madfloridian
madfloridian's JournalRick Snyder's school privatization plans may get Race To The Top money from Arne. Really?
I can't believe the man actually has a Twitter handle called One Tough Nerd. But here is a link.
https://twitter.com/onetoughnerd
One of the methods he is using is called the Education Achievement Authority. Here is more about that group from Brainwrap's post at Daily Kos
Apparently the EAA is a finalist in the current so-called "Race to the Top" competition. The Ann Arbor Public School district (as part of the Washtenaw Alliance for Education) and many other organizations and individuals have signed on to a letter sent to President Obama and Sec. Ed. Duncan objecting to the EAA's candidacy, and urging its rejection.
This is the key passage:
The EAA, a “state reform” district modeled after the problematic New Orleans Recovery School District (RSD), was established through an August 2011 interlocal agreement between then-Emergency Manager of Detroit Public Schools Roy Roberts and Eastern Michigan University under the former Public Act 4 of 2011 (“The Emergency Manager Law”), an act that was repealed by the Michigan electorate in the November 6 election. Shortly thereafter, the Detroit Board of Education voted to disband the EAA and to sever ties with Eastern Michigan University. Despite the voice of the electorate, our Michigan state legislature is pressing forward with bills during the lame duck session that would codify the EAA into state law.
We oppose the establishment of the EAA and ask that you stand in support of Michigan voters who are deeply concerned with its impact on our children’s education and on our rights as citizens to advocate for them.
The rejected Emergency Manager Law under another name?
Truth Out hit the nail on the head in a November article.
Education for Profit in Detroit
It seemed like a scene from an auction block. This past Tuesday at the House of Representatives in Lansing, MI, the education committee held a hearing on a bill (HB 6004) that would help drive a deeper stake into the heart of public education in Detroit, transferring absolute power to the Education Achievement Authority (EAA), a "public body corporate," as its chancellor, John Covington, defined during his testimony, which currently occupies more than 15 (nine elementary/middle, six high) Detroit Public Schools (DPS) and serves 10,000 students. It is a bill aimed, in plain terms, at shipping off larger swaths of Detroit's kids (each worth $7,000 per year, roughly $42 per day) into a private system.
The Electablog calls what Snyder is doing a "Big Government takeover, Republican style."
Michigan Republicans move to privatize public education under the guise of reform
Although many of us here in Michigan have been fearful regarding what the Republicans in our state legislature would do during the lame duck session which lasts for the next three weeks, few of us envisioned the draconian steps they would take to hand over the education of our kids to private, for-profit corporations and destroy our public school system once and for all. That is, however, exactly what they plan to do.
I don't know which if any have passed so far.
The Electablog includes explanations made by a very fearful and upset school superintendent.
House Bill 6004 and Senate Bill 1358: Would expand a separate and statewide school district (the EAA) overseen by a governor-appointed chancellor and functioning outside the authority of the State Board of Education or state school superintendent. These schools are exempt from the same laws and quality measures of community-governed public schools. The EAA can seize unused school buildings (built and financed by local taxpayers) and force sale or lease to charter, non-public or EAA schools.
House Bill 5923: Creates several new forms of charter and online schools with no limit on the number. Bundled with HB 6004/SB1358, many of these schools could be created by the EAA. Public schools are not allowed to create these new schools unless they charter them. Selective enrollment/dis-enrollment policies will likely lead to greater segregation in our public schools. This bill creates new schools without changing the overall funding available, further diluting resources for community-governed public schools.
Senate Bill 620: Known as the ‘Parent Trigger’ bill, this would allow the lowest achieving 5% of schools to be converted to a charter school while allowing parents or teachers to petition for the desired reform model. This bill will not directly affect our district, but disenfranchises voters, ends their local control, and unconstitutionally hands taxpayer-owned property over to for-profit companies. Characterized as parent-empowerment, this bill does little to develop deep, community-wide parent engagement and organization.
You need to read @onetoughnerd to keep up with what Michigan is doing through Rick Snyder.
Crossposted at Twitter
Dec. 7 update on Prep Academy from WTSP. Video includes attack on photographer.
http://www.wtsp.com/news/topstories/article/286071/250/Is-Bradentons-The-Prep-Academy-Closing-"Bradenton, Florida - The Prep Academy is a private Bradenton school that continues to find itself in financial and legal trouble. It may be shutting its doors - or is it?
Clayton Houston says a school official says they are open. "They said they're not closing."
In an email to parents, school officials say the 6-12th grade program will close December 21st, but parents have reportedly been told the entire school will be closing then."
The Democratic party has moved rightward long before Charlie Crist joined it.
A major Republican, former Florida governor, outspoken person against his own GOP...has joined the national Democratic Party. Yet many don't welcome him.
Just for a practical moment, here is a recent poll pitting Crist against Rick Scott.
Polling Charlie Crist against Rick Scott
Charlie Crist had nothing to do with that "rightward movement" of the Democrats. Can you say DLC, Third Way think tanks and gullible leaders who feared losing campaign funds?
In fact a major Democrat said years ago that the intellectual leveraged buyout of the party was nearly complete.
What we've done in the Democratic Party," explains institute Vice President Rob Shapiro, a Clinton economic adviser, "is an intellectual leveraged buyout." The DLC, presumably, is acting as arbitrageur, selling off unprofitable mind-sets to produce a lean and efficient philosophy for the "New Democrat," as DLCers call their slick bimonthly magazine.
The DLC morphed into the Third Way, and the rightward movement continues today.
One thing that won't be forgotten about Crist's time as governor is that he stood up for teachers when even our Democrats were not doing so. I disagreed with much of what he allowed to happen during his governorship, but his veto of SB6 was great.
Charlie Crist vetoed SB6. That bill that would have put bipartisan policies in place in Florida education....such as eliminating tenure and giving us merit pay. These were policies of the education "reformers" and included major Democratic leaders.
Calling it "significantly flawed," Crist decried Senate Bill 6, which would link teacher pay to student test scores and eliminate tenure for all new hires
" Under the bill, half of a teacher's evaluation would depend on students' learning gains. Good gains would equal positive evaluations and pay raises, which teachers said failed to factor the work that doesn't show up on tests — and ignores other forces that affect kids.
Tenure would have been out of the question for new teachers, which Crist highlighted in his problems with the bill. "
The Rick Scott Republicans with Scott's blessing quickly installed such education policies.
Now there is no more tenure in Florida, and merit pay rules supreme. And Arne Duncan approves.
There is no Democrat waiting in the wings in FL who is very much to the left of Crist.
We worked on Bill McBride's Democratic campaign against Jeb Bush in 2002. It was pathetic how top down it was. Republicans worked with us against Jeb, but McBride refused to take any important stances. We and our co-workers on the campaign called and pleaded, but it was like we didn't exist.
The campaign of his wife, Alex Sink, against Rick Scott was very much as bland as his was against Jeb.
I am having trouble understanding why so many are not welcoming Charlie Crist to the Democratic Party. I don't see any disadvantage to it.
The party's turn to the right began years ago. Charlie Crist had nothing to do with that.
Update edit 9:05 pm. I found a poll comparing Sink, Crist and others in the 2014 primary, at that time assuming Crist would change parties. This is interesting.
Poll of 2014 Democratic primary: Charlie Crist 61%, Alex Sink 25%
The first Florida-based poll conducted since the close of the Democratic National Convention shows former governor Charlie Crist lapping the prospective field of Democratic candidates eyeing the 2014 gubernatorial race.
Crist is the top choice of 61% of likely Democratic voters, followed by former Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink with 25% support. Orlando mayor Buddy Dyer comes in at 7%, state Senator Nan Rich at 3.5% and Florida Democratic Party chair Rod Smith at 3.4%.Sen. Rich is the only candidate officially running for governor. Dyer and Sink have said they will make a decision about whether to run after the presidential election. Crist has drawn extensive speculation that he intends to run for governor as a Democrat in 2014.
These new poll numbers will certainly intensify the speculation.
Bite off our noses or say welcome Charlie?
Crossposted at Twitter
The Democratic party moved rightward all by itself in spite of many of us pleading and begging.
Charlie Crist had nothing to do with that rightward movement. Can you say DLC, Third Way think tanks and gullible leaders who feared losing campaign funds?
Charlie Crist vetoed SB6. The bill that would have put Democratic policies in place in Florida education....such as eliminating tenure.
http://www.tampabay.com/news/education/k12/article1087675.ece
" Under the bill, half of a teacher's evaluation would depend on students' learning gains. Good gains would equal positive evaluations and pay raises, which teachers said failed to factor the work that doesn't show up on tests — and ignores other forces that affect kids.
Tenure would have been out of the question for new teachers, which Crist highlighted in his problems with the bill. "
So if he vetoed Democratic education policies, what does that say about Crist and about our party?
Now there is no more tenure in Florida, and merit pay rules supreme. And Arne approves.
There is no Democrat waiting in the wings in FL who is very much to the left of Crist.
Charlie Crist signs papers to become a Democrat
Source: Miami Herald
It was just a matter of time. Charlie Crist is becoming a Democrat.
Crist — Florida’s former Republican governor who relished the tough-on-crime nickname "Chain Gang Charlie" and used to describe himself variously as a "Ronald Reagan Republican" and a "Jeb Bush Republican" — on Friday evening signed papers changing his party from independent to Democrat.
He did so during a Christmas reception at the White House, where President Obama greeted the news with a fist bump for the man who had a higher profile campaigning for Obama’s reelection this year than any Florida Democrat.
The widely expected move positions Crist, 56, for another highly anticipated next step: announcing his candidacy for governor, taking on Republican incumbent Gov. Rick Scott and an untold number of Democrats who would challenge him for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination.
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/12/07/3132538/charlie-crist-signs-papers-to.html
Good for him. Look out, Rick Scott.
Signed papers at the White House Christmas reception.
Charlie Crist and his wife, Carole, are shown at a White House Christmas reception on December 7. Crist tweeted the image out through his @charliecristfl twitter account.
Ohio Gov Kasich compares schools to pepperoni on pizza
Governor Kasich and White Hat Charter School owner David Brennan about their attitudes toward public schools.
Ohio's For-Profit White Hat Charter Schools nearing one billion in revenue from state.
Congratulations are in order to Kasich pal David Brennan and his White Hat Management company for being awarded two more charter schools by the Ohio Department of Education despite the worst list of accomplishments we may have ever seen. And with these additional schools, it is likely that White Hat schools will top $1 billion in revenue in Ohio.
More about their revenues:
White Hat Management Company
School Revenues in Ohio since 1999: $818,919,080.00
Florida media specialist given bad evaluation for students she never taught. Not fair.
They used to be called librarians, but the term is now Media Specialist. A good one is worth their weight in gold for all the services they provide to students and teachers. I hear through the grapevine this one is great.
Yet she was marked Needs Improvement. She does not teach students for test-taking. That is not her job.
Teachers upset with newly released appraisals
Kelly Moore, a media specialist at Littlewood Elementary School, works after school on Tuesday.
Doug Finger/The Gainesville Sun
Kelly Moore has students from all grades pass through her library. As a media specialist at Littlewood Elementary, she does not prepare students for the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test.
Yet students' performance on the statewide assessment still affected her teacher evaluation for the 2011-2012 school year, which determined she "needs improvement."
"Needs improvement is like an F," she said.
Teachers are becoming fearful of this Value Added Model being pushed throughout the country by both parties.
Many expressed concern about job security, as state law holds that if they are rated unsatisfactory two consecutive years or two out of three years, they may be placed on an annual contract and possibly terminated.
The county superintendent offered teachers an apology for all the stress. He blamed Tallahassee, but VAM is bigger than just Florida.
"This is another half-baked scheme out of Tallahassee affecting the teacher profession," he said.
A perfect example of failed evaluation of teachers. A Florida Teacher of Year unsatisfactory.
Florida's value-added model snares top Alachua teacher
Florida teachers have made no secret of their disdain for the state's new evaluation model, which counts student test scores as half of their performance. Kim Cook, a teacher of the year at Irby Elementary School in Alachua, has gone public on Facebook with her concerns:
"Evaluation summary scores:
Lesson Study: 100/100 points x .20 (20%) = 20 points
Principal Appraisal: 88/100 points x .40 (40%) = 35.2 points
VAM Data: 10/100 x .40 (40%) = 4 points
Total points = 59.2 (Unsatisfactory)
The VAM data comes from Alachua Elementary School's FCAT scores; children I NEVER taught, although my opinion wouldn't be different even if I had."
Cook has noted on her Facebook page that her photo has gone viral, with even the Washington Post giving her a call.
So here you go, Mrs. Cook of Alachua, sharing that picture and sharing your outrage!
The utter insanity of blaming teachers only and letting parents and students off the hook.
That is the policy of the education "reformers", and it is not frowned upon by the Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan.
Did he and the president intend for the reforms to be so degrading to teachers? I don't know. Could they have stopped it before it went so far. Yes, they could have done so. They did not.
It is totally unfair to the students and their parents to sit back and let the teachers be blamed and fired over test scores. It takes away from the students a sense of responsibility for their actions.
The main difference between the Democrats and the Republicans on education policy is pretty simple: The Republicans push vouchers, the Democrats are content with charter schools. Both policies take per student funding from the public schools and give it to the private or charter schools.
I would honestly say I knew of four teachers throughout the over 30 years I taught who were really inadequate in the classroom. Two of them were inept. My last two teaching interns were obviously not going to be successful as teachers. But I never saw anything that would begin to reach the level of incapability that public schools are accused of now by the "reform" community. Most teachers are good teachers who have to take the child as he comes to them from his home, his parents, his life. All of those are factors in success and failure in school.
What's happened to the grades given by the teachers on classroom tests? How can it be that honor students end up in remedial classes because of one test?
Here are some of the things I did when I was teaching, and in fact almost every teacher at our schools did the very same things. I cared, they cared. We were in a low income school in a neighborhood with much drug activity. Tough teaching but we loved our students and got the best cooperation we could from the parents.
At the time we did these things we were not resentful, just wishing things could be better. Now when I look back I do feel resentment and anger at the way things have evolved.
I feel frustrated to see funds being taken from public schools because high stakes test scores were not met. Those funds are being given to charter schools who are not required to provide information on finances or student success and failure.
More than teaching, much more.
During summer vacation I bought a new broom and a new mop. I bought cleaning supplies in spray bottles to make clean-ups easier. I kept extra rolls of paper towels. I bought chamois cloths to make board cleaning easier.
I got estimates from a local printing company on my weekly run-offs for each child. Use of the office equipment was limited to school secretaries and teacher aides specially trained to use the copiers. They did not like teachers using the expensive machines. I never did figure out why.
We were smart enough to teach the children, but not bright enough to use the copiers.
So I paid for the worksheets I needed done because half the time the aide got tied up elsewhere, and the secretaries did not have time.
Our custodians were often absent. The students and I would pitch in and sweep, clean the sinks with spray cleaner disinfectant, dust the counters. A few times when we had a rest room in the room I would have to clean that, too. I would not feel right asking the children. They loved the cleaning, but it took time from class....not good.
I bought bulletin board displays from teacher supply stores. Lower grade teachers had to have shiny happy rooms with pictures of animals, flowers, or displays of what we were studying. I had 6 bulletin boards....not my choice. But my job to fill them.
One principal called me in right after I was moved into a portable because of overcrowding....he said my room looked too bare. I had to actually defend the fact that my class had only been there two days, just moving in.
That's just how things were. High school teachers do not have to worry about bulletin boards and making rooms pretty. It was fun, but it was hard work.
Some of the students who walked to school liked to stay later and help me get the room in order. Since most teachers stayed late anyway, that was very helpful. It made their parents happy to have the extra quiet time.
I think the children learned valuable lessons about responsibility for their surroundings by cleaning and helping, but it did take from my class time and planning time.
Then there was bus duty. That's what they called it when we had to supervise the kids before and after school as the buses brought them and took them home. It was done a week at a time on a rotating basis. If a child got on the wrong bus, or wandered off with a friend...we stayed until they were found. It was our job, and they were our responsibility.
We also had lunchroom duty. What fun that was. There were always visiting parents for lunch. If we tried to get students to comply with the rules, some parents would report us for being too strict. If we let them get away with too much, some would get upset with that. Lunchroom duty was the worst.
The last few years I taught, the county offices decided that principals'offices were to be authoritarian, not disciplinarian in nature. That made life easy for them, but we had nowhere to turn for the real discipline problems. I had one boy who did not qualify for a special class (don't ask me why), but he had serious problems. He would start kicking the walls and banging his head against the blackboard until it was a dangerous situation. If I tried to intervene, he would kick me as well.
Luckily the assistant principal and I had an understanding. He would come to the class and take him down to his office to calm down. He got kicked also. The parents were at their wits end, and gave permission for us to do this. We never knew what triggered his outbursts. Calm one minute, violent the next. No help in sight. At the end of the year his parents gave me a hug and a small gift. They did care but they were victims of the system as well.
We did do some teaching in between all the realities of life in a community that harbored drug dealers. We did good teaching, and there was a lot of good learning that went on.
We had a guidance counselor who had all the materials of James Dobson lined up in her office. He was for tough love, and wrote proudly of hitting his little dog Siggie, a dachsund, with a belt. When I discovered she shared those materials with the parents of the children she was counseling...I just handled things myself. I wondered often if the county approved those materials. In this area they probably did.
Did I tell you about the head lice? Once our principal decided head lice were annoying the office staff and bothering him, so he decreed there would be no more. We had one of the worst outbreaks ever about that time. We spread them out across the room and tried to be casual. Parents came to me asking what to do about the situation. I said go over my head to the county. They did, and the supervisor took care of it at once.
Once I was told by the principal that a mother called and said her son was being bullied during PE time. I told him that the coach and I had discussed it...that her son WAS the bully. He terrorized the other kids. The coach and I had already had a conference with the mother before she called the principal. Still the principal told both of us to fix it, and not make the mother angry. An impossible task among many other impossible tasks.
There were great successes along the way. I saw students with severe learning disabilities get the help they needed to be productive citizens. Some with IQs in the 170s who simply could not read but were math geniuses. I know some went to college, I don't know about the others. I saw a 4th grader with attention problems so severe he could not sit still, could not function. His parents and I worked with a physician for needed help. By the end of the year he was in a program for gifted and was teaching science lessons to our class.
I would like for Arne Duncan to come to classrooms like those I saw and worked in and tell those teachers they are inept and failing. That we need merit pay. That the students we loved and taught were to be tested to show if we were good teachers or not. They would have worked their hearts out to please, but reality would set in. Some could not do the tests that were made for one size to fit all.
Arne Duncan recently announced that during this four years "our basic theory of action is not going to change".
That's unfortunate. That says to the teachers that the politicians are not listening, that the agenda is already set.
As a favorite blogger, Jersey Jazzman, said:
Jersey Jazzman
September 25, 2012 at 4:33 pm
There are many good reasons to vote for Barack Obama.
Education policy is not one of them.
From the comments Obama's education plan
Today I started to post a quote from an article by Glenn Greenwald in The Guardian UK
Before I post I usually do a search to determine the atmosphere on a particular topic. Since I am just starting to post here again after a year, I try not to post stuff to cause anger.
But wow! After so many sentiments effectively saying f*** Greenwald because he criticized the president....I started not to post the segment. I have changed my mind because the statement was made by a Florida blogger and MSNBC contributor. I will take my chances. It should get notice for the snide insult and the ugly tone toward Bradley Manning. Whatever a person's views of what he did, he does not deserve this kind of scorn.
Here's what I twittered about the article.
Retweeting Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald ?@ggreenwald
Here's an Op-Ed I have in tomorrow's Guardian newspaper on what was revealed by the Bradley Manning hearing this week http://is.gd/WpqAcf
Here's the quote from the Guardian article.
Ever since I first reported the conditions of Manning's detention in December 2010, many of them not only cheered that abuse but grotesquely ridiculed concerns about it. Joy-Ann Reid, a former Obama press aide and now a contributor on the progressive network MSNBC, spouted sadistic mockery in response to the report: "Bradley Manning has no pillow?????" With that, she echoed one of the most extreme rightwing websites, RedState, which identically mocked the report: "Give Bradley Manning his pillow and blankie back."
That statement disturbed me, though I respected her as a blogger and often quoted her. I will remember it whenever I watch her on TV. I will try not to do so, but it will stick with me.
I don't have to agree with all Glenn Greenwald says, but I have read his work for years. I respect that he digs for his research, and that he is brave enough to post unpopular topics. That's how it should be at such a forum as this...we can discuss ideas without condemning someone.
I wrote sort of a good by post last December. A lot of people were having the same feelings. I thought of it today as I was doing more reading here, it stuck in my mind. I post about education mainly, and it often angers people when I say it is both parties involved in privatizing public education. It is the truth. There are many other bloggers here who have researched as well, and there is no doubt that the next four years for education are critical.
I and many others love the fact that education should be equal and free, and that instead of taking funds and resources away from public schools.....we should be giving to them.
Coming to DU in 2002 as more moderate and centrist....now finding that I am too liberal to fit in.
I really felt out of place here then a lot. I came from a Republican background (my parents were the first Democrats in the family). I began to realize how very little I knew of the world beyond my teaching career and raising my family. There wasn't much time for exploration of ideas outside of my re-certification classes, and my eyes were opened here every day.
I would read things and there would be a light bulb going on in my head. I would say to myself hey that is what I believe is true. I would wonder why I never read about any of this stuff in the newspapers. I was often out of my depth and probably thought of as arrogant in topics of tolerance of others. I was learning new things here every day, and my mind was taking it all in. I became less tolerant of who I had been and was more liberal every day.
I now find myself at the opposite end at this forum on the spectrum of opinion and political policies and ideas. I am stunned at how easily we now accept what we would fought hard against here 10 years ago. I find that most will accept ideas that are basically right wing in nature if our party does it as well. That scares me.
...."Over and over there are moves against experienced, tenured teachers by the education reformers. There is no major Democrat speaking out in defense of them. It is the position taken by the Republican party through the years....privatize the schools. We are doing it faster than they ever did, and I hate to say it...but the Bushes never allowed the contempt of public school teachers to take hold like this.
There has been no acknowledgement from any leader in either party that teachers have become fearful about their jobs as the billionaire reformers move in. Not a single word. Arne Duncan has said he will continue on the same path of reforms. That's a scary thought.
So I posted a quote from Greenwald's article because I was stunned to read it. If you want to read the rest of today's article from the Guardian, you might be impressed. You may not agree with all of it, but that's how being informed works.
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