In an op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle (11/15, Cohn), California Board of Education member Carl A. Cohn writes about the law recently passed in California to provide “a one-year respite from the state’s 15-year-old standardized testing program” as the state transitions to Common Core-aligned tests, and he laments that Education Secretary Arne Duncan is “threatening to withhold at least $15 million – and potentially billions more...as a punishment.” Cohn criticizes ED officials for issuing a “high-handed threat,” and calls on ED to reverse its position on the issue.
California BOE Begins Shaping New Education Funding System
Andrew Ujifusa writes at the Education Week (11/14) “State EdWatch” blog that in the wake of the “fundamentally new plan” for K-12 funding enacted by the California legislature earlier this year, the responsibility for setting up new less restrictive regulations for spending falls to the state Board of Education. The BOE met last week to review “a draft of regulations governing the local-control formula.” He continues to describe the three options that districts will have for “spending these ‘targeted’ state funds.”
California Releases Common Core Implementation Funding
The Imperial (CA) Valley Press (11/14) reports that the California Department of Education has released the full amount of funding for districts to implement the Common Core Standards, noting that districts must “come up with a spending plan, present it to their boards and then have it be approved at a later meeting” in order to spend their allotment of the $1.25 billion the state earmarked for the effort.
Author Offers Advice On Boys And Bullying
The US News & World Report (11/7, Zalan) interviews parenting expert and author Rosalind Wiseman, who said “boys oftentimes feel that people are talking to them in sound bites of advice that do not in any way acknowledge the complexity of their lives.” They also have “knowledge and an intolerance of adult hypocrisy.” Many people “dismiss boys in stereotypes” and “say things that are very derogatory or dismissive of boys that we would never, ever say publicly about girls.” Wiseman advised adults “to stop minimizing or dismissing [boys’] experiences.”
Concerns Over Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Influence On Education Policy
Education Week (11/6, McNeil, Sawchuk) reports that there are growing concerns about the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s influence on education policy partly “because so many policy actors,” including the US Department of Education, “have amplified ideas it espouses.” The Race to the Top competition “and federal waivers conditioned on similar principles are credited with influencing most of the states to revamp their teacher-evaluation policies, often in ways that mirror the Gates agenda.” Additionally, several top ED officials came from the foundation, and Education Secretary Arnie Duncan “lured many to work for him from other private-sector organizations that receive significant funding from Gates. “Brad Jupp, a senior program adviser on teacher initiatives at the Education Department, said the foundation should be credited “for influencing us, but there were many other factors that influenced us,” adding, “We share common goals and share some theories of action.” The article also says Jupp “praised the foundation’s teacher-quality focus, saying its work built a logical argument for focusing on teacher effectiveness.”
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Profiled
Education Week (11/6, Sawchuk) profiles the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which “has spent nearly $700 million on its teacher-quality agenda,” including “the development of teacher-evaluation systems, district initiatives experimenting with new ways of training and paying teachers, and related research projects,” as well as advocacy groups backing increasing instructional quality as “the key to erasing achievement gaps.” The foundation is “widely seen as the most influential independent actor in a period of nationwide—and deeply contested—experimentation with the fundamentals of the teaching profession,” and many of the ideas it backs, “such as the use of test-score algorithms as part of teachers’ ratings, have become a mainstream part of K-12 education policy.”
Authors: Public School Students Outperform Private School Students In Math
On the Washington Post (11/5) “Answer Sheet” blog, Christopher and Sarah Lubienski, authors of the book “The Public School Advantage,” write that their analysis, “one of the most comprehensive studies ever performed of school type and achievement in mathematics,” found that public school students “outperform those in private schools.” School reform efforts, including the charter school movement, “elevate the idea of autonomy,” with parents choosing between competing schools, but the “neat, appealing” market model is “quite possibly wrong.” Instead of using autonomy to adopt better education practices, private schools often “maintain outdated strategies that may align with parental preferences but are not particularly effective for educating students.” Meanwhile, parents often choose schools based on uniforms, demographics, sports, or religious affiliation instead of educational quality. Meanwhile, after controlling private school students’ “advantages,” such as money and highly-educated parents, “public elementary schools are, on average, simply more effective at teaching mathematics,” possibly due to public school teachers’ being “more likely to be certified and to receive ongoing training in the field.”
California Struggling To Assess Districts’ Testing Readiness
Southern California Public Radio (11/4) reports online that education officials in California are assessing districts’ readiness for “a new computerized field test” tied to the Common Core Standards scheduled for five months from now. However, “fewer than one in four have returned” a classroom technology survey.
Angelou “Blasts” RTTT
Valerie Strauss writes at the Washington Post (10/29) “Answer Sheet” blog that author Maya Angelou, who recently joined over 100 other authors and illustrators asking President Obama “to curb policies that promote excessive standardized testing,” has now “blasted” Race to the Top, calling it “‘a contest’ that doesn’t help children learn to love to read and get a better understanding of the world.”
California Education Groups Release Common Core Guide For Districts
EdSource Today (10/28) reports that the California County Superintendents Educational Services Association and other education groups in the state have released a new “Leadership Planning Guide” to help districts with their efforts in implementing the Common Core Standards.
Los Angeles Teacher Argues Against Classroom Technology
In an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times (10/25), Los Angeles USD teacher Jeff Lantos warns other districts not to follow LAUSD’s lead in spending “millions on high-tech gadgets” such as the iPads that the district is distributing to all students. Lantos cites his experience working in the district in 1986, “when Apple computers were first lugged into elementary classrooms.” Lantos writes that though the computers were (and still are) very useful for writing, and have other useful applications, such issues as cost and “disruption” issues make classroom technology more of an expensive distraction. Lantos specifically refutes Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s calls for electronic textbooks and for “a high-tech ‘disruption’” in classrooms.
Teacher Killings Raise School Safety Questions
The Christian Science Monitor (10/23, Khadaroo) reports that in the aftermath of the killings this week of teachers in Sparks, Nevada and Danvers, Massachusetts, communities are “renewing the national soul-searching about school safety and how to identify and help distressed young people before they turn to violence.”
CNN (10/23, Martinez) reports online that according to the School Improvement Network, the slayings demonstrate “how educators feel schools are less of a traditional safe haven, especially from gun violence.” The piece points to a survey conducted by the group after the Newtown shootings indicating that “almost a third of teachers felt that their school wasn’t safe from gun violence.”
Preliminary Study: “Flipping” Classrooms May Not Improve Education
USA Today (10/23, Atteberry) reports that the preliminary results of a study into the effects of “flipping” classrooms show little if any improvement to education. Flipping classrooms is a popular concept wherein students watch teacher lectures outside of class and devote class time to “real world” problems. Four professors from Harvey Mudd College found “no statistical difference” between student outcomes in traditional and flipped classrooms in a pilot study. The professors recently received funding for a much larger three-year study into the same concept and caution that their final results may be different from the pilot test.
Children’s Authors Urge Administration To Cut Standardized Testing
The Los Angeles Times (10/23, Tobar) reports that a group of leading children’s authors and illustrators have sent an open letter to President Obama arguing that “too much standardized testing is causing children to lose their love of books.” The signers, including Judy Blume and Jules Feiffer, were participating in an initiative launched by the National Center for Fair & Open Testing....
California Schools Chief Backs $9 Billion Technology Infrastructure Bond Measure
The Santa Rosa (CA) Press Democrat (10/22) reports that California Superintendent Tom Torlakson “is backing a $9 billion bond measure in 2014 to build up the technology infrastructure at K-12 campuses,” noting that he said on Tuesday that schools must be prepared for Common Core-aligned online testing. The article notes that California “bucked” Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s resistance to plans to abandon the state’s STAR test in favor of Smarter Balanced field tests.
Study: Children As Young As 18 Face Language Gap
The New York Times (10/22, Rich, Subscription Publication) reports that a new study--following up on research two decades ago which found that children as young as three face significant differences in the number of words they have heard based on their parents’ income levels--found that his “language gap” can be seen as early as 18 months. The article explores the impact that the new research is having on the early childhood learning policy debate.
Common Core Transition May Bleed Market Share From Textbook Giants
The Hechinger Report (10/17, Garland) reports that the shift toward the Common Core Standards is hastening the adoption of digital alternatives to printed textbooks, and explores what this means for major “publishing behemoths like Pearson” that have long dominated the textbook business. The piece suggests that market share is being gained by “small nonprofits, education technology startups,” and newcomers to the education content sector.
California Officials Struggle To Find Best Common Core Instructional Materials
The Hechinger Report (10/18, Wingert) writes that while California has earmarked significant funding for districts to implement the Common Core Standards, “the tricky part is how to spend it.” The piece notes that the difficulty in choosing the best instructional materials “is complicated by the sheer volume of new products that claim to be aligned to the Common Core,” adding that a “multibillion-dollar industry of competing vendors” has arisen to offer “a dizzying array” of instructional products.
Common Core Sparks Less Outrage In California
The Hechinger Report (10/16, Wingert) reports that though the adoption of the Common Core Standards has led to controversy and political rancor in several states, “that pushback is largely missing in California...even among some of the more conservative districts.” The article describes in positive terms the implementation of the standards in some California districts, suggesting that shifts to new “ambitious” standards in the 1990s have acclimated the state to such changes.
“Seven Habits” Program Helps Schools Improve Climate
The AP (10/15, Hollingsworth) reports that some 1,500 schools across the country are using a program called “The Leader in Me,” based on “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” by “self-help guru Stephen Covey.” Students are “assigned leadership roles” and adopt and track personal goals. The AP reports that though the program has proven successful in improving school climate, it is expensive and many schools are unable to pay for it with their Title I funding.