How to fix our public schools?

[boutons_deux]

Here's a Repug state allowing private, for-profit/shitty-product charter schools to meet state standards with lower results

Complaints follow charters' changed testing rules

Public school officials are criticizing state Education Secretary Ron Tomalis (http://www.mysanantonio.com/?controllerName=search&action=search&channel=news&search=1&inlineLink=1&query=%22Ron+Tomalis%22) for changing the rules for testing student achievement in charter schools.


In a story published Friday, officials told The Morning Call in Allentown (http://bit.ly/Q1Px1O ) that the changes made it easier for the privately run, publicly funded charter schools to meet state benchmarks for academic progress under the federal No Child Left Behind law.

They also criticized Tomalis for making the change for the 2011-12 school year without getting required federal approval.

Education Department (http://www.mysanantonio.com/?controllerName=search&action=search&channel=news&search=1&inlineLink=1&query=%22Education+Department%22) spokesman Tim Eller (http://www.mysanantonio.com/?controllerName=search&action=search&channel=news&search=1&inlineLink=1&query=%22Tim+Eller%22) says the new rules treat charter schools like school districts for the purpose of judging their performance, because both serve multiple-grade populations.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/article/Complaints-follow-charters-changed-testing-rules-3923542.php#ixzz29BdICL8P


http://www.mysanantonio.com/default/article/Complaints-follow-charters-changed-testing-rules-3923542.php

[boutons_deux]

You've made it abundantly clear that protecting the democratic funding source is what's important.

that unionized teachers fund mostly Dems is secondary for me, but it's PRIMARY for the VRWC/ALEC sociopaths intent on destroying public education while sucking taxpayer dollars into for-profit charter schools.

iow, GFY

[DMC]

kill half of them.

the others will fall in line.
The only real answer that will never happen. Better though is to cut off social funding for dysfunctional people and let them die on their own. If you want to be a lazy fuckstick, go for it. You have the right to die of starvation or be shot for being an idiot. Stop coddling the lazy. This means institute a set of standards, meet them or you're on your own, no school for you. There's a shovel go dig that ditch.

[Wild Cobra]

Does anyone think that the fact that most unionized workers vote democrat by a large margin gives cause that government employees should not be able to form unions?

[ElNono]

Does anyone think that the fact that most unionized workers vote democrat by a large margin gives cause that government employees should not be able to form unions?

What's the rationale behind that? Do you think if they don't form unions, they won't vote democrat?

[Wild Cobra]

What's the rationale behind that? Do you think if they don't form unions, they won't vote democrat?
You ever see the pressure union members exert on each other? You ever read union newsletters? As a collective, the unions do their best to get their membership to vote democrat. That is because it is the democrats who give in to union desires. More money, more tome off, more everything... Try being a conservative as a union member and see if there isn't a single person who tries to get you fired. Conservatives/republicans seldom say anything about their views with other union members. It is dangerous. There is enough pressure, that it probably sways a pretty good percentage.

[ElNono]

You ever see the pressure union members exert on each other? You ever read union newsletters? As a collective, the unions do their best to get their membership to vote democrat. That is because it is the democrats who give in to union desires. More money, more tome off, more everything... Try being a conservative as a union member and see if there isn't a single person who tries to get you fired. Conservatives/republicans seldom say anything about their views with other union members. It is dangerous. There is enough pressure, that it probably sways a pretty good percentage.

So you think if they don't unionize they won't vote democrat?

[Wild Cobra]

So you think if they don't unionize they won't vote democrat?
No, I just think the pressure would be off, and a balance would be restored. unions are also a reason some of us don't seek certain jobs. I would never be able to quantify a number, but I'll bet less conservative minded people do jobs like teaching because they don't want to be part of a union.

I think what upsets me more than the power the union has over the tax payers, is the power that teachers... who are more liberal than conservative... have power over our children's social upbringing.

[ElNono]

No, I just think the pressure would be off, and a balance would be restored. unions are also a reason some of us don't seek certain jobs. I would never be able to quantify a number, but I'll bet less conservative minded people do jobs like teaching because they don't want to be part of a union.

I think what upsets me more than the power the union has over the tax payers, is the power that teachers... who are more liberal than conservative... have power over our children's social upbringing.

What is this 'balance'? You're not really making much sense, IMO.

As far as teaching, I'm grateful to anything that prevents a dumbfuck like you from ruining kid's lives, tbh.

[Wild Cobra]

What is this 'balance'? You're not really making much sense, IMO.

As far as teaching, I'm grateful to anything that prevents a dumbfuck like you from ruining kid's lives, tbh.
You just don't know how to have a civil conversation. Do you?

Well, I don't like having dumfucks like you teaching kids either.

[Nbadan]

that unionized teachers fund mostly Dems is secondary for me, but it's PRIMARY for the VRWC/ALEC sociopaths intent on destroying public education while sucking taxpayer dollars into for-profit charter schools.

iow, GFY

Believe it or not, some math and science teachers would probably make more money in an all charter school system but overall, better charter schools would suck up all the better teachers and the majority of everyone else would suck...

[ElNono]

You just don't know how to have a civil conversation. Do you?

Sure I do. I have civil conversations with a lot of posters here all the time. I choose not to have them with you.


Well, I don't like having dumfucks like you teaching kids either.

I'm not in the teaching business. You have nothing to be concerned about.
That said, when people bitch and moan about those :cry meanie liberal teachers :cry the likelihood is that they're simply shitty parents.

[Wild Cobra]

That said, when people bitch and moan about those :cry meanie liberal teachers :cry the likelihood is that they're simply shitty parents.
Really?

Is that your informed opinion?

How many children do you have in the US public school system?

[ElNono]

Really?

Yeah...

[DMC]

Does anyone think that the fact that most unionized workers vote democrat by a large margin gives cause that government employees should not be able to form unions?

Ergo since most in the military vote Republican the military should not be allowed to vote since they are voting for their own welfare.

[Wild Cobra]

Ergo since most in the military vote Republican the military should not be allowed to vote since they are voting for their own welfare.
Does the military have a union type group they pay to change their working conditions, that contributes to the political process, and sends them newsletters telling them who the best candidate is?

[DMC]

Does the military have a union type group they pay to change their working conditions, that contributes to the political process, and sends them newsletters telling them who the best candidate is?

It doesn't matter. You cannot tell people they cannot unionize. So big business can pay lobbyists to change their working conditions but individuals cannot have collective strength if they are federally employed? There's no "union" box on the ballot, so each person can still vote their own choice and being in a union doesn't equate to more votes.

With all the bailouts, many auto and bank employees are technically federal employees, and don't you believe that they get told who to vote for in order to keep their benefits and union bargaining power?

Should there be no black federal workers since blacks mostly vote Democrat and the president himself is black?

I don't get your point.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

You ever see the pressure union members exert on each other? You ever read union newsletters? As a collective, the unions do their best to get their membership to vote democrat. That is because it is the democrats who give in to union desires. More money, more tome off, more everything... Try being a conservative as a union member and see if there isn't a single person who tries to get you fired. Conservatives/republicans seldom say anything about their views with other union members. It is dangerous. There is enough pressure, that it probably sways a pretty good percentage.

Is that what you tell yourself when your coworkers want you fired? That it's because you are a conservative?

[Wild Cobra]

I don't get your point.
I'm not even sure how to explain it to you. Consider this though.

1) Anyone in a public social assistance type job should be doing their best to put themselves out of work.

2) Teaching should be a calling to want to help children. Not hold them as innocent hostages.

If we get back to the idea of the OP, it has nothing to do with pay, but with attitudes. We allow kids to disrupt class in ways that was never allowed in the past. Discipline effectively doesn't exist any more because someone would yell child abuse. The liberal feel good idea that we cannot fail kids any more, no more "flunking" because it harms kids self esteem is unreasonable. Shame works, and is one of the best motivators around.

We need to go back to the tried and true methods of past teaching, instead of throwing more money at it.

[Wild Cobra]

Is that what you tell yourself when your coworkers want you fired? That it's because you are a conservative?
I learned long ago to be rather passive about my views at work. it isn't an issue, but I have seen things. Liberals can be so evil.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

You didn't answer the question.

[Wild Cobra]

You didn't answer the question.
You had a question?

I must have been passively ignoring you.

Sorry.

[boutons_deux]

Believe it or not, some math and science teachers would probably make more money in an all charter school system but overall, better charter schools would suck up all the better teachers and the majority of everyone else would suck...

Not in SA. Most of the charter schools pay peanuts, and get (transient) monkeys making less than the median salary.

[boutons_deux]

"Teaching should be a calling to want to help children."

so they should work for free, sacrifice their quality of life because you hate everything govt (except the bloated, corrupt, can't-beat-gooks, can't-beat-ragheads military?)

teach for next to nothing?

for a non-living wage simply because you hate that they get paid with taxes?

[TeyshaBlue]

I'm not even sure how to explain it to you. Consider this though.

1) Anyone in a public social assistance type job should be doing their best to put themselves out of work.

2) Teaching should be a calling to want to help children. Not hold them as innocent hostages.

If we get back to the idea of the OP, it has nothing to do with pay, but with attitudes. We allow kids to disrupt class in ways that was never allowed in the past. Discipline effectively doesn't exist any more because someone would yell child abuse. The liberal feel good idea that we cannot fail kids any more, no more "flunking" because it harms kids self esteem is unreasonable. Shame works, and is one of the best motivators around.

We need to go back to the tried and true methods of past teaching, instead of throwing more money at it.

If you understood anything about contemporary education, you would kow that the notion we cannot fail kids (and related talking point nonsense) is not a liberal agenda. But you don't know what you don't know.
Ignorance is excusable. That you continue to double down on ignorance ranks you with boutons.

[boutons_deux]

If you understood anything about contemporary education, you would kow that the notion we cannot fail kids (and related talking point nonsense) is not a liberal agenda. But you don't know what you don't know.
Ignorance is excusable. That you continue to double down on ignorance ranks you with boutons.

The Repug/ALEC/conservative agenda is to extract taxpayers dollars from public education funds into for-profit charter schools, NOT "save" the kids' education. Your willful ignorance as a blatant as the ALEC agenda.

[boutons_deux]

Education Profiteering: Wall Street's Next Big Thing?
It is well known, although rarely acknowledged in the press, that the reform movement has been financed and led by the corporate class. For over twenty years large business oriented foundations, such as Gates (Microsoft), Walton (Wal-Mart) and Broad (Sun Life) have poured billions into charter school start-ups, sympathetic academics and pundits, media campaigns (including Hollywood movies) and sophisticated nurturing of the careers of privatization promoters who now dominate the education policy debate from local school boards to the US Department of Education.


In recent years, hedge fund operators, leverage-buy-out artists and investment bankers have joined the crusade. They finance schools, sit on the boards of their associations and the management companies that run them, and -- most important -- have made support of charter schools one of the criteria for campaign giving in the post-Citizens United era. Since most Republicans are already on board for privatization, the political pressure has been mostly directed at Democrats.

Thus, for example, when Andrew Cuomo wanted to get the support of hedge fund managers for his run for governor of New York, he was told to talk to Joe Williams, director of Democrats for Education Reform, a group set up to lobby liberals on privatization.

Cuomo is now a champion of charter schools. As Joanne Barkan noted in a Dissent Magazine report, privatizers are even targeting school board elections, in one case spending over $630,000 to elect two members in a local school board race last year in Colorado.

Wall Street's involvement in the charter school movement -- when the media acknowledges it -- is presented as an act of philanthropy. Perhaps, as critics claim, hedge funders are meddling in an area they know nothing about. But their motives are worthy. Indeed, since they send their own children to the best private schools, their concern for other people's children seems remarkably altruistic. "Wall Street has always put its money where its interests of beliefs lie," observed this New York Times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/10/nyregion/10charter.html?pagewanted=all), "But
it is far less common that so many financial heavyweights would adopt a social cause like charter schools and advance it with a laser like focus in the political realm."

Yet, with the wide variety of social causes and charitable needs -- poverty, health, housing, global warming, the arts, etc. -- why would so many Wall Streeters focus laser-like on this particular issue? The Times suggest two answers. One is that the money managers are hard-nosed, data-driven investors "drawn to the business-like way in which many charter schools are run; their focus on results primarily measured by test scores."




http://www.alternet.org/education/education-profiteering-wall-streets-next-big-thing

[TeyshaBlue]

The Repug/ALEC/conservative agenda is to extract taxpayers dollars from public education funds into for-profit charter schools, NOT "save" the kids' education. Your willful ignorance as a blatant as the ALEC agenda.

How much time have you spent as an educator?

How much time have I spent as an educator?

Which is most likely to be the most ignorant?

NCLB, moron.
Fill in the blanks, bot.

[TeyshaBlue]

lol alternet.

Those fucks know about as much about education as you, which is to say, nothing.

[TeyshaBlue]

Not in SA. Most of the charter schools pay peanuts, and get (transient) monkeys making less than the median salary.

btw, do you have even a single clue how the "transient monkey" transience is measured?

Can you contrast it to how transience is measured in public education?

Of course not. You're an idiot.

[coyotes_geek]

that unionized teachers fund mostly Dems is secondary for me, but it's PRIMARY for the VRWC/ALEC sociopaths intent on destroying public education while sucking taxpayer dollars into for-profit charter schools.

iow, GFY

We get it boutons. As far as you're concerned, blue team / red team scorecard = important, actually improving the quality of education kids are getting = not important.

[RandomGuy]

We get it boutons. As far as you're concerned, blue team / red team scorecard = important, actually improving the quality of education kids are getting = not important.

Well, it becomes important when you get a huge philosophical swing that pushes things in a specific direction. I have not been impressed by privatized prisons, privatized mental health facilities, or a host of other instances where government has been outsourced to the for-profit sector. A lot of libertarians like horror stories about government inefficiency, but then play 3 monkeys when it comes to the horror stories from these privatization efforts.

You can't say it doesn't matter, because the two parties have wildly different solutions based on their inherent philosophies.

[RandomGuy]

That said, I am all for what works.

If privatizing schools is the way to go, then do do it.

I think though, we have learned a LOT about how to improve education in this country, and are close to really getting things right. That is just my sense of things, though. I would be hard pressed to really flesh that out.

Maybe someone could do a bit of digging and put together some links?

[TeyshaBlue]

Privatized prisons <> privatized schools.

[coyotes_geek]

Well, it becomes important when you get a huge philosophical swing that pushes things in a specific direction. I have not been impressed by privatized prisons, privatized mental health facilities, or a host of other instances where government has been outsourced to the for-profit sector. A lot of libertarians like horror stories about government inefficiency, but then play 3 monkeys when it comes to the horror stories from these privatization efforts.

You can't say it doesn't matter, because the two parties have wildly different solutions based on their inherent philosophies.




That said, I am all for what works.

If privatizing schools is the way to go, then do do it.

I think though, we have learned a LOT about how to improve education in this country, and are close to really getting things right. That is just my sense of things, though. I would be hard pressed to really flesh that out.

Maybe someone could do a bit of digging and put together some links?

Your second post pretty much captures how I was going to respond to your first one. I don't care about parties, profits, unions or philosophies. Whatever works.

[TeyshaBlue]

That said, I am all for what works.

If privatizing schools is the way to go, then do do it.

I think though, we have learned a LOT about how to improve education in this country, and are close to really getting things right. That is just my sense of things, though. I would be hard pressed to really flesh that out.

Maybe someone could do a bit of digging and put together some links?

I think there are + - for either approach. A successful educational strategy will likely cherry pick from both, imo.

[coyotes_geek]

I think there are + - for either approach. A successful educational strategy will likely cherry pick from both, imo.

I'm for some kind of a tiered voucher program with adjustments based on income and quality of the public school the kid would go to. Poor kid gets a bigger voucher than rich kid, kid going to a crappy public school gets a bigger voucher than a kid going to a highly rated public school.

[TeyshaBlue]

I'm for some kind of a tiered voucher program with adjustments based on income and quality of the public school the kid would go to. Poor kid gets a bigger voucher than rich kid, kid going to a crappy public school gets a bigger voucher than a kid going to a highly rated public school.

The devil is in the details re: quality school metrics. That's got to be solved first. The process of solving this will also answer many questions regarding educational methodologies in both models.

[boutons_deux]

We get it boutons. As far as you're concerned, blue team / red team scorecard = important, actually improving the quality of education kids are getting = not important.

You get nothing, CG. the only score I'm concerned with is to make sure the sociopathic 1%-promoting RED TEAM loses.

There are 1000s of excellent public schools in USA, which have been responsible for decades for educating SUCCESSFULLY, even educating conservatives/Repugs/1%ers. The ALEC/VRWC broadside attack on all public schools and public school teachers is BEYOND SUSPECT, exactly like their attack on ALL governemnt. It's fucking evil, pure BAD FAITH, because educating kids is not their objective, it's extracting taxpayer dollars into corporations, AND trying indoctrinate kids into conservative/"Christian" orthodoxy.

[TeyshaBlue]

We get it boutons. As far as you're concerned, blue team / red team scorecard = important, actually improving the quality of education kids are getting = not important.


You get nothing, CG. the only score I'm concerned with is to make sure the sociopathic 1%-promoting RED TEAM loses.

No, looks like CG was right on. http://homerecording.com/bbs/images/smilies/facepalm.gif

[coyotes_geek]

The devil is in the details re: quality school metrics. That's got to be solved first. The process of solving this will also answer many questions regarding educational methodologies in both models.

True.

I get the teaching-to-the-test concerns about using standardized testing as the measure of school performance, but I don't see a way around using them. Too many schools, too many kids to do something more subjective that could be tailored to individual students.

[TeyshaBlue]

True.

I get the teaching-to-the-test concerns about using standardized testing as the measure of school performance, but I don't see a way around using them. Too many schools, too many kids to do something more subjective that could be tailored to individual students.

This is an area where a charter school model can be illustrative. Charter schools, esp those that are concentrated in a particular subject area ala' magnet schools (which is also a pretty solid idea) can customize the testing methodology to fit their student base. IOW, more homogeneous population = easier measurements.

[ElNono]

I'm not even sure how to explain it to you. Consider this though.

1) Anyone in a public social assistance type job should be doing their best to put themselves out of work.

2) Teaching should be a calling to want to help children. Not hold them as innocent hostages.

If we get back to the idea of the OP, it has nothing to do with pay, but with attitudes. We allow kids to disrupt class in ways that was never allowed in the past. Discipline effectively doesn't exist any more because someone would yell child abuse. The liberal feel good idea that we cannot fail kids any more, no more "flunking" because it harms kids self esteem is unreasonable. Shame works, and is one of the best motivators around.

We need to go back to the tried and true methods of past teaching, instead of throwing more money at it.

You're the epitome of what's wrong with "tried and true methods of past teaching"

[ElNono]

The devil is in the details re: quality school metrics. That's got to be solved first. The process of solving this will also answer many questions regarding educational methodologies in both models.

Spanking kids with a ruler was a quality school metric. /WC

[TeyshaBlue]

Spanking kids with a ruler was a quality school metric. /WC

They didn't have metric rulers back in the day.:p:

[ElNono]

They didn't have metric rulers back in the day.:p:

And you wonder why public education was fucked up! :p:

[boutons_deux]

No, looks like CG was right on. http://homerecording.com/bbs/images/smilies/facepalm.gif

TB's eloquence: http://homerecording.com/bbs/images/smilies/facepalm.gif :lol

TB: :lol

[TeyshaBlue]

I got bitch slappled again!:depressed

[Drachen]

Speaking of rulers and education: So my cousin is a medical assistant for a Dr.'s office. She just told me that they are going to hire another one pretty soon and she hates that because she is going to have to train them and it always lowers her hope for humanity. She told us about how she has to teach girls how to measure kids ("have them stand here put the stick on top of their head and read the measurement that it points at"). She said that a girl will do that and say "ok, 64 inches" and my cousin will reply " no that is 64 and 3/4" the girl will reply "3/4? how do you know that?". She has also changed the way that she teaches them to take vitals. She used to say "ok, listen to the heartbeats/number of breaths for 15 seconds and then multiply that by four". That never worked. Now she has to sit there for 2 minutes while they take the vitals (1 minute for respirations/minute and 1 minute for bpm).

[boutons_deux]

"medical assistant"

what does it pay? $10/hour?

[coyotes_geek]

You get nothing, CG. the only score I'm concerned with is to make sure the sociopathic 1%-promoting RED TEAM loses. =
We get it boutons. As far as you're concerned, blue team / red team scorecard = important, actually improving the quality of education kids are getting = not important.

lol boutons

[DMC]

I'm not even sure how to explain it to you. Consider this though.

1) Anyone in a public social assistance type job should be doing their best to put themselves out of work.


As should anyone in a repair type job, or doctors. Doing your best to solve problems doesn't mean problems will go away. Doctors have been around for a thousand years and yet people still get ill.


2) Teaching should be a calling to want to help children. Not hold them as innocent hostages.

Since the education required to become a teacher isn't free, then you cannot expect a teacher to work for little to nothing. No one is holding children hostage (what hyperbole, can't you make a point without going to the extreme ends of the hyperbole scale?). The children are at home with their parents, and remain there until an agreement is reached. I am sure the children don't mind.


If we get back to the idea of the OP, it has nothing to do with pay, but with attitudes. We allow kids to disrupt class in ways that was never allowed in the past. Discipline effectively doesn't exist any more because someone would yell child abuse. The liberal feel good idea that we cannot fail kids any more, no more "flunking" because it harms kids self esteem is unreasonable. Shame works, and is one of the best motivators around.

None of this has anything to do with illustrating how you had a point when you said that federal employees should not be able to have a union.


We need to go back to the tried and true methods of past teaching, instead of throwing more money at it.
You're pontificating. Let me try to make your point for you:

The federal government cannot be shutdown by a strike based on labor negotiations. If the federal government gives in, then taxpayers are charged more for the same services yet we don't have representation in the proceedings.

There won't be a federal workers union mainly because of conflict of interest. Judges are federal workers and they would be presiding if it ever went to court. If it reached the USSC, severe conflict of interest and even Congress cannot rule on it. Ergo it won't happen.

[rjv]

best story i read about during the chicago teacher's strike was about a teacher who was fired (at her 71,000 per year salary) because her kids' test scores were consistently poor and she was rated a bad teacher. later, a charter school hires a "brilliant" teacher at 41,000. 00 per year. the catch was it was the same teacher who had been deemed incompetent at the public school.

charters are the same system, only privatized and at the expense of teacher's wages and the inner city students.

[Capt Bringdown]

Despite an individual student's social-economic status and family background, they can achieve a good education in the US public school system. More than that, if they work hard, the sky's the limit.
This is not the case in a great many places. I wonder if those who are suggesting that we blow up our public school system have had any direct experience with school systems in the developing/3rd world.
I have - and the experience has really made me appreciate the wonderful social achievement/institution that is our public school system.

Here's the thing - public schools can never be "fixed." And many of the "solutions" offered here remind of the conditions I have seen in my experience of teaching in the third world for the last 10 years. I know that radical Conservative/Libertarianism is the default setting for this forum. But I wonder, is there any other 1st world country that has turned their back on public education?

[FuzzyLumpkins]

Despite an individual student's social-economic status and family background, they can achieve a good education in the US public school system. More than that, if they work hard, the sky's the limit.
This is not the case in a great many places. I wonder if those who are suggesting that we blow up our public school system have had any direct experience with school systems in the developing/3rd world.
I have - and the experience has really made me appreciate the wonderful social achievement/institution that is our public school system.

Here's the thing - public schools can never be "fixed." And many of the "solutions" offered here remind of the conditions I have seen in my experience of teaching in the third world for the last 10 years. I know that radical Conservative/Libertarianism is the default setting for this forum. But I wonder, is there any other 1st world country that has turned their back on public education?

This makes great rhetoric but then you see the statistics and I cannot help but feel that given all the illiterates, dropouts and other various educational underachievements that not every one of those kids was just a lazy halfwit.

I think a big part of the problem is how the funding is based on property tax and thus disproportionate. Much like health care funding coming mostly from payroll, I also believe that the system as it is now administered is inherently disproportionate and goes a long way to the disproportionate success you see in regional schools.

It's convenient to say that well they are poor neighborhoods so therefor they are full of poor students and of course the poor are all lazy and so there kids are all lazy for if they were not lazy they would have succeeded but that just sounds like horseshit to me.

[Capt Bringdown]

This makes great rhetoric but then you see the statistics and I cannot help but feel that given all the illiterates, dropouts and other various educational underachievements that not every one of those kids was just a lazy halfwit.
It's convenient to say that well they are poor neighborhoods so therefor they are full of poor students and of course the poor are all lazy and so there kids are all lazy for if they were not lazy they would have succeeded but that just sounds like horseshit to me.
That's not at all what I hoped or intended to convey in my comments. I would like to see our commitment to public education expanded and for the issue of inequality to be more directly recognized and addressed.
Regarding such problems as illiteracy, dropouts etc that you mentioned, I don't believe that it's because our students or schools suck.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

That's not at all what I hoped or intended to convey in my comments. I would like to see our commitment to public education expanded and for the issue of inequality to be more directly recognized and addressed.
Regarding such problems as illiteracy, dropouts etc that you mentioned, I don't believe that it's because our students or schools suck.

I am pretty adversarial around here so please take me with a grain of salt. I actually think that it's because both our schools and our students suck.

[Capt Bringdown]

I am pretty adversarial around here so please take me with a grain of salt. I actually think that it's because both our schools and our students suck.

No worries. My comments were intentionally broad. I mainly wanted to say that having seen how it works on another side of the world, I appreciate the US public education system & I think it's a national treasure that's worth saving. I should have mentioned that I appreciate students as well.

[boutons_deux]

NYC Mayor Strikes a Major Blow to Charter Schools, Cuts $210 Million from Their Budgets


as de Blasio settles into office, his administration has already dealt major blows to one of Bloomberg’s sacred cows. Late last week, newly appointed schools chancellor Carmen Fariñaannounced (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/01/nyregion/funds-meant-for-charters-may-be-diverted-to-pre-k.html?hpw&rref=education&_r=0) that the Department of Education would redirect $210 million from charter schools and independent nonprofits to fund de Blasio’s pre-kindergarten initiative.

The surprise announcement reflects educational priorities in upheaval. The millions in question had been earmarked by the former administration to help clear space for new and expanding charter schools in the coming five years. Instead, Fariña plans to divert the funds to priorities like de Blasio’s flagship initiative, the pre-kindergarten (http://www.thenation.com/article/177717/will-new-york-city-lead-way-pre-k) programs sold largely as a remedy for inequality.

The move epitomizes the shifting public perceptions that propelled de Blasio into office. In his election, voters “were in many ways repudiating the last 12 years of Bloomberg,” says NYU education professor Pedro Noguera. While campaigning, de Blasio signed onto a moratorium on school closures and declared (http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2013/11/04/de-blasio-v-lhota-the-edu-voters-guide-to-the-final-matchup/) “the city doesn’t need new charters.”
A sharpened focus on inequality from the city’s top brass heralds a sea change in New York education, the third most deeply segregated (http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/05/11/nyregion/segregation-in-new-york-city-public-schools.html?_r=1&) system in the country. It’s no surprise, then, that de Blasio has targeted the charter sector many see as a manifestation (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/13/education/at-explore-charter-school-a-portrait-of-segregated-education.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0) of his well-known “tale of two cities” rhetoric. After private donations, many charters receive more (http://nepc.colorado.edu/files/NEPC-NYCharter-Baker-Ferris.pdf) funding (http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2011/02/15/most-city-charters-receive-more-funds-than-districts-study-finds/) than public schools, while serving markedly fewer (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/nyc-charter-schools-successful-article-1.1410880) students with special needs and English language learners.

http://www.alternet.org/education/nyc-mayor-strikes-major-blow-charter-schools-cuts-210-million-their-budgets?akid=11472.187590._BSQrZ&rd=1&src=newsletter954406&t=25

[Nbadan]

Here's the thing - public schools can never be "fixed." And many of the "solutions" offered here remind of the conditions I have seen in my experience of teaching in the third world for the last 10 years. I know that radical Conservative/Libertarianism is the default setting for this forum. But I wonder, is there any other 1st world country that has turned their back on public education?

Nope. But other countries leave the educating to educators, not politicians....

[boutons_deux]

Charter Schools are Cheating Your Kids: Report Reveals Massive Fraud, Mismanagement, Abuse

Titled “Charter School Vulnerabilities To Waste, Fraud and Abuse,” the report focused on 15 states representing large charter markets, out of the 42 states that have charter schools. Drawing on news reports, criminal complaints, regulatory findings, audits and other sources, it “found fraud, waste and abuse cases totaling over $100 million in losses to taxpayers,” but warned that due to inadequate oversight, “the fraud and mismanagement that has been uncovered thus far might be just the tip of the iceberg.”

While there are plenty of other troubling issues surrounding charter schools—from high rates of racial segregation (http://civilrightsproject.ucla.edu/research/k-12-education/integration-and-diversity/choice-without-equity-2009-report), to their lackluster overall performance records, (http://www.openleft.com/diary/13962/charter-schools-another-failed-bipartisan-policy-obama-is-in-love-with) to questionableadmission (http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/15/us-usa-charters-admissions-idUSBRE91E0HF20130215)and expulsion (http://dianeravitch.net/2014/02/26/breaking-news-new-data-show-high-expulsion-rates-from-charter-schools-in-chicago/)practices—this report sets all those admittedly important issues aside to focus squarely on activity that appears it could be criminal, and arguably totally out of control. It does not even mention questions raised by sky-high salaries (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/top-16-nyc-charter-school-execs-out-earn-chancellor-dennis-walcott-article-1.1497717)paid to some charter CEOs, such as 16 New York City charter school CEOs who earned more than the head of the city’s public school system in 2011-12. Crime, not greed, is the focus here.

In short, the report is about as apolitical as can be imagined: it is narrowly focused on a white-collar crime wave of staggering proportions, and what can be done about it within the existing framework of widespread charter schools.

http://www.alternet.org/education/charter-schools-are-cheating-your-kids-report-reveals-massive-fraud-mismanagement-abuse?akid=11784.187590.-p0oJn&rd=1&src=newsletter990012&t=7

Then add in the $100Bs of taxpayer-financed fraud by corporate for-profit colleges, and then you might agree America is fucked and unfuckable, and getting more fucked every day.

[Nbadan]

While there are plenty of other troubling issues surrounding charter schools—from high rates of racial segregation, to their lackluster overall performance records, to questionableadmission and expulsion practices—this report sets all those admittedly important issues aside to focus squarely on activity that appears it could be criminal, and arguably totally out of control. It does not even mention questions raised by sky-high salaries paid to some charter CEOs, such as 16 New York City charter school CEOs who earned more than the head of the city’s public school system in 2011-12. Crime, not greed, is the focus here.

big surprise...charter schools are just as much of a failure as inner city public schools...maybe now we can begin a real discussion about why American kids fail

[FuzzyLumpkins]

http://populardemocracy.org/sites/default/files/FraudandMismgmt5-3-14%28FINALx3.0%29REV.pdf

That is a link to the report in bouties link.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/05/06/new-report-cites-100-million-plus-in-waste-fraud-in-charter-school-industry/

That is a link to the story from a publication that is not quite so obviously mindlessly biased especially now that they have been bought out from the Korean Evangelicals.

[CosmicCowboy]

I am pretty adversarial around here so please take me with a grain of salt. I actually think that it's because both our schools and our students suck.

I agree with Fuzzy on this one. There are still excellent students in bad schools and suckass students in good schools, but generally the shitty results of our school system are classic "garbage in, garbage out" and they have emasculated the schools where they can't control or take out the garbage that is disrupting the classsroom and making it difficult for the other students to learn.

It is especially bad in the perpetual underclass minority communities where it is not cool to care about academic excellence or even care about academics at all.

[boutons_deux]

Privatized prisons <> privatized schools.

the objective is IDENTICAL: Follow the Money to corporations sucking down taxpayer wealth, NOT about the quality of education.

Then add in the Christian bullshit indoctrination in Christian schools. Again, the objective of Christian Taleban is not education, but indoctrination.

[boutons_deux]

We get it boutons. As far as you're concerned, blue team / red team scorecard = important, actually improving the quality of education kids are getting = not important.

bullshit. The red/Christian team is all only about transferring taxpayer money to corporations, AND Christian indoctrination, NEITHER of which as education as priority.

[TeyshaBlue]

the objective is IDENTICAL: Follow the Money to corporations sucking down taxpayer wealth, NOT about the quality of education.

Then add in the Christian bullshit indoctrination in Christian schools. Again, the objective of Christian Taleban is not education, but indoctrination.

Point one is demonstrably untrue.
Point two is nothing more than a manifestation of your tautology.

[boutons_deux]

Point one is demonstrably untrue.
Point two is nothing more than a manifestation of your tautology.

ok, DEMONSTRATE why CORPORATIONS/CAPITALIST controlled privatized schools are NOT about making money. Same shit with for-profit, taxpayer-funded "colleges"

[Nbadan]

I agree with Fuzzy on this one. There are still excellent students in bad schools and suckass students in good schools, but generally the shitty results of our school system are classic "garbage in, garbage out" and they have emasculated the schools where they can't control or take out the garbage that is disrupting the classsroom and making it difficult for the other students to learn.

...they who? the parents? they're the ones who 'emasculated the schools' by suing when their children have to face the consequences for their bad decisions...Parents are also supposed to be primarily responsible for teaching their kids respect for elders and authority, empathy of others, patience, ethics, morality, and how to act in social settings....in poorer districts all problems are worse because parents aren't usually around to teach their kids much..

[Nbadan]

It is especially bad in the perpetual underclass minority communities where it is not cool to care about academic excellence or even care about academics at all.

Untrue.....there are many students who care about their education in minority communities but they are always underfunded so they don't necessarily attract the best teachers and the better teachers in these districts almost always move on to better gigs..

[Nbadan]

..but I agree...fixing public schools begins by fixing the discipline issues in these schools...and for that, we need community education to help parents and in many cases, grand-parents, raise kids with the characteristics it takes to be successful ...

[Nbadan]

Cell Phone Video Shows Police Choking, Kicking 6th Graders
Source: Gawker dot com


On Tuesday, the Boynton Beach, Fla. police department released two student-shot cell phone videos that show police officers detaining two sixth graders who'd reportedly just been removed from a school bus. In one video, an officer appears to put a student in a chokehold; in another, an officer kicks a student in the back of the leg, causing the student to fall.

Read more: http://gawker.com/cell-phone-video-shows-police-choking-kicking-6th-grad-157585068

...expect these types of incidences to become much more frequent occurrences as discipline in schools transfers from teachers and principals to armed police officers on campus..

[boutons_deux]

The great charter school rip-off: Finally, the truth catches up to education “reform” phonies

http://media.salon.com/2014/10/ravitch_rhee.jpg

Rather than a negotiation over terms, charters are being imposed on communities – either by legislative fiat or well-engineered public policy campaigns. Many charter school operators keep their practices hidden or have been found to be blatantly corrupt. And no one seems to be doing anything to ensure real accountability for these rapidly expanding school operations.

Instead of the “bargain” political leaders may have thought they struck with seemingly well-intentioned charter entrepreneurs, what has transpired instead looks more like a raw deal for millions of students, their families, and their communities. And what political leaders ought to be doing – rather than spouting unfounded platitudes, as Clinton did, about “what works” – is putting the brakes on a deal gone bad, ensuring those most affected by charter school rollouts are brought to the bargaining table, and completely renegotiating the terms for governing these schools.

Charter Schools As Takeover Operations

The “100 percent charter schools” education system in New Orleans that Clinton praised was never presented to the citizens of New Orleans in a negotiation. It was surreptitiously engineered.

After Katrina, as NPR (http://apps.npr.org/the-end-of-neighborhood-schools/) recently reported, “an ad hoc coalition of elected leaders and nationally known charter advocates formed,” and in “a series of quick decisions,” all school employees were fired and the vast majority of the city’s schools were handed over to a state entity called the “Recovery School District” which is governed by unelected officials. Only a “few elite schools were … allowed to maintain their selective admissions.”

In other words, any bargaining that was done was behind closed doors and at tables where most of the people who were being affected had no seat.

Further, any evidence of the improvement of the educational attainment of students in the New Orleans all-charter system is obtainable only by “jukin the stats” (http://educationopportunitynetwork.org/the-dishonest-case-for-the-new-orleans-school-reform-model/) or, as the NPR reporter put it, through “a distortion of the curriculum and teaching practice.” As Andrea Gabor wrote for Newsweek (http://www.theinvestigativefund.org/investigations/politicsandgovernment/1848/the_great_charter_tryout?page=entire) a year ago, “the current reality of the city’s schools should be enough to give pause to even the most passionate charter supporters.”

Yet now political leaders tout this model for the rest of the country. So school districts that have not had the “benefit,” according to Arne Duncan (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2010/01/duncan-katrina-was-the-best-thing-for-new-orleans-schools/), of a natural disaster like Katrina, are having charter schools imposed on them in blatant power plays.

School districts across the state of Pennsylvania are financially troubled due to chronic state underfunding – only 36 percent of K-12 revenue comes from the state (http://thenotebook.org/summer-2007/07104/how-schools-are-funded-pennsylvania-primer), way below national averages – and massive budget cuts (http://www.factcheck.org/2014/06/playing-politics-with-education/) imposed by Republican Governor Tom Corbett (the state funds education less than it did in 2008).

The state cuts seemed to have been intentionally targeted to hit high-poverty school districts like York City the hardest.

After combing through state financial records, a report (http://www.psea.org/general.aspx?id=11715)from the state’s school employee union found, “State funding cuts to the most impoverished school districts averaged more than three times the size of the cuts for districts with the lowest average child poverty.” The unsurprising results of these cuts has been that in school districts serving low income kids, like York, instruction was cut and scores on state student assessments declined.

Now the local school board is being forced to pick a charter provider and make their district the first in the state to hand over the education of all its children to a corporation that will call all the shots and give York’s citizens very little say in how their children’s schools are run.


Charter Schools Takeover, Corruption Ensues

York teachers and parents have good reasons to be wary of charter school takeover. As a new report discloses, charter school officials in their state have defrauded at least $30 million intended for school children since 1997.

The report (http://populardemocracy.org/sites/default/files/charter-schools-PA-Fraud.pdf), “Fraud and Financial Mismanagement in Pennsylvania’s Charter Schools,” was released by three groups, the Center for Popular Democracy, Integrity in Education, and ACTION United.

Startling examples of charter school financial malfeasance revealed by the authors –just in Pennsylvania – include an administrator who diverted $2.6 million in school funds to a church property he also operated. Another charter school chief was caught spending millions in school funds to bail out other nonprofits associated with the school. A pair of charter school operators stole more than $900,000 from the school by using fraudulent invoices, and a cyber school entrepreneur diverted $8 million of school funds for houses, a Florida condominium, and an airplane.

What’s even more alarming is that none of these crimes were detected by state agencies overseeing the schools. As the report clearly documents, every year virtually all of the state’s charter schools are found to be financially sound. The vast majority of fraud was uncovered by whistleblowers and media coverage and not by state auditors who have a history of not effectively detecting or preventing fraud.

Pennsylvania spends over a billion dollars a year on charter schools, and the $30 million lost to fraud documented in this study is likely the minimum possible amount.

...

http://www.salon.com/2014/10/02/the_great_charter_school_rip_off_finally_the_truth _catches_up_to_education_reform_phonies/

for-profit charter schools with the basic capitalist offering: shittiest possible product for the highest possible price (and lots of fraud, theft, etc)

Do you right-wing assholes really think capitalists and corps are getting into CHARTER SCHOOL BUSINESS TO HELP THE KIDS? :lol

[boutons_deux]

What Happens to Test Scores When Teachers Are Paid $125,000 a Year?

The Equity Project Charter School opened in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan five years ago, with a fairly simple concept: get rid of extra administrative positions and pay teachers a lot of money—a base salary of $125,000 plus benefits and potential bonuses after two years of teaching. (A New York City public school teacher with five years of experience, by comparison, makes between $64,009 and $75,796.) Even the principal would earn less (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/education/05charter.html) than the teachers to ensure that the school would be able to rely only on public funding, other than the cost of the school facility and its technology system.

The research group Mathematica Policy Research tracked the experiment at the middle school (fifth through eighth grade), and recently released an analysis (http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/~/media/publications/pdfs/education/tep_fnlrpt.pdf), funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, of the school’s effectiveness during its first four years. The result: students gradually achieved significantly higher levels of learning, with a major leap during their fourth year, equivalent to more than one and a half grade levels for math and nearly half a year for English.

The data was drawn from standardized testing, comparing students who were demographically and academically similar in surrounding neighborhood schools:

TEP Students Additional Years of Learning in Math, English Language Arts, and Science
http://cdn.theatlantic.com/assets/media/img/posts/2014/11/Quartzgraph/f5cfb09e0.pngMathematica Policy Research
Even though the Equity Project students fared better compared to their peers at surrounding schools, the Wall Street Journal notes (http://online.wsj.com/articles/charter-school-study-finds-high-teacher-pay-helps-students-1414123264?mg=id-wsj) that only 43% of the school’s eighth-graders passed state math exams in 2013. A pretty low number, though a considerable improvement compared with the 26% city-wide pass rate.

Another big difference with the Equity Project, aside from the outsize salaries, is that the school looks for experienced teachers—the median teaching experience was 6 years—compared with charter schools that tend to recruit young teachers (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/27/education/at-charter-schools-short-careers-by-choice.html?hpw&pagewanted=all) with less experience.

But the Equity Project’s teachers are still relative newbies compared to surrounding public schools, which have a median teaching experience of 13 years.

The Equity Project’s inclusive strategy meant that teachers became a big part of the school and developing curricula—

there was no assistant principal for the first two years, and

teachers are very much a part of the student disciplinary process.

For example, one form of punishment for a student who speaks disrespectfully to a teacher is for that student to spend the whole day with the teacher. It also means, though, that the teachers are working more than they might at another school.

Their work includes administrative duties, classes of about 31 students in fifth through seventh grades, professional development classes, a six-week summer institute, and stringent performance indicators that dictate whether a teacher may return. Those include taking no more than three personal days and five sick days per year, as well as performance on student and peer surveys. The teachers were very well-compensated and received benefits, but they were not union employees, as is typical of charter schools, and they were not tenured (a topic that’s been controversial (http://time.com/3533556/the-war-on-teacher-tenure/) in general when it comes to teaching).

And that resulted in turnover—a lot of it.

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/11/what-happens-to-test-scores-when-teachers-are-paid-125000-a-year/382340/

so the students made serious improvement, and it's still early, but the teachers had too many non-teaching chores, so too much turnover. So the adjustments needed are clear.

[Spur-Addict]

How to fix public schools? Not possible.

[boutons_deux]

yeah, like for-profit charter schools are a solution (aka, shittiest possible teachers and shittiest possible education for the highest possible price)

and in total, privatized secrecy:

North Carolina Tells Charter-School Chain It Can’t Keep Administrator Salaries Secret

The schools’ management company, which receives millions in public funds each year from the schools, says that the salaries paid to school administrators should be considered a trade secret.

The North Carolina State Board of Education has issued a warning to a charter-school chain for failing to comply with an agency order to disclose the salaries of school administrators. The schools have been put on "financial probationary status," which could lead to sanctions if their board does not comply within 10 business days.

This is the same charter-school chain, Charter Day School, Inc., that ProPublica wrote about last month (http://www.propublica.org/article/charter-school-power-broker-turns-public-education-into-private-profits). As we reported, the four charter schools channel millions in public education dollars each year to for-profit companies owned by the schools' founder, businessman Baker Mitchell. One of the for-profit companies, Roger Bacon Academy, is paid to run all the day-to-day operations of the schools. As we wrote:

Roger Bacon Academy functions as the schools' administrative arm, taking the lead in hiring and firing school staff.

It handles most of the bookkeeping. The treasurer of the nonprofit that controls the four schools is also t he chief financial officer of Mitchell's management company. The two organizations even share a bank account.
Mitchell's management company was chosen by the schools' nonprofit board, which Mitchell was on at the time — an arrangement that is illegal in many other states.


Charter schools, which are privately run but government-funded, often outsource back-office functions to private companies. At issue between North Carolina and Mitchell's charter-school chain is the extent to which regulators can demand to know what happens to public dollars once they move into the coffers of a private company.

State officials say they have the right to ask for information related to the schools' activities and programs – and that includes salaries of any employees assigned to work at them. Other charter schools in North Carolina have complied and turned over this information. Mitchell's schools are the only ones that have not.

http://www.propublica.org/article/north-carolina-tells-charter-schoolchainit-cant-keep-administrator-salaries?utm_source=et&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter

[CosmicCowboy]

What Happens to Test Scores When Teachers Are Paid $125,000 a Year?

The Equity Project Charter School opened in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan five years ago, with a fairly simple concept: get rid of extra administrative positions and pay teachers a lot of money—a base salary of $125,000 plus benefits and potential bonuses after two years of teaching. (A New York City public school teacher with five years of experience, by comparison, makes between $64,009 and $75,796.) Even the principal would earn less (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/education/05charter.html) than the teachers to ensure that the school would be able to rely only on public funding, other than the cost of the school facility and its technology system.

The research group Mathematica Policy Research tracked the experiment at the middle school (fifth through eighth grade), and recently released an analysis (http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/~/media/publications/pdfs/education/tep_fnlrpt.pdf), funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, of the school’s effectiveness during its first four years. The result: students gradually achieved significantly higher levels of learning, with a major leap during their fourth year, equivalent to more than one and a half grade levels for math and nearly half a year for English.

The data was drawn from standardized testing, comparing students who were demographically and academically similar in surrounding neighborhood schools:

TEP Students Additional Years of Learning in Math, English Language Arts, and Science
http://cdn.theatlantic.com/assets/media/img/posts/2014/11/Quartzgraph/f5cfb09e0.pngMathematica Policy Research
Even though the Equity Project students fared better compared to their peers at surrounding schools, the Wall Street Journal notes (http://online.wsj.com/articles/charter-school-study-finds-high-teacher-pay-helps-students-1414123264?mg=id-wsj) that only 43% of the school’s eighth-graders passed state math exams in 2013. A pretty low number, though a considerable improvement compared with the 26% city-wide pass rate.

Another big difference with the Equity Project, aside from the outsize salaries, is that the school looks for experienced teachers—the median teaching experience was 6 years—compared with charter schools that tend to recruit young teachers (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/27/education/at-charter-schools-short-careers-by-choice.html?hpw&pagewanted=all) with less experience.

But the Equity Project’s teachers are still relative newbies compared to surrounding public schools, which have a median teaching experience of 13 years.

The Equity Project’s inclusive strategy meant that teachers became a big part of the school and developing curricula—

there was no assistant principal for the first two years, and

teachers are very much a part of the student disciplinary process.

For example, one form of punishment for a student who speaks disrespectfully to a teacher is for that student to spend the whole day with the teacher. It also means, though, that the teachers are working more than they might at another school.

Their work includes administrative duties, classes of about 31 students in fifth through seventh grades, professional development classes, a six-week summer institute, and stringent performance indicators that dictate whether a teacher may return. Those include taking no more than three personal days and five sick days per year, as well as performance on student and peer surveys. The teachers were very well-compensated and received benefits, but they were not union employees, as is typical of charter schools, and they were not tenured (a topic that’s been controversial (http://time.com/3533556/the-war-on-teacher-tenure/) in general when it comes to teaching).

And that resulted in turnover—a lot of it.

http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/11/what-happens-to-test-scores-when-teachers-are-paid-125000-a-year/382340/

so the students made serious improvement, and it's still early, but the teachers had too many non-teaching chores, so too much turnover. So the adjustments needed are clear.




It appears they got to cherry pick the teachers which cherry picked the results.

Better quality teacher = better results

higher paid teachers across the board not = to better results

[boutons_deux]

It appears they got to cherry pick the teachers which cherry picked the results.

Better quality teacher = better results

higher paid teachers across the board not = to better results

duh, of course. Why pay $125K/year to teachers who aren't carefully screened, selected, qualified, committed? fucking duh

if K-12 teaching was seen as a prestigious, respected, well-paid career, it would attract superior teachers, selected from a large pool of candidates.

But the Repug/VRWC strategy is to defund public schools, underpay/overwork/union-bust/trash K12 teachers so the taxpayer money gets re-distributed to for-profit scam charter schools and Christian madrasas.

[pgardn]

How to fix public schools? Not possible.

Fix parenting and public schools will be awesome.
So many parents attitudes towards public school is, " you take em and pass em because I can't handle them", especially HS. I challenge anyone on this board to volunteer as a tutor and ask to sit in a wide variety of classes and then talk with the teachers. It is so obvious which students have parents who care more about education than babysitting.

Next hire more teachers. 180 kids to keep track of and actually grade papers properly is basically impossible. That is standard for NISD HS teachers. And there are basically some very good schools in that district, Brandies, Health Careers, O'Connor, Clark. But they can't keep up.

[pgardn]

duh, of course. Why pay $125K/year to teachers who aren't carefully screened, selected, qualified, committed? fucking duh

.

If this was accomplished and you take those teachers, put them in a high socioeconomic area where parents have benefitted from education, success is assured. There are some public schools that have this model. Not 125k necessarily, but serious money based on cost of living in that area.

[byrontx]

The assumption is that public schools are bad. That is not necessarily the case, my son's school is excellent within the parameters it operates ($0 library budget, 10 yr. iMacs for the kids, etc.). For the most part, its the parents that seem to be lacking. Too many kids are not getting the help and support they should at home. On top of that, the school is pretty much starved on money, the library budget has been zero dollars for three years in a row now. So you underfund schools then beat the shit out of them when you do not get the results you want? You want to blame teachers because they are an easy target?

The reality is that our increasingly complex society and markets are placing more demands on our education system at the same time Republicans have under funded them. On top of that, a lot of parents want to park the kids in front of the electronic baby-sitter (TV) and be a bunch of lazy asses. Quality teachers are needed more than ever and we need to pay them accordingly.

[Infinite_limit]

http://i905.photobucket.com/albums/ac255/kegstermd/racism_zps44e104d5.png

[boutons_deux]

"markets are placing more demands on our education system"

wages are stagnant, there is over-supply of job seekers demanding jobs

Contrary to the corporate lie, there are plenty of US engineers available but the BigCorps prefer the much cheaper H1B engineers/techs imported from Asia, that's why BigCorps have been pushing for years to greatly increase BY MANY TIMES the annual H1B visa quota.

BigCorps, through their financing of VRWC stink tanks and laundered-money PACS, have been trashing teachers to bust their union as a source of Dem funds, and trashing/defunding public schools (Banksters' Great Depression devastated tax revenues, was an opportunity for the predators to go after K-12) to get taxpayer $100Bs transferred/redistributed from public schools to for-profit, non-union, shitty-teacher charter schools and Christian madrasas, while LYING that for-profit schools are the solution to their K-12 crisis.

BigFinance offers the very best science and engineering grads from the best universities huge starting salaries and bonuses to keep their corrupt businesses as corrupt as possible. Imagine if the same talent went to work in the productive Real Economy.

[z0sa]

How to fix our public schools: fix our parents.

[Nbadan]

Everybody thinks they know a simple fix to our education system...there are no easy fixes...but a good place to start is returning discipline into the classrooms and holding kids accountable for bad choices...

[dbestpro]

A good place to start is to make the schools safe. When kids are not in fear of other kids, the schools tend to well. No matter how much money you throw in the pot, kids will not do well when they go to school and live in fear of other students.

[TDMVPDPOY]

if u notice most public schools in rich suburbs =>elite schools>>>>>>>>>>private/public schools in poor area

now why cant those other public schools put up the same standard as the one in the rich suburb? is it due to govt funding? private/community funding?

[RandomGuy]

It appears they got to cherry pick the teachers which cherry picked the results.

Better quality teacher = better results

higher paid teachers across the board not = to better results

Well, at the kinds of salaries they offer, they can increase the number of willing teachers out of the supply pool to choose from.

Supply and demand dictates that you generally get what you pay for. :D

I would be willing to bet that not only are their teachers more experienced than average, they are probably better overall for their experience level.

[boutons_deux]

When a Wildlife Rehab Center Regulates Charter Schools: Inside the Wild World of Charter Regulation

Nestled in the woods of central Minnesota, near a large lake, is a nature sanctuary called the Audubon Center of the North Woods. The nonprofit rehabilitates birds. It hosts retreats and conferences. It’s home to a North American porcupine named Spike (http://audubon-center.org/portfolio-item/spike/) as well as several birds of prey, frogs, and snakes used to educate the center’s visitors.

It’s also Minnesota’s largest regulator of charter schools, overseeing 32 of them.

Charter schools are taxpayer-funded, privately run schools freed from many of the rules that apply to traditional public schools. What’s less widely understood is that there are few hard-and-fast rules for how the regulators charged with overseeing charter schools are supposed to do the job. Many are making it up as they go along.

Known as “authorizers,” charter regulators have the power to decide which charter schools should be allowed to open and which are performing so badly they ought to close. They’re supposed to vet charter schools, making sure the schools are giving kids a good education and spending public money responsibly.

But many of these gatekeepers are woefully inexperienced, under-resourced, confused about their mission or even compromised by conflicts of interest. And while some charter schools are overseen by state education agencies or school districts, others are regulated by entities for which overseeing charters is a side job, such as private colleges and nonprofits like the Audubon wildlife rehabilitation center.

One result of the regulatory mishmash: Bad schools have been allowed to stay open and evade accountability.

“Almost everything you see come up as charter school problems, if you scratch past the surface, the real problem is bad authorizing,” said John Charlton, spokesman for the Ohio Department of Education.

In 2010, an investigation by the Philadelphia Controller’s Office found lavish executive salaries, conflicts of interest and other problems at more than a dozen charter schools, and it faulted the authorizer – the School District of Philadelphia’s charter school office – for “complete and total failure (http://articles.philly.com/2010-04-09/news/25212620_1_charter-schools-charter-office-minimal-oversight)” to monitor schools. In 2013, more than a dozen Ohio charter schools that had gained approval from various authorizers received state funding and then either collapsed in short order or never opened at all.

“Considerable state funds were lost and many lives impacted because of these failures,” the Ohio Department of Education wrote (http://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/Topics/School-Choice/Community-Schools/News/Communication-to-Authorizers/Authorizer-Communication-Letter-4-26-14.pdf.aspx) in a scathing letter last year to Ohio’s charter-school regulators. The agency wrote that some authorizers “lacked not only the appropriate processes, but more importantly, the commitment of mission, expertise and resources needed to be effective.”

Aside from such dramatic implosions, it’s hard to tell how many authorizers are doing at this important public function. They’re generally not required to say much about the details of their decision-making.

http://www.propublica.org/article/inside-the-wild-world-of-charter-regulation?utm_source=et&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter&utm_content=&utm_name=

for-profit charter schools! :lol

"non-profit" charter schools that outsource almost everything to for-profit contractors! :lol

[boutons_deux]

Charter Program Expansion Looms, Despite Probes Into Mismanagement and Closed Schools

As Congress stands poised to increase funding for the quarter-billion-dollar-a-year federal Charter Schools Program by a whopping 48 percent (http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/budget16/summary/16summary.pdf), the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) has uncovered that the U.S. Department of Education's Office of the Inspector General has major nationwide probes underway into closed charter schools and suspected waste and financial mismanagement within the program.

The program is designed create and expand “high-quality” charter schools, but it has been repeatedly criticized by the watchdogs at the department's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in the past precisely because there is no way of knowing whether the money has gone to “high quality” schools.

With the vote looming in the U.S. Senate on the reauthorization (http://www.help.senate.gov/imo/media/S_EveryChildAchievesActof2015.pdf) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act containing the provisions expanding the charter schools program, Department of Education officials have assured stakeholders (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/union-backed-group-calls-for-pause-in-federal-money-for-charter-schools/2015/06/12/b1cbff0a-1081-11e5-adec-e82f8395c032_story.html) that the problems with millions disappearing down black holes is a thing of the past.

Last week, the Alliance to Reclaim Our Schools sent a letter (http://www.reclaimourschools.org/updates/open-letter-sec-duncan-oversight-charter-school-expansion) to Education Secretary Arne Duncan calling for more disclosure to the public of information on the impact and track record of the program. Federal officials responded through theWashington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/union-backed-group-calls-for-pause-in-federal-money-for-charter-schools/2015/06/12/b1cbff0a-1081-11e5-adec-e82f8395c032_story.html)saying that the department has stepped up its monitoring activities and efforts to hold states responsible. The message was: all is well in federal charter land.

But the fact that the OIG has found reason to launch major probes this year tells a different story.

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/31424-charter-program-expansion-looms-despite-probes-into-mismanagement-and-closed-schools

[Nbadan]

A good place to start is to make the schools safe. When kids are not in fear of other kids, the schools tend to well. No matter how much money you throw in the pot, kids will not do well when they go to school and live in fear of other students.

I don't think most kids feel physically unsafe...unless by 'safe' you mean alienation, teasing, and bullying....but kids have been doing this for decades

[Nbadan]

I would be willing to bet that not only are their teachers more experienced than average, they are probably better overall for their experience level.

There is the real problem.....better teachers work for better districts, with kids who may or may not need their experience set of skills.........and the problem only gets worse if you hold teachers accountable by compensating them based on student scores....if your an experienced teacher, why would you ever work in a poor district where some years your scores will be high and some years your scores may be low depending on the kids you get and their 'issues' ....when you can work at a better district where your scores will be much better and your job safe...

[boutons_deux]

"I would be willing to bet that not only are their teachers more experienced than average, they are probably better overall for their experience level."

yes, charter school "teachers" get paid less, fewer or no benefits, which always attracts the better, more experienced to jobs than higher paying jobs with benefits. You're bet is a sure thing.

[Nbadan]

"I would be willing to bet that not only are their teachers more experienced than average, they are probably better overall for their experience level."

yes, charter school "teachers" get paid less, fewer or no benefits, which always attracts the better, more experienced to jobs than higher paying jobs with benefits. You're bet is a sure thing.



You would be surprised...some teachers will take a cut in pay just to be able to teach nothing but the better kids....

[boutons_deux]

Growing Evidence that Charter Schools Are Failing

In early 2015 Stanford University's updated CREDO Report (http://urbancharters.stanford.edu/download/Urban%20Charter%20School%20Study%20Report%20on%204 1%20Regions.pdf) concluded that "urban charter schools in the aggregate provide significantly higher levels of annual growth in both math and reading compared to their TPS peers."

This single claim of success has a lot of people believing that charter schools really work. But there are good reasons to be skeptical. First of all, CREDO is funded and managed (http://educationalchemy.com/2015/03/19/who-wrote-the-new-credo-study-and-what-do-they-really-want/) by reform advocates. It's part of the Hoover Institution (http://www.hoover.org/about/missionhistory), aconservative (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Hoover_Institution_on_War,_Revolution_and_Peace) and pro-business think tank funded (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2014/12/12/major-charter-researcher-causes-stir-with-comments-about-market-based-school-reform/) in part by the Walton Foundation, and in partnership with Pearson, a leading developer of standardized testing materials. CREDO director Margaret Raymond (http://www.hoover.org/profiles/margaret-macke-raymond) is pro-charter and a free-market advocate.


questioned CREDO's statistical methods: for example (http://andreagabor.com/2015/04/28/new-credo-study-new-credibility-problems-from-new-orleans-to-boston/), the study excluded public schools that do NOT send students to charters, thus "introducing a bias against the best urban public schools."

harters Are Underperforming

The inadequacies of charter schools have been confirmed by other recent studies, one of them by CREDO (http://edexcellence.net/publications/charter-school-performance-in-ohio) itself, which found that in comparison to traditional public schools "students in Ohio charter schools perform worse in both reading and mathematics." Another recent CREDO study (https://credo.stanford.edu/pdfs/ca_report_FINAL.pdf) of California schools reached mixed results, with charters showing higher scores in reading but lower scores in math.

In a study of Chicago's public schools, the University of Minnesota (http://www.law.umn.edu/uploads/73/6e/736e1b2cfd23d7df731b532616d4dde7/Chicago-Charters-FINAL.pdf) Law School determined that "Sadly the charter schools, which on average score lower that the Chicago public schools, have not improved the Chicago school system, but perhaps made it even weaker."

In general, as concluded (http://www.in-perspective.org/) by the nonpartisan Spencer Foundation and Public Agenda, "There is very little evidence that charter and traditional public schools differ meaningfully in their average impact on students' standardized test performance." Another report from Data First (http://www.data-first.org/questions/how-do-charter-schools-compare-to-regular-public-schools-in-student-performance/), part of the Center for Public Education, stated that "the majority of charter schools do no better or worse than traditional public schools."

But there's a lot of data that leans toward "worse" rather than "better." A Brookings report (http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2014/11/06-chalkboard-arizona-charters-chingos-west) showed underperformance in Arizona's charter schools. An In the Public Interest (http://cashinginonkids.com/brought-to-you-by-wal-mart-how-the-walton-family-foundations-ideological-pursuit-is-damaging-charter-schooling/) group found that an analyst for the District of Columbia "could not provide a single instance in which its strategy of transferring a low-performing school to a charter management organization had resulted in academic gains for the students." The Minnesota Star Tribune (http://www.startribune.com/local/west/292139891.html) reported that "Students in most Minnesota charter schools are failing to hit learning targets and are not achieving adequate academic growth." Over 85 percent (http://www.epi.org/publication/school-privatization-milwaukee/) of Ohio's charter students were in schools graded D or F in 2012–2013.

In the much-heralded New Orleans charter experiment, the Investigative Fund (http://www.theinvestigativefund.org/investigations/politicsandgovernment/1848/the_great_charter_tryout?page=entire) found that "eight years after Hurricane Katrina...seventy-nine percent of RSD charters are still rated D or F by the Louisiana Department of Education."

Charters Won't Tell Us What They're Doing

Performance aside, charters have other serious issues. The Nation (http://www.thenation.com/article/181753/why-dont-we-have-real-data-charter-schools) called them "stunningly opaque...black boxes." Indeed, the federal government has spent billions (http://www.prwatch.org/news/2015/05/12830/federal-billions-fuel-charter-school-industry) on charter development without basic forms of accountability, even for the causes and details of school closings.

The charter system is so unregulated that oversight often comes from whistleblowers (http://educationvotes.nea.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Charter-Schools-Louisiana-Report_web2.pdf) who feel disturbed enough, and courageous enough, to report abuses.

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/07/06/growing-evidence-charter-schools-are-failing

[sickdsm]

if u notice most public schools in rich suburbs =>elite schools>>>>>>>>>>private/public schools in poor area

now why cant those other public schools put up the same standard as the one in the rich suburb? is it due to govt funding? private/community funding?

Would it be that rich suburbs parents are more likely to push their kids at home and expect more?

[Slutter McGee]

:lol Only liberals would think that closing failing schools is a bad thing.

Slutter McGee

[boutons_deux]

Sherrod Brown pushes for charter school accountability and transparency (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/07/07/1400214/-Sherrod-Brown-pushes-for-charter-school-accountability-and-transparency)

The Charter School Accountability Act would:


Improve accountability by strengthening transparency and disclosure measures for charter schools. It would require both independent financial audits and public disclosures about important financial information, like charter documents, performance agreements between the school and its authorizer, the school’s program and mission, student discipline policies and processes, and annual student and teacher attrition rates. The bill also requires disaggregated data on information on disciplinary actions, student recruitment, admission, and retention.

Increase state educational agencies’ charter school accountability measures.The legislation would require that states have performance standards for charter school authorizers, data on charter school closures, denials of renewals, and canceled charters. States must also have the authority to suspend or revoke a charter school’s authorization based on poor performance or violating policies. Additionally, states must have clear conflict of interest laws for school employees and establish fiduciary duties for officers, directors, managers, and employees of charter schools.


The bill would also require community buy-in "in the planning, opening, and operation of charter schools."

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/07/07/1400214/-Sherrod-Brown-pushes-for-charter-school-accountability-and-transparency?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+dailykos%2Findex+%28Daily+Kos %29

Let's see how enthusiastic you public-school-destroying rightwingnuts are about CLOSING FAILING CHARTER SCHOOLS

[boutons_deux]

:lol Only liberals would think that closing failing schools is a bad thing.

Slutter McGee

Only rightwingnuts would think that they think

[boutons_deux]

Colorado Supreme Court Rules Using Public School Money For Private Religious Instruction is Unconstitutional

In 1786 Founding Father Thomas Jefferson wrote, that like Founding Father James Madison, he believed in designing a bill for religious freedom that, “No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever;” particularly using tax dollars.

That sentiment is part and parcel of the “Establishment Clause” of the First Amendment, and yet over 229 years later evangelical Republicans are compelling taxpayers to support religious worship in private schools despite it is a blatant violation of the U.S. Constitution.

Last week, in a decision (http://static.aclu-co.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/LaRue-Opinion.pdf) sure to be appealed to the conservative Vatican-5 on the Supreme Court by the religious right and evangelical Republicans, Colorado’s highest court ruled that a county’s so-called “Choice Scholarship Program” violates the Colorado Constitution because it unconstitutionally diverts public school funds to private, religious schools.

The Court’s ruling specifically cited Article IX, Section 7 of the state Constitution and explained, “This stark constitutional provision makes one thing clear: A school district may not aid religious schools. Yet aiding religious schools is exactly what the voucher program does.”

http://www.politicususa.com/2015/07/10/colorado-supreme-court-rules-public-school-money-private-religious-instruction-unconstitutional.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+politicususa%2FfJAl+%28Politi cus+USA+%29

vouchers for Christian Taliban charter schools are as much a FRAUD as rightnwingnut "social welfare" orgs are not political.

[boutons_deux]

ALEC Admits School Vouchers Are for Kids in Suburbia

School vouchers were never about helping poor, at-risk or minority students. But selling them as social mobility tickets was a useful fiction that for some twenty-five years helped rightwing ideologues and corporate backers gain bipartisan support for an ideological scheme designed to privatize public schools.

But the times they are a-changin'. Wisconsin is well on its way (http://prwatch.org/news/2015/06/12861/walkers-voucher-expansion) towards limitless voucher schools, and last month, Nevada signed into law (http://www.rgj.com/story/news/education/2015/05/29/nv-legislature-approves-private-school-vouchers/28190165/) a universal "education savings account" allowing parents to send their kids to private or religious schools, or even to homeschool them - all on the taxpayers' dime. On the federal level, a proposed amendment to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act that would have created a multi-billion-dollar-a-year voucher program was only narrowly defeated (http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/education_law/2015/07/senate-votes-down-vouchers-esea-process-presses-forward.html) in the US Senate.

The American Federation for Children (AFC), chaired by Amway billionaire Betsy DeVos, estimates that vouchers and voucher-like tax-credit schemes currently divert $1.5 billion (http://www.federationforchildren.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/AFC_EIR_2014_FINAL.pdf) of public money to private schools annually. But that is not enough. By expanding "pro-school choice legislative majorities" in state houses across the country the organization hopes that $5 billion a year will be siphoned out of public schools by 2020 and applied to for-profit and religious schools.

With vouchers gaining momentum nationwide, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC (http://www.alecexposed.org/wiki/ALEC_Exposed)), which is meeting in San Diego today, has decided to drop the pretense that vouchers have anything to do with social and racial equity, and is now pushing vouchers for the middle class - a project which, if pursued enough in numbers, will progressively erode the public school system and increase the segregation of students based on race and economic standing.

ALEC Comes Clean, Vouchers Are for the Middle Class

The agenda (http://www.alec.org/wp-content/uploads/2015-06-23-Final-EDUC-35-Day-Mailing.pdf) for this week's ALEC meeting includes a presentation entitled: "Problems in Suburbia: Why Middle-Class Students Need School Choice, Digital Learning and Better Options."

Perhaps more importantly, ALEC's revisions to three of its "model" voucher bills make clear that it is changing focus from underserved inner-city schools to middle-class suburbia. The talking points at the end of the bills state:



"Legislators … should keep in mind the financial burden many middle-class families face in paying for private schools."
"The authors believe that all children from low- and middle-income families should receive public support for their education regardless of whether they are attending a public or private school."
"The authors do not adjust the amount granted to an ESA [Education Savings Account] student based upon the student's income because states do not adjust the public investment for a student attending a traditional public school or a charter based upon their household income."


As if to further nail down the point that school vouchers are not about equity, ALEC also advises legislators against including language "banning discrimination in hiring." But if they choose to do so, they should "take care not to interfere with the ability of religious institutions to hire individuals who share their religious beliefs."

"Abolishing the Public School System"

ALEC is not the only organization coming clean on vouchers.

At the American Federation for Children's (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/The_American_Federation_for_Children) National Policy Summit held in New Orleans, lobbyist Scott Jensen - who, before being banned from Wisconsin politicsfor violating the public trust (http://www.jsonline.com/news/waukesha/112195794.html) served as chief of staff to governor Tommy Thompson, and was a prime mover behind the first voucher program in the nation - admitted that vouchers were really all about "pursuing Milton Friedman's free-market vision" even though the ideological agenda was nowadays sugarcoated with "a much more compelling message ... of social justice."


Ditching the Marketing Plan

By shifting the focus from poor, minority children to the predominantly white middle class, ALEC has come full circle. Vouchers were first proposed in the 1950s (http://www.prwatch.org/news/2015/02/12730/segregation-school-vouchers) as a way for white families to get around the desegregation resulting from the Brown vs. Board of Education Supreme Court Decision. ALEC first pitched vouchers to legislators in 1984 as a way to "introduce normal market forces" into education and to "dismantle the control and power of" teachers' unions. While there was a narrative of parent "empowerment" at that time, there was not even a passing mention of children - let alone minority children.

But when William Bennett joined Ronald Reagan's cabinet in 1985, vouchers soon gained a unique selling point. In the words of The Black Commentator (http://www.blackcommentator.com/92/92_cover_vouchers_pf.html):

Former Reagan Education Secretary William Bennett understood what was missing from the voucher political chemistry: minorities. If visible elements of the Black and Latino community could be ensnared in what was then a lily-white scheme, then the Right's dream of a universal vouchers system to subsidize general privatization of education, might become a practical political project. More urgently, Bennett and other rightwing strategists saw that vouchers had the potential to drive a wedge between Blacks and teachers unions, cracking the Democratic Party coalition. In 1988, Bennett urged the Catholic Church to "seek out the poor, the disadvantaged…and take them in, educate them, and then ask society for fair recompense for your efforts"–vouchers. The game was on.


Conservative think tanks and advocacy groups across the nation soon launched massive whitewashing campaigns; they started churning out policy reports and books purporting to show how school vouchers would actually benefit minority students. Examples include: We Can Rescue Our Children: The Cure for Chicago's Public School Crisis (Heartland Institute, 1988) and Liberating Schools: Education in the Inner City (Cato Institute, 1990).

By proposing schemes with vouchers weighted to boost racial diversity, or restricted to children from low-income families, the organizations pushing vouchers were able to kill two birds with one stone. They made them acceptable by obscuring thesegregationist history (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_plan), and, crucially, they could now cast themselves as the "new" civil rights movement.

In state after state, politicians were in on the trick. They would sign limited voucher programs into law as "civil rights" measures only to gradually expand the programs to higher-income white families.

...

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32026-alec-admits-school-vouchers-are-for-kids-in-suburbia

iow, the entire rigthwingnut push for charter schools:

1. resegregation, esp in the Confederacy.

2. taxpayer $Bs transferred to BigCorp

3. destruction of public schools and teachers (Dem) unions

4. taxpayer $Bs transferred to religious schools indoctrinating Biblical bullshit, historical lies, Christian supremacy, Christian theocracy.

[spurraider21]

vouchers make no sense. the real issue is overall inefficiency with funds. throwing more money into a sinkhole is stupid. pensions for teachers, etc. they need an overhaul, not more money.

and dont even get me started on public universities

[boutons_deux]

“Smell something, say something!” Teachers’ unions do not hurt student outcomes.

Welcome to the first edition of a new OTE feature, dedicated to the parting admonition of the great Jon Stewart: when it comes to BS, “smell something, say something!”

To be clear, I’m not trying to emulate the fact checkers out there. Nor am I going to peruse the papers, like Dean does soeffectively (http://www.cepr.net/blogs/beat-the-press/), to find errant economics reporting. Instead, I’m just going to occasionally pounce on a specific brand of assertion: a stylized, accepted fact that isn’t a fact at all.

For example, conservative partisans (as well as many centrist D’s) consistently assert that teachers’ unions are bad for student outcomes, and if we want to improve such outcomes, we must diminish the impact of teachers’ unions. Most recently, this negative role of unions was a featured assertion in a Republican primary debate (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/gop-presidential-hopefuls-to-be-tested-on-education-issues-at-nh-forum/2015/08/18/ef63d62c-45dc-11e5-846d-02792f854297_story.html).

That claim smelled bad to me, as in I know of no body of evidence to support it. I know it’s a constant refrain, but I figured I’d have seen something from the deep academic community that runs analyses of such issues over the years to support it, and I haven’t.

Maybe I missed it. So I asked some experts in this field and they confirmed my intuition.

–Berkeley econ prof Jesse Rothstein, who’s done important work on “value-added-measurement” in teacher evaluations, confirmed my priors that such evidence is wanting.

–He and education policy expert Kevin Carey made the same interesting point: there’s a significant measurement challenge in that school districts that don’t have unions, and would thus serve as a useful control, “tend to have teachers associations and/or contracts that aren’t too different from what unionized districts have” (Rothstein).

–The unions themselves will correctly tell you that states with fewer unions, including “right-to-work” states, have worse student outcomes. And there are countries, like Finland, that have very high unionization rates and consistently rank highly in international comparisons of student outcomes. But, as Carey stressed, right-to-work states are also poorer, and Finland ain’t the US, and there’s the quasi-union arrangements noted above, even in non-union states. So it’s very hard to make an all-else-equal run at this question.

–Larry Mishel shares this paper (https://aefpweb.org/sites/default/files/webform/aefp40/AEFP%20DRAFT-Garcia-Mishel-UNIONS%20AND%20ALLOCATION%20OF%20TEACHERS%20_Febru ary%202015.pdf) by himself and Emma Garcia. It tests–rigorously, I thought–for correlations–again, we’re not talking causality–between the strength of teachers unions and whether unions shift more experienced and higher credentialed teachers away from poorer schools. Their results fail “to show an association between the strength of unions in the states and the allocation of teacher credentials across schools. We find no negative or no association between the allocations of credentials in average schools or in high poverty schools and the unions’ strength…we find no association between the unions’ strength and the misallocation of credentials among high poverty schools relative to the average.”

In other words, there is nothing like a well-established consensus that teachers’ unions have any impact one way or the other on student outcomes.

That doesn’t mean teachers’ unions are great for kids either. It means that when you hear a politician bashing teachers’ unions on behalf of students, they’re BS’ing…so: smell something and say something.

http://jaredbernsteinblog.com/smell-something-say-something-teachers-unions-do-not-hurt-student-outcomes/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+JaredBernstein+%28Jared+Berns tein%29

[Winehole23]

:lol Only liberals would think that closing failing schools is a bad thing.

Slutter McGeeOnly conservatives would think the poorest schools with the most challenging job to do need to be shut down.

We ain't all Highland Park and Westlake, yo. Stats don't tell the whole story. Just because you grew up in a rough place, with the roughest kids, doesn't mean the neighborhood place of learning needs to be shut down.

Something like the reverse, in fact, might be true.

[Winehole23]

How do you get a ticket out of the neighborhood, when the school gets shut down?

Bus em to Westlake and Highland Park and Stratford and Alamo Heights? Get real: that ain't gonna happen.

[pgardn]

:lol Only liberals would think that closing failing schools is a bad thing.

Slutter McGee

Reality alert!

Many urban underperforming schools are used to warehouse troublemaking teenage boys. The cops, parent(s), and businesses in the area greatly appreciate the kids being watched by an adult for 8 hours and coming home tired. The dirty little secret...

pgardn

[Winehole23]

using high schools as minimum security detention facilities is part of the problem educationally speaking and a big part of why some schools chronically underperform, but of course you're right to point out there's a social benefit to keeping teenagers inside all day.

[pgardn]

using high schools as minimum security detention facilities is part of the problem educationally speaking and a big part of why some schools chronically underperform, but of course you're right to point out there's a social benefit to keeping teenagers inside all day.

Public schools mirror the socioeconomic structure around them.

This is not an easy fix. Which is why it has not been.
Fixed.

[Nbadan]

using high schools as minimum security detention facilities is part of the problem educationally speaking and a big part of why some schools chronically underperform, but of course you're right to point out there's a social benefit to keeping teenagers inside all day.

The problem is the courts...you can say anything you want to a teacher in class and get a slap in the hand, but tell a Judge anything in his court and you wind up in JJ

[Nbadan]

Public schools mirror the socioeconomic structure around them.

This is not an easy fix. Which is why it has not been.
Fixed.

True dat.....one third of kids live in poverty....but schools are getting better...

[Nbadan]

Teachers in TX make a decent wage.....so why is there a teacher shortage?

http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/18344/the_teacher_shortage_isnt_an_accidentits_the_resul t_of_corporate_education


“It’s a sad, alarming state of affairs, and it proves that for all our lip service about improving the education of America’s children, we’ve failed to make teaching the draw that it should be, the honor that it must be,” mused Times columnist Frank Bruni.

That Bruni would bemoan such a state of affairs is ironic, as he has used his column over the years to repeatedly argue that teaching is too easy a profession to enter and too easy to keep, and amplified the voice of reformers who want to want to make the profession more precarious. But the reality is that speaking of a “shortage” at all is a kind of ideological dodge; the word calls to mind some accident of nature or the market, when what is actually happening is the logical (if not necessarily intended) result of education reform policies.

“This is an old narrative, the idea that we aren’t producing enough teachers,” says Richard Ingersoll, an educational sociologist at University of Pennsylvania who has written extensively on the subject of teacher shortages. “As soon as you disaggregate the data, you find out claims of shortage are always overgeneralized and exaggerated. It’s always been a minority of schools, and the real factor is turnover in hard to staff schools. It may be true enrollment went down in these programs nationally, but there are so many former teachers in the reserve pool.” In other words, the problem isn’t that too few people entering the profession, but rather that too many are leaving it.

Such high turnover rates are disruptive to school culture and tend to concentrate the least experienced teachers in the poorest school districts. A 2014 paper by Ingersoll and his colleagues shows “45 percent of public school teacher turnover took place in just one quarter of the population of public schools. The data show that high-poverty, high-minority, urban and rural public schools have among the highest rates of turnover.”

“If you look at the shortage areas in terms of subject or what districts are having trouble filling jobs, it’s a shortage of people who are willing to teach for the salary and in the working conditions in certain school districts,” says Lois Weiner, an education professor at New Jersey City University and author of The Future of Our Schools. “It’s not a shortage in every district. Look at the whitest, wealthiest districts in every state and call up the personnel department, ask if they have a shortage in special ed or bilingual ed. They don’t—in fact, they are turning candidates away.”

It's not new year teachers that are in shortage...it's experience class room teachers...especially in low socio=economic areas....and tying pay to student performance just makes this problem worse because the 'better teachers' wind up migrating to schools with better kids.....it's sad really....

[boutons_deux]

As Teacher Pay Lags, Attrition and Class Size Grow

Despite having a starting salary that is on par with other states, the average teacher in Texas makes about $49,000 a year — about $8,000 below the national average. Teacher pay in Texas ranked 30th in the nation during the 2010-11 school year (http://www.nea.org/home/2010-11-rankings-and-estimates.html), dropping to 35th two years later (http://www.nea.org/home/rankings-and-estimates-2013-2014.html), according to an annual state-by-state analysis by the National Education Association (http://www.nea.org/home/about-rankings-and-estimates-report.html).

showed a marked increase in teachers reporting that they had taken second jobs during the school year to make ends meet.

showed teachers increasingly spending their own money on school supplies. In 2013, teachers said they spent an average of $697 on school supplies, a $130 increase over 2010.

Despite a boom in alternative certification programs promising a fast track to teaching, the state faces a chronic — and growing — shortage of certified teachers in middle school math and science. In those subjects, according to Texas Education Agency data, 32 percent of educators (https://secure.sbec.state.tx.us/Reports/WhoisTeaching/frm_whois_main.asp?width=1440&height=900) are teaching outside their field. The figures for English-language learning programs, in which the number of students has grown 25 percent in a decade, are even higher. Across all grades, 41 percent of the teachers assigned to those programs are not certified.

Since 2005, Texas has dropped from 36th to 47th in per-student spending. In the 2012-13 school year, the state’s budget allowed for $8,200 a student, which was higher than only Arizona, Indiana, Oklahoma and Utah — and below the national average of $10,200.

The fight is over the consequences of lawmakers’ $5.4 billion budget cut to public education during the 2011 legislative session.

Months later, Texas public schools opened their doors without state funding to account for growing student enrollment — something that had not happened since the modernization of the state’s public education system more than 60 years prior.

There was an immediate effect on teachers, from those who lost their jobs to those who lost faith in the system. For the first time in a decade, the number of teachers employed by the state’s public schools declined, with the attrition rate jumping from 8.9 percent in 2010 to 10.5 percent in 2011. The number of elementary school classes with waivers to exceed the state’s 22-student cap soared to 8,479 from 2,238 the year before.

http://www.texastribune.org/2014/07/11/teacher-pay-lags-attrition-and-class-sizes-grow/

[boutons_deux]

How Jeb Bush's Florida Plan for School 'Choice' Created an Industry of Corruption and Chaos

"We're making decisions just based on the money.” That’s Rosemarie Jensen talking, a tone of exasperation creeping into her voice as she describes the influence of money on education policy in South Florida.

In her view, charter schools — the privately managed, publicly funded entities that operate outside the oversight of democratically governed school systems — are not now what they originally claimed to be: centers of innovation created by teachers and parents. Jensen has taken note of the amount of money these schools spend on advertising and marketing. She complains that the middle school her children attended can't get money to construct a safer point of entry, while the state steers funds to charters for new construction. She believes that making public schools compete with charter schools for money dilutes funding that should be paying for better education for all kids. While she used to be open-minded about these schools, she now considers herself to be “anti-charter."

She’s not alone. Charter schools may continue to enjoy generally favorable ratings in national surveys of Americans, but many parents and public officials across South Florida, where these schools are now more prevalent than in other parts of the country, openly complain about an education "innovation" that seems more and more like an unsavory business venture.

Undermining Public Education

The obsession over money that is driving charter school growth in Florida is increasingly evident to those who bother to look.

"Outrageous," is the word former state Senator Nan Rich uses to describe recent decisions Florida lawmakers made to steer more money toward these schools. Until she termed out, Rich represented the 34th District that overlaps part of Broward County. Although she has never opposed charter schools, she now believes financial demands coming from the sector have become unreasonable.

As a recent article (http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20150415/COLUMNIST/304159999) in Florida’s Herald-Tribune notes, for the past two years, only charter schools have received capital outlay funds from the state for new construction. Now charter school lobbyists say their schools deserve a share of local property taxes too.

"When they were started, charters were never supposed to tap capital funds," Rich explains, "but gradually lawmakers with ties to the charter industry tipped the scales to favor them financially."

"I'm not one who opposes charter schools that are set up the way they were intended," Rich adds. But she now believes, "The whole movement…is undermining public education and moves public money to private interests."

http://www.alternet.org/education/how-jeb-bushs-florida-plan-school-choice-created-industry-corruption-and-chaos?akid=13459.187590.YwyYXa&rd=1&src=newsletter1042126&t=2

Another red state fucked up by Repug MISgovernance.

The predatory capitalists won't stop until they have all our property taxes, schools funds, Social Security funds.

[boutons_deux]

How the GOP and Education Privatizers Are Using Charters to Bleed Pennsylvania Schools Dry

Teachers are now working for free in a school district undone by charter schools and state government neglect

As schools across Pennsylvania open their doors for the new school year, there’s one district in the state where teachers will be hard at work even though they’re not likely to get paid.

The teachers are actually already on the job, having reported for work a week early as originally expected. But when the district’s administration announced it could not meet a scheduled payroll on September 9, a week after classes start, the teachers – along with janitors, nurses, and other school personnel – held an impromptu meeting and voted to temporarily forego pay.

The teachers are employed by the financially strapped school district of Chester Upland, located about 20 miles west of Philadelphia. Years of deliberate under-funding by the state, coupled with policies that favor the rapid expansion of publicly funded but privately operated charter schools, are bleeding the district. The dedication of committed and caring educators seems to be one of the few forces binding the shattered school community together.

“We aren’t broken,” says Dariah Jackson, one of the teachers working for no pay tells Salon in a phone interview. Jackson, a Special Education and Life Skills Support teacher in grades 3-5, says, “I’m in my classroom, as are my colleagues, ready for the students to walk through the door next week.”

When asked how long is “temporary” in their resolve to work with no pay, Jackson says, “No one has set a time limit for now. We have to be here for our students. They need a place to go.”

But while Jackson and her colleagues show their determination to meet the needs of the students, there are forces acting in Chester Upland, and across Pennsylvania, focused on anything but that.

School Breakage 101

“Chester Upland is broke,” explains Wythe Keever, spokesman for the Pennsylvania State Education Association. “Actually, they’re a lot worse off than broke,” he tells Salon.

“They have an operating budget deficit in excess of $20 million that is expected by the end of the year to go beyond $40 million.”

“The school district is in danger of not existing,” says Jeff Sheridan, a spokesman for Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, in a report by Lyndsey Layton of The Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/in-a-bankrupt-pa-school-district-teachers-plan-to-work-for-free/2015/08/28/0332898e-4dba-11e5-84df-923b3ef1a64b_story.html) [3].

What’s not helping for sure is an ongoing imbroglio over Pennsylvania’s state budget. Legislators and Wolf have been unable to come to an agreement on the state’s fiscal responsibilities, delaying budget completion for over 50 days. What’s the fight about?

Education funding (http://www.ydr.com/politics/ci_28664643/wolf-lawmakers-resume-talks-gop-offer-school-aid) [4].

The newly elected Democratic governor insists on increasing school funding and correcting unfair distributions – particularly those that go to online “cyber” charter schools (http://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2015/05/pa-cyber-whine-party.html) [5] – while an entrenched Republican legislature continues to exhibit reluctance to adequately and fairly fund the state’s schools.

So school districts across the state are having to dig deeper into their own local resources to fund the reopening of schools. Districts like Chester Upland, that are heavily reliant on state aid, simply don’t have coffers to dig into.

But there are also long term “structural problems,” explains Keever.

As Layton recounts in her report, “Chester Upland’s financial problems date to 1994, when it was first classified by the state as being in ‘economic distress.” The district has been in and out of state receivership since.

“A similar financial collapse occurred in the district in 2012,” Layton continues, “and the teachers also agreed to work without pay then. In the end, a federal judge ordered the state to pay the district, and lawmakers arranged a bailout, so that employees’ paychecks were just a couple of days late.”

One of those “structural problems” is that Chester Upland is a school district serving a lot of families living in poverty. According to Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chester_Upland_School_District) [6], in 2009, “the District residents’ per capita income (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per_capita_income) [7] was $13,521, while the median family income (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_family_income) [8] was $30,900.” Both figures are way below national and Pennsylvania state averages. Only 10 percent of the people who live in the school district have college degrees.

Schools that serve communities that are so disproportionally poor are bound to be financially at risk in a system such as America’s where the financial base for schools starts with local property taxes. But the state of Pennsylvania compounds the problem by deliberately under-funding the schools in the state that are most in need of money.

As Rutgers University professor Bruce Baker (http://schoolfinance101.wordpress.com/2012/06/05/the-commonwealth-triple-screw-special-education-funding-charter-school-payments-in-pennsylvania/) [9] explains on his blog, “the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has among the least equitable state school finance systems in the country (http://www.schoolfundingfairness.org/) [10],” giving less state and local revenue to the state’s highest needs schools like Chester Upland.

A national report released by the U.S. Department of Education earlier this year spotlighted the Quaker State as being among the worst of the 23 states across the country that distribute more education money to richer school districts and less money to those with the least means.

As The Post’s Emma Brown (http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2015/03/12/in-23-states-richer-school-districts-get-more-local-funding-than-poorer-districts/) [11] wrote when the report was released, “Pennsylvania’s state and local per-pupil spending in its poorest school districts is 33 percent lower than per-pupil spending in the state’s most affluent school districts, the highest differential in the country.”

Charters Sap the District

Charter schools add to the financial burden placed on resource-starved schools like those in Chester Upland.

According to a local news outlet (http://6abc.com/education/chester-upland-teachers-agree-to-work-without-pay/960004/) [12], teachers in Chester Upland “say the district’s ongoing financial problems are because of the state’s funding formula, specifically what the school district is required to pay to charter schools. The school district receives about $16,000 for children with learning disabilities from the state, but it is required to give the charter schools $40,000 for each student listed with a learning disability.”

“It’s absolutely an unsustainable expense,” Keever explains. The Chester Upland district now pays about $64 million, over half of its budget, to the charter schools – more money than what the school district gets from the state.
Professor Baker, a school finance expert, says this method of financing special education in charter schools “is poorly conceived, creates perverse incentives for charter school operators, and inappropriately drains disproportionate resources from sending districts.”

Further, as Keever explains, “When students and funding are drawn away from a traditional public school, the traditional public school can’t reduce their overhead because they have fixed costs. They have to operate the buses and feed the students and pay the light and water bill. Charter schools taking away a few students from different grade levels doesn’t produce any savings. You still have to staff the same number of classrooms.”

A Special Education Scam

To be fair, charter schools, which have been expanding over the years, now educate about half of the students in the district. But there are good reasons to believe the charter schools have turned these payments for special education services into a profit center.

“The charter schools are submitting bills for students with special learning that are $10,000-17,000 more than what neighboring school districts are paying.,” Keever points out.

Indeed, Valerie Strauss (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2015/08/31/is-this-any-way-to-run-a-school-district/) [13], on her blog at The Washington Post, points to a report from Chester Upland’s state-appointed receiver, Francis Barnes, who documents how
the charter schools seem to mine the local district of low-cost special education students while leaving the traditional schools with students who have the most severe disabilities. He points to data showing the district’s charter schools tends to serve high proportions of low-cost special needs students – those with speech and hearing disabilities, for instance – while serving low proportions of high-cost special needs students, such as those with autism or emotional problems.

“Payments to the charters are absolutely more than what it costs to educate these children,” Keever contends. “Many of the children designated special needs in the charters are actually receiving low-cost services that the charters are billing at $40,000.”

Charter Fraud Is Rampant in Pennsylvania

It’s not at all hard to believe there might be something fishy about a charter school operation in Pennsylvania. Last year, a report (http://populardemocracy.org/sites/default/files/charter-schools-PA-Fraud.pdf) [14], “Fraud and Financial Mismanagement in Pennsylvania’s Charter Schools,” found charter school officials in the state have defrauded at least $30 million intended for school children since 1997.

The report found an administrator who diverted $2.6 million in school funds to a church property he also operated.

Another charter school chief was caught spending millions in school funds to bail out other nonprofits associated with the school.

A pair of charter school operators stole more than $900,000 from the school by using fraudulent invoices, and a cyber school entrepreneur diverted $8 million of school funds for houses, a Florida condominium, and an airplane.

Because Pennsylvania spends over a billion dollars a year on charter schools, the $30 million documented in this study is likely the minimum possible amount.

Another report revealed how Pennsylvania charters across the state had gamed the system for special education funding. The report found in 2013, public schools paid out $350 million for charters to educate special education students but the charter schools spent only $150 million on special education services, resulting in a $200 million profit (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRw5oO02KpA) [15] for the charter industry.

None of this evidence of financial fraud has been uncovered by state agencies overseeing the charter schools. The evidence has been brought to light by whistleblowers, media coverage, and watchdog groups – not by state auditors who have a history of not effectively detecting or preventing fraud. And charter schools, which self-report their enrollments to the district and the department of education, can operate for years without fear of an audit.

Charter Operators Get Mansions While Teachers Can’t Get Paid

What needs to change, at the very least, is the funding formula for how charter schools are paid for special education services.

The Pennsylvania State Education Association has presented recommendations (http://www.psea.org/uploadedFiles/LegislationAndPolitics/Solutions_That_Work/STW-UpdatePACharterSchoolLaw.pdf) [16] for changing the state’s charter school law, that include fixing the special education inequities, enforcing some financial transparency on charters, and capping charter school undesignated fund balances.

To his credit, Governor Wolf has taken steps (http://articles.philly.com/2015-08-24/news/65773715_1_public-charter-schools-robert-fayfich-pennsylvania-coalition) [17] to correct the funding formulas for special education in a way that would help cash strapped districts like Chester Upland. The charter school industry, unfortunately, has fought him at every step, and Wolf’s latest proposal was rejected by a Pennsylvania district court (http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/20150826_Judge_rejects_Wolf_challenge_to_charter_f unding.html#FaBkHDktlZRAO83z.99) [18].

In Chester Upland specifically, “The charter schools have accumulated massive fund balances,” due to gaming the state’s charter funding system, Keever contends. He points to one charter in particular, Chester Community Charter School.

Chester Community Charter, the largest charter in the district, is managed by a company owned by Vahan Gureghian. Gureghian, an attorney and prodigious donor to Republican politicians (http://powerplayers-pa.herokuapp.com/donors/vahan-gureghian-i/) [19], recently put on the market his Palm Beach, Florida mansion listed at $84.5 million. The “French inspired” house (http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/news/local/north-end-mansion-listed-at-845m/nkhyf/) [20] features 35,000 feet of living space, a bowling alley, and a moat.

“It’s difficult to pin down how much the Chester Community Charter School and others have profited,” Keever admits. “The charters have refused to honor right to know requests under the state’s open records laws, so there’s little to no way to document how much the management company that runs that charter is actually taking out.”

While the full extent of charter school profiting remains a question, nevertheless, Gureghian and his expansive Palm Beach estate strike quite a sharp contrast to Dariah Jackson and the rest of the Chester Upland educators willing to work for no pay.

Speaking from her small classroom, in a beleaguered school, in a long-struggling community, Jackson remains defiant. “I want everyone to know we care about our students. The paycheck is not what’s foremost in our minds.

“Now we just need our elected officials to act.”

For the students’ sake, let’s hope they do.

http://www.alternet.org/education/how-gop-and-education-privatizers-are-using-charters-bleed-pennsylvania-schools-dry

Repug MISgovernance is not just incompetence it's willful, intended misgovernance for profit.

[boutons_deux]

redistribution of taxpayer $100Ms to BigCorp

Web of Secrecy Surrounding Federal Half-a-Billion Handout to Charter Schools

More than $200 million in fraud, waste, and mismanagement in the charter school industry have been documented.

Already the federal government has spent $3.3 billion (http://www.prwatch.org/files/ed_charter_school_funding.png) in American tax dollars under the Charter Schools Program (CSP), as tallied by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD).

But the government has done so without requiring any accountability from the states and schools that receive the money, as CMD revealed earlier this year. (http://www.prwatch.org/news/2015/05/12830/federal-billions-fuel-charter-school-industry)

Throwing good money after bad, Education Secretary Arne Duncan called for a 48 percent increase (http://www2.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/budget16/summary/16summary.pdf) in federal charter funding earlier this year, and the House and Senate budget proposals also call for an increase—albeit a more modest one (http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2015/06/senate_appropriators_propose_c.html)—while at the same time slashing education programs for immigrants and language learners.

The clamor for charter expansion comes despite the fact that there are federal probes underway (http://prwatch.org/news/2015/06/12859/charter-program-expansion-looms-despite-ongoing-probes-mismanagement-and-closed) into suspected waste and mismanagement within the program, not to mention ongoing and recently completed (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/charter-schools-28m-questionable-expenses-audit-article-1.2028052) state audits of fraud perpetrated by charter school operators.

Earlier this year, the Center for Popular Democracy documented more than$200 million (http://populardemocracy.org/sites/default/files/Charter-Schools-National-Report_rev2.pdf) in fraud, waste, and mismanagement in the charter school industry in 15 states alone, a number that is likely to be just the tip of the iceberg.

http://www.alternet.org/education/web-secrecy-surrounding-federal-half-billion-handout-charter-schools?akid=13472.187590.KwQix-&rd=1&src=newsletter1042348&t=12

[boutons_deux]

Bankruptcy Is a "Huge Opportunity" to Privatize Schools Says EdBuild

One big reason for this obsession?

There's at least half a trillion dollars a year up for grabs for corporations that want to line their coffers with taxpayer money. K-12 education, Rupert Murdoch explained in a press release (http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20101122006883/en/News-Corporation-Acquire-Education-Technology-Company-Wireless) a few years ago, is a "$500 billion sector in the US alone that is waiting to be transformed."

"When you think of bankruptcy … this is a huge opportunity. Bankruptcy is not a problem for kids; bankruptcy is a problem for the people governing the system, right? So, when a school district goes bankrupt all of their legacy debt can be eliminated ... How are we going to pay for the buildings? How are we going to bring in new operators when there is pension debt? Look, if we can eliminate that in an entire urban system, then we can throw all the cards up in the air, and redistribute everything with all new models. You've heard it first: bankruptcy might be the thing that leads to the next education revolution,"


how bankruptcy could potentially lead to the kind of public-to-private "redistribution" Sibilia has in mind.

"Once you've cleared any hurdle the state has set up and file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy, the case goes before a federal judge who reviews the bankruptcy plan the municipality has submitted. The judge can only accept it or reject it, and is not allowed to propose any changes. This gives you plenty of leeway to impose radical policy changes under the guise of saving money. You could, for example, turn traditional public schools into charters and undo union contracts,"

"After undergoing improvement efforts, a struggling private firm that continues to lose money will close, get taken over, or go bankrupt … Urban school districts, at long last, need an equivalent."

Disaster Capitalism Is Now Expressly Embraced by the Corporate Right

At an education reform meeting in 2011, Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner argued that Katrina was not all bad. There were, he said, "bright spots (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fh99tlcJf0)" as the hurricane literally swept away public schools and paved the way for charter and voucher schools.

With Detroit in fresh memory, it is hardly a surprise that Governor Rauner is now making a callous push for the Chicago Public Schools District to declare bankruptcy to "restructure contracts" and address a $1.14 billion budget shortfall instead of raising revenue to meet the need to fund 21st century schools. He also tried to blame teachers' unions for balking at having their contracts torn up and pensions gutted.

Rauner has pitched bankruptcy as a last resort once all other options are exhausted, but preaching to the choir behind closed doors in New Orleans, Sibilia threw caution to the wind. Not only did she suggest that this was the solution the corporate school reform movement has been waiting for; she also made it clear that once bankruptcy is declared, the current public school teachers have got to go:

"The schools of choice that will largely replace the old schools have new teachers; they have a completely different teaching corps than those of the public schools."

no joke for the children and families and educators affected by the reformers' willingness to push every lever - no matter how disruptive or destructive - to undermine public schools and funnel money to the for-profit firms who turn around and spend big bucks on lobbying, elections, and non-profit groups, such as AFC and EdBuild, that help advance their bottom line at the public's expense.

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32960-bankruptcy-is-a-huge-opportunity-to-privatize-schools-says-edbuild

With so many BigCorp/1%/VRWC attacks to suck down taxpayers $Ts, a good number of the attacks will probably succeed. There's no stopping them. America is fucked and unfuckable.

[boutons_deux]

Test Scores Under Common Core Show That ‘Proficient’ Varies by State


Ohio seems to have taken a page from Lake Wobegon, where all the children are above average.
Last month, state officials releasing an early batch of test scores declared that two-thirds of students at most grade levels (http://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/78211ac4-37d4-4ecf-9fba-61fd69bc2ef2/performancelevels.pdf.aspx) were proficient on reading and math tests given last spring under the new Common Core requirements.
Yet similar scores on the same tests meant something quite different in Illinois, where education officials said only about a third of students (http://www.isbe.net/assessment/pdfs/parcc/parcc-prelim-state-lvl-results.pdf) were on track. And in Massachusetts, typically one of the strongest academic performers, the state saidabout half (http://www.doe.mass.edu/news/news.aspx?id=21214) of the students who took the same tests as Ohio’s children met expectations.
It all came down to the different labels each state used to describe the exact same scores on the same tests.

That kind of inconsistency in educational standards is what the Common Core — academic guidelines for kindergarten through high school reading and math that were adopted by more than 40 states — was intended to redress. But Ohio is not alone in adjusting the goal posts. In California (http://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/1st-school-test-score-results-Half-of-students-6494274.php) and North Carolina (http://www.ncpublicschools.org/newsroom/news/2015-16/20150902-01), state officials reporting headline results lumped together groups of students who either passed or nearly passed the tests. And in Florida, the education commissioner recommended passing rates less stringent than in other states.

“This was exactly the problem that a lot of policy makers and educators were trying to solve,” said Karen Nussle, the executive director of the Collaborative for Student Success, a Common Core advocacy group, “to get a more honest assessment of where kids are and being transparent about that with parents and educators so that we could do something about it.”

But as the results from the first Common Core tests have rolled out, education officials again seem to be subtly broadening definitions of success.

“That mentality of saying let’s set proficient at a level where not too many people fail is going to kill us,” said Marc S. Tucker, the president of the National Center on Education and the Economy, a nonprofit think tank. “The global standard of what proficient is keeps moving up.”

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/10/07/us/test-scores-under-common-core-show-that-proficient-varies-by-state.html?_r=0

[boutons_deux]

JEB great FL accomplishment

This Florida charter school sounds like every parent and teacher's education nightmare (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/10/06/1428552/-This-Florida-charter-school-sounds-like-every-parent-and-teacher-s-education-nightmare)


How would you feel as a parent if a little more than one month into the school year the principal of your new charter school fired the bulk of teachers and forced others to take huge pay cuts, lose benefits to remain?

That's what happened at Paramount Charter School in Broward county where stunned parents discovered their kids were sitting around and drawing all day because there were no teachers left: (http://www.local10.com/news/sunrise-charter-school-massfires-teachers/35672670)


"I just picked them up one day and all their teachers were gone," Brooks said, still incredulous. "I'm looking around like, 'OK, where's your teacher? Where's your teacher?' Nobody had a teacher."

And where were the teachers? Looking for new jobs. As many as 20 were fired and many more resigned:


Three now-former Paramount teachers who, fearing retaliation, spoke on condition of anonymity said about 20 teachers lost their jobs, many in a mass firing, the others resigning."One by one, she would call everybody in and they were getting fired, fired, fired," one teacher said.


Those who weren't fired were given a stark choice:


One said that after the mass firings, she was called into the room and told that the school wanted to keep her, but that if she wanted to keep her job she would have to take a cut in pay from $36,000 to $30,000 and that promised benefits, including health care, would be cut.


The teachers who spoke with Local 10 News in Miami said the school was a mess from the minute it opened the doors—teachers didn't have lists of their students names, no teaching supplies, no student schedules. Teachers and parents say they feel betrayed and worse yet—their kids are paying the price. See more on the unbelievable mismanagement of this Florida Charter school at Local10News.com. (http://www.local10.com/news/nearly-all-teachers-abruptly-fired-at-sunrise-charter-school/35674902)

The Paramount Charter School website proudly notes how charter schools are free of those pesky regulations that drag down traditional public schools: (http://www.paramountcharterschool.org/charter-school-faqs1.html)


Charter schools are public schools that operate under a performance contract, or a “charter” which frees them from many regulations created for traditional public schools while holding them accountable for academic and financial results.

The charter contract between the charter school governing board and the sponsor details the school’s mission, program, goals, students served, methods of assessment and ways to measure success. The length of time for which charters are granted varies but most are granted for five years.

The Florida Legislature, in authorizing the creation of public charter schools, established the following guiding principles: high standards of student achievement while increasing parental choice; the alignment of responsibility with accountability; and ensuring parents receive information on reading levels and learning gains of their children.

Charter schools are intended to improve student learning; increase learning opportunities with special emphasis on low performing students and reading; and measure learning outcomes.

Charter schools may create innovative measurement tools; provide competition to stimulate improvement in traditional schools; expand capacity of the public school system; and mitigate the educational impact created by the development of new residential units.


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/10/06/1428552/-This-Florida-charter-school-sounds-like-every-parent-and-teacher-s-education-nightmare?detail=email



Did the principal and other staff also take pay and benefits cuts?

[boutons_deux]

Why Are Eva Moskowitz's Success Academy Charter Schools Suspending Students Left and Right?

One principal issued 44 out-of-school suspensions to her 203 kindergartners and first graders. Who does that benefit?

According to a report by the website Chalkbeat, in New York City charter schools (http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2015/02/23/suspensions-at-city-charter-schools-far-outpace-those-at-district-schools-data-show/#.VhzlzLRVhHw) suspended students at about three times the rate of traditional public schools. Chalkbeat found that "charter schools suspended at least 11 percent of their students that year, while district schools suspended 4.2 percent of their students." Their study also concluded "The charter-school suspension rate is likely an underestimate because charter schools don't have to report suspensions that students serve in school."

Merrow then turned to the Success Academy Charter Schools where discipline for their "scholars" is much more punitive. According to Merrow, "Last year, principal Monica Komery issued 44 out-of-school suspensions to her 203 kindergartners and first graders." Her school is one of 34 Success Academies operating in New York City. The schools are publicly funded, but under private control. Komery admitted "We do have a zero-tolerance policy around certain behaviors," but claimed "I don't just suspend children as the first course of action" and argued "It's well-thought-out. It's a process, and there are systems in place."

Moskowitz, when interviewed by Merrow, defended the suspension policy because "If you get it right in the early years, you actually have to suspend far less when the kids are older, because they understand what is expected of them.

According to Merrow, Success Academy's "code of conduct (http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2012/04/success-academy-family-handbook-only.html) runs six pages and identifies 65 infractions, from bullying and gambling to littering and failing to be in a ready-to-succeed position."

These policies seem more like preparation for "Walking while Black (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/walking-while-black/)" in Stop-and-Frisk (http://www.nyclu.org/issues/racial-justice/stop-and-frisk-practices) New York City than a school discipline code.

http://www.alternet.org/education/why-are-eva-moskowitzs-success-academy-charter-schools-suspending-students-left-and-right?akid=13604.187590.OM279a&rd=1&src=newsletter1044691&t=22

For-profit, militarized, blindly authoritarian charter schools, another reason America is fucked and unfuckable.

[boutons_deux]

Commanding General Moskovitz: $475K


http://images.nymag.com/news/features/moskowitz100503_1_250.jpg

Top 16 NYC charter school executives earn more than Chancellor Dennis Walcott


http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1497801.1382841590!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/article_970/graphic-charter27-1026.jpg?enlarged


http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/education/top-16-nyc-charter-school-execs-out-earn-chancellor-dennis-walcott-article-1.1497717

[SpursforSix]

Why Are Eva Moskowitz's Success Academy Charter Schools Suspending Students Left and Right?

One principal issued 44 out-of-school suspensions to her 203 kindergartners and first graders. Who does that benefit?

According to a report by the website Chalkbeat, in New York City charter schools (http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2015/02/23/suspensions-at-city-charter-schools-far-outpace-those-at-district-schools-data-show/#.VhzlzLRVhHw) suspended students at about three times the rate of traditional public schools. Chalkbeat found that "charter schools suspended at least 11 percent of their students that year, while district schools suspended 4.2 percent of their students." Their study also concluded "The charter-school suspension rate is likely an underestimate because charter schools don't have to report suspensions that students serve in school."

Merrow then turned to the Success Academy Charter Schools where discipline for their "scholars" is much more punitive. According to Merrow, "Last year, principal Monica Komery issued 44 out-of-school suspensions to her 203 kindergartners and first graders." Her school is one of 34 Success Academies operating in New York City. The schools are publicly funded, but under private control. Komery admitted "We do have a zero-tolerance policy around certain behaviors," but claimed "I don't just suspend children as the first course of action" and argued "It's well-thought-out. It's a process, and there are systems in place."

Moskowitz, when interviewed by Merrow, defended the suspension policy because "If you get it right in the early years, you actually have to suspend far less when the kids are older, because they understand what is expected of them.

According to Merrow, Success Academy's "code of conduct (http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2012/04/success-academy-family-handbook-only.html) runs six pages and identifies 65 infractions, from bullying and gambling to littering and failing to be in a ready-to-succeed position."

These policies seem more like preparation for "Walking while Black (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/walking-while-black/)" in Stop-and-Frisk (http://www.nyclu.org/issues/racial-justice/stop-and-frisk-practices) New York City than a school discipline code.

http://www.alternet.org/education/why-are-eva-moskowitzs-success-academy-charter-schools-suspending-students-left-and-right?akid=13604.187590.OM279a&rd=1&src=newsletter1044691&t=22

For-profit, militarized, blindly authoritarian charter schools, another reason America is fucked and unfuckable.




You don't have enough information to judge on this. Six pages and 65 infractions. So? In today's litigious society, if you don't list every single thing, you'll end up getting sued over it.

[DMX7]

Kenny's salary supposedly comes from only privately raised funds per Wikipedia. Does that mean the charter schools she manages don't get federal/state/city money?

[boutons_deux]

Kenny's salary supposedly comes from only privately raised funds per Wikipedia. Does that mean the charter schools she manages don't get federal/state/city money?

In April, Success Academy applied for an increase from $1,350 to $2,000 in the annual per student payment (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/eva-moskowitz-success-academy-charter-schools-disproportionate-share-state-education-money-article-1.1101668?localLinksEnabled=false) it receives from the state to operate 10 of its charter schools, reports the New York Daily News.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/25/controversial-success-aca_n_1625256.html

I think many of Success Academy and other charter thingies are in former taxpayer-funded public buildings, and/or actually cohabiting in public school buildings alongside the non-charter dreck.

[boutons_deux]

You don't have enough information to judge on this. Six pages and 65 infractions. So? In today's litigious society, if you don't list every single thing, you'll end up getting sued over it.

65 infarction in 6 pages? applies to K-4? These are infractions for suspending, expelling kids. It's fucking control-freak's wet dream.

[SpursforSix]

65 pages? applies to K-4? These are 65 pages of infractions suspending, expelling kids. It's fucking control-freak's wet dream.

you're an idiot. it's 6 fucking pages. 65 infractions. you know this.

[SpursforSix]

1. no hitting
2. no kicking
3. no spitting
4. no cursing
5. no knives
6. no guns
7. no drugs
8. no short skirts
9. no racist t shirts
10. no religious stuff
11. no kissing
12. no yelling at teachers
13. no shooting the middle finger
14. no bringing clock bombs to school
15. no making fun of teachers
16. no making fun of each other

etc.

ets.

[boutons_deux]

you're an idiot. it's 6 fucking pages. 65 infractions. you know this.

correted, but

you're an asshole, you know this.

[spurraider21]

liberal solution to education:

http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/5049fdefecad04a361000008/throwing-money.gif

[boutons_deux]

liberal solution to education:

http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/5049fdefecad04a361000008/throwing-money.gif

ANYTHING beats you rightwingnuts' "solutions" to education.

[SpursforSix]

ANYTHING beats you rightwingnuts' "solutions" to education.

so...did you have a solution? to your thread? how to fix public schools. I didn't see it.

[spurraider21]

so...did you have a solution? to your thread? how to fix public schools. I didn't see it.
yeah it looks like this

http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/5049fdefecad04a361000008/throwing-money.gif

[boutons_deux]

so...did you have a solution? to your thread? how to fix public schools. I didn't see it.

public schools and their teachers have been so effectively trashed for so long, all of which will continue from you rightwingnuts duped by the VRWC, that improving K-12 will be extremely difficult because the VRWC and their Repug hitmen will block any solutions, while keeping tax payers $Ts flowing to charter school scams.

[TeyshaBlue]

So more give up. Check.

[boutons_deux]

So more give up. Check.

what are your suggestions, chickenshit

[TeyshaBlue]

Probably need to read the thread again, dickless.

[Nbadan]

if you remove all the wankers or clowns who dont want to learn, and just leave the nerds or fill up the shittest school with nerds, u telling me those nerds alone isnt enough to turn around a schools rating?

Of course, however there are policies that don't work but because of lawsuit threat and no child left behind, nobody speaks out...

[pgardn]

Again:

The public and politicians have not made it clear what they want out of public schools. Honors classes in well to do schools with parents that care do as well as any in the world. Schools in urban blight, teaching kids from homes where mom is the only parent and working do extremely poorly. By the time the kids in these impoverished areas reach puberty they have already fallen way behind. At this stage they are warehoused for 9.5 months so the police don't have to deal with them.

The public schools mimic the socioeconomics of the area they serve. So now go from here with the solutions. We put out the best and worst students in the world. And it's not surprising.

[Nbadan]

Schools in urban blight, teaching kids from homes where mom is the only parent and working do extremely poorly. By the time the kids in these impoverished areas reach puberty they have already fallen way behind. At this stage they are warehoused for 9.5 months so the police don't have to deal with them.

Yet there are schools that can be successful in such situations...it all begins with parent involvement though.....there has to be someone responsible at home or in the community otherwise, any plan will collapse...

[pgardn]

Yet there are schools that can be successful in such situations...it all begins with parent involvement though.....there has to be someone responsible at home or in the community otherwise, any plan will collapse...

Absolutely.

But this is very difficult.
Anecdotal situation, sorry, but I can't help myself. I helped with a school in a a well to do area that also contained a segment of government housing. The kids from these apartment complexes were failing badly. I helped set up a system whereby the parents were invited to a school get together for those entering Elementary school. Food served, books given out, talking to the parents about teaching the kids letters and numbers BEFORE they entered. Then every grading period after that, food, merriment, and updates. Police helped out voluntarily I might add. So follow this for a while. Many of the families are transient and just left even though they were at a "good" school. Families with older kids that had already experienced failure were, for the most part, a horrible influence. We helped enough kids to get their Elementary a raised State mark, but overall, it was a failure IMO, but not to some of the schools that received their better scores. (Pat administrator on the back and send them to central office; and some admin. were utterly clueless; they could not figure out the simplest of logistics and had no idea where to start or did not care to try)
Middle school and HS proved almost impossible as I reasoned but they wanted to try anyway. The parents were already embarrassed of their kid's standing and did not even show up at the scheduled events right in their own apartment complex for the most part. The parents and kids that did show were already successful.

Conclusion: Schools asked to be a semi surrogate family does not work for the vast majority of kids.
Especially the older ones. If we could all take one home and care for them we might get somewhere (strike Avante from this hypothetical volunteer group)

Now I expect anecdotal great news from some private group running a charter which is most likely horse caca.

[Nbadan]

why is it there are some high achieving public schools, but that same formula cant be used in other public schools?

Better teachers move on to better schools....more support, better kids......poor districts, those that need better teachers, get left with first year or career teachers... first year teachers often quit teaching or move on to other districts by their third year...

[Nbadan]

u notice those high achieving public schools only exists in working class suburbs, im talkin about suburbs where the the household income is at leasts above 120k plus

In SA that would be well-to-do....the avg. household income is less than $50K...

[SpursforSix]

public schools and their teachers have been so effectively trashed for so long, all of which will continue from you rightwingnuts duped by the VRWC, that improving K-12 will be extremely difficult because the VRWC and their Repug hitmen will block any solutions, while keeping tax payers $Ts flowing to charter school scams.

any thoughts that the problem might start in the home? Parents not stressing the importance of education or worse, not instilling in their child any sense of personal responsibility.

[boutons_deux]

The public and politicians have not made it clear what they want out of public schools.

WTF? what have public schools provided for the last 100+ years that "Made America Great" (c)?

[pgardn]

WTF? what have public schools provided for the last 100+ years that "Made America Great" (c)?

America has changed if you have not noticed. Families used to be large and kids helped with labor.
Get real... Last 100 years...

[boutons_deux]

America has changed if you have not noticed. Families used to be large and kids helped with labor.
Get real... Last 100 years...

how has "America changed" that made public schools so bad they have to be destroyed?

[pgardn]

how has "America changed" that made public schools so bad they have to be destroyed?

There have always been bad public schools. The rural country schools taught rudimentary skills to farm kids. Because that's what many children did, became farmers. Now we obviously have the technology to solve many labor intensive jobs. Where have you been?

[TheSanityAnnex]

any thoughts that the problem might start in the home? Parents not stressing the importance of education or worse, not instilling in their child any sense of personal responsibility.
boutons is allergic to holding individuals responsible for the upbringing of their children.

[DMX7]

why is it there are some high achieving public schools, but that same formula cant be used in other public schools?

u notice those high achieving public schools only exists in working class suburbs, im talkin about suburbs where the the household income is at leasts above 120k plus

Serious question?

Students are better prepared, often receive outside tutoring, typically have all the resources they need, usually have greater parental interest in their performance, etc.

Parents of students at these wealthier high achieving public schools probably are more likely to hold admins and teachers accountable for their performance as well.

[pgardn]

Serious question?

Students are better prepared, often receive outside tutoring, typically have all the resources they need, usually have greater parental interest in their performance, etc.

Parents of students at these wealthier high achieving public schools probably are more likely to hold admins and teachers accountable for their performance as well.

Yes.

Yes again.

Same with those who go to high cost private prep schools. The basic formula for creating good and bad schools is generally well known. How to fix the poor schools is very tough as they mimic the surrounding socioeconomic situation. There are some unique situations where magnate schools have done a good job in teaching less fortunate kids who want to learn. Parental involvement is an absolutely huge driving force though.

The statistics show a very clear trend. Single parent mom not at home much with teenage sons with little to no guidance = big trouble. And daughters much more likely to have an early child. This is not a mystery in general. It's a vicious cycle.

[boutons_deux]

Arne Duncan’s Race to the Bottom: Our national test fixation isn’t just bad for kids — it doesn’t even work

The president's surprise announcement that testing is out of control is more than welcome: The tests deserve an F

Sometimes events happen that seem to be disconnected, but after a few days or weeks, the pattern emerges.

Consider this:

On October 2, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced that he was resigning and planned to return to Chicago. Former New York Commissioner of Education John King, who is a clone of Duncan in terms of his belief in testing and charter schools, was designated to take Duncan’s place.

On October 23, the Obama administration held a surprise news conference to declare that testing was out of control and should be reduced to not more than 2 percent of classroom time. Actually, that wasn’t a true reduction, because 2 percent translates into between 18-24 hours of testing, which is a staggering amount of annual testing for children in grades 3-8 and not different from the status quo in most states.

Disconnected events?

Not at all. Here comes the pattern-maker: the federal tests called the National Assessment of Educational Progress released its every-other-year report card in reading and math, and the results were dismal. There would be many excuses offered, many rationales, but the bottom line: the NAEP scores are an embarrassment to the Obama administration (and the George W. Bush administration that preceded it).

For nearly 15 years, Presidents Bush and Obama and the Congress have bet billions of dollars—both federal and state– on a strategy of testing, accountability, and choice.

They believed that if every student was tested in reading and mathematics every year from grades 3 to 8, test scores would go up and up.

In those schools where test scores did not go up, the principals and teachers would be fired and replaced. Where scores didn’t go up for five years in a row, the schools would be closed.

Thousands of educators were fired, and thousands of public schools were closed, based on the theory that sticks and carrots, rewards and punishments, would improve education.

But the 2015 NAEP scores released today by the National Assessment Governing Board (a federal agency) showed that Arne Duncan’s $4.35 billion Race to the Top program had flopped.

It also showed that George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind was as phony as the “Texas education miracle” of 2000, which Bush touted as proof of his education credentials.

In his Race to the Top program, Duncan made testing the primary purpose of education. Scores had to go up every year, because the entire nation was “racing to the top.”

Only 12 states won a share of the $4.35 billion that Duncan was given by Congress: Tennessee and Delaware were first to win, in 2010. The next round, the following states won multi-millions of federal dollars to double down on testing: Maryland, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, and Rhode Island.

Tennessee, Duncan’s showcase state in 2013, made no gains in reading or mathematics, neither in fourth grade or eighth grade. The black-white test score gap was as large in 2015 as it had been in 1998, before either NCLB or the Race to the Top.

The results in mathematics were bleak across the nation, in both grades 4 and 8. The declines nationally were only 1 or 2 points, but they were significant in a national assessment on the scale of NAEP.

In fourth-grade mathematics, the only jurisdictions to report gains were the District of Columbia, Mississippi, and the Department of Defense schools.

Sixteen states had significant declines in their math scores, and thirty-three were flat in relation to 2013 scores.

The scores in Tennessee (the $500 million winner) were flat.

In eighth grade, the lack of progress in mathematics was universal.

Twenty-two states had significantly lower scores than in 2013, while 30 states or jurisdictions had flat scores. Pennsylvania, Kansas, and Florida (a Race to the Top winner), were the biggest losers, by dropping six points. Among the states that declined by four points were Race to the Top winners Ohio, North Carolina, and Massachusetts. Maryland, Hawaii, New York, and the District of Columbia lost two points. The scores in Tennessee were flat.

The best single word to describe NAEP 2015 is stagnation.

Contrary to President George W. Bush’s law, many children have been left behind by the strategy of test-and-punish.

Contrary to the Obama administration’s Race to the Top program, the mindless reliance on standardized testing has not brought us closer to some mythical “Top.”

Disgusted with the testing regime, experienced teachers leave and enrollments in teacher education programs fall.

The past dozen or so years have been a time when “reformers” like Arne Duncan, Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein, and Bill Gates proudly claimed that they were disrupting school systems and destroying the status quo. Now the “reformers” have become the status quo, and we have learned that disruption is not good for children or education.

http://www.salon.com/2015/10/28/arne_duncans_race_to_the_bottom_our_national_test_ fixation_isnt_just_bad_for_kids_it_doesnt_even_wor k/

"Some think" that an (economically) advanced country like USA would know, at this point many decades after compulsory education, how THE FUCK to teach K-12.

==============

History of education in the United States

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_education_in_the_United_States#Religion _and_schools

=================

More Countries Pass U.S. by in Education Rankings

http://www.uschamberfoundation.org/blog/more-countries-pass-us-education-rankings

[pgardn]

Arne Duncan’s Race to the Bottom: Our national test fixation isn’t just bad for kids — it doesn’t even work

The president's surprise announcement that testing is out of control is more than welcome: The tests deserve an F

Sometimes events happen that seem to be disconnected, but after a few days or weeks, the pattern emerges.

Consider this:

On October 2, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced that he was resigning and planned to return to Chicago. Former New York Commissioner of Education John King, who is a clone of Duncan in terms of his belief in testing and charter schools, was designated to take Duncan’s place.

On October 23, the Obama administration held a surprise news conference to declare that testing was out of control and should be reduced to not more than 2 percent of classroom time. Actually, that wasn’t a true reduction, because 2 percent translates into between 18-24 hours of testing, which is a staggering amount of annual testing for children in grades 3-8 and not different from the status quo in most states.

Disconnected events?

Not at all. Here comes the pattern-maker: the federal tests called the National Assessment of Educational Progress released its every-other-year report card in reading and math, and the results were dismal. There would be many excuses offered, many rationales, but the bottom line: the NAEP scores are an embarrassment to the Obama administration (and the George W. Bush administration that preceded it).

For nearly 15 years, Presidents Bush and Obama and the Congress have bet billions of dollars—both federal and state– on a strategy of testing, accountability, and choice.

They believed that if every student was tested in reading and mathematics every year from grades 3 to 8, test scores would go up and up.

In those schools where test scores did not go up, the principals and teachers would be fired and replaced. Where scores didn’t go up for five years in a row, the schools would be closed.

Thousands of educators were fired, and thousands of public schools were closed, based on the theory that sticks and carrots, rewards and punishments, would improve education.

But the 2015 NAEP scores released today by the National Assessment Governing Board (a federal agency) showed that Arne Duncan’s $4.35 billion Race to the Top program had flopped.

It also showed that George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind was as phony as the “Texas education miracle” of 2000, which Bush touted as proof of his education credentials.

In his Race to the Top program, Duncan made testing the primary purpose of education. Scores had to go up every year, because the entire nation was “racing to the top.”

Only 12 states won a share of the $4.35 billion that Duncan was given by Congress: Tennessee and Delaware were first to win, in 2010. The next round, the following states won multi-millions of federal dollars to double down on testing: Maryland, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, and Rhode Island.

Tennessee, Duncan’s showcase state in 2013, made no gains in reading or mathematics, neither in fourth grade or eighth grade. The black-white test score gap was as large in 2015 as it had been in 1998, before either NCLB or the Race to the Top.

The results in mathematics were bleak across the nation, in both grades 4 and 8. The declines nationally were only 1 or 2 points, but they were significant in a national assessment on the scale of NAEP.

In fourth-grade mathematics, the only jurisdictions to report gains were the District of Columbia, Mississippi, and the Department of Defense schools.

Sixteen states had significant declines in their math scores, and thirty-three were flat in relation to 2013 scores.

The scores in Tennessee (the $500 million winner) were flat.

In eighth grade, the lack of progress in mathematics was universal.

Twenty-two states had significantly lower scores than in 2013, while 30 states or jurisdictions had flat scores. Pennsylvania, Kansas, and Florida (a Race to the Top winner), were the biggest losers, by dropping six points. Among the states that declined by four points were Race to the Top winners Ohio, North Carolina, and Massachusetts. Maryland, Hawaii, New York, and the District of Columbia lost two points. The scores in Tennessee were flat.

The best single word to describe NAEP 2015 is stagnation.

Contrary to President George W. Bush’s law, many children have been left behind by the strategy of test-and-punish.

Contrary to the Obama administration’s Race to the Top program, the mindless reliance on standardized testing has not brought us closer to some mythical “Top.”

Disgusted with the testing regime, experienced teachers leave and enrollments in teacher education programs fall.

The past dozen or so years have been a time when “reformers” like Arne Duncan, Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein, and Bill Gates proudly claimed that they were disrupting school systems and destroying the status quo. Now the “reformers” have become the status quo, and we have learned that disruption is not good for children or education.

http://www.salon.com/2015/10/28/arne_duncans_race_to_the_bottom_our_national_test_ fixation_isnt_just_bad_for_kids_it_doesnt_even_wor k/

"Some think" that an (economically) advanced country like USA would know, at this point many decades after compulsory education, how THE FUCK to teach K-12.

==============

History of education in the United States

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_education_in_the_United_States#Religion _and_schools

=================

More Countries Pass U.S. by in Education Rankings

http://www.uschamberfoundation.org/blog/more-countries-pass-us-education-rankings




So clearly you want federal oversight of education out and leave it to local entities?
This is not the first time the US has cycled through the Test frenzy phase and accountability.

[boutons_deux]

So clearly you want federal oversight of education out and leave it to local entities?
This is not the first time the US has cycled through the Test frenzy phase and accountability.

so clearly, you are wrong, again.

I think Common Core (it ain't Federal) was, is a great program, no curricula, just expected achievement at various stages, leaving the how-to details up to the states, districts.

The most credible analysis I've seen is that the problem is teachers (how much "local" can you get?). Undertrained, underpaid, over stressed (esp by childish "carrot-stick" authoritarianism), under resourced, and disrespected and viciously trashed non-stop as the sole reason of educational failure by the VRWC/Repugs/BigCorp who want to pocket taxpayers' education $Ts with selling tests, selling books (corrupted with capitalist,religious indoctrination), with running for-profit charter schools.

VRWC/Repugs/BigCorp trashing and firing 100Ks of union-contributing teachers, cutting education budgets ("small govt"), busting teacher unions are political moves, with not the slightest concern for actual educational impact. All Politics, All The Time, and predatory greed for the $Ts they don't already own.

America is fucked and unfuckable.

[pgardn]

So clearly you want federal oversight of education out and leave it to local entities?
This is not the first time the US has cycled through the Test frenzy phase and accountability.

uhhhhh....

What am I wrong about?

I asked you a question.
And I made a statement about heavy testing cycling through our educational history.

You say you do want fed control, ok.

[boutons_deux]

uhhhhh....

What am I wrong about?

I missed your "out".

The only Federal involvement in K-12 should be regs about teacher qualifications

1. 4 years of general college education

2. 2 years of teacher training plus "residency" of monitoring experienced teachers before becoming a teacher.

3. teachers can only teach subjects in which they are themselves educated (no more picking up a lesson plan in an unknown subject and following it mechanically)

4. "entrance exams" to the K-12 teaching PROFESSION must be rigorous as law or med school exams.

no more mba/business managers running schools "for profit, as a business", all school administrators must come up through teaching.

[pgardn]

I missed your "out".

The only Federal involvement in K-12 should be regs about teacher qualifications

1. 4 years of general college education

2. 2 years of teacher training plus "residency" of monitoring experienced teachers before becoming a teacher.

3. teachers can only teach subjects in which they are themselves educated (no more picking up a lesson plan in an unknown subject and following it mechanically)

4. "entrance exams" to the K-12 teaching PROFESSION must be rigorous as law or med school exams.

no more mba/business managers running schools "for profit, as a business", all school administrators must come up through teaching.




Sounds good.
But no one will enter the profession with the current pay.
And they will still end up quitting in many urban blight schools. Teachers alone will not change socioeconomics.

[Nbadan]

Fixing the schools is pretty easy really....in high school students should have the choice of going to a high school that is more academically rigorous or more vocationally rigorous.. if students flunk out of the academic high school they must attend the vocational high school....this school will teach them how to read, write, history science and do math but the instruction will center on more vocational trades like plumbing, electrical, car and home repair..and ROTC/military training.....if a student changes his mind after high school and decides he wants to go to college then there are ways of doing this too...

This will offer students who don't want to be in the classroom and persistently cause classroom disruptions an alternative to traditional school and give the students who really want to study and get ready for college the opportunity to do so more efficiently and with a lot less hassle..

[pgardn]

Fixing the schools is pretty easy really....in high school students should have the choice of going to a high school that is more academically rigorous or more vocationally rigorous.. if students flunk out of the academic high school they must attend the vocational high school....this school will teach them how to read, write, history science and do math but the instruction will center on more vocational trades like plumbing, electrical, car and home repair..and ROTC/military training.....if a student changes his mind after high school and decides he wants to go to college then there are ways of doing this too...

This will offer students who don't want to be in the classroom and persistently cause classroom disruptions an alternative to traditional school and give the students who really want to study and get ready for college the opportunity to do so more efficiently and with a lot less hassle..

As of right now the vocational schooling is mixed with the academic schooling in Texas. You are proposing a somewhat European model. The kids in academic settings don't necessarily cause disruptions because of the setting. They won't change their attitude with tools in front of them if they don't care about any education. In fact tools are good weapons and there is a market for them. I again stress socioeconomics. The students must care. This comes from parents. It's very difficult. It mirrors OUR culture.

[boutons_deux]

Europeans have been "tracking" kids into vocational or academic education quite young for decades. Germany has other countries very envious of Germany's very successful apprentice/work-study programs.

The American argument against tracking has been "equal opportunity (to the supposedly superior academic track) for all", which is hypocritical bullshit since entire schools and school districts are underfunded to deny "equal opportunity" of any education.

About the ONLY expected change to US K-12 education will be the continued onslaught by the VRWC/BigCorp on K-12 to transform it into failing for-profit, under-paying, under-educating charter schools. The onslaught of killing teacher jobs to kill teacher contributions to teacher unions supporting Dems, of weakening/killing teacher unions, all with financial windfall of grabbing taxpayers' $Ts away from public schools to for-profit charter schools.

"non-profit" charter schools pay shitty teacher salaries and get shitty non-union teachers (very high churn), while outsourcing as much a possible to for-profit contractors.

iow, "non-profit" charters schools are a successful scam but an educational failure because education and students were never their objective.

America is missing 100Ks of welders. One solution: http://www.npr.org/2015/09/07/437589596/amid-a-shortage-of-welders-some-prisons-offer-training

For-profit prisons are very probably not interested in in-prison education and training since those programs have proven to reduce recidivism. The PIC is most interested in the keeping prisons full and recidivism as high as possible, "for profit". Corrupt police, mandatory sentencing, corrupts prosecutors and judges, absent mental health care, Repugs REFUSING any immigration reform, all combine keep for-profit prison very profitable.

[boutons_deux]

Koch brothers' higher-ed investments advance political goals

http://www.publicintegrity.org/2015/10/30/18684/koch-brothers-higher-ed-investments-advance-political-goals

... more evidence that the VRWC/BigCorp has the $10Bs to corrupt education at all levels "for profit". Where is the countervailing force, power to stop them?

[pgardn]

Europeans have been "tracking" kids into vocational or academic education quite young for decades. Germany has other countries very envious of Germany's very successful apprentice/work-study programs.

The American argument against tracking has been "equal opportunity (to the supposedly superior academic track) for all", which is hypocritical bullshit since entire schools and school districts are underfunded to deny "equal opportunity" of any education.

About the ONLY expected change to US K-12 education will be the continued onslaught by the VRWC/BigCorp on K-12 to transform it into failing for-profit, under-paying, under-educating charter schools. The onslaught of killing teacher jobs to kill teacher contributions to teacher unions supporting Dems, of weakening/killing teacher unions, all with financial windfall of grabbing taxpayers' $Ts away from public schools to for-profit charter schools.

"non-profit" charter schools pay shitty teacher salaries and get shitty non-union teachers (very high churn), while outsourcing as much a possible to for-profit contractors.

iow, "non-profit" charters schools are a successful scam but an educational failure because education and students were never their objective.

America is missing 100Ks of welders. One solution: http://www.npr.org/2015/09/07/437589596/amid-a-shortage-of-welders-some-prisons-offer-training

For-profit prisons are very probably not interested in in-prison education and training since those programs have proven to reduce recidivism. The PIC is most interested in the keeping prisons full and recidivism as high as possible, "for profit". Corrupt police, mandatory sentencing, corrupts prosecutors and judges, absent mental health care, Repugs REFUSING any immigration reform, all combine keep for-profit prison very profitable.

Yes that argument is bs as we don't have to "condemn" students to manual labor. They can change their mind. And there are plenty of academically gifted kids who want to learn a skill. Just because they are good at academic work does not mean they like it.

In Texas my personal experience with the majority of vocational schooling is subpar. The teachers have to be very careful with what the kids are allowed to do because of accidents and flat out bad behavior. Public schools have a top priority of keeping kid safe. They send PE classes out to walk around due to possibilities of getting hurt. Chemistry classes can't do many labs because of so many prohibited chemicals. Some school districts don't have competitive swimming because of accidental drowning fears (but football stays). The litigation fear should not be discounted. Public schools do not want to have to use their lawyers.

The problems run deep and are going to solved with baby steps IMO.

And yes, the generalization I will make about the basic shop teacher now is a guy who got out of business and wanted to read the paper. A good shop teacher is invaluable if given a class that really wants to learn.

[rmt]

I've been homeschooling for 16 years. My humble opinion is that US education is a mile wide and an inch deep especially in the elementary grades - they teach too many subjects/topics and with no depth - all this so that parents think their children are learning a lot when all that is needed is that they learn a few things very well (in elem grades). I think there needs to be a focus on the 3 Rs to all exclusion up to 3rd grade. Those math facts must be AUTOMATIC. Reading must be the most important emphasis. Writing should be taught from the building blocks of grammar - not having 1st graders write pages and pages of How I Spent my Summer Vacation. All this time spent on Hispanic Month, Black Month, Arts and Crafts, Music, etc. should be left to after school programs - not regular school time. History and Science can be learned through reading books - there are great Let's Read and Find out about Science books. Encourage reading, reading, and more reading.

Math - look at the countries that do well in international testing. Singapore often leads the 4th and 8th grade math competitions. They use a very simple (in English) series called Primary Math from 1st through 6th grade. The books are cheap (less than $10 each) and stress critical thinking. They are used nationwide so that when a child transfers to another area of the country, they still use the same curriculum. I realize that this can't be used nationwide, but it could be done state-wide. Emphasize mastery - when a topic is learned - follow up with word problems. Only when a child can solve a word problem does he know how to APPLY what he's learned. Do not move on in math until a topic has been mastered (meaning don't move on to fractions until multiplication facts are automatic - that's a case in frustration and failure). I would outlaw poster boards, authors' gallery and science projects in elementary school. Learn the material - not which parent can make the best poster board.

In middle and high schools, I think they should offer high-achieving students 3 for 1 peer tutoring hours - peer tutor for an hour - get 3 hours community service hours. A win-win for everyone - and costs nothing. Most states offer virtual (online) classes. I can tell from experience that these classes are easy to cheat on (just open up another tab with google and everything is at your fingertips) and believe me, kids are inventive - they will find the easy way out. I would outlaw them for foundational classes (that you build on) like math. For Math and Science, I would pay teachers more so that you can attract good teachers - I don't think that a teacher who teaches AP Calculus or AP Physics should be paid the same as a PE teacher.

If it were left to me, all colleges would accept students on MERIT - not do this social engineering/affirmative action stuff where they build classes and want x amount of this race or that. There's nothing that kills initiative more than getting accepted/rejected (both ways) BECAUSE of the color of your skin.

[rmt]

My son goes to a charter public high school. They are very flexible and responsive - if a new teacher is bad, he's gone the next year - not so in public school. The teachers who they keep are very good, want to be there and are given great flexibility in what they can do/teach. The charter school requires a certain amount of volunteer hours (which can be paid for - in cash or school supplies). The school forces all 9th, 10th and 11th graders to take the PSAT test (free) and 1 (free) SAT that anyone can take. All 11th graders have to take a SAT prep class (year-round, 1 period of regular school). The school principal got Principal of the Year for the state of Florida this year. The school has now extended its grades down to PK so they will have the students from they are tiny and control over their entire K-12 education.

[boutons_deux]

here's different approach to comparison, US state vs state, and US state vs foreign countries

Weirdly, two blue states, MA and CT, are the best in USA and compare well with best foreign countries.

Bringing it back home

Why state comparisons are more useful than international comparisons for improving U.S. education policy

http://www.epi.org/blog/disappointing-naep-scores-and-the-questions-they-raise/

============

another EPI paper on education:

Disappointing NAEP scores and the questions they raise

http://www.epi.org/blog/disappointing-naep-scores-and-the-questions-they-raise/

[rmt]

This charter school my son is attending is in a low-income, hispanic area. All parent meetings are in both English and Spanish - so there's no help at home. In my son's gifted class, there are 2 kids (my son and one other) who were born in the US. It seems like they test them all in the younger grades (gifted kids get more funds) - not sure as my son went in at 9th grade. They don't put up with any discipline problem kids - they will throw them out of the school - and a place in this charter school is well sought after as the kids get a good education. So low-income, bad neighborhood (6 armed guards - compare to my good neighborhood K-8 center which has 1 unarmed old guard) - so no I don't think the neighborhood has anything to do with it. It's money (in the form of volunteer hours, cash or supplies), flexibility to run the school as a business and freedom to fire bad teachers. I have never met more ambitious, hard-working kids in my life. It's like they know that the only way out of poverty is a good education, and the competition in the school is fierce.

The counselor at my local K-8 had told me that my son would have culture shock going to this school but surprisingly, he loves them and they love him (maybe because he's so different - homeschooled, asian, Christian (most of them are atheists)). They did have fights at first, but my son is over 6 ft tall and can handle himself. My younger son is short, small and well, we shall see next year.

[pgardn]

This charter school my son is attending is in a low-income, hispanic area. All parent meetings are in both English and Spanish - so there's no help at home. In my son's gifted class, there are 2 kids (my son and one other) who were born in the US. It seems like they test them all in the younger grades (gifted kids get more funds) - not sure as my son went in at 9th grade. They don't put up with any discipline problem kids - they will throw them out of the school - and a place in this charter school is well sought after as the kids get a good education. So low-income, bad neighborhood (6 armed guards - compare to my good neighborhood K-8 center which has 1 unarmed old guard) - so no I don't think the neighborhood has anything to do with it. It's money (in the form of volunteer hours, cash or supplies), flexibility to run the school as a business and freedom to fire bad teachers. I have never met more ambitious, hard-working kids in my life. It's like they know that the only way out of poverty is a good education, and the competition in the school is fierce.

The counselor at my local K-8 had told me that my son would have culture shock going to this school but surprisingly, he loves them and they love him (maybe because he's so different - homeschooled, asian, Christian (most of them are atheists)). They did have fights at first, but my son is over 6 ft tall and can handle himself. My younger son is short, small and well, we shall see next year.

So they throw the bad kids out? Where do they go to school? Of course there are low income families who want good education. You care, good. Tell me about the kids and "families" who don't? And why don't they? Why are parents who are professionals and college educated usually very concerned with education compared to those parents with only a HS education and constantly changing jobs while moving often?

The stats point to the above and I don't find this surprising.

[Nbadan]

As of right now the vocational schooling is mixed with the academic schooling in Texas. You are proposing a somewhat European model. The kids in academic settings don't necessarily cause disruptions because of the setting. They won't change their attitude with tools in front of them if they don't care about any education. In fact tools are good weapons and there is a market for them. I again stress socioeconomics. The students must care. This comes from parents. It's very difficult. It mirrors OUR culture.

The kids who cause disruptions in vocational schools get military type training...marching at 6....drill..drill...drill....these kids need structure, respect for authority and belonging ....

Plus, it would remove these kids from the group, the majority of kids in even poor schools, who do want to be in school, don't have discipline issues and want to learn just like kids in the more affluent areas...

[Nbadan]

So they throw the bad kids out?

Charter school have the luxury of throwing out kids they don't find up to their standards.....they also exclude special pops students because they don't have the facilities to accommodate these types of students...

[boutons_deux]

Charter school have the luxury of throwing out kids they don't find up to their standards.....they also exclude special pops students because they don't have the facilities to accommodate these types of students...

special ed students need expensive special ed staff which would cut into charter school profits, socharter schools simply refuse special ed students.

[rmt]

So they throw the bad kids out? Where do they go to school? Of course there are low income families who want good education. You care, good. Tell me about the kids and "families" who don't? And why don't they? Why are parents who are professionals and college educated usually very concerned with education compared to those parents with only a HS education and constantly changing jobs while moving often?

The stats point to the above and I don't find this surprising.

Entrance into the charter school is by lottery (luck). If you have a sibling going there, you get preference (but still a lottery) so eg. my younger son will get preference but no guarantee (a different lottery). The bad, discipline problems go back to the local public school (there are warnings and chances to get one's act together). Yes, more highly educated people emphasize education, but in this case, the parents are low-income, uneducated, Spanish-speaking immigrants and the kids do fine. The teachers make a big difference. They are excellent - I don't know where they find them. Some of them have quirks but they are given great latitude. My son's physics teacher used to be an emergency room doctor, got tired of it and returned to his first love - teaching. I find that they really want to be there as opposed to the more tenured, unionized public school teachers.

Don't get me wrong - this school is not for the faint of heart - there are fights but there is an (admired) intellectual hierarchy - after all, you never know when you might need help with a subject. Families who don't care don't seek out a school like this. It involves x volunteer hours per child. Kids of those families go to the local public schools which don't have the latitude/flexibility that charter schools have. Here in Miami, a lot of kids are flocking to the charter schools - the money follows them and the public schools with less students get less teachers. My younger son is taking a US history class at the local public school. This teacher has been teaching them geography for the past 9 weeks (she's a geography teacher) - I'm always asking him when she's gonna get to history because he won't know what he's supposed to know for 11th grade US history.

You can see the value of parental expectation/involvement in a lot of the Asians. You've heard of the term "tiger mom" I'm sure. It's not that Asian kids are any smarter than others, but that their parents have high expectations and are very involved in their education. They have them take piano classes, play chess - things that help the brain develop. They make them take Kumon (a rote math program) or join the math club.

I don't think that they can exclude special ed kids - that'd bring huge lawsuits. The charter schools get their money from public school funds - I think they just use them more efficiently and weed out the bad teachers.

IMO, schools need to emphasize the basics and stop trying to impress parents with all the different things the kids are supposedly learning - think depth and not breadth. Mastery of the 3 Rs will go a long way to solving the education problems. If you read, write and do math well, you can teach yourself anything (because you are gonna get some bad teachers).

[boutons_deux]

your personal anecdotes are useless in characterizing the national charter school scam, but thanks anyway.

[pgardn]

Entrance into the charter school is by lottery (luck). If you have a sibling going there, you get preference (but still a lottery) so eg. my younger son will get preference but no guarantee (a different lottery). The bad, discipline problems go back to the local public school (there are warnings and chances to get one's act together). Yes, more highly educated people emphasize education, but in this case, the parents are low-income, uneducated, Spanish-speaking immigrants and the kids do fine. The teachers make a big difference. They are excellent - I don't know where they find them. Some of them have quirks but they are given great latitude. My son's physics teacher used to be an emergency room doctor, got tired of it and returned to his first love - teaching. I find that they really want to be there as opposed to the more tenured, unionized public school teachers.

Don't get me wrong - this school is not for the faint of heart - there are fights but there is an (admired) intellectual hierarchy - after all, you never know when you might need help with a subject. Families who don't care don't seek out a school like this. It involves x volunteer hours per child. Kids of those families go to the local public schools which don't have the latitude/flexibility that charter schools have. Here in Miami, a lot of kids are flocking to the charter schools - the money follows them and the public schools with less students get less teachers. My younger son is taking a US history class at the local public school. This teacher has been teaching them geography for the past 9 weeks (she's a geography teacher) - I'm always asking him when she's gonna get to history because he won't know what he's supposed to know for 11th grade US history.

You can see the value of parental expectation/involvement in a lot of the Asians. You've heard of the term "tiger mom" I'm sure. It's not that Asian kids are any smarter than others, but that their parents have high expectations and are very involved in their education. They have them take piano classes, play chess - things that help the brain develop. They make them take Kumon (a rote math program) or join the math club.

I don't think that they can exclude special ed kids - that'd bring huge lawsuits. The charter schools get their money from public school funds - I think they just use them more efficiently and weed out the bad teachers.

IMO, schools need to emphasize the basics and stop trying to impress parents with all the different things the kids are supposedly learning - think depth and not breadth. Mastery of the 3 Rs will go a long way to solving the education problems. If you read, write and do math well, you can teach yourself anything (because you are gonna get some bad teachers).

Yep sounds good.

If you got parenting and the will to understand the value of an education, good things can happen. But what about the "bad" kids? They just go back to the public schools. I believe we have a "raising" kid problem. Not sure how this gets solved. Some would say, "so what, they choose to be stupid, let them remain in the permanent underclass" I would say the permanently underclass is too large and it affects the entire country.

[rmt]

Yep sounds good.

If you got parenting and the will to understand the value of an education, good things can happen. But what about the "bad" kids? They just go back to the public schools. I believe we have a "raising" kid problem. Not sure how this gets solved. Some would say, "so what, they choose to be stupid, let them remain in the permanent underclass" I would say the permanently underclass is too large and it affects the entire country.

It's not the kids - it's the parent(s). Babies are a clean slate and kids need to be taught, loved, etc. I don't know the solution and I know the constitution calls for a separation of church and state, but I wish there could be some kind of collaboration between those who really wish to volunteer, mentor and make a meaningful difference in a kid's life. My church is currently doing Operation Christmas Child - where they make shoe boxes full of "goodies" for underprivileged kids. I wish that sincerely meant time and effort could be spent in personal contact with these kids - like a Big Brother, Big Sister type service. There is so much need out there and it's the connection that's not happening. One adult who cares can make such a difference in a child's life. And no, just because one is born into a bad neighbohood/situation doesn't mean that it has to turn out badly. I'll refer you to listen to Dr. Ben Carson's story of how he almost stabbed someone when he was 14 years old and how his life was turned around. He had one person in his life who cared (even though she herself couldn't read or write) - his mom.

[rmt]

your personal anecdotes are useless in characterizing the national charter school scam, but thanks anyway.

Some people like to hear different points of view so I thought I'd offer my experiences with homeschooling, public, charter and private school. Silly me, thinking that that is the purpose of a discussion board - to discuss ideas and try to come up with a solution. I'm sorry if my post in the other thread turned you off - but if you dish it out, prepare to hear the other side. Please feel free to put me on ignore.

[boutons_deux]

This Junk-Food-Funded Elementary School Curriculum Is Bonkers


Kids are learning that they can exercise away Big Macs and Pepsis. Scientists beg to differ.


http://www.motherjones.com/files/pizzaWeightLifter_0.gif

At elementary schools nationwide, a health curriculum called Energy Balance 101 has taught millions of kids a seemingly simple concept: In order to stay fit, all we need to do is balance the food we eat with exercise. In the first lesson, elementary schoolers learn that anything and everything takes energy, from playing sports to doing homework. Teachers are instructed to ask how much you would need to eat or drink in order "balance shooting baskets for 30 minutes." Calories in, calories out.
Sensible enough, right? But there's something odd about the curriculum: Not once does it suggest ditching junk food—in fact,

the lesson plan explicitly says, "There are no good foods or bad foods!"

. The class is part of a program called Together Counts. That program is wholly funded by a group called the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation—which is in turn run and bankrolled by junk food corporations.

Indra Nooyi, CEO of PepsiCo, is the chair of the board, and directors include the CEOs of

Kellogg,

Hershey,

Nestle USA,

Coca-Cola,

Unilever,

Smucker, and

General Mills.

BigFood! :lol

The organization's mission, according to tax filings, is "to help families and schools reduce obesity—especially childhood obesity." :lol

In addition to schools, the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation, which has an annual budget of about $10 million, funds energy balance programs for a wide variety of organizations, including the Girl Scouts, the National Parent Teacher Association, and the National Head Start Association. A Boy Scouts program is in the works.

Regardless of who constructs the curriculum, scientists point out that there's a major problem with programs like Energy Balance 101: Study (http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2015/10/low-fat-diets-are-bunk) after study (http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1199154) shows that not all calories are created equal, because our bodies metabolize them differently. Robert Lustig, a pediatric neuroendocrinologist at the University of California-San Francisco, believes that programs that emphasize exercise over diet are on the wrong track. "A calorie is a calorie—it's the first thing dieticians learn in dietary school," he says. "That's the mantra, and guess what? It doesn't work."

Regardless of long term-effects of junk food, adds Barry Popkins, a food researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the majority of research confirms the importance of prioritizing diet over the exercise in promoting weight reduction in part because it takes a huge amount of time to work off the calories in junk food. "We'll never be able to move enough to offset one or two Cokes a day,"

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/12/obesity-exercise-energy-balance

Just another example of evil, fraudulent, cheating, corrupt, unethical BigCorp

[rmt]

IMO, the culprit in obesity is the amount of carbs that's in the typical American diet. Drastically cut down the carbs and replace with fats - yes, bacon, butter, cheese, fish oil, whole milk, etc. Low carb, high fat - all those high cholesterol/blood pressure numbers will come down, and they will lose weight.

[pgardn]

Again:

The public and politicians have not made it clear what they want out of public schools. Honors classes in well to do schools with parents that care do as well as any in the world. Schools in urban blight, teaching kids from homes where mom is the only parent and working do extremely poorly. By the time the kids in these impoverished areas reach puberty they have already fallen way behind. At this stage they are warehoused for 9.5 months so the police don't have to deal with them.

The public schools mimic the socioeconomics of the area they serve. So now go from here with the solutions. We put out the best and worst students in the world. And it's not surprising.

Exactly what I have stated. This school district is taking a huge step to possibly solving the problem... Making the school integrated with the family through shelter as well as food. This is what I meant when expressing that the public has not made it clear what they want from education. This Mo. district has. So what do we think conservatives feel about this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/this-superintendent-has-figured-out-how-to-make-school-work-for-poor-kids/2015/12/20/cadac2ca-a4e6-11e5-ad3f-991ce3374e23_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_jennings9p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

[pgardn]

liberal solution to education:

http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/5049fdefecad04a361000008/throwing-money.gif

Will this approach end up saving welfare/incarceration money? No possibility?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/this-superintendent-has-figured-out-how-to-make-school-work-for-poor-kids/2015/12/20/cadac2ca-a4e6-11e5-ad3f-991ce3374e23_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_jennings9p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

[rmt]

Exactly what I have stated. This school district is taking a huge step to possibly solving the problem... Making the school integrated with the family through shelter as well as food. This is what I meant when expressing that the public has not made it clear what they want from education. This Mo. district has. So what do we think conservatives feel about this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/this-superintendent-has-figured-out-how-to-make-school-work-for-poor-kids/2015/12/20/cadac2ca-a4e6-11e5-ad3f-991ce3374e23_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_jennings9p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

As a conservative, I think it's wonderful that someone is trying a different method when the normal/traditional way doesn't work. I love that she tests the teachers in math - how can a teacher teach students when they themselves fail a math test 2 grades above what they're teaching. The lack of basic math skills in the American population in general also affects the college kids who eventually become teachers. The best and brightest students are not going into a profession like teaching. I would guess that a lot of the elementary teachers are housewives returning to the work force who want to be on the same schedule as their kids and choose elementary teaching. Their major was in something else than STEM or education. These are the people teaching our kids how to read, write and do math - then it's not hard to figure out why the kids aren't doing well either.

I do disagree with her spending time on music, art, etc. - if the kids are still behind national average, that extra time should be spent in doing reading and math (even writing can be delayed). The teachers who need math reinforcement would benefit from extra tutor/classes themselves.

And I absolutely love that this woman is a Christian and is living her faith in her everyday life. Maybe other inner cities can follow her model.

[rmt]

Will this approach end up saving welfare/incarceration money? No possibility?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/this-superintendent-has-figured-out-how-to-make-school-work-for-poor-kids/2015/12/20/cadac2ca-a4e6-11e5-ad3f-991ce3374e23_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_jennings9p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

As far as cost is concerned, the majority of the money seems to be spent on administration - salaries, pensions, health care, etc not on the actual teaching of the students. I would guess that with a computer, internet connection, printer, library cards in a fairly good city library system and $50-100/year, I could educate elementary kids (the lower end for kindergarteners and the higher end for upper elementary) - even less per student the more students there were.

It definitely would save money on welfare/incarceration if students had the skills/tools necessary to go to college/get jobs.

[pgardn]

As far as cost is concerned, the majority of the money seems to be spent on administration - salaries, pensions, health care, etc not on the actual teaching of the students. I would guess that with a computer, internet connection, printer, library cards in a fairly good city library system and $50-100/year, I could educate elementary kids (the lower end for kindergarteners and the higher end for upper elementary) - even less per student the more students there were.

It definitely would save money on welfare/incarceration if students had the skills/tools necessary to go to college/get jobs.

I know two very large districts in San Antonio thru teaching friends. This is not the case for these two districts. But again, these districts are richer and the School Boards are made up of citizens who volunteered to get elected and actually care about sufficient auditing. There are wastes in any large organization. But I contend it's not on admin in these districts. I can safely add that SAISD has been corrupt as hell as well.

BTW you can look up salaries in the Texas Tribune if you think things are dicey in Texas. I do know that the stipends of coaches are not added on, but they are looking to change that loophole.

[rmt]

I know two very large districts in San Antonio thru teaching friends. This is not the case for these two districts. But again, these districts are richer and the School Boards are made up of citizens who volunteered to get elected and actually care about sufficient auditing. There are wastes in any large organization. But I contend it's not on admin in these districts. I can safely add that SAISD has been corrupt as hell as well.

BTW you can look up salaries in the Texas Tribune if you think things are dicey in Texas. I do know that the stipends of coaches are not added on, but they are looking to change that loophole.

The money/resources that I suggested are from a homeschooling pov - not public schools. Of course teachers have to be paid, have health benefits, etc. But there is a LOT of waste in administration. I worked 12 years in the computer center of the public schools here in Miami (the 4th largest district in the US) and there was so much specialization, lack of work, people just waiting to retire - it was terrible. I was astounded by the difference in the private sector (where my husband worked mostly in small businesses) - how lean they ran, how much work each person had to do/learn, how little leeway they had with finances, etc. My husband interviewed with the county last week and they are so woefully behind when it comes to technology - it's not even funny - our taxpayers' money at (not work) but waste.

[pgardn]

The money/resources that I suggested are from a homeschooling pov - not public schools. Of course teachers have to be paid, have health benefits, etc. But there is a LOT of waste in administration. I worked 12 years in the computer center of the public schools here in Miami (the 4th largest district in the US) and there was so much specialization, lack of work, people just waiting to retire - it was terrible. I was astounded by the difference in the private sector (where my husband worked mostly in small businesses) - how lean they ran, how much work each person had to do/learn, how little leeway they had with finances, etc. My husband interviewed with the county last week and they are so woefully behind when it comes to technology - it's not even funny - our taxpayers' money at (not work) but waste.

Well I guess Miami is not San Antonio, the wealthier districts anyway. There is access to administrative salaries in Texas, it's out there. When my cousin, who owns a small construction company, makes 5x more money than the Super of San Antonio's largest school district and one of the largest (soon to be 3rd largest in Texas) , I don't see what you see. I know who has the more important job. Maybe Florida education is totally screwed. Maybe they can hide a lot more.

[rmt]

Well I guess Miami is not San Antonio, the wealthier districts anyway. There is access to administrative salaries in Texas, it's out there. When my cousin, who owns a small construction company, makes 5x more money than the Super of San Antonio's largest school district and one of the largest (soon to be 3rd largest in Texas) , I don't see what you see. I know who has the more important job. Maybe Florida education is totally screwed. Maybe they can hide a lot more.

It's not just the school system but the county too (in Miami). They'll dig up a perfectly good intersection and put a roundabout with a bunch of palm trees and flowers in the middle or line a dead end street with palm trees or put pavers at an intersection that pedestrians hardly use - totally useless - it's like they've got to spend the money if they have it - just for the sake of spending it - frustrates me no end. But the property values are higher here than in San Antonio so maybe they get more tax revenue.

Having a business is the way to go if you want to make money. One of my fellow girl scout moms used to own a towing company whose only business was to cruise up and down the highways pulling off stalled cars asap (so as not to block the highway) - you should see the mansion she lived in. Public servants don't get paid much, but they get it back in pension. Imagine working for 30 years, retiring at 52 and getting a pension for another 35 years. Do you know how much we (non-public sector) would have to save to generate anywhere near that pension? A LOT.

[pgardn]

It's not just the school system but the county too (in Miami). They'll dig up a perfectly good intersection and put a roundabout with a bunch of palm trees and flowers in the middle or line a dead end street with palm trees or put pavers at an intersection that pedestrians hardly use - totally useless - it's like they've got to spend the money if they have it - just for the sake of spending it - frustrates me no end. But the property values are higher here than in San Antonio so maybe they get more tax revenue.

Having a business is the way to go if you want to make money. One of my fellow girl scout moms used to own a towing company whose only business was to cruise up and down the highways pulling off stalled cars asap (so as not to block the highway) - you should see the mansion she lived in. Public servants don't get paid much, but they get it back in pension. Imagine working for 30 years, retiring at 52 and getting a pension for another 35 years. Do you know how much we (non-public sector) would have to save to generate anywhere near that pension? A LOT.

I can't imagine, I like working.

[TDMVPDPOY]

throw more money? no

get rid of all the dumbshits from that school

enrol more asians and shit

im certain the education system in usa offers more scholarship to international students then local students....once a school gets a good rep that alot of students are achieving high marks to get into uni/college....then watch the mass migration of families buying into that suburb pushing up property prices and shit

[rmt]

I can't imagine, I like working.

Then get another government job (from another municipality/federal), work for 10 more years and get a second pension - that's what one of my best friends is doing.

[boutons_deux]

the best general way to help poor kids, even kids with no homes, is to raise the federal minimum wage to $15/hour indexed to inflation, and free day care. Poverty, including homelessness, are huge obstacles for kids of any age.

The Repugs refuse to raise the minimum wage to be complicit with their perverted God who punishes poor people for being poor.

[Nbadan]

Brain development is different for kids who grow up poor..that;s why they tend to score lower marks on standardized tests...the key is early childhood education, which SA needs to expand the ECE program to include more kids BTW, and for kids as young as 3...

[Nbadan]

Then get another government job (from another municipality/federal), work for 10 more years and get a second pension - that's what one of my best friends is doing.

Military and public education...two pensions....nice...

[rmt]

Brain development is different for kids who grow up poor..that;s why they tend to score lower marks on standardized tests...the key is early childhood education, which SA needs to expand the ECE program to include more kids BTW, and for kids as young as 3...

Lots of reading and solid math education is the key. Even writing is not that important if you read a lot (grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc). Something as simple as turning on the captions while kids are watching TV helps too.

[pgardn]

Then get another government job (from another municipality/federal), work for 10 more years and get a second pension - that's what one of my best friends is doing.

I do not have a government job and I don't plan to get one in the future thank you. I'm not looking for pensions, I will run my own. But I do see the value in public education as it allows me to work with people who can handle all sorts of situations. And yes, there are plenty of good science people in this country. The real problem is the lower segment who drain the system in the long run. And we are back to my original statements. Public education mirrors the socioeconomic group it serves for the vast majority of the US. And IMO charter schools are not the answer. There are business people who know nothing about education milking that system. I'm sure there are some well meaning good charters, but what I have seen here stinks. They are horrible. Again its anecdotal, my probing has turned up a government giveaway. They close some of these places down after the primaries have made their money. Lots of scamming.

[rmt]

I do not have a government job and I don't plan to get one in the future thank you. I'm not looking for pensions, I will run my own. But I do see the value in public education as it allows me to work with people who can handle all sorts of situations. And yes, there are plenty of good science people in this country. The real problem is the lower segment who drain the system in the long run. And we are back to my original statements. Public education mirrors the socioeconomic group it serves for the vast majority of the US. And IMO charter schools are not the answer. There are business people who know nothing about education milking that system. I'm sure there are some well meaning good charters, but what I have seen here stinks. They are horrible. Again its anecdotal, my probing has turned up a government giveaway. They close some of these places down after the primaries have made their money. Lots of scamming.

Sorry, it was not my intention to offend. I was commenting on the compensation of private (your cousin) vs public sectors.

I'm not so sure that it's socioeconomic as it is the quality/methods of teacher. I'll give you an example - my niece goes to a private Montessori school - there's low teacher-student ratio, lots of resources/funds but the method of teaching math is spiral (introduce a new subject, do a few problems, review previous lessons) not mastery (stay on one topic, do only problems on that topic, master it). Somewhere along the line, she didn't "get" a topic(s) and now at pre-algebra level (7th grade), she is falling apart - can't do word problems which is the ultimate in applying what you understand. Her mother is obsessed with keeping her on this track so that she'll be with the "good" honors kids when she gets to high school. It makes for brutal Thanksgiving lunch when I suggest pulling her out of school, starting with Singapore Math at 1st grade level and work upwards to try to catch whatever gaps she has in her math education.

At least where math is concerned, IMO educators need to focus on MASTERY of basic math (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, decimals, percents) in the elementary ages. Forget about statistics, graphs, all that fancy stuff meant to impress parents. On the other spectrum of the socioeconomic angle, I have first hand knowledge of my son's charter school in a low-income area that does great. If it did not perform, the parents would send their kids to other magnet or public schools. We have an enrollment period to sign up for a lottery for each magnet school (preference given if you have a sibling at a school) so there are ways out but it takes involved parents. So for us, (student) results and competition work - if anything, problems arise in the public schools which have unionized teachers who are hard to get rid of. So you guys don't have any school choice in SA? Is there no accountability of the charter schools - performance wise?

[pgardn]

Sorry, it was not my intention to offend. I was commenting on the compensation of private (your cousin) vs public sectors.

I'm not so sure that it's socioeconomic as it is the quality/methods of teacher. I'll give you an example - my niece goes to a private Montessori school - there's low teacher-student ratio, lots of resources/funds but the method of teaching math is spiral (introduce a new subject, do a few problems, review previous lessons) not mastery (stay on one topic, do only problems on that topic, master it). Somewhere along the line, she didn't "get" a topic(s) and now at pre-algebra level (7th grade), she is falling apart - can't do word problems which is the ultimate in applying what you understand. Her mother is obsessed with keeping her on this track so that she'll be with the "good" honors kids when she gets to high school. It makes for brutal Thanksgiving lunch when I suggest pulling her out of school, starting with Singapore Math at 1st grade level and work upwards to try to catch whatever gaps she has in her math education.

At least where math is concerned, IMO educators need to focus on MASTERY of basic math (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, decimals, percents) in the elementary ages. Forget about statistics, graphs, all that fancy stuff meant to impress parents. On the other spectrum of the socioeconomic angle, I have first hand knowledge of my son's charter school in a low-income area that does great. If it did not perform, the parents would send their kids to other magnet or public schools. We have an enrollment period to sign up for a lottery for each magnet school (preference given if you have a sibling at a school) so there are ways out but it takes involved parents. So for us, (student) results and competition work - if anything, problems arise in the public schools which have unionized teachers who are hard to get rid of. So you guys don't have any school choice in SA? Is there no accountability of the charter schools - performance wise?

We dont have teacher unions. It's illegal and teachers cannot strike by law.
Yes there is accountability. But the charters get shut down and the businessmen have already made their money. Everyone has choice. They can choose to go private. You can also choose to go to a magnate school within a district.

You write all this because you care. I am telling you the proportion of parents who don't care grows with poverty. When a parent never experienced any sort of value associated with an education the kids are not likely to care either. It's a vicious cycle. Again, for the vast majority of cases, socioeconomics mirror the surrounding educational system. Because you know people who have taken an active role in breaking the cycle does not mean my generalization is false. The teachers will get better when the community as a whole demands it. The bad administration and teachers are not the base of the problem, they are symptoms of the problem. The State of Texas just took over a school district in Pearsall Texas. Read about that and compare this to The Missouri case I posted. Both are rural so it's an interesting comparison.

When parents care and unite things can get done. Then there are rich spoiled areas in which the parents get too involved. I would put Reagan HS in San Antonio As dangerously close to this better problem. One can learn a lot by volunteering time. Younger people can volunteer, I'm not amongst a bunch of geezers when I do.

[Nbadan]

We dont have teacher unions. It's illegal and teachers cannot strike by law.

There are teachers unions, but since TX is a right to work state, teachers cannot strike....but the teacher's union can and does lobby at the local, state, and national level

[Nbadan]

There is school choice within districts, but if you want to go to another district it's not so easy...

[pgardn]

There are teachers unions, but since TX is a right to work state, teachers cannot strike....but the teacher's union can and does lobby at the local, state, and national level

Yes this is true.

The teachers "unions" are pitifully weak in Texas. They don't have the big card so it's not what I would consider a Union. There are teacher associations that lobby and really don't get crap done. These associations get most of their members by providing lawyers in case the teachers need them.

Based on what I have been told and read they get more done concerning education. They are not much of a self interest organization except when individuals need to lawyer up.

[boutons_deux]

There are teacher associations that lobby and really don't get crap done.

They can't possibly outbid TX's BigCarbon, BigFinance, etc. Who Pays the Most, Wins.

[tlongII]

The problem with public schools in Oregon is the tremendous waste in Admin.

[RandomGuy]

House Restores Local Education Control in Revising No Child Left Behind


WASHINGTON — The House on Wednesday approved a sweeping bill to revise the contentious No Child Left Behind law, representing the end of an era in which the federal government aggressively policed public school performance, and returning control to states and local districts.

No Child Left Behind, which had strong bipartisan backing when it passed in 2001, was the signature education initiative of George W. Bush, who said the failure of public schools to teach poor students and minorities reflected the “soft bigotry of low expectations.”

Students taking part in a trial run of a new state assessment in Annapolis, Md., in February. The new test is linked to the Common Core standards, which Maryland adopted in 2010 under the federal No Child Left Behind law.

That law ushered in high-stakes testing to measure student progress in reading and math between the third and eighth grades. Schools were required to make every child in the nation proficient in those subjects by 2014, as measured by standardized tests. Schools that failed to hit targets along the way were subject to federally required sanctions, ranging from tutoring to school closing in the worst cases. Over time, the law became anathema to both the right and the left, and it became clear that the sanctions as well as the goal of proficiency by 2014 were unworkable.

The overhaul passed by the House on Wednesday, 359 to 64, jettisons No Child’s prescribed goals and punishments, and allows states and school districts to set their own goals and to decide how to rate schools and what to do with those that underperform.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/03/us/house-restores-local-education-control-in-revising-no-child-left-behind.html?ref=education&_r=0

[boutons_deux]

"local control" of public schools in slave and red states means severe budget cutting, teacher layoffs, privatization to Christian Madrasas and shovelling taxpayer $100Ms to for-profit charter schools, and generally pro-Bible, anti-science dumbing down of K-12.

[RandomGuy]

Sorry, it was not my intention to offend. I was commenting on the compensation of private (your cousin) vs public sectors.

I'm not so sure that it's socioeconomic as it is the quality/methods of teacher. I'll give you an example - my niece goes to a private Montessori school - there's low teacher-student ratio, lots of resources/funds but the method of teaching math is spiral (introduce a new subject, do a few problems, review previous lessons) not mastery (stay on one topic, do only problems on that topic, master it). Somewhere along the line, she didn't "get" a topic(s) and now at pre-algebra level (7th grade), she is falling apart - can't do word problems which is the ultimate in applying what you understand. Her mother is obsessed with keeping her on this track so that she'll be with the "good" honors kids when she gets to high school. It makes for brutal Thanksgiving lunch when I suggest pulling her out of school, starting with Singapore Math at 1st grade level and work upwards to try to catch whatever gaps she has in her math education.

At least where math is concerned, IMO educators need to focus on MASTERY of basic math (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions, decimals, percents) in the elementary ages. Forget about statistics, graphs, all that fancy stuff meant to impress parents. On the other spectrum of the socioeconomic angle, I have first hand knowledge of my son's charter school in a low-income area that does great. If it did not perform, the parents would send their kids to other magnet or public schools. We have an enrollment period to sign up for a lottery for each magnet school (preference given if you have a sibling at a school) so there are ways out but it takes involved parents. So for us, (student) results and competition work - if anything, problems arise in the public schools which have unionized teachers who are hard to get rid of. So you guys don't have any school choice in SA? Is there no accountability of the charter schools - performance wise?

My wife teaches high school science at a very poor, rural school system.

pgardn is very right in that the parents attitudes affect children's performance, and that is reflected strongly by their economic status.

The data for the US shows that kids born into poverty, tend to stay in poverty. We should find out why that is, IMO.

[RandomGuy]

Exactly what I have stated. This school district is taking a huge step to possibly solving the problem... Making the school integrated with the family through shelter as well as food. This is what I meant when expressing that the public has not made it clear what they want from education. This Mo. district has. So what do we think conservatives feel about this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/this-superintendent-has-figured-out-how-to-make-school-work-for-poor-kids/2015/12/20/cadac2ca-a4e6-11e5-ad3f-991ce3374e23_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_jennings9p%3Ahomepage%2Fstory


Gwen McDile, a homeless 17-year-old in Jennings, missed so much school this fall — nearly one day in three — that it seemed she would be unlikely to graduate in June. But then she was invited to move into Hope House, a shelter the school system recently opened to give students like her a stable place to live.

Again, jibes with the problems that my wife's students have. It is hard to teach a kid anything when they are falling asleep from working at night, or staying with the only relative that allows them to live with them because mom/dad is so messed up.

If you don't build a social safety net around the kids you are trying to educate, you have a much harder time getting through.

Conservatives like to bitch about "woe is us, family values, bla bla bla", and bemoaning reality won't help things. Better to do something than simply complain about it.

Ignoring these kids while they are growing up because we don't want to spend the money in the short term costs us far more money in the long term in lost potential economic output.

[pgardn]

Again, jibes with the problems that my wife's students have. It is hard to teach a kid anything when they are falling asleep from working at night, or staying with the only relative that allows them to live with them because mom/dad is so messed up.

If you don't build a social safety net around the kids you are trying to educate, you have a much harder time getting through.

Conservatives like to bitch about "woe is us, family values, bla bla bla", and bemoaning reality won't help things. Better to do something than simply complain about it.

Ignoring these kids while they are growing up because we don't want to spend the money in the short term costs us far more money in the long term in lost potential economic output.

Volunteering.

People should try it.

And now i climb the high horse and declare that some of the best volunteers are associated with, God forbid, Christian Churches. I have a job with intensely long hours followed by dry runs were business can be done via EM waves. So I have the time. Seems like others should based on posting numbers.

[rmt]

Volunteering.

People should try it.

And now i climb the high horse and declare that some of the best volunteers are associated with, God forbid, Christian Churches. I have a job with intensely long hours followed by dry runs were business can be done via EM waves. So I have the time. Seems like others should based on posting numbers.

Volunteering is a requirement of charter schools here and it works - the parents are involved. You are allowed to "pay" for your hours if you can't volunteer and they put the funds to good use - class supplies, paying for PSAT/SAT tests, etc.

Seems like Christians are anathema on this board, but their focus is turning hearts and they do it through service and love. - Prison Fellowship, Habitat for Humanity, etc. One that I disagree with is Operation Christmas Child where they fill shoe boxes with little knick-knacks for underprivileged kids. There was also AngelTree where we delivered gifts to children of prisoners - but some of these kids lived in mansions (from ill gains) and that didn't go over too well. I think the time and energy would be better served doing a Big Brother/Big Sister type program - something more one on one (mentoring) the kids instead of gifts.

[Nbadan]

Volunteering.

Volunteering helps, but half of school age kids in our rich nation grow up in poverty...time to do something about that...

[Nbadan]

Volunteering is a requirement of charter schools here and it works - the parents are involved. You are allowed to "pay" for your hours if you can't volunteer and they put the funds to good use - class supplies, paying for PSAT/SAT tests, etc.

Honestly, you don't want some of the parents in poorer districts to volunteer...at least, not without adult education classes in parenting...

[rmt]

Honestly, you don't want some of the parents in poorer districts to volunteer...at least, not without adult education classes in parenting...

I think they're only doing stuff like chaperoning on field trips, helping with refreshments, things they can't get into too much trouble with :-) I know there's supposed to be separation of church and state, but the schools would benefit from volunteers from churches. LOTS of elderly widows with nothing but time on their hands, and they are excellent at parenting/dealing with kids. You should taste the food they cook when it's potluck at church.

[boutons_deux]

"separation of church and state, but the schools would benefit from volunteers from churches."

that has nothing to do with govt ESTABLISHING religion, unless the Christian volunteers try to teach or proselytize in taxpayer-funded facilities (which is always a risk with the predatory Christian Taliban).

I remember dubya saying volunteers, churches should take care of the poor, not govt.

subtext: the wealthy have said they don't want any of their tax dollars being spent on the poor

AND

Repugs always wanting to cut taxes on the 1% so there wouldn't enough govt dollars to help the 40M+ people on public assistance.

volunteering is great, but it's not systematic enough, not stable enough to share anything but a small part of the total work that is done by salaried staff.

volunteers to charter schools are of course helping the charter schools screw teachers with heavy class loads and lower salaries, while the charter school top staff gets paid extremely well. Head of the Success schools in NYC makes over $400K, and continues to lobby for more tax dollars to prop up Success schools.

[pgardn]

Volunteers are extremely important.

Once you you witnessed it in action... Changed my way of thinking. There are a lot of good people. This country would be much worse off without them.

[boutons_deux]

Fraud is a great way to dump uneducated, functionally illiterate, innumerate kids out of public schools (to save money, so govt can cut school funding even more) and keep teachers, staff from being punished for low graduation rates. Fraudulent diplomas, a moral hazard for teachers and school staff.

As Graduation Rates Rise, Experts Fear Diplomas Come Up Short

GREENVILLE, S.C. — A sign in a classroom here at Berea High School, northwest of downtown in the largest urban district in the state, sends this powerful message: “Failure Is Not an Option. You Will Pass. You Will Learn. You Will Succeed.”

By one measure, Berea, with more than 1,000 pupils, is helping more students succeed than ever: The graduation rate, below 65 percent just four years ago, has jumped to more than 80 percent.

But that does not necessarily mean that all of Berea’s graduates, many of whom come from poor families, are ready for college — or even for the working world.

According to college entrance exams (http://ed.sc.gov/data/test-scores/state-assessments/act-test-scores/2015/school-act-scores/?ID=2301002) administered to every 11th grader in the state last spring, only one in 10 Berea students were ready for college-level work in reading, and about one in 14 were ready for entry-level college math. And on a separate test of skills needed to succeed in most jobs, little more than (http://ed.sc.gov/data/test-scores/state-assessments/act-workkeys-test-scores/2015/act-workkeys-test-scores-district/act-workkeys-test-scores-school/?ID=2301002)half of the students (http://ed.sc.gov/data/test-scores/state-assessments/act-workkeys-test-scores/2015/act-workkeys-test-scores-district/act-workkeys-test-scores-school/?ID=2301002) demonstrated that they could handle the math they would need.

It is a pattern repeated in other school districts across the state and country — urban, suburban and rural — where the number of students earning high school diplomas has risen to historic peaks yet measures of academic readiness for college or jobs are much lower. This has led educators to question the real value of a high school diploma and whether graduation requirements are too easy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/27/us/as-graduation-rates-rise-experts-fear-standards-have-fallen.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Meanwhile Repugs in red, slave states keep cutting funding to K12 and state colleges. Repugs are fucking America into unfuckability.

[Nbadan]

Fraud is a great way to dump uneducated, functionally illiterate, innumerate kids out of public schools (to save money, so govt can cut school funding even more) and keep teachers, staff from being punished for low graduation rates. Fraudulent diplomas, a moral hazard for teachers and school staff.

It's not fraud...it's no child left behind....the state of education right now is akin to a car company that has grandiose plans to make tons of the most fuel-efficient, stylish, trendy, spacious, muscle-car but still uses the same production line, parts quantity, employee training, technology and management that nearly drove Chevy and Ford to bankruptcy...repeal no child left behind...it doesn't work...

[boutons_deux]

When a school graduates student who is functionally illiterate, innumerate, the diploma is fraudulent.

NCLB doesn't force HSs to fail to teach. Risking loss of funding or being closed because too many kids fail to graduate is the motivation to shove kids out the door with a fraudulent diploma.

[pgardn]

When a school graduates student who is functionally illiterate, innumerate, the diploma is fraudulent.

NCLB doesn't force HSs to fail to teach. Risking loss of funding or being closed because too many kids fail to graduate is the motivation to shove kids out the door with a fraudulent diploma.

This is exactly why testing became hugely popular.

Your solution boots?

[boutons_deux]

This is exactly why testing became hugely popular.

Your solution boots?

education is fundamentally, essentially teaching, so the emphasis has to be on teachers, their education in the subject(s) they teach, their professional training in teaching methods, and their compensation as professionals. I think Finland's example should be followed, where its as hard, rigorous to "break into" teaching as it is for medicine or law or engineering. Bureaucratically, teachers have to be the center, the priority, not the non-teaching staff, principal, sports.

[TDMVPDPOY]

can someone tell me why a principal gets paid the most when they dont teach any subjects, even if they did....it be some lame ass easy subject

their job is to balance the books and hire teachers....

maybe school sucks monkey dick cause principal is earning half the schools budget

[rmt]

How high should our property taxes be raised to pay teachers so that it's worth it for them to go into teaching instead of medicine, law or engineering? I would hazard that the majority of a school system's budget is going toward salary, health care and pension. The way it's set up over here, if you have a degree in a subject, you can teach in that subject. If not, you either have to take 18-30 college credits in that subject or pass that subject content test.

The problem is that for the elementary ages, typically ONE teacher teaches all the subjects - how is it going to be possible to have professional training in teaching methods in math, language arts, social studies and science especially when it's the poorest students who are themselves becoming teachers (especially elementary because they can't handle the specific subjects in depth). I would guess that the majority of them don't really know math past the basic math facts - that word problems in fractions, decimals or percents would give them problems. How then are they to teach the student? This is the stage that I think students get lost in - they're getting lost before middle school where each subject is taught by one teacher.

As far as administration/principals are concerned - just like a company the CEO/managers get paid the most - not the people doing the actual work. Why would we think that it'd be any different in the schools?

[pgardn]

How high should our property taxes be raised to pay teachers so that it's worth it for them to go into teaching instead of medicine, law or engineering? I would hazard that the majority of a school system's budget is going toward salary, health care and pension. The way it's set up over here, if you have a degree in a subject, you can teach in that subject. If not, you either have to take 18-30 college credits in that subject or pass that subject content test.

The problem is that for the elementary ages, typically ONE teacher teaches all the subjects - how is it going to be possible to have professional training in teaching methods in math, language arts, social studies and science especially when it's the poorest students who are themselves becoming teachers (especially elementary because they can't handle the specific subjects in depth). I would guess that the majority of them don't really know math past the basic math facts - that word problems in fractions, decimals or percents would give them problems. How then are they to teach the student? This is the stage that I think students get lost in - they're getting lost before middle school where each subject is taught by one teacher.

As far as administration/principals are concerned - just like a company the CEO/managers get paid the most - not the people doing the actual work. Why would we think that it'd be any different in the schools?

The teaching is NOT the major problem.
Its not even close. When people actually vie for teaching positions that require expertise where the teachers are allowed to teach willing students you will get good teaching.

There are very few good teachers that want to enter situations where they become baby sitters or just an adult watching adolescents who don't want to be there. RMT and boots keep wandering down the same path. If you combine good teachers with kids who want to be there good things, great things happen. Visit AP classes were the teacher is an expert and the kids choose to be there. These are the best classes in the world.

Now go to a school in trouble who can only hire a teacher willing to baby sit... The majority of good teachers don't enter the profession to discipline... Why can't you guys get this? You can crush the life out of very good teachers sending them into classes that are unteachable. They would be better off teaching in a prison where inmates choose to take the class.

Again, the problem is public schools mimic the socioeconomics of the area they serve. This is the general rule to start with. Now go from there like the Missouri school I noted.

[rmt]

The teaching is NOT the major problem.
Its not even close. When people actually vie for teaching positions that require expertise where the teachers are allowed to teach willing students you will get good teaching.

There are very few good teachers that want to enter situations where they become baby sitters or just an adult watching adolescents who don't want to be there. RMT and boots keep wandering down the same path. If you combine good teachers with kids who want to be there good things, great things happen. Visit AP classes were the teacher is an expert and the kids choose to be there. These are the best classes in the world.

Now go to a school in trouble who can only hire a teacher willing to baby sit... The majority of good teachers don't enter the profession to discipline... Why can't you guys get this? You can crush the life out of very good teachers sending them into classes that are unteachable. They would be better off teaching in a prison where inmates choose to take the class.

Again, the problem is public schools mimic the socioeconomics of the area they serve. This is the general rule to start with. Now go from there like the Missouri school I noted.

Pgardn, I respectfully disagree and from personal experience. My local K-8 school is in a relatively affluent area - rated "A" for a number of years, but the teaching is crap. My son did 2 classes in this K-8 from 3rd grade up to 8th grade where he transitioned to full-time 8th grade - that was 16 classes in public school. It was pitifully easy to get As in those classes. He transferred to a charter school in a low-income area (of his entire gifted class, only he and one girl are not on free/reduced lunch) and the step up was astounding. I am willing to admit that maybe these two examples are the outliers but is it coincidence that I happen to experience both? The kids in the charter are ambitious, hard-working, tough students. The ones in the K-8 were spoon fed, babied, with no idea of the rigors of high school (maybe this is more a symptom of K-8 [instead of dedicated middle] schools. The economics in the 2 schools is extreme - the richer school goes on a Washington DC trip every 8th grade and either Disneyworld or Universal Studios every year - the low-income goes only on local field trips but their academics is far superior.

This is where I disagree with boutons - he dislikes the charters whereas in Miami, they are among the best schools because they have great latitude and don't have to kowtow to the teachers' union (can get rid of bad teachers). Maybe it's the charter school (regardless of income) because I know other charter schools that are excellent (see Archimedes - a greek charter that my daughter's best friend graduated from). Or maybe it's that there isn't more school choice in low income areas - or that the parents are not involved enough to enroll their kids in something like a charter school and they default to the local public but again that's not the case in my son's charter - word gets around and even though the parents are Spanish speaking immigrants - they know the reputation of the school.

What are your ideas for a solution since you can't cure poverty? Most of them are getting free breakfast, lunch and books. Feed them dinner, uniforms? I still think that regardless of income, the breakdown (especially in math) is in the elementary grades.

[pgardn]

Pgardn, I respectfully disagree and from personal experience. My local K-8 school is in a relatively affluent area - rated "A" for a number of years, but the teaching is crap. My son did 2 classes in this K-8 from 3rd grade up to 8th grade where he transitioned to full-time 8th grade - that was 16 classes in public school. It was pitifully easy to get As in those classes. He transferred to a charter school in a low-income area (of his entire gifted class, only he and one girl are not on free/reduced lunch) and the step up was astounding. I am willing to admit that maybe these two examples are the outliers but is it coincidence that I happen to experience both? The kids in the charter are ambitious, hard-working, tough students. The ones in the K-8 were spoon fed, babied, with no idea of the rigors of high school (maybe this is more a symptom of K-8 [instead of dedicated middle] schools. The economics in the 2 schools is extreme - the richer school goes on a Washington DC trip every 8th grade and either Disneyworld or Universal Studios every year - the low-income goes only on local field trips but their academics is far superior.

This is where I disagree with boutons - he dislikes the charters whereas in Miami, they are among the best schools because they have great latitude and don't have to kowtow to the teachers' union (can get rid of bad teachers). Maybe it's the charter school (regardless of income) because I know other charter schools that are excellent (see Archimedes - a greek charter that my daughter's best friend graduated from). Or maybe it's that there isn't more school choice in low income areas - or that the parents are not involved enough to enroll their kids in something like a charter school and they default to the local public but again that's not the case in my son's charter - word gets around and even though the parents are Spanish speaking immigrants - they know the reputation of the school.

What are your ideas for a solution since you can't cure poverty? Most of them are getting free breakfast, lunch and books. Feed them dinner, uniforms? I still think that regardless of income, the breakdown (especially in math) is in the elementary grades.


We can all find anecdotal evidence to back our claims. I am sticking firmly with my statement. To me, it's a no brainer. Of course there are poor folks who want better for their kids to go the extra mile and demand a good education and actually make the time to accomplish their goals. And of course you will find slackers in any large institution who find a nice spot while maintaining incompetence. It's too difficult to fire bad teachers IMO. The pool of replacements is where we run into trouble again.

And as a solution, I really don't know. It will most likely have to be bottom up. Like the Missouri example modified to meet the needs of a particular area. If it was easy, it would be done. You can continue to site the shining stars without looking at the whole if you choose.

Just think about the day and life of a kid/infant raised in a family who cares. The kid is loved and attention is given. There is a smiling face to look at everyday while the child is awake talking to him/her constantly. The child is held and played with regularly. The child has books and toys around, is read to and played with. The child mimics songs that are sung...ABCD... The child counts his toys or whatever with the help of the parents. They count cereal, pieces of grass, whatever... Everyday. It's expected and enjoyed. Schools just refine the process, it starts in the home. The above just gets a kid ready for school. They come in happy and READY.

This is the VERY crucial beginning. You think this is easy for single parents with two jobs and two kids? Now look at the numbers. Now keep going all the way through HS and maybe into college. You think this is easy in poverty?

And for your example above, a section of migrant workers who don't stay in one spot adds to the difficulty of Spanish speakers. It's rife throughout California and Texas. No stability.

[pgardn]

As a generalization/anecdotal evidence I will add that in my experience in San Antonio, Hispanic families with two parents who care raise some of the hardest working most determined kids in this city. I just helped a middle class Hispanic older friend (vacation) water the pets and let em out before I leave for work and come home.

3 kids

One post doc in Austin molecular biology (this is how I met them)
One engineering at MIT
One married and a nurse

This is one among many families I have met in the city that work their butts off. And now I must do the same.
Out.

[rmt]

We can all find anecdotal evidence to back our claims. I am sticking firmly with my statement. To me, it's a no brainer. Of course there are poor folks who want better for their kids to go the extra mile and demand a good education and actually make the time to accomplish their goals. And of course you will find slackers in any large institution who find a nice spot while maintaining incompetence. It's too difficult to fire bad teachers IMO. The pool of replacements is where we run into trouble again.

And as a solution, I really don't know. It will most likely have to be bottom up. Like the Missouri example modified to meet the needs of a particular area. If it was easy, it would be done. You can continue to site the shining stars without looking at the whole if you choose.

Just think about the day and life of a kid/infant raised in a family who cares. The kid is loved and attention is given. There is a smiling face to look at everyday while the child is awake talking to him/her constantly. The child is held and played with regularly. The child has books and toys around, is read to and played with. The child mimics songs that are sung...ABCD... The child counts his toys or whatever with the help of the parents. They count cereal, pieces of grass, whatever... Everyday. It's expected and enjoyed. Schools just refine the process, it starts in the home. The above just gets a kid ready for school. They come in happy and READY.

This is the VERY crucial beginning. You think this is easy for single parents with two jobs and two kids? Now look at the numbers. Now keep going all the way through HS and maybe into college. You think this is easy in poverty?

And for your example above, a section of migrant workers who don't stay in one spot adds to the difficulty of Spanish speakers. It's rife throughout California and Texas. No stability.

Pgardn, I fully understand the advantages a child who is loved has - remember I homeschool - it's as personal and child-centric as it comes. But it came at a cost - good, government job & pension, living on one income (I know I bitch about Obamacare but when they want us to spend $19k on healthcare - it's ridiculous) and now, job skills in a field that's moves so fast that I'm a dinosaur. But yes, I spared no expense when it came to speech/physical/occupational therapy because I know that any deficit is best fixed at a young age. It's not just academics but teaching them the right way. The girls at my son's school love him because he's so different - because he opens doors for teachers and females, because he never swears, because he doesn't talk down to people. And because they're then willing to listen to him, he tries to evangelize. This is my reward. I believe that we make the most difference in everyday life, trying to exhibit Christ-like behavior, TURNING hearts. We can throw millions of dollars at the problem, but does it help? Do these kids have hope, something to look forward to and work toward? These are things that can't be bought with money but with people willing to put in the time and effort (like your Missouri principal). Most are not going to go out of their way as she has and does because of her faith. More of these volunteers that you have met - we need a whole army of them.

I read the other thread about the payment card and it's so sad. I totally agree with you about the Hispanic families and their hard work. I see it everyday at my son's school. They know the way out is education. I know I'm gonna get flamed by this, but I don't see it as much in the blacks. I grew up in Jamaica surrounded by blacks and there is a vast difference between them and a lot of the blacks I've met here in the US. I'll give you another anecdote. I was a Brownie Troop leader way back and another troop was having an arts and craft event. I announced both by emails and in the weekly meetings to sign up so that the other troop would know how many crafts to prepare. The night before the event I was arranging where we'd meet, etc and two of the moms (black) who hadn't signed up protested and wanted their girls to go. I explained that I'd already sent the count in and they got very angry screaming at me that it was because they were black that their girls weren't allowed to go. I told them that I would call the other troop and see what I could do. The other moms came up to me and sympathized. Turns out that the black girls did end up going but two girls from the other troop gave up their crafts to accommodate them. This race card that some black Americans use is not evident in Jamaica. There they blame no one even though they are sometimes poorer than the US blacks (there's not much social safety net there) and work hard to get out out their situation.

I don't know what the solution is but people are trying. My daughter is currently at Urbana - a missions conference and they are heavily pushing the multicultural, refugee, racism, (a little) gender issues. Their entire worship team was wearing Black Lives Matter shirts. I'm dismayed by what I see as a missions conference turned political but they excuse it as meeting people where they are. My daughter can't believe I sent her to this - to which I say that when her dad and I went 24 years ago, none of these issues existed. Anyways, continue with the volunteer work, do your little part and I keep praying (even for those on this board - even you, boutons :-) however unwelcome it may be.

[boutons_deux]

Outrage Grows Over Viral NYT Video Showing Charter School Teacher Yelling at, Berating First-Graders


Episode is part of a long line of harsh tactics from the powerful charter school network.

A report (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/13/nyregion/success-academy-teacher-rips-up-student-paper.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share&_r=0) in the New York Times Friday showing a Success Academy teacher in Brooklyn berating students has gone viral, sparking outrage from parents, anti-reform activists and education experts. The teacher, Charlotte Dial, who is white, is seen in the minute-and-a-half clip dressing down a room full of first-graders, most of whom are black and Hispanic.

The video was recorded by an assistant teacher at Success Academy who feared Dial’s tactics had gone too far. Upon being shown the video in November of last year by the Times, Success Academy quickly suspended Dial, though she was reinstated a week and a half later.
Success Academy CEO Eva S. Moskowitz, a powerful, well-connected charter school advocate (http://dianeravitch.net/2015/07/31/hedge-fund-manager-gives-8-5/) in her own right, insisted to the Times that the incident was “an anomaly.”

http://www.alternet.org/education/outrage-grows-over-viral-nyt-video-showing-charter-school-teacher-yelling-berating-first

Moskowitz pays herself nearly half a $M/year, more evidence that the charter school movement is about corruption, sucking down taxpayer $100Ms, and resegregation

[boutons_deux]

A leading charter school advocate’s stunning admission: Online public schools are a colossal disaster

For the second time in three months, the Walton Family Foundation—which has spent more than $1 billion to create a quarter of the nation’s 6,700 public charter schools—has announced that all online public school instruction, via cyber charter schools, is a colossal disaster for most K-12 students.

“If virtual charters were grouped together and ranked as a single school district, it would be the ninth largest in the country and among the worst performing,” co-wrote Walton’s Marc Sternberg and Marc Holley, respectively the foundation’s director of educational giving and its evaluation unit director, in a recent Education Weekcommentary (http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2016/01/27/walton-family-foundation-we-must-rethink-online.html). “Online education must be reimagined. Ignoring the problem—or worse, replicating failures—serves nobody.”

Last fall, the giant foundation, which has pledged (http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/~/media/documents/k12-strategic-plan-overview.pdf?la=en) to spend its second billion to expand charter public schools nationally between now and 2020, simultaneously released three detailed comissioned studies finding more than two-thirds of America’s 200,000 charter students receiving all of their instruction over the Internet were barely learning the basics.

“The majority of online charter students had far weaker academic growth in both math and reading compared to their traditional public school peers,” their experts’ press release (http://credo.stanford.edu/pdfs/Online%20Press%20Release.pdf) said, after noting that kindergarten-through-high school students need to be in classrooms with live teachers, not occasional faces on computer screens. “To conceptualize this shortfall, it would equate to a student losing 72 days of learning in reading and 180 days of learning in math, based on a 180-day school year.”

Stanford University’s Center for Research on Educational Outcomes, or CREDO, which calculated the semesters of lost learning, looked at virtual charter schools in 18 states. It found (http://credo.stanford.edu/pdfs/Online%20Charter%20Study%20Final.pdf) enrollments had nearly doubled between the 2009-’10 and 2012-’13 school years, documenting a rapidly growing corner of the charter school industry, which presents itself as an alternative to traditional public schools.

“Based on even modest funding levels of $6,000 per student, 65,000 students [in 18 states] represents a public investment of $390,000,000 annually,” CREDO’s report (http://credo.stanford.edu/pdfs/Online%20Charter%20Study%20Final.pdf) said.

With 200,000 students in 200 online schools in 26 states, that means taxpayers are now spending upwards of $1.2 billion annually for these failing charter schools.

http://www.salon.com/2016/02/15/the_walton_family_foundation_admits_partner/

Rightwingnut extremist 1% ideologues FUCKING UP everything they touch. And don't give a shit if students are hurt.

[rmt]

You are blaming charter schools for the "failure" of online instruction. That's 2 separate things. In Florida, the online school is run by the counties. Are you willing to put the blame of any online failure on Miami Dade Public Schools or Broward County Public Schools. Online instruction is not a good medium for kids under 6th grade. It's fine for catching up, accelerating, taking classes not offered at the local (middle or high) school but for learning to read, write and do math - no.

[boutons_deux]

You are blaming charter schools for the "failure" of online instruction. That's 2 separate things. In Florida, the online school is run by the counties. Are you willing to put the blame of any online failure on Miami Dade Public Schools or Broward County Public Schools. Online instruction is not a good medium for kids under 6th grade. It's fine for catching up, accelerating, taking classes not offered at the local (middle or high) school but for learning to read, write and do math - no.

online instruction, MOOCs, are mostly failure, just like charter schools fail to educate while succeeding to suck down taxpayers $100Ms.

[boutons_deux]

Broken discipline tracking systems let teachers flee troubled pasts

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/14/broken-discipline-tracking-system-lets-teachers-with-misconduct-records-back-in-classroom/79999634/

How USA TODAY audited the country's broken systems for tracking teacher discipline

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/14/how-usa-today-audited-countrys-broken-systems-tracking-teacher-discipline/80357584/

Like bad cops, bad nurses, bad doctors, bad teachers simply move to be bad elsewhere.

[boutons_deux]

Abbott is such a wonderful stand-up guy

Denied: How Texas keeps tens of thousands of children out of special education

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/denied/