Bill Gates talks philanthropy, science, child rearing at Stanford

[Starry Messenger]

http://www.siliconvalley.com/news/ci_14917940

Speaking about charter schools, he said that within the United States, there is a big gap between people who get the chance to make the most of their talents and those who don't. Every year, 1 million kids drop out of high school. Only 71 percent of kids graduate from high school within four years, and for minorities, the numbers are even worse — 58 percent for Latinos and 55 percent for African-Americans.

But some charter schools, such as the nation's 82 Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) schools, "have achieved something amazing." He criticized the teachers' unions for stifling innovation, adding "If you ever want to see education that works, go to a KIPP School."

That article really should have been titled clueless billionaire burbles on ignorantly while charter school run by Stanford has its charter threatened by low test scores.


http://www.stanforddaily.com/2010/04/20/stanford-charter-schools-in-epaa-could-get-extension/

Stanford charter schools in EPAA could get extension

Stanford New School, the University-operated charter school in East Palo Alto, faces an uncertain future after the Ravenswood City School District Board denied its five-year charter renewal in a 3-2 vote last week. The board is now set to consider a two-year charter extension on Thursday.

A product of the Stanford School of Education, Stanford New School, which includes an elementary school and a high school, together called East Palo Alto Academy (EPAA), ranked in the state’s lowest 20 percent of schools based on test scores last month.

“The primary reason the charter was not renewed was the minimal gains in student performance,” wrote Ravenswood Superintendent Maria de la Vega in an e-mail to The Daily.”We learned a hard lesson Wednesday night that there is little room for learning in the current policy environment, or for efforts to find a balance between preparing students for tests and fostering the other skills they need to become productive citizens,” said School of Education Dean Deborah Stipek.

The high school component of the School of Education project began about nine years ago. In the past seven years, the high school increased its Academic Performance Index (API) by 181 points.

“Stanford took a risk to start a school in one of the most challenging communities in California,” Stipek said, “where most children live in poverty and many arrive at school with little English.” A majority of the schools’ students are non-native English speakers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/16/education/16sfcharter.html


Charter Extension Denied to Low-Scoring Stanford School

Stanford’s educators expected that with excellent teachers, many trained at the university, they could provide state-of-the-art instruction, preparing students to become “global citizens.” While Stanford New School does better than most other California schools in student retention and sending them to college, the students’ standardized test scores are low. East Palo Alto is also a tough place to experiment — of the 12 schools in the district, 3 landed on the state’s new list of worst-performing schools.

...

In recent years, education departments at several major universities have started charter schools. As Stanford has found out, however, running a public school can be a teaching experience even for the learned.

But Stanford New School has the best of credentials. It was founded by Linda Darling-Hammond, a leader in the school reform movement and President Obama’s adviser on education during his transition. Its blueblood board includes Stanford administrators and professors and Silicon Valley royalty with connections to Google and Cisco. It also includes Maria de la Vega, the superintendent of the Ravenswood City School District — who recommended that her board deny the charter extension.

During Wednesday night’s jammed board meeting, professors parsed test statistics, while unimpressed board members simply looked at the scores. Some board members spoke favorably of the high school, reserving major complaints for the newer elementary school.

Ms. Darling-Hammond — who told the board that the school “takes all kids” and changes their “trajectory” — was angered by the state’s categorization of the charter as a persistently worst-performing school. “It is not the most accurate measure of student achievement,” she said, “particularly if you have new English language learners.”

I wonder if the President and his SOE will see fit to mention any of this the next time they badmouth the progress of public schools run under similar adverse conditions.