sources.” Consequently, when enrollments decline, either because families move out of the district or put their children in charter schools, local authorities have little choice but to reduce spending.

Arsens study….shows that the impact of this funding formula hits the mostly African-American central cities the hardest, with a 46 percent drop in inflation-adjusted school funding revenue between 2002 and 2013.

Bottom line: as charters grow, they suck the resources and the life out of nearby public schools. They are like a parasite that kills its host unless it is contained or removed.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Detroit, Education Industry, Education Reform, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Orleans, Privatization

Peter Greene: What is “$tand for Children”?

By dianeravitch
August 1, 2016 //
23

Yesterday we learned that billionaires have assembled a fund of $725,000 (so far) to defeat Washington state Supreme Court justice Barbara Madsen. The money is being funneled mostly through a group called “Stand for Children.”

Why are the billionaires eager to oust Judge Madsen? She wrote the 6-3 decision in 2015 that declared that charter schools are not public schools under the Washington state constitution and are not eligible to receive public funding devoted solely to democratically governed public schools. For daring to thwart their insistence on charter schools, the billionaires decided that Judge Madsen had to go.

But what is this group “Stand for Children” that is a willing handmaiden to the whims of billionaires who hate public schools?

Peter Greene explains its origins as a social justice organization some 20 years ago, founded by Jonah Edelman, the son of civil rights icon Marian Wright Edelman and equity advocate Peter Edelman. Josh’s pedigree was impeccable, and Stand for Children started as a new and promising civil rights organization.

But somewhere along the way, SFC took a radical change of course. It began receiving buckets of money from the Gates Foundation and the Walton Foundation. By 2010, Oregon SFC was advocating charters, cybercharters, and a reduction in the capital gains tax. Flush with reformer cash, it became active in many states, opposing unions, supporting charters, removing teacher job security.

Strange.

The apple has fallen very far from the tree.

SFC endorsed the anti-public school, anti-union propaganda film “Waiting for Superman.”

SFC crowed about pushing legislation in Illinois that would cripple the Chicago Teachers Union. It opened a campaign in Massachusetts to reduce teacher tenure and seniority rules, threatening a referendum unless the unions gave concessions. Jonah Edelman boasted at the Aspen Ideas Festival in 2011 about his role in spending millions, hiring the best lobbyists, and defeating the unions.

Be sure to read the 2011 article by Ken Libby and Adam Sanchez called “For or Against Children? The Problematic History of Stand for Children.” They captured the beginning of the transition of the organization to a full-fledged partner of the billionaire reformers.

Old friends, now disillusioned, call Stand for Children “Stand ON Children.”

Greene lists the members of the current board. All corporate reformers and corporatists, not a single educator.

Greed is the root of a lot of evil. It turns good people bad if they can’t resist its lure.

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Reform, Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, Illinois, Massachusetts, Stand for Children, Teacher Tenure, Unions
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