Archives for category: New York
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Carol Burris: SUNY’s Absurd Proposal to Allow Charters to Certify Their Own Teachers

By dianeravitch
July 30, 2017 //
32

Carol Burris, veteran teacher and principal, author and executive director of the Network for Public Education, here analyzes the proposal by the charter committee of the State University of New York to allow charter schools to hire uncertified teachers and to do their own certifying. Among other problems, this insults the education faculty of SUNY, as well as the New York Board of Regents, which sets high standards for new public school teachers in the state. The charter committee includes no educators; its members were appointed by Governor Cuomo.

Burris writes:

The proposed regulations by the State University of New York (SUNY) Board for charter school teacher certification have been posted. The SUNY Board should hang its head in shame. These regulations eliminate nearly all NYS requirements, requirements they themselves have endorsed under the new TEACH certification regulations.

While this proposal may further the political interests of the Governor who appointed 15 of the 18 Board members, and who has received millions in contributions from charter school board members, it does so at the expense of the children who attend the charter schools SUNY authorizes.

In a nutshell, turn up at a charter school door with a bachelors’ degree, and you can become a certified teacher in weeks.

According to the proposed regulations:

· Prospective charter teachers would be required to take only 30 hours of instruction (the equivalent of less than 4 days) by someone who holds a Master’s Degree, including an uncertified teacher whose students got good scores on state tests. (Yes, that nuttiness is written into the regulation.) The 30 hours do not even have to be “real” hours—SUNY’s proposed regulation defines an instructional hour as at least 50 minutes. Instruction can even be provided via video, as long as there is some face to face time.

· For a second certification—only six more hours is all that is required.

· The candidate needs 100 hours of field experience under the supervision of an experienced teacher. That teacher can be uncertified as long as they are a two-year, TFAer, anyone who has taught for 3 years and received satisfactory evaluations, or a university professor. Contrast this field experience requirement with that of SUNY’s Stony Brook University which requires a 75 day internship with a certified teacher. The State Education Department requires a minimum of 40 days.

· The teacher would be eligible to teach in SUNY authorized charters only, essentially relegating them to an indentured servant status. They would be unable to leave for public schools with better pay and better working conditions unless they went through a traditional program which would be very difficult, if not impossible, given the long days required by charter schools.

Speak out and let SUNY know that you are opposed to the proposed regulations. Let them know every New York child deserves a well-trained, qualified teacher.

Sign the Network for Public Education’s petition: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/every-child-deserves-a-well-prepared-teacher?clear_id=true

Call: Ralph A. Rossi II, at (518) 455-4250

Send an e-mail to charters@suny.edu

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, New York, Teacher Education, Teachers and Teaching

Do You Think Every Child Deserves a Qualified Teacher?

By dianeravitch
July 25, 2017 //
34

The charter school committee of the State University of New York will soon decide whether charter schools will be allowed to hire uncertified teachers. This is a bad idea because teachers must be prepared for a wide variety of children, including children with disabilities and English language learners. Of course, if charter schools are private schools, then it doesn’t matter whether their teachers are well prepared because they are unlikely to encounter the same students as in public schools.

If you think that every child deserves a well-qualified teacher, please send an email to the members of the SUNY charter committee, all of whom were appointed by Governor Andrew Cuomo. The linked message from the Network for Public Education makes it easy to send an email.

Categories Charter Schools, Network for Public Education, New York, Teachers and Teaching

A Teacher Who Often Criticizes His Union Says It Is Time to Stand Strong Together

By dianeravitch
July 12, 2017 //
17

Arthur Goldstein, a high school teacher in Queens, New York, has often criticized the UFT for not taking the militant stands that Arthur prefers. But now, he says, it is time to stand together and fight. Unions are facing an existential threat to their existence. The Rightwing billionaire Robert Mercer is behind an effort to call a state constitutional convention. Arthur knows what Mercer has in mind: stealing the hard-earned pensions of working people.

Goldstein writes:

“This is problematic for those of us who envision a retirement in which we don’t have to check prices of canned cat food before purchasing it for lunch…

“This is a very real threat, and not just for senior teachers. Our pensions are already under attack by national reformies, and folks like Mercer would probably like nothing better than to do away with them utterly. Right now, the only solid entity I know that’s fighting this is our union and AFL-CIO. That’s why I went before my staff and made my own pitch for COPE this year, and that’s why I signed up another 80-plus members.

“I would not be able to sleep at night if I weren’t doing my bit to fight Mercer and like-minded reformies. While some of my friends disagree, I will continue to push COPE for now. Hey, if we win in November, maybe we can reconsider. But a country controlled by Donald Trump and his thugs is a very dangerous place for working people. While I frequently disagree with union leadership, this is one area in which I don’t want their hands tied.

“To them, I say fight this vigorously. Too frequently I see UFT leadership fall down when no one pushes them. They can’t afford to do that now. We need to not only support them in this, but also to monitor their actions and progress.”

Categories Billionaires, New York, Pensions, Resistance, Teachers, Unions

New York: Charter Schools Win Power to Hire Non-Professional “Teachers”

By dianeravitch
July 11, 2017 //
50

Blogger Peter Goodman reports that a last-minute deal was struck in the closing hours of the legislative session in New York State. Charter schools authorized by the State University of New York (which includes Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academy schools) will not be required to hire professional, certified teachers. This is yet more evidence that charter schools are not public schools. Teachers in public schools must be professionals, with appropriate professional education and certification. To become a public school teacher, applicants must pass three different tests.

Goodman writes:

“Within days of the end of the special session of the state legislature the SUNY Board of Trustees approved a new regulation – teachers in SUNY authorized charter schools are no longer required to be certified by the State Department of Education – charter school networks can now self-certify teachers: no college courses, no student teaching, no pre-service tests. Politico writes,

“New York City’s charter school sector appears to have secured a significant victory in the 11th hour of the Legislative session Wednesday night, with a set of regulations that will make it much easier for large charter networks to hire more uncertified teachers.

“All other teachers must complete a program approved by the state education department as well as meet CAEP Standards (Council on the Accreditation Of Education Programs) and pass three separate tests: the edTPA (a self-assessment developed by Stanford), Educating All Students (multiple choice and essay test emphasizing teaching children with disabilities and English language learners) and a Content Specialty Test, also multiple choice and essay testing knowledge and literacy within their area of expertise. SUNY teachers would not have to meet ANY of these requirements.”

Charters are already free to hire as much as 30% of staff from uncertified persons.

Bottom line: the public schools have genuine standards for teachers. The charters authorized by SUNY have no standards at all for their teachers.

Categories Charter Schools, New York, Teachers

Exposed: Wall Street Money Pays Democratic Clique to Help GOP Control State Senate

By dianeravitch
June 10, 2017 //
25

New York is a blue state but has a divided legislature. Democrats control the Assembly, and Republicans control the State Senate. Republicans are not the majority of the State Senate. They are in power because of a small group of renegade Democrats who vote with the Republicans. They are called the Independent Democratic Caucus, and they hold the balance of power. Governor Andrew Cuomo likes the divided legislature, as it enhances his power.

The Alliance for Quality Education (AQE) investigated the IDC and discovered the source of their ample funding: Hedge fund managers and equity investors who favor charter schools and privatization.

Its report, called “Pay to Play: Charter Schools and the IDC,” lays out the political contributions that fuel the IDC campaigns:

“The IDC received $676,850 from charter school political donors.

“Over the past six years, the Independent Democratic Conference, a group of breakaway Democrats who support Republican control of the New York State Senate, have received $676,850 from charter school political donors. These political donors, including hedge fund managers and their political action committees, have been rewarded by the IDC as seen in the 2017 state budget where privately-
run charter schools got much larger funding increases per pupil than public schools. The IDC-Republican advocacy for privately-run charter schools at the expense of public schools runs counter to the IDC’s public pronouncements that they are championing public school funding and the Campaign for Fiscal Equity. The IDC is empowering pro-privatization, pro-Trump Republicans to run the State Senate even though it hurts the more than one million public school students they represent.

“The table below is lists the charter school-af liated individual and political action donations made to IDC members and to committees speci cally bene ting the IDC.

“Senators Hamilton and Peralta are not included in the list of IDC members shown below. Senator Jesse Hamilton joined the IDC on November 7, 2016. Senator Jose Peralta joined in January 2017. The two senators however, have a long history of receiving donations from the charter industry. Over the years, the donations they received come to a total of $ 11,500 for and $26,500 for Peralta. This money is in addition to the total shown in this report.”

Open the link to see the list of donors.

Why does this connection matter?

A Republican Senate can be relied on to prevent tax increases on the wealthy. This matters to them even more than charter schools. Bottom line: the 1% prefer charters instead of tax increases to pay for smaller classes, early childhood education, and the services that would help children and public schools.

Categories Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corporate Reform, New York

Leonie Haimson: Why New York’s ESSA Plan is a Nightmare for the Neediest Students

By dianeravitch
June 7, 2017 //
12

Please read Leonie Haimson’s description of student testimony against New York state’s ESSA plan.

Commissioner of Elia represents the old discredited model of NCLB, RTTT, and Test-based accountability. Isn’t 17 years of failure enough?

Categories Accountability, New York, Students, Testing

Massive Data Breach Announced by New York State Education Department

By dianeravitch
May 21, 2017 //
18

The New York State Education Department sent out the following notice to all principals in the state:

The Department has learned that Edmodo, Inc., a learning platform used by many schools and districts across the State, has suffered a security incident that potentially affects the accounts of Edmodo users. Edmodo’s platform was hacked and the user names, email addresses, and hashed passwords of about millions of account users were acquired by an unknown, unauthorized third party.

The Department is using this communication to ask districts to instruct their Edmodo users to reset their passwords immediately, and to warn them to be vigilant about phishing attacks that may result from this incident. Users who use the same password on multiple sites should be encouraged to change them on those sites as well. To reset a password on the Edmodo platform, users should: 1. Go to the Edmodo website and log in to your account. 2. Click on the “Password Reset” link in the notice at the top of the page. 3. Enter their current password, and then create a new password. Questions about resetting passwords should be directed to the Support Help Center on the Edmodo website.

Please remember that any unauthorized access to a student’s personally identifiable information should be reported to SED’s Chief Privacy Officer at Privacy@NYSED.gov.

Presumably someone will find a fix and patch whatever went wrong.

Given the constant hacking these days, we can safely assume that someone will hack into the system again. And again. And again.

The massive hack by a group who call themselves “The Shadow Brokers” disrupted computers all over the world, locked them up, and unlocked them for ransom money.

Nothing online is secure.

It is time to start thinking seriously about solutions to the invasion of privacy. Better security is one solution, but for every new lock, there is a better lock-picker. Think about it.

Categories New York, Privacy and Privacy Rights, Technology

Bianca Tanis: New York’s New Standards Are Bad News for Young Children

By dianeravitch
May 19, 2017 //
26

Bianca Tanis is a teacher of special education in a K-2 classroom in the Hudson Valley of New York. She is also a member of the board of NYSAPE (New York State Allies for Parents and Educators), the statewide group that has led the Opt Out movement.

In this post, she excoriates New York’s new standards and says the New York State Education Department ignored the voices of early childhood educators. From the perspective of young children, she says, the standards are fundamentally flawed.

She writes, in part:

We should never have to fight for the right of children to play. Nor should we have to fight for them to spend more than 20 minutes at recess. Instruction should never come at the expense of the creative, spontaneous, and joyful exploration of 4- and 5-year olds. But, increasingly, it does. With the unveiling of New York State’s “Next Generation of English Language Arts and Mathematics Standards,” the struggle to maintain these experiences for young learners—already underway—will intensify.

When New York’s Education Department released the draft standards last September, Commissioner MaryEllen Elia claimed they represented substantive change. Yet most revisions consisted of minor tweaks to language and placement. There were very few shifts in content, and the Common Core anchor standards remained mostly intact. The latest iteration walks back any positive content changes, increasing the rigor of the prekindergarten through second-grade grade standards over and above the draft released in September, and moving some first-grade standards to kindergarten.

While many policymakers profess their commitment to play-based learning and meeting the needs of the whole child, their actions say otherwise. This problem is not unique to New York. But in a state with one of the largest parent uprisings against high-stakes reform and the arbitrary imposition of rigor on child-centered practice, Elia’s reaction is disturbing. She and the New York Education Department have missed an opportunity to deliver developmentally appropriate learning standards that align with early childhood’s robust evidence base.

They’ve also systematically denied teachers who work with young children the chance to advocate for their students and reasonable expectations for development as well as practice that engages them in the critical early years of learning.

Although some teachers working with children in prekindergarten through second grade took part in the review, their voices were marginalized. Not a single early educator was a member of the Standards Review Leadership and Planning team. None were facilitators, or on any of the advisory panels that made the final revisions.

Those who took part in the original standards revision work in August of 2016 were so dissatisfied with the process that they ultimately requested the formation of an early learning task force. These outspoken educators were barred from serving on the 32-member committee, of which only a quarter were early educators.

It’s easy to understand why they were largely excluded from this process. In a room full of teachers working with prekindergartners to second-graders, you would be hard-pressed to find consensus around the idea that all kindergartners should “read with purpose and understanding”—an expectation that Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Common Core Task Force report cited as concerning to early childhood experts.

Ten out of 14 members of the PreK-2 review committee issued a letter of dissent, expressing concern that the number of skills included in the revised standards would make it difficult to find time for play-based and child-led learning.

Categories Accountability, Childhood, Pre-K, K, Common Core, New York, Testing

Good News: Supporters of Public Schools Elected to School Board in Ossining, New York

By dianeravitch
May 17, 2017 //
5

I know this may seem like small potatoes after the devastating loss in Los Angeles. But it is good news. Two strong supporters of public schools were elected to the school board in Ossining, New York. One is Lisa Rudley, a co-founder of New York State Allies for Public Education, and a leader of the successful Opt Out movement. Her running mate was Diana Lemon, a local civic leader. Both are parents of children in the district schools.

Lisa describes who they are in this letter to the editor, written before the election.

Step by step, district by district, we will take our country back from those who would destroy our public institutions and treat our children as data points.

Categories New York, Opt Out, Parents, Supporting public schools

New York: One Week from Today, Your Chance to Elect a Teacher to the State Assembly on Long Island: CHRISTINE PELLEGRINO!

By dianeravitch
May 16, 2017 //
0

New Yorkers who live on Long Island in District 9 should vote a week from today in a special election.

Christine Pellegrino, a Democrat, is running against Tom Gargulio, a Conservative Party member from Babylon.

Christine is the real deal. She is a mother, a teacher, a leader in the Opt Out Movement, and a member of the BATs. She was a Bernie Sanders delegate to the Democratic National Convention. She has been endorsed by Our Revolution (Bernie Sanders’ group), NYSUT, and the New York Progressive Action Network.

Christine lives in West Islip, Long Island. She has been a teacher in the Baldwin school district for 25 years.

She is a staunch advocate for public schools. She will be a voice of experience and reason in the State Assembly, speaking for kids and public schools.

She opposes high-stakes testing to evaluate students, teachers, or schools. She supports education geared to the whole child, not testing geared only to basic skills.

Go to her website, pellegrinoforassembly.com. Volunteer, donate, do whatever you can.

But above all, if you live in District 9 on Long Island in New York, turn out to vote for Christine a week from today, May 23!

Categories Accountability, New York, Opt Out, Testing
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